Winning Folks over to Hero System

Well I was looking for a topic to roll with before the end of the month and I think I finally found something...well again.

Now for those of you who don't know me, or haven't followed what I do, you should know that I love the Hero System.  Its as far as I'm concerned the best game system out there, it just takes some getting used to.

But the question is how do I win people over to this system?  I'm pretty sure I've done this before infact, but I need to put something on my blog and this is probably the best thing I can do at this time.


Now before I get started you all should know that Hero Games, the company that makes all their books in physical form, and in PDF.  Yes you can get a legit copy of a game book from them and use it on your tablet or computer.  And the cost for the PDF is cheaper than the physical copy.  Moreover they have bundles where you can get not just the physical copy but a digital copy as well.  But the system also has a character generator too called Hero Designer - and yes it's been around for years.


You've all seen the character's I've posted on here but looking at a character doesn't provide context on the game system, at least not unless I break down how things work.

For the most part the aspects of character creation are straight forward in what does what.

What people often want to know is how things work, the aspects of how character's function in this system, and that means combat and skill use.  Building a character isn't a big deal as point spending is fairly straight forward in most things.  The complications come when you start adding in "advantages", "limitations", and "adders".  But the books are fairly easy to follow on dealing with this, and if you're using Hero Designer the steps on building your character are made even more simple.

Now let's get to the meat of the system that is what people want to know about before they go and buy any books.

• SPEED:  Combat is broken up with a number of "turns".  Each Turn is made up of a number of segments called phases.  Each player gets to make 2 Half Phase actions when their turn comes up (their segment).  After 12 segments or phases it ends the turn and a new turn starts.  A character's speed influences how many actions the can take in that turn.  For example a normal human will often have a Speed Score of 2 to 3.  This means that in 1 turn a normal person can only act 2 or 3 times.  Now superheroes for example will have a higher speed.  Bricks will have a speed of 4-5.  Most blaster and martial arts types will have a speed of 5-6.  And then speedsters will have a speed score of 6 at a low, but going on up to that of a 12.
• COMBAT VALUE:  This is is how a character does combat.  A character will have a score for physical attacks and defense, and then one for then mental counterparts.  The base for this is 3.  Now there is a chart in the 2nd book that helps to quickly figure out if you hit with an attack roll.  But what do you do to make an attack?  In this system you don't roll a d20.  Instead you roll 3d6 and the object is to roll low - not high.  The formula is simple:  Attackers OCV Score + 11 - 3d6 = the DCV the attacker hits.  A blaster type character might have an OCV (Offensive Combat Value) and DCV (Defensive Combat Value) of 10.  This means that we have a 21 and subtract our 3d6 roll.  Now lets say we roll a 12.  That means we hit a DCV of 9 or higher.  Other factors to your roll are penalties, if you have skills that add to your OCV of DCV.
• STUN & BODY & END & REC:  A character's ability to stay healthy and in a fight is based upon their Stun and Body staying at full.  Stun that reaches 0 results in a character falling unconscious.  If Body hits 0 then the character also falls unconscious, but is not dead, a character is only dead once their Body falls below a certain point.  Endurance or END, is used to track the energy the character has for exerting themselves or using their powers.  Finally there is Recovery or REC, this determines how much STUN and END the character can recover.  Typically a character can gain their Recovery at the end of 12 segments or at the risk of being hit easily they can attempt to take a recovery on their turn.
• DAMAGE & PHYSICAL/ENERGY DEFENSE:  Once you hit with an attack it's time to roll damage.  Now things are not that hard to understand here, but can be a bit complex once certain factors are added in.  Damage itself is broken up into Normal Damage, and Killing Damage.  Normal damage is figured like this.  The amount rolled on the dice is "Stun" damage.  Body damage (the part that can kill a character) is then figured a bit differently.  A roll of 1 is 0 Body, while a 2-5 is 1 Body, and a 6 is 2 body.  Thus if your rolled 12d6 and had all 3's your Body damage would be 12.  Now to resist damage characters have PD & ED (Physical & Energy Defense.  The score you have here allows you to reduce the damage you take.  So if you have PD 10 and you took 20pts of Normal damage (with 10 Body in damage) then that means that your STUN is reduced by 10 (not 20) and you take no Body Damage.  On the other hand killing damage works differently.  Each die rolled for killing damage is treated normally, thus a 4 is 4pts of killing damage.  However here you apply a multiplier to the damage you roll to figure out the STUN damage taken.  The roll is typical 1/2d6 but the rules allow for this to be tweaked for either a 1d6-1 roll, or a flat x3 roll.  Here you roll the extra die to determine the stun multiplier and then multiply your initial roll to that.  Thus 12 body in damage would garner an average of 36 Stun.  But there is a problem when you apply your PD or ED against killing damage.  It doesn't apply to the Body of the damage, just the STUN.  Now in order for your PD/ED to resist killing damage you have to buy powers, or advantages that offer you resistance to your PD & ED.  Once that is in place your character is better adept at taking the deadly attacks.  Things still get a bit complex once attacks and defenses add in advantages like Armor Piercing, Penetrating, and Hardened.  Then there are some power defenses that may reduce the damage you take by a percentage or it may even completely negate a portion of the damage by reducing the dice rolled.
• OTHER DAMAGE TYPES:  In the game there are other ways to take damage.  Mental attacks often do mental damage and require a specific defense to reduce the damage, as well as to make the attacks and avoid being affected.  Then there are other types of powers that do damage that the character can't defend against at all unless they take a power defense against it.  typically the damage from these is either applied to a primary Characteristic (like your Strength), or it applies to your END or just your STUN.
• SKILLS:  In this system skills work differently than in other systems.  First off this system has the largest array of skills over that of any other system...though the GM can decide to make a shorter list if they want to.  Skills all have a base roll that is figured off of a Characteristic. Now figuring a skills roll is simple.  You have a score and that is what you roll under.  To figure this roll its 9 + (Characteristic/5).  Thus if I have an INT of 15 then by skill roll score would be marked down as "11-" (that means 11 or less).  Now add to this the fact that you can improve your skills by buying up the roll or buying separate bonus.  This is in the form of a +1.  So our 11- that gets a +1 to it would now be a 12-.  You then just roll 3d6 and hope for a roll less than the score.  But what if your score is 21-?  Well that means the anything over 18 is a bonus that helps to cancel out any penalties you may have to deal with for the roll.  For example if your in a magic using game your GM may want you to build your spells with a skill roll required to use them.  As such you will have a penalty to your rolls.  Thus having a score of 21 or higher is beneficial for being able to counter the penalties for using the spell.
• BASES & VEHICLES:  Just like how character's are built off points, so too are bases and vehicles that a character can use.  Essentially this makes them like characters too.  You also have perks that you can buy that essentially grant you specific points used to build these things, unless the GM prefers to let you earn them or buy them with money instead of XP.
• COMPLICATIONS:  Now in the previous edition of the game there were Disadvantages but in the current 6th Edition of the game they have been renamed.  Characters will have to have a number of "matching" complications.  Now these do not grant extra points for building a character but are just a requirement for them.  This can change however if the GM wishes.  These add things like weaknesses to a character, or mental problems, obligations that they have to deal with.  Sometimes you can spend xp to buy off these complications.

Now the system makes use of just d6's.  This does help keep things simple and more or less easy to deal with.  Adding up die rolls can be done whoever you like but the game system advises grouping your die rolls together into groups of 10 or 12.  This makes it easy to count them when you're rolling something along the lines of 12d6 or more.

The real appeal of the system is the ability to craft any character you can think of so long as the rules allow it.  Now there are restrictions on how powers are built, like you can't put Armor Piercing on the Damage Reduction power.  But its through powers that you can build not just superhuman abilities like shooting lasers from your eyes, or turning your skin to stone, its also how you craft physical weapons like a Long Sword, an M203 Grenade Launcher, Power Armor, and so forth.

Gear built with the system can either be one power, or it can be multiple powers that work together to create a whole object.  For example if you were playing in Champions and wanted a Power Armor using hero like Ironman, then you would need powers for flight, energy blasts, the defenses of the armor, life support, enhanced senses and so forth.  These would be built under a single group where you apply a limitation upon everything built in that group.  You could even go a step further and have the systems tied together where if one system were to be taken offline it takes the whole suit offline.

On the other hand, lets say you want to play a swordsman who wears full plate armor and can cast a few spells that enhance his ability to fight.  That's easily doable in this system unlike in other systems like D&D.

Yes all of this sounds great, right?

But there is a down side.  First off if you're not using Hero Designer and are figuring things out on paper then making characters is going to take you a while.  This is the downside for both GM's and Players alike.  Unlike in other systems, making characters here is time consuming as there is a lot of math involved.  It can take a few days because of this.  And if your a GM and need NPC's it can take longer.  Now some of the source books do offer pre-made NPC's and villains for you to use, and this saves a bit of time.  But for the most part if you're the GM then most of the work load is on you.  And don't let this scare you off.  There are people who post things online (like myself) who can help with character creation, so don't feel like you have to do everything yourself either.


I hope that some of you found this helpful and if you want to know more just ask me, I'll gladly tell you more about the system.  So either comment below or reach out to me on Facebook.