Steve Long

Re: BOOKS OF THE UNDEAD: MUMMIES Now Available! That is absolutely a travesty. It was supposed to take double your money!

At last it can be told! I am about to inflict more fiction on the world. Woot! My latest story, "The Two Fires," will appear in the anthology Thunder On The Battlefield, by Seventh Star Press. This anthology focuses on Swords And Sorcery stories, which I know many of you enjoy. My story does something pretty unusual for S&S: it has a priest as the protagonist. Hopefully folx will enjoy it because I have plenty of other ideas for stories about this guy. The editor tells me they had so many quality submissions they're expanding the anthology to two volumes. I don't know yet whether I'll be in Vol. 1 or Vol. 2. Currently TotB is slated for a June release. I'll keep y'all posted on availability and other developments.

Re: BOOKS OF THE UNDEAD: MUMMIES Now Available! JG -- nope, I couldn't get the rights.

Re: For your South Seas Gold Monkey Tales Nice find, Celt!

Re: Smart Missils and summon Whether it's rules abuse really isn't a question I can answer -- that's up to your GM. Different GMs react to a given power in different ways. Assuming the missiles aren't doing ridiculous amounts of damage, personally I'd allow something like this -- it sounds like it has a lot of potential for humor and roleplaying. But some GMs are stricter than others. If you haven't already, try posting this on the Discussion board. See what a wide spectrum of GMs and players think.

Re: unusual senses and range There's no specific rules restricting the range of Senses -- after all, under the right conditions the unaided human eye can see a match struck 50 miles away (at least according to an article I once read). But the Range Modifier applies to PER Rolls just like it applies to Ranged Attack Rolls, so there's a practical limit. Even with positive modifiers for things like the size/intensity of the object to be perceived, sooner or later the Range Modifier essentially makes it impossible to succeed with a PER Roll.

Re: BOOKS OF THE UNDEAD: MUMMIES Now Available! True! I didn't list that (or, say, Ninja Jamboree) because those are Hero Games products I wrote back when I was formally employed by the company. The list above is the stuff I get the money for myself.

Re: Is there any way to get more Mind Control? The second roll "replaces" the first. They don't add together. If you wanted a form of Mind Control that could "add" in the way you're talking about, look at buying Mind Control with the Cumulative Advantage. You might also consider posting that part of the question on the Discussion board (if you haven't already), since clever HERO gamers out there may think up some other good answers.

Re: Healing and expanded effect I’m going to rephrase your question in a more generic sense so that everyone will understand what’s going on. If I mis-state what I think you’re asking, please post a follow-up. Q: Suppose a character buys Healing with the Expanded Effect Advantage so that it applies to two Characteristics simultaneously (say, BODY and STUN). A situation may arise where a character suffers some loss of Characteristic A and not Characteristic B (for example, he takes STUN damage but no BODY). If the character uses Healing and obtains the maximum result to Heal Characteristic A, can he later use Healing to its full effect on Characteristic B? A: As a default rule, no. The Healing roll applies equally to both Characteristics, as described on 6E1 142. The fact that the character who lost Characteristic A didn’t actually need any Healing on Characteristic B is just his tough luck; the effects of the Expanded Effect Advantage can’t be “split up” in the way the question suggests. But as always, if a GM wants Healing to work a little differently in his campaign, he’s free to tweak the rules to suit himself.

Re: Barrier vs. Tunnelling Not necessarily. It depends on how thick the Barrier is. If the Barrier's PD is less than or equal to the PD that Tunneling can "dig" through, if the Barrier's thickness is less than or equal to a Half Move with Tunneling, a character can Tunnel through it as a Half Move; if it's thicker than that, it will take at least one Full Move, and possibly longer.

Re: Regeneration Question You can certainly apply a Limitation to a "naked Adder," similar to the way you can with naked Advantages. In this case the simplest thing is just to apply the standard Extra Time value, but if the GM prefers he could certainly have you calculate the "difference" between the normal Regeneration time and the Extra Time to derive a lesser Limitation value the way you suggest. The situation gets trickier when a character only wants a Limitation to work in a restricted way. The easiest way to deal with this is to apply the Limitation to the base Power (Regeneration, in this case), but at a lesser value (thus, from some perspectives, creating a sort of “limited Limitation,” if you see what I mean). Or if the GM wanted to be stricter, he could have you pay for the difference between the two Powers (in this case Regeneration (Hour) and Regeneration (Day)), and only apply the Limitation to that difference in cost.

My latest PDF of undead monsters is now available! It features a couple dozen mummies perfect for all sorts of Fantasy, Superheroes, and even Science Fiction adventure: Mummies And of course my other fine PDFs are still available as well. Please check 'em out! Acquitaine Acid Magic Lightning Magic Ranger Magic Pestilence Magic Lava Magic Expanded Warrior-Magery Desert Magic Books Of The Undead, Vol. 1: Skeletons Books Of The Undead, Vol. 2: Zombies Books Of The Undead, Vol. 3: Ghosts Legions Of Hell

My latest PDF of undead monsters is now available! It features a couple dozen mummies perfect for all sorts of Fantasy, Superheroes, and even Science Fiction adventure: Mummies And of course my other fine PDFs are still available as well. Please check 'em out! Acquitaine Acid Magic Lightning Magic Ranger Magic Pestilence Magic Lava Magic Expanded Warrior-Magery Desert Magic Books Of The Undead, Vol. 1: Skeletons Books Of The Undead, Vol. 2: Zombies Books Of The Undead, Vol. 3: Ghosts Legions Of Hell

My latest PDF of undead monsters is now available! It features a couple dozen mummies perfect for all sorts of Fantasy, Superheroes, and even Science Fiction adventure: Mummies And of course my other fine PDFs are still available as well. Please check 'em out! Acquitaine Acid Magic Lightning Magic Ranger Magic Pestilence Magic Lava Magic Expanded Warrior-Magery Desert Magic Books Of The Undead, Vol. 1: Skeletons Books Of The Undead, Vol. 2: Zombies Books Of The Undead, Vol. 3: Ghosts Legions Of Hell

Re: END Reserve See 6E1 206, under "Adjustment Powers."

Re: Swords and Sorcery Setting It all depends on the nature and context of the interaction. "Meeting" a god is one thing. Frequently calling on them and negotiating with them is another. As with all things, it's a continuum. I discuss this in the "radial categories" blog post I linked above. I agree that the motivations of the protagonists are important, but I wouldn't consider them the only (or even the most important) determinant. The setting/events, the magic level, and similar factors are, from my perspective at least, crucial considerations.

Re: Swords and Sorcery Setting Agreed. I think what tips it over the edge for me are (a) the frequent interactions with gods and similar beings, which is definitely more a feature of High Fantasy, and ( the presence of fairly powerful spells and magic items, again an HF feature rather than one of S&S. Though to be sure, S&S can feature characters who use magic. It just has to be done in the right way. I think Marrion Zimmer Bradley's stories of Lythande of the Blue Star are an excellent example.

Re: Swords and Sorcery Setting In addition to the discussion of the S&S subgenre on FH 39-41, I've blogged about the subject a time or two: http://stevenslong.squarespace.com/blogs/2012/1/27/radial-categories-and-swords-and-sorcery.html http://stevenslong.squarespace.com/blogs/2012/5/29/the-sword-and-sorcery-anthology-a-review.html If you don't have FH, my Defining Fantasy article mirrors the first chapter of that book, which discusses the subgenres and elements of Fantasy: http://stevenslong.squarespace.com/articles/2011/12/28/defining-fantasy.html Some of the stories I'd recommend include: Robert E. Howard's Conan and Kull stories Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories Karl Edward Wagner's Kane stories Gardner F. Fox's stories of various characters like Niall and Kothar (though admittedly these aren't of the best quality) Much of Clark Ashton Smith's work Depending on what sort of campaign you want, I might not recommend the Elric stories. Many people, including myself in the past, consider them S&S, but the more I think about it the more I think they belong on the low end of High Fantasy rather than the high end of S&S. Reasonable minds may, of course, differ.

Re: Must pass through intervening space limitation Generally speaking, no, it doesn't mean that -- that's a separate Limitation (see, for example, the ability "Disappearing Act" on p. 131 of Dark Champions). For a full discussion of the meanings and implications of that Limitation, see pp. 52-53 of The Ultimate Speedster.

Re: OCV applied to Block and Reflection The default rule in this situation is that the bonus to OCV applies to only one thing: either the roll to Block the attack; or the roll to hit the target with the Reflected attack. A single level cannot improve the character’s OCV with both. However, as with anything else, the GM is free to change this if it makes sense for his campaign, or for a specific character or situation.

Re: Dispel with autofire If a character buys Autofire for Dispel, he must pay the additional +1 Advantage. However, as with all things in the HERO System, the GM’s free to waive that rule if he doesn’t think the Autofire Dispel will be especially unbalancing or problematic.

Re: Looking for victorian occupations Just Google for "Victorian occupations" or similar terms and you'll find sites like: http://www.victorianweb.org/history/work/index.html

Re: Fantasy Fiction From Steve in THE END WAS NOT THE END Anthology I'm hoping to get a look at the book's cover next weekend when I'm attending MystiCon; I understand some folx from the publisher will be there. I'll pass along any news as soon as I have it.

Re: Counterstrike (and the lack thereis) This appears to be a general request for help/advice rather than a rules question, so I've moved it.

Re: Looking for the Faerie Queens The Shadow Queen (in CV1) could also be used in a faerie queen sort of role.