A Look Back at Previous HERO System

Editions
by Chris Goodwin
This document is a comparison and contrast of third and prior editions of Champions and the Hero
System with the other pre-fourth edition standalone Hero System games (Espionage, Justice Inc.,
Fantasy Hero, Danger International, Robot Warriors, Star Hero). Generally, where Champions is
concerned, I only refer to the third edition rules (because that's when I started).

In Champions specifically, while the third edition rules were at the time official, most people who had
bought earlier editions didn't see a need to buy the later ones. Players and GMs built characters using
whichever edition they owned at the time; you might occasionally find characters in third edition-era
supplements that were, for example, built using the first or second edition rules (which themselves had
some differences between them).

Unless specifically noted, Fantasy Hero and Star Hero refer to the first editions of those books,
Champions refers to pre-fourth edition, and Hero System refers to fourth edition; the other book titles refer
to the books by name. References to editions without a book name are assumed to refer to Champions
releases. Champions was in fact the superhero game, including the rules for powers; specifically,
"Champions rules" refers to "that subset of pre-fourth edition Hero System that appeared in the
Champions book and was used to play games in the superheroic genre". Champions II and Champions III
refer to the books of those names released to expand the pre-fourth edition rules, but were not
themselves new editions of the game. "Heroic level games" or similar refers to, collectively,Espionage,
Justice, Inc., Fantasy Hero, Danger International, Robot Warriors, and Star Hero. For the most part, this
document does not cover books such as SuperAgents and the like.

The books I owned prior to fourth edition Hero were the third edition Champions as well as Champions II
and Champions III. I also owned all of the Hero System core rulebooks except for Espionage. I can't say
with any authority what the differences were between third and prior editions.

Allow me to note that this document is more of a look back at third edition from a fifth edition standpoint
(fourth at the time I wrote it). If you're going to use it as a conversion to either fourth or fifth edition Hero,
you'll need those books.

2018 Update
Bundle of Holding has just finished a pair of bundles: Early Champions and Early Hero System. Together
the bundles contain every product released by Hero Games prior to the 1989 "Big Blue Book" Champions
book. I have purchased the bundles, and accordingly have made a few additional updates, including a
link to a Google Sheets spreadsheet I wrote comparing skills between editions and games.

General
Conversions
The general rule when converting characters from one edition to another is that a character should be
able to do everything after the conversion that he could do before. In some cases, some fine tuning is
desirable to make the character better fit the original vision of its creator or GM. Some things will have
different costs; characters should not be penalized for this. If a character requires more points to do the
same thing afterward as before, he gets those points for free, and if he requires fewer points, he gets
those points back to save or spend elsewhere.

Most third edition games didn't have Active Point limits. You'd see powers bought up to 300 Active Points
with -10 in Limitations to get them down to buyable levels.

There wasn't necessarily a standard starting point level. The default base point level for Champions was
100; most "beginning" superheroes started with anywhere from 200 to 300 total points, though 225-275
was the most common spread. The standard for heroic games after Espionage was 75 base points plus
up to 25 points worth of Disadvantages; this would be more closely equivalent to 50 base points plus 50
in Disadvantages nowadays.

Heroic level games did not charge points for normal equipment. Danger International and Justice, Inc.
provided nearly identical optional rules for using the Champions Power rules for building gadgets, and
Fantasy Hero had its own rules for building magic items (similar to the Champions rules, with a few minor
differences).

Damage Classes didn't exist per se in Champions. They were first called this in the heroic level games.
Champions worked on dice of damage, and it wasn't explicit in the Champions rules that you could buy
intermediate levels of Killing Attack, though it did specify that three dice of normal damage was equivalent
to one die of killing.

Combining games or game mechanics

It was not unheard of to combine games, or to use mechanical elements from one game in another.
Some of the games, particularly Champions, referred players to Espionage or Danger International for
additional skills, and the heroic level games had guidelines for using the Champions Powers rules for
creating gadgets. In general, if a game had its own versions of a skill or other mechanic provided in
another game, it would specify which game's version to use.

Characteristics
Characteristics were bought identically from second through fifth editions and for the most part worked the
same. The exceptions were in things like END cost for Strength and comparing stats for Presence Attack
and mental powers, and are covered elsewhere in this document. (In first edition Champions there was
no prohibition against selling back more than one Figured Characteristic; this is the only thing about
Characteristics that changed between first and second.)

Skills
The original Champions, in its first through third editions, didn't have as many skills to choose from as the
other Hero System games, then or now. Champions II improved the available skill set by a lot, and
Champions III by a little more. Most of the heroic level games added their own skills, but no two games
added the same skill set, and none of the skills from the heroic games were "official" in Champions. Third
edition Champions did mention allowing the use of skills from Danger International, but in cases where
the same skill existed in both, to use the Champions cost. Fourth edition unified the skills, at least as
regards costs, and fifth edition unified them as far as Characteristic bases. If you have fifth or sixth
edition, you shouldn't have any trouble converting skills.

An extensive spreadsheet comparing Skills between the various editions can be found here.

Skills
● Acrobatics existed in Champions (all editions), Espionage, and Autoduel Champions, but none
of the other heroic level games. Its cost was 10 points for 9+(DEX/5), 3 points per +1. In
 Champions, it provided the functions of Breakfall skill, which existed separately in the heroic
level games. It also allowed for an Acrobatic Dodge; a Dodge made in conjunction with an
Acrobatics roll provided an additional +2 DCV.

● Brawling was a Skill that appeared in the heroic level games. It was basically the same as 1d6 of
Hand-to-hand Attack that only worked with punching and kicking, not with weapons or Martial Arts
maneuvers, and you could only buy one level.

● Detective Work was a skill that included uses of Criminology and Forensic Medicine. It didn't
exist in the heroic level games (other than Autoduel Champions), but both Criminology and
Forensic Medicine did (in Danger International).

● Knowledge Skill, but not Professional Skill, appeared in Danger International. KS and PS
appeared in Fantasy Hero. PS, but not KS, appeared in Champions II. Science Skill appeared in
Champions II and Espionage.

● Td was a skill in editions prior to fourth.

● In Champions, Martial Arts was one skill, and it had a cost equal to your STR. Thus, if you had
30 STR, you paid 30 points for Martial Arts. It consisted of five maneuvers (Martial Punch, Martial
Kick, Martial Dodge, Martial Block, Martial Throw) that had OCV and DCV modifiers, and also
modified your damage, usually by increasing it in increments of 1/2 STR. You could buy up
damage: for half the cost of your Martial Arts, all of the maneuvers that did damage received a
bonus equal to +1/2 your STR damage. Martial Arts in Espionage used a slightly modified subset
of the rules in Champions. Martial Arts in Danger International (and to a lesser extent in Robot
Warriors) worked a lot more like they do in fourth and fifth edition. Martial Arts didn't exist in
Fantasy Hero.

● Power Skill didn't exist as a complete concept prior to fifth edition (though it first appeared in print
in the Fuzion RPG). Variable Power Pool allowed for a separate skill to be used to manipulate
the pool, but that skill was seldom given much to do beyond that. Fifth edition unified the Variable
Power Pool control skill with first edition Fantasy Hero's Magic Skill and Champions II’s
Gadgeteering Skill while bringing in some new and cool concepts.

Perks and Talents

● Perks, including Fringe Benefits, appeared in Danger International.

● Mastermind Bonus: First appeared in Champions II. This cost 50 points and gave the character
a number of points equal to his remaining point total to buy Bases, Vehicles, and Followers.
Nowadays you'll want to break all of those out separately.

● Justice, Inc. had Weird Talents, while Danger International had Extraordinary Abilities. These both
served the same niche that Talents did in fourth through sixth editions, and most of the Talents in
the later games were drawn from these.

● Justice, Inc. included rules for Psychic Powers, which didn't work in the same way as Champions
powers or Fantasy Hero spell effects; buying the ability granted a skill roll (usually based on EGO,
and required to use the ability), were treated as having No Conscious Control, and took a -5 to
skill to attempt to use consciously.

Powers
● The Fantasy Hero spell rules were similar, but not quite identical, to the Champions power rules
(effectively a subset with some different default conditions). In Fantasy Hero, all spells took a half
phase to cast, cost END, and required a Magic Skill roll; these provided no cost bonus, they were
 just the default conditions. These default conditions could be bought down or off with Advantages;
the system of Advantages and Limitations was identical to that of Champions. For the most part,
under Powers I am only covering Champions Powers, not Fantasy Hero spells.

● Star Hero included yet a different subset of the Champions Power rules for building both gadgets
and alien Powers; it did suggest going back to Champions for additional abilities. This was the
final Hero Games book released before fourth edition Champions, though it didn't include any
concepts from that book.

● Gadgets: Danger International, Justice Inc., and Robot Warriors all included some slightly
oddball guidelines for building gadgets using Champions Powers (Espionage may have included
similar rules). "Gadget" was a -1 Limitation with a few extras, and things like concealability or
breakability changed this. They weren't exactly the Champions Power rules, and none of the
heroic level games included rules for transplanting Powers straight in. I don't recall these ever
being used in any published product, but they're included here as a historical note.

● Endurance Cost: The Endurance Cost for Powers in first generation games was 1 END per 5
Active Points, except for movement, which cost 1 END per 5" (which essentially came down to 1
END per 10 Active Points). Strength used to cost 1 END per 5 points to use. Unless you have a
specific reason for wanting the power to cost the same amount of END to use as it did under third
edition and prior, you probably don't want to change it. Reduced Endurance has changed
greatly; see below.

● Most powers that nowadays work on a scale of CHA, CHA+10, CHA+20, etc., back then worked
on CHA, CHAx2, CHAx3, CHAx4, etc. scale, including Presence Attacks.

● Powers weren't categorized in the same way they are nowadays -- the categories of Standard
Powers, Special Powers, Adjustment Powers, etc. didn't exist. There weren't really any
restrictions on what you could and couldn't put into a Framework, though a few powers were
allowed in Frameworks only by special GM permission.

Powers
● Adjustment Powers: This did not exist as a separate category; what we now call Adjustment
Powers didn't have a unified methodology for the way they worked, and in some cases they
worked differently from one edition to another. In general, you'd pay X points times the
Characteristic Cost Multiple to adjust 1d6 pips of the Characteristic, rather than paying X points to
adjust 1d6 Active Points worth, but this wasn't necessarily always the case.

● Size Powers: Growth, Shrinking, and Density Increase worked differently in every edition prior to
fourth. See the descriptions of those Powers below for more information. In fourth edition and
prior, it was okay to buy these as Always On to represent characters who were permanently
larger or smaller than normal.

● Aid: Aid first appeared in Fantasy Hero. It worked similarly to the way Succor does in fifth, without
the ability to cumulatively stack uses; as long as you paid END, the additional characteristics
stayed, and when you shut the spell off, the Aided points went away immediately. In Champions,
it was much more common to buy extra characteristics with Advantages and Limitations, including
Usable By Others, than it is now.

● Armor: The cost of Armor has changed; in third edition it was 5 points for 3 resistant PD or ED.

● Density Increase: Its third edition cost was as follows: 10 points for +5 STR, +5 CON, +3 fully
resistant PD and ED, 1 BODY, -1" Knockback, and 2x Mass.

● Desolidification: This used to cost 5 points per 1 BODY you could go through, minimum cost 40
points. Most people just bought 8 BODY Desolidification.
● Dispel: This didn't exist outside of Fantasy Hero. Barring the basic differences between FH spells
and Champions Powers, it worked almost the same way then as it does now.

● Drain: This used to be called Power Drain and worked differently from the way it does now.
Power Destruction worked like Drain, except that points would come back at the rate of the
target's REC per month.

● Ego Defense: The name changed to Mental Defense in fourth edition. It otherwise hasn't
changed.

● Endurance Reserve did not exist as a separate Power. The END Battery modifier worked much
differently from END Reserve. Essentially, the END Battery provided a certain number of uses
worth of END to the battery, and it had a slow recovery time; it was treated as a Limitation similar
to Charges. The details changed with each edition.

● Enhanced Senses: These weren't broken up into Sense Groups. Enhanced Senses had a cost
reduction progression: the two most expensive were at full cost, the next two were at half cost,
the next two were at one quarter cost, etc. Minimum cost on a sense was 1 point.

● Extradimensional Movement: Extradimensional Movement was not its own power. Instead,
there was a +1/2 Advantage for Teleport to allow it to transport interdimensionally.

● Flash: This only affected normal sight. You couldn't buy it to affect other senses. It was Area of
Effect (Radius) with Nonselective Targeting by default (thus, you had to roll one Attack Roll to
target the Flash area, and another against each target within the area). In all editions prior to fifth,
each BODY on the dice caused the target to be Flashed for one full Phase, rather than one
Segment.

● Growth: Its third edition cost was as follows: 10 points for each level of Growth, which gives +5
STR, +5 PRE, +2 BODY, +1 PD, +1 ED, and other effects listed on the Growth Effects charts.
[Growth added +2" Running per level, as well as doubling the character's height, reach, area, and
others' Range Modifier every 3 levels.]

● Hand-to-Hand Attack: This did not exist. If you wanted it, you had to kludge something together
using Energy Blast or Limited Strength.

● Healing: Healing under third edition worked pretty much the way it does in fifth edition, including
to the extent of tracking wounds; it had changed in fourth edition to become a subset of Aid.
Regeneration was a separate Power (see below).

● Images: This didn't exist in third edition. Champions II included a Light Illusions Power, but there
was no corresponding Sound Illusions available in Champions (though I recall including that in my
games as a house rule); such an ability did appear in Fantasy Hero as a spell called Sounds.
Light Illusions and Sounds were both bought in dice, and were compared to the target's INT
(using a table similar to other "comparison" mechanics such as Mental Powers and Presence
Attacks) to determine how complex an illusion the Power could create.

● Invisibility: You could buy Invisibility to various senses, but again they weren't broken up into
groups. You could only buy Invisibility to what we now call the Sight Group senses, and not to any
others, though Desolidification explicitly provided effective Invisibility to the Hearing Group. "Full
Spectrum" Invisibility meant you had bought it to cover all of the senses it could cover.

● Life Support: This had a straight cost progression whereby higher levels automatically included
lower levels; it wasn't possible to buy, for instance, Immunity to Pressure Extremes without first
buying Self Contained Breathing. "30 points of Life Support" or "Full Life Support" meant that you
had bought all of the Life Support there was to buy. The third edition Golden Age of Champions
supplement brought about the more familiar method of buying Life Support, including to allow
 additional conditions that weren't covered by the progression (such as aging); that supplement
also suggested allowing Life Support to be purchased at the same cost reduction progression as
Enhanced Senses.

● Light Illusions: See Images.

● Luck: Luck was a Skill.

● Mental Paralysis: This was a power that worked very similarly to Entangle except that it was
based on ECV, could be blown away by any Mental Powers (doing 1d6 Normal Damage to the
Paralysis per die in the Power), and was protected against by Mental Defense. Nowadays there
are various methods for building a "Mental Entangle" that more or less give the same effect.

● Neutralize: See Suppress.

● Piercing: This was a power that allowed you to ignore some of the target's defenses. You'd
probably convert it to Armor Piercing nowadays (though Piercing in almost its original form has
returned in the fifth edition Dark Champions book).

● Power Destruction: See Drain.

● Power Drain: See Drain.

● Power Transfer: This became Transfer in fourth edition. It changed in accordance with the other
Adjustment Powers (see also).

● Regeneration: In third edition and prior, Regeneration worked per recovery, including post-12,
rather than per Turn; a character could take a Recovery during combat and Regenerate, and if a
character was at negative STUN and recovering at GM's discretion, Regeneration was reduced
as well. It also returned Drained and Destroyed characteristics (points equal to BODY
regenerated).

● Running: Running was a Skill in the heroic level games.

● Shrinking: Its third edition cost was as follows: 10 points for every x1/2 size, resulting in x1/2 to
other's Range Modifiers for Attack Rolls and sight Perception Rolls, x1/2 inches of ground
movement, +3 to knockback, and 1/8 mass.

● Summon: This first appeared in Fantasy Hero.

● Suppress: This was called Neutralize in Champions III. It didn't reduce a Characteristic or Power,
just prevented the target from using it.

● Swimming was a skill in the heroic level games.

● Swinging: Swinging was a Skill. It used to cost 1 point for 1" of Swinging, with a minimum cost of
5 points. It stated in the description, "The hero must have an implement (a Swing line) in order to
swing."

Advantages, Limitations, Modifiers, Generally

● The notation for Advantages and Limitations has changed. Previously, Advantages were noted as
"x1/4" or sometimes "+x1/4". Limitations were noted as "+1/4", "+1/2", etc. Figuring out costs
worked identically to the way it does now. In this document I use the current notation for
Advantages and Limitations regardless of which edition I refer to.

● In third edition and prior, there were Advantages, Modifiers, and Limitations. Reduced Endurance,
Multipower, Elemental Control, Variable Power Pool, and Variable Advantage were considered
 Modifiers. In fourth edition, Reduced Endurance became an Advantage; Elemental Control,
Multipower, and Variable Power Pool became Power Frameworks; and anything else that was a
"Modifier" either became an Advantage or died. The word Modifier is now used to refer to
Advantages and Limitations in general.

● Reduced Endurance: It used to be you bought Reduced Endurance in increments of 1/2 (so
you'd get 1/2 END, 1/4 END, 1/8 END, etc.). Reduced Endurance was a Modifier, and essentially
was an Advantage paid against your Active Points rather than your Base Cost. To buy a power to
0 END, you had to buy it to 0.5 END or below (which would then round in your favor to 0 END).
There was no such thing as Persistent; to buy a power at Always On, you had to first buy it to 0
END. Math errors abounded: did 3.5 END round to 3 END immediately, to halve to 1.5 and round
to 1, or did 3.5 END halve to 1.75 END, which rounded to 2 END? There was no single answer.
Usually four levels of Reduced END would get a power to 0 END; I never saw one that took more
than five.

Advantages
● Autofire was 10 shots by default, though you could buy it at the 5 shot level. 5 shots
automatically gave +2 OCV, with an additional +2 OCV for every 2x shots. This was built into the
Advantage. Selective Fire was an additional Advantage on top of this; without Selective Fire you
could only fire the maximum number of shots. (Autofire was +1/2 for 10 shots, or +1/4 for 5 shots;
+1/4 for Selective Fire; and +1/4 for 2x shots.)

● Autofire and Area Effect attacks both halved the Range Modifier (see below under Combat for
more on Range Modifier).

● Cumulative: This Advantage only existed for Transforms, which were not Cumulative by default,
and essentially made them infinitely cumulative.

● Persistent: This first appeared in Fantasy Hero. It didn't require the Power to be bought to 0
Endurance Cost, though. It didn't exist in Champions, and therefore was not required on Powers
that were bought Always On.

● Reduced Endurance Cost. This was a Modifier.

● Variable Advantage: This was a Modifier in Fantasy Hero and didn't exist elsewhere. Your spell
could have a maximum Active Points equal to the points worth of the spell you originally bought;
you could have any Advantages on any amount of Base Points as long as the Active Points were
less than or equal to the basic Active Points in the spell. Thus, if you had purchased 60 Active
Points worth of Ranged Killing Attack (or Killing Blast in first edition Fantasy Hero), and bought
Variable Advantage on top of that, you could have any configuration of Advantages on a Killing
Blast up to 60 points worth. So, you might have 2d6 Area of Effect (Radius), or 2 1/2d6 Explosion,
etc. It required a successful Magic Skill Roll to change the Advantages. It was unclear how this
worked on a spell that already had Advantages on it.

● Variable Result was an Advantage in Fantasy Hero. It was something like modern Variable
Special Effect on steroids; it allowed you to change many things about your Powers, such as the
apportionment of PD and ED in a Force Field or Force Wall, etc.

● Variable Special Effect: This did not exist; see Variable Result for more.

Limitations
● Activation Rolls were much more common, and came in three flavors: 14-, 11-, and 8-.

● Always On: Since Persistent did not exist, Always On did not require the use of it; it was only
necessary to buy Reduced Endurance Cost down to 0 END. Inherent came about with fifth
 edition.

● Gestures and Incantations first appeared in Fantasy Hero, as did Variable Advantage (which
was a Modifier along with Reduced Endurance Cost).

● Linked: This has been vastly overhauled in fifth edition. For all intents and purposes, it worked
the same in fourth as it did in third.

● Requires A Skill Roll: The Requires a Skill Roll Limitation was a back-construction from the
Fantasy Hero magic rules generalized with the skill roll requirements for Variable Power Pools; it
didn't exist as its own Limitation prior to fourth edition. No Magic Roll was a +1/2 Advantage in
Fantasy Hero.

● Variable Limitation did not exist.

Frameworks (Power Modifiers)

● Frameworks (Elemental Control, Multipower, Variable Power Pool) were referred to as
"Modifiers" and did not appear in Fantasy Hero; there, characters paid full points for all spells.

● Gadgeteering and Gadget Pools appeared in Champions II; the full Variable Power Pool rules
appeared in Champions III. Variable Power Pools were a superset of Gadget Pools that ended up
working just a bit differently (the Control Cost was 1 per 5 points in the pool). If you see a Gadget
Pool, replace it with a Variable Power Pool.

● The costs for Elemental Control were figured differently depending on which edition (first,
second, or third) you were looking at. Third and fourth editions work the same way, for the most
part.

● Variable Power Pools worked almost identically to the fourth and fifth edition versions. (This is a
change from the previous versions of this document; I had it incorrect before.)

Disadvantages
● In first generation Champions, instead of a per-category maximum number of Disadvantages, the
first two (highest bonus) in one category were full value, the next two were halved, the next two
were quartered, etc. Fourth edition included occasional conditions that would halve the value of a
Disadvantage; in fifth edition, all Disadvantages are worth some multiple of 5 points.

● In the first generation heroic games, all Disadvantages except Unluck were worth half their
Champions values. The dropoff progression was also halved (the first one was full value, the next
one was halved, etc.).

● Not infrequently, writers would forget to break out disadvantages. So you might see "Code
Against Killing: 15 points" and not know whether that was Common and Strong, Very Common
and Moderate, or what. The most egregious offenders were Psychological Limitations and
Hunteds.

● Berserk appeared only in Champions. Enraged appeared in Champions II.

● Hunted appeared in Champions, but Watched only appeared in the heroic level games.

● Normal Characteristic Maxima did not exist as a Disadvantage until the first edition of Golden
Age of Champions, released by Firebird Ltd. (Note: The concept did exist in the heroic level
games, just not as a Champions Disadvantage.) The Age Disadvantage existed only in the heroic
level games, with the exception of its inclusion in Golden Age.
 ● Public ID and Secret ID are now Social Limitations; they were separate Disadvantages in fourth
edition and in all editions of Champions, and didn't exist in the heroic level games.

● Rivalry first appeared in Robot Warriors.

● Unusual Looks appeared only in Champions. It has been replaced by Reputation, Distinctive
Features, and (in fifth edition) Social Limitation.

Combat
● For the most part, combat worked the same: 11 + OCV - DCV or less on 3d6; mental combat was
11 + OECV - DECV. Some maneuvers differ, especially martial arts maneuvers, but most are the
same.

● The base range modifier was -1 per 3" (or 3 hexes), noted as -1/3". Modifers, maneuvers, etc.
could change this; you'd see adjustments like 1/2 Range Modifier, +1 Range Modifier, 2x Range
Modifier, etc., which would modify the number of hexes; -1/3" would double to -1/6", while +1
would take -1/3" to -1/4". Halving a range modifier to something ending in .5 rounded in the
character's favor, so -1/3" halved to -1/2", then to -1/1".

Other
● The Vehicle rules were much different. The full vehicle rules first appeared in Champions II;
subsets of them (mainly movement and combat) were used in Justice, Inc. and Danger
International. Vehicles had Maximum Speed, Acceleration, Deceleration, and Range (maximum
distance travelled on one tank of fuel), and moved per segment. Assigning DEX and SPD to
vehicles first appeared in Robot Warriors, as did the idea that a pilot and vehicle combination got
the lower of either the pilot or vehicle's DEX and SPD.

● The Bases rules were similarly different, and also appeared in Champions II.

● The Computer and AI rules were almost identical (computers were called AIDs, for Artificial
Intelligence Devices) and appeared in Champions II as well.

● Hit Locations, Impairing and Disabling Wounds, and the advanced Bleeding rules came about
with the standalone games.

Game by Game
Fantasy Hero
Skills

● Most skills in Fantasy Hero had near equivalents to current skills; second edition Fantasy Hero
(for 4th edition Champions/HERO System included a good conversion chart.

● Magic Skill would be called Power Skill (Magic) in fifth edition. Power Skill encompasses
everything Magic Skill did, and then some.

● Spell Research no longer exists as a separate skill; use Inventor (Spell).

Effects (magic)

● Spells by default took a half-Phase to cast, Concentrate at half DCV, and required a Magic Skill
Roll, all for no points. Also, by default a wizard could only have INT/5 spells running at once (this
 included Constant spells, Delayed Effects, and Triggers). To build any spell effects as a "power"
required these conditions to be bought down or off with Advantages (Fast, Easy, and No Magic
Roll, respectively, for a total of +1). All Spells cost 1 END per 5 Active Points and reduced a
caster's Magic Roll by -1 per 10 Active Points. Almost all Spell effects had their names changed
from the equivalent Champions Powers, and in many cases worked slightly differently as well.

● Champions Powers were never used in Fantasy Hero supplements (though one supplement in
particular unofficially added a few Champions concepts to FH); it was sometimes amusing to see
the lengths to which authors would go to recreate abilities from the other games, without referring
to those games specifically.

● Adapt is Life Support; the standard Adapt provided self contained breathing, but could be
specified to protect against another condition. The Base Cost was a flat 20 points regardless of
what was protected against.

● Aid uses a different mechanic in fourth and fifth editions (the original was very similar to Succor in
fifth or Boost in sixth), and did not appear in Champions until fourth edition.

● Analyze is now part of Detect.

● Blast is Energy Blast (or Blast in sixth edition).

● Create was for creating magic items, and no longer exists as a separate Power, though the
mechanic is still used as Usable By Others With Differing Modifiers. Nowadays this might be done
with a separate skill (such as a PS or Power Skill, possibly Inventor (Magic Items)).

● Dazzle is Flash.

● Defense is a generic defense that encompassed Flash Defense and Power Defense, mostly.

● Destroy is now part of Drain (see Power Destruction, above).

● Dominate is Mind Control.

● Heal is Healing and works very similarly to both third and fifth edition Healing.

● Illusions is Mental Illusions.

● Killing Blast is Ranged Killing Attack. Hand-to-hand Killing Attack did not exist in Fantasy Hero,
and many effects that would otherwise be built as HKA were instead built as Killing Blast, No
Range, which necessitated buying, among other things, Fast, Easy, and No Magic Roll. It was
assumed but not made explicit for weapons that STR added to Killing Blasts bought as a weapon
(this may have been made explicit in the STR Minimum Limitation now that I think about it).

● Levitate is Flight. All Levitate effects reduced a character to half DCV while flying; this could be
bought off with an Advantage.

● Mind Defense is Mental Defense.

● Restore would be built as Healing vs. Characteristics other than BODY and/or STUN.

● Shapeshift worked much differently, effectively being something like a Multiform.

● Shield is Force Field (or Resistant Protection in sixth). Armor as a Power or Spell didn't exist in
Fantasy Hero; many effects that would otherwise have been built as Armor were instead built as
Shield. Again, armor effects would have been built with the Fast, Easy, and No Magic Roll
Advantages.
 ● Sounds is Images vs. the Hearing group.

● Transport is Teleport.

● Ward is Force Wall (Barrier in sixth edition).

● Size Change Powers were built as "monster effects" that explicitly could not be built as Spells. If
you wanted to grow or shrink, you needed to Shapeshift to a larger or smaller form.

Advantages/Modifiers

● Frameworks didn't exist in Fantasy Hero. See above under Frameworks.

● Variable Advantage and Reduced Endurance Cost were Modifiers. See above under Modifiers.

● No Magic Roll was used to buy off the default Requires Skill Roll condition.

● No Normal Defense was not used in Fantasy Hero; few effects were built that would have
required it.

Limitations

● Materials is Focus. The Materials Limitation could typically achieve much larger bonuses than
Focus in Champions (-1 1/2 to -2 was not uncommon for an item that granted -1 at most in
Champions).

Other

● Monsters were, for some strange reason, built with base Characteristics of 0 with 0 inches of
Running. Thus, all monsters cost 137 points more than their effective worth. This included "NPCs
as monsters" such as wandering bands of dwarves, halflings, even humans. This even applied to
using Shapeshift and Summon to turn into or summon them.