Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs

Nein

I haven't been playing Superhero-themed games for a long time, but something I've noticed as a recurring theme along the several I've dinked about on is that all of the major villains, or indeed anyone of any real import or leadership role, are all locked in a dust-gathering gun safe that only staff has the combination for. Some games won't allow you to play a villain at all, which seems to me like shooting yourself in the foot, especially if the game is in any way shape or form faction-based.

Does anyone know the reasoning behind this, or when this became popular? I'm assuming it's to prevent people from forming Mr. Sinister's Harem of Mutant Wives or General Zod's plot for the longest possible character squatting in internet history, but that's almost along the lines of "cutting off the hands of the musicians".

I've seen some games do this because they actively want to prevent PVP roleplay of any kind, but that's at the very extreme end, so I'm assuming that's the exception rather than the rule.

Eventually on these 'No Badguys Allowed' treehouses the game degenerates quickly into The Real Housewives Of Westchester County for lack of anything else to do: the street-level villains cluster together and the heroes cluster together and never the twain shall meet.

Ghost

I've noticed this, too.

I've seen some villains poking around some old SH games, but it appeared like they were all alts kept around until necessary.

If I had to guess, I would say that the ONLY HEROES comes from a long history of OOCANGSTFUCKERY that pollutes this hobby. I can see potential past issues of players of villains crossing IC ethical content lines, players of heroes feeling like the player of a villain was trying to ruin their fun, potential harassment, or just good, old-fashioned competitive assholes getting bent out of shape.

Or...The staff just want to hang onto the villains as NPCs so that they can use them as plot devices, but never get around to it because their Tony Stark charbit is too busy TSing to disseminate plot.

Arkandel

@Nein said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

Does anyone know the reasoning behind this, or when this became popular? I'm assuming it's to prevent people from forming Mr. Sinister's Harem of Mutant Wives or General Zod's plot for the longest possible character squatting in internet history, but that's almost along the lines of "cutting off the hands of the musicians".

For starters I've no idea why it's done. I haven't played comic MU* almost at all.

Why I would have it like that? It's because I wouldn't want to see the Red Skull doing random bar scenes or hanging out with random people just because I have the character, I'm bored, and I want to play him. Overuse breeds familiarity and the character becomes less menacing if you've met him fifty times, or a joke if that's 50 times you had to listen through his racist bite-less tirades.

Ghost

Super Hero MUs pretty much exist to alter canon. I remember that I once applied for - and was approved to play - Nova (Richard Ryder). He was famous for being Marvel's ad-hoc Green Lantern steal, and his previous love interests include Gamora from Guardians of the Galaxy.

About 15 minutes after approval, I started receiving hopeful pages asking me if I was going to be continuing his ongoing homosexual orgy scenes with the other gay characters on the game, many of which were never canonically LGBTQ.

SO...Yeah, there would be plenty of Red Skull/Dr Strange buddy cop strip club scenes. Potentially.

Ghost

Double post.

Epilogue: I ended up leaving the game because I couldn't find roleplay. Nova's old romantic flames kept showing up IC and making passes at Nova, and I got the feeling the reason I couldn't seem to find much RP (or much response on the game via channels, etc) was due to a sort of mild neglect. I got the gut feeling that there was some shunning involved out of the assumption that GAY NOVA was back, so the female players wouldn't bother, and once the gay rpers found out I wasn't playing GAY NOVA, why bother with a dead end?

I quietly drifted off.

Edit: I didn't mention straight male RPers because the amount of rp I get with other male players/characters that didnt involve passes for TS is pretty remarkable. I assumed straight males were like HOLY FUCK GAY COOTIES or DOESNT HAVE VAGINA/DONT CARE.

TNP

@Ghost Heroes Dreams?

On topic... not sure, really. Marvel: 1963 allows villains as PCs. We also have a stable of them that players can check out for plots, some of which can be taken over to become a PC.

Ghost

@TNP said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Ghost Heroes Dreams?

Possibly? I wasn't there terribly long and it was so long ago, but it definitely wasn't one of the places geared towards Gaymers. I would have known what I was getting into, there. Let's say this was around 2003-2005.

Roz

@Ghost I have seen you tell this story so many times but you still keep spelling Rich's last name wrong.

Ghost

@Roz Oh snap, it is Rider. Sigh.

Then again, it's kinda the perfect name for a gay porn actor.

Ganymede

@Ghost said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

Then again, it's kinda the perfect name for a gay porn actor.

Well, it seems to be okay for a gay comedian and radio host, so why not?

Arkandel

@Ghost said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

Edit: I didn't mention straight male RPers because the amount of rp I get with other male players/characters that didnt involve passes for TS is pretty remarkable. I assumed straight males were like HOLY FUCK GAY COOTIES or DOESNT HAVE VAGINA/DONT CARE.

Frankly I have a pet theory that some games are somehow aimed for a certain demographic and no one tells you these things when you sign up.

I've been in MU* where the male/female ratio is tremendously skewed for some reason and it's open season on whichever gender is in short supply, and I've felt either like a piece of digital meat or completely invisible for no obvious reason accordingly.

Nein

@Ghost

In my time I've had characters straight up harass me for TS no matter what I play. Less so if I play a straight male that isn't a feature character - then it's like you don't exist. Interest exponentially decreases if you're an OC straight male.

My biggest problem with this is that, if you are playing a faction-based game, you need to have the bosses around on a daily basis, both to connect and direct with your IC underlings, and to establish OOC morale. If you're having fun RPing together because the boss is there scaring you sh*tless (or inspiring you if you're a hero) and making sure you have your orders, you're more likely to want to stay. Villain bosses in particular need to be around for their team/faction - not necessarily for just schlepping on down to Moe's. Leader characters often end up being the energizing factor for faction. Staff locking them up 'for plot only' means that the underlings are waiting for orders that never come, and since they're villains and their options for slice-of-life garbage RP are a little limited by their status as villains, you end up with villain factions withering to death and the hero factions milling around in a vain search for people to beat up.

At that point, Nova's neghole looks pretty interesting.

Roz

@Ghost They do make that joke in one of his solo titles at one point. (Rich may or may not be my favorite ever. I may or may not have a Nova tattoo. My icon may or may not be from original artwork of him by Kris Anka. I may or may not love Rich a lot.)

Then again, you'll pry bisexual Rich in love with Peter Quill from my cold, dead fingers, and I 100% played it on a MU*, so.

More on-topic, I imagine the reason a lot of superhero games don't have villain PCs is that a lot of games don't want to be that hardcore PvP.

Nein

@Roz That seems like they missed the entire point of Superhero themes then.

Roz

@Nein Not necessarily? People often play superhero games to do big, heroic stuff. Some people don't like the drama of how PvP tends to play out on MU*s. With an active staff, you can still do big, heroic stuff in a PvE environment.

Nein

@Roz I probably run in different mu subcultures, because I've rarely heard of PvP causing drama. It's usually unethical staff or rampant IC f*cking that causes the drama.

Arkandel

@Nein said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Roz I probably run in different mu subcultures, because I've rarely heard of PvP causing drama.

What?

Roz

@Arkandel said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Nein said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Roz I probably run in different mu subcultures, because I've rarely heard of PvP causing drama.

What?

That was my first response, too.

Ghost

@Roz said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

Then again, you'll pry bisexual Rich in love with Peter Quill from my cold, dead fingers, and I 100% played it on a MU*, so.

For the record, I totally support this. That's an awesome idea. Oh the sarcasm factor. Being real? I think the reason I've never played a gay male character is because, while I'm absolutely comfortable roleplaying the emotional/connection side of a gay relationship, I'm not much of a TSer. Not to say that TS is required, but I've had enough issues surrounding that with Rping characters in a straight relationship, and I'd also hate to be some vague level tease to an ACTUAL gay rper looking to simulate the whole shebang.

Ghost

@Roz said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Arkandel said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Nein said in Superhero Games: Quest For Villain PCs:

@Roz I probably run in different mu subcultures, because I've rarely heard of PvP causing drama.

What?

That was my first response, too.

I think @Nein has a point: I would equate drama surrounding PvP as rare due to the absolute rarity of players risking their character's lives to series of dice rolls. The last time I heard of a PvP death was on Fallcoast, and even then, I heard 4-5 staffers say things like "holy shit, a PvP death???"

So, yeah, unethical staff and IC fuckery channels far more drama than PVP, IMO.

Edit: Belatedly, I would estimate that 90% of the time I've heard of a character dying, it's due to some kind of rage quit, normal quit, or weirdly IC/OOC revenge move to ensure no one gets to play the character after they're gone...and mostly handled via @mail or bbpost.