Re: Re: stretches and credibility checks - anyone else having difficulty? from L C on 2010-02-16 (HeroQuest-Rules)

From: L C <lightcastle_at_...>
Date: Mon, 15 Feb 2010 20:46:28 -0500

DreadDomain wrote:
>
>
>
> Let me jump in to this interesting discussion and...
>
> >A depressing large number - and they end up with "Basic Rules" the
> size of
> >The Sartar Book. GURPS, I'm looking at you. And the Hero System don't
> >pretend you can't break a man's wrist by taking you off the shelf.
>
> ... just state that the examples chosen are by themselves interesting for
> two reasons. First, Ash is right, both GURPS and HERO do bring a lot of
> crunch and details to the table. Second, both systems are quite excellent
> in my opinion.
>

Was a fan of HERO for many years. Have never really played GURPS, although some of their sourcebooks are wonderful.

> Having all these useful stats in a book just help me
> to bring verisimilitude to my games.
>

Agreed, but I don't recall HERO statting it's things out that way. (Things may have changed.) They used to stat by way of the effect, like other powers. I'm not sure how that would be helpful. GURPS seems to be more about giving other stats, but then GURPS is also huge on genre packs.

> I guess I am just saying it is not all black or white, simulationist or
> narrativist. Shades of gray do exist and every once in a while someone
> pops
> up saying "I'd like to play grey with HQ because I like the premises of HQ
> but I prefer grey as a style. Please help me out". Most of the time a lot
> of helpful people answer with genuinely interesting answers that might be
> summed up as "Ah, there is your problem, you should play white!".
>

Hmm.. I suppose by your description I play grey, then. I use all those things to add versimillitude, which I think is explicitly asked for and expected by the system. Like I said, those stats are orthogonal to the ability rankings in my mind, and so attempts to map them to ability rankings are besides the point. I still think games like HERO would be well served to not stat out every kind of gun in existence and put those off to genre books, though.