Results 31 to 55 of 55
Thread: Favorite Superhero RPG
-
2021-06-29, 12:19 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2006
- Location
- Protecting my Horde (yes, I mean that kind)
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.Last edited by Beleriphon; 2021-06-29 at 12:22 PM.
-
2021-06-29, 12:22 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2014
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
That is an entirely you problem.
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.
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?
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.Last edited by Razade; 2021-06-29 at 12:25 PM.
-
2021-06-29, 01:00 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2009
- Location
- In my library
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
-
2021-06-29, 02:33 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2006
- Location
- Protecting my Horde (yes, I mean that kind)
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
-
2021-07-05, 09:07 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Apr 2020
- Location
- Emerald City, Oz
- Gender
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
"There is no hunting like the hunting of man, and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never care for anything else thereafter."
~ Ernest Hemingway
2021 2022 2023 2024
Dwarf Magus (Deep Marshal) spell list
-
2021-07-06, 07:03 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jun 2011
-
2021-07-06, 09:19 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Aug 2011
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
-
2021-07-06, 05:42 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2012
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.Last edited by SimonMoon6; 2021-07-06 at 05:53 PM.
-
2021-07-06, 06:40 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
- Gender
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
-
2021-07-06, 11:13 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Feb 2005
- Gender
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
NOW COMPLETE: Let's Play Starcraft II Trilogy:
Hell, It's About Time: Wings of Liberty
Does This Mutation Make Me Look Fat: Heart of the Swarm
My Life For Aiur? I Barely Know 'Er: Legacy of the Void
-
2021-07-07, 03:09 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2019
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
No love for Villains & Vigilantes? Man, that was a fun game. I wonder if I still have the rulebook?
-
2021-07-07, 04:57 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2015
- Gender
-
2021-07-07, 07:35 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jun 2012
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.Currently in playtesting, now with optional rules for a cover based sci-fi shooter.
Games for Harry Potter, the Hunger Games, and Silver Age Marvel. Skins for The Gorgon, the Deep One, the Kitsune, the Banshee, and the Mad Scientist
-
2021-07-09, 11:01 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jun 2011
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
-
2021-07-24, 05:33 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jul 2021
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
-
2021-07-24, 08:05 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Nov 2019
-
2021-07-24, 11:10 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2007
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
A System-Independent Creative Community:
Strolen's Citadel
-
2021-07-25, 04:05 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Oct 2009
- Location
- In my library
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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).
-
2021-07-25, 04:39 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Sep 2014
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
-
2021-07-25, 10:09 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Dec 2014
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
-
2021-07-25, 10:16 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Nov 2019
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.
Last edited by Batcathat; 2021-07-25 at 10:17 AM.
-
2021-07-25, 10:33 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Mar 2015
- Gender
-
2021-07-25, 10:46 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2012
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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.Last edited by SimonMoon6; 2021-07-25 at 11:06 AM.
-
2021-07-27, 06:48 AM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jun 2011
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG
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).
-
2021-07-29, 06:03 PM (ISO 8601)
- Join Date
- Jan 2006
- Location
- Protecting my Horde (yes, I mean that kind)
Re: Favorite Superhero RPG