Heroica: Glory Amongst The Stars - Mission Masters Lounge

[Waterbrick Down]

~Note: This is a guide for those who want to host their own missions for Heroica: Glory Amongst the Stars RPG. You should have a firm grasp on the rules of the game and preferably at least one completed mission as a player under your belt before applying to host your own mission. Use this thread to also discuss mission feedback.~

Mission Planning

So when it comes to running a mission, the first thing you’ll need is a potential plot or scenario to run your players through. Your mission can have a single plot or several side quests. It can range from an escort scenario, to a planet scouting, to making a delivery, to engaging hostile forces. It can be composed of all combats or no combats. You can include riddles or puzzles for the players to solve or simply complex roleplaying scenes they have to navigate. Settings can range from within a single city block to an entire planet or maybe even a galaxy. Your mission could take place in-game over a couple of hours or months. If you’re looking for inspiration you can always look to past missions or the Library-topic.

For your first mission we’d recommend keeping it simple, run one or two battles, throw in a puzzle, and give the players an interesting setting or a few unique Non-Player Characters (NPC’s). As you grow more experienced you’ll learn what is exciting to players and how to manage the narrative in this collaborative storytelling experience over longer plots. While running a game completely improvised is possible, we’d recommend outlining your plot, your major NPC’s, the enemies you’ll use in combat, potential locations, and any items or vendors that might be encountered. 

Because this is a LEGO RPG, try to build MOC’s ahead of time for your mission and take pictures of the events, the environments, and the enemies to illustrate the mission and make it that much more interesting to your players. Please avoid using blurry photos. LDD-pictures are allowed with the reservation that they are of good quality. Alternatively there are numerous pictures of sci-fi and fantasy builds on the internet. If you use those, the only ask would be that you get permission from the original content creator and provide acknowledgement. You can also create maps and diagrams, some Mission Masters even include links to music or soundscapes to set the mood for their players.

Once you have the mission planned, write a pitch for it and send it to one of the Game Managers via PM. The pitch should include the following things:

Mission Title: Name the mission something interesting, but don’t reveal everything in the title.
Patron: Explain who is hiring the heroes.
Assignment: Write the main goal that the players should achieve during the mission. Preferably write it in the perspective of the employing character (which must be different from your player character) or organization.
Party Requirements: Write the requirements that you wish the players fulfil in order to participate in your mission. These can include specific character point thresholds, or even specific genders or species, but most importantly the size of the party that can participate in the mission. The party size should not exceed five players at least on your first missions. Keep in mind, the more players the longer it will take to establish consensus or collect all of the combat actions.
Reward: Define what rewards the players get from completing the mission. This can include credits, special items, extra character points, etc.

You may have to provide some enemy statistics and pictures you've prepared as well as answer some questions before your mission is accepted into the game.

Lore Planning

The world of Heroica: Glory Amongst the Stars RPG is a vast one. The Calliope Wheel Galaxy and the contained Euripides Arm is filled with many uncharted locations. Even the known star systems have dozens of planets waiting to be explored or expanded upon. When creating new lore for the world, be it a location, a technology, a species, or an organization, feel free to be creative, just try and keep it within the established setting and canon. Heroica: Glory Amongst the Stars strives to be a “science fantasy” game. That means it attempts to blend tropes from these two distinct genres into a setting that is enjoyable for those folks who are into either. With that said, we realize that some missions will emphasize the “science” part and some missions will emphasize the “fantasy” aspect. All in all, the aim for the world is one where-in magic and the fantastic came first, but science slowly gained traction and now the two work hand in hand to advance society. This does mean the world will have some unique idiosyncrasies, but we prefer to view those as the game’s strength and not its weakness. That being said, people are always willing to discuss any questions you might have either here or in the game’s Discord channel. Additionally the Library and Embassy topics are filled with an amazing trove of information to inspire you and help you make your creation part of the living breathing world that our players get to enjoy. In conclusion, please be courteous with your world building and how what you create may have an impact on other players and Mission Masters down the road.

Combat Planning

We’re not going to lie, combat in Heroica: Glory Amongst the Stars RPG is the most mechanically intensive part of the game. That’s not to say that it is as difficult as some pen and paper RPG’s out there, but compared with the rest of the game, this is where things like game balance can get tricky.

When planning a combat scenario, it’s best to remember that players and their enemies run off the same mechanics. Thus, making a challenging yet rewarding combat experience means your best indicator of balance is whether the characters’ total character creation points equals the creation points of your enemies. If the sums are skewed toward one side or the other too drastically this can indicate that the encounter will either be too easy or too difficult. Another thing to consider is that the more enemies you include in a battle, the longer the battle will take to resolve. Try and steer away from giving your enemies equipment or spells that are not available to the player base, but sometimes if you need to make an enemy unique this can be the path to take.

As far as initiating combat, that is the responsibility of the Mission Master. Players cannot fight enemies without you telling them they can. When you feel it is appropriate, roll the players’ and enemies’ Initiatives (Skill Attribute Check) and tell the players to prepare for battle. Post the Initiative so that your players know what order everyone will act in and then prompt them for whether they will move, whether they will perform an action, or simply stay put. You can arrange your players and enemies on a battle grid to give a visual indicator to your players the layout of the battle. As your players are considering their actions, decide upon the actions of the enemies. Once all the actions have been decided upon, go down the Initiative order and resolve each of the actions with the appropriate checks. Adjust the players and enemies Vitality and other stats accordingly, move the players and enemies on the battle grid, and proceed to the next round of battle. If a player has not responded within an appropriate amount of time (generally 24hrs), either the Mission Master or the Mission Leader may pick a suitable action for them. If the players’ characters are successful in defeating their enemies, grant them the rewards from the enemy corpses. If the players’ characters are defeated they are considered dead if no one revives them before the end of combat. If all the players’ characters are defeated, depending upon the enemies, they may kill the player’s characters and the mission is considered a failure. You may rerun the mission at a later date, but please consider the balance of the game and whether the failure was unavoidable or simply poor luck.

If the entire party flees the battle, you can choose whether to give them a chance to try it again or not..

Item Planning

Designing treasure and new items can be one of the most rewarding parts of being a Mission Master. The items you create will travel with your players into other adventures far beyond what you’ve designed. This can be both a good thing and a bad thing. When designing an item, you will need to consider not only how you will deal with it in your mission, but potentially how other mission masters will need to deal with it in the future. Giving an overpowered weapon to a player may seem cool and fitting in the moment before they deal with the big bad at the conclusion of your mission, but every subsequent Mission Master after you may have to adjust their combat encounters drastically to keep the average battle from becoming too easy.

With all this in mind, the best strategy for creating a new balanced item is by copying the mechanical format of an already existing item. Perhaps there is an item that prevents players from becoming poisoned, it would be a logical extension then to create an item that can prevent players from being restrained or blinded. In the case where no similar items to your idea exist, see if it matches an existing mechanic. Perhaps an item like a cybernetic eye can grant a player a proficiency in perception if they don’t already have it. In this example the eye item functions the same as a character creation point granting a player proficiency in a skill. If you’re creating a brand new mechanic, consider consulting other mission masters or posting in this thread to solicit feedback on ways the item could potentially be broken or abused. Because of the underlying dice pool system items can impact probabilities in a number of ways such as:

·Increasing/decreasing the number of Successes required for an action
·Increasing/decreasing the threshold on a standard d6 required for a Success i.e. instead of the standard 1-3 = Failure, 4-6 = Success an enhancing item could cause the following 1-2 = Failure, 3-6 = Success
·Allowing for all or some of the Success/Failure results to be rerolled and the better or worse result taken
·Granting or Removing guaranteed Successes/Failure
·Directly increasing the numerical value of an Attribute or a Skill proficiency
·Allowing for combined Skill proficiencies or Attributes in a single dice pool
·Allowing for more or less than the maximum of 10 dice to be used in a dice pool

Templates

The following templates are shared to assist in running a mission. Overtime we may expand this section to its own topic to include pictures of enemies, NPC’s, locations, battle grids that are free to use and can be easily incorporated into your mission.

Standard Enemy Template (Character Point Total = 10)

Enemy A
Vitality: 7/7
Velocity: 2
Strength: 2
Skill: 1
Smarts: 1
Spirit: 0/0
Proficiencies: Weapon Skill 2, Social Skill 2, Physical Skill, 1
Spells: 0
Credits: 10
Equipment: Weapon A (Grade Damage Range), Tool A, Armor (Grade Damage)
Inventory: Consumable

Battle Grid Template 4x4

Item Template

Item - (Consumable/Weapon/Armor/Tool) Effect (Minimum Attribute or Proficiency Requirement if applicable)

Heroica: Glory Amongst the Stars Banner

Heroica Logo

[samurai-turtle]

I hope their is going to be a guide for how to run a battle. Because right now I am not sure where the numbers are coming from. Probably need a sub guide for the weapon's too. 

[Kintobor]

16 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

I hope their is going to be a guide for how to run a battle. Because right now I am not sure where the numbers are coming from. Probably need a sub guide for the weapon's too. 

I've considered writing up a document in the style of the old Theatre thread explaining how battles are run, both for Mission Master and player use. I understand it, having run it, but for others it might it being a little confusing, as it's radically different from Heroica 1.0 and different from how Dungeons and Dragons' combat is run.

Edited July 4, 2021 by Kintobor

[Waterbrick Down]

22 hours ago, samurai-turtle said:

I hope their is going to be a guide for how to run a battle. Because right now I am not sure where the numbers are coming from. Probably need a sub guide for the weapon's too. 

Each MM will probably develop their own style to report the results they are rolling, but at least for me here's how I run a combat round:

Player A vs. Enemy A (Player Weapon Dice Roll 1, Player Weapon Dice Roll 2, etc. + Bonus number dependent upon the grade of the player's weapon or Negative Number if the weapon is being used outside it's optimal range) # Total Successes vs. (Enemy A Skill Dice Roll 1, Enemy A Skill Dice Roll 2, etc. + Bonus number dependent upon the grade of the enemy's armor if applicable) # Total Successes = Damage = Player # Total Successes - Enemy # Total Successes.

[Peppermint_M]

Thanks for the mission @Kintobor. Be honest; how much did we derail by being nice?

[Kintobor]

On 7/30/2021 at 6:25 AM, Peppermint_M said:

Thanks for the mission @Kintobor. Be honest; how much did we derail by being nice?

To be completely honest? Not as much as I originally anticipated, if only because I was reminded of a valuable lesson halfway through the mission: be flexible.

Hugo was not originally in the initial concept I had for the mission, and came about roughly halfway through the quest as I realized my initial, larger scope for the quest was going to be dashed due to my currently small collection on hand, so it was around the time you got into the basement I added in Hugo. The cranium rats were always there, the concept of someone living in the garbage chute was a very late addition. I kind of figured the group would be heading towards a diplomatic angle once Duvors had Enson reach out while in the chute and from there allowed for the potential of a fight should Hugo's poor communication skills and inability to face his troubles head on get the better of him. You would've merely had to deal with the rats while Hugo panicked, but the rats would've had more spells at their disposal since they get stronger the closer they are together, and the more of them are in one area.

I went out with this quest with two goals in mind: introduce some of the staff working in the Hall, and figure out how the game is run while running a fun quest, and on both accounts I think I did a reasonable job. Part of me feels like it was a little quick, but part of me also feels like trying to lengthen it would've dragged on something that was naturally coming to a conclusion. I do enjoy the story of the quest, as it has some parallels to the Hey, Arnold! episode "Bird Man", with Hugo being this misunderstood, socially awkward loner who just really likes rats. It's a parallel I didn't realize until after the mission wrapped up, but considering he's still around I imagine we haven't seen the last of him.

Mr. Grumble was very loosely inspired by Mr. Moseby from the Suite Life of Zach and Cody, more so the concept of a concierge obsessed with professionalism and his record than anything else about the character. Rachel, on the other hand, wasn't really inspired by any one thing in particular, and not in a negative way. She's a character whose concept I took time to think on, over some other characters who are inspired by either another character I enjoy or a number of different character concepts that just come together. She's definitely got more to her that didn't come up here, including her previous time in college and her hobby, but I imagine we'll get to those eventually. I specifically wrote these characters to fit into this hall of misfits. There's a reason why Rachel and Grumble are working for an upstart despite their apparent talents, and I hope to explore those concepts eventually now that they're introduced. I hope you guys enjoyed the characters.

Anyways, I imagine I'll have more thoughts down the line, and I want to talk a bit about each of you individually, but for a brief overview: you three were fantastic. Enson, Valeria, and Aysu are wonderful characters, and I'd love to host either of you again in the future.

Feel free to ask more questions or give me some critique, I'm a fairly laid back individual and I do enjoy talking about game design, but thank you to WBD, Duvors, and Peppermint_M for joining me on my first adventure in the new system.

[Waterbrick Down]

Thanks for running the quest Kintober as typically a forever DM it's fun to participate as just a single character sometimes. Even thought we discussed a fair number of details prior to your running this quest, it was so neat to see them fleshed out and interacting as part of the world. Both Rachel and Mr. Grumble are excellent addition's to the Hall's staff. It's one of things I was somewhat protective of early on with the concept of the Heroica sequel and am glad to see them fitting in so well. I'd have been interested in the layout of the 2nd battle as the 1st felt just a tad on the easy side. It was good to see the mechanics in action though and I think you had a good balance for providing for role-play opportunities as well as times to use the skill mechanics to decide things. I am right there with you in terms of flexibility and while it can prove to be a hassle in the moment, in hindsight I really think it provides for a better experience overall. Nothing ever felt forced, which I think is the goal, the addition of Hugo seems great and I look forward to him as an NPC for future quests. :)

Only a few points of frustration. First was the connection between the blockage and the rats. It was never quite clear if the rats created the blockage or were simply taking advantage of it. So as a player it felt confusing on what our objective actually was. We worked through it in the end, but there was a little frustration on my part due to the uncertainty. Second, and this may be a mechanics thing to mull over, as a spell caster Spirit management still doesn't feel quite right. I'm all for how it works in battle, but out of combat it felt a little frustrating. I knew I was going to get back all my spirit at the beginning of the next battle, but I didn't know what obstacles I'd be facing between the end of the first battle and the second so consuming an Aether Brew felt potentially wasteful as I couldn't be sure whether that extra Spirit would be needed. At least in battle one can determine whether or not to spend Spirit because you can more easily assess the situation. I don't necessarily have a solution for this yet, but it's something I'm stewing on...

It was great questing with both of you, Duvors and Peppermint_M. Both of your characters have definitive characteristics that make them quite memorable and I definitely look forward to going on future missions with them. I'm still not 100% satisfied with Valesia quite yet as I'm still working on figuring out her goals and overall perspective on life that drives her, but we'll see.

All in all a short and sweet mission that I think continues to build and expand the world we're trying to start. 

[Peppermint_M]

Your characters were fun and I can see Mr Grumble getting to shine with all the heroes walking around the building! Rachel and Hugo will certainly be interesting to bump into again. 

My stats problem at the start was a misunderstanding on my part so thanks for letting me clear it up, I am glad I went with this quest to get Aysu started as a character.

It was fun to roleplay with you all. Valesia was nice and motherly in tone, I think if the quest went longer or riskier then Aysu would have certainly latched onto that! Enson was good and sensible, a helpful contrast that let me keep my character more "newbie". 

[Duvors]

I'm happy to see everyone enjoyed the experience as much as I did. I especially enjoyed the interaction between Enson and Valesia's different forms of maturity and Aysu's chipper newness. Though I feared I was being a bit overbearing throughout the quest I'm glad to see that I was worrying over nothing. As for the mission itself, while it was short it was still very satisfactory. I chose this mission specifically because it seemed exactly what I wanted to start my character's career. I'm especially thankful to Kinto for being willing to alter the mission while in progress to allow for a peaceful resolution. Thank you all once again and I'll be seeing you in future!

[Classic_Spaceman]

On 8/2/2021 at 2:39 AM, Kintobor said:

Hugo was not originally in the initial concept I had for the mission, and came about roughly halfway through the quest as I realized my initial, larger scope for the quest was going to be dashed due to my currently small collection on hand, so it was around the time you got into the basement I added in Hugo. The cranium rats were always there, the concept of someone living in the garbage chute was a very late addition. 

Was there ever a point wherein Hugo would have turned out to be a puppet for the Cranium Rats (see Locutus of Borg)? Some of his earlier lines made me think that you were going in that direction. 
 

[Kintobor]

9 hours ago, Classic_Spaceman said:

Was there ever a point wherein Hugo would have turned out to be a puppet for the Cranium Rats (see Locutus of Borg)? Some of his earlier lines made me think that you were going in that direction.

Honestly, no. The quest didn't manage to go into what might've allowed Hugo to have a connection with the rats, but... there is one, it's weird, you'll have to wait and see when, and if it comes up.

I didn't have much of an idea where Hugo was going to go when I finished the quest, but now- like, I wish I could talk about it, but it's so bizarre and weird that I honestly don't want to spoil what I have planned for Hugo, because it is just that weird and out there.

[Waterbrick Down]

47 minutes ago, Kintobor said:

Honestly, no. The quest didn't manage to go into what might've allowed Hugo to have a connection with the rats, but... there is one, it's weird, you'll have to wait and see when, and if it comes up.

I didn't have much of an idea where Hugo was going to go when I finished the quest, but now- like, I wish I could talk about it, but it's so bizarre and weird that I honestly don't want to spoil what I have planned for Hugo, because it is just that weird and out there.

Sounds like you'll just have to run another quest. 

[Kintobor]

Just now, Waterbrick Down said:

Sounds like you'll just have to run another quest. 

It won't be for awhile, but I've got a few ideas for how to present the ideas I want to explore.

[Duvors]

@Waterbrick Down, I've been thinking about what you said about how awkward the way Spirit works feels, and I think that the best ways to deal with that are either to make Meditate a regular action or have Spirit replenish at the end of battles.

[Waterbrick Down]

39 minutes ago, Duvors said:

@Waterbrick Down, I've been thinking about what you said about how awkward the way Spirit works feels, and I think that the best ways to deal with that are either to make Meditate a regular action or have Spirit replenish at the end of battles.

It depends I think on how powerful we want to make spellcasting. Meditate as an action would mean that heroes have unlimited casting potential out of combat. Having Spirit replenish after battle though makes me wonder if it'll cause heroes to never cast anything outside of battle because they never know if they'll need it when combat starts.

[Khorne]

Is this where we post our post-mission thoughts? If not, I'll repost these somewhere else.

First off: I really enjoyed the mission. The story was simple, yet exciting and fresh enough to get started in this new era of Heroica. It introduced the White Knights organization and ended mysteriously with hints at further plot lines in the dark realm. It also served as a nice introduction to aetherspace as a location and story element. The sets were great and really pulled you into the world, which I really loved. Well done! Character design was also top notch, as were the different personalities and relationships.

Like I stated multiple times during the mission: I was personally still learning the new system. I'm more of a hands-on person to learn new things, than reading and remembering everything in detail. Also being used to old Heroica made me sometimes not use 2.0's new system to its full advantage. Therefore, I think we as a party sometimes made the battles more difficult for ourselves by not using all the available mechanics. Nearing the end of the quest, I was starting to get the hang of things a bit more. The final battle seemed really daunting at first, but I'm glad we pulled through as a team. Luckily, Polaris was a heavy hitter with medical skills: a very welcome and direly needed addition to the team.

That being said: wow, healers are needed in 2.0 more than in 1.0, I believe. Heroica 1.0 started of with several Clerics, but I don't think there are that much healers/supporters in 2.0 as of yet (?). But boy, are they needed. Especially since this was a first quest and no one had the money or resources to buy a lot of potions, it was really difficult to keep the team "healthy" during combat and it was especially hard when someone went down. It added to excitement of the battles, since characters can die now, but I can imagine it looked kind of bleak for KOTZ at times . It would've really sucked to see Varen die in Mission 1. But like I said: it's part of the game and certainly adds and extra layer to combat, which I applaud.

Just for completeness' sake, I'll add in my 2 cents on the party as well.

The party:

• Varen: Loved the character already in the hall. Genuinely had to laugh at some of the jokes. I hated to see him bleed out helpless on the floor with the prospect of death without being able to do much. I don't know what can be done to make a dying character more "fun" to play, because now there were several rounds where you couldn't do anything because of Varen dying, which was too bad. I can imagine it can bum someone out or take you out of the story. I don't know if that is the reason, but nearing the end of the quest I got the impression you were being less active?
  
  Like I said: I do love the character, though. The whole ex-lawyer, smooth talking, party hard gig is so cool. I also liked that he represents a certain aspect of the "law" just like Felix used to be a different part of the "law", so there's a bit of a connection already. I was hoping to delve into the RP'ing somewhat more, but I'm still kind of searching for the right footing for my character as well, so I haven't used the RP possibilities to their full potential sadly.
   
• Polaris: I like that Polaris is a genuinely nice character. The addition of MILES is (IMO) a bit superfluous. I don't see his use story-wise, as of yet. It also makes that you sometimes turn to MILES for RP'ing instead of the other players. Most of the interaction I recall between our characters was strictly business, which is okay but perhaps also a missed opportunity because there was potential for more since both characters are Chimerans and there's definitely potential in Polaris as a character. An added plus are your medical skills and melee strength. I think Polaris was truly the MVP of this mission.
   
• Felix: Like I said in General Discussion already: I'm still looking for the right tone of voice or characteristics of the character. I really loved RP'ing as Eric in the past, but I know he only got to where he was in the end because of many quests and trial-and-error to find the essence of the character. I find myself slipping back into "Eric mannerisms" at times when typing up stuff for Felix, which I then correct and make more friendly. Because in the end, that's what I want the character to be (for starters): a good guy with a strong moral compass who will try to help others, but with some rough edges at times. Somewhere between a noir detective and spaghetti western cowboy, but less brooding and dark. I've played the cunning, snarky character already so I definitely want something a different now.
  
  I loved seeing the description of the mission popping up at first, because aetherspace was a part of Felix's background I came up with from the start so it matched perfectly. Like I said already: I didn't fully grab all opportunities, but the base is there.

[Waterbrick Down]

Alrighty, Mission #2. Firstly, thanks to @Khorne @samurai-turtle @KotZ for joining onto my first completed quest in Heroica: GATS! It's a great feeling to have seen how far we as a community have come since the inception of the idea. As a party you guys worked well together and really were a cohesive group even while getting your feet wet with the new mechanics. Thanks for your patience as I learned them as well and figured out how to run a mission smoothly, typos and copy errors included. 

The story itself was quite straightforward without a whole lot of branching paths:

Talk with White Knight → Figure out a way inside the Warehouse → Locate Lars → Get out alive

The details around the setup of the situation were a little more complex however and certainly evolved as the mission wore on resulting in the ending we had. I hadn't intended to expand on Thudaal lore in this mission, but I'm certainly glad we did. Ætherspace as a concept was a bit tricky to carve out and I'll be interested to see how other MM interpret it. For me it's a mix between Tron's cyberspace and the D&D Ethereal plane and hopefully that came through in the photos and descriptions. The main thrust behind most of the mission was really laying groundwork for pieces of the world: White Knight, Lupin, Quarm, Thudaal, Ætherdiving. For the most part, I think I got everything out there that I had intended and I don't think you all missed much or didn't interact with. Your interactions with the NPC's was fitting and I appreciated that you all really interacted with them just as much as you did each other and helped flesh out their characters. White Knight is a bit of an amalgamation of the Town Watch and the Paladin Order from Heroica 1.0 and I really hope to bring some of the NPC's back in the future, not to mention the Collective. 

Gameplay wise, you guys faired well on the non-combat side of things. You really learned how to interact with the Proficiency Check mechanics and use your particular skills to get things done (Felix Survival/Coding, Polaris Nature/Medicine, Varen Persuasion) which was cool to see. You pieced most of the puzzle together as to what was going on and you all solved the literal puzzle expertly, so well done. As for combat...  The new battle mechanics certainly take some getting used to and they afford a lot more tactical options compared to Heroica 1.0, where all you had to worry about as a weapon user was what enemy to target. I also realized after the first battle that I had set the Skill of the enemies too high and it resulted in them being too difficult to kill. That battle should have only been half the number of rounds it took and I didn't do a good job of realizing that rolling 1 dices +1 weapon hit was very infrequently do damage against something rolling 3 dice. And that didn't even account for if someone was shooting with a disadvantage (i.e. being too close or too far away from the target). All in all it meant that battle dragged and I'm sorry your first combat experience with the new system was like that. The second combat I feel went much better. Yes it was more challenging, but you all started working more as a team and figuring out ways to use the system to your advantage, whether it was by stunning the creature or defending/rallying each other to help do lots of damage/protect from damage. The moment you realized that if you took care of the creature that it would help Lars, I think shifted the battle into potentially hopeless to achievable. It still was close, but I think you had enough tools at your disposal to get the job done. @KotZ sorry you spent so much time unconscious, the Stabilization mechanic needs to be fixed to provide more hope and I think we need a way to incentivize Heroes not only stabilizing their fellow companions but actually healing them and getting them back in the battle. In the end, I learned a lot about what works with the new system and what doesn't so hopefully my next mission you all are on will feel a little less overwhelming in the battles department.

 Varen (KOTZ)
A lawyer doing mercenary work I think fits the setting very well. I like Varen's reminiscing of his legal practice and party days, but maybe it's not super clear why he ever got out of it. It certainly comes up in his interactions and it fits his stat choice super well, maybe its something we'll see explored later. I'll echo Khorne's comments about the contrast between his and Felix's justice/law approach was really cool to see. While you did spend a fair amount of time knocked out in the combat, I think in those instances where you were up, your long range capabilities definitely assisted your companions. The trick would be in the future to keep your space from the enemy (granted that depends on the grid layout) and you'll go down less often. All in all, it was great to have you along on the quest and you brought a lot to it.

Polaris (samurai-turtle)
You embody the combat veteran pretty well I think and it definitely came out in this mission. I'm still not sure what to make of MILES as I think companions can be difficult to pull off well, but I'm still interested to see where it goes. You definitely propped up the team's combat side of things acting as the damage sponge and it became obvious that in order for the enemies to win they'd have to deal with Polaris. You were really good at coming up with creative solutions to problems and that helped me as a Mission Master want to provide things that could be interacted with. The fact that Polaris kept on reading the holocubes took me a little by surprise, but I'm glad she did and was cool to see her medic background reinforce this aspect of her personality traits. The debrief at the end I think also helped reveal more about Polaris's perspective on life and the law which I think will be neat to see explored as she develops. Great job!

Felix (Khorne)
I really like what you're doing with Felix, Khorne. I know it can be difficult to get out of the habits created for one character, but you are doing a really good job with differentiating Felix as his own character. The noir detective thing comes through really well and doesn't feel forced. As mission leader, you expertly handled not only the new mechanics but helping the group strategize as well. As a MM it can be tricky to figure out how much advice to give your players in a certain situation without it spoiling the fun. Thankfully you stepped up and I didn't have to worry about it too much. Yes combat was rough, but your group definitely improved over the length of the quest and so did Felix. His interactions with Lars and Molly made me smile and I like that while his background impacts his actions, it doesn't control them. I think you've got that balance down. I'm glad the quest was such a good fit for his character and I look forward to having Felix along for future missions.

Thanks again to everyone who participated and read along, hopefully this was a good start to many more missions to come.

1 hour ago, Khorne said:

That being said: wow, healers are needed in 2.0 more than in 1.0, I believe. Heroica 1.0 started of with several Clerics, but I don't think there are that much healers/supporters in 2.0 as of yet (?). But boy, are they needed. Especially since this was a first quest and no one had the money or resources to buy a lot of potions, it was really difficult to keep the team "healthy" during combat and it was especially hard when someone went down. It added to excitement of the battles, since characters can die now, but I can imagine it looked kind of bleak for KOTZ at times . It would've really sucked to see Varen die in Mission 1. But like I said: it's part of the game and certainly adds and extra layer to combat, which I applaud.

Yes, with the threat of character death, I think healing is going to become more critical to groups. Thankfully characters can be retooled, so if medicine or a spell is useful for a given mission its fairly straightforward to set your character up to do well. Glad you all kept stabilizing KOTZ. While the Stability mechanics need to be reworked, I was glad we didn't have to make a rules exception for this game because of an unfair character death.

[samurai-turtle]

1 hour ago, Khorne said:

 

• Polaris: I like that Polaris is a genuinely nice character. The addition of MILES is (IMO) a bit superfluous. I don't see his use story-wise, as of yet. It also makes that you sometimes turn to MILES for RP'ing instead of the other players. Most of the interaction I recall between our characters was strictly business, which is okay but perhaps also a missed opportunity because there was potential for more since both characters are Chimerans and there's definitely potential in Polaris as a character. An added plus are your medical skills and melee strength. I think Polaris was truly the MVP of this mission. 

I should talk some about MILES. You are right about him about being superfluous. Probably why I didn't use him to much. Sometimes I feel no one is role playing with me so I do "silly" stuff like use a sub character. As for MILES personality I see his as the strait man to Polaris' "silly" moments. As for any "role playing" he is a robot, I see him punching and kicking the enemies not Polaris, she is just directing witch enemy get hit first. Not to mention they have different "senses" so they see things quite literally differently. 

Ok other things.

For the mission it's self. Khorne is right it was fairly straightforward. But I do have a question for you @Waterbrick Down where you trying to kill our characters off or not? 

I guess I will talk a little about the characters now. 

Varen - Was he spouse to be a sleazy lawyer? 

Felix - I was getting a John Constantine vibe from him. Were you going for that or am I projecting something on to him? 

Lars - He was basically the victim and under mind controlled. So I guess he was about what I expected. 

Agent Molly - I guess she is Lars want to be girlfriend. And the basic scientist wondering why are these guy here. 

Oddsphere - Basic management character trying not to fully take any blame. 

Drones - Just basic minions. 

Tank Creature - It was coming off like it wanted to control everyone / everything. 

I guess I should talk some more about Polaris. {Troubles one has when someone else post before you do.} ...

When I first came up with this character it was in 1.0 days. At first I thought she was going to be a second character but that never happen. Plus I thought a character with a disability will be interesting to play (another reason for MILES). And at the time I thought no one else came up with this idea. Later I found out someone makes d&d minis with characters in wheelchairs. After thinking Heroics was completely over with, I used Polaris in a d&d adventure League game slightly retooled (unfortunately I didn't use MILES for the game). And as I used her for a cleric. The cleric needs some sort "deity" to give up your magic power, hence the figure in the snow storm and inheriting the "power" from one of her grandparent's. ...

I guess the d&d game help me flush out the characters some more. So I guess the lesson their is if you are having trouble with your character, get a d&d character sheet and fill it out. It probably will ask you questions you didn't think of at the time. You might not need to fill the numbers part the other things will help. 

49 minutes ago, Waterbrick Down said:

You embody the combat veteran pretty well I think and it definitely came out in this mission. I'm still not sure what to make of MILES as I think companions can be difficult to pull off well, but I'm still interested to see where it goes. You definitely propped up the team's combat side of things acting as the damage sponge and it became obvious that in order for the enemies to win they'd have to deal with Polaris. You were really good at coming up with creative solutions to problems and that helped me as a Mission Master want to provide things that could be interacted with. The fact that Polaris kept on reading the holocubes took me a little by surprise, but I'm glad she did and was cool to see her medic background reinforce this aspect of her personality traits. The debrief at the end I think also helped reveal more about Polaris's perspective on life and the law which I think will be neat to see explored as she develops. Great job

I should point out some things or admit to something. The Holo cube stuff was me trying permanent boot her medical skills.  

Now that I am think of it where the crystals at the warehouse entrance could they been used to make potions (or something)? 

And the last thing is to thank you for letting me play with MILES "virtual" look. I think part of my problem their is I come up ten plus looks for him and I want to use most of them. 

@KotZ

[Waterbrick Down]

20 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

For the mission it's self. Khorne is right it was fairly straightforward. But I do have a question for you @Waterbrick Down where you trying to kill our characters off or not? 

Yes and no.  As a Mission Master, it's part of my job to present challenges for the Party to overcome. Sometimes those challenges slide more towards the deadly side of things. Having been working on the rules set for quite a while now, I have a pretty good sense for balance and how to let the enemies effectively use the combat system (where as in Heroica 1.0 enemies were reactionary). So in a way, I am more playing against you than MM ever did in Heroica 1.0, so it can become a game of who knows how to use the rules more effectively with their given resources. Thus when I created the combats, I may have balanced them so that they almost had the same point spread as you, but I didn't account for me knowing the rules and tactics better, which made the fights much more difficult. To compensate, toward the end of the last battle I had to intentionally not take advantage of some of the rules (Opportunistic attacks for instance) otherwise it would have been a slaughter. So I suppose, I was not intending to try and kill the characters, it sort of happened unintentionally by assuming everyone would play as optimally as possible.

26 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

Lars - He was basically the victim and under mind controlled. So I guess he was about what I expected. 

Agent Molly - I guess she is Lars want to be girlfriend. And the basic scientist wondering why are these guy here. 

Oddsphere - Basic management character trying not to fully take any blame. 

Drones - Just basic minions. 

Tank Creature - It was coming off like it wanted to control everyone / everything. 

Your takes are dead on. This was an intro quest, so not a whole lot of time to do deep delves into each NPC's character, but enough to hopefully keep people interested and wanting to come back.

28 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

I should point out some things or admit to something. The Holo cube stuff was me trying permanent boot her medical skills.  

Makes sense, and I hope the bonus I did give was ok. I was reticent to set a precedent where you could just make a check outside of a quest and permanently bump your stats, but I still wanted to reward you for interacting with the world.

29 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

Now that I am think of it where the crystals at the warehouse entrance could they been used to make potions (or something)? 

The crystal flowers were manifestations of thought, you could maybe have made something like an essence out of them.

30 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

And the last thing is to thank you for letting me play with MILES "virtual" look. I think part of my problem their is I come up ten plus looks for him and I want to use most of them. 

Glad it worked out. I love variant builds, so I'm always interested to see what other interpretations of a character look like.

31 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

I should talk some about MILES. You are right about him about being superfluous. Probably why I didn't use him to much. Sometimes I feel no one is role playing with me so I do "silly" stuff like use a sub character. As for MILES personality I see his as the strait man to Polaris' "silly" moments. As for any "role playing" he is a robot, I see him punching and kicking the enemies not Polaris, she is just directing witch enemy get hit first. Not to mention they have different "senses" so they see things quite literally differently. 

This makes sense and I get it. The balance is making sure to easily transition to role playing with the other characters when they do interact with Polaris so that it doesn't become an instance of no one wants to role play with Polaris because she's too busy interacting with herself. Not saying you've strayed that far yet, just something to be aware of. 

[Khorne]

1 hour ago, Waterbrick Down said:

The details around the setup of the situation were a little more complex however and certainly evolved as the mission wore on resulting in the ending we had. I hadn't intended to expand on Thudaal lore in this mission, but I'm certainly glad we did. Ætherspace as a concept was a bit tricky to carve out and I'll be interested to see how other MM interpret it. For me it's a mix between Tron's cyberspace and the D&D Ethereal plane and hopefully that came through in the photos and 

Aetherspace made me think of the Matrix or the internet universe from Wreck-It-Ralph .

1 hour ago, Waterbrick Down said:

His interactions with Lars and Molly made me smile and I like that while his background impacts his actions, it doesn't control them.

 I liked the Lars and Molly ambiguous will-they-won't-they relationship, hah. I was trying to get a finite answer from one of them, but they kept it vague. It was a fun addition that made the characters feel "alive".

 

46 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

I should talk some about MILES. You are right about him about being superfluous. Probably why I didn't use him to much. Sometimes I feel no one is role playing with me so I do "silly" stuff like use a sub character. As for MILES personality I see his as the strait man to Polaris' "silly" moments. As for any "role playing" he is a robot, I see him punching and kicking the enemies not Polaris, she is just directing witch enemy get hit first. Not to mention they have different "senses" so they see things quite literally differently. 

[...]

When I first came up with this character it was in 1.0 days. At first I thought she was going to be a second character but that never happen. Plus I thought a character with a disability will be interesting to play (another reason for MILES). And at the time I thought no one else came up with this idea. Later I found out someone makes d&d minis with characters in wheelchairs. After thinking Heroics was completely over with, I used Polaris in a d&d adventure League game slightly retooled (unfortunately I didn't use MILES for the game). And as I used her for a cleric. The cleric needs some sort "deity" to give up your magic power, hence the figure in the snow storm and inheriting the "power" from one of her grandparent's.

Wow, I did not catch on that Polaris was a character with a disability. In that case, I'm starting to understand the addition of MILES somewhat more. That's actually a clever combination. Like I said, Polaris definitely has a lot of potential. I think the main reason for the "lack" of interaction for me personally was that I didn't really know what to expect from Polaris as a character. With Varen I already knew that he was an ex-lawyer etc., which is also alluded to in the character's train of thoughts and inner monologues.

Like I said in my previous post: it was definitely also a case of me still looking how to play Felix. As the game progresses and I find his "character" more, I'm sure it'll start getting easier to interact with everybody else. That being said, I will pay more attention to interacting with Polaris if we end up being on the same mission again. 

54 minutes ago, samurai-turtle said:

Felix - I was getting a John Constantine vibe from him. Were you going for that or am I projecting something on to him? 

More of an ex-detective/private eye in general, but less brooding and dark. Not specifically John Constantine. But I think after this quest I might start looking into spending some points on Occult. I'll see.

[Zepher]

Really enjoyed the quest, WBD! Like everyone has said, it was straight forward, but that's frankly good for a lot of reasons. Lets you introduce a bunch of lore and characters because the actual "plot" is pretty dry, so building world isn't drowned out. I think it was super well done, and I really really want to go into the Aether and meet the collective now. I think it was clever to establish a team that can send people there, so we have that in the future if you or others want to use it.

I'm interested in the general shape of quests in Heroica 2.0 too. When I played 1.0 I hadn't played any D&D or other TTRPGs, so I didn't have an opinion on this. But in general D&D games (or at least the one I play) are designed with the characters driving the story - the GM reacts to their characters/backstory and creates quests out of it. Since Heroica has a larger party, and frequently the party shifts from quest to quest, it's more focused on the GM telling an overarching plot with the characters sort of observing and commenting on it. They may do something big, like destroy an industry or something, and then just not happen to be in the Hall when the follow up quest is posted! I know as arcs in Heroica 1.0 came to conclusions and stuff it was a real scramble to try to get people in the Hall so they could be there. Just interested to see how that works this time around - musings, really. Definitely can find a cool good balance - not everything needs to be based off the way other games run, obviously! Just curious how to get buy in to events - obviously these characters have an attachment to Aetherdiving now.

I remember Peppermint_M approached me about doing a quest based on Tensi (that was the character name, right? It was years ago) as sort of a send off. I was starting to wind down at that time, but I wish I'd pulled it off!

[KotZ]

Yay my turn to talk!

First, thanks for the fun intro quest, WBD. I feel kinda special knowing I was on one of the first missions of Heroica: GATS. And of course it was fun to roleplay again in a similar manner to H1, which is very different from mafia games and the building games in other subforums.

I really liked the quest and story. It definitely took me some time to wrap my head around the new terms and characters after having done H1 for so long, even if the last mission was a few years ago. But I'm really liking the world/universe that's being set up. I liked the straightforwardness of the quest, and it was a great way to ease into the new world/system. The Aethersphere reminded me of a mix of the Matrix and Cyberpunk 2077's The Net with how dangerous it is, probably because I'm playing that game. I'm really excited to see where this Aethersphere goes along with the organizations you set up.

The not-so-fun parts: Believe me, I had a lot of fun, but I found the combat frustrating, but I think I learned as it went along. I always wanted a more complex system than H1, and GATS definitely has it. I think it's just me needing to learn the ins and out and get used to this style of combat compared to the heavier number crunching of H1. And I don't think any of us have played new characters in a LONG time on here. With H1, we all became accustomed to our characters dealing massive damage and walking out of battles with barely a scratch. Not so here. As Khorne said, we definitely need healers in this game, especially starting out.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy the combat, it's just the learning curve (at least for me) is pretty steep. I'm pretty sure I'll enjoy it as Varen levels and I can really craft him into a role I want him to be, and by learning the new system. I will admit that the constantly getting knocked out kind of killed my drive for the game, coupled with being knee-deep in work and other LEGO responsibilities.

Character-wise, I'm happy with Varen's first outing regarding who he is. I really wanted to try something different from Kiray in H1 and make a more confident, wise-cracking character from the get-go. Less sleazy lawyer, more guy who just found himself in the sleaze, enjoyed parts of it and can't shake the habits at times. Definitely want to dive into that in the future. I really like Felix, and he's fun to interact with. I can see Varen and Felix becoming fast friends, especially with their shared history of the law, of course on different areas. Polaris (and MILES to an extent) is harder to nail down. After your explanation of Polaris being disabled, it all makes a lot more sense and I can see what you're doing. I think Polaris is an interesting character and do want to learn more (and oh man, Polaris was absolutely MVP this quest).

[Waterbrick Down]

15 minutes ago, KotZ said:

The not-so-fun parts: Believe me, I had a lot of fun, but I found the combat frustrating, but I think I learned as it went along. I always wanted a more complex system than H1, and GATS definitely has it. I think it's just me needing to learn the ins and out and get used to this style of combat compared to the heavier number crunching of H1. And I don't think any of us have played new characters in a LONG time on here. With H1, we all became accustomed to our characters dealing massive damage and walking out of battles with barely a scratch. Not so here. As Khorne said, we definitely need healers in this game, especially starting out.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy the combat, it's just the learning curve (at least for me) is pretty steep. I'm pretty sure I'll enjoy it as Varen levels and I can really craft him into a role I want him to be, and by learning the new system. I will admit that the constantly getting knocked out kind of killed my drive for the game, coupled with being knee-deep in work and other LEGO responsibilities.

Yes, combat is definitely going to take some getting used to. I don't think a lot of players had a sense for how much their combat proficiency stat (be it a weapon or magic) would translate to effectiveness. Knowing what we've seen so far, I'd definitely recommend that all new players put at least 2 into either a magic proficiency, weapon proficiency, or an Attribute where they can reliably use the Rally or Defend action. Otherwise combat is going to be rough, especially when ties go to the defender in terms of damage.

44 minutes ago, Zepher said:

I'm interested in the general shape of quests in Heroica 2.0 too. When I played 1.0 I hadn't played any D&D or other TTRPGs, so I didn't have an opinion on this. But in general D&D games (or at least the one I play) are designed with the characters driving the story - the GM reacts to their characters/backstory and creates quests out of it. Since Heroica has a larger party, and frequently the party shifts from quest to quest, it's more focused on the GM telling an overarching plot with the characters sort of observing and commenting on it. They may do something big, like destroy an industry or something, and then just not happen to be in the Hall when the follow up quest is posted! I know as arcs in Heroica 1.0 came to conclusions and stuff it was a real scramble to try to get people in the Hall so they could be there. Just interested to see how that works this time around - musings, really. Definitely can find a cool good balance - not everything needs to be based off the way other games run, obviously! Just curious how to get buy in to events - obviously these characters have an attachment to Aetherdiving now.

I remember Peppermint_M approached me about doing a quest based on Tensi (that was the character name, right? It was years ago) as sort of a send off. I was starting to wind down at that time, but I wish I'd pulled it off!

I echo every bit of what you've said. Going back to Heroica with a lot of other RPG's now under my belt, I'm trying to figure out how the story telling is going to be shaped as the heroes remain the same, but we run with multiple DM's. I've got to imagine it'll look closer to the early history of D&D when you just took your same character from DM table to DM table. More of a West Marches style, but dependent on the where the DM wants to run as opposed to the players. I think as time goes on and character develop we may see more *custom* type quests, but those usually take a while to develop a good rapport between players and mission masters. Right now, I'm trying to look at what are the cool areas of the setting and try and hope the folks who sign up for the quest will think it is as cool as I do. That was sort of the intention of launching with more established lore than the Heroica 1.0. By allowing players to insert their characters into the pre-baked setting, it would give them ideas on what sort of quests to look out for. Kind of like Felix and Ætherspace.

[Classic_Spaceman]

I am putting this here, since it fits better with post-quest discussion, IMO: 

20 hours ago, The Legonater said:

Is there a chance that you could not do that, because I’m pretty sure that would actually kill us at this point. 

EDIT:

I was pretty busy earlier, but I wanted to expand on this because I'm not trying to be a Debbie Downer, I just legitimately don't see that as an option. Kintober kind of said what I was going to, but Yelana's previous attempts at diplomacy have all been unsuccessful. Her attempts to persuade the stowaways were met with a DC 3 and then a DC 5. Her attempt to talk to Pierce earlier didn't even seem to have a DC check - and I presume that trying to persuade an enemy in the middle of combat, after Yelana has already canonically fired upon her, is not going to go smoothly. 

Role-playing games are a lot about playing out your character and figuring out what they would do in any situation, but they're also about playing on a team. Soren and Zaria are both hurting bad, and Yelana is the biggest weapon we have. She's the only one on our team with a calibrated weapon, we're relying on her to get some good damage in. But when our hardest-hitting teammate refuses to engage in combat, it kind of screws the rest of us. If Zaria fails to push Crunch off this turn, and Pierce still has her ward up, it's going to be a very bad time for us. 

I definitely encourage you to play Yelana faithfully, but I also encourage you to find a version of that which still functions with the team when the chips are down. Sometimes RPGs are about finding that balance. If diplomacy against all odds and to the direct expense of herself and her team is genuinely the way Yelana would play, then okay, just know that it likely isn't going to go down very well.

19 hours ago, Kintobor said:

The reason I have Yelana firing at Pierce is to force her to put up another Warding Bond as I'll be directly able to strike her next turn. We're setting up an offensive next turn, and having all three of us attacking Pierce puts a lot of pressure off of us, even if I don't succeed at getting Crunch off the train. Pierce has been pretty clear in dialogue that she doesn't want to negotiate. If you want to try, go ahead, but you're putting the mission in jeopardy doing so. Running won't be an option at that point. We need to apply pressure this turn or get wiped off the board next turn.

I actually did not realise that Yelana is the most powerful member of the party! Since I am not completely familiar with the rules/battle system yet, and since this mission has been very RP/Proficiency-focused, I had not paid much attention to Zaria's and Soren's stats. Character-wise, Zaria feels like the party's heavy-hitter, while I have been playing Yelana in more of an ancillary support role (the only reason that she has a Calibrated weapon is because she built and customised it herself, using the advanced technology at her disposal). 
 

[Waterbrick Down]

1 hour ago, Classic_Spaceman said:

I am putting this here, since it fits better with post-quest discussion, IMO: 

I actually did not realise that Yelana is the most powerful member of the party! Since I am not completely familiar with the rules/battle system yet, and since this mission has been very RP/Proficiency-focused, I had not paid much attention to Zaria's and Soren's stats. Character-wise, Zaria feels like the party's heavy-hitter, while I have been playing Yelana in more of an ancillary support role (the only reason that she has a Calibrated weapon is because she built and customised it herself, using the advanced technology at her disposal). 
 

Mechanics wise at early levels auto-successes have a much bigger impact than proficiency bonus. Zaria statistics to hit look like this (50%, 50%, +100%), Yelana's on the other hand (50%, 100%, 100%) so at this point she'll hit more consistently. Combine this with Yelana's superior range (Artillery vs. Melee) and she is probably the bigger threat to enemies.

I know you're still new to role-playing games, so something to consider for future missions (and this applies to everyone) is to look at what your party members statistics are before leaving on the Mission and prepare accordingly. The rules allow for characters to be super flexible. Know you're going to a dark planet, prepare a light spell; know that the party doesn't have someone with healing, consider picking up extra plasma potions or a healing spell for yourself; know that things are going to require a lot of sneaking, consider swapping an athletics proficiency for a stealth proficiency. Party members are a team, it's your job to work together as that as you either all succeed together or all fail together (most of the time).