What older edition things do you miss?

[Ian Cooper]

So we have had a number of editions of the game: Hero Wars, HeroQuest 1e, and HeroQuest 2.0 and 2.1 (HeroQuest Glorantha).

Without getting into flame wars, by critiquing what other miss, I wondered if folks wanted to talk about what they miss from older editions of the rules, that we dropped as part of the evolution of the game. Do you miss AP-based extended contests with edges? Do you secretly long for fixed resistances again?

Please do explain why, but please don't challenge other posters or editions. Just say positively why you miss something.

[jajagappa]

While most encounters in my games use a variable resistance for the storyline, I do use fixed resistances occasionally where I want someone or something to be easier to overcome over time.

I never got the AP approach - dropping that was a big improvement for ease of play.  There's enough bonuses that additional edges are not needed - that really just seemed a way to deal with resistances at multiple masteries.

 

[David Scott]

Ignoring all editions except HQ2, as it’s my favourite system. It lacks expansions in the form of accessible genre packs. I don’t mean full sourcebooks like mythic Russia, HeroQuest Glorantha or nameless streets. But much more simple write ups much like the style of games for Hillfolk and DramaSystem. Two sides of A4 at most and a website to host them. 

[Joerg]

I do miss NPC stats... not for your everyday goon, but for characters on a comparable (or higher) competence, and possibly to toss in as spare characters if someone drops in and doesn't want to retrofit a new person into the narrative.

They do convey some idea what the author of a scenario or campaign thinks the characters should look like. And while the consumer is free to ignore them when he makes a scenario or setting his own, at least the author has a way to communicate how he envisioned the scene when he wrote it.

But that's just simulationist old me.

 

[Mankcam]

i miss the generic rule set approach of HQ2. I love HQG, but in my opinion we should have a wide range of genre booka for other settings as well. Given how simple HQ2 is and how it can portray narrative/fictional gaming settings, it really should be taking a page out of the book by Evil Hat's approach to FATE rpg and present itself as a nifty set of mechanics that can be used for various settings.

Well HQ2 initially did this, but the idea seemed to have been steamrolled over by HQG.

I would have hoped to see a range of genres/settings such as Pulp Adventure, Crime Noir, Murder Mystery, Space Adventure, cheesy Action Flick. Or anything really, I think it could be a great generic system but it needs to be presented as such.

I really like HQG, and am not unhappy with that as a setting. However I have always preferred Glorantha through the eyes of the BRP system, so RQG will probably be how I play it.

Given this, I really would like to see HQ with a wide range of other settings. Anything from Agatha Christie's Mysteries, Indiana Jones, Tolkien's Middle-Earth, The A-Team, Bosch,  Fast & Furious, even Star Wars.

Not those actual licences, but genres along those lines could be easily handled by HQ.

Edited April 2, 2018 by Mankcam

[Mark Mohrfield]

I prefer the lower roll to win as presented in HQ 2 to the higher roll wins method of HQ:G as the former favors the underdog.

I liked the fact that HQ 2 presented optional rules, such as stake points and the death spiral, even if I don't use them myself.

Edited April 8, 2018 by Mark Mohrfield

[jrutila]

On 4/8/2018 at 1:17 AM, Mark Mohrfield said:

I prefer the lower roll to win as presented in HQ 2 to the higher roll wins method of HQ:G as the former favors the underdog.

1

It works both ways. If the GM tries to lower the resistance then it is frustrating that the player might not succeed. But yeah, I think you had an interesting point there.

I somewhat liked the Common Magic idea from HeroQuest Roleplaying in Glorantha (I think?). I never got the change to actually play with it but reading it made sense. On the other hand, you can still allow usage of "common magic" abilities that are not necessarily under a rune in HQG, too.

[jajagappa]

7 hours ago, jrutila said:

I somewhat liked the Common Magic idea from HeroQuest Roleplaying in Glorantha (I think?). I never got the change to actually play with it but reading it made sense. On the other hand, you can still allow usage of "common magic" abilities that are not necessarily under a rune in HQG, too.

Many of my player's characters have specific abilities that might be charms, talents, or other odd magics outside of their Runes.

[davecake]

While I don't miss the AP rules, that always seemed a bit weird and confusing to me, I do miss that the AP variations, edges etc gave you some interesting variables to make combats a bit more interesting and varied. I liked that you could have combats that might go fine, but where much riskier. Or Combats that you knew you would probably win, but would take a lot longer. And so on. 

I uncomfortably have begun to feel that while HeroQuest succeeds at its goal of making a rules set that can tell an incredibly wide variety of stories, and model a wide range of types of conflict, using it to run combat scenes has begun to feel like having a tiny special effects budget - I want combat to be quick (and have moved much more towards Simple Contests) because if I take longer, it becomes more noticable how generic it often is. 

[davecake]

I don't want full NPC stats a la HW back, but I would like to move towards a bit more detail than current HQ2. Even just a list of a few abilities the character is good at, a few notable weaknesses. 

Even if they are not used to set difficulties, they are still useful to explain results (eg if you failed to overcome them, mention their strengths, if you beat them soundly describe it as exploiting a weakness), and while I certainly think narrativist concerns overrules simulationist ones, a little consistency and verisimilitude can improve any narrative that has some realist aspirations. 

[Garwalf]

On 5/1/2018 at 12:22 AM, davecake said:

I don't want full NPC stats a la HW back, but I would like to move towards a bit more detail than current HQ2. Even just a list of a few abilities the character is good at, a few notable weaknesses. 

Even if they are not used to set difficulties, they are still useful to explain results (eg if you failed to overcome them, mention their strengths, if you beat them soundly describe it as exploiting a weakness), and while I certainly think narrativist concerns overrules simulationist ones, a little consistency and verisimilitude can improve any narrative that has some realist aspirations. 

I like the way that HQ2 suggested handling animals (and, by implication, NPC's): Set a block aside with a description and notation of "Significant Abilities" and "Exceptional Abilities." A quick summary like that makes it easier for a GM to run the heroes' opponents in a contest, instead of having to plow through paragraphs of exposition to find a couple of "gameable" nuggets of information.