Returning to Shadowrun

A sort of where we are in our gaming post.

We finished our experiment with Claymore ending the campaign on a up note with the founding of the city of Rabona. Lots of fun and it showed that Age of Heroes can manage superheroic level games rather well- as long as it's superheroic swordsmen that is. It was in many ways one of the darker campaigns I ever played in, not from the character actions as such but in the way a shadow of doom hung over them. It was fun for single series of adventures, but not something I'd like to do all the time.

After some sorting and voting the group decided to return to our unfinished Shadowrun campaign, although that's a misleading label. It's a similar setting stealing names, places and ideas from the published setting- but really it's completely reworked and I think most players of the official setting would think it's a different type of game completely. In addition we're using HERO System instead of the published game system.

HERO 5th edition at that. We used 6th edition for a campaign before, but it never felt right to anyone due to the lack of support for traditional maps and minis playing (meaning you had to covert everything when you referenced the book). And none of the 6th edition changes were actually helpful. So it's back to the version that worked for us.

Age of Heroes 5.0 Errata

Last Updated: 02-04-2012


The Errata has been moved to a PDF file located here.

What is Age of Heroes

Age of Heroes is homegrown set rules for table-top fantasy role-playing designed for my gaming groups. It was available in a very incomplete form for free download around the turn of the century, and most recently a completed version at Lulu in hardcover.

The latest version is 5.0.4, available at Lulu.

Interested in a review? The most recent one for version 5.0.2 is found at The Bedrock Blog.

Age of Heroes Now Available

Ok, it's finally finished, up on Lulu and available to anyone willing to spend a few bucks on it.

What do you get for your $25 plus shipping?

The core rules (complete enough for a beginning campaign) for a fantasy setting of your choice. These home grown rules have been in continuous play for 32 years now (hence the 5.0 version label on the cover).

This is a 80s style RPG with some rather uncommon features:

1. The game play focus is on maneuver rather than the more common resource management.
2. That focus allows mixed level adventurers to an extent almost unheard of. This in turn allows for Generational Campaigns when one's own offsprings might adventure with their parents.
3. Balanced armor and weapons selection making the choice of what to use a matter of style instead of effectiveness.
4. A somewhat open Class/Level system that allows for great variety creating characters while still protecting classic fantasy niches
5. A unique advancement system that avoids endless power growth while encouraging mixed level adventuring.
6. Combat is similar in some ways to BRP, but is more scalable and with greater options.

Age of Heroes uses d100 as it's core resolution mechanic, and the full range of polyhedral dice for damage.

I've also made available a 6 page GM Screen PDF to use with game. I use it with the Savage Worlds Customizable GM Screen to wonderful effect nearly completely eliminating page flipping during games.

Also available is a basic character sheet (also a PDF).

The 80s, The Golden Age of RPG Design

I loved the 80s, the music and games at least.

Most 80s RPGs were driven by a simple goal- to be less abstract and more true to the source materials than D&D. In short, to be more realistic and/or faithful. A movement in game design that actually started earlier than 80s with games like RuneQuest (78) and Traveller (77) but reached its apex with systems like Champions (81) and GURPS (86).

Along the way there were dozens of games- Twilight 2000, Morrow Project, Aftermath, etc.

While RuneQuest was mostly just different from D&D, as the 80s progressed the style grew to embrace more complex and detailed rules (if with far fewer exceptions and special cases than D&D). A growth D&D mirrored, but the key difference was still realism and/or faithfulness.

What was interesting about these games, is what the designer thought was realistic or faithful. Aftermath had an very detailed hit location system for example. Champions a very dynamic Superhero Combat System, and Morrow Project highly detailed equipment rules. It seemed that like the blind men with the elephant, each designer was fixated on their own interest and it was those interests that would be modeled in their rules.

And that was a pure joy, never since have we seen such vast differences in game design or such a wealth of materal to pick and choose from. To me, it was truly the Golden Age of game design.

80s Game Characteristics:

• High Page Count
• Rules with little fluff or background in comparison
• Focus on wargame like conflict resolution, story and the larger world were left to be creations of the GM and players
• The search for realism or faithful recreation of source materials
• Extreme variety in subsystems depending upon the designer's goals
• Wide Ranging Experimentation