With the rise of mainstream cultural interest in super heroes over the last decade, the world has clamored to live the life of a superhero vicariously through film, television, and video games. Accomplishing magnificent deeds and saving the world from monstrous dangers are just some of the fun we see our heroes and idols perform all the time, and we want to be a part of it. From seeing Superman t-shirts, to Iron Man footed pajamas, and even a Batgirl corset and panties combo. (I kid you not. You can find all of that here.)
But what if my dreams go beyond cosplay and the sleepy time? What if my love of the modern mythological gods and goddesses goes beyond my en vogue/post modern t-shirt? (And to be clear, most of us were wearing those shirts LONG before they were cool. Back when people laughed and pointed. Well, the joke’s on them, right? Right?!) That’s where we turn to our favorite interactive, imagination-filled, polyhedral tossing, group storytelling activity. Or as my mom used to call it “Fantasy Land.” (Gotta love your mom, right? Right?!)
Of course, I’m talking about roleplaying games! And what better way to live out those superhero fantasies with some dice, sheets, friends, and loads and loads of crime fighting.
There are numerous superhero rpgs out there, they come, and they go all the time. The following is by no means a comprehensive list, but just some insight into three I have enjoyed over the years, and the reasons why. If you have more you want to discuss, by all means, mention them in the comments below.
And without further ado…
MARVEL SUPER HEROES (TSR – 1984)
TSR’s FASERIP system from the 1980’s and 1990’s is a fantastic journey into the world of superhero roleplaying. Its rules are easy to understand and it’s action is fast and furious.
Character creation is a blast. You can either let fate decide by rolling the dice, or design your character from scratch using pretty easy to follow guidelines. Characters have everything from an origin, to abilities, resources, popularity, powers, feats, limitations, talents, and contacts, all in an effort to defeat the baddies and earn karma – MSHRPG version of XP, used not only to advance your character, but also to assist in die rolling.
Using a percentile system and an easy to understand table, every die roll is fairly easy to resolve. The only draw back is…with a good enough roll even Aunt May can knockdown Galactcus. So, there’s that.
Because this game has been out of print for almost three decades it is difficult to find hard copies of most materials, however, there are various online resources where you can find the rule books, character sheets, and a plethora of modules for your use.
I find this system is best when playing your own characters, because of the freedom it provides and how fun character creation is. There are tons of your favorite heroes pre-made, though, complete with all of their stats if you want to play one of them.
MUTANTS AND MASTERMINDS (Green Ronin Publishing – 2002)
Green Ronin’s foray into the superhero gaming system abandoned the previous percentile dice mechanic of other games and plunged headlong into the d20 back when rolling a twenty-sided dice for every rpg was the way of the world. This system is a blast to play, and easy to resolve situations with a d20 mechanic, opening up doors for creativity MSHRGP lacked.
Despite this, M&M’s distractions are difficult to ignore.
Instead of rolling for stats, powers, and the rest, you’re given a point buy system where the user is allotted a certain number of points to create their character and literally places points into each attribute until the points are depleted. While this provides an unlimited potential for character creation and player creativity, it can be daunting and requires a level of mathematics most gamers don’t want to put forth the effort. Make character creation “quick and easy and let’s get playing,” is what most of my players say. Not “let’s take 2 hours to build a character from nothing,” and “hand my the calculator.”
Add this to the fact that M&M’s universe isn’t as easily accessible as Marvel and DC’s and you’re facing an uphill battle with player buy-in to the world.
The system can be a load of fun, and players love, and are very protective of, their PCs.
MARVEL HEROIC ROLEPLAYING GAME (Margaret Weis Productions – 2011)
If you and your group are interested in playing established Marvel characters with fast-paced action and little to no downtime, then this is your system.
Using a dice pool mechanic where players take different attributes of their heroes – everything from a power, to a talent, a trait and even an affiliation – to build their pool adds a previously un-examined perspective to the game. And with rolls being used as both potential currency for the hero and the GM (called “The Watcher” in this system) every die result matters. It’s an edge of your seat thrill ride.
There are two main detractors with this system though.
First off, character creation is too nebulous. Unlike MSHRPG there is no rolling, but there aren’t any limitations like M&M to keep your imagination in check. No guidelines and it’s up to the player’s imagination. Therefore, what’s to stop every new hero from being Thor or the Silver Surfer? Nothing.
Secondly, because the license was pulled fairly quickly, there is not a lot of licensed content for this system. Online you can find loads of fan generated content, but the official stuff is lacking.
However, if you and your group love playing with the existing heroes, then this system works beautifully.
Those are some of my favorites superhero rpg systems, but what superhero system do you play? How do you get your “Save-the-world” fix in? Let me know because I’m always willing and ready to experience a new game…and maybe save a few million people in the process…
Until next time, I’ll roll with you again real soon!
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I cut my teeth on the Mayfair Exponential Game System with DC Heroes. This was another game that seemed to be in the vein as Marvel FASERIP. It was a point-buy system, which allowed custom created characters, but wasn’t as complex as Mutants & Masterminds.
It too had the drawback that with one good roll, Robin could knock out Superman! There were genre controls that the GM could implement that would curtail such nonsense but my group never did and were happy enough letting the dice tell wacky tales of a common house cat cut Darkseid in two! It must have been a “What If…”
Truthfully, I’ve found Mutants & Masterminds to be the top of the heap in terms of super-hero RPGs. The TSR Marvel always felt too “swingy” both in terms of char-gen (especially if you go random as the books suggested) and in combat results. And the MHRPG really didn’t feel like we were playing super-heroes, plus the problem of really not encouraging you to make your own heroes or even letting them advance in terms of capability.
M&M on the other hand very easily lends itself not only to the established Marvel and DC Universes (especially the later thanks to a series of sourcebooks built around the pre-52 version), but the recent Emerald City sourcebook goes a long ways towards allowing new players and GMs to access the Freedomverse from the ground level and not have to deal with all the baggage that’s attached to the Freedom City portion of the setting.
That said, M&m is a bit on the crunchy side in terms of building characters, but myself and quite a few other folks have found that you can build pretty much any character concept or replicate any comic book hero. In fact, there’s a whole sub-forum on the company forums called “Roll Call” that has a slew of builds, including many that are primed for use as starting characters. Plus, character creation for a PL10 hero in 3rd edition can be done very quickly thanks to the Quickstart Character Generator pages that debuted with the GM screen and were added to the Deluxe Hero Handbook, and the math has been pretty well worked out to generate a perfectly viable PL10 hero in a few minutes for a wide breadth of concepts.