raemus
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Post by raemus on Dec 23, 2013 13:36:21 GMT -8
Anyone ever try to recreate the Phase World Universe (from Palladium Books) in Hero System?
I've been looking over hero system for the first time and it seems to have all the particulars that I would need to use to do this. But I'm hoping some of you Hero Veterans could clue me in if i'm barking up the wrong system.
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maxinstuff
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Preferred Game Systems: DCC RPG, Shadowrun 5e, Savage Worlds, GURPS 4e, HERO 6e, Mongoose Traveller
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Post by maxinstuff on Dec 23, 2013 15:19:44 GMT -8
Well in theory you can recreate just about anything in Hero - with the application of sufficient effort.
I am unfamiliar with this setting, was there anything in particular that you wanted to create?
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raemus
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Post by raemus on Dec 23, 2013 16:08:43 GMT -8
the Phaseworld Setting is like a combination of Star Trek, Star Wars, Spelljammer and Space 1889. It has Superpowers, Psionics, Magic, Hypertech and Technowizardry. Its Rifts in space. So I need something that can tackle anything and still keep a reasonable balance & a feel of actual difference between the powers. (The Palladium system fails miserably at the first of these two requirements).
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maxinstuff
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Preferred Game Systems: DCC RPG, Shadowrun 5e, Savage Worlds, GURPS 4e, HERO 6e, Mongoose Traveller
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Post by maxinstuff on Dec 23, 2013 17:51:44 GMT -8
Hero sounds like a good fit. However, it also sounds like a lot of work Hero is a bit like that, if you are scratch-building a world it will take some time. The good thing here is you have your fluff all sorted, which is often the hardest part. So it should be a matter of just putting it together in the system. It sounds like Hero would handle this fine. EDIT: I forgot something very important. You mentioned yiu wanted different abilities to 'feel' different. HERO uses a unified 3d6 mechanic. The rest is special effects. For example - you might have a mage and a gadgeteer having a fight, the mage is hurling fireballs left and right while the gadgeteer is shooting at him with a laser gun he put together using a broken pistol and some coils of wire. Mechanically, these two attacks are the same though. Both are built using the blast power, both roll 3d6 to hit, both might do 5 dice of damage. The difference is all theatrics.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 23, 2013 17:52:27 GMT -8
Hero system can do it
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Post by Houndin on Dec 24, 2013 5:00:27 GMT -8
For example - you might have a mage and a gadgeteer having a fight, the mage is hurling fireballs left and right while the gadgeteer is shooting at him with a laser gun he put together using a broken pistol and some coils of wire. Mechanically, these two attacks are the same though. Both are built using the blast power, both roll 3d6 to hit, both might do 5 dice of damage. The difference is all theatrics. Wait so what you're saying is it's Savage Worlds with a bell curve....
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 24, 2013 14:08:06 GMT -8
Hero system has way more in making those 2 attack look different as night and day even if both use the blast power Savage world can do alot but it does not have the fiddly bits Hero System has not to mention cheaper and all the rules in 1 book right now SW needs 4 books to cover horror,supers, fantasy and normalsFor example - you might have a mage and a gadgeteer having a fight, the mage is hurling fireballs left and right while the gadgeteer is shooting at him with a laser gun he put together using a broken pistol and some coils of wire. Mechanically, these two attacks are the same though. Both are built using the blast power, both roll 3d6 to hit, both might do 5 dice of damage. The difference is all theatrics. Wait so what you're saying is it's Savage Worlds with a bell curve....
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maxinstuff
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Preferred Game Systems: DCC RPG, Shadowrun 5e, Savage Worlds, GURPS 4e, HERO 6e, Mongoose Traveller
Favorite Species of Monkey: Proboscis
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Post by maxinstuff on Dec 24, 2013 15:49:53 GMT -8
For example - you might have a mage and a gadgeteer having a fight, the mage is hurling fireballs left and right while the gadgeteer is shooting at him with a laser gun he put together using a broken pistol and some coils of wire. Mechanically, these two attacks are the same though. Both are built using the blast power, both roll 3d6 to hit, both might do 5 dice of damage. The difference is all theatrics. Wait so what you're saying is it's Savage Worlds with a bell curve.... Not exactly. As said above, HERO does have lots of fiddly bits in the form of power modifiers (positive and negative). For example the gun would be a focus, meaning the power is attached to an item that can be dropped, lost or stolen. It might be unreliable, with a chance of overheating and exploding in your hand. The fireball might have a casting time, requiring words and hand gestures. It probably also fatigues you. All this is prep though. Once you are playing you still just roll 3d6 and do 5 dice of damage. Some players find that samey (I don't). I should add - HERO (Champions) is where this concept started. It inspired GURPS, and later Savage Worlds.
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Post by Houndin on Dec 26, 2013 20:46:49 GMT -8
Hero system has way more in making those 2 attack look different as night and day even if both use the blast power Savage world can do alot but it does not have the fiddly bits Hero System has not to mention cheaper and all the rules in 1 book right now SW needs 4 books to cover horror,supers, fantasy and normals SW does have books to cover all those things, however the SW Deluxe includes all that as well, maybe not as fleshed out, or de-fleshed in the case of horror. I've successfully run modern military, fantasy and horror with nothing but the core SW book. And from what I've heard the HERO base book might as well be an unabridged dictionary for its size. But we digress from the topic at hand and I was just making a joke originally anyway. So, Flame off!
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 27, 2013 11:59:23 GMT -8
The point I was making was that ,is that you only need 1 40$ book to do it all instead of 4 books at nearly 80$ using 1 the core SW book is very limited where as the Basic Hero system rules has way more and can cover just about any genre as it has about 90 % of the full rules
in other word you get more bang for your buck w/ hero system
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Post by Houndin on Dec 28, 2013 9:40:52 GMT -8
The point I was making was that ,is that you only need 1 40$ book to do it all instead of 4 books at nearly 80$ using 1 the core SW book is very limited where as the Basic Hero system rules has way more and can cover just about any genre as it has about 90 % of the full rules in other word you get more bang for your buck w/ hero system Hey! I said "Flame Off!", I'm not arguing that. In my opinion we, in any system, are limited only by our own imaginations. I mean, Risus is free and one page, front and back, and as far as I can see it's not limited in any way.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 28, 2013 9:48:32 GMT -8
I was not flaming on anybody, just pointing out facts about both systems
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 29, 2013 22:39:14 GMT -8
the Phaseworld Setting is like a combination of Star Trek, Star Wars, Spelljammer and Space 1889. It has Superpowers, Psionics, Magic, Hypertech and Technowizardry. Its Rifts in space. So I need something that can tackle anything and still keep a reasonable balance That kind of game plays to Hero's strengths; all of those are standard parts of the system (in fact, they aren't even distinct parts of the system, but rather applications of the power building system). That said, hero is and isn't balanced, depending on what you mean. The genericity of the powers means they have to be "balanced" in one sense across the whole system, not just one particular genre (something that I had headaches with in GURPS back a couple of versions ago when I tried it). It's as good about that as a game with a power-building toolkit can be, I think. However, it doesn't attempt to achieve absolute balance, something I think isn't possible in a generic system anyway. As an example, if you have the entire power suite at your disposal it is trivial to build a character that completely outclasses normal humans on the same point total. The reason is essentially that the humans don't have the opportunity to buy paranormal defenses any more than they have the opportunity to buy other paranormal powers. This is actually not *mechanically* different than the balance problem of a superhero who is known by the whole world to have neglected to buy an entire category of defense (such as superman apparently having no defenses against magic). But in a different campaign where powers of some kind are common, the same character would probably not be unbalanced. Hero doesn't try to balance such situations. Instead, it balances characters generally, against opponents who have the same choices available that they do, and then assumes that when the GM chooses what powers are available in the campaign he will also hand-balance any situations where his choices have created imbalances. For example, in a world of normals, he might limit the strength of mental powers to a level that will not overpower most of the population, rule that normals automatically have some mental defense, or anything else that achieves the effect he wants. Hero assumes that such decisions are part of campaign design just like deciding that 1930's gumshoes can't fly or shapeshift. Your game is probably actually easier to balance than most, as it sounds like the above example wouldn't apply, but you still have to think about what you want in your game. Also, it sounds like you'd have to learn most or all of the system since most or all of the powers would be available, which could steepen the learning curve. Individualized feel is something some feel Hero does just fine and others think it does poorly, so I guess it's a matter of taste. Hero has a long suite of power modifers that allow you to customize how the rules work, and it is extremely flexible once you understand how to separate effect and special effect. For example, a pistol is built with a ranged killing attack and some modifiers that say it is tied to a physical object that requires a free hand to use and cartridges that can be used up. A fireball spell is built with the same ranged killing attack, but different modifiers that require the mage be able to speak incantations and use his body's endurance instead of cartridges. (Also, in many games you wouldn't have to pay points for a normal piece of equipment, but that's a different issue.) Is that a different feel or not? I have no problem with it, but some people complain. Only you can decide if you think it fits your requirements or not.
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Post by jazzisblues on Dec 31, 2013 7:46:11 GMT -8
the Phaseworld Setting is like a combination of Star Trek, Star Wars, Spelljammer and Space 1889. It has Superpowers, Psionics, Magic, Hypertech and Technowizardry. Its Rifts in space. So I need something that can tackle anything and still keep a reasonable balance & a feel of actual difference between the powers. (The Palladium system fails miserably at the first of these two requirements). What Max says is very true, it's likely a fair bit of work. However, most of it may well have been done already but you're going to have to pull things from elsewhere to do it and fit them together. Some resources that would likely prove useful are: Star Hero (Sci-Fi stuff) ( frpgames.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=77027#.UsLmAHmyhuo) Fantasy Hero (Magic and Psionics) ( frpgames.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=63857#.UsLl33myhuo) Cyber Hero ( www.amazon.com/Cyber-Hero-Campaign-Book-System/dp/1558061525) [Note: It's the previous version but the changes are not bad) I would also suggest going to the Hero Games forums as there's a lot of very useful information there as well. ( www.herogames.com) I think Hero System would work really well for what you're trying to do. Cheers, JiB
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