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I play it fairly close by the book except that I don't do the "win more" style of awarding.
So at the start of the session everyone gets a point (or more in PFS, depending on glyphs and boons).
Awarding one more every hour on what's supposed to be a four-hour game means practically speaking, 3 more points to hand out. And most adventures have about 3 notable encounters, so most of the time, once per hour is equivalent to one after every major encounter.
If I know there's a particularly tough scene coming up, I might hold off on giving hero points until just before it, so that people will still have a couple to spend on it.
I will usually give them to people who were actually being heroic (doing something dangerous to rescue someone etc.) or who seem to be the underdog (the lower-level character playing up who's already spent a point). If there's no clear choice then I'll generally let the table pick.
PFS is pretty generous with hero points, as glyphs and boons can quickly add up. But that really doesn't seem to be causing any problems so I'm fine with people having them.
PFS is pretty generous with hero points, as glyphs and boons can quickly add up. But that really doesn't seem to be causing any problems so I'm fine with people having them.
I'm concerned that it's not a problem right now, but could be for the future. There was probably an excess of Hero Points when Season 1 started, and the scenarios were scaled up in difficulty to balance it (plus whatever other reasons). As more Hero Points (and better general understanding of the system) causes power inflation, the scenarios have to be very carefully written to offset. Hero Points are difficult to quantify, so balancing is hard.
A few scenarios seem like they went too far, which is actually fine in my opinion (to quote a James Bond movie, "there's no point living unless you can't feel alive"). But without guide rails, it seems pretty easy to end up in some kind of arms race where GMs have to hand out more Hero Points because they think the scenarios are too hard and designers end up making the scenarios hard because they think there are too many Hero Points.
My game last week, I gave out a Hero Point for a player coming up with the idea to do reconnaissance on a location, instead of just busing through the front door.
Unfortunately that lasted all of 30 seconds, but what can you do?
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PFS is pretty generous with hero points, as glyphs and boons can quickly add up. But that really doesn't seem to be causing any problems so I'm fine with people having them.I'm concerned that it's not a problem right now, but could be for the future. There was probably an excess of Hero Points when Season 1 started, and the scenarios were scaled up in difficulty to balance it (plus whatever other reasons). As more Hero Points (and better general understanding of the system) causes power inflation, the scenarios have to be very carefully written to offset. Hero Points are difficult to quantify, so balancing is hard.
A few scenarios seem like they went too far, which is actually fine in my opinion (to quote a James Bond movie, "there's no point living unless you can't feel alive"). But without guide rails, it seems pretty easy to end up in some kind of arms race where GMs have to hand out more Hero Points because they think the scenarios are too hard and designers end up making the scenarios hard because they think there are too many Hero Points.
I really don't think the varying difficulty of season 1 scenarios has had very much to do with hero points. I'm pretty sure it's more down to individual authors, as well as an evolving understanding of how to apply the CRB's "you should keep all the PCs at the same level" style of encounter building to PFS where that fundamental assumption doesn't hold.
Wow. Talk about a thread necro. I nearly jokingly posted with "What are hero points?" then realized I was the one who started this thread...
...so long ago.
There was a 14- year necro earlier this week.
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I generally dislike awarding Hero Points for impressive play. It is so subjective, and my experience is that GM's tend to be wildly inconsistent (myself included). I also don't like how it excludes shyer players.
I tend to be louder, taking my full share plus of table time. That is reward enough in itself. I don't think I should get an extra reward for doing more in the game.
I prefer an even distribution of HPs, with extra being awarded for table support (brining treats, managing the loot list, hosting the game, etc).
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Remembering to issue Hero Points in the middle of a rousing story or just when I have a lot going on is a bit too much for me. So I have taken to just issuing one to each player at the start of our session and that's it. If they don't use it, fine, it carries over. They know the cap is three. Fortunately, our sessions generally run about 3-4 hours so issuing 1 each to my five players is not too far off the math of issuing one each hour as suggested AND I don't have to remember :-D
I start with 1 per player but give them out very sparingly cause I forget. But when a player comes up with a particularly neat idea I might remember to hand one over.
I kinda want to try adding an option of using the points to return to 1HP instead of 0. It just doesn't feel heroic to just stabilize at 0 and still be out of the fight to me.
Problem is if I make the cost 1 Hero Point then players might be incentivised to hold onto them at all costs. Could either do 2 Hero Points or all of them no matter how many they got.
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Hero Points are one of my least liked aspects of this edition, it isn't terribly well defined and despite them interacting with the game pretty much everywhere the game does not do much with them - there are no feats, ancestries, items, or spells that affect them.
Adding on to that, I learned tabletop RPGS with Dark Heresy which has a similar system in Fate Points - but the game interacts with them more and you didn't gain them during play, they were a set pool per session. I currently have a player who has 5 every game.
This sets me up for how I run them now. I'm running Age of Ashes, with a party of 5. I don't know how often the game really assumes that players have Hero Points, I don't want to play favourites, and I don't want Hero Points to compound by having one player end up with a lot of rerolls and chances to not die and then always be more Heroic because they have the resources to do so.
I start with 1 on everyone, and every time they beat a moderate encounter (or every 3 Skill check encounters) I give everyone a hero point.
So far, it has worked well. One guy usually banks them and has a very good finale near the end of the session, one guy always rerolls worse than the initial roll, and the rest tend to use them regularly. They haven't been a crutch and it doesn't seem to have affected the game balance - encounters are still challenging but a string of bad luck doesn't usually rub salt in the wound.
I typically play when I do PFS, and I'm not entirely sure if there is more protocol there but last I checked with the local organizer he said 1/hour as a pity mechanic was probably how he'd expect it done for the time being.
Outside of PFS I have started to use Hero Points as a way of smoothing out bad luck. Giving a hero point whenever they suffer from a critical hit or critical failure. A bit early to say if I prefer it to the default system but the initial few games have been quite promising.
Page 1 and 2 had a lot of cool ideas. I think I'll try some of them out when I get to GMing, though it'd be a bit premature to pick at the moment. ~w~
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Dad jokes related to game events have a 50/50 chance of giving you a hero point or making you the NPC's next target.
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one guy always rerolls worse than the initial roll
This aggravates me as well. It hurts my reasoning when something called HERO points can be used to change a failure into a critical failure. I have recently added an option whereas the players can chose to either reroll with the Hero Point normally, or they can use it to boost their result by one step. Crit fail to fail to success to crit success. I know it further skews the math, but it’s too early to say whether or not it is disruptive to the game (too much success). I like the concept because it supports the design methodology of 2E. That being you should be able to succeed at what you want to do (ie try vs a static DC), rather than others trying to oppose your attempt (ex 1E stealth roll vs perception roll). Hope that makes sense to others cause it does inside my head. :-D
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cost
I keep the cost of stabilizing at all your HP. It encourages them to spend their points and not horde them. No one wants to be stuck spending three to recover when you can do it for one. I find they use them for saves and critically failed skill checks (especially Medicine checks to Treat Wounds) more than anything, but occasionally they will use one to reroll an attack, usually the first one (no MAP) in the turn. Generally it’s when they know/think the target is near defeat and they don’t want to risk it getting another turn.
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one guy always rerolls worse than the initial rollThis aggravates me as well. It hurts my reasoning when something called HERO points can be used to change a failure into a critical failure. I have recently added an option whereas the players can chose to either reroll with the Hero Point normally, or they can use it to boost their result by one step. Crit fail to fail to success to crit success. I know it further skews the math, but it’s too early to say whether or not it is disruptive to the game (too much success). I like the concept because it supports the design methodology of 2E. That being you should be able to succeed at what you want to do (ie try vs a static DC), rather than others trying to oppose your attempt (ex 1E stealth roll vs perception roll). Hope that makes sense to others cause it does inside my head. :-D
So you've just invented another Fate Point mechanic from Dark Heresy. I can't look at Hero Points and see them as anything but worse/less complete version of Fate Points.
I have recently added an option whereas the players can chose to either reroll with the Hero Point normally, or they can use it to boost their result by one step. Crit fail to fail to success to crit success. I know it further skews the math, but it’s too early to say whether or not it is disruptive to the game (too much success).
This is an enormous skew to the math.
As a baseline, calculate percentage CF/F/S/CS for every value of DC minus Modifier (DCmM), or basically, what natural roll you'd need to succeed. Quantify CF = -1, F = 0, S = +1, CS = +2. The expected value of a single roll varies by DCmM, from -0.5 at DCmM = 21 (need nat 20 to just succeed) to +1.45 at DCmM = 1 (only a failure with a nat 1). We'll call this Method 1.
Now, calculate a popular usage - using a Hero Point to reroll a natural 1. Basically, all the EVs skew positive by about 1/20 - relative to basline, you have 1.05x the probability of F/S/CS, and 0.95x the probability of CF. The expected values now range from -0.48 to +1.52. We'll call this Method 2.
The change in EV can be expressed as if it were a bonus to the original roll. Incrementing the modifier by 1 lowers the DCmM by 1, which translates to a +0.1 EV. So the effective modifier that a Hero Point confers is the change in EV divided by 0.1 ... equivalent to a +0.25 modifier at DCmM = 21 (very hard roll) to a +1.2 equivalent modifier at low DCmMs (very easy rolls).
tl;dr: A standard Hero Point usage is equivalent to a +0.5 to +1.0 modifier on a roll, with the larger bonuses towards the easier rolls. Call it "nat 1 insurance".
Let's do something naughty - let's have the GM tell us whenever we critically fail, and let us reroll all critical failures, which we'll call Method 3. This is much more powerful than Method 2, and leads to EVs of -0.23 to +1.45. Very specifically, it's not only more powerful overall, but it's more powerful when DCmM is high (tough rolls), because there are way more critical failures. Effective modifier peaks at +3.2 at DCmM = 16 down to a minimum of +0.75 at DCmM = 11. It's important to note that not only has the magnitude changed, but the distribution of when to use it.
Now let's get to your method (Method 4). Critical failures turning into failures is huge - especially at high DCmM. DCmM = 20, the Hail Mary roll, is now a whopping +0.5. DCmM = 1 is almost an automatic critical success, +1.95. The equivalent modifier that this Hero Point confers is +10 (!!!) at high DCmM (tough rolls) and at least +5 at low DCmM (easy rolls).
DC minus mod Method 1 Method 2 Method 3 Method 4
21 -0.50 -0.48 -0.23 +0.50
20 -0.40 -0.37 -0.10 +0.55
19 -0.30 -0.27 +0.02 +0.65
18 -0.20 -0.16 +0.12 +0.75
17 -0.10 -0.06 +0.22 +0.85
16 +0.00 +0.05 +0.30 +0.95
15 +0.10 +0.16 +0.38 +1.05
14 +0.20 +0.26 +0.44 +1.15
13 +0.30 +0.37 +0.50 +1.25
12 +0.40 +0.47 +0.54 +1.35
11 +0.50 +0.58 +0.58 +1.45
10 +0.55 +0.63 +0.63 +1.50
9 +0.65 +0.73 +0.73 +1.55
8 +0.75 +0.84 +0.84 +1.60
7 +0.85 +0.94 +0.94 +1.65
6 +0.95 +1.05 +1.05 +1.70
5 +1.05 +1.15 +1.15 +1.75
4 +1.15 +1.26 +1.26 +1.80
3 +1.25 +1.36 +1.36 +1.85
2 +1.35 +1.47 +1.47 +1.90
1 +1.45 +1.52 +1.45 +1.95
DC minus mod Method 1 Method 2 Method 3 Method 4
21 0 +0.25 +2.75 +10.00
20 0 +0.30 +3.00 +9.50
19 0 +0.35 +3.15 +9.50
18 0 +0.40 +3.20 +9.50
17 0 +0.45 +3.15 +9.50
16 0 +0.50 +3.00 +9.50
15 0 +0.55 +2.75 +9.50
14 0 +0.60 +2.40 +9.50
13 0 +0.65 +1.95 +9.50
12 0 +0.70 +1.40 +9.50
11 0 +0.75 +0.75 +9.50
10 0 +0.77 +0.77 +9.50
9 0 +0.82 +0.82 +9.00
8 0 +0.88 +0.88 +8.50
7 0 +0.92 +0.92 +8.00
6 0 +0.97 +0.97 +7.50
5 0 +1.03 +1.03 +7.00
4 0 +1.08 +1.08 +6.50
3 0 +1.13 +1.13 +6.00
2 0 +1.18 +1.18 +5.50
1 0 +0.73 +0.00 +5.00
tl;dr: Allowing someone to bump up the success level not only changes the worth of a Hero Point by about 10-fold (+5 to +10), but it also skews its optimal usage towards harder rolls. This may or may not be intended, but basically subsidizes crazy attempts at ultra-hard DCs.
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Edit: Just remembered Method 5 - Hero Point gives Advantage (roll twice and take the better roll; per Glass Cannon Podcast, or D&D 5e).
DC minus Mod Method 5 eMod
21 -0.21 +2.95
20 -0.06 +3.45
19 +0.09 +3.85
18 +0.22 +4.15
17 +0.34 +4.35
16 +0.45 +4.45
15 +0.55 +4.45
14 +0.64 +4.35
13 +0.72 +4.15
12 +0.79 +3.85
11 +0.85 +3.45
10 +0.89 +3.43
9 +1.03 +3.78
8 +1.15 +4.03
7 +1.27 +4.18
6 +1.37 +4.23
5 +1.47 +4.18
4 +1.55 +4.03
3 +1.63 +3.78
2 +1.69 +3.43
1 +1.75 +2.98
tl;dr: Advantage confers a +3 to +4 bonus, evenly spaced across all difficulties.