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In addition to the custom abilities assumed to be in us in Here There Be Monsters,
following are a collection of optional but recommended House Rules.
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DEATH (5e & 6e)
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PC's and significant NPC's (as determined by the GM) use the normal rules for
determining character death.
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All other NPC's die when they reach -1 BODY. At 0 BODY they are on the verge
of death and, depending on the circumstances, may "bleed out" or succumb with
undue exertion or rough handling at the GM's discretion.
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UNCONSCIOUSNESS AND KNOCKED OUT (5e & 6e)
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PC's and significant NPC's determine Knocked Out categories in increments of the character's
CON. For instance, a character with 15 CON recovers Every Phase and Post Segment 12 at 0 to -15 STUN, Post Segment 12 only at -16 to -30 STUN, and so on.
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All other NPC's are in the "GM's option" category at -1 STUN or below. At 0 STUN they are in the "barely Knocked Out" category and can still recover.
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SPECIAL RESOURCE POOL SFX (5e & 6e)
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In addition to any other concept driven SFX, abilities taken in the Special Resource
Pools (Believer, Psychic, Mystic, Professional, Innati) have a broad SFX tied to
the Resource Pool they are in. Thus a Psychic's pyromancy ability might have the
SFX of Fire, but as the ability must be taken in a Psychic Resource Pool it also
always has the Psychic SFX.
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Adjustment Powers that allow an extended target group to be taken as an Advantage
can work against all special abilities of a given Special Resource Pools SFX as
a +1/2 Advantage.
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Some Enhanced Senses, such as properly defined Detects, can work against Special
Resource Pool SFX.
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SPECIAL RESOURCE POOL RESTRICTIONS
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PROFESSIONAL POOL EXCLUSIVES
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In Here There Be Monsters the following kinds of abilities can only be taken in
a Professional Pool:
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- Military grade weapons and gear, such as high end sniper rifles, ordinance, heavy
machine guns, etc.
- Significantly improved / customized weapons and gear, such as a "normal" pistol
with unusual modifiers or increased damage classes. Where the threshold for this
lies is left to the GM's discretion.
- The Deadly Blow Talent
- The Weapon Master Talent
- The Professional Edge Talent
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DISPEL (5e & 6e)
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DISPEL DICE OF EFFECT + DICE ROLL
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When used as per the rules, Dispel suffers from point disparities which generally result in a
Dispel ability either being very narrowly defined and corner case, or so encumbered by advantages
that the dice of effect are too low to be reasonably capable of affecting equivalently pointed target
abilities.
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Due to this lack of teeth, Dispels are rarely ever actually taken by player characters,
unless their cost can be subsumed into a Multipower or Variable Power Pool, and in general Dispels tend
to go unused during play as they hardly ever work vs creditable opponents.
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This house rule allows a reasonably defined Dispel with some degree of Expanded Effect to still be viable
vs abilities with equivalent Active Points.
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Dispel grants a base effect equal to the number of dice the character has in Dispel,
plus the roll. Thus a 6d6 Dispel confers +6 points of automatic effect, while a
12d6 Dispel confers +12 points of automatic effect, and so on.
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ABORT TO DISPEL
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Even though Dispel has a defensive use (countering attacks before they can take effect), the
Power is not flagged as a "Defensive" ability, and is flagged as an "Attack".
The rules more generally allow a character to Abort to a defensive action, but does not allow characters to Abort
to an attack. It has been a long standing house rule of mine that a character can abort to a Dispel if it would protect
them from harm.
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A character with a relevant Dispel can Abort to Dispel an incoming attack that would
harm them.
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ENDURANCE RESERVE (6e)
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In earlier editions of the rules, Endurance Reserves were fairly easy to abuse. HERO System 6e reworked the
costing of this ability in an effort to make it more balanced. However it is thought by some (including me)
that the "nerf" went too far in the other direction, leaving Endurance Reserves no longer viable. The following
house rule(s) are an attempt to fairly price Endurance Reserve and return them to usefulness, but curbing against excesses.
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PRO-RATED RECOVERY
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The GM's option to allow the REC on Endurance Reserves to be pro-rated across a
TURN is on by DEFAULT. A character with 12 REC on their Endurance Reserve recovers
1 END per Segment, for instance. This occurs at the very end of each Segment after
all actions have been taken.
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CANNOT BE DISPELED
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While the abilities using an Endurance Reserve can potentially be Dispeled, the
Endurance Reserve itself cannot be.
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ADJUSTMENT POWERS MUST BE EXPLICIT
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An Adjustment Power that affects END or REC Characteristics cannot affect the END
or REC of an Endurance Reserve. An Adjustment Power that specifically targets Endurance
Reserves can, however.
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DRAIN PROTECTION
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The END in an Endurance Reserve is Drained at the rate of 1 END for 1 Character
Point.
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USE BOTH RESERVE AND CHARACTERISTICS
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If a character doesn't take any Limitations on the Reserve or the Recovery of an Endurance Reserve,
then that character's abilities may use either the Endurance Reserve or the character's
own Endurance Characteristic. The decision of which to use to pay the Endurance
of an ability is under the characer's control and is made with each use.
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MULTIFORM (6e)
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The following restrictions apply to a character with a Multiform.
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CANNOT EXCEED POINTS OF TRUE FORM
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An extra form from Multiform cannot exceed the point total of a character's true
form.
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EVERY 6TH POINT TO MULTIFORM
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After play starts a character may spend every sixth experience point on a Multiform,
but no more.
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