SUPERHERO RPG GENERAL

Has anyone else ever attempted to play the Big Bang Comics RPG?

It's a clunky patchwork mess, but shit if it isn't funny.

>Trait: Adamantium Arches
>Benefit: You are never considered flat-footed.

It revolves heavily around character concepts and story telling.

You can make whatever kind of character you want right out of the box. Since power limits are required for every set, you are never completely OP. And at the end of the day your powers are still tied to a die in a dice pool going against a different dice pool.

Fights and action scene initiative is determined by how things start and who the GM says goes first. After that player's turn, he picks the next guy, whether on his team or one of the NPCs. You inflict stress -- mental, physical, or emotional -- on your enemy, which is added to any rolls against him, and he does the same to you whenever his attacks land. This leads to the battles starting slow and ramping up as the fights go on.

The SFX let you broaden what your powers can do without a character miraculously getting new super powers. I really like this element since it feels like you're honing your abilities/tech/magic over time like you certainly would after a few weeks of punching robots in the dick.

Milestones are your chief source of XP and are centered around how your character behaves. It encourages role playing and every milestone ends, leading to your next one.

I've GM'd for MHR a few times and love it when a group really hits their stride, but it does take some getting used to. Especially for the crunchier anons.

Only superhero game I've ever played is Mutants & Masterminds, and although I've never cared for flat d20 systems I absolutely loved the piecemeal hero generation.

Fun is subjective but I liked it.

Basically, everyone's charsheet (or "datafile") is a set of buckets with dice in it. See pic as an example.
When you want to do something, you describe your action (seriously, do it first), then go through the buckets fishing for dice. You usually can only pick one die from each.

All dice are step dice with d4 being underwhelming, d6 normal and d12 godlike.

You have: your Affiliation, which denotes how good you are at working solo/with somebody/as part of a team. It encourages to split the party of to work together. GM is encouraged to mess with your party composition (he has to spend a certain resourse and give you Plot Points, though)
As you can see, Spidey is amazing when working with somebody, pretty good when going solo and a lousy team player

Distinctions: Things that make you stand out from the rest, be they your personality, your occupation or some circumstances you found yourself in. They can be helpful or hindering, you choose (which means they give you a d8 for your roll or a d4 and a Plot Point)
For example, Spider-Man's distinction Wisecracker could help him ("I mock Vulture's baldness to keep him off his game") or hinder ("Vulture is pissed and going for the kill, I might've gone too far on this one")

Powersets are a bucket each, that's why you probably souldn't have more than two active at once. Powersets have SFX (fancy things you can do by spending some currency, be it a Plot Point, your highest die or some stress) and Limits (hindering things you might choose to activate to gain something)
Spider-Man' Spider Sense is a great example of an SFX: you can spend a Plot Point to add your Senses d8 to your dice pool even if there already is something else from your Spider-Powers powerset.
Exhausted is a Limit that means you shut down your powerset or a single power to gain 1PP. On Web-Slinging powerset it likely means you've run out of web fluid.

Then there are Specialties which are basically skills. Not much to say there.

Your action could be spent doing some Stress to an opponent (physical, mental or emotional, you pick), to give your opponent a Complication (which limits his actions narratively and gives you another die should you choose to tap into it) or to give yourself or your ally an Asset (narrative advantage and more dice but it usually is only temporary)

And what of the complaints referenced where there's no chargen?

I'm a fan of girls for these kinds of games. The gm veto power needs to be enforced often though (so that absolutely point crock shit like hyper-iron-man doesn't happen, for example)

I miss my pulp action heroes game
>gunslinger who can talk to guns
>sniper mage with time powers
>James bond/ nick fury

The entire chargen system is pretty much "Pick a character and give him whatever traits are appropriate. Don't worry, it'll work fine"
And it does but "fine" is not enough for grogs

Most powers are broken down into tiers

d12 being Thor tier
d10 being Spider-man tier
d8 being Captain America tier
d6 being Henchmen tier

There are rules for datafiles (1-2 power sets, 3 distinctions, 2 milestones, power sets must have limits, etc.), but there aren't any set rules for your "power level"

If you want to be Superman and I want to be Daredevil, that's on us. There's nothing saying you only get so many d12s and have to have a d6 for something. It's all up to what your character idea is.

I feel like I'm missing something here

Also is all combat just throwing your dice pool or are there manuevers and stuff you can do?

I've played Mutants and Masterminds, Champions, and Savage Worlds. Of the three, Mutants and Masterminds had the highest highs and the lowest lows - when one DM ran it we had some amazing encounters with deadly as fuck supervillains who forced us to be creative to eke out a win, but with another we just had a bunch of shitty enemies who we mopped the floor with over way too much playtime.

>amazing encounters with deadly as fuck supervillains who forced us to be creative to eke out a win

How is this at all unique to MnM?

Let me take an example from a DBZ style character I made once.

He had a d8 for Solo, a d8 for his distinction, a d8 for Energy Blast, but I used a SFX (A special move associated with a power set) that let me ignore my enemy's durability, so he could not use his durability die in his dice pool.

SFX are detailed in your power set when you make it up and you can buy more with XP.

So, I'm rolling 3d8 and saying my character is using a special beam cannon to punch right through someone.

If I wanted to use an Area Attack SFX, I would have added a d6 for every target I was attack.

There are other example SFX in the game books and the datafiles, but you can also make them up for your character.

Your dice pool is your maneuvers. The game features a pretty complicated interplay of Plot Points, Doom Pool, Stress and powers.
Here's an official example of play. I think it explains the system pretty well.

So I've been sort of thinking about trying to run a supers game (I've never played or DM'ed one before, but as forever DM if I don't we'll never play one). The idea I've been sort of tossing around is to take the modern day, have a giant solar flare that knocks out most of the power grid and electronics and causes worldwide chaos, and then supers start appearing. Campaign starts some time later after nations have got their infrastructure under control, and now supers are being tracked down and having their powers cataloged and are those with dangerous powers are either imprisoned/executed due to the potential for danger they have or pressed into the service for the government as human weapons. The players are rogue supers who have manifested powers too dangerous to be allowed to be allowed to live, and are fugitives running from the containment teams sent after them. I sort of have a bit of an idea about the government transitioning their supers from human weapons to more traditional super hero teams backed by the government since people understand that dynamic due to comic book culture and that makes the existence of supers more comforting and is better PR than the previous method.

I usually run more sandboxey campaigns, so I intend to let them do whatever and see how it goes, just giving them the option to stay rogue, go full villain/hero, work as freelance mercs maybe. Thoughts?

I'm just relaying my experiences. Hero system was nice, but it never felt quite right - there were always too many stupid things to keep track of. Savage Worlds maybe has potential, but our GM was terrible at running it, so we just roflstomped everything.

Seems fine to me.
Though be aware that usually (in my experience at least) in supers games a lot hinges on the personality of the NPCs and how they interact with PCs so you'll have to prepare quite a lot

Anyone have any good hero art to dump, while we're at it? I would love some stuff that isn't too blatantly Marvel or DC, but I'm seriously lacking there. Street level, cosmic, whatever.

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Yeah I'd definitely give it a shot if it had rules for character creation.

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Which it does. In Operations Manual (aka basic rules), pages 110-114

I've been meaning to try and play a game with my siblings, they're really into capeshit, but I feel like M&M or Marvel rpg are a bit too system heavy for them.

So, my question is if anyone knows of any system that has a point-buy system for powers or is relatively light-weight. If you could give me a pdf it'd be even better.

I'm waiting for Masks, but that's been on hold for years.

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Truth & Justice is simple as fuck.
Though it can get pretty confusing with Megascale and normal scale but you could ignore it largely

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>Truth & Justice
Do you have a pdf or somewhere where I can see it?

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Thanks man. I'll contribute with what little cape art I've got. If anyone has any other suggestions, I'm all ears.

There's one thing about MHR that makes it unsuitable for some people.

In M&M, HERO and every other game in existense, you're making a character and it exists in a world of other super-people.
In MHR you're making/picking a character and it exists in a comic book with its often wonky logic and narrative weight being more important that "objective" traits.

It's not a physics simulator, it's a comic book emulator

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Mildly lewd.

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What do you guys think of aberrant? The setting and mechanics seem nice.

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>White Wolf game
>mechanics seem nice

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Is Masks out yet anyway?

Will it ever come out?

I haven't played it yet, what's wrong with the system?

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Just a general observation.
Dexterity is likely a god-stat
Fights are likely a whiff-fest that ends when one lucky roll splatters the opponent
Powers are likely all over the place utility- and power-wise

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How does HERO actually play?

Let's share character concepts. I find villians are the most fun to come up with, but you need a strong flow of them for teams of players. One BBEG just doesn't sit well for me for superhero games.

>Bazooka Duke and the Shootgoons:
Low level armed mercenaries. Strong having all the best guns. Led by the charismatic former 2nd rights spokesperson turned nutjob, they like bazookas and shotguns.

>Queen Bee:
A researcher looking to solve the bee die-off. Typical backstory of a lab accident gone wrong. Extremist environmentalist a-la Poison Ivy. Has an army of mindless, man-sized beemen drones that she breeds.

> Straw Man:
Was just a farmer until a agricultural company had their genetically altered crops cross contaminate his field. He unknowingly ate the altered crops and was transformed into Straw Man. Basically like Sandman, but with straw. Can animate plants as well.

> Plasmad:
A toxic goo being. Rumour has it that a child fell into a vat of illegal chemicals, but rather than die, it formed a conciousness. Eats toxic waste, radiates some bad stuff, and creates goo-minions as needed. The tragedy is that he could be a huge asset to humanity if he didn't have such anger issues. Almost always being manipulated by someone else

> Downtime:
A thief that somehow got futuretech that allows him to freeze time for short periods at a time. He's more interested in robbery and isn't a murderer, but he's also a pain in the ass to catch. His timefreezing suit runs on diamonds, so he's constantly trying to steel them.

>The Wiz
Dave Arneson is an occultist fanatic who actually picked up a bit of magic. His aims are low; money and power, but his powers aren't to be trifled with. He’s as dangerous to himself as he is to everyone around him. Usually summoning shot far beyond his ability to control or fucking up reality in strange ways. He's supposed to be like a Sorcerer Supreme and has a spirit animal trying to talk him into doing good

Double Cross.

>Prima Donna
An absurdly powerful telekenetic and the estranged, cut-off former heiress to her family's fortune. She’s a dopey airhead that steals to maintain her spoiled lifestyle. “(chews bubbblegum) Whatever...”

>The Gay Agenda:
Real name: Kinsey Scale
Prima Donna’s hanger on and gay-friend/spoiled-white-girl accessory. He’s using the name ironically. His powerset is super strength, super toughness, and incredible wrestling skills. He wears a Superman-esque outfit that rips apart at the slightest tough except for the panther thong. Every bad stereotype and he's too much of a sassy bitch to care.

>Princess:
Prima Donna’s yappy little chihuahua. It’s barks unleash a viciously powerful, piercing sonic blast. Players that underestimate the little turd are in for a surprise.

>Mothram:
A genetic breed between a moth and a ram. It's way more powerful than most strong characters, but dumb and easily distracted by light sources. Mostly focuses on ramming attacks. Usually brought into a fight by any badguy with some food who wants extra backup.

>Everyman:
A shapeshifter who can also make clones of himself. They're all just regular strength people, but he's basically a mob-on-demand. Great at running around corners and blending into (or creating) crowds.

I'm loving this art dump Anons, a ton of thanks

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I have a gang of psychics called the Yurinators. They're mostly teenage kids who can move stuff with their mind, led by a crazy old Russian with telepathy. Good for breaks inbetween serious arcs.

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Oh god that's fantastic.

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What the hell is Virgo good for?

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I have no idea. Not that it's very clear what any of their powers are. I mean, Scorpio has that tail, and the other one can shoot a bow, and that's sort of it.

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