Sep 15, 2017, 12:46 PM
New Superhero Game Looking for Staff/Feedback
-
-
People mostly use it to refer to the general feel of early comics. What they emphasize is different sometimes but it's usually the simplicity of the storylines and a very clear-cut black and white morality when it comes to heroes and villains.
-
@n0q said in New Superhero Game Looking for Staff/Feedback:
In the absence of source material to function as an appeal to authority, PCs are somewhat free to do whatever is most efficient for them.
On that note, I don't know how you advance in M&M, but remember to incentivize the behavior you want to see, and disincentive that which you don't.
E.g., if you want your PCs to accept failure, then set up a system where they will advance faster if they do. The drive to succeed will always be there, but the acceptance of failure should be incentivized so that it isn't always a bad thing.
-
@n0q I have been giving that a lot of thought, especially when it comes to the Two Cities/Themes. I've always had issues with the ridiculous levels of Plot Armor it takes for The Punisher to exist in the same city as The Avengers. Now, some of it does work, when it comes to the idea of rogue elements in the government or law enforcement secretly supporting the Punisher; but constantly having the Avengers (especially Captain America, Black Panther, Falcon, and others) turn a blind eye to the Punisher with the refrain of 'we focus on the bigger threats' is just unrealistic.
Staff will be flexible, and work to come up with reasonable plot explanations, but we're never going to force other characters to ignore someone's actions.
One of the ways we're 'enforcing' the separation of Four Color heroes and the grittier vigilantes & anti-heroes is that San Macario has active anti-vigilante laws. It means that the Superman & Wonder Woman type characters are going to get no help from the local police there, and will be 'encouraged' to go back to the other side of the Bay. The corru[ption in the city extends upwards into having the Congressman that represents the District San Macario is in actively working to keep the Federally sanctioned superhuman team out of the city as well. That way, we can manage the reasonable plot elements to allow the crimefighters there to exist, like allies on the police force (Jim Gordon) and such.
-
@Runescryer said in New Superhero Game Looking for Staff/Feedback:
@n0q I have been giving that a lot of thought, especially when it comes to the Two Cities/Themes. I've always had issues with the ridiculous levels of Plot Armor it takes for The Punisher to exist in the same city as The Avengers.
A lot of handwaving is absolutely necessary in any comic book (or MUSH, they share this trait) based on the superpower disparity we're familiar with. There's no reason Spider-man just happens to be the one who sees the Vulture rampaging on the news and gets to the crime scene first instead of, say, Thor who'd just one-hit him, and you probably don't want a game where every PrP ran with standard Gotham-level goons is populated with Green Lantern-level good guys wiping the floor with them.
Plot armor is a necessity, and players need to respect these facts else I don't see how it could work.
-
@Runescryer said in New Superhero Game Looking for Staff/Feedback:
Give me an example of how you think the system can be broken. That way, we can work to patch up flaws. No system is perfect and I'd rather be proactive about preventing possible misuse of the game system.
If you're talking about the Affliction rules, I'm working on a resolution for that.
One exploit to keep an eye out for:
Incorporeal + affect corporeal + extreme grappling.
A PL10 character can effectively make a mutant type char who can go Incorporeal where they can only be affected if their attacker has "Affects Incorporeal", then double down on their own "Affects Corporeal".
With a few cleverly added things such as grappling feats, they can effectively go Incorporeal, Grapple, and choke characters out. Any major defense to it requires a lot of pre-planned purchases on their target's behalf.
Suggestion: Characters with Incorporeal powers should set their powers to have limitations on what they can or cannot effect while Incorporeal, rather than a blanket "they cant touch you but you can touch them" schema.
Delete the Hog Pit. It'll be fun.
I really don't understand He-Man -
I’ve been told before that you simply don’t do things like that on superhero games. The system may make it possible, but it breaks the theme of ... well, the entire superhero genre if you use your powers to do things like that.
Wild Talents straight up says “don’t do that”. You can do that. One game (maybe also Wild Talents) creates a system where losing your hero focus means increased negative effects.
“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos -
@Ghost Incorporeal is always a pain, regardless of system
But yes, I'll work on that. -
That could work, but the only solution I can think of which prevents your setup from needing even more 'plot armor' involves direct PC conflict (which you might or might not want): What prevents your gritty 'iron age' heroes from walking over to your 'four color' area and stopping crime forever? The only thing I can think of is that the 'four color' heroes see the iron age guys as villains, themselves.
Unless you're going to force characters into staying in their intended cities, you will deal with stranger in a strange land incidents any way you slice it. I swear this stuff is candy to a player. They want to stand out in some way. Why not play a gritty anti-hero who refuses to play by the rules in a city where everybody else pulls their punches?
If you keep both cities split off from one another, then why have them both at all? It starts to sound like you've got two games on one server. If you stick to one style, then you can focus all your energy on a single place, not have your playerbase split across two grids, get by with less plot armor, and also allow your players to be more certain of what sort of world they're playing in. It's like I said earlier. You don't have actual source material to rely upon, so you have to be concise and consistent. Your weaker players will strain the cohesion of your setting until it's just kind of a mess. Your stronger players will be unsure of what they should be doing and will need to ask you all the time if this or that is okay.
Regarding M&M stats, one thing which has never changed across 1e, 2e, and 3e is that M&M actually requires an especially critical eye on a PC's proposed stat block. There are a zillion things the game technically allows you to do which is stoopid broken OP or in no way, shape, or form fits in any sort of comic book world. Sometimes the problem is subtle, but is a one-way ticket to WTFsville. I don't just mean hella-broken power/advantage/skill combos, either (of which there are unlimited amounts. I wish I could remember some of the imaginative and completely fucked stuff we saw at Crucible City). With some imagination, you can squeeze an absurd amount of fuckery into a small amount of power points.
If there's any advice I can give you, it's this: Before you open, get really, really, really good with Mutants and Masterminds. I mean seriously, mega-fucking good. Then start trying to make the most powerful characters you can within the confines of whatever rules you're going to apply to your playerbase. I mean it. Break that shit and break it good. Then revise your rules and do it again. Eventually you'll reach a state where your rules will generally guide a player into making a fair character, and you'll be skilled enough to spot problems on a statblock even when they follow all of your rules. M&M is not one of those systems where chargen spits out characters who are even roughly matched in power and utility. It's easy to make a broken character, and I've seen plenty of M&M games fail because they approved any legal statblock.
-
Is telenuke a thing for M&M?
-
@Arkandel said in New Superhero Game Looking for Staff/Feedback:
Is telenuke a thing for M&M?
Unless you refuse to approve it, pretty much anything is a thing in M&M. Spitballing off the top of my head (so this won't be perfect)...
INDIRECT (FLAT 1-4 POINTS)
A ranged effect with this modifier can originate from a point other than the user, ignoring cover between the user and the target, such as walls and other intervening barriers, so long as they do not provide cover between the effect’s origin point and the target. An Indirect effect normally originates from a fixed point directed away from you. In some cases, an Indirect effect may count as a surprise attack (see Surprise Attack).Indirect 1: the effect originates from a fixed point away from you.
Indirect 2: the effect can come from any point away from you or a fixed point in a fixed direction (not away from you).
Indirect 3: The effect can come from any point in a fixed direction (not away from you) or a fixed point in any direction.
Indirect 4: The effect can originate from any point and aim in any direction, including towards you (hitting a target in front of you from behind, for example).Telenuke: Attack X, Range: Perception, Indirect 4 (3pp/rank + 4)
Perception: The effect works on any target you can perceive with an accurate sense, without any need for an attack check. If you cannot accurately perceive the target, you cannot affect it.
Now add a sensory power to the character that lets the character perceive radio waves, see through cover, see through cellphones, whatever. Buy 2 or 4 ranks of Accurate. For extra fun, apply a flaw to it: "Flaw: Only works with Telenuke" Take that sensory power from 1pp/rank to 0.5pp/rank.
Quite legal. You'd be insane or incompetent to approve it.
EDIT: Added indirect.
-
Unless you are building a PvP arena (and that could be fun for someone, somewhere), you have to state clearly that you are not interested in clever designs to exploit the system, or give cheap victories. The build your character system is to allow you to describe a hero in some detail, in a way that is fair to all. Not a way to make an unstoppable killing or taking over other characters machine.
Otherwise, make an attack with a huge radius, invisible to all senses, does slow lethal damage, and you are Radiation Lord. Lovely. What a story, let me tell you. The Readers get bored, your comic isn't bought, the character is forgotten.
-
@n0q Yeah, in other games telenukes are the worst.
"Hey, just so you know, you died in your sleep" makes for an engaging storyline.
-
@Thenomain said in New Superhero Game Looking for Staff/Feedback:
I’ve been told before that you simply don’t do things like that on superhero games. The system may make it possible, but it breaks the theme of ... well, the entire superhero genre if you use your powers to do things like that.
Wild Talents straight up says “don’t do that”. You can do that. One game (maybe also Wild Talents) creates a system where losing your hero focus means increased negative effects.
I can throw a coffee mug across the coffee table into someone's face if they do this on tabletop night.
But I think if MU* has taught me anything, it's taught me that if you don't outright come out and say DO NOT DO THIS, you're gonna get an app for it and your player will argue it into the ground.
Delete the Hog Pit. It'll be fun.
I really don't understand He-Man -
@Ghost No no, you'll get it sneakily through the app and XP spends, and it will be used at a strategic time with the argument that you already agreed to it, and if you don't allow it that you're playing favorites for your pet players.
-
M&M TELENUKE: Telekinesis with the range of perception paired with clairvoyance.
"I can see things happening thousands of miles away and have the ability to lift and throw 1500 tons. My telekinesis requires line of sight, which my clairvoyance provides."
My advice is to train your staff to look for these sorts of loopholes and as Misadv said, state that exploits will be dealt with. Power configs against the spirit of the game should be monitored.
In the above example, you could initiate combat from a park bench in NYC to drop an aircraft carrier onto the Kremlin.
(I didnt catch this one until we were in play. The player sat on a park bench and solved a bank robbery before the rest of the PCs made it to the bank. IIRC he was able to attack multiple targets in a burst.)
-
@WildBaboons
Four Color references the printing process used in the late fifties and early sixties that relayed on four colors of ink hence the name. So you have a lot of people that use the term to mean silver age, however since the process was mainly used into the mid-80s it can also be legitimately counted on to mean Bronze Age stuff as well.
Add it that it was all comics that used the process not just superhero ones that muddies things further.
Fun fact: the four color process is why the hulk changed from gray to green, it was too hard to get a consistent gray tone by mixing the colors so they in the second issue they changed his color to green because they could do a constant green.Edit to add: Here is a neat link that gets into the technically aspects of comic coloring http://facweb.cs.depaul.edu/sgrais/comics_color.htm
Note Neat is a highly subjective term, but I did find it very interesting. -
@ThatGuyThere Which made Green much cheaper, which was also a motivating factor.
-
This is why 'four color' is a horrible way to describe a game. Superman was four color. So was Plasticman. The only thing worse than a term that doesn't mean anything is a term that means everything.
-
@n0q
I don't mind Four Color as a term to describe a comic book itself because that does give a meaning. Four color art does look a lot different than modern printing techniques so it is a valid descriptor, much like calling a motion picture from the right era a CinemaScope movie, it details a part of the process used in creation and gives an idea of how it will visually look.
Calling the story content of a comic book four color drives me bonkers for the reason you mentioned it includes everything from a decades long era so really tells you nothing about the content. Just like if I told you a movie was shot with CinemaScope cameras it would tell you nothing about the content of the film. Well except that is would not be about any RL events that happened after the technology was no longer in use.