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This is the latest release of the Hero 6E Framework. This release has some bug fixes and some new features. If you do encounter some sort of error, please post a message so that I can fix the framework at the earliest opportunity.

Tutorials

1. Part I: GM Setup
2. Part II: Creating a Character
3. Part III: Combat Basics
4. Part IV: Alternative Methods and Hotkey Reference
5. Troubleshooting

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The is the final version of the 1.2 framework. I leave it here solely for those who are curious or somehow prefer the earlier version. All of the work I did to optimize the character sheet and other improvements did not come along until late in the 1.3 cycle.

Framework Tutorial Part I: GM Setup
Campaign Parameters

Before any of the characters are created, it is essential that the GM set a few parameters. The first thing is to setup the Campaign Parameters. To start, press F5. It will bring up a menu with several check boxes.

• Use Hit Locations: If checked, Hit Locations and multiples to Body and Stun damage based on location hit will be used.
• Use Knockdown: If checked, characters can be knocked back and down slightly. This option is overridden if the Use Knockback button is checked.
• Use Knockback: If checked, characters can be knocked back and down. This is the full superheroic option from Champions.
• Use Impairing/Disabling Wounds: Right now this does nothing.
• Use Bleeding Rules: If checked, characters will take Bleeding damage if they take any Body damage after defenses are applied.
• Use Stunned Rules: Applies the state "Stunned" to a character if the amount of Stun taken exceeds the character's Constitution score.
• Use Sectional Defenses: Uses defenses per Hit Location area in addition to generalized defenses.
• Use Superheroic END Costs for Strength: This toggles between Str/5 or Str/10 END Cost for Strength usage.
• Campaign Maximum Combat Value: Set this number to be the highest Combat Value that any attack can reach. If any attack exceeds this value, it is set to the maximum value. If you do not want to limit your campaign, set this value to some really high number like 99.
• Campaign Maximum Damage Class: Sets the highest Damage Class available for the campaign. Anything that exceeds this Damage Class is set to the maximum. If you do not want to limit your campaign, set this value to some really high number like 99.
• Campaign Maximum Non-Resistant Defenses: Sets the maximum amount of non-resistant defense a character can have per type of defense (PD, ED, Mental, etc.).
• Campaign Maximum Resistant Defenses: Sets the maximum amount of resistant defense a character can have per type of defense (PD, ED, Mental, etc.).

Everyman Skills
The GM may set Everyman Skills up. The Everyman Skills are kept on the Explosion token so that token must be copied from map to map. Alternately, if you use different maps for different campaigns, the Explosion token for each map may contain separate Everyman Skills.

To set up Everyman Skills, you must be the GM. Click on the Set Everyman Skills macro in the Campaign window. A window will appear with 15 slots for Everyman Skills. Typical Everyman Skill lists are about 10 skills long, but I wanted some extra room for the "just in case" scenario.

Each slot looks like; name= ; roll=8. Just add the name of the skill after the name= and before the semi-colon. Most Everyman skills have a roll of 8-. The one typical exception is Professional Skill, which is usually 11-. Click OK once all of the Everyman skills are set up

Character Tokens
The GM must set the ownership on all tokens before a Player may run the Character Sheet macro.

1. Double Click on desired Token.
2. Select Ownership tab.
3. Click the box next to the Player's name.
4. Tip: If you want to make things simple until all character creation is done, just check the All Players option. You can come back later and change it to individual owners.

Framework Tutorial Part II: Creating a Character

Building the Character Sheet

1. Click on the Hero token.
2. Press CTRL + C to copy the token.
3. Hover the mouse button over the map where you want your own token. Press CTRL+V to paste the token.
4. Press F2. This will bring up the Character and Combat Sheets. I usually overlap the Combat frame over the Character frame and dock them on the left side. You can set them up in whatever way is convenient for you.
5. On the Character Sheet, you will notice next to the Characteristics, Defenses, Skills, Perks/Talents and Complications headers there is an icon that looks like a Wrench and Hammer. Well it looks like that because that's what it is. Anyway, this is the Builder icon. Wherever you see this, click on it to open the builder for that category. Run each builder in whatever order you feel comfortable with.
6. Tip:You can even enter in, Skills, Perks and Talents without a roll. Just leave the area after "Roll=" blank. While these don't do anything, they do display on the Character Sheet.

Important!: This framework is only a supplement to the Hero rules. Your character will need to be built before you start, so that you know what values to enter.


Building the Combat Sheet

1. Click on the Combat Sheet.
2. The same Builder icon is next to the Attacks and Maneuvers headers. Go ahead and click on the one next to the Attacks header. Whoa! There is a lot of stuff there. Luckily most of it should be pretty easy to understand.
3. Clarifications:
   
   • Use the DC of the attack instead of the dice. The macros figure out how many dice to roll.
   • The option for Jam is a dummy value. An older campaign framework used it but they have since been removed. I left it in, in case I get around to putting the functionality back in.
   • A power can calculate END from Strength, have a flat END cost listed, have Charges, have any combination of the three or have nothing related to END or Charges.
   • Once your Attacks are all built, go ahead and click on the Maneuver Builder icon. Enter in the values for each maneuver.
   • Your character should now be ready to play.

Tip!: The 6E framework has no error checking, mathematical computation or anything related to helping you build a character. It is up to you to enter the stats correctly and it is up to the GM to check them for errors.

Framework Tutorial Part III: The Basics of Combat

Initiative Routine

The Initiative Routine should be fairly simple to master.

1. The GM presses the F10 button selecting which Segment to use (defaults to 12 of course). This will load all of the tokens (PC and NPC) into the Initiative window and sort them from highest to lowest. It will also check for Held actions and display a reminder.
2. The GM will then press F11. This will move the Initiative list to the top character. It will check for States like Abort, Stunned or Held Action and output whether the character has to recovery from those states (or loses his Held Action). Once the GM determines that the character has completed his action, he will hit F11 for the next character and so on.
3. Once all of the characters for that Segment have gone, the macro will clear the Initiative table and output a message to the chat window indicating that all parties have taken their initiative. If the combat ends before the Segment concludes, the GM can press the F12 button instead.
4. Start over from Step 1 with the next combat Segment or Post-12 Recovery.
5. Post-12 Recovery applies a standard Stun/End Recovery as well as Regeneration and Endurance Reserve Recovery.
6. Bleeding is always checked for on Segment 1. Even if none of the characters can act on Segment 1, you should always run Segment 1 if you use the Bleeding rules.
7. Tip!:Turn off the Show Initiative Gain Message under Preferences in order to get rid of the default initiative messages that MapTools uses. They can mislead you.

The Combat Sequence

The Combat Sequence is pretty straight forward as well. I tried to keep everything in the background as much as possible.

The Attacking Token must be Impersonated. The easiest way is to Right+Click on the token and select Impersonate from the list of commands. From there, the player has two options for attacking; Selected Tokens or a Token List.

Selected Tokens are attacked in the order they are selected. Dragging a window over several tokens creates some unpredictable behavior. The best way to select multiple tokens is to hold down the CTRL key while clicking on each token.

If you want to create a temporary list of targets, you can select a token and click on the Add Target button. This adds the token to the target list. You can even add the same token, multiple times. That is how multiple attacks against the same target are handled. Once your list is complete, just select List instead of Targeted Tokens.

Note that by default, an attack will only fire once, no matter how many tokens are selected or added to the list. The Attack must be built with a higher number of Multiple Attacks in order to be able to attack more than one target. If the number of targets exceeds the Multiple Attacks value of the Attack, then the number of targets will be reduced from the last target (selected or listed) moving towards the first target.

The input window that pops up is divided into two tabs. One is for the Primary Attack. The other is for Special Modifiers

Primary Attack

• Use the Target List or Selected Tokens: 2 options. Defaults to Selected Tokens.
• This Attack Uses the Off-Hand: Check box. Check if the character is attacking with the Off-Hand. Applies Off-Hand modifiers (adjusted by Ambidexterity and Off-Hand training) to the attack.
• Select Attack has a drop down list of all Attacks. You define the attacks with the Attack Builder macro.
• Select Linked Attack has a drop down list of Attacks that can be linked to the main attack. Linked attacks are also defined with the Attack Builder.
• Combat Skill Levels to OCV are those assigned to OCV. Note: If using an Off-Hand attack in conjunction with the Primary hand, the Primary Attack Combat Skill Levels and Martial Arts modifiers are applied to OCV until the next phase. The modifiers for the Off-Hand attack are applied only against the current attack and then discarded. If the character is only making an Off-Hand Attack, then those values will carry over until the next Phase.
• Combat Skill Levels to Increase Damage are divided by two and rounded down, so you will need two CSLs to increase the damage by +1 DC.
• Extra Damage Classes: If this attack has extra Damage Classes, usually defined as Deadly Blow or Weapon Master, add those extra Damage Classes here.
• Choose Combat Maneuver allows you to select a combat maneuver and apply the modifiers to the attack. Make sure you pick the right one.
• Choose Hit Location allows you to either select a precise location (Head, Vitals, Leg) or a general area (High Shot, Head Shot, Low Shot). If nothing is selected, it uses a generic 3d6 determination. Note that useLocations must be set in the Global Parameters. Otherwise no damage multiples will be used or output will be shown.
• Situational Modifiers Assigned by the GM is for anything the GM thinks you should input. Defaults to 0.
• Combat Skill Levels to DCV. Defaults to 0.
• Ignore Combat Luck (Surprise Attack!) negates the target's Combat Luck (if any). Use only when the GM determines that you have Surprise. Note that Area of Effect and Explosion attacks negate Combat Luck for all of the targets save the first. When attacking a specific token (as opposed to the Explosion token), make sure you check this.
• Kockback Dice Adjustment (# of Dice): Enter the number of dice that will be used to determine knockback. Useful for things like Flying characters. A positive number will add more dice to the pool and a negative number will reduce the number of dice used. More dice, less knockback. Defaults to 0

Special Modifiers

• Target is Immune to Damage: Useful when using the Explosion Token as the Center of an AoE or Explosion attack. When checked, the target Token takes 0 damage. Defaults to "Off."
• Apply Damage Automatically does exactly that. It takes the damage output and applies it to each token. In the case of AoE or Explosion attacks, it applies damage to each token. Defaults to "Off."
• Output Debug Code is mostly for me or anybody that wants to look at an extended output for nearly all the factors that go into the attack. It is useful for seeing if the macro is doing what it is supposed to do. This tends to clutter the chat up, so it is an optional flag. Defaults to "Off."

Applying Damage

1. Once you have a Stun and Body damage to work with, go ahead and hit the Damage button on the Character Sheet.
2. Enter the values for Stun and then Body.
3. Enter the type of Defense you are using.
4. Enter whether the attack is Normal damage, Killing damage, or Other ( a catchall category).
5. Click on whether the attack should ignore your character's Damage Reduction. For example, is you character's Damage Reduction does not apply versus Fire attacks, then you would check this if hit with a Fire-based attack.
   
   The macro will then apply the damage to your character token. If you have Damage Reduction, it will calculate what the damage is after Damage Reduction is applied. If your character starts to bleed, is Stunned, knocked Unconscious, or Dying, it will set those states and output a message to chat with whatever conditions apply.

Area of Effect: Radius, Area of Effect: Cone and Explosion

Note: These options have changed in the latest release.

Area of Effect: Radius is now handled by clicking the Attacks button. But first, you have to build an Attack using the Attack Builder macro. One of the options is Radius. Set that for whatever radius the Area of Effect has. If the attack is an Explosion, click that button instead of changing the Radius. It will calculate the maximum radius of the explosion based on the DC.

Area of Effect: Cone is built with the Attack Builder macro. When building the attack, make sure that you set the Radius properly for Cone Area of Effects. More information regarding that is in the Hero 6E: Character Creation book. Once the attack is built, you can run the attack with the AoE: Cone macro.

GM Warning: Nothing stops the character from running the cone Radius as a regular Attack. Keep an eye out to make sure that the correct power is being run. I suggest naming attacks with the AoE (Radius, Cone, Explosion) added into the title of the attack.

I'm excited to try this out, but I'm having (the usual) sorts of problems running it: stack overflows, NPEs, etc.

What memory/stack settings do you recommend?

Framework Tutorial Part IV: Alternative Methods and Hotkey Reference

Alternative Method: Basic Hero Function
Okay, let's just assume that you do not want to deal with the complexity of the full macro set. Perhaps you are running on a low memory machine. Maybe you don't like the size of the character sheet frame (which is huge on smaller monitors). You can still use this framework effectively to run your games.

All of the basic macro functions reside within the Campaign Window. You can open this window by turning it on in the Window menu. Just make sure there is a check mark next to "Campaign"

The macros you will be interested in right off are in the Quick Rolls section. These macros give you basic functionality. There is no fancy target selection or drawing information from token properties. In a pinch though, they are pretty decent.


Alternative Method: No Character Sheet but Everything Else
I admit it, the character sheet is a monster on screen space, especially with laptops and other small monitors. If, even with Auto Hide activated on the frame, it is too much to handle, you're in luck. Aside from the monitoring of stats, you can pretty much do anything the character sheet can do from the Campaign Window.

The Token Builders, Combat, Damage & Recovery and Holdovers areas are your four most useful groups of macros as a player. GMs can add the Initiative group. The Quick Rolls group is also quite useful.

Hotkey Reference
Character Sheet: F2
Campaign Parameters: F5
Attacks: F8
Set Phase: F10
Advance Initiative: F11
End Combat : F12

Most other Hotkeys have been disabled. You can always set a hotkey by right-clicking on a given macro and selecting Edit. The Hotkey assignment is on the top row on the far right.

Ah, much better!

There is a lot to like here: did you base this off of any other frameworks?

1) Interesting way to get around the Hero initiative rules and their incompatibility with the Initiative Panel. Have you thought about creating an automated "next segment" macro that would just keep track of the current segment? And how would you handle reserved characters?

2) The AOE/Explosion code is really cool! My initial results seem to indicate that it may be a little too big, even when I shrink the "BOOM" token down to something small. I'll look into this more later.

3) Have you considered writing a character parser? JamesManhattan wrote one (search for "monster card pdf") that inspired me to make one for Champions/Hero. In my framework I just export from HeroDesigner to a carefully designed export format, paste the contents of the character sheet in a dialog box, and hit "Import." All my properties are set in one action.

Can't wait to see more work on this, I'll be reusing plenty of code!

Glad it is working for you. Honestly I've only been using it on my laptop, my desktop and a laptop at work. Good to know that it works for more than just me.


I reused bits of code from here or there. The most obvious is Brad's Hero 5E framework. I lifted the Skills thing almost entirely from there. The rest, not really. When I was actively running a game, one of my players would say something along the lines of "It would be really neat if...." So I spent a lot of time trying to learn how to make "if" become reality. This is the first thing I've ever coded so I'm sure I could have done many things better.


Yes. In fact I have some ideas for that in the near future. I don't know what you mean by "reserved" though.


The token is just a visual aid. You can replace that with anything you like. The DC is what makes the size of the explosion in terms of cells/range. Most of the range finding stuff was done by Daltwisney over at the Hero forums. All I did is add the code to have it use his code to check distance to each token within range and apply damage. I sort of cheated on that too. I don't follow a strict Hero "drop the highest dice first" method. Mine is sort of a consistent damage drop per increment.


I would not even know where to begin to be honest. It is easy enough to "build" the character from my perspective. I suppose a Hero Designer to Nolgroth's framework parser would be cool, but I really am a newb at coding. Not that I couldn't learn, given time and impetus.

Thanks kindly. I think I am nearing the end of my development. I know there will always be little things that need to be tweaked and the odd feature that I forgot. I've been itching to run something again and I have been wanting a near complete/complete framework to do it with. That way I can focus on story and characters instead of patching/upgrading the framework.

I really appreciate your comments, questions and general feedback. I've been building this monster based on how I run a game. I wasn't entirely sure if anybody else would find it useful.

Pretty darn great for a "newb!" My first attempts were much simpler.

Reserved = A held action. I was looking at somebody's framework (probably D&D) lately, and they had a nice visual aid: they placed tokens that were reserved at the top of the initiative list. If you dug into the initiative code much it wouldn't be that hard to do. It's a common problem in our games--not being able to remember who has held their action as we go from segment to segment.

Finally, the character sheet parser is a game-changer for me. Imagine: you go through all the "builders" for your villain team, and then discover you need to make changes. Then you have to go through all of that AGAIN. Burnout, typos, and general unpleasantness follow. And just *forget* trying to do this with 10 minutes left before the players show up.

Instead, you make changes in HeroDesigner, Export, paste the contents in Maptools, and hit "Apply." Your token is all loaded-up with property goodness. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Held action. I was going to create a state for that and have an image of a fist or hand appear over the character. When the initiative comes around, it reminds the person that they have a Held Action and, when their action phase comes back up, sets the Hold state back to 0. The person is welcome to Hold again, but it wouldn't (as it shouldn't) stack.

The character sheet thing makes sense. I may look into it a bit more later.

One thing I thought of as I slept ( I work odd hours) was that I should set the campaign DC max as one of the settings on the Lib token (like Using Locations or Knockback is now). That one is a relatively easy change so that will likely happen today or tomorrow. I just want to think of other settings that might go there so that I can modify the Campaign Properties and the parameters macro at the same time.

And I just noticed you live just a short way down the road. Greetings fellow Californian.

It makes sense, but it always surprises me that the Hero System has a bit of a West Coast fan base bias. But considering I used to go to DunDraCon in the 80's to hear Peterson/Harlick/Greer/etc. talk about the game, I probably shouldn't be surprised.

Lol... I'm a huge Champions fan myself and live in Alameda .

Thats the approach I took in my Lightweight 5E framework, and seems to work in play

I also use a state to indicate when a character has aborted to an action. I thought about trying to code the result and the clear state event but decided that in practice the Referee needs to decide too much to make it worth the effort. Plus from a player's point of view, if they clear their "Aborted" status when its their next turn, rather than it happen automatically, then they are still involved in the combat. Just

Ooh. Thats an interesting idea. My Ref uses HeroDesigner.

Not to be at all snarky, but I ran a MapTool game for about two years. Players tend to get distracted a lot. At least mine did. The more automation I throw in, the better.

As to the max DC being a Lib token property that I mentioned earlier, that change is already in the next release.

The character parser thing is a really awesome, but I would so need to see how it is done. At least have a prototype to reason from.