Special Considerations
The Hero system is set up so that characters of similar points
value are roughly comparable to each other when placed in stress
situations. Combat is a common "stress situation" and non-combat
skills and powers are correspondingly cheaper than combat-related
powers. While this works most of the the time, in heroic level games
with a grittier feel, it can lead to some slightly odd effects. This
may not matter - but it's worth thinking about when you are designing
your game's magic system.
While I am not a fan of banning powers outright, in some cases,
you may need to do this to maintain the atmosphere you want. Below is
a discussion of various powers and the distorting effect they can
have in some games - particularly Fantasy Hero games.
Magical healing
While magical healing has long been a part of fantasy roleplaying
games, the powers which cover this are relatively cheap in the Hero
system. If you have a mage who can cast "Regeneration - usable on
others" then you can expect any survivors of a fight to be fully
functional again a few minutes afterward. While this may be good for
the players, it does mean that adventures where the players must
overcome injuries, taking punishment as they approach their goal, are
not possible. Instead, after a fight they're either dead - or
uninjured. It's hard to maintain a gritty atmosphere under these
conditions, and the players will be more reckless if they know that
injuries can be quickly healed.
Healing has some of the same effects, but it is not quite as bad,
since it has a defined limit to the number of Body points that can be
restored. It has been suggested that healing can be applied to
individual wounds, but this involves way too much paperwork for most
people - and makes Healing even more powerful. Nonetheless, there
needs to be some way to deal with using this power when the
characters may be wounded in multiple incidents at different times. A
simpler way to deal with the problem is thus to calculate the maximum
amount of magical healing a character can generate, and then keep
track simply of how much of this is used up. Here's an example:
Lucius the Priest has a healing spell (simplified healing: 2d6)
which can generate a maximum of 12 points of healing (Stun) - and up
to 4 body. His companion, Hrothgar the Unseemly, gets his nose broken
in a barroom brawl (2 body). Lucius can heal him easily enough. The
next day however, Hrothgar falls off the roof of an inn and breaks
his arm (-4 Body). Lucius can only heal 2 of this, before he reaches
the limit of the spell.
So when can Hrothgar get more benefit from the healing magic? The
answer is that he can only be magically healed again, when he has
naturally healed back some of the magically-repaired damage.
So if Hrothgar has a Rec of 6, he gets back 6 body per month, or
about 1 point every 5 days. So after 5 days, Hrothgar has
naturally healed 1 point - and can thus be healed magically
for 1 point further. In other words, he can carry a maximum of 4
points of magical healing from Lucius's spell at any one time.
This system has two advantages. First - it's simple. Wounded
characters need keep track of only two numbers - the actual injury
they have suffered and the magical healing they have received. Both
will decrease at the same rate. Secondly, it keeps healing from being
too powerful. A healing spell can cure quite a lot of damage - but
only once. Then it will take time before it can be employed at full
effectiveness again.
But however you choose to handle it healing - particularly in
Fantasy games - can drastically alter the feel and balance of the
game. If you want a more "classic fantasy" feel to your game, you may
wish to ban Regeneration and limit healing to 1 or 2 dice.
Immortality
Immortality has been a dream of humans for centuries, and a prized
goal for sorcerors in many a story. Using Hero system rules it is
easy - immunity to aging costs only 5 points, and let's face it - if
I was a mage, it's the first spell I'd want (immunity to disease
would be the second). Unlike Healing - discussed above - immortality
doesn't mess with game balance. But in a Fantasy Hero setting, it
certainly has the potential to mess with the game's background. If
the spell is available, kings and emperors will get their hands on
it. Mages will covet it. Even wealthy merchants might be able to buy
it (it's only 5 points after all). The traditional medieval world
which still forms the core of most fantasy games would be greatly
altered if the senior priesthood and nobility didn't age, but instead
grew ever older and more powerful. What would happen to the laws of
succession if a prince had to wait perhaps hundreds of years to claim
his throne? By that time he could have fathered several generations
of other princes, who in turn could have fathered more...
You could argue that mages might not want to give the spell to
other people, but if it costs them little to do so (2 character
points are enough to create an independent item that confers the
power) and people would offer huge sums for such tokens, it's hard to
see why they wouldn't. Certainly player characters would do it, which
makes it harder still to argue that NPCs would not.
A few deathless, ancient mages can be fun to have a round. A whole
coterie of them is something else again. That's not to say you can't
or shouldn't allow immunity to aging into the game - it can be great
fun. Just think about the consequences before you do. One good way to
reduce the numbers of immortal characters is to say that when a
character with immunity to aging has it dispelled (and it is a
very cheap spell, and thus very easy to dispel) the character gains
back all the years he has actually lived. For very old individuals
this means that they would basically just crumble away into dust.
This makes artificially youthful characters very fragile - and
increases the demand for more expensive spells which restore actual
youth, not just hold off advancing years.
However, immunity to aging is not real immortality. A non-aging
magic user - even if he avoids being dispelled - can still be killed
by a simple piece of sharpened steel (or a thrown rock, for that
matter). There are a number of ways to generate something a bit
closer to actual immortality. These are included here for interest's
sake - unlike immunity to aging, they are expensive enough that they
are much less likely to have an effect on the game world, since few
but the most powerful mages would have access to this level of power
and they are unlikely to part with it so easily.
One way to simulate actual immortality is Regeneration from death,
listed in the Hero rules. A second approach is this:
- Immortality: Summon (1 exact duplicate), Trigger (+1/4), 1 use
(-2), Can only be triggered by own death (-2)
This spell (which is rather expensive) needs to be cast before the
character is killed. But once done, a new version of the character
appears if the old one is killed - providing a character who - as
long as his two bodies are not killed immediately sequentially can
duplicate the trick - and thus cannot easily be killed. This is the
trick I used to make the all but unkillable monster Inwai
in Sengoku. It's a
good trick for recurring villains of the magical kind.
Alternatively, you can buy extra body, fully invisible (+1), only
to calculate point of death (-2), feign death and regeneration. A
character with this combination of powers can be hacked up - and will
look convincingly dead, but in fact can remain alive - and come back
later. A character with this power who bought 10 extra body would
look like he was dying if he took more than 10 Body, and would look
convincingly dead once he had reached -10 Body - but in fact would
need to take 20 Bod y before he started to die and reach -20 before
he actually died. Not an easy task if he regenerates as well! Of
course this won't help if his attackers burn the body to ash.
Movement Powers
Movement powers can easily be unbalancing in a fantasy game. You
only need to see the example cited in "all-conquering
wizards" to see what I mean. If you have a traditional fantasy
game with medieval-style castles, a clever player can wreak havoc
with your best-laid plans given access to spells like Flight,
Teleportation or Tunneling. Likewise, if the players have access to
spells which allow all or most of them to fly, wilderness-trek
adventures are off the menu. It's hard to justify a ban on such
powers, which means the best advice is simply - think about how your
players get around when designing games. If you have a player with
powers like Teleportation, remember that other wizards can cast
counterspells to protect against such entry - and secure places like
castles will be very likely to have such magic.
Here's a few suggestions: Force wall (1 PD/ 1 ED, hardened) will
stop teleporters. It's expensive - and easily destroyed - so it is
best cast on the INSIDE of strong stone walls - and on limited, high
security areas like keeps. Still, it's a valuable tool.
Tunnelers can be best be kept out by other means - although a
forcewall might stop them temporarily, they'll probably be able to
blow a hole in it or go around it. A large area affect drain against
tunneling (continuous, uncontrollable at 0 END) cast under the castle
should stop them (although that also requires a powerful mage).
Alternatively, an elemental imprisoned under the castle and compelled
to attack tunnellers will at least make them pay for their free
entry.
Fliers - especially when combined with an invisibility spell - are
even harder to keep out. A few flying creatures or an air elemental
are probably the best defence here. Storms and flying monsters are
also the best deterrents to players who wish to avoid all that grubby
ground travel. Still, once they've gotten flight, be resigned to the
fact that you won't be able to keep 'em on the ground.
Finally, to secure your castles against magical intruders, perhaps
the cheapest - and most reliable - route is some area effect
detection spells. That makes getting OUT the hard part!
Permanency of magical
effects
In the Fantasy Hero rules, it is suggested that "permanent" spells
not be permitted. It's easy to see why - no-one wants a magic user
with a permanent forcefield running around. Moreover, there are
plenty of other spells that could be a real nuisance if made
permanent. However, many magical effects - from those left over from
ancient sorceries, through those cast on castle dungeons to keep
intruders out, to simple heating and lighting spells - are also
forbidden if you choose such an approach. Remember also that
permanent spells with a combat application are not much more
imbalancing than spells with Trigger and a duration.
There are two ways to deal with this problem. The first is to
allow only permanent spells that have the limitation "Independant".
That should reduce the number of permanent spells significantly. The
second is just to accept permanent spells and fight abuse with
cleverness. Making a spell permanent is not cheap, and the points
spent on this after all could well be used in more game-unbalancing
ways. If you have characters who always have permanent protection
spells, they tend to become dependant on them. So, let them encounter
characters from time to time who can dispel them - or use spells like
Mage's Bane (specifically
developed for this task!).