Nolgroth Posted October 11, 2014 Report Share Posted October 11, 2014 Yeah you can make Hero very lethal and dangerous for characters, but somehow the rules don't lend themselves well to hopeless fear and that sense that you're overmatched and in danger of your life at all times. Actually that is a role playing issue. I have yet to meet a single player who was willing to give up the power fantasy in favor of playing a character who is vulnerable and afraid. Nobody wants to play Wilber Wimberly, the Doomed Heir to the Wimberly House. They want to run Ser Perfectius the Shining Paladin of Holy Baddassery or Nightblade Shadowstep, who is so stealthy that he can sneak through a castle of guards during broad daylight to pick the supposedly unpickable lock to the impenetrable vault; while twenty guards stand around it. I could name a couple of other over the top examples, but I believe you get my drift. I've tried to run horror games and it just hasn't worked. When I add the trappings of horror to another genre, however, I have had a lot more success. Ravenloft is a good example of combining Gothic Horror with D&D fantasy. Even then though, you have to be careful. All of the advice from the early horror products talk about robbing characters of the things that make them powerful in order to instill fear. All it ever did for my players was create resentment. Nobody likes to build themselves up, only to have all that hard work mean nothing. In video game parlance, it is the cutscene that robs you of all the powerups you've spent all game accumulating. It doesn't create dramatic tension, it fosters a sense of frustration. If you can find a balance in there, much fun can be had. I probably took that response way too far. What can I say, horror is a tricky role playing subject. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zslane Posted October 11, 2014 Report Share Posted October 11, 2014 How then does one explain the apparent success and longevity of the Call of Cthulhu RPG? If played correctly, player characters don't last very long, and players must learn to extract satisfaction from something other than long-term character progression (it is perhaps a good thing that the Chaosium BRP system doesn't have levels for characters to become fixated upon). One would think that fans of horror, understanding and enjoying the genre as they do, would join a horror campaign with appropriate expectations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tasha Posted October 12, 2014 Report Share Posted October 12, 2014 It's more of a question of what haven't I used the system for.High FantasyMedium FantasyLow FantasyHarn HeroSuper Heroes (Powerlevels from Low to Cosmic)Super AgentsMecha Pilots in MechaPulp High AdventureSteampunkModern High Adventure (Hollow World)CyberpunkWild WestSuper Agent VillainsSci FiTravellerStar WarsStarGate SG-1 (We were that universe's SG-1)Urban FantasyOthers I have forgottenI want to runStar TrekStar Hero (Homebrew Universe/Galaxy)Glorantha (I think)Fantasy Cyberpunk (Shadowrun, but different world and background)Urban Fantasy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nolgroth Posted October 12, 2014 Report Share Posted October 12, 2014 How then does one explain the apparent success and longevity of the Call of Cthulhu RPG? If played correctly, player characters don't last very long, and players must learn to extract satisfaction from something other than long-term character progression (it is perhaps a good thing that the Chaosium BRP system doesn't have levels for characters to become fixated upon). One would think that fans of horror, understanding and enjoying the genre as they do, would join a horror campaign with appropriate expectations. I love Call of Cthulhu. It is a great reference book tacked onto a workable game mechanic. I even like aspects of the game mechanic a lot. The one game I ran with it was actually one of my better games, but it wasn't horror. It was weird fiction in the vein of pulp x-files (which is sort of what Weird Tales was really) but it was not played with the intent of creating horror or scares. It was a mystery and a ghost story and it went over great with my group. It just wasn't horror. Perhaps your statement about extracting something other than long-term progression has merit in my case. Every player that I've played with is in it for the long haul. Ironically, they could play Paranoia (with its morbidly high death count) but anything "serious" was going to end up being a campaign. And maybe there are fans of horror who are so into genre simulation that they get a kick out of their characters being victims. I personally haven't met any. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher R Taylor Posted October 13, 2014 Author Report Share Posted October 13, 2014 When we play Call of Cthulhu we only play short bursts of games, just a few sessions. It doesn't seem like a long campaign sort of game heh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tiger Posted October 13, 2014 Report Share Posted October 13, 2014 Lets see 1) Champions 2) Fantasy Hero 3) Traveller Style Sci-Fi 4) Spies 5) Cops 6) Wild West 7 Star Trek STNG 8) Gamma Hero (Gamma World Theme) 9) Super Villain camapign 10) Warhammer 40k (Imperial Guard Squad) 11) Teen Heroes 12) justice Inc/Pulp Hero I think that's all of them Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigdamnhero Posted October 13, 2014 Report Share Posted October 13, 2014 I've only ever played Call of Cthulu for short bursts, and don't think I'd enjoy playing it as a longterm campaign. But I know a ton of people who love it for that. Different strokes and all that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drunkonduty Posted October 16, 2014 Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 I've used HERO for: Super Heroes - A lot. All about the standard recommended power level. Pulp Adventures - worked great, had lots of fun the one short campaign I ran. Want to do it again. Jane Austen's Cthulhu - was working pretty well for a couple of the players but the other 3 just weren't getting it. Fantasy - mid-level starting power doing the murder hobo thing. I've considered using it for: Legend of the Five Rings. Most of the L5R schtick can be done pretty easily in HERO but I've been unable to come up with a good mechanic to replace the L5R dueling mechanic. (and yes, suggestions are welcome. ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carmachu Posted October 16, 2014 Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 How then does one explain the apparent success and longevity of the Call of Cthulhu RPG? If played correctly, player characters don't last very long, and players must learn to extract satisfaction from something other than long-term character progression (it is perhaps a good thing that the Chaosium BRP system doesn't have levels for characters to become fixated upon). One would think that fans of horror, understanding and enjoying the genre as they do, would join a horror campaign with appropriate expectations. because you go into the game knowing that you are the weakling vs the all powerful beings from beyond. No matter what you become, they are beyond you. its about surviving, not winning. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher R Taylor Posted October 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 The Japanese Fantasy Hero game I played in long ago at a place called the Game Alliance of Salem (ha, ha, GAS... yeah) had a duelling system for shukenja to use. Each character would split off into their astral forms, and would use their Ego roll to battle. Each round of combat was a skill vs skill battle, but as you described what you were doing and how, the GM would assign modifiers and tell you what your opponent was doing. In practice it ended up being very much like the magic duel in Disney's Sword In The Stone cartoon. The winner applied the amount they won by in damage to the opponent's stun total, until one or the other was knocked out. There were no defenses and the battle took place in seconds; basically one turn of astral combat was 1 segment real time. It played out pretty well but when I tried to implement it, a clever player came up with a spell that granted him +10 ego roll only for astral combat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Goodwin Posted October 16, 2014 Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 The Japanese Fantasy Hero game I played in long ago at a place called the Game Alliance of Salem (ha, ha, GAS... yeah) I miss that place, so bad. Do you ever see anyone from there? There were no defenses and the battle took place in seconds; basically one turn of astral combat was 1 segment real time. It played out pretty well but when I tried to implement it, a clever player came up with a spell that granted him +10 ego roll only for astral combat. I think part of how the original GM handled that was that all of the spells had to be based on the ones in the original Bushido game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher R Taylor Posted October 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 I heard Cam died, but other than that I have no contact with anyone but you. The GAS was the ultimate gaming club, and set the template for what I have always wanted to set up again. A dedicated place that's open every day, games running almost all day, every day, and tons of friendly folks. Yeah some were sort of... socially awkward, to put it mildly, but the games were ready and fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Goodwin Posted October 16, 2014 Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 I heard Cam died, but other than that I have no contact with anyone but you. Yeah, I'm friends with Mike S. on Facebook, but can't seen to find anyone else. The GAS was the ultimate gaming club, and set the template for what I have always wanted to set up again. A dedicated place that's open every day, games running almost all day, every day, and tons of friendly folks. Yeah some were sort of... socially awkward, to put it mildly, but the games were ready and fun. There absolutely does need to be something like it. I too had the idea when I still lived in Salem, but never had any way to make it happen. I've thought about it since then, but... same thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher R Taylor Posted October 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2014 If I was able to earn enough writing I'd do it with some of my money. There are enough gamers around here to keep it going and a very small dues would help keep it open. I'd work on setting up some vending machines too, and wifi. There's not really much else you need besides lights, tables, and chairs. Some shelves and gaming books handy would be nice too. There are some really nice gaming spaces in town now, but a club would be quite welcome, I expect. If I had a lot of money I'd set up other stuff too like a mini golf course, old school arcade, a computer gaming room, etc Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drunkonduty Posted October 17, 2014 Report Share Posted October 17, 2014 Ego vs. Ego roll... That could be a good base for it. I admit I'm more keen on the iaijutsu duel than the shukenja duel. But if I want to GM this eventually I really need to think about the shukenja too. Thanks, I shall ponder how to use it in my copious spare time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigdamnhero Posted October 18, 2014 Report Share Posted October 18, 2014 because you go into the game knowing that you are the weakling vs the all powerful beings from beyond. No matter what you become, they are beyond you. its about surviving, not winning. I thought it was less about surviving and more about who can die/go insane the most spectacularly. But I've only ever played CoC in one-shots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dino Posted October 18, 2014 Report Share Posted October 18, 2014 I am currently running a Fading Suns game on the Hero System. I have run just about anything on Hero in the past. The only things I feel Hero's not good for are games that are heavily tied to their game mechanics, such as Shadowrun's use of essence/force, or if it make a distinction between mental and physical characteristics like in Eclipse Phase or In Nomine. If it requires that I add characteristics or game mechanics to Hero then I'm not inclined to run it on Hero at all. I guess I'm a purist that way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigdamnhero Posted October 19, 2014 Report Share Posted October 19, 2014 The only things I feel Hero's not good for are games that are heavily tied to their game mechanics, such as Shadowrun's use of essence/force, or if it make a distinction between mental and physical characteristics like in Eclipse Phase or In Nomine. If it requires that I add characteristics or game mechanics to Hero then I'm not inclined to run it on Hero at all. I guess I'm a purist that way. Yeah I've played/run games where we added on Characteristics, like a Force stat for a Star Wars game, but it always feels kindof tacked on as an afterthought. Other thoughts on why Call Of Cthulu-esque games don't work well in Hero IMX. Many of Hero's core assumptions are based on the premise that the PCs are...well, heroic; so CoC does a better job of capturing the "normal Joe in an abnormal situation" vibe that's key to that sub-genre. Also Hero has a bit less granularity at that level, and it gets boring when all the PCs' characteristics fall in the 8-13 range. Plus playing Hero at that level can feel like driving a Ferrari around in 1st gear. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher R Taylor Posted October 19, 2014 Author Report Share Posted October 19, 2014 The only time adding a stat has worked for me is the use of "Mana" as a stat; it feels right in fantasy games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghost-angel Posted October 20, 2014 Report Share Posted October 20, 2014 Let's see... Cyberpunk Sword & Sorcery Fantasy Low Magic Fantasy High Fantasy High Powered Fantasy (like Atlantean Age, only we were playing Greek Demi-Gods) Superheroic (silver, bronze, & iron age styles, never really had a chance to play a Golden age style game) High Powered Superheroic (700+ points) Teen Superheroes Deadlands Western (no weirdness like Deadlands) Time Travel Dimension Hopping Post-Apocalyptic Horror (short lived, online game, fell apart before it got appropriately horror-esque though) Urban Fantasy (it lasted 8 sessions before a GM switch turned it from Spooky Monsters to Get Bigger Guns and immediately fell apart) Science Fiction (both a very straight Space Opera and a more Star Trekish setting, and a few other 'Star Hero' styles) War Hero (specifically WW2 Hero) Modern Spy Hero (well, it was pitched as James Bond, it ended up as A-Team... because Players) Edit: forgot one short (6 session) Steampunk game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigdamnhero Posted October 21, 2014 Report Share Posted October 21, 2014 Urban Fantasy (it lasted 8 sessions before a GM switch turned it from Spooky Monsters to Get Bigger Guns and immediately fell apart) That perfectly describes my first-last-and-probably-only attempt to run a Horror campaign, except it wasn't a GM switch so much as "GM switched subgenres when he saw it wasn't working." Oh, and in my case it ran for 7 years, cuz everyone liked Get Bigger Guns! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ghost-angel Posted October 21, 2014 Report Share Posted October 21, 2014 Sadly ours was a case of the players wanting a Spooky Monster game, and we were supposed to rotate GMs, the second GM up can only run a Get Bigger Guns campaign (in any genre): which he does extremely well, but that players wanted a non-gun-fight game for a change. To be fair, it wasn't entirely him - real life got in the way, but we kind of let it do so instead of trying to work around it, or even say "we'll pick this up in a few months", the group just sort of stopped talking about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted October 21, 2014 Report Share Posted October 21, 2014 Westerns (mostly mundane) Special Forces (Danger Int) (very briefly) Star Hero, on an approximately Alien Legion power level--somewhere between Traveller and full space opera, with many aliens Cyberpunk Dark Sun Generic AD&D Extremely low powered fantasy (converted players to Hero stats...when I say "low powered" I mean it) High-powered Kung Fu/Wu Xia Low-powered Kung Fu/Oriental Adventures Martial dueling tournaments cf. Mortal Kombat Low-powered Supers (Dark Champions) "Mystery" Supers (Players don't see character sheets) Typical 250-275 pt. Champions Supers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
culhwch Posted October 29, 2014 Report Share Posted October 29, 2014 I am currently running a Fading Suns game on the Hero System. I have run just about anything on Hero in the past. The only things I feel Hero's not good for are games that are heavily tied to their game mechanics, such as Shadowrun's use of essence/force, or if it make a distinction between mental and physical characteristics like in Eclipse Phase or In Nomine. If it requires that I add characteristics or game mechanics to Hero then I'm not inclined to run it on Hero at all. I guess I'm a purist that way. This is why I gave up on my In Nomine-to-Hero conversion years ago..although I've recently pulled out the books again to see how I would do it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher R Taylor Posted November 1, 2014 Author Report Share Posted November 1, 2014 I'm hearing rumors that a Traveler Hero conversion for 6th edition might be on the horizon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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