Hero System

And when you want to play something that has no existing system, or when you have tried and hate the existing "optimized" systems available?

One example, I know people who like shadowrun (setting) but don't like any edition of the game mechanically.

Personally I havent found a scifi system I actually like yet. Eote was sort of passable, I guess. I wouldn't seek it out, but I'd play it if it was being run.

And superheroes? I've tried aberrant and m&m. You'd have to pay me at least $20/h to play m&m, and aberrant was crappy for other settings.

And for urban fantasy they're all obnoxiously specific so it's a pain in the ass of you're not looking to run specifically wod or buffy, you're looking at a while bunch of homebrew of you want to use the default systems.

Hence wanting a lego system.

Or if the dozens of "specific" systems I've played since I started gaming, I would be actively interested in 5e d&d and shadowrun 4e, maybe also buffy /angel (unisystem). Anything else I've tried so far was either bad, or merely tolerable, so at this point I'm often shopping around for new stuff looking for games I will actually like playing, as they're few and far between.

I've been considering trying fate. I havent done so because I have heard it shares what I hated about 4e d&d - most of what you do in play is done not through the lens of your character, but the lens of like, a co author of a series.

Its on my list of games to try, but its like a movie youre going into with low expectations hoping to be pleasantly surprised.

I claim the high ground and I am therefore the victor, here. Begone and be banished, vile sycophant.

Using GURPS or HERO even as a last resort is like trying to cure cancer using baking soda and a lemon.
Really you will hurt yourself more than necessary, especially in this day and age where you can find a better set of rules for literally anything.

So, gurps dude.

How do you like hero system? Have you tried it? Did you like it?

I have tried HERO a few different times, between 5th and 6th. I wasn't as "in" on it as a system prior to then, so I didn't feel the pang when 6th came out to the extent that many other fans seem to have.

It's a decent enough system; it's certainly a "big brother" to GURPS, and you can see where that influence shines through (particularly in GURPS 4th ed). As a long-time GURPS player (among other games), it's not quite as closely dialed as I prefer. A lot of the abstractions bug me even though I can fully understand the purpose of their presence (and I'm even a fan of lots of narrative systems; abstraction itself doesn't bug me so much, rather than HERO's specific abstractions combined with the sometimes absurdly literal measurements which just puts me off for some reason), and the system itself is astoundingly well put together. Some stuff goes a bit too in-depth for me, but again I can see the beauty of the scaling and the simplicity of the ability interactions.

It's lacking a bit of the grit that I appreciate about GURPS.

The writing of 5th and especially 6th is unbelievably dense to me, for some reason. The writing style maybe just isn't something my brain easily acclimates to, and usually I can digest up densely-packed information fairly easily.

Bottom line, I enjoyed playing it (running it was a lot more effort than I'm used to) and it was a fun game to build stuff in. I can certainly see it working elegantly at all kinds of scales, for all kinds of stuff (they've got great resources for HERO system in terms of supplements, fan work, etc.), but bottom line I don't see myself personally gaining much value from learning it any more deeply since I'm already well familiarized with GURPS (though it doesn't scale as neatly, has its own fair share of issues and quirks).

Most really high-powered stuff I might end up running in Heroquest 2 or ICONS or Wild Cards or something really 'rubbery' anyway though.

Unless I can find a lego system I like, there are piles of settings and homebrew campaign ideas I want to run with no decent system available for me to run them, without a ton of homebrewing to make it work.

What is the better set of rules for a fullmetal alchemist campaign, for instance? How about breath of fire? Gargoyles? Andromeda? Stargate(it has a game, the game is not good)? Song of ice and fire (same, one exists but it's not good)? The witcher (one exists but not in English) - to name a few examples of things I've wanted to run in the past that were a pain to find something good to run them with.

I'm not convinced there always *is* a good specialized system available to run the campaign.

Sometimes you only have lego systems like gurps, hero, or fate.

Oh, lastly I forgot to mention how much HERO made me appreciate the breadth and diversity of GURPS supplements. I truly felt spoiled by GURPS after realizing how much work I had ahead of me in modelling things and prepping characters, etc. I would have to do to get a similar game up and running in HERO.

Not to say that it's necessarily extra cognitive load, just that GURPS already has so many prebuilt lego sets and prefabs to choose from, imitate and reconstitute for your purposes that it feels like a breeze in comparison.

Take all this with a hefty serving of salt, though; as I said, I've been GURPSing for a long time and so my familiarity with it is most certainly tinting my comparisons here (kind of unavoidable as in many ways they are very similar systems).

Primetime Adventure. It's literally made for TV Shows.

Thanks!

... I'd never heard of that system before. Upon reading a summary, I'm curious to try it but am somewhat skeptical of its very abstracted narrativist sales pitch.

Its also clearly just a different brand of "lego" system, not something specialized to a genre like you said earlier. It sounds a lot like a synopsis for fae.

It's a game that does what it was meant to do. Unlike GURPS that does nothing besides giving you a headache.

You're welcome. Good gaming to you, whatever you end up deciding to run!

I'm sure there will be someone more knowledgeable on HERO in shortly to elaborate where my assessment has fallen short, or else offer other alternatives suited to your taste.

If you're looking for 'tv show melodrama' with this like 'screen presence' as an in game mechanic, maybe.

A lot of people are looking for something more 'first person rpg' and less 'how to write a tv script, the game', even if they want their game set in the *setting* of a tv series.

But sure, if "scriptwriter, the party game" is up your alley that could certainly work.

It may do what it was 'meant to do', but it doesn't necessarily do what a particular group is wanting to play or deliver a more satisfying game experience any more satisfyingly than gurps does.

If you're looking for a good fantasy rpg high in verisimilitude that can simulate the gritty but high magic world of the witcher novels (from the list above), that you can access as someone who doesn't speak polish, primetime adventures certainly isn't going to give you that.

Gurps, *could* do it if you choose the right 'plugins' - low tech, ritual path magic, powers, martial arts.

Until the vaporware that is talsorians witcher rpg materializes, gurps is probably your best bet for a Witcher campaign.

Not at all.
GURPS RPM is inconsistent and too much dependent on something as obsolete as GM-Fiat.
GURPS Combat system is irrealistic as D&D System, you can literally Dodge bullets spray unless you load the system of option rules, the DR is literally useless since a hobbit with a stick can bypass most armor without even trying and Martial Arts are nothing but an unoptimized set of useless feats.
Goodness Pathfinder would do the Witcher better than GURPS and Pathfinder is not even an RPG but an SJW abortion.

Did somebody just mention 'GURPS' and 'Witcher' in the same sentence?

>WAAAAAAAAAAH THERE ARE PEOPLE WHO DISAGREE WITH ME! WAAAAAAAAAAH!
Another victim of FATE inducted mental damage. Go back to your shitty general and stay there.

Then play a Videogame. I'm pretty sure that is the only way to play First Person RPG. Every other way is simply impossible on a tabletop.

...

Pathfinder is straight up incapable of doing witcher magic.

The only system ive seen so thats like the magic in the witcher is ritual path magic. Channel mana, stronger spwlls take longer and more mana.

Actually, that would go for an mtg themed campaign, too.

D&D vancian magic is unsuitable shit for either one.

Pathfinder has people who can survive a fall from orbit on its combination of luck and meat points known as hp.

Witcher has massive badasses die by a peasant mob with pitchforks (becayse the games arent cqnon and diverge significantly from the books in many ways).

I'm not saying gurps is perfect. I've yet to come across an rpg I didnt have several complaints about. The question isn't whether it's perfect, the question is whether it's better than the alternatives for whatever you're trying to run.

A videogame doesn't have realistic in character interaction, everything is pre-scripted.

A tabletop rpg with a somewhat simulationist ruleset and no narrative editing mechanics, is the most 'first person' you're gonna get, short of larping with a system that also has no narrative editing mechanics.

For instance, Shadowrun is a more 'first person' rpg experience than d&d4e or fate, with the big exception of the 'edge' mechanics.

a workable set of Simulationist rules does not exist. And it never will unless you will make a IA capable to simulate all the expectations of a reality. Stop deluding yourself user. Simulationist is a print refuse from a '80 pamphlet. The only way to play RPG is either Gamist or Narrativism.

And GURPS is even more incapable of doing that than Pathfinder. It's factual.
GURPS is nothing than a set of broken lego part, it doesn't work as a game and work even worse as a toolkit. You cannot properly play anything in GURPS unless the GM abuse the Rule 0.

>It's factual
Can you pass me that shit you're smoking? Must be really good

The fun fact about GURPSers is that none of them as really played GURPS once in their lives. Just a bunch of Houserules patched up by their GM. GURPS as a system and toolkit is so broken that it's impossible to play anything with it that work in a consistent manner. Low Tech Fantasy even more so.

Must be one hell of a trip dude

Yep, GURPSers are nothing but a group of stoners believing in an LSD trip induced hallucination they called an RPG.
What a sad bunch.

At this point i just wanna see how long you can keep up blabbing about the same shit

GURPSers have kept babbling about the same shit for 20 years I doubt I could do better than them.

Impressive. Can you do it in reverse?

.meht naht retteb od dluoc I tbuod I sraey 02 rof tihs emas eht tuoba gnilbbab tpek evah sreSPRUG

You're wrong.

Look mom, i can do it upside down!

¡SƎꓶꓵꓤ Sꓒꓤꓵꓨ

Ive played gurps since 2nd edition, I guess you could use it if you want to, but its not my cup of tea. And if you do just use 4th.

You will need a ton of trimming tho, Ive yet to play a game in my 15+ years of rpging that needed more than 20 skills. Also you need to remove advantages and disadvantages as some are very unbalanced, even more in specific settings. Then you need to put together the rules you want to use and remove the ones you dont like. Then you can start worldbuilding. Finally while playing you need to keep an eye on people abusing narrative advantages/disadvantages over mechanical ones, as gurps is easy to break if you know what you are doing.

I remember a fried did a character in a hero campaign so strong he could destroy the world in one turn, dunno if it was bad scaling in 3ed or if he was so good at optimisation and the problem still persist.

Ive heard good things of Hero system, but never played it. My friend who broke gurps said he likes it quite a lot. In my personal opinion the more I game, the more I like rules light systems to the point that I finished making one that have 16 skills to cover all settings, no stats or anything else, and people have liked it so far.

Yet the same faggot claiming tha gurps is broken.

All of your critics are ineffectual because are all based on the same assumption: Gurps must be played as a whole regardless genre and setting of a game.

Of course you don't need more than 20 skills: you're supposed to pick the ones allowed for your game! If you're playing a dungeon crawl you don't need rules about cooking or housekeeping.

Of course some advantage are more unbalanced than others: you're supposed to pick the one allowed based on parameters like "it's a cinematic campaign?" "It's a supernatural campaign?", etc... They're not ment to work alltogether (unless you want, for wich case specific rules exist to balance the game like "unusual background" trait)

Stob being butthurt about shit you don't even grasp

sorry pal, not the same person, so calm your tits. I understan people like gurps, I just prefer other games. If you like gurps, fine, thats why I sujested what to do if OP wants to use it.

>GURPS RPM is inconsistent and too much dependent on something as obsolete as GM-Fiat.
>GM intervention is obselete
Oh, I see. That other user is wrong, it's not FATE induced mental damage. It's video game induced mental damage.

I'm ok with the fact that people have different tastes. I do play different games but i don't assume that my experience as an absolute parameter ("gurps is easy to beak if you know what you're doing").
E.g. i do strongly dislike 3.pf, but i'm not vomiting shit on it solely on my experience of it ("3.pf is easy to break if you know what your doing"). I do know that 3.pf is ment to be that way, more on a gamist-simulationst spectrum with ivory tower structure. I don't like it and thats fine, so for people who like it

I dont know what are you on about, gurps is easy to break, and so is 3.5, that is not an opinion. If you can build a character that can create earthquakes so strong he could crack the surface of the earth with HALF the points gurps suggest to use for superhero campains then its fucking broken, the same way a druid outclases everything in 3.5.

If you can pit disadvantages against themselves so you dont suffer their consequences (lecherousnes and lazy/shy) then its fucking broken.

Not only that, it may be obvious to you that you need to trim down the game, but Ive never met a GM that gave us a small pool of options to build characters, instead they just add splatbooks so your options are so many they are overwelming, creating a huge ivory tower. The only trimming of skills Ive seen is "dont use skills out of your max tech advancement". I had to take classes of game design to understand this, because it is so common in my scene for people to just stack shit atop of more shit.

So yes, gurps does have problems, do they affect your enjoyment of a good game? no, do they need extra work? yes.

But then again, Ive had fun just playing pretend with no rules and all that extra work give my person no extra enjoyment, thays why I like rules lite systems and that is why I started my post with "you can use it, its not my cup of tea" and finished with "i like rules lite systems".

GMs are not necessary anymore. The Forge has shown us that. Creative Agenda should never be owned by a single person.
But I suppose you like playing 'Mother May I' games.

Disadvantages that negate each other can't be bought that is RAW. And in any case, a character that is Lazy and Lecherous must play both of them, same as the shy one. Fiction is filled with examples of Lazy asses that still wooo wimen as much as a shy person going all stalkerish on the target of their sexual desires.

yes they are banned if they are mechanical, like obvious shit "enemy:knight order" and "ally: knight order"

And I can say my character is to lazy to be lecherous that moment or viceversa, as you say they are not direct counters of eah other, but can work that way and negate each other as I see fit.

Im curious on what are you on about, whats the forge and what does it do?

NOOOOPPE.
A character that is Lazy is adverse to WORK, especially HARD WORK is not adverse to the pursuit of Happiness and self gratification. Submitting itself to Lecherousness is not work is following your desire otherwise that character would be so Lazy to forget about eating, drinking and they would be DEAD.
If you fail the control roll for Lecherousness YOU MUST TRY TO WOO THE TARGET with all the skill you have.
Like I said fictions is filled with character that will not move their butt for anything but will wag their tails for a hot piece of ass.
Same for the Shy character going full Hinata Hyuuga on a very attractive guy.
this is not GURPS being broken, its you or your GM not knowing anything about how rules work.

>Of course some advantage are more unbalanced than others: you're supposed to pick the one allowed based on parameters like "it's a cinematic campaign?" "It's a supernatural campaign?", etc... They're not meant to work all together

Neither of the other people in this conversation, just jumping in here, but this is one of the things that always stopped me from really embracing GURPS. Maybe someone here has another take on it, though.

It just seems like a really weird enterprise to assign point costs to everything but then turn around and say the points aren't meant to be balanced. Obviously everything can't be perfectly balanced, but pricing things approximately accurately seems like half the appeal of a universal system. If one guy can build James Bond on 100 points and the guy next to him can crack the Earth, what's the point of the points system?

Are mundane things more appropriately costed and it's just magic, powers, and scifi stuff that's bonkers?

indie-rpgs.com/forge/index.php

It's a place for indie game designers, and as such has seen a fair share of GM-less games.

>the persue of gratification is not hard work
>also ignory that you can chose to be shy too
sorry pal, you can decide to pick and choose specific rules and inore the rest for a specific situation, but in the worst case scenario I can also ask to roll if I consider its more wotk than not for my character laziness.

And i keep saying that Gurps is NOT broken, it simply doesn't have by default a framework to begin with, 3.pf is not broken, it is built around a framework that dicatates that some choices are bettere than other (ivory tower design). You may say that said design choices are outdated, that you didn't like them, but that is the way they are ment to be!

So if gurps says "you have x points for this genre" it means that said genre has that ammount of variantion AND power standing (not power alone, as you wrongly assume).

Superheroes may vary from street crimefighters to overgodly superbeings (genre variation AND power standing variation) so yes, let alone the genre you can have spiderman and the beyonder coexist in the setting, but doing a story in wich spiderman and the beyonder team up to defeat the evil bankrobbers league it's utterly retarded. So is your friend building a character capable of braking the planet and the gm for allowing it , unless that's the power standing you where aiming for, in wich case i don't know why you're whining.

In short you can like/hate a system for whatever reason, but saying opinions and pretend them to be objective truth it's retarded.

Tldr: you're a dumbass

Im the user attacking gurps, he did not crack the earth at 100 points, that is impossible, youcan do crazy shit at 100, even more than james bond, but not that, the hero module said 1000 points, he cracked the earth at 500-700 or something.

Gurps is not really that unbalamced for normal humans, in that sense its good if your GM takes the time to rrim things he does not like, like roleplaying advantages/disadvantages.

I don't understand it. If people out there really want to play a game so complex or unique that it doesn't fit under D&D, Shadowrun, or any of the other numerous specific game systems out there, why don't they just make their own systems?

Surely forcing yourself to learn and retweak everything in a GURPS or Hero system for your extremely specific and weird game would be just as much work as just creating a simple homebrew?

Point costs are predicated on an opportunity cost for player agency. Two characters with the same point values definitely must not be balanced (that is not the point of the point values) but it ensures that they have the same opportunities (point values offer an opportunity cost). The cost of individual abilities are balanced around the amount of 'story power' (player agency) they provide, of course this is not perfect (see Regrowth), but generally, similar abilities are balanced relative to each other. Point values absolutely do not ensure 'player balance', it's anathema to a system that aims to be generic. Ensuring that a party is coherent is the GM and the group's job.

>its not broken, it is desined that way!
>it is not broken if the GM fixes it!
nah, ou are assuming we used the wrong thigs when nowhere in the rules stated that, also the GM accepted my friends character because he used 2 retarded disadvantages put together just for shit and giggles as he was so strong (agoraphobia + claustrophobia) so he ended up being usless, should he house others he would have been unstoppable.

Gurps has a share of unbalanced options, thats why i needs GMs fiat harder than other games. I get the same GM fiat work in rules lite systems and non of the painfull salecting of what to use to play.

Lazyness.
You are violently averse to labor.
Your chances of getting a raise or pro-
motion in any job are halved. If you
are self-employed, halve your monthly
pay (see Jobs, p. 516). You must avoid
work – especially hard work – at all
costs. Roleplay it!

Lecherousness
You have an unusually strong
desire for romance. Make a self-con-
trol roll whenever you have more than
the briefest contact with an appealing
member of the sex you find
attractive – at -5 if this person is
Handsome/Beautiful, or at -10 if Very
Handsome/Very Beautiful. If you fail,
you must make a “pass,” using what-
ever wiles and skills you can bring to
bear. You must then suffer the conse-
quences of your actions, successful or
not: physical retribution, jail, commu-
nicable disease, or (possibly) an ador-
ing new friend.
Unless the object of your affection
is Very Handsome/Very Beautiful, you
need not roll more than once a day to
avoid making a pass. If someone
turns you down very firmly (e.g., a
black eye, or an arrest for sexual
harassment) the GM may give you a
bonus to future self-control rolls
regarding that individual . . .
Note that you are likely to change
your standards of attractiveness if no
truly attractive members of the
appropriate sex are available!

Neither Lazyness nor Shyness have a control roll, but Lecheuroness do. And if you fail it the rules are clear. YOU MUST MAKE A PASS.

Lecheurness is not Work is a DESIRE. Otherwise, you will not be Lazy and Alcoholics since you will be too Lazy to Drink. Or Lazy and Glutton since you will be too Lazy to eat.
Same for Shyness. You are scared of other people but if you fail the control roll you must attempt it, and since your social skills are probably horribles you will end up doing a Hinata. Like a said the problem here is you not GURPS.

Im sorry, seams i that case I was wrong, lecherousness is a mechanical disadvantage. It bean at least 7 years since I plaued gurps.

It really doesn't take that much work. In fact, the most work-intensive games, I've seen, are those where you try to 100% emulate another game. D&D is built on a lot of ad-hocs so it takes a lot of work to translate, for example. GURPS, at least, makes short work of adapting a genre, it feels natural. If you're trying to translate another game's mechanics, it could take a while to get it to 'feel right', if you cut out the middle man and go for the genre the game is trying to emulate instead, it's a more enjoyable experience. This is why it's great for games that don't yet have games/have games that you're not aware of, there's no temptation to translate another game's mechanics.

>It just seems like a really weird enterprise to assign point costs to everything but then turn around and say the points aren't meant to be balanced

Balance/cost is balanced as long you are in a setting agnostic condotion. "True faith" is an avdantage worth 15 points, it allow your character to turn away supernatural evil monsters, but what happens if isai character get planeshifted to a reality in wich supernatural monsters don't exist? That said character is short if 15 points in comparison with other character that haven't pick "true faith".

Know you can do the same in reverse by stating "we are playing an hystorical accurate wild west setting" and then allowing the "gunslinger" advantage to a character (gunslinger is worth 25 points, and is not ment for moundane campaigns). That's the same thing as allowing an anphibious race in a d&d game about surviving a drawning dungeon: it's balanced within the rules but not within the game you want to play

Sorry for the horrible grammar and syntax but i'm phoneposting

It's a game where you use logarithms during play. Take that as you will.

I bought this book before i was an experienced roleplayer. I was hoping to stat a morrowind campaign with it. it was too complicated.

a decade later i picked it up for a read. it's still needlessly clunky. very customisable, but too much work for the DM. avoid it.