drunkonduty

It's not JUST the existence of MPs (again, LoneWolf, apologies if I'm getting this wrong) it's "MPs only for spells" that LoneWolf is worried leads to unfairness. I share his concern. If we were to go with something like Panpiper's theoretical Wuxia game, where you have MPs for all sorts of wild and wacky high fantasy shenanigans, I suspect LoneWolf would have no problem with the inherent balance implicit in the campaign guidelines. I know I wouldn't. As you point out, there's many other ways to unfair builds. They need policing too.

Yeah, that's fair. It comes down to the type of game you're after. My current mood, after some years of running high level Pathfinder, is for oh so low fantasy. So low... "You want what? METAL weapons? OUT!" But I admit I might be having a bit of a (over)reaction. :-P

Folks, I don't think LoneWolf (and apologies, LoneWolf, if I'm getting this wrong) is suggesting abusive powers be allowed. They are simply using extreme examples to help illustrate a point - to whit that an MP gives great flexibility. With said flexibility one can have powers that target every conceivable weak point. AND that doing so only for spell casters gives spell casters an inherent advantage. As for me, I'd like to point out that this is HERO; we don't have to have distinct "wizards" and "fighters." There's no reason a barbarian can't learn some animal summoning spells (Conan did in... I want to say Beyond the Black River) or a graduate of Hogwarts can't learn to use an uzi. Now I wonder if spell MPs would facilitate easier mixing of fighter & wizard traits or inhibit it?

I think it all comes own to what feel are you hoping for in your game. If you want low fantasy multipowers may not work. Although if you limit the size of the pool they would probably still be ok. Another thing that might make them acceptable, to the the GM at least, is for the GM to actually write up all the spells. Which is a lot of bloody work.

I've opted to not use them for two reasons. Simplicity. I hope to get a bunch of new to HERO people to play in my fantasy game. Thus I've limited mechanical shenanigans as much as I felt I could. Low Fantasy feel. Multipowers allow for more flexibility and power. In the next game I'd like to run (as opposed to the next game I'll probably run 😞 ) I'm after a low fantasy, low magic feel.

Here's a list or equipment and trade goods I knocked together for my (wholly theoretical at this point) low fantasy game. I should point out that I've applied a few whacky house rules. Most notably Armour Piercing is based on a suggestion here on the forums, it is a simple negative number applied to armour values, not a %. I've also renamed OCV, DCV, PD, and ED as Attack, Defence, PA, & EA, respectively. Weights are based on a bit of googling. Money values for things are based on some vague aim of "game balance" and should be considered suggestions only. :-) Money&Equipment.docx

DnD has an alternative to death - taxes! If you die just spend x thousand gp and you're good to go.

I had a couple of heroes once who really needed to get a team vehicle. Their cry was "To the bus stop!" I also count "It's clobberin' time!" So what if only Blue Eyed Benjy said it? Did the others not then follow his ever lovin' lead? Yes, yes they did. Also, not aware of any definition of "rallying cry" that requires all parties to say it. Likewise "Spoon!"

Hmmm. There's assassination. Taking out the Supreme Serpent (or just one of the Council high ups) would be a goal for some. Sabotage. Blow up a VIPER factory, or arms dump, or super weapon. Hearts and Minds. Doing good deeds and spreading the word of the heroes selflessness and VIPER's evil would be a good strategy. Similarly: The heroes have proof of VIPER atrocities and they need to get it out to the world. Have VIPER recovered the Serpent Lantern? (a magic item that stops people from ageing.) If so then getting it off of them and destroying it would put their leadership once more in the realm of mortals. Or perhaps VIPER has only just discovered its location (I think in official Champions history it was lost in outer space somewhere near Earth orbit) and are sending an expedition to recover it. The heroes have to get there first. This can intersect with Destroyer wanting the thing. (He's the reason it was lost in the first place. Also, he real old.) Working with VIPER to stop a Mechanon plot. Extra points for making the person they have to work with someone they already know and hate. Could lead to winning mutual respect and getting a friend on the inside. Or extra hate. Both are good. If Doctor Destroyer is alive and working with the heroes then there's all sorts of dramatic tension that can be milked from having to deal with an utterly ruthless sociopath. Not necessarily plots, but added dramatic scenes. The Serpentine Network is a valuable (vital?) piece of VIPER's infrastructure and both Destroyer and Mechanon have the means to infiltrate/take it over. Perhaps the heroes have to link some sort of device to the central mainframe to enable Destroyer to hack it. Or perhaps some VR adventures, a la Tron. For the mystically minded there's direct interaction with Nama, the patron saint of VIPER. Nama seems to be a real trickster and supports VIPER for reasons that come down to "shits and giggles." But maybe not - maybe the wily old serpent needs a VIPER controlled Earth for some reason; a greater extra-dimensional threat the needs the full might of the whole planet to combat. Or, conversely, Nama plans to become that greater extra-dimensional threat itself and invade someone else. Nama has its thumb (Nama is a snake, we all know it's using it's tail) on the scale of chance and has been feeding VIPER good luck for years now. Block that and even the odds. Preface this outrageous luck with some back story and the heroes witnessing it in action. Finding other allies against VIPER. Possibly an old, embittered hero. Or one of the few villains to have escaped VIPER (so far!) needs to be found and "brought in from the cold." Could be how they meet Destroyer or some other old fave. (Personally I don't like Destroyer as a character. Much prefer Professor Muerte.)

The Star Lost. I recently started watching that on ... someone's(?)... recommendation. I think it was a poster on ENWorld. Not that that matters. One episode in and boy is it terrible. I have no problem with the cheap SFX. But the directing, plot, acting, and pacing... just awful. Watching the extras running around in the background (or sometimes foreground) completely at a loss as to what they're doing is highly amusing though.

With my more savvy and experienced players Aborting and Holding are big parts of the combat. The interaction between these and the SPD chart are one of the main reasons I like HERO combat.

I definitely think about things like trade routes and such. It tells me where the biggest and richest cities are going to be, if nothing else. In one of my current games the heroes have just travelled a little of the main sea trade route that connects their own land (at one end of the route) and a whole bunch of others. It's my campaign's analogue to the East Africa/Arabia/India sea trade routes. And although the players have not asked anything specific about it there have been questions (about the people they see, the foods to be eaten, the loot to be found, distant lands their ship's captain had seen) that I could answer more fully because I had thought about the trade routes already. Not having something like this doesn't break immersion for me, but having it does make my immersion fuller and more satisfying. I'll admit that I am an inveterate world builder. I love working out odd details for all sorts of things. But I have long since realised that I do this for me, not for the players. (On one of my campaign settings I went into detail about the history of Dwarven Opera in the campaign city. Never once came up in play. Why would it?) But it is nice to occasionally have a player ask a weird and wacky question about an aspect of the campaign world and be able to answer it right there on the spot.

I've only ever played Champions and Marvel FASERIP. But they're the two best so that's okay.

I'm getting set up to run a fantasy hero game on Roll20.

Oh and Blast from Afar: make it two powers - 1. targeting clairsentience of some kind 2. the actual blast. Indirect sounds essential. Maybe consider No Range Penalties and Unified Power with the clairsentience.

I like @Tom Cowan's suggestion. But I would add Indirect to allow for going around corners. What I'm unsure of is whether or not each lot of damage would qualify as a separate charge or not. Does anyone know? (Am away from my books.)

Flint knapping carried on into the 19th century. Tinderboxes, flints for muskets. Correction: 1940s! Here's a video.

Session 9. TL;DR: the heroes get framed into doing a dangerous job. They bump into their enemies at a sumptuous ball. The heroes are in the land of Axum, wondering if they could maybe find a guide to help them reach their destination. They are in fact sitting in a tavern discussing their next move when the place fills with cops. The heroes are accused of the crime of "Disturbing the Elemental Balance to the Detriment of the Common Weal." To whit: the marid is now off the coast of Axum and in a terrible mood. Fierce storms are lashing the coast and are interrupting trade. The ruling council of magi who run Axum need someone to blame; they have picked the heroes. In all fairness, technically, the heroes are guilty. There follows a scene in which I, in the character of the leading officer, explain repeatedly to the players that "under arrest" means you do not get to keep your weapons, armour, spell components, etc. Anyhoo... the heroes languish in some not-so-dismal cells for about 3 days when they are approached by a man named Salana. He offers to spring them from jail and give them the freedom of the city in return for a favour involving great danger. The heroes are naturally suspicious and one asks if Salana had had them imprisoned just so he could blackmail them now. Salana assures them that he had nothing to do with their arrest; that was his ex-wife's doing. Someone asks if he is helping them just to annoy his ex. Salana says no, that's just icing on the cake. Negotiations follow and Salana offers them a small fortune in magical potions in additional payment. The heroes agree to the terms. Behind the scenes: Salana needs the heroes to gain him access to the Tower of Art, a place that acts as a repository for magical power. He needs to access the Tower on a night of a mystical conjunction. A night when certain magics are at their most potent. A night when all the magi in the city are obliged to stay the hell away from the Tower. The heroes are to get in and place a magical key into the Tower's control panel. Once the key is in place Salana can magically enter the Tower and finalise his ritual. He wants to use the stored magic power to turn himself into a lich. Not that he's telling the heroes precisely what he has planned. Just to get him in and then take his "sleeping" body back to his home after the ritual. The heroes are quickly released and have the run of the town. They also get to stay in Salana's palace. The night after they are released the heroes hear about a big hubbub down by the city gates. A couple go to look and they see a score of skeletons marching up the street. They are escorting a large, ornate carriage. The carriage is painted with frescoes of Osiris and Isis in the Underworld. An odd feature they note is that the carriage is lacking any windows. Riding alongside the carriage is their old friend, the traitor Ferridoon. Another score of skeletons march behind the carriage and at the very back of the parade stalks a hulking gnoll woman. The Kemeti are in town. On the night of the conjunction the all the magi in the city are expected to be at a grand ball. This is ostensibly a celebration, but really just so everyone can keep an eye on everyone else. Salana invites the heroes to attend. It'll be fun, he says. The ball is also close to the Tower. The heroes are enjoying the ball when a new party makes a grand entrance. At the head is a small, plump, yet ever so impressive woman, Salana's ex-wife Nyala. Behind walk three individuals. Immediately obvious to the heroes is the tall, scarecrow like figure of their old friend Ferridoon. Beside him shuffles a figure who is completely hidden by voluminous robes and a deep cowl. Lastly, but most jarringly, they see Lady Jasmine Sunblessed. Lady Jasmine is their old commander and was last seen dying upon the blade of Lord Iniquitous way back in the opening scene of the adventure. Nyala walks straight up to Salana and asks to meet the Akkadians he spent so much of his political good will to free. She introduces herself and her own guests. There followed a hilarious scene in which the heroes freak out. The paladin's player cannot lie. She just can't. Nor can her paladin. So to avoid giving away... everything the paladin spends the entire scene stuffing pastries in her mouth. If there is ever any chance of sound escaping her mouth she shoves in more pastries. But she does peak under the cowl of the mystery guest and realises that he/she is a mummy. The mummy introduces themself as Ak-Hortep and asks why a child of Bast consorts with filthy Apep worshippers. Paladin can do nothing but offer them a pastry. The sorcerer, the party's most charismatic member, immediately hits on Lady Jasmine. She returns the flirtation and gives the little fellow a smile that shows her extended canines off to their best advantage. The cleric's player had been out of the room having a nap. They came back in at the sound of hysterical (nervous maybe?) laughter, get caught up, and are "WTF?" At about this point someone thinks to ask if the bad guys might recognise them. The cleric realises that Ferridoon is giving them "where have I seen these people before" face. Not wanting to drag things on too long Salana made excuses and in ones and twos the heroes quietly slipped out of the ball to begin their mission. That ended the session. Next one will be a good ol' fashioned dungeon crawl.

That is a great list, very handy to have. As for my seeming fascination with poo... er...

What? Puny muggle. Voldemort is a name with which to conjure terror in those who hear it! Which begs the question, "why does it sound like Mouldy Wart?"

How do you @Tywyll. How do you describe a haymaker with a bow? I mean, how does it look in the game?

Glove Makers. A specialised form of sewing. Pure Gatherers. These proud folk gather the "pure" from the streets and sell it to the glove makers who use it to whiten the leather of the gloves.

Back onto poo. One of my current games, the one with my ersatz Ancient Egypt and Akkad, is called the Shitting Curse. For reasons... On two occasions the players have attempted to weaponize bags of flaming poo. It didn't work. (no, this isn't why it's called the Shitting Curse.) And then back onto fantasy names. Just last night I was working on a system to come up with fairly consistent sounding names for gnolls. (Gnames for gnolls?) It's for the above mentioned campaign, the players are about to wander across ersatz African savannah and gnolls happen to be the main inhabitants. I went into it with a definite idea - I wanted the names to sound like a mix of laughter and growling. I already had one name - Heeyahee. It occurred to me to write out a list of sounds that I wanted to work with. I jotted down: Hee, Hai, Ha, Har, Her; Yee, Yai, Ya, Yar, Yer; Gee, Gai, Ga, Gar, Ger; etc. When I had 10 of those little lists I started putting the syllables together. Overall it's turned out alright, I have a decent list of potential names for NPCs. But a few of them turned out... poorly. For instance Garyee. It's Gary. We all know it'll be Gary the instant the players hear it. Gary the Gnoll. Then there's Yeehar. Yeehar has to wear a cowboy hat. Will my players remember any of the names? God no. Except for Gary and Yeehar, of course. Do I intend to have fun at the players' expense by having the NPCs be offended when the foreigners mangle their names? Yes. Yes I do.

Yes. 🙂

Hmmm. Haven't thought about this specifically til now. 1. I can't think of any combat manoeuvres I wouldn't allow in general. But there are manoeuvres I wouldn't allow in specific cases. For example: 2. I wouldn't allow haymaker for bow attacks, although I would probably allow it for thrown ranged attacks. As for haymaker-ing* spells... it feels wrong. But I allow Pushing for spells so why not haymaker for spells? * the word haymaker-ing also feels wrong. So, so wrong.