Favorite Superhero RPG

[kingcheesepants]

The D&D 5e game that I run every week is approaching its end (after a year and a half of weekly play). I want a change of pace and am thinking that a superhero game would be fun. Do you guys have any suggestions as to what RPG is best for superheroes?

Right now I'm considering City of Mist, Masks and, Mutants and Masterminds. But I'm not sure which to go with since I've never actually played any of them and I'm also sure there are a lot of other good ones out there I've never heard of or have overlooked which might be even better.

Please give me a rundown of some of your favorites and what you would consider to be the biggest pluses and minuses.

Thank you

[Batcathat]

I'd recommend Mutants & Masterminds, though I must admit it's the only superhero RPG I've tried. :smallwink:

That said, I really like it compared to other games in general. It hits my personal sweet spot between "too strict" and "too loose" especially regarding the super powers (as well as related areas like skills and gadgets). It's possible to create almost any sort of super powers and flavor them in a suitable way while also having enough rules not to make them seem too freeform-y, if you understand what I mean.

The downside of the flexibility is that it's quite easy to create stupidly overpowered characters, even by accident. If you don't feel you can trust your players to balance them self, you're probably gonna have to ban or nerf a lot of stuff. Personally, I like that the imbalance is at least between specific powers rather than broader types of characters (like classes). So unlike D&D where some classes are almost automatically more powerful than other classes, almost any type of superhero can be as strong or weak as you want.

You can also set the general power level of the campaign, which affects how powerful the characters can be (so if you want to play Justice League you set a much higher level than if you want street-level heroes).

[Anonymouswizard]

Wild Talents, because the authors expect you to go wild with it. Unlike M&M there's no Power Level, just a bunch of points that you spend on Stats, Skills, Hyperstats and Hyperskills (cheaper but can be nullified), and Miracles for everything else. Oh, and your power source(s), which determines what you're allowed to buy.

Powers are built by first buying instances of the ability to Attack, the ability to Defend, and the ability to do Useful things. Telekinesis would be Attack (throw objects with your mind), Attack (strangle people with your mind), Defend (push incoming objects away), and Useful (move things that aren't near to you). Flight is DU, throwing fireballs is A, controlling water is ADU, shooting webs is ADUUU (arguably). You turn load these effects up with extras if you want, because by default you only get to have them be ranged, affect an area or certain amount of mass or be fast, not everything, and also apply flaws if you want some points back. Oh, and stack on things like extra range or area or other nice things.

Rolls are made using a d10 dice pool, either stat+skill or the rating of a miracle. You roll your pool and keep any set, the number on the dice (height) determines if you succeed, the number of dice in a set (width) determines how well you did. All dice in a set must have rolled the same number. I'm addition to normal dice you can also buy Hard Dice (always rolls a 10) or Wiggle Dice (rolls whatever you want). Mix and match as much as you want, it's legitimate to have an body of 2+1HD+2WD.

You could buy Fight, Hypertrength, and Heat Vision. Or you could buy two hard dice in Turn Off The Sun (don't worry, the book stats that one). So decide if you want to load up on armour and other miracles or just put five hard dice in hypershooting and only ever land headshots. It's very flexible, because anything that isn't a hyperstat or hyperskill boils down to those same three effects.

As a bonus I think the no frills, rules only edition is like £5 in paperback.

[Lord Raziere]

Yeah I've read Wild Talents and M&M. They're both ones I like most for different reasons: M&M is for one when you want to emulate most things with a sensible framework and such to play normal supers, Wild Talents is when you want to do something even M&M balks at, like being reality warpers or gods or destroying universes like in Dragonball Super, or Homestuck, or things that in general are not as easily mappable to M&M, as M&M assumes certain things about powers and how they are built. like M&M can do general superhero stuff people archetypically think superheroes are capable of easily, but its much harder and more work to do things that are more abstract or have fuzzier limits in what they effect and how they affect things with it, while in Wild Talents that isn't a problem. what would take lot of hashing out how a specific Variable effect power works in M&M, would be simple dice rolls in Wild Talents.

[nharwell]

What level of complexity do you like in character creation? What kind of gameplay do you prioritize (genre emulation, tactical combat, character drama & relationships, etc) ? I can't speak to City of Mists but M&M and Wild Talents I'd put at the high end in terms of character complexity; they both use granular power building systems (though with some interesting differences). Masks is a "Ptba" game like Dungeon World, so is quite different both in character building and in play.

[thorr-kan]

I'm going to recommend an 80s throwback: The Marvel Super Heroes RPG, otherwise known as FASERIP. It covers comic book heroes almost perfectly.

It's available for legal download at classicmarvelforever.com.

There's an *active* fan group producing new content on Facebook: The Unofficial Marvel Canon Project.

[Batcathat]

I must admit, this thread is kind of making me want to check out Wild Talents.

[SimonMoon6]

My go-to superhero RPG is Mayfair's DC Heroes RPG.

It is long out of print, so that's a drawback. And there are three editions. You want to avoid the 1st edition (characters are based on a pre-Crisis power level), but the 2nd and 3rd editions are equally great, though the 2nd edition comes with more stuff (like a lot of character stats for existing DC characters).

The advantages of this system over every other superhero game system are as follows:

(1) It easily handles *every* power level. You can effortlessly make *any* comic book character, regardless of how powerful. Superman? No problem.

And there's none of this awkward fudging that some games have to use, where they go, "Oh, you can lift a planet? Well we can't give you that much strength so instead we'll give you this advantage/feat/whatever that makes you lift more than normal, so that you can still only be as strong as Aunt May and still lift a planet." I hate that sort of thing.

DC Heroes uses a logarithmic scale (with a base of 2) so that Superman only needs a STR of 25 (or pre-Crisis Superman needs a STR of 50), while an average ordinary person would have a STR of 2.


(2) You only ever roll two dice.

The game uses 2d10 (with "exploding" dice, meaning you re-roll and add every time you roll doubles). And that's it! Superman punches someone? Roll 2d10. You want to try to repair your broken car? Roll 2d10. You want to seduce the barmaid? Roll 2d10. That's it.

The game uses a table that combines "did you hit/succeed" with a second half that tells you "how much damage you did or how well you succeeded". You don't have to roll damage which is great because a lot of games would make you roll 5000 dice for Superman's damage (unless they're using the stupid "you're not really strong but you can lift a lot" idea).

(3) There's no complicated intricacy, but it still handles everything.

You don't have to sweat the details of "gee, I'm trying to make Batman and I don't know if he needs to take the feats for Disarming, Tripping, and Tickling". No. He's good at fighting. Give him the stats and skills for being good at fighting. Done.

You don't have to build (in a Champions way) every single power. They're all pre-built.

But the game still handles everything. You want to be like Beast Boy and shape change into animals? Great, here's the one power you need to do it. You will have a "rank" in the power (like Shape Change: 8) but that's all the detail you need. And you can turn into every animal. And you don't have to (in a Champions way) figure out how to redistribute tons and tons of points, to "build" each animal that you would ever become. You just turn into the animal. Take the stats of the animal. Those are your (physical) stats now. Done. (Okay, you get to split up your ranks and add them to the stats too, but that takes like 5 seconds.)

And every complicated power is just. that. easy.

Power Negation? No problem. Power Duplication? No problem. Power Stealing? No problem. "I can do anything because I'm magic"? No problem. "I have every power but almost never use them"? No problem.

Things that take hours to build (and use each time) in some game systems are trivially easy in DC Heroes. And it's not because it's a rules-light or rules-absent game (like, say, FUDGE or BESM). It has just enough rules to cover *exactly* how your powers work.

(4) It is effortless to make a character (especially for DMs).

If you can describe a character and you even barely know the game system (no real system mastery needed), you can write down the character sheet for the character. There's none of this looking up obscure feats or trying to find the "best" way to build the character. None of that garbage is in this game.

So, if you want to run a sandbox game, where the players can do whatever they want, it's okay to have them do things you didn't expect. If you need to design a villain's character sheet on the fly, you can do it in five seconds.

If you want to translate characters from your favorite work of fiction into the game, you can do it. Again, it takes about five seconds. It's not difficult.

(5) Things work almost exactly like they do in the comics.

Okay, the game's not perfect. But most superhero games are "D&D but with superpowers", like they haven't changed the mindset of what an RPG is to focus on what superhero comics are like. DC Heroes gives you the feel of superhero comics. Sometimes, that's not a good thing, but it is a thing.

Fights can go the wrong way. Spider-Man can beat Firelord, Batman can beat Amazo, and Deathstroke can defeat the entire Justice League by himself. That happens in the comics even though it shouldn't. Well thanks to exploding dice and "hero points", fights might not always go the way you expect them to (though they often will).

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The game's drawbacks:

(1) The game is meant for superheroes. While the game can handle non-powered nobodies, if you really want to play non-powered nobodies, this is probably not the best game for you. Yes, we have stats for Sergeant Rock and Blackhawk and Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane. You could use those people as PCs in a game. But you shouldn't.

(2) Character creation is a bit too open. The GM needs to keep a careful eye on what the players want to make as it is easy to make a character that should not be allowed to exist.

(3) There's one obvious rule that everyone who plays the game knows needs to be changed. (It's the "your powerful energy blast becomes more likely to hit, the more damaging that it is" rule.)

(4) Building gadgets on the fly is not really a thing in this game, unlike TSR's Marvel Super Heroes RPG which has "kit bashing". That's not a big deal, but that's one of the few comic tropes that DC Heroes really doesn't do. In DC Heroes, you have to be in your lab to build a gadget.

But if you can get past those drawbacks, DC Heroes is really the best superhero RPG ever produced, to the extent that some of its awesome features seem to have been... let's say "homaged*"... in Mutants and Masterminds.

*it's better than saying "ripped off".

[Anonymouswizard]

I feel the need to point out that M&M also has abilities scale exponentially with a base of two, it just puts a cap on attack+damage and defences.

[Kapow]

This is the kind of thread, where I have to mention Capes: Super Roleplaying again.
It is a GM-less system, where you can change the character you play with each scene. Sometimes those characters aren't people, but some kind of event or device, sometimes you play multiple characters in a scene.
It is ridiculous simple to create characters and it, kind of balances every kind of ability, due to the system being about influencing the story, not about who hits the hardest.

The only downsides are, that it is REALLY obscure and that you need active players, who are willing and able to contribute to the story.

Have a link:
http://www.museoffire.com/Games

[Jay R]

My preference is Champions, from Hero Systems. I can set up any kind of character I want; there is infinite flexibility. The distinction between STUN, BODY, and Endurance, rather than just "hit points" makes perfect sense to me.

I once built a brick with four different levels of STR. He had 45 STR that cost no endurance, 75 that he could use all day, because it cost exactly the Endurance that he recovered each turn, and he could make a 90 STR action, but it would take him awhile to recover. That made intuitive sense to me.

I also built a Robin-like character with several of his skills based on powers in a multipower. For instance, he had Teleportation 5 squares, with the ability to change facing and ignore relative velocity, but he needed gestures, a skill roll, and to pass through the intervening space. This was his ability to jump onto (or off of) a moving vehicle, or to flip over a villain and come down behind him, kicking the back of his head. I also built his escape artist skills as the power Desolidification, with similar limitations.

Many people don't like Champions, because character creation takes some moderate-level arithmetic. But that is no barrier for me. [I will often wind up building one or two other players' character sheets, for that reason. But once the sheet is finished, people have no trouble playing it.]

[Quertus]

If Mayfair's DC Heroes RPG predates and… "strongly influenced" Mutants and Masterminds, then not only can I see why I like descriptions of the former, but I also may have seen it. Unfortunately, I didn't buy it, because the GM wanted players to run "Lois Lane aspiring to become Robin", rather than the super heroes the game was designed for.

M&M is like 3e D&D: it has a really strong concept of "balance" in certain dimensions, and is as unbalanced as a superhero game in others.

Either way, my vote is for these two (although, of them, I've only really played M&M).

Champions is nice if you want to spend the extra mental energy tracking stamina (sometimes I do, sometimes not). Just… if your players are like mine, you may need to reverse the math (it's a "roll low" system).

I have a soft spot for Marvel facerip, and the way that it handles stunting (and power stunts becoming permanent portions of the character's repartee). Spending XP to succeed is… interesting? But the XP system makes buying whole new, unrelated powers at high levels much cheaper than improving even low level existing powers. It's the WoD XP problem, writ superhero large.

[EggKookoo]

Throwing my vote in for DC Heroes. Absolute blast of a rules-light superhero game. The focus is on fun action.

Unfortunately, being out of print, it's hard to find. You might be able to find a PDF of the rules tucked away somewhere on the intertubes, but that's a kind of at-your-own-risk thing.

[The Glyphstone]

Has anyone ever tried Wearing The Cape, a superhero setting running on the Fate/Fudge engine? Fate tends to fall apart at the outright superhuman levels of power normally.

[Beleriphon]

I feel the need to point out that M&M also has abilities scale exponentially with a base of two, it just puts a cap on attack+damage and defences.

Yeah, you can lift universes with Strength, or shove Mars back into orbit with a high enough Move Object. Just don't expect to use that score to damage anything.

[Anonymouswizard]

Has anyone ever tried Wearing The Cape, a superhero setting running on the Fate/Fudge engine? Fate tends to fall apart at the outright superhuman levels of power normally.

No it doesn't. It just takes an understanding on what skill ranks in Fate mean, and use of Permissions.

As for Wearing the Cape? While I have it, I'd honestly say that Venture City is the better way to do supers in Fate. It concentrates on characters with one or two parts instead of the common piwersets in WtC, but there's some bits in WtC I really don't like (bringing in an Attribute/Skill split for starters).


Yeah, you can lift universes with Strength, or shove Mars back into orbit with a high enough Move Object. Just don't expect to use that score to damage anything.

To be honest, I think separating lifting Strength and damage Strength like that is useful. Plus it means they as long as you're hiring PL limits on attacks and defences you can put your remaining points anywhere and still participate in combat.

Although honestly these days I find myself more interested in running a PL 6 or 8 game instead of PL 10. Not entirely sure why, probably because if I want to actually go high powered I'd rather be playing something like WT.

[Lord Raziere]

I feel the need to point out that M&M also has abilities scale exponentially with a base of two, it just puts a cap on attack+damage and defences.

Wait.

*rechecks M&M*

huh I misread. I thought the power level cap applied to everything. This makes playing DBZ with make much more sense if things like flight, strength and such can go above the cap.

[Anonymouswizard]

Wait.

*rechecks M&M*

huh I misread. I thought the power level cap applied to everything. This makes playing DBZ with make much more sense if things like flight, strength and such can go above the cap.

How do you think I get the bunnies to go FTL?

But yeah, there's some weird things as to what it applies to. Speed is somewhat questionable due to the ability to just run/fly into people, but I'd b that it might also be reasonable to take Speed (no ramming) at one point per two ranks of the GM comparing about it.

But yeah, the PL limit is the thing I see must people not quite getting, mostly by making it more restrictive. I had one GM who insisted that nothing could go above your PLb(stats, skills, powers, whatever), which was hilarious because all characters ended up effectively identical.

[Lord Raziere]

To be honest, I never thought of that use for Speed, and I think any reasonable ruling would just say the attack ramming attack is the PL limit no matter how fast your going, or if your being mechanical about it, require a hero point to use speed as a ramming attack or even have to design an alternate effect for that.

but yeah, nice to know I can go above the cap outside of certain things, that really opens things up.

[Anonymouswizard]

To be honest, I never thought of that use for Speed, and I think any reasonable ruling would just say the attack ramming attack is the PL limit no matter how fast your going, or if your being mechanical about it, require a hero point to use speed as a ramming attack or even have to design an alternate effect for that.

but yeah, nice to know I can go above the cap outside of certain things, that really opens things up.

Just double checked, it's called a Slam Attack and it's recommended to restrict or to PL limits with an optional extra point of damage if you moved your full speed rank (which is kind of weird). It does mean that a speedster doesn't have to buy a Damage power for ramming, although it still makes sense of you can throw a fast punch while remaining in place, and sadly I'm not sure it helps with grapples.

But yeah, what you, and in all honesty I, immediately went to as a limit. Damage is equal to Speed, attack bonus is Close Attack (Ramming), reduce damage until PL limits aren't broken (I mean, it's supposed to be 'I run up to you and punch you really hard', but you're still basically ramming).

Yes, I have built at least one character who uses this as their primary attack. 0 Strength, over 20 Speed, some points in getting it to hit, and Move-By-Attack. Runs across the city every round bumping into you on the way. Sadly never got to play them.

[Martin Greywolf]

The D&D 5e game that I run every week is approaching its end (after a year and a half of weekly play). I want a change of pace and am thinking that a superhero game would be fun. Do you guys have any suggestions as to what RPG is best for superheroes?

The issue here is that, well, superheroes is one of the widest genres there are, even more so than sci fi or fantasy. Sure, fantasy can be in an expy of Babylonia circa Bronze Age collapse, but... so can superheroes.

If you don't really care what the excat flavor of superhero is, then you have all the suggestions above.

If, ont he other hand, you're trying to recreate something specific (HeroAka, DC, Marvel, Watchmen etc), my advice is to go for FATE. If you put in a bit fo work, it can recreate almost any system - I did HeroAka in it - and not just superheroes, so getting skills in it will mean your next game can well be Wild West IN SPACE, and you will still have a system to run it with.

The drawbacks are obvious - a system this generic doesn't really have tactical puzzle combat that DnD has, and you have to put in some work to make the setting. I can hash out new setting mechanics in a few hours, but I've got kind fo a lot of playtime in FATE, so...

[Nemenia]

The issue here is that, well, superheroes is one of the widest genres there are, even more so than sci fi or fantasy. Sure, fantasy can be in an expy of Babylonia circa Bronze Age collapse, but... so can superheroes.

If you don't really care what the excat flavor of superhero is, then you have all the suggestions above.

If, ont he other hand, you're trying to recreate something specific (HeroAka, DC, Marvel, Watchmen etc), my advice is to go for FATE. If you put in a bit fo work, it can recreate almost any system - I did HeroAka in it - and not just superheroes, so getting skills in it will mean your next game can well be Wild West IN SPACE, and you will still have a system to run it with.

The drawbacks are obvious - a system this generic doesn't really have tactical puzzle combat that DnD has, and you have to put in some work to make the setting. I can hash out new setting mechanics in a few hours, but I've got kind fo a lot of playtime in FATE, so...

I don't mean to thread hijack, but I'm curious how you did HeroAca in FATE. Did each person have a stunt that represented their quirk? or an aspect? How did you handle the differing power levels?

[Pauly]

I really like BASH!. Simple but not simplistic. Easily scales so you can run anything from low power to high power to universe shattering power. You spend more time playing less time with your head in tables. Character generation isn’t convoluted and doesn’t reward min-maxing/unnatural synergies the way some other systems can.
There are also a lot of supplements cheaply available if you don’t have the time to create your own niche.

I’ve run it with Golden Age settings (think The Shadow, The Phantom, Darkman, Doc Savage, 1940s era Batman, **** Tracy) with enhanced humans as heroes not full on modern superpowered superheroes and it handles that kind of game excellently. I know people who run it in modern settings and they like it for that too.

[Frankbit]

I'm a huge fan of Champions - and Hero System is probably the game I run most often - but the learning curve for character creation can be a bit much for some people. (My normal tactics, when introducing the system to people, is run a non-powered genre like Pulp Hero first. This gets new players exposed to the in-play mechanics, which relatively straightforward, without forcing them into a deep-dive into character creation.)

[Razade]

The D&D 5e game that I run every week is approaching its end (after a year and a half of weekly play). I want a change of pace and am thinking that a superhero game would be fun. Do you guys have any suggestions as to what RPG is best for superheroes?

Right now I'm considering City of Mist, Masks and, Mutants and Masterminds. But I'm not sure which to go with since I've never actually played any of them and I'm also sure there are a lot of other good ones out there I've never heard of or have overlooked which might be even better.

Please give me a rundown of some of your favorites and what you would consider to be the biggest pluses and minuses.

Thank you

Masks is incredibly good. One of the best PbtA chassis games you're going to find. It's quite well built mechanically, allows for a team of wildly different powerlevels without anyone feeling underpowered or useless and with how PbtA operates, it's narrative focused. The issue is in if you want to play teenagers or not because the game is very much dependent on that coming of age/teen drama on top of super hero stuff. It does not do adult heroes, it doesn't try to do adult heroes.

City of Mists is not a super hero RPG despite it constantly being brought up as one. It's more like Dresden Files or other, similar Urban Fantasy games but also has a mix of Vampire/World of Darkness to it. A lot of it's mechanics just do not allow the Marvel/DC style stories people think of when they hear superhero. I would avoid it if that's what you're looking for, and it seems that you are. The game is also mostly PbtA but it adds other mechanics on top of itself and honestly the game is really clunky in that aspect.

[SirDidymus]

It's a new game, so I haven't gotten much of a chance to play, but I really like the look of the Sentinels of the Multiverse RPG. They've done some work to make the system feel like playing in the middle of a comic book, including getting certain abilities in the worst situations. It's worth at least giving a look.

[Balmas]

Gonna throw my hat in the ring as an advocate of Masks. It's incredibly well built for doing one specific variety of superhero, which is Teen Titans. You play as a team of young superheroes, who each face different challenges based on their playbook archetype. For instance, the Legacy is at least the third in a line of super heroes. You're Tim Drake Robin, having to deal with Batman, Nightwing, and Jason Todd. You're defined by the heroes who came before you, and so the challenges you face have a lot to deal with the expectations you're gonna have to live up to. Compare that to the Outsider, who's the alien in a new world, or the Janus, who must balance the needs of being a mundane teenager with having a super-powered secret identitity.

Over the course of the game, your hero changes and adapts as their self-image changes, as they deal with expectations of adults and people they respect. Do they choose to live up to those expectations, or reject them? Do they lash out to deal with the stress? What does it look like when they finally have thir climactic moment of truth? What kind of hero do they grow up to be?

It's just an amazing system to play in, provided the game you want to play is Teen Titans.

(And, if you don't mind me tooting my friends' horns, I think the PbP game we did in Cyberpunk Teen Titans was pretty darn incredible if you want to take a look. (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?579533-Masks-IC-Resurrection-Roundabout-Drawing-Individuals))

[Anonymouswizard]

City of Mists is not a super hero RPG despite it constantly being brought up as one. It's more like Dresden Files or other, similar Urban Fantasy games but also has a mix of Vampire/World of Darkness to it.

While I'm not going to disagree with the 'can't do Marvel/DC style stories' because I haven't played it, I would like to note that there's a lot of overlap between superheroes and urban fantasy anyway, the biggest differentiators seem to be costumes and a less strictly Masquerade-style arrangement. Both genres are a pretty natural successor to pulp stories anyway, to the point where 'pulp hero' versus 'streer level super' is very much not clear cut. Jet Black (and his amazing jetpack) would likely fit into most superhero settings without needing any adjustment.

So yeah, there's always going to be grey areas and games which are supers games but not Marvel/DC style ones.

[Razade]

While I'm not going to disagree with the 'can't do Marvel/DC style stories' because I haven't played it, I would like to note that there's a lot of overlap between superheroes and urban fantasy anyway, the biggest differentiators seem to be costumes and a less strictly Masquerade-style arrangement. Both genres are a pretty natural successor to pulp stories anyway, to the point where 'pulp hero' versus 'streer level super' is very much not clear cut. Jet Black (and his amazing jetpack) would likely fit into most superhero settings without needing any adjustment.

So yeah, there's always going to be grey areas and games which are supers games but not Marvel/DC style ones.

O...k? I have played City of Mists, I'm telling you (and anyone else) what the system is and how the mechanics don't allow for what people are thinking of when it says it can run a "super hero" game. The game's lore (which like most PbtA games are tied to the mechanics) and focus on neo-Noir don't allow it to take on a lot of the popular hero stories in the same vein as Masks or Worlds in Peril. I'm saying it doesn't do street level supers well either. I honestly don't know why you'd feel like you, who haven't played the game, are going to try and lecture me on the types of game it might be able to run without any experience with it. That's...that's weird.

[Anonymouswizard]

O...k? I have played City of Mists, I'm telling you (and anyone else) what the system is and how the mechanics don't allow for what people are thinking of when it says it can run a "super hero" game. The game's lore (which like most PbtA games are tied to the mechanics) and focus on neo-Noir don't allow it to take on a lot of the popular hero stories in the same vein as Masks or Worlds in Peril. I'm saying it doesn't do street level supers well either. I honestly don't know why you'd feel like you, who haven't played the game, are going to try and lecture me on the types of game it might be able to run without any experience with it. That's...that's weird.

Because I get very annoyed by overly narrow genre definitions. I'm not talking about the game except as a jumping off point, I'm talking about the definition of a superhero story/game.

You say 'it isn't a superhero game because it can't do X style of story'. I say 'it can still be a superhero game, because supers is a genre that tends to blur with others, at least partially due to what genres it diverged from'. As I ought admitted, I haven't played the game. But you said that it's not a supers RPG, and your argument was 'it doesn't do Marvel/DC style stories'.

I'm not saying it can do those stories, or that it's not got more in common with The Dresden Files than them. I am saying that such a thing doesn't discount it from being a supers game (despite being a really useful thing to know).

Okay, I've gone back and had a look at the game. I'd argue that it's definitely a supers concept, but yes not a supers story. Which makes it a supers game but with an asterisk next to it (like how Venture City tried to blend superheroes with cyberpunk themes).

[Beleriphon]

Wait.

*rechecks M&M*

huh I misread. I thought the power level cap applied to everything. This makes playing DBZ with make much more sense if things like flight, strength and such can go above the cap.

The PL cap only applies to combat effects. That is to say things that provoke saves or require attack rolls. There are some other effects in regards to skills, but the hard bonus cap is 2xPL so you can get to say Investigate +20 however you want through some combination of skill bonus, stat bonus, and other stuff that can affect it.

Otherwise sky's the limit. Want Flight 20 at PL1? Go bonkers as long as you have enough points to dump into the effect.

[Razade]

Because I get very annoyed by overly narrow genre definitions. I'm not talking about the game except as a jumping off point, I'm talking about the definition of a superhero story/game.

That is an entirely you problem.


You say 'it isn't a superhero game because it can't do X style of story'. I say 'it can still be a superhero game, because supers is a genre that tends to blur with others, at least partially due to what genres it diverged from'. As I ought admitted, I haven't played the game. But you said that it's not a supers RPG, and your argument was 'it doesn't do Marvel/DC style stories'.

I was addressing OP's question and directly answering if City of Mist could fulfill a standard superhero story and the answer is no. It cannot. I didn't think I'd need to defend exactly why beyond the absolute bare minimum just because you, personally, want to be pedantic over what sorts of stories can be told with a Super Hero lens or that there are better games to run superhero stories under the PbtA umbrella.


I'm not saying it can do those stories, or that it's not got more in common with The Dresden Files than them. I am saying that such a thing doesn't discount it from being a supers game (despite being a really useful thing to know).

Except I'm telling you, as someone who has run the game multiple times, that it really can't. Which of the two of us, someone whose actually played and GM'd the game or someone whose just had a handful of looks over the game, is in a better position to tell others what the game is good for and what it isn't good for?


Okay, I've gone back and had a look at the game. I'd argue that it's definitely a supers concept, but yes not a supers story. Which makes it a supers game but with an asterisk next to it (like how Venture City tried to blend superheroes with cyberpunk themes).

And here in lies the problem. You've had what, a few hours of looking over the rules at most compared to my several months/almost a year of running the game but you think you're supremely more situated to tell me (and thus contradict something I am conveying to someone asking for assistance) and everyone else what it ought to be able to do simply because you've got some gumption over how people use the super hero label.

City of Mists has a fundamental Masquerade built into its mechanics with the titular Mist that makes all but the most strained concepts of a "super hero" game possible because you (the players) oscillate between knowing about the supernatural world and not knowing about the supernatural world. The rest of the city gets weird when it sees any kind of supernatural powers used in their presence because the Mist tries to keep people "asleep". It's like Quintessence from Mage: The Awakening with its negative effects. This limits the overt superhero shenanigans the team can pull on top of the Noir stylings it holds as a primarily detective style or at least mystery style/investigation game.

[Anonymouswizard]

The PL cap only applies to combat effects. That is to say things that provoke saves or require attack rolls. There are some other effects in regards to skills, but the hard bonus cap is 2xPL so you can get to say Investigate +20 however you want through some combination of skill bonus, stat bonus, and other stuff that can affect it.

Otherwise sky's the limit. Want Flight 20 at PL1? Go bonkers as long as you have enough points to dump into the effect.

Skills are capped at PL+10 actually. Doesn't make a difference if everybody's the same part level, but it does if you follow the advice of making villains higher PL but more specialised.

[Beleriphon]

Skills are capped at PL+10 actually. Doesn't make a difference if everybody's the same part level, but it does if you follow the advice of making villains higher PL but more specialised.

Ugh, true. I was speaking entirely from the PL10 stand point and forget that it is PL+10.

[aglondier]

My goto system for superhero games is White Wolf's Aberrant game. I've scaled it from Kick Ass level all the way up to Justice League. Uses d10s, and the usual White Wolf game mechanics, but it pretty versatile.

[Rakaydos]

It's (masks) just an amazing system to play in, provided the game you want to play is Teen Titans.

Are there any other systems that specialize in one aspect of the superhero genera? (and do it well) How many subgeneras would you say the Superhero label covers?

[Lord Shark]

Are there any other systems that specialize in one aspect of the superhero genera? (and do it well) How many subgeneras would you say the Superhero label covers?

Off the top of my head, there's Cold Steel Wardens, which is about late-80s style grimdark superheroes (e.g., The Dark Knight Returns, Longbow Hunters-era Green Arrow, etc.). Or Cartoon Action Hour, which is designed to emulate 70s-80s Saturday morning cartoon adventures.

There are also games set in specific worlds where supers are regulated in various ways, like Mutant City Blues, Godlike, Base Raiders, or Underground.

[SimonMoon6]

How many subgenres would you say the Superhero label covers?

The thing about superheroes... or at least superhero comics... is that they cover ALL the genres. That's why it is hard (imho) for companies to make a good superhero game system because it has to be able to cover everything.

Yeah, you could quibble about "street level superheroes" or "medium power superheroes" or "cosmic powered superheroes" but that's just looking at one dimension of superheroes.

Superheroes can do space travel science fiction. It can be the Buck Rogers/Flash Gordon or John Carter/etc style adventure of "modern day human finding himself in a science fiction setting" such as DC's Adam Strange. Or it can be just "spaceships going through space" like with DC's Omega Men. Or heroes who are usually on Earth but might go traveling through space with their spaceships (like Silver Age Hawkman) or their power rings (Green Lantern) or under their own power (Silver Age Superman).

Or superheroes might do other sorts of exploration to find new worlds and new civilizations. This might be going underwater (DC's Sea Devils), underground (DC's Cave Carson or the first Fantastic Four story), other dimensions (such as the Fantastic Four exploring the Negative Zone), other times (such as DC's Rip Hunter), or all of the above (DC's Challengers of the Unknown). So, "exploring new places and times" is a genre that superheroes do, like Star Trek TOS but on Earth, in space, in time, and in other dimensions.

And also magic. Magic of all power levels and story telling types. From "magic is hard to learn" (maybe DC's Tim Hunter?) to "magic should rarely be used and has consequences" (John Constantine) to "magic lets you do anything" (Dr. Strange, Dr. Fate, Zatanna, etc.). You can live in a fantasy world (Amethyst). You can live in a fantasy world in outer space in the future (White Witch and/or Princess Projectra of the Legion of Super-Heroes).

And that's just the fun stuff. There's all sorts of borderline mundane stuff to consider. Gritty private investigators. Martial arts themed adventures (like with Richard Dragon (and Lady Shiva and Bronze Tiger) or Shang-Chi or Badger). And the list goes on and on.

You can have the genre of stories where the world has been conquered by the enemy and the heroes have to save it, whether you're saving the world from Nazis (as the Freedom Fighters had to do on their world of Earth X) or saving the world from the alien Badoon (as the original (future) version of the Guardians of the Galaxy had to do (with help from Killraven)).

Every genre ever shows up in a superhero comic at some point. Gritty war stuff? Sure. Silly cartoon characters? Sure. Put it all together, and you've got a superhero universe.

Want to be an alien? No problem. A princess? No problem. A warrior? No problem. All of the above? No problem. You're Starfire of the Teen Titans.

Want to be a tormented soul, raised by a demon who has mostly removed your soul allowing you to manifest a "soul sword"? No problem. Want to be the absolute ruler of another dimension thanks to your mastery of demonic sorcery? No problem. Want to be a mutant with the power to travel anywhere in space and time? No problem. Want to be part of a kid-friendly superhero group? No problem. Want to be all of the above? No problem. You're Magik of the X-men.

[Lord Raziere]

The thing about superheroes... or at least superhero comics... is that they cover ALL the genres. That's why it is hard (imho) for companies to make a good superhero game system because it has to be able to cover everything.

Yeah, you could quibble about "street level superheroes" or "medium power superheroes" or "cosmic powered superheroes" but that's just looking at one dimension of superheroes.

Superheroes can do space travel science fiction. It can be the Buck Rogers/Flash Gordon or John Carter/etc style adventure of "modern day human finding himself in a science fiction setting" such as DC's Adam Strange. Or it can be just "spaceships going through space" like with DC's Omega Men. Or heroes who are usually on Earth but might go traveling through space with their spaceships (like Silver Age Hawkman) or their power rings (Green Lantern) or under their own power (Silver Age Superman).

Or superheroes might do other sorts of exploration to find new worlds and new civilizations. This might be going underwater (DC's Sea Devils), underground (DC's Cave Carson or the first Fantastic Four story), other dimensions (such as the Fantastic Four exploring the Negative Zone), other times (such as DC's Rip Hunter), or all of the above (DC's Challengers of the Unknown). So, "exploring new places and times" is a genre that superheroes do, like Star Trek TOS but on Earth, in space, in time, and in other dimensions.

And also magic. Magic of all power levels and story telling types. From "magic is hard to learn" (maybe DC's Tim Hunter?) to "magic should rarely be used and has consequences" (John Constantine) to "magic lets you do anything" (Dr. Strange, Dr. Fate, Zatanna, etc.).

And that's just the fun stuff. There's all sorts of borderline mundane stuff to consider. Gritty private investigators. Martial arts themed adventures (like with Richard Dragon (and Lady Shiva and Bronze Tiger) or Shang-Chi or Badger). And the list goes on and on.

Every genre ever shows up in a superhero comic at some point. Gritty war stuff? Sure. Silly cartoon characters? Sure. Put it all together, and you've got a superhero universe.

Yyuuuuup. Batman in Noir/old pulp hero, Spiderman is high school, action and science fiction, John Constantine is urban fantasy, Fantastic Four is sci-fi exploration all over, SHIELD is a spy fiction, Captain America and Wolverine are both war stuff, X-Men is different high school, Myztptlk, Spider-Ham and Bat-Mite are loony tunes characters, horror is whenever a supervillain is loose and no hero is around to help, even Superman was inspired by pulp's Man of Bronze: Doc Savage.

superhero universes aren't "a few people get empowered by mutant abilities" they are "reality when everything is enhanced and embellished and anything could happen." and when we say anything, we mean anything.

To see how weird superheroes can get, just look at the enemies of the Doom Patrol:
-Mr. Nobody who is a sentient shadow creature who a strange half-present abstraction who leads the Brotherhood of Dada
-The Quiz who has any superpower you haven't thought of yet (their full powers are restored with each new foe so each new foe has to keep guessing powers to decrease them)
-someone who only has superhuman strength while sleepwalking
-The Fog, a psychedelic death cloud that absorbs people and their personalities
-Agent !, someone who automatically goes invisible when in crowds and wears an exclamation point on his forehead
-Love Glove, a person with invisible arms who can access an alternate dimension where they pick magic gloves off of a glove tree to give them more superpowers
-Number None, a seemingly conceptual being that only manifests as bad luck as is never seen on panel
-a radioactive cement brutalist sculpture that feeds on the pain and suffering of others
-the lower half of some being
-a godlike entity who feeds on the suffering of others and collects butterflies
-a shapeshifter known as "Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man"
-Mister 104, who can become any combination or one of any elements on the periodic table
-Scissormen, who are scissor-handed creatures that cut people out of reality
-a man who hunts beards and kills any man with a beard because he can't grow his own (yes really)
-a girl that alters reality by tap-dancing and sell a foodstuff to try and destroy it known as "$#!+" (not censorship, this is actually what it is called)
-The Disappointment, a blank white being with "WITHHELD DUE TO COPYRIGHT" stamped across him that exists outside continuity and kills a god to get the comic book ending he always wanted because in universe his toys emitted strange radiation and his former identity was banned.

and nots talking about Danny The Street, a sentient street that can teleport itself and integrate him into any city, or Flex Mentallo who inverts the usual "warp reality with your mind" thing by instead warping reality by flexing his muscles.

[The Glyphstone]

Flex Mentallo who inverts the usual "warp reality with your mind" thing by instead warping reality by flexing his muscles.

So that's where Major Armstrong ended up after FMA finished...

[jjordan]

No love for Villains & Vigilantes? Man, that was a fun game. I wonder if I still have the rulebook?

[EggKookoo]

No love for Villains & Vigilantes? Man, that was a fun game. I wonder if I still have the rulebook?

V&V was my first superhero RPG. I have fond memories of playing it with friends in middle school. I don't know if I have any real love for the game itself...

[neonchameleon]

Marvel Heroic Roleplaying - a short lived game in 2012 due to Marvel taking the license back for not producing All The Profit that took the bull by the horns and decided they wanted a game where Hawkeye could meaningfully contribute to fights alongside the Hulk, and where using silly dice tricks Iron Man felt like continually adjusting your power level while Hulk felt nice, simple, and smashy.

Runner-up: Sentinels Comics RPG. Another superhero game by basically the same design and development team but with a smaller license.

[Rakaydos]

Would someone be willing to host a Sentinals Comics RPG game? I have the book and played the card game, but have hardly looked at the rulebook yet.

[Vianceit]

Definitely Masks: The New Generation. No other game can quite emulate that Teen Titans/Avengers Academy. Not great for grown up heroes but the teenage hijinks and drama is great fun.

[Batcathat]

Definitely Masks: The New Generation. No other game can quite emulate that Teen Titans/Avengers Academy. Not great for grown up heroes but the teenage hijinks and drama is great fun.

Out of curiosity (I'm not at all familiar with the system), how does it work better for young heroes than older ones?

[Thane of Fife]

Marvel Heroic Roleplaying - a short lived game in 2012 due to Marvel taking the license back for not producing All The Profit that took the bull by the horns and decided they wanted a game where Hawkeye could meaningfully contribute to fights alongside the Hulk, and where using silly dice tricks Iron Man felt like continually adjusting your power level while Hulk felt nice, simple, and smashy.

I think this one's been republished minus the Marvel stuff as... Cortex Heroic, maybe? Definitely some variety of Cortex.

[Anonymouswizard]

I think this one's been republished minus the Marvel stuff as... Cortex Heroic, maybe? Definitely some variety of Cortex.

A better Fate than the Marvel Universe Roleplaying Game got then (although I never liked MURP). Marvel RPGs just don't seem to get decent treatment.

From what I can see from a brief look online Marvel Heroic Roleplaying is Cortex Plus Heroic (and might be worth my time checking out, except for the fact that I prefer street level).

[Razade]

Out of curiosity (I'm not at all familiar with the system), how does it work better for young heroes than older ones?

The game's mechanics put the influence people (all adults and villains by mechanics) have over you as central to the rest of the game as well as your stats (called Labels) shifting based one people's (and your own since you can shift your own Labels) opinions and feelings and how they see the world. The playbooks focus on being the protege of an adult hero or the up and coming member of a Heroic Legacy as themes, as well as body issues, the inability and lack of training to control your own powers...that sort of thing. Adults already sorta know where they stand, they aren't influenced by the words of everything and everyone around them because they generally have an idea of who they are which is just not what Masks does.

[NorthernPhoenix]

I haven't personally played any superhero TTRPGs, but it's always surprised me how they haven't managed to become more popular alongside the rise of the superhero movie as the premier big budget/pop culture action movie. The mainstream popularity of Lord of the Rings and later Game of Thrones did huge things for the fantasy genre, and super-hero movies are currently bigger than both! Strange that no superhero TTRPG has managed to capitalize in nearly the same way Dungeons and Dragons has for fantasy.

[Batcathat]

I haven't personally played any superhero TTRPGs, but it's always surprised me how they haven't managed to become more popular alongside the rise of the superhero movie as the premier big budget/pop culture action movie. The mainstream popularity of Lord of the Rings and later Game of Thrones did huge things for the fantasy genre, and super-hero movies are currently bigger than both! Strange that no superhero TTRPG has managed to capitalize in nearly the same way Dungeons and Dragons has for fantasy.

Probably a matter of timing. By the time superheroes got to their current level of popularity, there were already so many RPGs on the market, including superhero ones. I would assume that the peak in superhero interest have increased their share of the roleplaying market, but it's probably hard to become the superhero RPG the way D&D is the fantasy RPG.

[EggKookoo]

Probably a matter of timing. By the time superheroes got to their current level of popularity, there were already so many RPGs on the market, including superhero ones. I would assume that the peak in superhero interest have increased their share of the roleplaying market, but it's probably hard to become the superhero RPG the way D&D is the fantasy RPG.

Also, from what I understand, TTPRGs aren't really giant moneymakers. Disney could certainly get a decent Marvel-based game on the shelves, but it would draw enough revenue to maybe cover the catering for one of their movies.

[SimonMoon6]

Personally, I think "fantasy" and "super heroes" are apples and oranges.

"Fantasy" is a very generic sort of setting. Sure, you *can* go full Tolkien, but you can also do anything. Magic can explain anything and you don't have to have anything like the real world in the setting. So, it's easy to create a "fantasy" world without worrying about whether things make sense. And you don't need to know all the details in advance. Who's the mightiest wizard or dragon or whatever? You can make it up whenever you need to, if you ever need to.

"Superheroes" tends to be more about the individual characters. Which superheros exist? Marvel? DC? Others who instantly seem lame by comparison? What do the heroes do? There's not a lot of world building that's typically done apart from "exactly the real world but with some guys in cool costumes", so it's hard to make the setting inherently interesting and exciting. But also, you need to create the world in a lot more detail in advance in figuring out what heroes exist. Does the world have the Justice League, the Avengers, or a similar group? Can the PCs ask them for help? What do the PCs know about all the other heroes of the world? You don't need to know all that in a fantasy game. Or you can make it up on the spot. But if the PCs go on their computers to find a superhero with teleportation powers to help them, you better know who is available. And you might think, "No problem, I'll just use the DC Universe as is from the comics" but... which DC Universe? Pre-Crisis? Post-Crisis? Post New 52? Post Rebirth? Post Infinite Frontier where everything is true so nothing makes sense anymore? This can be a headache. And you'd better be an expert or else the players will find your weak points (like when a player once went to find Blue Beetle's magic scarab that he swore was seen lost in Chicago in a comic book, but it was actually destroyed when I read the comic in question).

And when it's not about the characters, "superhero" stuff tends to be about the superpowers. A superhero game can be judged by how well it handles the various superpowers. Does it contain all the powers that superheroes could have? Does it handle pre-Crisis Superman power levels cleanly and easily? Does the system do a good job imitating comic book heroes or does it have to sacrifice a lot (like, the faster you are, the less invulnerable you can be)? And so on and so forth. That makes designing a superhero game a lot more difficult. Whereas, "fantasy" games tend not to be judged by their magic systems. D&D has a pretty broken magic system but it remains a beloved game.

Also, "fantasy" supports more in the way of pro-active adventures. Let's go investigate that mysterious tomb over there. Let's go defeat the Dragon Lord of the islands. Let's go topple an evil king.

"Superheroes" are typically more reactive. Let's sit around the headquarters until the Trouble Alert tells us that the Legion of Doom is up to something again. So, it's hard to be inspired by what your character is going to do, since what they're always going to do is to support the status quo.

I love superheroes, but running an *interesting* superhero game takes a lot more work than a fantasy game.

[Rakaydos]

Also, from what I understand, TTPRGs aren't really giant moneymakers. Disney could certainly get a decent Marvel-based game on the shelves, but it would draw enough revenue to maybe cover the catering for one of their movies.

Oh, definately. I'm in a discord with a developer for a niche series of RPGs, and he talks about how licencing properties is really difficult, because licence holders have wildly more grandiose expectations than the RPG market can practically deliver (unless your game is called D&D).

[Beleriphon]

Oh, definately. I'm in a discord with a developer for a niche series of RPGs, and he talks about how licencing properties is really difficult, because licence holders have wildly more grandiose expectations than the RPG market can practically deliver (unless your game is called D&D).

Green Ronin did okay with DC Adventures, but they had a full blown 100% compatible game system they could use already.