How does IH actually play?

[Ry]

I was wondering, for those who have branched out into multiple systems, what are the actual play experiences for Iron Heroes like. I was especially wondering how it plays in the mid/ upper level range.

 

[Vigilance]

I ran Iron Heroes for a bit.

It has a lot of flavor and works pretty well. Ultimately though, it proved too dense and complicated a system for the majority of my players. There was a lot to keep track of.

 

[Terramotus]

I've been running an IH game for about a year. The characters have gone from level 3 to level 9 (yeah, I level them up slowly). The main thing I'd say to be aware of is that the GM really has to be on his toes, particularly in making sure there are interesting battlefields, and it helps out if a lot of your players are gearheads who like exploring the rules. Also, it's not as polished as D&D, so be prepared to house rule the things you don't like, particularly the magic system - the Arcanist was not well thought out, and I've just removed it completely from my games.

That said - it's awesome. It's my favorite system, period. It's the only way to run a low/no magic. And the great thing is that it leaves the way open to actually make COOL, mystical magical items, because you're freed from having to provide numerical game benefits to keep the characters competitive. The skill system also means that characters are MUCH more well rounded. I can't say enough good things about it.

My game is set in a fantastic Ancient Rome, and the rules fit well to that as well as to a brief Pirates of the Carribbean style game. The Conan RPG? This is the rules system it should have used. I'll only run D&D now to get some of that stereotypical D&D goodness.

The system has recently been purchased by Adam Windsor, who wrote the rules FAQ and errata for the game, so we'll even be seeing some future development on it, which should smooth out its rough edges.

 

[Arrgh! Mark!]

I played a single session. Unfortunately the problem was that the majority of players just didn't get the combat system and ended up just hitting things. The combat also took a bucketload of time to fully get through. Unfortunately, more character oriented people just got bored.

I do like the system, but we had the situation of getting to be really, really good roleplayers to avoid another 2 hours of combat. Even the combat wombat people in our group weren't overly impressed.

I think it requires a GM who is a) fast as lightning and b) knows the rules inside out, and the players abilities inside out. Also, c) a good, interesting plot would be helpful - we unfortunately didn't have any of those benefits.

 

[accipiter]

I think it requires a GM who is a) fast as lightning and b) knows the rules inside out, and the players abilities inside out. Also, c) a good, interesting plot would be helpful - we unfortunately didn't have any of those benefits.

Interesting you'd say that! Terramotus is my IH DM, actually, and I agree, if he didn't know the rules so well, it'd be pretty miserable. He was too nice to say that I was the DM for the ill-fated pirates campaign he mentioned or that it was basically my lack of experience that doomed it. I'm nowhere near as rules-brained as my players are and it was painfully obvious from the beginning that I was in over my head.

I'd been running a very fast-paced, very RP-heavy monster hunting D20 Modern campaign for about a year and a half at that point, and I was completely unprepared to run a game that required me to know more than a few basic DCs and how to read a statblock. Preparing and running games under IH was a LOT more work than I was ready for.

It was especially frustrating because I could picture the scenes in my head (say, the grand swashbuckling fight in the enemy's fortress dining hall while flames from a kicked-over candelabra race up the drapes) but I wasn't skilled enough to actually execute them. I didn't even really understand some of the key concepts, like zones, until we'd all pretty much decided it just wasn't working.

A lot of the 'cool' features of IH -- stunts, zones, token pools -- really only shine if the DM puts a lot of prep work into it or the players are really, really inventive and the DM is willing and capable of being flexible and creative (and in some cases, has seen the same movies you have).

I don't think the system is overly complicated, though, and I'm a four-pages-of-backstory-what's-BAB-mean-again? type player usually. I haven't had any trouble running my executioner character at all, and, in fact, he's probably my favorite character ever so far.

One thing I did notice, though, is that seemed as if the IH system really lends itself to either an intrigue-heavy campaign OR a combat-heavy campaign, and you have to be careful that all of your players are on the same page as far as what their characters will be doing.

My executioner was originally a thief, for example. I loved having all the skill points, but my combat abilities were so poor I was basically standing around any time we weren't talking to someone. And some of the feat trees tailored for the thief are ill-suited to a player character (at least one feat tree is designed to make your character the power behind the throne; not particularly useful when you're lost on a mountain and a titan is trying to kick your teeth in, IMO. Maybe in preventing the situation, but then you're a Grand Vizier, not an adventuring hero).

One of the other players helped me swap my backend from thief to executioner, and, while the character didn't change substantially story-wise, he really became a lot more fun to play (I had no idea bouncing all those sneak attack dice would be so satisfying!) in the context of a gritty, Special Forces-style, low-magic campaign.

So I don't think IH is a good system necessarily for learning to game, or one for every plot or setting, but in the right hands and with the right setting it's been a lot of fun. And the combat speed really picked up after the first few sessions, once we got the rhythm of combat down and felt out how our token pools could be used most effectively.

And if I had to sum up our Rome campaign, I would have to say, best campaign ever. I'm madly happy with my character, who I manage to get at least a little RP in for every single game, and the other players, who tend to be a bit more combat-minded, seem pretty happy with the three or four fights we somehow get into every session.

(Sorry, looks like I wrote a novel!)

 

[ValhallaGH]

Having played at level 16 and almost single-handedly killed a powerful red dragon using darts and party-member-distractions, I can say with some confidence that IH plays the same at high levels as at low levels.
There aren't a dozen spells per character to track, there aren't five hundred durations per character to be aware of and there aren't many new options. Basically, if an Iron Hero can do it at level 18 then he could probably do it (not as well and not as reliably but still had the option) at level 3.

Obviously, you need to adjust the challenges. Fifth level Iron Heroes can take on small armies; fifteenth level Iron Heroes can take on large armies. At a certain point, you really want to either improve your mook hordes or replace them with small groups of big nasties, otherwise the challenge drops off (this is as true if the foes are diplomatic as it is if they are combat).

As a player, you should know what your character can do, have a general idea what the rest of the party can do, and think about what you will do to speed up gameplay for everyone. Getting creative, such as knocking down a tree so that another party member can pick it up and use it as a giant flyswatter on hell wasps, is a good thing and your DM will be grateful for the extra awesome you bring.

As a DM, you should know all of the general rules and have a basic idea of what characters' abilities are. Don't be afraid to ask players what the ability they are using does. Don't be afraid to ask the same question you asked ten minutes ago. Don't be afraid to make stuff up. And most importantly, don't be afraid to cheat if it makes the game more fun.
Do your best to remember the badguys abilities and the conditions of the environment. Various memory aids, such as index cards with notes, symbols on the table, getting someone to poke you on the bad guy's turn and remind you, all help you bring a full, complete and satisfying encounter to your players. These things turn another boring fight against cultists into an apocalyptic battle for the fate of the world.

Iron Heroes has been one of the most rewarding experiences I've had as a DM. The level of badassitude in my IH game has been ridiculous and I've thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Whether dancing on a T-Rex's head while throwing darts into it's face, leaping off a tower to kill a blood rook and then catching yourself on the tower, or simply crashing through a burning barn to save villagers and kill demons, Iron Heroes have been the most cinematic and entertaining encounters I've seen in a very long time.

I hope that was the sort of response you were looking for.

 

[Ry]

Hmmm... sadly... well, I was hoping it played more quickly than it read... from what I'm seeing I might run an all Man-At-Arms game (likely Man-At-Arms plus converted Warlock), but I doubt I'd use the whole set of classes.

 

[Pbartender]

Hmmm... sadly... well, I was hoping it played more quickly than it read...

Nope... I'm running Iron Heroes right now. It preparation, combat... pretty much the entire game runs at about the same speed and complexity as D&D. You have little to no magic or magic items to worry about (which reduces the complexity), but you have feats, class abilities, token pools, stunts, challenges, and actions zones (which are in total about equivilent in complexity as all the magic you leave out). All that doesn't speed up gameplay any, it just gives the game a very different style and tone.

Like any D&D game, it greatly benefits from players who KNOW what their characters can do without looking it up it the book all the time, and it benefits from a well-prepared (or equally flexible) DM. A cheat sheet with combat stunts and challenges helps a lot. Players who are used to D&D will have a hard time getting used to the idea of "Describe what you want to do, and we'll make the combat stunt fit." They often get stuck in the usual D&D move-attack, move-attack, full-attack sort of paradigm, which completely ignores all the most interesting bits of IH. Even when they do remember, my players don't always realize that they could be using practically any skill they're good at for those stunt bonuses, so long as they can describe it reasonably.

I find that DM preparation doesn't take any longer than D&D. Primarily because IH is designed to follw the power curve of D&D level advancement. In general, what any D&D character of a given level can tackle, so should an IH character of equal level. For the most part, that true, though there are some creatures that fall outside that curve -- incorproeal creatures, for example -- though the rulebook gives suggestions for handling those oddball encounters. What that means is, anything creature, encounter or adventure module you can use for D&D, you can also use for IH.


By the way... At the last Chicago gameday, I ran an IH adventure that used six pre-generated characters. They were six Men-at-Arms, each focused along a different ability score. It worked admirably.

 

[ruleslawyer]

I may be bucking the trend here, but I find that IH actually does play smoother than D&D... if you have players who know what they're doing. Not having magic means not having to plan for divination spells, flying, etc., and villain classes make statting NPCs a pretty speedy thing related to D&D.

One of the key elements to playing an easier IH game, IMHO, is to just take some of the mechanics off the table. Give the players the responsibility for calculating their numerical stunt and challenge bonuses and penalties (as well as stuff like Combat Expertise and Power Attack), and then just have them tell you what they want to do in narrative terms. If you think the stunt, or skill use, or whatever, is cool enough to be usable, then let the player roll the dice!

Zones are slightly trickier, but the dirty secret of them is that you really just should adjudicate them on the fly using the guidelines in Mastering IH. A PC who rolls a 10 or so can achieve a medium result with a zone; one who's aiming for a more extreme result can shoot for a 15 and get a better result. The DM just needs to add one or two fun terrain features to every encounter, but there's no need to stat them out as in the published adventures.

 

[Pbartender]

I may be bucking the trend here, but I find that IH actually does play smoother than D&D... if you have players who know what they're doing.

That's a pretty big "if".

Zones are slightly trickier, but the dirty secret of them is that you really just should adjudicate them on the fly using the guidelines in Mastering IH. A PC who rolls a 10 or so can achieve a medium result with a zone; one who's aiming for a more extreme result can shoot for a 15 and get a better result. The DM just needs to add one or two fun terrain features to every encounter, but there's no need to stat them out as in the published adventures.

Absolutely... Let the players determine where the action zones are, and what they do. Most imortantly, you need to give them ideas by example. If the Bad Guys use stunts, challenges and action zones effectively against the PCs, then evenutally the PCs will get the idea and start using them back.