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HalloweenKnight

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Everything posted by HalloweenKnight

  1. Well shoot. But even with all the logistics aside... It's still a nice thing to wish for, don'cha think? A Champions Online with actual HERO System numerics behind it? We know it can be done. And we also now know that: 1. It would be easier to change lead into gold using only Q-tips and Windex 2. The makers of Q-tips and Windex would both need to lisence-out the rights to use their products for the project 3. An initial investment of $320,000 is required to buy the lead 4. "Do It Yourself Gold Online" had such an abysmal reception that neither Q-Tips nor Windex would ever possibly be interested in lending their IP to a new project Heh!
  2. Our first expense is the cost of the Kickstarter itself. This goes to various companies such as Amazon, to Kickstarter, as well as the cost of the perks and add-ons. This comes to about 10% of the total. Then there are taxes, which we estimate can run us up to 12% of the total. So, before anything else, we’re out $70,000. Since we are developing the game using the Unreal Engine, and the Kickstarter counts as revenue, we owe Epic Games, the company which makes the Unreal Engine royalties. That comes to about $70,000, as well. We’re rounding up, of course, and estimating based on the best numbers we have available. By rounding up, we buy margin in case an unexpected cost, tax or fee enters the picture. This is a direct quote straight off of the City of Titans Kickstarter page. $140,000 for Kickstarter fees and the Unreal Engine alone. They go on to earmark another $180,000 for more software, servers, lawyers and programmers. Someone was asking for dollar amounts needed to get "HERO System Online" up and running? There you go: $320,000. Not even a million dollars. And as of this post they've exceeded their Kickstarter budget funding and currently have $678,189 to develop City of Titans with. OK, so, you may scoff and say "Well, hey, thats City of Titans...not HERO System Online! They'd be two completely different things!" And you'd be right. But that's where programming the game and tweaking the numbers behind it to make it emulate the HERO System factors in. Also, I posted a "HERO System Online, Anyone?" discussion thread under "Kickstarter Projects"...just to see how much support the idea would actually get. Still too early to tell.
  3. Oh, so, there aren't dozens of people who read these boards, play the HERO System PnP and love it while at the same time are displeased, disgruntled, and/or disgusted with the final product of Champions Online? Dozens constitutes "a lot" to me. I don't know if one or two dozen people is enough to quantify as being "support" for an MMO game project, though, so, you may be right.
  4. Since City of Titans got their Kickstarter funding so quickly and so easily... Why couldn't someone do the same and instead make a true "HERO System Online"? Are the guys at HeroGames just not interested in such a thing? Because it seems a *lot* of HERO System PnP players certainly are...
  5. Yes I do realize this. The same game engine that was supposed to be Marvel Universe Online, I think. I'm just lamenting the fact that Cryptic's already-made engine still had little to do with the HERO System... ...and I so very much wish that it did.
  6. Herogames, I'm a little disappointed in you. You were given a chance to make the universe you created for Champions become a living, breathing online world with Champions Online... But somewhere, somehow, someone dropped the ball. I'm not here to point fingers and/or say who's to blame, and there'd be nothing to gain here by doing so anyway. But I'd like to explain a little how my wish to play a Champions computer game – one with the HERO System running it – remains unfulfilled by the reality of Champions Online. Primarily, as a player of Champions and the HERO System in tabletop form since 1982 and as a Lifetime Subscriber to Champions Online, I don't feel that Champions Online is what a computer-game version of Champions should be. What should have been an explosion of creative possibilities in character conception, all made possible by Champions having the HERO System as its solid rules, somehow ended up being the limited group of character “archetypes” we see in Champions Online, with nothing resembling the HERO System behind it save for some shared names in character statistics (STR, DEX, CON, etc). What should have been the “design-your-own” powers that Champions players have used the HERO System to create for three decades instead became Champions Online's limited power sets, with strict rules regarding when they're available and an inability to change something so relatively simple as the power's color without paying extra for the privilege of doing so. What should have been the open-ended character ideas made by Champions players and driven by the point-based HERO System instead became Champions Online's level-based character advancement. The whole reason the Champions (HERO) game system was invented 30 years ago was so that the game's characters would never be level-based to begin with. I wanted a computer version of Champions. I wanted to make characters limited only by the rules of the HERO System, some “house rules” for the sake of fairness, and my own imagination...and then pit those characters against published Champions adversaries like Grond, Firewing and Dr. Destroyer. I wanted to share these adventures alongside others via the Internet. But Champions Online? Not what I wanted. I tried to pretend it was, and I tried for six years. I can't pretend anymore. I'm giving up on it and dropping out. Maybe it will become something closer to what I want sometime in the future, but for now my Lifetime Subscription is going inactive. I think what I wanted, and what I wanted Champions Online to be, was just a MUD or MUSH that used the HERO System. I've looked around for something like that, but I don't think anyone runs those any more.
  7. Re: Ankylosaur is up OK, I don't get that.
  8. Re: Ankylosaur is up Yeh, they did OK with this one.
  9. My earlier post on "Champions Online vs. City of Heroes" was a little too...disjointed and unfocused, so I'd like to do something more positive and make a "wish list" of things I'd like to see when the Champions MMO comes out. 1) Just A Single Costume Option - Being that I am an old-school "plumber" player type who comes up with one really good character concept and spends years plumbing that character to its depths through multiple incarnations in games and game systems of all kinds, I just have one request for Cryptic in regards to the costume for the CO version of "The Halloween Knight": I'd like there to be an option for a "pumpkin" or "jack-o-lantern" helmet. A helmet, not a mask. The head needs to be bulbous. Its just a generic thing that no one would have to worry about as far as copyrights are concerned. I hope. The City of Heroes version of HK uses the "chitin helmet", which is OK...but its more "orange Guyver" than pumpkin. 2) No Archetypes - Even though the 5th Ed. Champions book describes some archetypes (bricks, blasters, martial artists, etc.) and City of Heroes uses them already (Tankers, Blasters, Scrappers, etc.), having archetypes (or ATs) in CO would just be silly, redundant and needlessly limiting. You don't box-in and limit things that should be open-ended unless it is absolutely necessary to preserve game balance. I may want my "blaster" to have good defenses and resistances to attacks. I may want my "brick" to have a ranged attack or two. I just want it to remain my choice and not get limited by the character's AT. Even in the Champions sourcebook, ATs were just a guideline...not an actual rule. It should stay that way no matter how far out the window they're throwing the HERO System for CO. 3) Classic Characters "Updated", Not Reworked Entirely To The Point Where They're Unrecognizable - Do I need to explain why? Granted, I'm prepared to accept modernization and "updating" to classic published characters like Armadillo, Ogre, Pulsar, Mechannon and Grond. I accepted it willingly when I thought the FUZION version of Champions was the "new" version. I looked at that artwork and said "Wow, these guys look better than ever now." Woops! FUZION got flushed. OK, so, now there's the 5th Ed. versions from "Conquerors, Killers and Crooks". I looked at that artwork and said "Ah, they look so modernized now." Faithful to their original concepts in books I've had for 20 years or so. And why not, since the same guys from 20 years ago were still doing it! There's accepting "modernization and updating" then there's "who the hell are these characters supposed to be?" and Cryptic's "concept art" for Defender, Ironclad, Menton and Dr. Destroyer is falling more and more into that latter category. I've read what people are saying on these boards, and the majority do not seem pleased with how Cryptic is drawing-up visions of these "classic old standby" characters. Defender and Ironclad with swords? Menton as a scrawny ghetto kid with an enlarged cranium? I'm not complaining about "change". I'm not opposed to "modernization and updating". I'm prepared to accept both, and I have in the past. But when you look at the "new version" of something and your reaction is "WTF?"...something is definitely wrong there. If this signifies Cryptic's collective middle-finger-salute to us "fanboys" of Champions 5th Ed. along with an unspoken vow that "Champions is ours now and we'll do what we please with it to make a buck"...well, they can have it. But I won't be buying it. 4) Just A Few Game Mechanics From The HERO System - OK, so, Cryptic is pitching the rules system that Champions is based on - the HERO System itself - out the window. My question is: How far out the window? Is anything of the HERO System going to be seen in Champions Online? I'd like to see Power Frameworks make it. Elemental Controls and Multipowers seem reasonable, and if Variable Power Pools don't show up I won't cry. I'd like to see Advantages and Limitations on powers in Champions Online. I'd like to see the "classic" HERO System stats like STR, DEX, CON, etc...but I don't know how well some things would translate into an MMO as opposed to others. Further opinions and/or comments are welcome.
  10. Re: Would you allow this I agree. The Multipower method is good - put the Charges limitation on the MP Reserve itself and on the Slots, so that way it becomes "all one pool of Charges" by default. The potential "redundancy" of a Slot having available Charges when the MP Reserve does not is a non-issue, since the reverse (MP Reserve has available Charges and the Slot does not) will never happen. And I think I just hurt myself.
  11. Re: SIZE and MASS, works in progress Just a quick question for you: What would you rate the value of an Advantage on Density Increase to have "No Extra Mass"? ie the character buys Density Increase and gains all of its benefits (extra STR, PD, ED and KB Resistance) with none of the drawbacks (too heavy for elevators, falls through flimsy floors, gets stuck in soft ground that doesn't impede people of "normal" mass, etc.) Normally I'd rate that as a +1/2 Advantage for D.I. but considering that the negative effects of extra mass are the only negative effects of the power, I'd make it +1. Going to +2 like "Affects Physical World" when Desolid seems silly. You seem to have MASS pretty well in mind already so whaddaya think?
  12. Re: Intelligent Swords Hey Q! I sent you this as a message already, but here's an edited version for everyone: Biggest question is: Can the sword attack on its own? If the answer to that is "no", then the whole idea can be resolved as one very nice "Special Effect" about the sword without any extra costs or game technicalities added. The sword's decision on who uses it (or not) could be resolved simply as the "Universal or Personal" aspect of the Focus. If the sword is stolen, but can propel itself back to its "owner" within 24 hours, that falls under "Focus" too (most Foci are recovered within 24 hours by default). Even if the sword "talks" and can "perceive" the world around it, thats still just a Special Effect to me. If the sword can "see" things that its owner can't, buy Enhanced Senses through the sword Focus. The sword need never have to "shut up" when its owner is KOd either. On the other hand, if the sword can fight and attack on its own, you're in a whole different venue now. You'll have to build the sword as a separate character on its own and have its owner pay for it as a Follower or a Duplicate. Expensive and complicated with no precedent that I know of, since I've never read any Fantasy HERO books.
  13. Re: Ironclad is up C'mon, dudes..."concept art" is like a "concept car" at a show - its just for show...none of the spiffy gadgets inside actually work (yet) and the thing probably doesn't even have an engine...it just sits there and looks good (or not). All of this concept art is subject to change at a moment's notice. Most likely none of this stuff will end up looking much like the in-game version when all is said and done. But thats why they're asking for opinions, right? Because our opinions matter to them, right? So if we say "the sword sucks" now, they'll actually drop it from the concept? And do a "concept art version 2" without the sword? That'd be nice... So far, whoever is doing this concept art doesn't look like they've ever seen the original versions of the character art. Looks like someone just told the artist "OK, draw up this..." and they go to it. Which is why we got a resulting "WTF" version of Menton, Dr. Destroyer looks pretty un-Destroyer-like (and odd), Defender looks like Statesman (woops!) and Ironclad looks like a "generic super-strong guy with metal skin". But hold the phone a second. Do the CO people actually have the rights to the original Champions artwork, in addition to the source material? Because if they don't, it explains everything above. And if they do? Someone's asleep at the wheel. As for Ironclad himself...generic super-strong guy with metal skin. *shrug* And the sword is unnecessary on a character who originally had a Code Against Killing...unless they changed that too.
  14. I've always wanted to go to a gaming convention, bring my 5th Ed. Champions character in a nice binder, front some cash (I assume you have to pay), and game the day away with a bunch of strangers. But I've never actually been to a convention. Ever. They just don't happen for me locally and/or conveniently. Still...if I could... Anyway, one thing that ruins the whole idea for me is: What if my beloved Champions character has something the GM doesn't allow? Granted, I'm careful about rules abuse, but I can only bring just so many alternate versions of my character with me "just in case". So, for you convention-regulars (and irregulars) I ask you this: When have you shown up at a gaming convention with your tried-and-true character sheet in tow and nothing (you think) abnormal about it, only to have the table GM say "Sorry, I don't allow that" while you stand there in shock with a little word bubble saying "WTF?!" over your head?
  15. It was just a simple thing to give a 350-point startup superhero character some "color"... Then the second-guessing came, and questions of "legality", and finally I'm here to ask for what I'll consider the FINAL answer. The premise was this: A "Brick" with a "Fiery Aura" who could exert his STR to do either regular damage vs. PD *OR* fire damage vs. ED. Not both at the same time, and no combinations thereof. Just the ability to change his STR damage from being vs. PD to being vs. ED at will. Now, how to do this? And how to do it in a way that a 350-point character could afford it comfortably and still be a "Brick" with appropriate amounts of STUN and defenses, etc etc? My Preferred Solution: The simplest, most direct and most inexpensive method I came up with was to buy all of the character's STR with a +1/4 Variable SFX Advantage (regular STR vs PD or Fire damage vs ED). Quick and clean. Then I started second-guessing myself: Would a GM disallow this for any reason, i.e. is it rules-exploitive? Granted, the only alternative SFX is "fire" vs. ED, but then again, how many SFX *would* be vs. ED besides fire? (The only one that readily comes to mind is electricity.) Should it be a +1/2 Advantage instead? Alternative #1 was an EB bought as a Damage Shield. The damage had to be equal to the character's STR or else there was no point in having it all. And at that level, its cost was just too much. Alternative #2 was putting the Damage Shield AND the STR as two slots of the same Multipower. But then the STR lost all of its benefits to Secondary Characteristics, and the character wasn't a "Brick" any more. Alternative #3 was buying a simple HA and defining it as doing fire damage vs. ED, and therefore all of the character's STR behind it did fire damage vs. ED too. The ability to exert fire damage vs. Entangles and Grabs would be lost (any bindings prohibit the use of most HA, right?) and the low cost was certainly appealing, but it still seemed too rules-exploitive to me. Steve said it was book-legal for STR bought with Variable Advantage BUT just because you CAN do a thing in HERO 5E doesn't necessarily mean you should...SO I want to know: How many of you, as GMs, would allow it, given the effect that I'm looking for? Is it rules-exploitive or not?
  16. Man oh man, where to begin. The concept of a Champions MMO is delightful. I was happy to find out such a thing was in development. I've played / GM'd Champions and HERO System pretty much exclusively throughout my life, so a chance to see it "live and breathe" as a participant-player is like a dream come true. I am, however, a little jaded - there was a Champions game for the PC announced back in the 90's that never materialized. Plus another PC game called "Guardians: Agents of Justice" - which looked very Champions-ish - also vanished soon after its development was announced. "Freedom Force" was on-target. No, it wasn't Champions per se', but by God it was close! Your character's appearance was unrestricted, though you needed some tutoring and some free downloads to do it just right. The powers were fairly open - with a little work, you could make just about anything. Time, patience and the right mods were all you needed to bring your own personal Champions game to life with the Freedom Force engine. Then came "City of Heroes" and "City of Villains" (CoX), and Freedom Force was quickly forgotten and tossed aside in favor of the "newer and flashier" thing. I've played CoX now for four years, with a small pause to try "Auto Assault" (I once loved "Car Wars" as much as I did Champions, so you can see why I was drawn to it). CoX is NOT Champions. Attempts to re-create my beloved Champions characters in CoX were frustrating. The character archetypes in CoX are strict and narrow compared with Champions' flexibility. A strong ranged attack in CoX meant your defenses were practically non-existent, strong defenses meant you had no ranged attack. Bottom line: Just to see them running around as "living" 3D characters in CoX, nearly all of my re-created Champions characters ended up as Tankers or Scrappers just so they would survive. And that didn't seem right to me, especially when, during their Champions careers, most were ranged attackers. On my own, I came up with a simple solution that would bring CoX so much closer to being Champions that it would please even a hard-core Champions fan like myself: A new Archetype (AT) - Multi-Class. Pick and choose from ALL of the available (non-Epic) primary and secondary power sets instead of just the few available to other ATs. The upside: Incredible, Champions-like versatility. The downside: You'll never do as much damage or have as many hitpoints or have as high a defense as the other ATs. It seems so simple...why haven't they done it already? Would it be all that unbalancing? NPC enemies can already do it, so it can't be that bad. So we look now to the future, to Champions Online (CO). I say if CoX just had Multi-Class ATs, it would be so close to Champions that it would almost *be* CO already, just add VIPER and PRIMUS instead of Arachnos and Longbow. And then I could be truly happy, right?
  17. It was just a simple thing to give a 350-point startup superhero character some "color"... Then the second-guessing came, and questions of "legality", and finally I'm here to ask for what I'll consider the FINAL answer. The premise was this: A "Brick" with a "Fiery Aura" who could exert his STR to do either regular damage vs. PD *OR* fire damage vs. ED. Not both at the same time, and no combinations thereof. Just the ability to change his STR damage from being vs. PD to being vs. ED at will. Now, how to do this? And how to do it in a way that a 350-point character could afford it comfortably and still be a "Brick" with appropriate amounts of STUN and defenses, etc etc? My Preferred Solution: The simplest, most direct and most inexpensive method I came up with was to buy all of the character's STR with a +1/4 Variable SFX Advantage (regular STR vs PD or Fire damage vs ED). Quick and clean. Then I started second-guessing myself: Would a GM disallow this for any reason, i.e. is it rules-exploitive? Granted, the only alternative SFX is "fire" vs. ED, but then again, how many SFX *would* be vs. ED besides fire? (The only one that readily comes to mind is electricity.) Should it be a +1/2 Advantage instead? Alternative #1 was an EB bought as a Damage Shield. The damage had to be equal to the character's STR or else there was no point in having it all. And at that level, its cost was just too much. Alternative #2 was putting the Damage Shield AND the STR as two slots of the same Multipower. But then the STR lost all of its benefits to Secondary Characteristics, and the character wasn't a "Brick" any more. Alternative #3 was buying a simple HA and defining it as doing fire damage vs. ED, and therefore all of the character's STR behind it did fire damage vs. ED too. The ability to exert fire damage vs. Entangles and Grabs would be lost (any bindings prohibit the use of most HA, right?) and the low cost was certainly appealing, but it still seemed too rules-exploitive to me. Well, you can see why I've brought my question here. Which one of these would be the one solution that I could put on my character, take him to a convention, sit down at a table for a run and not have the GM say "no"?
  18. Re: Bag of Holding...How Would You Do It? Many good answers, but none suggest the use of Transform, which I personally find to be the best all-around: Bag of Holding (Active Cost 30 Points, Real Cost 11 Points) 1d6 MAJOR Transform (Target object into object "stored" in unique pocket dimension, reversed when storer retrieves from Bag); Penetrating [for use against "Unbreakable" Foci which would otherwise resist the Transform] (+1/2); Reduced Endurance (0 END) (+1/2); No Range (-1/2); Limited Target(s) [only vs "unliving", non-sentient targets that fit through Bag's opening] (-1/4); OAF (Leather bag), Personal, Unbreakable (-1) Note that Transform is already "Cumulative". This build answers almost all questions about potential targets, their "pocket dimension" destination, their pre-Transformed "weight" as defined by the target's BODY (anything that fits through the Bag's opening is viable, higher-BODY objects just take longer to stuff in if they do fit and some objects won't fit at all), is usable as part of a larger framework (ie Multipower) if desired and doesn't seem unbalancing. But just because it looks good and fair to me doesn't make it "legal". I still don't know what the official Fantasy HERO build is (if there is one) and further input is greatly appreciated.
  19. I ran out of time and money when Fantasy Hero 5th Ed. hit the shelves, so if this is already in there I apologize. In some "fantasy" settings, adventurers can sometimes buy a "Bag of Holding" - just a relatively harmless little draw-string leather sack with a "minor" magical enchantment on it that allows the bag to hold way more than its physical volume would normally limit. In other rules systems, this translated into "pay X gold for the Bag of Holding, increase your inventory capacity by +N items". Simple enough. So how would it work in the HERO System? I ask this not so much for Fantasy HERO but for Champions as well (plenty of magic-using superheroes could certainly use one). I've come up with two possibilities already: 1) Extra-Dimensional Movement (to the Bag's "pocket dimension" of storage), Usable As Attack 2) Transform: Major (target into "stored" target), Cumulative What else is possible? From what I know and remember about Bags of Holding, nothing "living" could be stored in them (there was no air inside the bag, living creatures would suffocate)...but in a fantasy setting, the term "living thing" was really skewed. Obviously, small creatures like kittens and imps and dragon eggs were out of the question. But then there were "non-living" things like re-animated corpse parts and "intelligent" weapons with spirits bound to them and genies in bottles...but there's got to be a common ground somewhere, right?! And just how "safe" were stored items, anyway, if, say, the bag was jostled or thrown or trampled over by a war-elephant? So many questions for so simple a thing. *sigh*
  20. Re: Who Is... Your Favorite Villain? My all-time favorite Champions supervillain? No hesitation: Doctor Destroyer. By the book, Destroyer's very involvement in any story arc was a signal to the players that whatever they just went through, things were about to get much worse and, most likely, the fate of the world was also going to be at stake. When I was a GM, Destroyer's presence also meant "Have an alternate character prepared in case he kills you." Everyone knew - if you had to face him in combat at all - Destroyer would vaporize you where you stood. And if his write-up didn't literally show him as having something that could turn even the high-defense "brick" into a greasy smear on the battlefield with one good shot, he'd have it by the time he met the players there. He took some work to GM properly, even more work to get it done to my own satisfaction, and in the heat of combat with dice flying everywhere even choosing the words of his merely speaking to the players was a true task. But I either did it right, or I didn't want to do it at all. Dr. Destroyer was worth every ounce of effort for me to GM every time. To me, that is the mark of the best supervillain. Second-place honors go to Grond, who was a kick for me to GM simply because I made him "lovable" to the point where even the weakest, most non-combat-oriented player in the group could "apprehend" Grond (solo!) with just very good role-playing and not so much as a single Conversation Skill roll. I always figured that if Grond was so easy for so many "smarter" supervillains to use as a pawn ("Hey Grond, go beat up that hero! He just called you a chicken!"), my players should be able to "talk him down" just as easily. One wrong or poorly-chosen word, however, and any one of Grond's four muscle-ripped arms was enough to "squash hero flat!"
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