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An article of this sort really calls for some clarification of vocabulary first, which, to the reader's dismay, I haven't done. Might be something for interested parties to hammer out.

I think my point is on solid soil, but needs some clarification. (And in all of this, it's actually a little hard to peg HERO, with its unique turn system. The best I can do is pigeonhole it where it seems to fit, and add notes as necessary.)

Here I refer to an attack (and I should have said "attack", not "action") which itself requires more time than does the standard "one per turn" attack. An example would be a rule that has a heavy polearm swing... very... slowly, and spend two turns to make an attack: the first slowly building the swing, and the second completing the swing and hitting. As far as I know, there's no such thing in HERO or D&D. (HERO will have one character taking slower actions than another, but it has nothing to do with dagger vs polearm use, or otherwise adjusting the time required for a given action by a single character.)

GURPS sort of has this type of "slow attack": the polearm will require a Ready action, reducing its attack frequency. But that readying isn't the attack itself. You can ready and hold, and from that position, swing the polearm as quickly as the dagger. So if you ask me whether a polearm is slower than a dagger in GURPS, I'd have to respond with a deeply meaningful "kind of".

I think the key here is the reference to slower pace of attacks, not attacks that are themselves slower. Again, my use of the vocabulary may not be up to the needs of clarity. If I may babble more:

For all three systems, the only significant means I know of for a weapon to attack at a slower frequency than one-per-turn is for the fighter to simply not attack on some turns. GURPS enforces that for users of certain heavy weapons, which adds a little realistic detail. I believe that HERO and D&D don't enforce any such thing for heavy weapons.

But all the systems freely let you spend turns running, or defending, or taking some long action, or staggering stunned, or just hanging loose, without attacking. By taking actions other than attacking, at the end of 10 turns, you may have have made 4 attacks and me 3 attacks, and they'll be interleaved realistically in whatever order they occurred in.

(Yes, that's blatantly obvious stuff; the intent is only to contrast that with actions that take place faster than one-per-turn, where you'd take your 4 multiple attacks all at once, then I'd take my 3 all at once.)

Anyway, I don't think there's a contradiction. Let me see whether I can state it more clearly: For most weapons and attacks, the games don't model an attack itself requiring more time than the standard one-per-turn attack time (as in a weapon that swings... really.. slowly). Attacks can of course be launched at a pace slower than one every turn; such attacks by multiple fighters will interleave in logical "it happens when it happens" manner. But at a pace faster than one every turn ("multiple attacks"), attacks shift to the "all at once" model.

Which is all a way of saying "games fit actions into 'turns' ". Hmm, I wonder whether I can think of an even more obvious point for next installment. : )