D20 or HERO or TriStat: what I have picked

[PCD]

Another aspect that I liked right off was the fact that I started to think of other games that could be converted to HERO. Things don't always convert easily or well to the various D20 System products.

Example:

Let's say I want to have James Bond, Merlin and Captain Britain working together. I would need Spycraft, D&D and Mutants and Masterminds: three books, to do it right.

Or I could use the HERO book...

 

[Sir Whiskers]

You are lucky. I had to start prioritizing my finances a bit and just don't have the throw away cash like I once did.

Well, I have noticed that, as my Hero purchases have gone up, my d20 purchases have gone down. But I take your point - gotta have our priorities straight.

 

[JoAT]

You bought the BESM core rules? But that isn't the core system of dX - if you wanted a full view of the actual system center, just download a copy here http://www.guardiansorder.com/downloads/ - first download on the page. It's free, after-all, though you do need to join up with RPGNow (also free) in order to get it. A hard copy of the rules is about $10 american.

I'd recommend taking a look at this - BESM is a great game, but everythign is skewed rather dramticly towards the anime end of things, and it wasn't designed with general play in mind - plus, it shows the signs of being a for-bearer system, in that it doesn't actually follow the dX ruleset. Silver Age Sentinals is a better choice if you absolutly need a core world, and it does use the full ruleset...

 

[mmadsen]

I started playing Champions back around the time it first came out, around 1981 or '82, and I loved it! I liked the fact I could create whatever kind of character I wanted (the building blocks) and not have rely on the 'luck' of the dice to get me where I wanted to be (or not).

That was my experience too. Compared to AD&D, Champions made sense. And it was very flexible.

At the time, I loved all the math -- but, then, I assumed all those calculations really meant something. Now I'd love to see a game with Champion's philosophy, but streamlined. Silver Age Sentinels isn't quite there. Maybe Mutants & Masterminds is?

Another thing I always liked about the Hero system was the phase/segment turn-based system of combat. For the life of me I have never found another game system that laid out combat so neatly and organized as Champions.

I have always found the segment/phase/turn system interesting, but a pain to run -- yet another thing to track. What I did like about the speed system was that there was no quantum leap from one attack per turn to two.

By the way, you can replace the speed chart with "Monte Carlo" speed -- roll a d12 to see if you act each phase.

I also liked the Body and Stun points concept of splitting the damage instead of having just one damage stat (i.e., hit points).

I liked the notion, but the implementation never worked out as planned -- especially with the killing-attack "stun lottery".

One thing our group tended to do to makes things go easier and quicker is we usually ignored the Endurance (END) stat.

Again, I liked the notion of endurance and recovery -- which map nicely to anaerobic capacity and VO2max -- but (a) tracking END is a pain, and (b) superhero fights are not about judicious pacing.

 

[Psion]

No! Anything but HERO.

Actually, HERO is pretty cool, so long as:
1) You have the patience and time to stat stuff, and
2) Your players have a head for it.

I switched from 2e to HERO for a while for my fantasy game, and I have players who would never take magic because they just didn't get the power system.

 

[buzz]

Let's say I want to have James Bond, Merlin and Captain Britain working together. I would need Spycraft, D&D and Mutants and Masterminds: three books, to do it right.

Or I could use the HERO book...

Well, you could probably do it with just M&M. "James Bond, Merlin and Captain Britain" is, to my mind, analogous to saying "Batman, Dr. Fate, and Superman," which M&M would handle fine. I may be a drooling HERO fanboy, but M&M is *nice*.

Nonetheless, I agree that HERO seems to do the "one book" thing better. I'd love to try M&M with some non-supers genres, though.

Thankfully, like Sir Whiskers, I don't really have to chose. I'd play *more* systems if I could; the problem is convincing my players.

 

[PCD]

You bought the BESM core rules? But that isn't the core system of dX -

Really?

I'll have to get dX then. I thought BESM would atleast give a fair idea of what TriStat was all about.

 

[buzz]

BESM is the game from whch TriStatdX spawned, so it does give you a pretty good idea of what it's all about. TriStatdX is more "genericized", and SAS is more fitted to the supers genre specifically. I like it, but I just never found it as compelling as HERO or M&M.

 

[durin]

Now I'd love to see a game with Champion's philosophy, but streamlined. Silver Age Sentinels isn't quite there. Maybe Mutants & Masterminds is?

I haven't picked it up, but there is a stripped down version of HERO 5th. It is called the "HERO System Sidekick" and it is supposed to ease you into HERO.

According to the product description on www.herogames.com, it simplifies things by removing the confusion of power modifiers. At the same time, it is supposed to be true to the options oriented HERO system.

The Sidekick retails for $9.99US, but I have seen it in online stores for as little as $7.99US. Unlike TriStatDX, I don't think there is a free download anywhere on the internet.

I own both Silver Age Sentinels and TriStatDX. While I don't own the HERO System Sidekick, I would assume the Sidekick is to HERO 5th what TriStatDX is to SAS.

 

[mmadsen]

I haven't picked it up, but there is a stripped down version of HERO 5th. It is called the "HERO System Sidekick" and it is supposed to ease you into HERO.

According to the product description on www.herogames.com, it simplifies things by removing the confusion of power modifiers.

The problem with that is that power modifiers are exactly what you should not "streamline" out of Hero. They're a perfect example of added complexity that pays off (at least in theory). What you don't need is the redundant stats for the same basic concept (Con, Body, PD/ED, Stun, etc. for toughness), with lots of division, rounding rules that favor not-round numbers, etc.