I would likely say even though at core these two are the same - I would consider Champions complete almost Medium, but 6E full core box heavy - in presentation if nothing else.armies erak, I have to ask - why would GURPS be in your heavy list but Hero System in your medium?
I would likely say even though at core these two are the same - I would consider Champions complete almost Medium, but 6E full core box heavy - in presentation if nothing else.
Having also played GURPS, Champions, Pathfinder, and D&D - I'm not sure I agree. Champions, may front load a lot of complexity, but it still has a lot of complexity in play as well. I feel that a lot of experienced Champions players downplay that complexity. Basic attacks like an energy blast or a punch may be pretty simple to handle, but even then you may be dealing with adjustments to combat values, picking whether or not to use your full dice, paying the END cost based on how many you actually used, calculating the STUN damage and the BODY damage (in 2 separate ways), applying defenses (potentially multiple ones), comparing the resulting damage vs CON. And that's without dealing with different sorts of attacks like killing attacks, entangling attacks, mental illusions, etc, figuring out how often you can turn a hex-side based on your flight speed, dividing up active points in a character's multipower, and doing it all on the speed chart.Re. HERO and GURPS and the line (if any) between them in terms of crunch.
Up front I should say that I'm a big time HERO system fan, so assume I'm gonna show bias in its favour.
Folks over on the HERO boards always say that HERO's complexity is "front loaded." That once you've done character design it plays pretty smoothly. In my experience that is broadly accurate. What it doesn't say is that that axiom applies to campaign settings too; even published ones. So say you want to play generic high fantasy adventures in the HERO published setting The Turakian Age. The GM still has a lot of prep work to do going such as choosing limits to attack, defence, damage, spell power, etc. Unlike a level based system where power level is hard coded into the game, in HERO the GM has to work that stuff out themselves. And there's decidedly little guidance on how to go about doing that. A very frequent question posted on the HERO boards is "How do I tell what's too much/too little power?"
But once that is all done the game plays very smoothly. It runs well because HERO runs on an algorithm. There's not much need to look things up in play.
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Character design is easier in GURPS because the player, especially a new player, can simply pick things from a list. Hell, most gamers of my acquaintance, me included, think that that's fun. Character design in HERO is harder as it requires an understanding of an algorithm that looks pretty damn impenetrable to a new player.
Having also played GURPS, Champions, Pathfinder, and D&D - I'm not sure I agree. Champions, may front load a lot of complexity, but it still has a lot of complexity in play as well. I feel that a lot of experienced Champions players downplay that complexity. Basic attacks like an energy blast or a punch may be pretty simple to handle, but even then you may be dealing with adjustments to combat values, picking whether or not to use your full dice, paying the END cost based on how many you actually used, calculating the STUN damage and the BODY damage (in 2 separate ways), applying defenses (potentially multiple ones), comparing the resulting damage vs CON. And that's without dealing with different sorts of attacks like killing attacks, entangling attacks, mental illusions, etc, figuring out how often you can turn a hex-side based on your flight speed, dividing up active points in a character's multipower, and doing it all on the speed chart.
There may be less looking things up, in a sense, but in order to avoid that, you're packing the character sheet with a lot of stuff to support that algorithmic approach to paying the game.
Having also played GURPS, Champions, Pathfinder, and D&D - I'm not sure I agree. Champions, may front load a lot of complexity, but it still has a lot of complexity in play as well. I feel that a lot of experienced Champions players downplay that complexity. Basic attacks like an energy blast or a punch may be pretty simple to handle, but even then you may be dealing with adjustments to combat values, picking whether or not to use your full dice, paying the END cost based on how many you actually used, calculating the STUN damage and the BODY damage (in 2 separate ways), applying defenses (potentially multiple ones), comparing the resulting damage vs CON. And that's without dealing with different sorts of attacks like killing attacks, entangling attacks, mental illusions, etc, figuring out how often you can turn a hex-side based on your flight speed, dividing up active points in a character's multipower, and doing it all on the speed chart.
There may be less looking things up, in a sense, but in order to avoid that, you're packing the character sheet with a lot of stuff to support that algorithmic approach to paying the game.
One thing I do want to specifically address is the Speed Chart. I love the speed chart. At heart it's just initiative tracking. And if all you use it for is to track initiative then it's no more complex than any other initiative system. But as a player you can hold actions/interrupt actions in ways that give a really nice sense of the back and forth of cinematic combat. Is using it this way complex? Yes. But its' complexity is born out of the way a player wishes to use it, not from the thing itself. I love that.