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Guunshtaff
2020-03-19, 05:11 PM
Hi everybody! One of my favorite past-times is imagining what a given fictional canon might look like if it were adapted to another fictional setting. It's a fun thought experiment to picture how certain elements might translate into something familiar, yet new at the same time! I wanted to see my favorite super heroes in high fantasy, so for fun, I assigned a major character from the marvel cinematic universe to every core, base, hybrid, and occult class. Several of them didn't feel complete without a race, so I worked those out too. Here and there I thought of some specific build options, but I stopped myself at that point, realizing I was on a slippery slope to an incredibly deep rabbit hole! My intent had only been to use this creativity exercise as an amusing diversion, not to give myself a full-time, unpaid job! After all, a fully fleshed out character sheet with a planned progression path in mind just begs to have an entire campaign created for it, and the source material is deliciously ripe with possibility. However, creating a campaign in the first place is no small task, let alone creating a campaign when you frankly have little to no experience doing so, LET ALONE a campaign based off of an intellectual property so tremendously expansive (and not designed with the, *ahem*, endgame being an ttrpg either). With all this in mind I nearly abandoned the idea. I was certainly pleased with my precious spreadsheet and I definitely wasn't looking to take on a big project, but I couldn't quite get my mind off of what might be possible, if challenging. There would be unique and significant difficulties to making this campaign fun and playable while remaining true to the source material and simultaneously deriving bold, yet appropriate aesthetic choices. I kept finding myself intrigued and excited one moment, then exasperated and resigned the next! It's in this spirit that I decided to post here and hopefully get some help. What form of help I'd like to take, well, truth be told I'm not sure. Of course it would be awesome to rally a team together to actually develop this and make this a reality, but I'm not holding my breath for that. After all, it couldn't be legally published anyways. I might potentially be open to passing on the torch, so to speak. If sharing what few ideas I have cobbled together inspires someone else to take on this labor of love, then hey, that's great! I certainly have my own vision of what a finished product might look like, but it's not like I can even claim this as my own baby in the first place, and I'd rather have results that I can play with at home than immaterial credit for an unpublishable homage. Or maybe this is all an overly ambitious pipe dream and all this will amount to is one more debate on the internet. Even if that's the case, it still might be fun just talking about characters in classes and comparing ideas. I could be at peace with that, just getting some validation and/or critical insight. Anyways, I've rambled long enough. Without further ado, I present two lists: class/race combos for mcu characters, and the problems that need to be resolved for this to work.


TL DR Help me make a campaign based on the mcu! Here's what I've got so far.


Human Summoner
The eidolon is the Iron Man suit and it's fittingly flexible with the opportunity to change evolutions at each level, like Tony is building new marks. There's a perfect archtype that allows the eidolon to surround the summoner like a suit of armor. Tony Stark still gets spells without the eidolon, by the way. He is a "genius billionaire playboy philanthropist" after all. It's important to his "I am Iron Man" arc that he not be incompetent without the suit. And speaking of arcs, that glowing rune which the summoner and eidolon share? It's the arc reactor!
Human Cavalier
For a character who is canonically only the peak of human performance and not technically superhuman (Marvel science, I know, right?), spellcasting didn't make sense. That being said, it is insane what Cap pulls off, powered by his conviction to his ideals, even when he was a skrawny kid in Brooklyn! Cavaliers wear the symbol of their order, Steve wears the symbol of his country. As for a cavalier mount, well, Rogers does seem to be always riding a motorcycle. And yes, cavaliers are proficient with shields.
Dwarf Paladin
My first non-human! That's right, I think dwarves make a great translation for Asgardians, what with their drinking, fighting, magnificent architecture, inaccessible homeland, royal intrigue, and tremendous fortitude. As for Thor himself, this is a good example of how a character can believably fit multiple different classes. I thought about cleric for Thor since he's, you know, a GOD, but is he the God of Thunder, or is he the God of Hammers? No offense to the Odinson, but I felt that paladin offered better representation for Thor AND Mjolnir. Thor's divine bond will, of course, be with his hammer, not a horse. No, paladin doesn't get the destructive lightning power that a cleric could, but at least he still gets some divine magic and full BAB. I actually have one more reason for choosing paladin, but you'll have to wait patiently to read it :D
Orc Barbarian
HULK SMASH! Nuff said. Actually, I'm constitutionally incapable of not writing a wall of text, so I am saying more anyways, sorry about that. Alchemist also makes sense what with the mutagen and all, and it lets Bruce Banner be powerful and useful, but I am going to side with Thor on this one and ask "Is he though?" Plus, if loosing control and becoming an enormous green rage monster doesn't qualify you to be a barbarian which literally increases in strength when raging, then I don't know what does.
Human Ninja
I should clarify a bit of context here. Since the mcu is so expansive and because I wanted to challenge my creativity I wanted to give a main character to every core, base, hybrid, and occult class, as well as some classes that are nigh identical to some of the core and base classes, but thematically unique. I had Natasha set as a rogue until I remembered ninja existed. All of the awesome spy stuff that makes her a good rogue works just as well for ninja, plus she is one of exactly two characters that have a scene in Japan. A poignant, memorable scene too.
Human Samurai
Remember an entire line ago when I said there were exactly two characters that had a scene in Japan? It's almost too perfect. Two shield agents. Two oriental reskinned classes. This scene is literally a nod to Hawkeye's time as Ronin. It may be tempting to call Hawkeye a Ranger, but I'm not seeing the wilderness affinity or the animal companion. The archery specialization, while appropriate, are only feats which can be selected by any class.
Human Oracle
Okay, listen. I know, I know, just... hear me out. No one would fault you for taking umbrage at casting Samuel L. Jackson as a primary divine spellcaster (I'm looking at you, George Lucas >:( ), but if you give it a chance, the similarities are actually really cool. Now oracles, like clerics, get their divine, supernatural power from a deity. However, while clerics must remain one alignment step away from their deity, oracles have no such restriction, and I get the impression that the shadowy, bureaucratic World Security Council sways lawful neutral, while Director Fury is decidedly chaotic good. Also, while an oracle's spellcasting is diverse, one thing oracles are particularly known for in mythology is divination, which is basically just the magical version of spying, and Fury is the highest clearance level operative in the world's most advanced intelligence gathering organization. And that eye-patch is a shoe in for the oracle curse of clouded vision, come on!
Human Rogue
Not a lot to explain here. I will note that I managed to make Hill the only rogue in S.H.I.E.L.D. when it could have been really easy and lazy to make them all rogues.
Human Spiritualist
I wasn't sure I wanted to include the occult classes at first, but a couple characters didn't fit as anything else. When Steve Rogers is getting to know Sharon Carter, you might say he feels a bit like it's bringing back ghosts from the past. Fun fact, according to Pathfinder lore, if a spirit is prevented from finding it's final resting place, the negative energy plane invariably corrupts it to evil, regardless of it's alignment in life, unless it can bond with a spiritualist, which somehow protects it I guess. Anywho, this way we get a two-for-one with Peggy Carter, Sharon's aunt!
Aasimar Bard
I-I-I-I-I-'M HOOKED ON A FEELIN'! I'M HIGH ON BELIEVIN'! THAT STAR-LORD IS A BAAARD! Also an aasimar 'cause his daddy is David Hasselhoff. I mean a planet. I mean a celestial.
Elf Fighter
There were a lot of characters that I almost made fighters because it was easy and it was a struggle to think of anything else, but there's forty classes I'm trying to include here, so I have to be judicious. Of all the many plausible candidates, only one is known as the most dangerous woman in the galaxy. She doesn't seem to have any superpowers as far as I can tell; she earned that reputation through sheer martial prowess. Now THAT is a fighter! As for race, none of the aliens seem to have names for their species (or any sort of real explanation at all). She's graceful and lithe though, and elves do seem totally alien to humans, so I thought it was as good a fit as any.
Half Orc Brawler
Oh Drax. I'm afraid I have fewer specific examples for you than most of the others. Just sort of general aesthetic matching. You're big and green and aggressive, but not as big and green and aggressive as the hulk. Half orc will do. You fight shirtless and are likely to get into fights, like a brawler. He's called Drax the Destroyer and brawlers break stuff. That's something I guess.
Ratfolk Skald
Rocket presented a unique challenge, namely, that raccoons aren't a playable race in Pathfinder. Rocket Ratfolk, however, is still an alliterative vermin! The triangle faced monkey may blame Quill for all the music, but he gets into it just as much. He's got an aggressive streak, so I liked skald more than bard. Give him max ranks in his class skill use magic device, and voila, our sweet rabbit is ready to go!
Vine Leshy Druid
The fun thing about vine leshy for Groot is that it flips the size dynamic between him and Rocket, which there is precedent for with Baby Groot. Druid is the obvious pick here with all sorts of nature based surprises and a secret language to boot! One tricky thing here is that Rocket is too intelligent to be an animal companion, so instead I think it's apropo to give Groot an eponymously named Raccoon.
Human Gunslinger
The War Machine suit is all about the guns, but there's more to it than that. Rhodey's suit may be less sophisticated than Tony's, especially with the introduction of nano tech, but it is still exotic. Handling it requires specialized training, just like a gunslinger. Also, a veteran like Colonel Rhodes has grit in spades.
Strix Ranger
Okay, there was no class so focused on flying that it made sense for Falcon, so I gave him a flying race instead. Focusing more on Redwing and survival in extreme environments, I thought ranger fit well. Additionally, you can get an alternate combat style for using two hand crossbows.
Human Witch
Sometimes the obvious choice is also the best. I mean it's right in the name, it would seem crass to choose anything else. Also, it's a bit meta, but with Disney's acquisition from Fox, I like that witch has some ambiguity about it's source of power.
Android Sorcerer
Android is really the only race for Vision. Class, though, is a bit more troubling. I think primary arcane spellcasting like Scarlet Witch is perfect since they are both (probably) powered by the mind stone. I also think inherent bloodline arcane power is perfect, since Vision's relationship with the mind stone is different. The only trouble is that androids get charisma as their penalized stat. >:( I don't know a good gameplay solution, but thematically, it has been delightfully intriguing to watch Vision level up and put points into charisma, culminating in his final words "I love you".
Human Cleric
The panther goddess Bast could potentially provide a wide variety of domains, but I think the two that make the most sense for T'Challa to select are animal and nobility. The incredibly sophisticated vibranium suit can logically be classified as medium armor, which clerics are proficient with. His holy symbol could even be made out of the heart shaped herb!
Human Vigilante
You know what's crazy? After several decades of masked vigilantism history in the comics, Spider-Man is the only mcu character to have a secret identity! Some characters had to be retconned for that to be the case, which I think highlights how important the Spider-Man/Peter Parker dichotomy is, as he remains the only one with a mask.
Human Slayer
Winter Soldier was made for one thing: killing. Normally, ranger and rogue are a bit more versatile than that, but Slayer really hones in on taking the more murder-y aspects of the two and combines them into a much purer death focused experience.
Halfling Hunter
Before I continue, a word about races. While I felt it was fun and made sense to represent every class, I did not feel the same rigor and scrutiny was justified for races, as the majority of the characters are human. It also didn't help that the core races are relatively little in number, while going above and beyond that introduces the opposite problem with drawing the line. Therefore, I decided to mostly ignore race, leaving humans as humans and minimizing creative license elsewhere. However, I realized at the end of my first draft that in doing so I had naturally included all of the core races but one. The thought that immediately followed was that I could give a little thematic unity to each character involved with pym particles by making them all halflings, so that is what I did! Ant-Man was another tricky one. Like unto Falcon and flight, there was no class so focused on the core mechanic of size manipulation that it made sense for Scott for that reason. Fortunately, however, we do have more to go on than that. Hunter is a hybrid between ranger and druid particularly focused on the animal companion, and who better for this role than the ex-con who decided to name (some of) his ants despite their incalculable population? Hunter does also have several size manipulation and vermin focused spells to compliment Ant-thony.
Gnome Mesmerist
Mantis is weird. Presumably, her power comes her species, whatever it is, since it has to do with her antennas. Gnomes have that same fey like presence as the source of their spell-like abilities, so I went with it. Of course, you can't take levels in gnome. That's not a thing. We're not finished. Her empathic abilities seem very magical to me, but in a very specific way. I don't want to make her a wizard and see fireball added to her spellbook. No, mesmerist fits much better and was the big reason I did add occult classes.
Drow Inquisitor
Oooohh I liked this one! Nebula and Gamora are always at each other's throats until their dramatic reconciliation. I needed another alien race beside Gamora's elf anyways, why not highlight that conflict with drow? Thanos practically becomes a god and the Children of Thanos is his cult. Nebula displays the fanatical zeal in the execution of her quests of a true inquisitor!
Adaro Occultist
Yondu took some creative interpretation. While there are a few different art images of the adaro, at least one of the iconic ones sports a fin on its head. It's blue skinned and I think Yondu fits their rapacious nature. He is a ravager after all.
It's no stretch to say Yondu get's his power from his arrow. Occultists also get their powers from objects, and while the arrow is the most iconic, he does also have a collection of mysterious trinkets.
Dwarf Swashbuckler
Angry Girl! Somehow her bitterness makes her all the more charismatic. A hard drinking mercenary with a (deeply buried) heart of gold dropping everything to save the day in shining armor to the backdrop of fireworks? That's what swashbuckling is all about!
Duergar Antipaladin
Remember when I said there was another reason for making Thor a paladin that you would have to read on to find out? Well allow me to introduce you to Loki, the anti-paladin! The Trickster God of Mischief truly is antithetical to Thor in every way. Brains vs brawn, noble vs ignoble, worthy vs get help! When creating the character sheet, I would make sure every build progression choice be handled differently than Thor's.
Oread Kineticist
Oreads seem to be made of rock. Kineticists manipulate the elements, including earth. This I do not feel requires any further explaining.
Trox Monk
Haha, ahh… the unique challenge here was that there are no lines from Meek himself to inform any character to stay true to. Groot at least made sense as a candidate to speak the secret druidic language. There are some very distinct aesthetic touches though. I did want to make sure I wasn't just concocting stuff when it got tricky, that's not the point of adapting. A quick perusal through the Advanced Race Guide encouragingly revealed that Pathfinder is indeed already diverse enough to provide a perfect race. The shared insectile traits were immediately apparent. I can easily see Meek as a larval stage of this race. If you search for Meek in the comics actually this proves horrifyingly true! I got the idea for monk from his knife-suit-thing. That looks like an exotic monk weapon to me. Plus, monks perfect their form as they level up, almost like metamorphosis!
Dwarf Psychic
Heimdall's big sword is misleading. Sure he's formidable with it, but if you look at his actual powers, primary spellcaster becomes more appropriate. His eye is all seeing. He commands the rainbow bridge through dark magic. Those sound like 9th level spells to me! being able to communicate across any distance at will struck me aesthetically as psychic magic.
Human Arcanist
A little minutiae is important here, for I think we can all agree that the title of "Sorcerer Supreme" in Marvel doesn't come from bloodlines like sorcerers in Paizo. He strikes me as more intelligence powered spellcasting than charisma. At the same time, he has a tendency to bend the rules to obtain the power necessary to protect the entire multiverse, so traditional wizard, while a much closer fit, lacked a bit of that aggressive touch. The hybrid arcanist brings it all together.
Human Wizard
Wong on the other hand is pretty old school, so he'll be the wizard.
Human Warpriest
This one is informed by the choice of Black Panther as cleric. The Dora Milaje protect the throne via physical might, so the hybrid warpriest could have the same role with a theological twist in the Church of Bast!
Human Alchemist
I wanted a scientist for alchemist and Shuri is the smartest person in the mcu. More than that, Shuri creates lots of products and alchemists use extracts, not spells, as well as bombs and mutagens. For an aesthetic touch, Shuri uses beads in place of beakers. We've seen beads she created stop cars dead in their tracks and fix broken white boys!
Halfling Investigator
Another perfect fit, the hybrid investigator provides a rogue's stealth, honoring Hope's spy skills, and an alchemist's extracts, reflecting advanced pym tech! Regarding the similarities between Ant-Man and Wasp, their classes might have believably been switched. The factors I noted to determine this layout include Scott's greater reliance on ants as well as the sources of their stealth skill. Due to Scott's suit's inability to fly unaided, he needs Ant-thony more. Scott's stealth experience comes from a past he is ashamed of, while Hope honed her talent with an eager drive.
Halfling Shaman
We haven't seen much from Janet (yet), but her appearances displayed significant and noteworthy powers. Most prominently, her ability to heal is more direct than anything else we've previously seen, so a primary divine caster is in order. Her powers come from the quantum realm. A mysterious source, not unlike the mystery behind oracle and witch. Also, there are a couple, let's say, disconcerting moments, that fit the flavor of hexes. (Search for "Marvel Comics Red Queen" and let the theory crafting begin!) I may be reading too much into this, or it may be foreshadowing, but her initial reunion with Hank is accompanied by bizarrely ominous music. Also, while presented benignly enough, she totally possesses Scott, a power ripe for malicious abuse!
Half Elf Bloodrager
Marvel's answer to Wonder Woman is more akin to Superman in scope of strength. How do we translate such raw, unadulterated power onto a PC's character sheet? I submit that bloodrager is our solution. It's easy to imagine that all barbarian raging is a matter of furious, blood curdling screaming, but why limit our creativity like this? I just as easily see "rage" as a righteous conviction, a quiet determination, an unwavering commitment to get back up, no matter what anyone says! Remember the look in Carol's eye when Thanos tried to headbutt her? She didn't even flinch. In fact, her aura only intensified! Yeah, that's rage. Her infusion with the tessaract is responsible for both bloodline and race. There are many bloodline options and I'm still not sure which is best for Danvers (or Vision for that matter), but we do know that she was born human and after the incident became something more. Heck, she thought she was kree! Now Gamora isn't kree, but in the spirit of elves reflecting aliens, half elf is a poetic fit.
Reptoid Shifter
See this is one of the things I love about Pathfinder, it's so diversely inclusive. They even have a race to represent the popular alien conspiracy theory of reptiles! It's a no brainer for skrulls, as is shifter.
Human Magus
Magus was actually one of the classes I considered for Ironman. While I ultimately decided it didn't represent Stark's journey, Pepper's path has been different, and not to mention varied! Of course, she hasn't had superpowers for the majority of her career. I don't want to give her an NPC class now that Endgame revealed the Rescue suit, but her extensive business acumen will still determine her skill point allocation. There was that brief stint with extremis, but that was cured. Still, maybe an abundance of fire spells would be a fun nod. All in all, the suit enables the physical and magical combat magus excels at.
Dwarf Medium
Yes, I'm including Frigga. Thor's mom, in case you forgot. Her prominence in Endgame earns that much. Another case without much to go on. We do know that she was raised by witches and helped train Loki. We don't see any actual spellcasting to justify witch though. Her motherly wisdom takes more spotlight than anything else. In fact, I find it telling that her love for her sons tops the list of her concerns, even with everything going on in Thor: The Dark World. Combining that with the fact that Asgard often got the short end of the stick, both canonically and from a meta perspective, I can't think of a better candidate to represent the voices of the many noble Asgardians taken from us too soon.
That's one character for every class. There are characters remaining yet, so at this point duplicates are reasonable. Heck, I've only used a single villain! I'm going to table that endeavor though, I'm exhausted from wracking my brain about this.

Obviously the marvel cinematic universe is trademarked and this cannot be published. Anyone who contributes therefore will do so non-profit. Accordingly, I don't have high hopes that this will attract the talent and commitment of professionals, just hobbyists (like myself). You never know until you try, though. Additionally, if this does become a work of any quality, I'd certainly like to make this visible and available to the general public, but we wouldn't be able to advertise this the same way something published could be. Outside of the box solutions for sharing it around would help.
Most Pathfinder adventure paths have 6 volumes. The "Infinity Saga" has 22 movies. Reconciling this will be challenging. Do we combine some? Cut some? Do we have more volumes than average? Should this even be a single adventure path?
The starring protagonists in the movies vary wildly from movie to movie. Even the amount of main characters fluctuates from solo focus to small team to huge team. TTRPGs, however, rely strongly on a consistent party from start to finish. This will require some clever adaptation or be unplayable.
One of the biggest appeals in TTRPGs is virtually unrestricted control over your character. However, these characters already exist in concisely defined portrayals. Perhaps preexisting character sheet templates with recommended level up guides which still include some choice is a healthy middle ground. Whatever the solution, however, does not change the fact that a pile of characters and character sheets do not a campaign make. They're important, sure, especially for a project like this. Everyone wants to emulate their favorite superhero, but I'm not even sure that each of these could effectively be PCs, there's just too many. In short, I'm acknowledging that what I've so far created is frankly the opposite of what is needed to create a campaign. It can still be used though as a launch pad for artistic direction though.

GreatWyrmGold
2020-03-19, 06:37 PM
Problem 1: Wall of Text. Whitespace is your friend. I can't claim to have truly overcome that demon, but it's important to try.


Problem 2: Focus. You spend most of the post assigning superheroes to classes rather than considering literally anything relevant to the plot of an MCU adventure path (unless the superheroes are major NPCs or premade PCs).


Problem 3: The MCU is not one story. The "Infinity Saga" is composed primarily of movies starring one or a few superheroes going on their own adventures, often in entirely different genres from one another. Individual characters often have arcs lasting a few movies (often including some crossover movies like Civil War or Age of Ultron), but none of these arcs really dominate the "Infinity Saga".

(You can maybe make a case for Iron Man being the protagonist, since he's the guy who started the MCU and played a pivotal role in the Infinity War movies, but he's not even in most of the movies.)


Problem 4: Superhero storytelling maps terribly onto premade TRPG adventures. Most superhero stories, including basically the entire MCU, are distinctly personal. Most TRPG stories are cripplingly impersonal.

Take Snyder's Man of Steel; Zod's backstory is intimately tied to Clark's, and his motivations are perfectly aligned with a personal crisis that Superman has to deal with—whether to side with the people of Earth or the legacy of Krypton. (None of the elements are handled that well, but the parts are there.) Or look at any version of The Killing Joke; a clear parallel is drawn between Batman and the Joker, and a contrast is made in how they responded to their respective traumas. The DCEU Wonder Woman has two potential points of personal conflict; it's either a story of World War 1 forcing Diana to come to terms with the conflict between her understanding of human nature and the complexity of suffering, or a conflict between Diana and the god who killed her father and caused all the suffering that she hates. One of these is stronger than the other, but they're both personal.

Premade adventures for tabletop games are always impersonal. (To be honest, even homebrew adventures usually are, because most DMs just don't have the time to try and build a story around a random assortment of weirdos, which is pretty dang difficult since you can't control anyone's backstory or personal struggles to make them fit with some mutual foe or connective theme or whatever, but that's a subject for another time.) Premade adventures need to fit any possible set of characters, which means that basically all of them start with a problem that PCs can be drawn to by any of the big standard motivations (money, glory, altruism, etc) and escalates to something that basically nobody can afford to ignore no matter what their motivations are (generally something that threatens the End of the World). There's usually not much room to weave in backstory elements without rewriting large parts of the adventure, unless you specifically work with the players to make sure they add the right names and themes into their backstories.

This is the biggest problem with trying to adapt the MCU, or any decent superhero story, into a premade TRPG adventure. Iron Man only works because Iron Man is in it; Black Panther only works because Black Panther is in it. Having T'Challa take down the Iron Monger wouldn't make much sense, and having Tony Stark stop Killmonger would be a gods-dang trainwreck if given even a moment's thought.

A modern American capitalist fighting a more heartless American capitalist when he decides not to sell weapons is a coherent story; a traditional isolationist African monarch fighting a violent revolutionary who wants to share their power with the disenfranchised across the world and deciding to take some of said claimant's beliefs to heart is a coherent story; having the American capitalist fight the African revolutionary to maintain the status quo is effing ugly, and having the monarch fight the other capitalist to maintain isolationism is...it's not terrible, but it's missing the part where T'Challa has a chance to recognize that his antagonist has a point, and learning from it.

That example wound up ramblier than I intended. The point is, you can't just have your players play their own OCs (or even characters with statistics representing Marvel heroes, but changed by each player's personality, preferred playstyle, and general orneriness) in a story custom-built for a specific character and expect it to work.


Conclusion: If you want to play an MCU-inspired adventure, don't take the specific characters or plot points. Take the structure.

There's an overarching villain with an overarching plan that centers around getting a bunch of MacGuffins (Thanos and the Infinity Stones). Each PC has a backstory, and if you want to go full MCU you can even run one-shots with each of their characters (either solo or with other interested players in supporting roles) that let the players figure out who their characters are and what they're struggling with.

Once you've figured out who everyone is, bring them together. This can involve a Nick Fury trying to find people who can handle some vague task, or the party happening to be in the same place with parallel goals like the Guardians of the Galaxy are for a bit, or they can even be outright antagonistic a la Civil War. Then the party goes on adventures which challenge the specific beliefs or flaws of various members of the party, ideally multiple at once, ideally weaving in elements from various backstories.

All the while, you're building up the Big Bad and/or MacGuffins, so that when the BB shows their face and initiates the MacGuffin race, it's not so shocking. Ideally, there would be an adventure for each PC to receive an ultimate challenge of their character, facing people from their backstories and either overcoming their problems or showing how far they've come by already overcoming them; the PCs have to go there because MacGuffin, and that specific PC needs to grow as a person in order for the PCs to win.

Eventually, the PCs have all their MacGuffins, the Big Bad has all theirs, and there's a big final confrontation as each tries to get all the MacGuffins to either initiate or stop the Big, Bad Plan. Maybe some characters sacrifice themselves, maybe they just crush the Big Bad with a couple debuffs and a finger of death. Either way, fireworks and celebrations for all, credits roll.

Guunshtaff
2020-03-19, 08:12 PM
Oh I like that a lot! That's exactly the kind of solution oriented thinking I like to see! I also appreciate your patience in wading through my wall of text. It's a doozy, I know.

I do think having one shots for characters makes sense for the different sort of wish fulfillment this would encapsulate. Much shorter ones than a movie trilogy might suggest though as this is indeed a completely different medium. It's still a lot of work, but maybe the one shots could be created on an as needed basis. Following that, yeah, a more all purpose macguffin pursuit.

By the way, your Tony in Wakanda example is a priceless gem in the history of ill advised ideas! XD

Boci
2020-03-19, 09:25 PM
Other obvious problems are the railroad aspect. Having Thanos aquire all 6 infinity stones works well in a movie, but in a campaign it can be a bit yawen inducing once you notice you can't actually stop the BBEG from aquiring these things. My solution would be to have the golden glove only work at a specific time (and perhaps also place). When he gets there he will snap his fingers, and do something, the severity of which will be based on how many of the stones he has aquired. Trying to stop him from getting each stone would be a miniadventure, then the endgame would be fighting him after he unleashed the click, with a world change in proportion to how many stones he was able to aquire. This will be the tricky part, balancing each quest to allow for the possibility of the players finding the gem first, but also failing and letting him get away with it.

I'd also say that Thanos motivation might need to be tweaked a little for Pathfinder. "There's too many living creatures in the universe, half must die" is a very modern problem, and the sentiment might not work so well in most pathfinder settings.

GreatWyrmGold
2020-03-21, 09:36 PM
I'd also say that Thanos motivation might need to be tweaked a little for Pathfinder. "There's too many living creatures in the universe, half must die" is a very modern problem, and the sentiment might not work so well in most pathfinder settings.
And it's debatable whether or not it's even a modern problem. You could spice it up with some fantastic justification, like something about how there's a limited amount of soulstuff in the multiverse and increasing population has lead to it all being concentrated in people, but that leads into the same kinds of...issues as just asserting an insurmountable resource shortage in a realistic setting.

You could go with the comics motivation. I've heard a lot of people moan about the MCU not using that, even though it wouldn't really fit the tone of the movie universe; however, that kind of petty, deeply personal motivation works well in a D&D-esque setting, especially if the PCs also have equally petty personal motivations that they put aside when they find a greater cause.

Razelquin
2020-03-23, 11:42 AM
I like the original concept, but I think trying to make the movies into a game isn't going to work. Aside from the fact that if the player saw the movie they know whats going to happen, movies are short.
Campaigns are generally played over several sessions, whereas each movie would likely be a oneshot, most of which would be in the battle at the end.
Movie plots are also really linear so audiences aren't lost. But in a game you need twists and turns for the players to figure out. Otherwise they're reenacting the movie. And that's not really fun.

Instead, I'd focus on characters and setting, then make your own unique story or adapt the stories the movies adapted (or stories the movies didn't adapt), but in a different way for the table top. That way you're not shoehorned into replaying the scene by scene of a movie.