Steve Long

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter You can find a full breakdown of the costs here: Mythic HERO Cost Breakdown

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter Generally speaking, it almost certainly means the book is sunk, for a variety of reasons. First, I'm not really interested in doing it in pieces; it's less fun and is likely to lead to inconsistencies in the long run. Second, I'm not sure the backers' enthusiasm (and thus pledges) would remain over multiple smaller projects. Third, aside from perhaps eliminating the printing costs, breaking the book up into pieces isn't going to do much to reduce costs. I still want to pay myself a reasonable salary, want to pay the artists a reasonable amount for their work, and so on. If anything, I think splitting the book up into multiple volumes will man more work for me, not less, and thus more expense for the end customer. I still very much want to do the book, and if the Kickstarter fails and I later think of some way to do it, I will. But aside from some wealthy fan subsidizing the whole thing I'm hard-pressed right now to think of what that "other way" might be. The sad truth is, if enough people don't want to pay for the book, enough people don't want to, and not much can be done to change that. It'd be a shame... but if that's the ultimate outcome, better to learn that now than after doing all the work.

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter Realistic or not, it's a minimum value I place on my work given the time and effort involved, my skills, and similar factors. If anything it's too low; assuming a book the size of the HSB it comes out to a mere 6 cents a word, which is roughly the same as what I made freelancing 12-15 years ago. If that's going to keep the project from succeeding, c'est la vie; I'm not going to work for free or for substandard earnings.

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter Aye, there's the rub, as the Bard would say. And I definitely agree it's better to know now than after I've put in all the work! So far the new thread over on ENWorld has done a good job; it's brought in three backers. That's triple the numbers and about double the money brought in from mentions on RPG.Net or RPGGeek. I don't know what, if any, statistically valid conclusions can be drawn from that, but it makes me glad the ENW thread was started.

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter If the price scares them off, so be it. That's the price the book has to have for me to cover the cost of goods and make a little money for my effort and skill. Similarly, if people are concerned about the reward levels, so be it. I put a lot of thought into them and think they're arranged the way they need to be if the project's going to succeed. I don't have the capacity to offer extra stuff for the higher level tiers; I'm already offering what I can. I'm always pleased to get a good ol' $25 or $75 pledge in any event.

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter No and no. Once you create a project, you cannot change its deadline or the amount requested. Nor can you change a specific reward tier once one person has pledged for that reward. You can add different reward tiers, but you can't change existing ones.

Re: Variable Advantage and DC calculation It’s Saturday night and I’m not going to run through a mess of numbers; I’m just going to give a basic answer and leave the rest up to you. For purposes of determining the DCs in an attack with Variable Advantage (and thus the effects of adding damage to it in various ways, and so on), use the value of Variable Advantage itself, not the value of the Advantages it can change among. For example, if an attack has Variable Advantage (+½ Advantages; +1), you use the value of +1 to determine the DCs.

Re: The obviousness of changing a VPP That's a good question; I'm surprised it's never come up before. As a default rule the changing of slots in a Power Framework has the same perceivability as that of the Power being changed to: if a character changes to an Obvious power the fact he’s changing is Obvious; if he changes to an Invisible power the fact that he’s doing so is likewise Invisible. An observer won’t necessarily know what specific Power or slot the character’s changing to (though he might, depending on circumstances), but he will know that the character is making a change and is free to draw his own conclusions about that change based on the circumstances. Whether and how the observer reacts to the change is up to him. As always the GM is free to rule otherwise based on common sense, dramatic sense, game balance, and other factors. Situations defined primarily by game terms/rules and not by “real world” considerations often require a certain amount of delicate handling.

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter I'm certainly pleased you like the setting! Unfortunately it was never popular enough to justify any further development. Hero gamers, for better or worse, tend to be the sorta folx who like to create their own settings.

Here's another Kickstarter some of y'all might be interested in: a superhero comic that helps teach kids math! Solution Squad

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter Thanx Matt!!

Re: Monster Hunter International I read the first one recently -- a friend of mine who works at Baen thought I'd like 'em and sent them to me (along with some of Correia's pulp-era novels). She was right; I've enjoyed what I've read of both series so far. I could definitely see MHI as a gaming setting. My friend tells me the author is in fact a gamer to some extent, so perhaps some of that "perspective" leaks through into his fiction.

Re: Growth/Size Template and Area of Effect I'm not sure I understand the question. If what you're asking is, "Does the OCV bonus for targeting larger than normal characters make it easier to hit them with Area Of Effect attacks by reducing the normal DCV 3 such attacks apply against?”, the answer is “No; Area-affecting attacks target DCV 3 regardless of the size of any given person or object within the affected Area.” If that doesn't answer your question, please post a follow-up.

Re: Allen Thomas projects? No. AFAIK he hasn't done any game writing at all for years. Unfortunately we all lost touch with him, so I don't know what he's up to. I keep an eye out for him every GenCon, since I know he has family in Indianapolis, but I've never seen him. I expect he's found something other than gaming to devote his considerable talents to... and whatever that is, I for one wish him great success.

Re: NND Martial Arts Maneuvers and Characters Resistance The defenses listed for the Choke Hold and the Atemi Strike are correct. But that doesn't mean the GM can't add to the listed defenses, change them, or otherwise alter things to suit himself. If he thinks a character has some ability that should provide a defense to an NND attack, he's well within his rights to rule so regardless of what the rulebook says.

Re: Book of the Empress ::insert fiendish chuckle here::

Re: Book of the Empress There was no way Hero Games could make BotE a color book. Color printing has just gotten too expensive, particularly in light of the psychological "ceiling" many gamers have re: the price of supplements.

Re: Book of the Empress To be clear, I wasn't takin' a poke at anyone or any post specifically there -- I've used that exact same text in multiple books, dating all the way back to the VIPER sourcebook.

Re: BOOK OF THE EMPRESS -- New Character Preview That was the intent. The "sponsor" of that character wanted me to re-create Thunder outright, which I didn't want to do. So I suggested this instead, which was more "in tune" with BotE anyway. He thought it was a great idea, so I ran with it, and I think it turned out well.

Re: Pulp Hero Thanx CorPse!

Re: Entangles Possibly, but that would probably be a pretty awkward construction. I'd suggest just using the rules for "Swallowing Targets Whole" on HSB 40-41.

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter Don't forget folx -- the Mythic Hero chat is tonight, Wednesday the 22nd, at 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM Pacific. Hope to see you there!

Re: MYTHIC HERO Kickstarter Let's talk mythology! This Wednesday, February, 22, beginning at 9:00 PM Eastern (6:00 PM Pacific), I'm holding a Mythic Hero chat in the Chat Rooms at the Hero Games website. We'll talk about the contents of the book, which gods and subjects I'm covering, stuff about Kickstartering, whatever you're interested in as it pertains to the MH project. Hope to see you there!

Re: Acv There's no official option for that. Bribe your GM with pie and see what you can talk him into.

Re: Side Effects Calculations You start with a Minor Side Effect, -1/4. Then you apply the reduction of 1/4 less Limitation, to -0. Then you apply the multiplier; -0 x 2 = -0... subject, as always, to GM approval.