rjcurrie

Interesting announcement in Steve's weekly update: Finishing up FH has actually led to a sort of addition to the publication schedule. As I edited back through the manuscript, I came across a lot of bits and pieces, mostly in the Skills section, that were eventually incorporated into and expanded upon in The Ultimate Skill. Since we have ’em in print there, my preference is to not reprint them in FH, but simply to cross-reference them. However, I don’t like to refer to 5E books, even really great ones like TUS, in a 6E genre book. So the solution I came up with is this: I’m going to convert TUS to 6E. Right after I get done with the main work on FH I’m going to spend a couple days converting TUS — which will be renamed HERO System Skills — to 6E. I don’t anticipate this being hugely difficult; mostly it’s little things like replacing hexes/inches with meters and recalculating the costs of security devices and a few other gadgets. Skills weren’t changed much in 6E, so most of the info in TUS doesn’t need to be changed at all. The biggest challenge will be reworking the various types of Skill Levels. However, come what changes may, I’m going to make them directly to a copy of the layout file and will work it so that the pagination isn’t thrown off at all — thereby allowing me to refer to HSS by page number in FH even though it isn’t actually “written” yet. (This has the additional benefit of saving me the work of preparing a new Table of Contents or Index, yaaaay.) Initially we’ll just make HSS available as a PDF. When we sell out of TUS hardcopies (which will probably occur late this year or early next), if we want to reprint the book we’ll do so using the HSS layouts. I'm glad to see TUS getting a 6e update, but I must admit I'm a little bit unsure about the publishing approach. While I can understand HERO wanting to move their hard copies of TUS before printing HSS, I wonder if it might be a bit confusing. Still, it will be good to have an updated version of TUS.

Re: CON Only to Resist Stunning It's going to partly depend on whether things like "Based on CON" Mental Powers (or other "CON-Based" Powers) are in use.

Re: CON Only to Resist Stunning I still think it's a -1/4 in Champions but I can see an argument for -0.

Re: Only in Hero ID The first Limitation is basically Unified Power from 6e and I see no reason why both Lims can't be used.

Re: Total NEWB gushing over how amazing this forum is

Re: THE HERO SYSTEM BESTIARY: What Do *You* Want To See? But can't you just derive these things from the creature write-ups?

Re: The HERO System Advanced Player's Guide Yes. Hero Games had another print run done a little while ago -- just before DunDraCon in mid-February.'

Re: Blue Stuff Battery Is there a reason this isn't just REC 5 on the END Reserve with the Limitation "Only when injected with Blue Stuff"?

Re: More Complications, Please Actually, there were two versions of 3e. One was square-bound. The other was a box set that had two stapled books: the rules and a sourcebook. It was the same content, just packaged differently.

Re: Basic Rulebook To clairfy, I suspect when Checkmate says "the Advanced Rules", he is referring to the main 6e rulebooks. I just want to clarify because there is a book called the "Advanced Player's Guide" which is not what you want right now.

Re: CHAMPIONS UNIVERSE: What Do *You* Want To See? I'm pretty sure it is planned to be full color.

Re: Does your campaign world have a S.H.I.E.L.D.?

Re: CHAMPIONS UNIVERSE: What Do *You* Want To See? Given that "Book of the Empress" has been announced for 2011, I suspect that is where you are more likely to find info on alternate dimensions and on taking the fight to Istvatha V’han.

Re: What if... I suspect they would have used him in a similar manner to how they use Green Arrow. In fact, didn't they decided to use Green Arrow when they couldn't get Batman?

Re: CHAMPIONS UNIVERSE: What Do *You* Want To See? I'm pretty sure that Champions Beyond would be the book for that.

Re: building KISS I believe Darren Watts is writing up the superpowered KISS for this year's HERO All-Stars convention event.

Re: Does your campaign world have a S.H.I.E.L.D.? In my SuperSquad America universe, I haven't introduced a worldwide UNTIL equivalent, but for the U.S., I use EAGLES -- the Elite American Group for Law Enforcement and Security. This is not to be confused with E.A.G.L.E. (Extra-normal Activities Garrison for Law Enforcement) from Kurt Busiek's Astro City but since I had been using EAGLES for years before Astro City came out, I decided to keep it, even though I suspect some people in my convention games figure I just took it from Busiek. That universe also has OASIS -- the Office of American Scientific Investigative Studies -- which was somewhat inspired by OSI (Office of Scientific Investigation) from the Six Million Dollar Man; however, OASIS is focused much more on the science and tends to work with EAGLES on projects that need agents more than scientists. In other campaigns in the past, I have also used the Canadian agency M.A.P.L.E. -- the Multiprovincial Agency for Protection and Law Enforcement. And in a short-lived comedy campaign, I had the United States Elite Law Enforcement Security Service aka USELESS.

Re: New to Champions advice on what books to get needed please Actually, it is the Champions genre book which is currently at the printers. This is the book that describes how to use the Hero System to run superhero games. The setting book is entitled Champions Universe and will be out later this year. In between those will be Champions Powers (which mayapuppies referred to as Champions Super Powers) which is a collection of super powers of various special effects written up in Hero System terms. Also, due out this year are Champions Villains 1, 2, and 3 which should provide you with all the villains you need.

Re: USA 5O for Sixth Edition His Team Blackberry is Difficult to Dispel and thus costs 9 points compared to Alaska's 6 point version without Difficult to Dispel. You should probably settle on one version. I'm assuming these are still very rough write-ups and you will eventually clean-up things like replacing "Custom Adder" with the actual text describing the Adder. And I second Bob's recommendation of using "Custom Modifier" rather than "Limited Power". There's at least one example (Water Currents Sense) where there is no definition of what the Limitation being represented by Limited Power is. To be honest, these write-ups seem so rough that it is hard to review them in any meaningful way. If there is more editign to come on areas such as Custom Adder and on the Limited Power stuff, it might be best to state up front what reviewers shoudl and shouldn't be looking for.

Re: USA 5O for Sixth Edition Once again, if a lot of it is flavor text, is it really necessary on the charater sheet? Or can it simply be in the text? "Science Skill: Science" seems a strange way to express a knowledge of Flora and Fauna. Perhaps "Science: Flora and Fauna" and even then is his knowlege of all Flora and Fauna or American (or North American) Flora and Fauna? For example, does he really know anything about exotic plants in the Amazon Rain Forest? Is the team Blackberry something that only some team members have?

Re: USA 5O for Sixth Edition Looks pretty good. I don't care much for your approach to Complications. I suspect I'd rather see you take a close look at how important the various Complications really are to the character and trim them down to 75. For instance, is the group DNPC really that important to the character? Or is it just something that worth a line or so in the background write-up? Also, is it really necessary to give Research In Motion (makers of the Blackberry) a book full of free advertising? Would "Team smartphone" not work just as well? If you do decide on using Blackberry, you check into what you need to do to properly acknowledge Research in Motion's trademark -- so that you do not contribute to the possible loss of their trademark.

Re: Steve's Chat Tonight (Wednesday, December 9) I assume he actually meant 9 PM EST, 6 PM PST -- the usual time for his chat.

Re: HERO SYSTEM MARTIAL ARTS -- What Do *You* Want To See? I think it's a great idea. I suspect that there are a number of practical reasons against doing it -- but I like it . I thinkit would be a great help in selecting a martial art for a character. Speaking of which, how about a page or two on selecting the right martial art for your character -- basically, a section that suggests vario0us marital arts based on certain criteria.

Re: Ultimate Pulp Cover From what I understand, the Blue and Gold covers with a Hexman variation are going to be used for many (or all) of the core library (and similar books) while more genre-specific books will have covers with genre-related art.

Re: day of ragnararok pulp?