a look back at previous hero system editions

7/27/2019 A Look Back at Previous Hero System Editions

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A Look Back at Previous HERO System

Editions

by Chris GoodwinThis document is a comparison and contrast of third and prior editions of Champions and the Hero System

with the other pre-fourth edition standalone Hero System games (Espionage, Justice Inc., Fantasy Hero,

Danger International, Robot Warriors, Star Hero). Generally, where Champions is concerned, I only refer to

the third edition rules (because that's when I started).

In Champions specifically, while the third edition rules were at the time official, most people who had bought

earlier editions didn't see a need to buy the later ones. Characters were built using whichever edition the

person building them owned at the time; you might occasionally find characters in third edition-era

supplements that were, for example, built using the first or second edition rules (which themselves had

some differences between them).

Unless specifically noted, Fantasy Hero refers to first edition FH, Star Hero refers to that book's first edition,

Champions refers to pre-fourth edition, and Hero System refers to fourth edition; the other book titles refer to

the books by name. References to editions without a book name are assumed to refer to Champions

releases. Champions was in fact the superhero game, including the rules for powers; specifically,

"Champions rules" refers to "that subset of pre-fourth edition Hero System that appeared in the Champions

book and was used to play games in the superheroic genre". Champions II and Champions III refer to the

books of those names released to expand the pre-fourth edition rules, but were not themselves new editions

of the game. "Heroic level games" or similar refers to, collectively,Espionage, Justice, Inc., Fantasy Hero,

Danger International, Robot Warriors, and Star Hero. For the most part, this document does not cover

books such as Autoduel Champions, SuperAgents, and the like.

The books I owned prior to fourth edition Hero were the third edition Champions as well as Champions II andChampions III . I also owned all of the Hero System core rulebooks except for Espionage. I can't say with

any authority what the differences were between third and prior editions.

Allow me to note that this document is more of a look back at third edition from a fifth edition standpoint

(fourth at the time I wrote it). If you're going to use it as a conversion to either fourth or fifth edition Hero,

you'll need those books.

General: The general rule when converting is that a character should be able to do everything after the

conversion that he could do before. In some cases, some fine tuning is desirable to make the

character better fit the original vision of its creator or GM. Some things will have different costs;characters should not be penalized for this. If a character requires more points to do the same thing

afterward as before, he gets those points for free, and if he requires fewer points, he gets those

points back to save or spend elsewhere.

Most third edition games didn't have Active Point limits. You'd see powers bought up to 300 Active

Points with -10 in Limitations to get them down to buyable levels.

There wasn't necessarily a standard starting point level. The default base point level for Champions

was 100; most "beginning" superheroes started with anywhere from 200 to 300 total points, though



225-275 was the most common spread. The standard for heroic games after Espionage was 75

base points plus up to 25 points worth of Disadvantages; this would be more closely equivalent to

50 base points plus 50 in Disadvantages nowadays.

Heroic level games did not charge points for normal equipment. Danger International and Justice,

Inc. provided nearly identical optional rules for using the Champions Power rules for building

gadgets, and Fantasy Hero had its own rules for building magic items (almost identical to theChampions rules, with a few minor differences).

Damage Classes didn't exist per se in Champions. They were first called this in the heroic level

games. Champions worked on dice of damage, and it wasn't explicit in the Champions rules that

you could buy intermediate levels of Killing Attack, though it did specify that three dice of normal

damage was equivalent to one die of killing.

Characteristics: Characteristics were bought identically then and now and for the most part worked the same. The

exceptions were in things like END cost for Strength and comparing stats for Presence Attack and

mental powers, and are covered elsewhere in this document.

Skills: There weren't as many skills to choose from. Champions II improved the available skill set by a lot,

and Champions III by a little more. Most of the heroic level games added their own skills, but no

two games added the same skill set, and none of the skills from the heroic games were "official" in

Champions. Third edition Champions did mention allowing the use of skills from Danger

International , but in cases where the same skill existed in both, to use the Champions cost. Fourth

edition unified the skills, at least as regards costs, and fifth edition unified them as far as

Characteristic bases. If you have fifth edition, you shouldn't have any trouble converting skills.

Acrobatics existed in Champions (all editions, to my knowledge) but none of the heroic level

games. Its cost was 10 points for 9+(DEX/5), 3 points per +1. It provided the functions of Breakfallskill, which existed separately in the heroic level games. It also allowed for an Acrobatic Dodge (a

Dodge made in conjunction with an Acrobatics roll provided an additional +2 DCV).

Brawling was a Skill that appeared in the heroic level games. It was basically the same as 1d6 of

Hand-to-hand Attack that only worked with punching and kicking, not with weapons or Martial Arts

maneuvers, and you could only buy one level.

Detective Work was a skill that included uses of Criminology and Forensic Medicine. It didn't

exist in the heroic level games, but both Criminology and Forensic Medicine did (in Danger

International ).

Knowledge Skill, but not Professional Skill, appeared in Danger International . KS and PS

appeared in Fantasy Hero. PS, but not KS, appeared in Champions II . Science Skill only appearedinChampions II .

Luck was a skill in editions prior to fourth.

In Champions, Martial Arts was one skill, and it had a cost equal to your STR. Thus, if you had 30

STR, you paid 30 points for Martial Arts. It consisted of five maneuvers (Martial Punch, Martial Kick,

Martial Dodge, Martial Block, Martial Throw) that had OCV and DCV modifiers, and also modified

your damage, usually by increasing it in increments of 1/2 STR. You could buy up damage: for half

the cost of your Martial Arts, all of the maneuvers that did damage received a bonus equal to +1/2



your STR damage. Martial Arts in Espionage and Danger International (and to a lesser extent in

Robot Warriors) worked a lot more like they do in fourth and fifth edition. Martial Arts didn't exist in

Fantasy Hero.

Power Skill didn't exist as a concept prior to fifth edition; Variable Power Pool allowed for a

separate skill to be used to manipulate the pool, but it was seldom given much to do beyond that.

Fifth edition unified the Variable Power Pool control skill with first edition Fantasy Hero's Magic Skillwhile bringing in some new and cool concepts.

Perks and Talents: Perks, including Fringe Benefits, appeared in Danger International (perhaps in Espionage as well).

Mastermind Bonus: This cost 50 points and gave the character a number of points equal to his

remaining point total to buy Bases, Vehicles, and Followers. Nowadays you'll want to break all of

those out separately.

Justice, Inc. had Weird Talents, while Danger International had Talents. These both served the

same niche that Talents did in fourth and fifth editions.

Justice, Inc. included rules for Psychic Powers, which didn't work in the same way as Champions

powers; they were all essentially built with No Conscious Control and Requires A Skill Roll, and

took a -5 to skill to attempt to use consciously.

Powers: The Fantasy Hero spell rules were similar, but not quite identical, to the Champions power rules

(effectively a subset with some different default conditions). In Fantasy Hero, all spells took a half

phase to cast, cost END, and required a Magic Skill roll; these provided no cost bonus, they were

just the default conditions. These default conditions could be bought down or off with Advantages;

the system of Advantages and Limitations was identical to that of Champions. For the most part,

under Powers I am only covering Champions Powers, not Fantasy Hero spells.

Star Hero included yet a different subset of the Champions Power rules for building both gadgets

and alien Powers; it did suggest going back to Champions for additional abilities. This was the last

book released before fourth edition, though it didn't include any concepts from that book.

Gadgets: Danger International, Justice Inc., and Robot Warriors all included some slightly oddball

guidelines for building gadgets using Champions Powers (Espionage may have included similar

rules). "Gadget" was a -1 Limitation with a few extras, and things like concealability or breakability

changed this. They weren't exactly the Champions Power rules, and none of the heroic level games

included rules for transplanting Powers straight in. I don't recall these ever being used in any

published product, but they're included here as a historical note.

Endurance Cost: Powers used to cost 1 END per 5 Active Points, except for movement, which

cost 1 END per 5" (which essentially came down to 1 END per 10 Active Points). Strength used to

cost 1 END per 5 points to use. Unless you have a specific reason for wanting the power to cost the

same amount of END to use as it did under third edition and prior, you probably don't want to

change it. Reduced Endurance has changed greatly; see below.

Most powers that nowadays work on a scale of CHA, CHA+10, CHA+20, etc., back then worked on

CHA, CHAx2, CHAx3, CHAx4, etc. scale, including Presence Attacks.

Powers weren't categorized in the same way they are nowadays -- the categories of Standard



Powers, Special Powers, Adjustment Powers, etc. didn't exist. There weren't really any restrictions

on what you could and couldn't put into a Framework, though a few powers were allowed in

Frameworks only by special GM permission.

Adjustment Powers: This did not exist as a separate category; what we now call Adjustment

Powers didn't have a unified methodology for the way they worked, and in some cases they worked

differently from one edition to another. In general, you'd pay X points times the Characteristic CostMultiple to adjust 1d6 pips of the Characteristic, rather than paying X points to adjust 1d6 Active

Points worth, but this wasn't necessarily always the case.

Size Powers: Growth, Shrinking, and Density Increase worked differently in every edition prior to

fourth. See the descriptions of those Powers below for more information. In fourth edition and prior, it

was okay to buy these as Always On to represent characters who were permanently larger or

smaller than normal.

Aid: Aid first appeared in Fantasy Hero. It worked similarly to the way Succor does in fifth, without

the ability to cumulatively stack uses; as long as you paid END, the additional characteristics

stayed, and when you shut the spell off, the Aided points went away immediately. In Champions, it

was much more common to buy extra characteristics with Advantages and Limitations, including

Usable By Others, than it is now.

Armor: The cost of Armor has changed; in third edition it was 5 points for 3 resistant PD or ED.

Density Increase: Its third edition cost was as follows: 10 points for +5 STR, +5 CON, +3 fully

resistant PD and ED, 1 BODY, -1" Knockback, and 2x Mass.

Desolidification: This used to cost 5 points per 1 BODY you could go through, minimum cost 40

points. Most people just bought 8 BODY Desolidification.

Dispel: This didn't exist outside of Fantasy Hero. Barring the basic differences between FH spells

and Champions Powers, it worked almost the same way then as it does now.

Drain: This used to be called Power Drain and worked differently from the way it does now. Power

Destruction worked like Drain, except that points would come back at the rate of the target's RECper month.

Ego Defense: The name changed to Mental Defense in fourth edition. It otherwise hasn't changed.

Endurance Reserve did not exist as a separate Power. The END Battery modifier worked much

differently from END Reserve. Essentially, the END Battery provided a certain number of uses worth

of END to the battery, and it had a slow recovery time; it was treated as a Limitation similar to

Charges. The details changed with each edition.

Enhanced Senses: These weren't broken up into Sense Groups. Enhanced Senses had a cost

reduction progression: the two most expensive were at full cost, the next two were at half cost, the

next two were at one quarter cost, etc. Minimum cost on a sense was 1 point.

Extradimensional Movement: Extradimensional Movement was not its own power. Instead, there

was a +1/2 Advantage for Teleport to allow it to transport interdimensionally.

Flash: This only affected normal sight. You couldn't buy it to affect other senses. It was Area of

Effect (Radius) with Nonselective Targeting by default (thus, you had to roll one Attack Roll to target

the Flash area, and another against each target within the area). In all editions prior to fifth, each

BODY on the dice caused the target to be Flashed for one full Phase, rather than one Segment.

Growth: Its third edition cost was as follows: 10 points for each level of Growth, which gives +5



STR, +5 PRE, +2 BODY, +1 PD, +1 ED, and other effects listed on the Growth Effects charts.

[Growth added +2" Running per level, as well as doubling the character's height, reach, area, and

others' Range Modifier every 3 levels.]

Hand-to-Hand Attack: This did not exist. If you wanted it, you had to kludge something together

using Energy Blast or Limited Strength.

Healing: Healing under third edition worked pretty much the way it does in fifth edition, including to

the extent of tracking wounds; it had changed in fourth edition to become a subset of Aid.

Regeneration was a separate Power (see below).

Images: This didn't exist in third edition. Champions II included a Light Illusions Power, but there

was no corresponding Sound Illusions available in Champions (though I recall including that in my

games as a house rule); such an ability did appear in Fantasy Hero as a spell called Sounds. Light

Illusions and Sounds were both bought in dice, and were compared to the target's INT (using a table

similar to other "comparison" mechanics such as Mental Powers and Presence Attacks) to

determine how complex an illusion the Power could create.

Invisibility: You could buy Invisibility to various senses, but again they weren't broken up into

groups. You could only buy Invisibility to what we now call the Sight Group senses, and not to any

others, though Desolidification explicitly provided effective Invisibility to the Hearing Group. "Full

Spectrum" Invisibility meant you had bought it to cover all of the senses it could cover.

Life Support: This had a straight cost progression whereby higher levels automatically included

lower levels; it wasn't possible to buy, for instance, Immunity to Pressure Extremes without first

buying Self Contained Breathing. "30 points of Life Support" or "Full Life Support" meant that you

had bought all of the Life Support there was to buy. The third edition Golden Age of Champions

supplement brought about the more familiar method of buying Life Support, including to allow

additional conditions that weren't covered by the progression (such as aging); that supplement also

suggested allowing Life Support to be purchased at the same cost reduction progression as

Enhanced Senses.

Light Illusions: See Images.

Luck: Luck was a Skill.

Mental Paralysis: This was a power that worked very similarly to Entangle except that it was

based on ECV, could be blown away by any Mental Powers (doing 1d6 Normal Damage to the

Paralysis per die in the Power), and was protected against by Mental Defense. Nowadays there are

various methods for building a "Mental Entangle" that more or less give the same effect.

Neutralize: See Suppress.

Piercing: This was a power that allowed you to ignore some of the target's defenses. You'd

probably convert it to Armor Piercing nowadays (though Piercing in almost its original form has

returned in the fifth edition Dark Champions book).

Power Destruction: See Drain.

Power Drain: See Drain.

Power Transfer: This became Transfer in fourth edition. It changed in accordance with the other

Adjustment Powers (see also).

Regeneration: In third edition and prior, Regeneration worked per recovery, including post-12,

rather than per Turn; a character could take a Recovery during combat and Regenerate, and if a



character was at negative STUN and recovering at GM's discretion, Regeneration was reduced as

well. It also returned Drained and Destroyed characteristics (points equal to BODY regenerated).

Running: Running was a Skill in the heroic level games.

Shrinking: Its third edition cost was as follows: 10 points for every x1/2 size, resulting in x1/2 to

other's Range Modifiers for Attack Rolls and sight Perception Rolls, x1/2 inches of ground

movement, +3 to knockback, and 1/8 mass.

Summon: This first appeared in Fantasy Hero.

Suppress: This was called Neutralize in Champions III . It didn't reduce a Characteristic or Power,

just prevented the target from using it.

Swimming was a skill in the heroic level games.

Swinging: Swinging was a Skill. It used to cost 1 point for 1" of Swinging, with a minimum cost of

5 points. It stated in the description, "The hero must have an implement (a Swing line) in order to

swing."

Advantages, Limitations, Modifiers: The notation for Advantages and Limitations has changed. Previously, Advantages were noted as

"x1/4" or sometimes "+x1/4". Limitations were noted as "+1/4", "+1/2", etc. Figuring out costs

worked identically to the way it does now. In this document I use the current notation for

Advantages and Limitations regardless of which edition I refer to.

In third edition and prior, there were Advantages, Modifiers, and Limitations. Reduced Endurance,

Multipower, Elemental Control, Variable Power Pool, and Variable Advantage were considered

Modifiers. In fourth edition, Reduced Endurance became an Advantage; Elemental Control,

Multipower, and Variable Power Pool became Power Frameworks; and anything else that was a

"Modifier" either became an Advantage or died. The word Modifier is now used to refer to

Advantages and Limitations in general.

It used to be you bought Reduced Endurance in increments of 1/2 (so you'd get 1/2 END, 1/4 END,

1/8 END, etc.). Reduced Endurance was a Modifier, and essentially was an Advantage paid against

your Active Points rather than your Base Cost. To buy a power to 0 END, you had to buy it to 0.5

END or below (which would then round in your favor to 0 END). There was no such thing as

Persistent; to buy a power at Always On, you had to first buy it to 0 END. Math errors abounded:

did 3.5 END round to 3 END immediately, to halve to 1.5 and round to 1, or did 3.5 END halve to

1.75 END, which rounded to 2 END? There was no single answer. Usually four levels of Reduced

END would get a power to 0 END; I never saw one that took more than five.

Advantages: Autofire was 10 shots by default, though you could buy it at the 5 shot level. 5 shots automatically

gave +2 OCV, with an additional +2 OCV for every 2x shots. This was built into the Advantage.

Selective Fire was an additional Advantage on top of this; without Selective Fire you could only fire

the maximum number of shots. (Autofire was +1/2 for 10 shots, or +1/4 for 5 shots; +1/4 for

Selective Fire; and +1/4 for 2x shots.)

Autofire and Area Effect attacks both halved the Range Modifier (see below under Combat for



more on Range Modifier).

Cumulative: This Advantage only existed for Transforms, which were not Cumulative by default,

and essentially made them infinitely cumulative.

Persistent: This first appeared in Fantasy Hero. It didn't require the Power to be bought to 0

Endurance Cost, though. It didn't exist in Champions, and therefore was not required on Powers

that were bought Always On.

Reduced Endurance Cost. This was a Modifier.

Variable Advantage: This was a Modifier in Fantasy Hero and didn't exist elsewhere. Your spell

could have a maximum Active Points equal to the points worth of the spell you originally bought;

you could have any Advantages on any amount of Base Points as long as the Active Points were

less than or equal to the basic Active Points in the spell. Thus, if you had purchased 60 Active

Points worth of Ranged Killing Attack (or Killing Blast in first edition Fantasy Hero), and bought

Variable Advantage on top of that, you could have any configuration of Advantages on a Killing Blast

up to 60 points worth. So, you might have 2d6 Area of Effect (Radius), or 2 1/2d6 Explosion, etc. It

required a successful Magic Skill Roll to change the Advantages. It was unclear how this worked on

a spell that already had Advantages on it.

Variable Result was an Advantage in Fantasy Hero. It was something like modern Variable

Special Effect on steroids; it allowed you to change many things about your Powers, such as the

apportionment of PD and ED in a Force Field or Force Wall, etc.

Variable Special Effect: This did not exist; see Variable Result for more.

Limitations:

Activation Rolls were much more common, and came in three flavors: 14-, 11-, and 8-.

Always On: Since Persistent did not exist, Always On did not require the use of it; it was onlynecessary to buy Reduced Endurance Cost down to 0 END. Inherent came about with fifth edition.

Gestures and Incantations first appeared in Fantasy Hero, as did Variable Advantage (which

was a Modifier along with Reduced Endurance Cost).

Linked: This has been vastly overhauled in fifth edition. For all intents and purposes, it worked the

same in fourth as it did in third.

Requires A Skill Roll: The Requires a Skill Roll Limitation was a back-construction from the

Fantasy Hero magic rules generalized with the skill roll requirements for Variable Power Pools; it

didn't exist as its own Limitation prior to fourth edition. No Magic Roll was a +1/2 Advantage in

Fantasy Hero.

Variable Limitation did not exist.

Frameworks: Frameworks (Elemental Control, Multipower, Variable Power Pool) were referred to as "Modifiers"



and did not appear in Fantasy Hero; there, characters paid full points for all spells.

Gadgeteering and Gadget Pools appeared in Champions II ; the full Variable Power Pool rules

appeared in Champions III . Variable Power Pools were a superset of Gadget Pools that ended up

working just a bit differently (the Control Cost was 1 per 5 points in the pool). If you see a Gadget

Pool, replace it with a Variable Power Pool.

The costs for Elemental Control were figured differently depending on which edition (first, second,

or third) you were looking at. Third and fourth editions work the same way, for the most part.

Variable Power Pools worked almost identically to the fourth and fifth edition versions. (This is a

change from the previous versions of this document; I had it incorrect before.)

Disadvantages: Previously, instead of a per-category maximum number of Disadvantages, the first two (biggest

bonus) in one category were full value, the next two were halved, the next two were quartered, etc.Fourth edition included occasional conditions that would halve the value of a Disadvantage; in fifth

edition, all Disadvantages are worth some multiple of 5 points.

In heroic games, all Disadvantages except Unluck were worth half their Champions values. The

dropoff progression was also halved (the first one was full value, the next one was halved, etc.).

Not infrequently, writers would forget to break out disadvantages. So you might see "Code Against

Killing: 15 points" and not know whether that was Common and Strong, Very Common and

Moderate, or what. The most egregious offenders were Psychological Limitations and Hunteds.

Berserk appeared only in Champions. Enraged appeared in Champions II .

Hunted appeared in Champions, but Watched only appeared in the heroic level games.

Normal Characteristic Maxima did not exist as a Disadvantage until the first edition of Golden

Age of Champions, released by Firebird Ltd. (Note: The concept did exist in the heroic level games,

just not as a Champions Disadvantage.) The Age Disadvantage existed only in the heroic level

games, with the exception of its inclusion in Golden Age.

Public ID and Secret ID are now Social Limitations; they were separate Disadvantages in fourth

edition and in all editions of Champions, and didn't exist in the heroic level games.

Rivalry first appeared in Robot Warriors.

Unusual Looks appeared only in Champions. It has been replaced by Reputation, Distinctive

Features, and (in fifth edition) Social Limitation.

Combat:

For the most part, combat worked the same: 11 + OCV - DCV or less on 3d6; mental combat was

11 + OECV - DECV. Some maneuvers differ, especially martial arts maneuvers, but most are the



same.

The base range modifier was -1/3". Modifers, maneuvers, etc. could change this; you'd see

adjustments like 1/2 Range Modifier, +1 Range Modifier, 2x Range Modifier, etc. -1/3" would double

to -1/6", while +1 would take -1/3" to -1/4". Halving a range modifier to something ending in .5

rounded in the character's favor, so -1/3" halved to -1/2", then to -1/1".

Other: The Vehicle rules were much different. The full vehicle rules first appeared in Champions II ; subsets

of them (mainly movement and combat) were used in Justice, Inc. and Danger International .

Vehicles had Maximum Speed, Acceleration, Deceleration, and Range (maximum distance travelled

on one tank of fuel), and moved per segment. Assigning DEX and SPD to vehicles first appeared in

Robot Warriors, as did the idea that a pilot and vehicle combination got the lower of either the pilot

or vehicle's DEX and SPD.

The Bases rules were similarly different, and also appeared in Champions II .

The Computer and AI rules were almost identical (computers were called AIDs, for Artificial

Intelligence Devices) and appeared in Champions II as well.

Hit Locations and wounding rules came about with the heroic level games. So did the advanced

bleeding rules.

Game by Game:

Fantasy Hero:

Skills:

Most skills in Fantasy Hero had near equivalents to current skills; second edition Fantasy Hero

included a good conversion chart.

Magic Skill would be called Power Skill (Magic) in fifth edition. Power Skill encompasses

everything Magic Skill did, and then some.

Spell Research no longer exists as a separate skill; use Inventor (Spell).

Powers/Spells: Spells by default took a half-Phase to cast, Concentrate at half DCV, and required a Magic Skill

Roll, all for no points. Also, by default a wizard could only have INT/5 spells running at once (this

included Constant spells, Delayed Effects, and Triggers). To build any spell effects as a "power"

required these conditions to be bought down or off with Advantages (Fast, Easy, and No Magic Roll,

respectively, for a total of +1). All Spells cost 1 END per 5 Active Points and reduced a caster's

Magic Roll by -1 per 10 Active Points. Almost all Spell effects had their names changed from the

equivalent Champions Powers, and in many cases worked slightly differently as well.

Champions Powers were never used in Fantasy Hero supplements (though one supplement in



particular unofficially added a few Champions concepts to FH ); it was sometimes amusing to see

the lengths to which authors would go to recreate abilities from the other games, without referring to

those games specifically.

Adapt is Life Support; the standard Adapt provided self contained breathing, but could be specified

to protect against another condition. The Base Cost was a flat 20 points regardless of what was

protected against.

Aid uses a different mechanic in fourth and fifth editions (the original was very similar to Succor),

and did not appear in Champions in any form.

Analyze is now part of Detect.

Blast is Energy Blast.

Create was for creating magic items, and no longer exists as a separate Power, though the

mechanic is still used as Usable By Others With Differing Modifiers. Nowadays this might be done

with a separate skill (such as a PS or Power Skill, possibly Inventor (Magic Items)).

Dazzle is Flash.

Defense is a generic defense that encompassed Flash Defense and Power Defense, mostly.

Destroy is now part of Drain (see Power Destruction, above).

Dominate is Mind Control.

Heal is Healing and works very similarly to both third and fifth edition Healing.

Illusions is Mental Illusions.

Killing Blast is Ranged Killing Attack. Hand-to-hand Killing Attack did not exist in Fantasy Hero,

and many effects that would otherwise be built as HKA were instead built as Killing Blast, No

Range, which necessitated buying, among other things, Fast, Easy, and No Magic Roll. It was

assumed but not made explicit for weapons that STR added to Killing Blasts bought as a weapon(this may have been made explicit in the STR Minimum Limitation now that I think about it).

Levitate is Flight. All Levitate effects reduced a character to half DCV while flying; this could be

bought off with an Advantage.

Mind Defense is Mental Defense.

Restore would be built as Healing vs. Characteristics other than BODY and/or STUN.

Shapeshift worked much differently, effectively being something like a Multiform.

Shield is Force Field. Armor as a Power or Spell didn't exist in Fantasy Hero; many effects that

would otherwise have been built as Armor were instead built as Shield. Again, armor effects would

have been built with the Fast, Easy, and No Magic Roll Advantages.

Sounds is Images vs. the Hearing group.

Transport is Teleport.

Ward is Force Wall.

Size Change Powers were built as "monster effects" that explicitly could not be built as Spells. If



you wanted to grow or shrink, you needed to Shapeshift to a larger or smaller form.

Advantages/Modifiers:

Frameworks didn't exist in Fantasy Hero. See above under Frameworks.

Variable Advantage and Reduced Endurance Cost were Modifiers. See above under Modifiers.

No Magic Roll was used to buy off the default Requires Skill Roll condition.

No Normal Defense was not used in Fantasy Hero; few effects were built that would have required

it.

Limitations:

Materials is Focus. The Materials Limitation could typically achieve much larger bonuses than

Focus in Champions (-1 1/2 to -2 was not uncommon for an item that granted -1 at most in

Champions).

Other:

Monsters were, for some strange reason, built with base Characteristics of 0 with 0 inches of

Running. Thus, all monsters cost 137 points more than their effective worth. This included "NPCs as

monsters" such as wandering bands of dwarves, halflings, even humans. This even applied to using

Shapeshift and Summon to turn into or summon them.

a look back at previous hero system editions

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