On the subject of DC Heroes I've been running it without the standard tables for 10 years and not broken it. Plays much faster than looking stuff up, counting column shifts etc and each AP becomes it's own column, effectively, instead of grouping them together. Another project I'm on is adding colour to a mashup of 2e/3e/BoH. I got a few chapters in then decided to break off (MS Word isn't the greatest thing for DTP, who knew? I now use Word, Publisher and Paintshop Pro for the art and so far so good, so I'll use what I have learned on the Marvel Supers Revamp on all projects going forward).

In the UK rules sometimes come up for cheap but it's one of those games that didn't sell in huge numbers as far as I can tell, at least not compared to Marvel. I don't think 3rd edition was round for long and it's clear they had a tiny/almost non existent art budget.

BoH is famous for it's awful art but the rules are solid. Stripping the art and rewriting the rules/powers section (by far the largest part of the book) into it's own thing might be doable. Art is the sticking point though anything which is 99% or so compatible with existing stuff has a shot of being picked up for nostalgia purposes.

Some basic thoughts on a few things. Ignoring typos etc.

Combat
Action Economy needs clarification. Specifically "Reaction" needs to be better defined mechanically/narratively.

Action Economy - Every PC gets to Move and take an Action..
Actions include Feats/Attack/Reaction

Certain Defensive Maneuvers are Actions/Reactions

With the Powers as Defenseclause in the Defensive Maneuvers, this should remove Reaction as part of the Action Economy entirely because everything Reaction is defined by is already covered. I think this is cleaner and less confusing.

Grapple - Fighting vs. Fighting. As written, Strong characters are overwhelmingly better than skilled Fighters that actually know how to fight.


Pulling Your Punch - Does this imply that you can't do less than -3CS damage? Or are we supposed to declare how much damage we're attacking with before we attack?

Action Economy Questions Not Included
Non-Attack Actions? - In MSH you could do up to 3 non-attack actions as an Action. There is no mention of it in the 2.2 rules.

Sneak Attack - Since we're using relative Feat actions, why not have a Sneak Attack for Stealthy characters? Agility vs. Intuition/Super senses. If you succeed you get a bonus to the next higher color-shift, or +2CS to Attack Feats or whatever. There are multiple mentions of Surprise, but no mechanical definition for it. MSH did short shrift to this idea, and this is an excellent opportunity to codify it. Especially for sneaky-ass characters.

Drives
Conceptually works great as a PC focused Karma addition for players. Description needs a rework.

Edit: I'm talking with Bear offline about these things and on Discord, lots of feedback from him, he's got this well in hand. I'll continue here as I post there (for those that don't do Discord.)

Quote from: APN on March 12, 2024, 10:17:01 AM
On the subject of DC Heroes I've been running it without the standard tables for 10 years and not broken it. Plays much faster than looking stuff up, counting column shifts etc and each AP becomes it's own column, effectively, instead of grouping them together. Another project I'm on is adding colour to a mashup of 2e/3e/BoH. I got a few chapters in then decided to break off (MS Word isn't the greatest thing for DTP, who knew? I now use Word, Publisher and Paintshop Pro for the art and so far so good, so I'll use what I have learned on the Marvel Supers Revamp on all projects going forward).

In the UK rules sometimes come up for cheap but it's one of those games that didn't sell in huge numbers as far as I can tell, at least not compared to Marvel. I don't think 3rd edition was round for long and it's clear they had a tiny/almost non existent art budget.

BoH is famous for it's awful art but the rules are solid. Stripping the art and rewriting the rules/powers section (by far the largest part of the book) into it's own thing might be doable. Art is the sticking point though anything which is 99% or so compatible with existing stuff has a shot of being picked up for nostalgia purposes.

Totally deserves its own thread. Preach the word and build it man!

Since I'm already in my pajamas I'm curious as to what exactly the magnitude of difference between ranks is. In MEGS each step is double the previous, which leads to some odd situations due to its lack of precision. In TORG each step is 1.5 times the previous, which is a bit more precise but still can make certain things simply impossible by default. So what's the sitch with #Heroic?

It follows closely to MSH.

Each rank isn't *technically* a doubling, but it's close. MSH (and Heroic) hits the trope "sweet spots" that are commonly observed in comic lore. Obviously canon needs to be curated, MSH hits the best era (imo) of Marvel during the Jim Shooter era, when there was rigor in terms of enforcing what precisely a character could do power-wise.

Hence the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe came out during this period and MSH pretty much emulates it.

The *big* difference is that outside of Strength which is attached to a discrete number, all the other stats are narrative assumptions.

So TY(6) Strength lets you lift 200lbs. GD(10) lets you lift 400lbs. EX(20) Human Maximum is 800lbs. Then it jumps to RM(30) which is 1-ton. Then IN(40) 10-tons, then AM(50) 50-tons, etc.

Are their characters that fall between these scales? Yeah sure, but the idea is that while not a straight doubling, the assumption of the abstraction is that each rank is sufficiently greater that the numerical representation between each rank covers that ground mechanically, if not narratively.

i.e. If in your mind a character that could lift 30-tons is represented by IN(40) rather than AM(50), maybe he's got a Strength rating of IN(44), vs. AM(46) which is the minimum number to be in the AM column. Or you know, you can just say - this guy has AM(50) Strength and move on.

There has been tons of discussions over the years talking about adding other rank values (specifically because of Strength), but from my view it has never been necessary.

Streaming tonight talking about HEROIC Mechanics.

I'll be a guest if anyone is interested.

https://youtube.com/live/whzme7xsX8E

I saw some of that podcast.  I was surprised to see Tenbones was a guest. 

It makes sense based on how much you played the old MSH game.  You can talk from experience, unlike me.  Unless we switch to Palladium Books RPGs.  Those I know. 

Palladium Heroes Unlimited is a good super hero game, and the only hero game we played as a group.  I just wish it wasn't as time consuming to build a hero character.  My last one was a robot pilot with a transforming motorcycle (think Mospeada Cyclone).  It took twice as long to make because the robot machine was as detailed as the pilot. 

That's one of the reasons I'm a backer for Heroic.  I want to get into a game that is easier to play.  That game, or Tiny D6 Supers also looks good. 

It looks interesting from the kickstarter page. I haven't seen the rules yet so I may have missed if it talks about this. Does it fix MSH/FASERIP's Daredevil problem described by Ray Winninger? As it stands, Daredevil can't perform as he does in the comics in a fight with five thugs. It's going to take him at least two rounds per thug even if they have all typical stats. Meanwhile he's likely going to take damage over the 10+ potentially rounds rather than it barely making him sweat as he blows through them to get to Kingpin.

Street level was one thing that MEGS did better for us, despite the knock thrown at it of 'characters all look the same'.

How does Heroic handle fights like that?

*edit* Looks like there are Minion and Goon pools for this sort of thing.

I've been taking a run at a MEGS retro clone for a year now. My sticking point so far is looking at the BoH book, it has everything and then some. A super 3e if you would. Then I hold up my copy of the Batman RPG and I love that it is a slim volume. Now how do I get BoH to fit in a tight package like the Batman game? This is the thought-experiment world I live in these days. I tinker, contemplate, but as of late lightning has yet to boil my brain with a Eureka moment. I've even stopped smoking pot so I can try and get serious about this!

Quote from: Tristan on March 19, 2024, 12:51:40 AM
It looks interesting from the kickstarter page. I haven't seen the rules yet so I may have missed if it talks about this. Does it fix MSH/FASERIP's Daredevil problem described by Ray Winninger? As it stands, Daredevil can't perform as he does in the comics in a fight with five thugs. It's going to take him at least two rounds per thug even if they have all typical stats. Meanwhile he's likely going to take damage over the 10+ potentially rounds rather than it barely making him sweat as he blows through them to get to Kingpin.

Street level was one thing that MEGS did better for us, despite the knock thrown at it of 'characters all look the same'.

How does Heroic handle fights like that?

*edit* Looks like there are Minion and Goon pools for this sort of thing.

Short Answer: yes it absolutely addresses this "issue".

Longer, More Thoughtful, Answer:
Ray Winninger is very much *wrong* about this being an issue. In MSH a round is effectively a "snapshot" of a flow of combat, ironically representing a single panel in a comic. It's not supposed to represent a 1-minute Round or anything. DD could effectively knock out 2-people per round with good rolls. With a stunt, like richocheting his billy-club across the heads of everyone in the scene as an "area attack" - which we've all seen many times in the comics - he could do it in one round with a Stun result.

The *real issue* is the Aunt May rule. That those thugs could reliably hit DD with decent rolls every round. I.E. if your conception of DD is an inexperienced to moderate experienced version of his career, this idea that 5-thugs are going to lay a finger on him is definitely probable. He might take a few shots. But if he's the Devil of Hell's Kitchen as we all know him, they probably will never lay a finger on him. Original MSH did a crappy job of reflecting that *in conjunction* with keeping the fight short. It's possible - with lots of Evades and sub-optimal rolls from the thugs.

Heroic *completely* fixes that by making combat relative. How? The universal table is no longer a one-way sliding scale. Now you compare Fighting skills and the difference is tracked up/down based on the relative differences between the combatants. In the original MSH a thug would need a 51 or higher to hit DD normally assuming he has TY(6) Fighting. This is because MSH did nothing to take into account DD's actual fighting ability (which in their defense was normal for game design of this era - D&D *still* does this).  In Heroic - you compare the differences in Fighting and that moves your attack column up/down the scale as a modifier. This is similar to MEGS. So by comparison - in Heroic a Thug would have to roll 70 or higher to just get a glancing blow (Green Result) which is -1CS in damage. This is *before* DD did any kind of defensive move as a Reaction. So let's pretend DD decide to Dodge also and gets a basic Green result. Now those thugs need to roll 80+ for a glancing blow, and 99 for a normal solid hit.

Consider also we haven't even entered in combat Talents etc. DD is going to justifiably wipe the floor with 5-thugs and do it pretty much how you'd imagine it in a comic.

*That* is exactly why Heroic shines. I have been using this as a House Rule in my own campaigns for a few years, so when I saw Heroic cooked this into their ruleset, I knew it was a real winner. The Uni-Chart he made makes it really good and easy to reference.

On top of that - yes, you have Goon rules. I never needed them before, but now we have some. Icing? Meet cake.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on March 16, 2024, 11:26:28 PM
I saw some of that podcast.  I was surprised to see Tenbones was a guest. 

It makes sense based on how much you played the old MSH game.  You can talk from experience, unlike me.  Unless we switch to Palladium Books RPGs.  Those I know. 

Palladium Heroes Unlimited is a good super hero game, and the only hero game we played as a group.  I just wish it wasn't as time consuming to build a hero character.  My last one was a robot pilot with a transforming motorcycle (think Mospeada Cyclone).  It took twice as long to make because the robot machine was as detailed as the pilot. 

That's one of the reasons I'm a backer for Heroic.  I want to get into a game that is easier to play.  That game, or Tiny D6 Supers also looks good.

Yeah Bear reached out to me to consult on the rules (which I'm now doing) and I'm very pleased to be part of the project in my own small way. I've long held that MSH is one of the greatest systems ever made. It's *waaaay* ahead of its time on several levels. Heroic is very much that rare attempt at an update that *actually* is backwards compatible with its predecessors (Basic too!) and requires nearly zero effort to adapt for even inexperienced GM's.

This is less to do with Bear (or my own) insight as it has to do with Jeff Grub and Steve Winter's genius design. The "cleanup" in Heroic is just a couple of fundamental tweaks of the chart that Bear (and myself, independently) realized from years of play, and literally everything else in the game falls right into place without changing anything. You can pick up *any* of the MSH content out there and run it with Heroic.

I *want* Heroic to not just succeed, I want it to conquer. The system can work with *any* genre, not just Supers. That's the secret. You can literally slap any genre on into Heroic, because of the Relative task resolution mechanic, and play. It scales from street-level normie play, all the way up to Cosmic planet-shaking monstrosities that can eat Hydrogen bombs, ON THE SAME TABLE.

I've always said that Supers *is* the hardest genre to GM for - because Supers contains all other genres. ALL OF THEM. And any genre outlier you want to throw in there, Supers can gobble down. Well Heroic as a system can handle all of it with tremendous fidelity.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on March 07, 2024, 01:30:59 AM

Quote from: Domina on March 06, 2024, 11:44:58 PM

So did this guy have a bet with his buddy to see who could design the least elegant resolution mechanic or something?

Quite the opposite. 

The people who swear by the FASERIP system have always bragged that the one chart on the back cover of the rulebook was the entire game.  It is used for all conflict resolutions.  You don't need lots and lots of specialized rules for interrogation, land navigation, gambling, crafting, etc. that many games have.   You just need the chart.

As we mentioned above, it wasn't perfect.  Direct, head-to-head conflicts didn't compare the skill of the two involved.   If I'm feeble at shooting a gun, taking a shot at Spider-Man is the same odds as shooting at a Galapagos tortoise, at least in old FASERIP.  Bear's new game, Heroic doesn't have that flaw. 

Like I said, FASERIP style rules are popular for having a single mechanic that covers it all, and actually works well.

It's why I chose a music battle.  It works just as well as if I said they were punching each other or competing in a golf tournament.

Yeah, and the chart is embarrassingly inelegant.

Quote from: tenbones on March 22, 2024, 10:50:35 AM

Quote from: weirdguy564 on March 16, 2024, 11:26:28 PM
I saw some of that podcast.  I was surprised to see Tenbones was a guest. 

It makes sense based on how much you played the old MSH game.  You can talk from experience, unlike me.  Unless we switch to Palladium Books RPGs.  Those I know. 

Palladium Heroes Unlimited is a good super hero game, and the only hero game we played as a group.  I just wish it wasn't as time consuming to build a hero character.  My last one was a robot pilot with a transforming motorcycle (think Mospeada Cyclone).  It took twice as long to make because the robot machine was as detailed as the pilot. 

That's one of the reasons I'm a backer for Heroic.  I want to get into a game that is easier to play.  That game, or Tiny D6 Supers also looks good.

Yeah Bear reached out to me to consult on the rules (which I'm now doing) and I'm very pleased to be part of the project in my own small way. I've long held that MSH is one of the greatest systems ever made. It's *waaaay* ahead of its time on several levels. Heroic is very much that rare attempt at an update that *actually* is backwards compatible with its predecessors (Basic too!) and requires nearly zero effort to adapt for even inexperienced GM's.

This is less to do with Bear (or my own) insight as it has to do with Jeff Grub and Steve Winter's genius design. The "cleanup" in Heroic is just a couple of fundamental tweaks of the chart that Bear (and myself, independently) realized from years of play, and literally everything else in the game falls right into place without changing anything. You can pick up *any* of the MSH content out there and run it with Heroic.

I *want* Heroic to not just succeed, I want it to conquer. The system can work with *any* genre, not just Supers. That's the secret. You can literally slap any genre on into Heroic, because of the Relative task resolution mechanic, and play. It scales from street-level normie play, all the way up to Cosmic planet-shaking monstrosities that can eat Hydrogen bombs, ON THE SAME TABLE.

I've always said that Supers *is* the hardest genre to GM for - because Supers contains all other genres. ALL OF THEM. And any genre outlier you want to throw in there, Supers can gobble down. Well Heroic as a system can handle all of it with tremendous fidelity.

Prowlers and paragons can already do that, and it's already been released.

Quote from: Domina on March 25, 2024, 12:13:01 AM


Prowlers and paragons can already do that, and it's already been released.

In your opinion, what makes Prowlers and Paragons better than Mutants & Masterminds or Champions/Hero system?

I've seen PP being compared to those two as a less crunchy version of M&M or Champions/Hero so, that's why I ask.

Quote from: tenbones on March 22, 2024, 10:38:45 AM

Short Answer: yes it absolutely addresses this "issue".

Longer, More Thoughtful, Answer:
Ray Winninger is very much *wrong* about this being an issue. In MSH a round is effectively a "snapshot" of a flow of combat, ironically representing a single panel in a comic. It's not supposed to represent a 1-minute Round or anything. DD could effectively knock out 2-people per round with good rolls. With a stunt, like richocheting his billy-club across the heads of everyone in the scene as an "area attack" - which we've all seen many times in the comics - he could do it in one round with a Stun result.

The *real issue* is the Aunt May rule. That those thugs could reliably hit DD with decent rolls every round. I.E. if your conception of DD is an inexperienced to moderate experienced version of his career, this idea that 5-thugs are going to lay a finger on him is definitely probable. He might take a few shots. But if he's the Devil of Hell's Kitchen as we all know him, they probably will never lay a finger on him. Original MSH did a crappy job of reflecting that *in conjunction* with keeping the fight short. It's possible - with lots of Evades and sub-optimal rolls from the thugs.

Heroic *completely* fixes that by making combat relative. How? The universal table is no longer a one-way sliding scale. Now you compare Fighting skills and the difference is tracked up/down based on the relative differences between the combatants. In the original MSH a thug would need a 51 or higher to hit DD normally assuming he has TY(6) Fighting. This is because MSH did nothing to take into account DD's actual fighting ability (which in their defense was normal for game design of this era - D&D *still* does this).  In Heroic - you compare the differences in Fighting and that moves your attack column up/down the scale as a modifier. This is similar to MEGS. So by comparison - in Heroic a Thug would have to roll 70 or higher to just get a glancing blow (Green Result) which is -1CS in damage. This is *before* DD did any kind of defensive move as a Reaction. So let's pretend DD decide to Dodge also and gets a basic Green result. Now those thugs need to roll 80+ for a glancing blow, and 99 for a normal solid hit.

Consider also we haven't even entered in combat Talents etc. DD is going to justifiably wipe the floor with 5-thugs and do it pretty much how you'd imagine it in a comic.

*That* is exactly why Heroic shines. I have been using this as a House Rule in my own campaigns for a few years, so when I saw Heroic cooked this into their ruleset, I knew it was a real winner. The Uni-Chart he made makes it really good and easy to reference.

On top of that - yes, you have Goon rules. I never needed them before, but now we have some. Icing? Meet cake.

I will respectfully disagree as we did find it an issue and we moved on to MEGS for street level hero genres as a result of it being an issue for us. In MEGS a guy like DD could pretty normally take 3-4 thugs in a single round, possibly up to 8 with a good roll.

For DD to do his ricochet stunt, that's 100 karma per attempt (at least three times).  He's got 91.  If he saves a kitten from a tree and pulls a kid out of the road he'll have enough karma to try that stunt with a red feat, and have no karma for the big bad at the end.  Power stunts were too expensive and the Karma examples in published modules too little.

Don't get me wrong, we played the hell out of MSH for a long time and loved it. It's still for me the easiest super's game out there, but it had its flaws.

The "Aunt May" issue certainly exacerbates the issue by making the thugs do way more damage than they should, leaving DD more bloodied than he should be. I'd say the issues go hand in hand.  The comparing attacks and moving along a chart reminds me of how Ascendant handles combat in a way.

After looking a the goon rules and some of the other changes, my interest is piqued.

Quote from: Tristan on March 25, 2024, 11:24:44 PM

I will respectfully disagree as we did find it an issue and we moved on to MEGS for street level hero genres as a result of it being an issue for us. In MEGS a guy like DD could pretty normally take 3-4 thugs in a single round, possibly up to 8 with a good roll.

Sweet. MEGS is a great system. Heroic doesn't have that problem. Either way - if you're demanding that DD be handle to knock out <X>Thugs per round for it to be playable, I suspect there are other "issues" at play here. But if you found a solution in MEGS, there you go. As for Heroic, it won't have that problem either.

Quote from: Tristan on March 25, 2024, 11:24:44 PM
For DD to do his ricochet stunt, that's 100 karma per attempt (at least three times).  He's got 91.  If he saves a kitten from a tree and pulls a kid out of the road he'll have enough karma to try that stunt with a red feat, and have no karma for the big bad at the end.  Power stunts were too expensive and the Karma examples in published modules too little.

1) Daredevil is an NPC. If you're playing him as a PC, then you are free as the GM to decide whatever stunts that PC needs to do whatever you need to do. The whole point of MSH (and Heroic) is to let the PC's have what is needed to exemplify that character. 2) In your example you're not actually discussing *which* Daredevil you're talking about. Are you talking about Daredevil when he first started? Are you talking about Daredevil from Frank Miller's era? Are you talking Ninja-God Modern DD? The solution is the same - give him what he needs to be the DD you imagine. We've *all* seen DD do that move. He probably has that stunt and slew of others. If you're hanging on this as an argument, you're splitting the hair mighty fine. If you think Stunts are "too difficult" to attain - I'll happily disagree as I run sandbox MSH for decades now, and any PC worth his salt typically has enough Karma earned through hard play to pop a stunt off and do their due diligence on mastering it (often through the simple use of saying "During my downtime I master this stunt.")

Quote from: Tristan on March 25, 2024, 11:24:44 PM
Don't get me wrong, we played the hell out of MSH for a long time and loved it. It's still for me the easiest super's game out there, but it had its flaws.

The "Aunt May" issue certainly exacerbates the issue by making the thugs do way more damage than they should, leaving DD more bloodied than he should be. I'd say the issues go hand in hand.  The comparing attacks and moving along a chart reminds me of how Ascendant handles combat in a way.

After looking a the goon rules and some of the other changes, my interest is piqued.

Again, depends on which DD we're talking about. Year One DD? Sure. But I don't gauge my systems by how "fast" or "many" goons any hero can take out in a round. In fact, I can't think of where I ever even considered it outside of your question. I don't think Heroic needs "goon rules" but hey, they're there for people to enjoy them and that's the real point.

Let us know what you think if you choose to get them!