Just got my latest Loot! shipment. The “Ultimate Hero System Bundle“, consisting of the following books (descriptions from the Loot! page):
#1 The Ultimate Base: Whether it’s a castle, a gadget-filled secret headquarters, a starbase in deep space, or something even more unusual, a Base provides both resources for the Player Characters and adventure ideas for the GM. The Ultimate Base is your guide to creating any sort of Base using the HERO System rules, whether it’s a two-room apartment or an entire world.
#2 The Ultimate Brick: Strength! While it focuses on the powers and abilities of “brick” superheroes so common to Champions, like Hero’s other Ultimate books The Ultimate Brick has rules, information, and other useful material for any genre of gaming. If you want to know how strong your Fantasy Hero character has to be to lift an ox, how your superhero can squeeze coal into diamonds, or how an immensely strong alien can use his muscles in Star Hero adventures, this is the book for you.
#3 The Ultimate Energy Projector: A book about the strange and awesome energies wielded in comic books and adventure fiction and the powerful characters who wield them. It features detailed HERO System rules about how different types of energies interact and affect one another, hundreds of sample powers and abilities for energy-wielding characters, sample energy projectors from many genres, and more!
#4 The Ultimate Mentalist: Mental and psychic powers, and the characters who use them, appear in just about every adventure genre in some form. The Ultimate Mentalist takes a thorough, detailed look at the HERO System’s rules for mental and psychic abilities. It includes expanded discussion of the Mental Powers; new and optional rules, rules expansions, and rules variants for psionics; advice for creating, running, and GMing mentalists; special rules for Mental Combat; sample mentalist powers and abilities; and more.
#5 The Ultimate Metamorph: Characters who can change shape, alter their bodies or minds, or otherwise transform themselves in some way are a common feature of almost every adventure genre. The Ultimate Metamorph takes a thorough, detailed look at the HERO System’s rules for changing the shape, form, or function of a character’s own body. It includes new, optional rules, rules expansions, and rules variants, advice for creating, running, and GMing metamorphs, lots of “metamorph tricks” abilities, and more.
#6 The Ultimate Mystic: The next book in Hero’s Ultimate series explores the theme of magic and characters who use it. In addition to a detailed discussion of major types of magic (such as voodoo, alchemy, kabbalism, and Hermetic theurgy), including dozens of sample spells, it covers archetypical mystic characters, multiverse creation, and many related subjects.
#7 The Ultimate Skill: In addition to expanded and alternate rules for learning, using, and modifying Skills, it contains detailed information about every Skill in the game, making it a resource unparalleled in the world of roleplaying games. If you want to know the modifiers for picking a double-wafer lock (or even what one is), bypassing a fingerprint analyzer, navigating by the stars, living off the land, tracking a fearsome monster, bribing a city guard, or anything else that has to do with a Skill, The Ultimate Skill will tell you all about it. The product of hundreds of hours’ and thousands of dollars’ worth of research, The Ultimate Skill will bring new levels of detail, excitement, and fun to your game.
#8 The Ultimate Speedster: No matter what genre or setting they appear in, characters have to walk, run, and leap… and in many settings, they can also fly, teleport, travel to other dimensions, or move at super-fast speeds. The Ultimate Speedster takes a thorough, detailed look at the HERO System’s rules for Movement Powers and how characters use them. It includes new optional rules, rules expansions, and rules variants, advice for creating, running (no pun intended!), and GMing speedsters, hundreds of “speedster tricks” abilities, and more.
#9 The Hero System Vehicle Sourcebook: The Hero System Vehicle Sourcebook delves into the subject of vehicles, providing advanced and expanded rules for Hero System gamers who want to build anything from a chariot to a gigantic mecha. The book also includes extensive rules for vehicle combat and dozens of complete vehicle writeups to drop directly into your game.
Total: $28.74 USD, plus $35.50 USD shipping (to Canada).
I already had The Ultimate Base (HERO 6e) and the The Ultimate Mystic (HERO 5e, like the other seven books). So even though I now have two duplicates, I still got seven books I previously did not have for under $65.
Even after shipping, that’s less than half price. Booyeah.
Now, I don’t remember if I ordered the Grim Tales (Bad Axe Games, the same folks that did Trailblazer) offering a few days later… I suppose I’ll find out soon, won’t I?
(Update: another HERO bundle today… $16.47 for five books:
#1 Conquerors, Killers and Crooks: The first enemies book for Champions, Conquerors, Killers and Crooks contains detailed character sheets and descriptions of nearly 100 supervillains, including old favorites like Dr. Destroyer, Foxbat and the Ultimates as well as plenty of new and exciting characters. A must-have for any Champions player!
#2 Cops, Crews and Cabals: Not every organization in the Champions Universe is as big and powerful as VIPER or DEMON… but that doesn’t mean they’re not every bit as dangerous! Crews, Cops, And Cabals provides complete information about several organizations suitable for any Champions campaign. It includes the mutant-hating Institute for Human Advancement, bounty hunters who specialize in superhuman prey, the Metahuman Activities Response Squad of the Millennium City Police Department, laboratories dedicated to studying supertechnology, and many more.
#3 Monsters, Minions and Marauders: What’s a Fantasy Hero game without dragons, giants, and other monsters to fight? Monsters, Minions, And Marauders provides you with complete game information for nearly a hundred monsters suitable for any Fantasy game. It includes dozens of humanoid foes, ranging from goblins and orcs to ogres, trolls, and giants; psionic and extradimensional monsters, such as the devious phantasmite, terrifying Qliphothic hound, or malicious dreamstalker; spirit creatures like dryads, leshi, and nature spirits; templates for customizing humanoid monsters, so you can quickly and easily make an average orc into a chieftain, shaman, or war-leader; character sheets for “generic” human adversaries, such as city guards, pirates, thieves, soldiers, and barbarian warriors. No matter what your campaign or your Fantasy world are like, Monsters, Minions, And Marauders has just the right monsters for you!
#4 Nobles, Knights and Necromancers: Every great hero needs an equally great villain as his nemesis. In a Fantasy Hero campaign having just the right enemies can make the game especially exciting. That’s what Nobles, Knights, And Necromancers offers you – dozens of Fantasy villains perfect for adding even more fun to any campaign!
#5 Villains, Vandals and Vermin: Time for another dose of fiendish villainy! Villains, Vandals, And Vermin introduces sixty new villains for Champions campaigns, ranging from low-powered costumed crooks to villains powerful enough to singlehandedly threaten the world. It includes: the master villain Sunburst and his supervillainous henchmen three villain teams: the Brain Trust, a group of strange villains led by a living brain; the Crimelords, a mercenary supervillain team; and the Tiger Squad, the official superhero team of China over three dozen solo villains, suitable for combining into your own teams or hatching their own evil schemes notes about how to make each villain weaker or more powerful plot seeds for each villain So watch your back… there are new villains out there waiting for you!
… but the books in here I’d want, I already have. I’ve got both Fantasy Hero books, and I’m not interested in the Champions books. Ah well.)