Quote from: The Butcher;532411In three words? Front-loaded complexity.

The heart of the matter right here.

Quote from: danbuter;532413A character generator would help, but it still would have problems, unless you could go in and tick boxes or something to allow or disallow skills and powers that don't fit the genre of game you're running.

Both GURPS and HERO have programs to create characters, and there are many free character generators on the Internet to be found.

Quote from: James Gillen;532471The Hero Designer program is good.
The designer of Hero Designer has a lot of bugs that need to be worked out.  

JG

Indeed!  HD is frackin' bomb for HERO players and GMs.

My friends and I recently played a 6-hour session of 6e Fantasy HERO without computers, and only using dice as counters.  Once our characters were created and the NPCs' stats assigned, it ran smoothiy... well, until beer started affecting math skills.

Quote from: B.T.;532482No, they're not.  GURPS is awful.  Haven't played HERO but from what I've heard, it is sub-par.  If the designers want to make GURPS work, they need to drastically simplify the system and then create genre-specific splats with self-contained rules that can optionally be grafted onto other games.  GURPS Fantasy Heartbreaker should be a completely separate game from GURPS Space Opera in the way that Werewolf is a completely separate game from Vampire.

Fuck GURPS.

So what is so complicated about any of that? A Runequest or D&D 4e walk through is no less complex. The virtue of GURPS that real life concept have direct analogues. The faster character moves first, you attack, and the target defends, and so on.

GURPS Problem is one of presentation not system. A product implementing GURPS is what needed.

Quote from: Caesar Slaad;532497The reason that I think they have a popularity problem -- and the reason I quit Hero -- is because making a well designed character is above the time and knowledge investment that many players are willing and able to put into it.

I loved Hero's ability to craft whatever ability I wanted to see in the game, but I could tell some of my players struggled and really didn't "get" the power system.

When I run Hero I ask the novices what they want for their characters and work it out for them. Eventually they learn how it works for their characters and then after that they learn enough to things on their own.

I started running a campaign after a lapse of a decade, using 5th edition, and got Hero Designer. That software and the Until Database of Powers have made everything a snap.

However it is a steep learning curve.

My experience with both GURPS and Hero has convinced me is that

A) generic system are fine with the right presentation.
B) you need a single book implementation of a popular genre to serve as a intro.

You know what I notice? The prevalent theme in this thread is character creation is too involved.  Hate to bring another game into this but the prevalent theme for 5e is that the playtesters are saying over and over is KISS, I wonder if they have a point ....I'll be over here thinking on it.....

To be fair I blank out if character creation takes more than 30 minutes. And that means for any point based system, my patience is far shorter concerning class based systems and their ilk..just sittin' here in the corner don't mind me...

Edit: Traveller. Burning Wheel, and the old game Swords and Sorcery/Castles and Crusades or Warhammer gets a pass because the creation of a character is a game in itself.

I had the front-loaded problem when Mutants & Masterminds 2e came out. 1e was a breeze to me and then Kenson amped up the complexity and my head started to spin.

Quote from: The ButcherIn three words? Front-loaded complexity. Once you're done with chargen the game runs smooth, but God help you through your first (and sometimes second and third) character sheet.

This.

Quote from: The Butcher;532411In three words? Front-loaded complexity.

Only in Part. And mostly for this site which tends towards front-loaded designs. IME with HERO groups the GM handles character generation for the players (with their input) meaning that the front-loading exists only for the one person who in general enjoys its. For the players, it's one of the smoothest gaming systems around.

Last decade HERO of one of the more successful systems. Winner of a Best RPG of all Time award (forget which one sadly) and a constant on the game shelves. This despite the fact it never had a compelling game setting or campaign support, both serious drawbacks.



There are other important factors in it's fading from the scene.

A breaking point came when Steven Long decided for 6th edition that he was now God and that he would change major sections of the Rules (including dropping support for maps and minis) and go for a rather horible art style taken from Champion's Online (a IMO failed MMORPG).

Add in the lack of campaign support, the absence of a good setting, edition change burnout, and you have today's state. New players aren't willing to try such a shallow offering and older players are generally running 5th Edition.

It's a sad thing.




GURPS is a different story, and I can only speak for my reaction to the game.

It was always Stat heavy, which resulted in the inability to create certain character concepts in a balanced way. That always killed the game for me.

I think it was successful not for it's system so much, but for its resource books for settings and eras. Fine stuff there.

Not just front-loaded complexity, but boring front-loaded complexity.  I can handle a complicated chargen system if the game can make it interesting - which, for me, usually means a mix of point-buy and randomized elements, but even straight point-buy can be fun.  HERO couldn't achieve that for me, nor GURPS.

Quote from: gleichman;532556A breaking point came when Steven Long decided for 6th edition that he was now God and that he would change major sections of the Rules (including dropping support for maps and minis) and go for a rather horible art style taken from Champion's Online (a IMO failed MMORPG).

Surely Champions Online has given Hero more exposure than most other games outside D&D ever get. CO might not have been huge in MMO terms, but your still looking at tens of thousands of players who will have tried it, maybe even a hundred thousand. Most games would kill for that kind of indirect advertising.

And just to prove the point, in our group one guy started running published Champions adventures for us based on familiarity he gained with the setting playing CO. However we are using ICONS for the system.

Quote from: This Guy;532585Not just front-loaded complexity, but boring front-loaded complexity.  I can handle a complicated chargen system if the game can make it interesting - which, for me, usually means a mix of point-buy and randomized elements, but even straight point-buy can be fun.  HERO couldn't achieve that for me, nor GURPS.

I kind of agree with your take.  Whatcha think of White Wolf?

Quote from: gleichman;532556Last decade HERO of one of the more successful systems. Winner of a Best RPG of all Time award (forget which one sadly) and a constant on the game shelves. This despite the fact it never had a compelling game setting or campaign support, both serious drawbacks.



There are other important factors in it's fading from the scene.

A breaking point came when Steven Long decided for 6th edition that he was now God and that he would change major sections of the Rules (including dropping support for maps and minis) and go for a rather horible art style taken from Champion's Online (a IMO failed MMORPG).

IIRC, Cryptic actually bought the Champions IP, which was licensed back to Hero Games  so using assets from CO might have been cheap and convenient.

Game's a bit rubbish, though. CoX is better at being a supers MMO and DCU:O is better as an online multiplayer brawler game with superheroes; CO sits in an uncomfortable position, not quite as good at being either and with no real identity of it's own.

When I ran Mutants & Masterminds 2e, I bought one of the "Instant Heroes" books, because getting six players to generate playable 150pt PC's in an evening was just a nightmare I couldn't be bothered with.

Quote from: Soylent Green;532592Surely Champions Online has given Hero more exposure than most other games outside D&D ever get.

CO was never tied to the HERO System mechanics, only the medicore Champions setting (with much of the original settings edition being off limits).

Even that tie was weak, as they changed the appearance and art style of most of the characters in ways that made them basically new creations.

HERO never got any boost from CO as a result. It was just impossible to see CO as a computer port of HERO or even the Champion Setting for those who knew the history of the pnp game; and for those who didn't- it was something completely new.

Quote from: gleichman;532556I think it was successful not for it's system so much, but for its resource books for settings and eras. Fine stuff there.

I never could really embrace the system, but the sourcebooks are pure gold. I will pick up a GURPS sourcebook and be able to apply it any game that I currently have in my home. Hell, come to think of it, Robert Zubrin gave GURPS: Mars his personal seal of approval.

GURPS needs a new "edition". There should be an online repository that you subscribe to. All the fiddly bits would be there. Let's call it "GURPS toolkit". This toolkit will include a character generator, NPC generator, power creator, and allow customization of the various "parts" of the toolkit all stored in a repository.

Templates are no longer collections of stats with optional choices. Characters are created by making conceptual choices, in order, to come to the "finished character". Each step below represents a series of "templates" created and included in a setting book.

1.Choose species
2.Choose a "home world" or nation (determines some skills)
3.Choose culture (determines some skills)
4.Choose upbringing (determines some skills)
5.Choose education or training (in phases based on years in, like a life-path or pick and choose and define time in) (determines some skills)
6.Choose profession (at game start) (determines some skills)
7.Choose social standing
8.Choose important events (these will determine contacts, allies, various disadvantage choices)
9.Have a handful of customization options that help to define the setting and genre

Then, SJGames needs to commission the creation of 3 settings. They should have a STRONG focus on adventures. The question "What do the characters do?" should be easily discernible from the book. I would suggest Fantasy, Modern Horror, and Space Opera. These are NOT genre books. They are complete RPGs powered by the GURPS toolkit.

Each book translates the toolkit into a step-by-step character creation method and includes a customized "combat and adventuring" section, distilling the rules down to what those players need for that setting. The GM section will include advice on building adventures around the choices the players make in character creation.

The "combat and adventuring" and "character templates" sections will be a publishing template, customizable with the online tool, so players can create "setting books" of home brew or converted settings and tailor the toolkit to a specific use. You pick and choose systems, power and advantage builds, spells, skills, etc. and slot them into the stepped templates of character creation.

The online toolkit becomes a repository for power builds, sub-systems, optional rules, etc. Players and publishers can share ideas, and the system should facilitate a method by which "editors" from SJGames can approve "official" or sanctioned builds.

Then, a license needs to be created where publishers can use the GURPS toolkit to create similar setting books. Only approved rules and bits from the online toolkit are "legal". The publisher must use the toolkit to built the "ruleset" of the book and submit that to SJGames for approval (using the online toolkit system, so editors work within the toolkit system to approve "rulesets" for publishing).

Instead of a generic system, you have a toolkit by which you create actual RPGs that people can digest and play.

Quote from: Machinegun Blue;532500I didn't feel like shelling out $75 for Gurps 4e when I already had a shelf full of 3e stuff. Especially for two full color, glossy hardcovers.

Technically the " 3/e " stuff already IS GURPS 4/e compatible.

In the Update booklet that comes weith the GM screen package - there is a simple conversion system for 3/e into 4/e.
(Converts a hell of a lot easier than 3rd/e D&D to 4th/e D&D - which is practically impossible)


SO......looked at that way you already have plenty of 4th edition GURPS material.

- Ed C.



Oh and B.T. is full of crap......