Heroes: what makes them "heroic"

[Rainbowsand]

"You know what definition of hero is? It is the guy who gets other people killed." /Zoe, "Firefly"


The common trait of all heroes i observed in multitude of books, and films, and games, that they all had their destiny, until completion of which they stay alive. They may have minor injuries caught along the way (some bruises and hands cut by lightsabers...) they may become imprisoned and even tortured awhile but then they do escape due to their exceptional 'luck'. Often before being found and activated by some passing wizards they all appear almost plain. Some of the heroes are possessing unique abilities and almost all of them have heightened generic qualities as strength or intellect sometimes risen to be the best within their settings (Conan).

"There is no such thing as luck, there is only the Force" /Jedi axiom

The whole game devoted to heroes, with number four in it, does represents this as a rule that hero can only be imprisoned, not killed, and he abandons player's service when tired of defeats.

While in FfH we do observe a "heroes" which are being recruited as a normal units, with quite a build cost (centners of equipment? not artifacts, they are separate), receive combat skills (through XP gain) without even training, start plain first level despite a sound background and sometimes die in brawls with bunch of goblins.

A great lots of players feel it right to load a savegame after their hero dies in 98.5% or even do that

In a similar vein, the other day I was playing as the Calabim and took Valin Phanuel as a slave from the Malakim. Because I'm a nerd like that, I renamed the slave as "Valin Phanuel", moved him onto an Ancient Tower within my territory and plopped a couple guard units on him for the rest of the game. I decided that if the Malakim ever broke through my defenses and overran the tower then I would go into World Builder and give them Valin back, but it never happened.

Another striking nonsense: immortal units and a mortal heroes...

So in-game heroes in order to look somewhat more heroic should:
- be added to the player by event
- have lump sum of free xp at entering the game
- be adept lair/dungeon explorers
- have imprisonment/an 'absolute escape' mechanics or at least be immortal if that is too bothersome
- possess unique abilities (Gilden Silveric, my favoured flavourwise hero is but a simple archer with stat boost)

 

[hbar]

This sounds like a great idea for a modmod. Shouldn't be too hard to do, some python and 21 custom events. Too bad multiple-part events still aren't working (a la Galeen).

I disagree with the lump sum of free xp on join - after all, considering your inspiration, there should definitely be a "hero's journey" aspect involved. In a perfect world (read: event and quest system), the free per-turn XP would be capped until you completed some quest or series of quests with your hero.

I know there is at least one mod that has an improved withdrawl mechanic for heroes. If I remember correctly, a hero always withdraws from a losing battle unless it has the "wounded" promotion. A hero gains this promo on withdrawl; it prevents healing and it is only removed by returning to the capital (so if your hero loses a battle s/he has to trek across enemy lands to return home). And remember, FFH is dark fantasy, so heroes do die.

As for unique abilities, some already have them (Loki, the War Machine, and to a lesser extent Guybrush), but designing and balancing 21 abilities, all of which add something to gameplay without being overpowered, is a daunting task for a minor gain. Heroes can already steamroll entire nations if used correctly.

Oh, and heroes are already adept at exploring lairs - no BIGBAD results for them.

 

[Rainbowsand]

- have lump sum of free xp at entering the game
As all the heroes whose stories i bothered to read have a significant background before entering the players' service which certainly accounts as 'experience' then it is logical to give them on the start either some number of common promotions or xp sum - but latter does allows them to be adapted to the current situation. While quests are better be reserved for gaining unique "hero-line" promotions that would be unavailable through normal combat xp means.

Also, i do eschew free xp gain for simple reason: it does allows stockpiling of heavily promoted units without risks of combat. Imo it should be replaced completely by xp gain bonuses such as "inspired", and small xp from actions such as shooting (which some modmods adopted) and spellcasting; training facilities imo should give free "Drill" line promotions (and other looking like gained through training) not the free xp, because 'xp' does represents the power rather than skills and knowledge. (The most profound presentation of that i know are 'xp orbs' from Fable which are essentially pockets of essence )

And remember, FFH is dark fantasy, so heroes do die.

Yes. But as a certain tech enables immortality for units then heroes who survive until it should be made immortal too. Besides, in some dark fantasy games heroes die on average every 5 minutes, then rise again and that does not makes these games 'unbalanced'

I know there is at least one mod that has an improved withdrawl mechanic for heroes.

Oh. Could you name it?

 

[hbar]

I couldn't find the mod - I'm not even sure it was ever made, but I know it was talked about. I put out some feelers here.

Also, regarding hero death, remember that the Life III spell can resurrect a dead hero, which seems like a fitting punishment for losing, and is also a staple of fantasy/comic book plot hooks. (Be aware - the site I linked is known to obliterate entire otherwise productive afternoons).

 

[Tasunke]

I think that if a Unit has the "hero" promotion, then their base level for exploring Dungeons should be +10. So if a level 6 hero explores a dungeon, for game purposes it was a level 16 unit that explored the Dungeon. Also, I think the % chance for really good results (great person, missionary, adventurer) should be increased by half (or more) for heroes.

So then, if a level 6 hero explores a dungeon, he has the odds for normal level 16 unit ... HOWEVER!!! also, lets say for arguments sake he had a 20% odds for a "decent" outcome, and a 10% odds for a "really good" outcome. A hero would have the "really good" outcome's chance increased by half, cutting into whatever was below it. Therefore the hero would have 15% odds for a decent outcome and 15% odds for a really good outcome. Or something to that effect. It would probably be larger even with just a lv 6 hero becoming lv 16 for the equation ... but I feel 150%-ing or doubling a heroes chance for the really good events would also contribute to this.

What would this do? It might make it worthwhile saving Lairs for your heroes ... and also would give the Grigori a HUGE boost in Adventuring ... which would be really awesome flavorwise. Hmm, maybe units upgraded from adventurers get Double the benefits when exploring lairs compared to a normal hero??? So maybe Grigori hero gets a +20 base level, and a Grigori hero also gets a triple chance for a really good event, as opposed to a 1.5 chance.

 

[thapagan]

re: hero's journey, I had a wacky idea about a goblin hero that would start out with that 2 attack and the hero promotion, and as you research he gets more skills (promotions), So towards the end of the game he should have just about every non magic promotion.

 

[Kranden]

Heroes can easily influence your emotions thats for sure. Last game as the infernal I was bringing about armageddon and nabbed myself a crown of command with mardero(look at me 60% chance to convert enemy units ahhh yeaa) stacked with war and orthus axe and a few other random item. So I set about taking on Archeron and all of his sons of the inferno with no problem. I convert the big bad dragon himself and bout 15 sons of the inferno and set about roflstomping on every civ who looked at me funny. Of course the Armageddon comes about 25 turns later and I lose Archeron 14 sons of the inferno and rosier dohhh! I had already won at that point so it wasn't too bad.