What are your favorite superhero RPGs?

[deuxhero]

I've gotten a hold of a few of these and wanted to hear the Codex's opinion on which they like best since I'm sure people here have played more of them then me (only some M&M experience here) and what the pros and cons of them are.

 

[JamesDixon]

My absolute favorite is Hero System by Hero Games. The very first superhero RPG I bought was Marvel Superheroes by TSR.

With Hero System you can design any character you want with a fairly robust power creation system. You want an energy projector that generates miles wide storms you can do it. Combat is structured fairly well and if you follow the rules then it should be rather easy to do large scale fights.

 

[luj1]

Freedom Force

 

[deuxhero]

With Hero System you can design any character you want with a fairly robust power creation system. You want an energy projector that generates miles wide storms you can do it. Combat is structured fairly well and if you follow the rules then it should be rather easy to do large scale fights.

Lots of them do this though. M&M outright includes this in the description for the power that weather control falls under

Your Environment affects a 30 foot radius around you at rank 1. Each additional rank moves the radius up one distance rank, for a reach of approximately 2,000 miles at rank 20, sufficient to alter the environment of an entire continent!

 

[JamesDixon]

With Hero System you can design any character you want with a fairly robust power creation system. You want an energy projector that generates miles wide storms you can do it. Combat is structured fairly well and if you follow the rules then it should be rather easy to do large scale fights.

Lots of them do this though. M&M outright includes this in the description for the power that weather control falls under

Your Environment affects a 30 foot radius around you at rank 1. Each additional rank moves the radius up one distance rank, for a reach of approximately 2,000 miles at rank 20, sufficient to alter the environment of an entire continent!

Hero System can go up to 10 quadrillion kilometers which is 1,000 light years with the Megascale advantage on a power. It's not a matter if a system can do it. It's a matter of scale. This advantage can be used with pretty much any power.

 

[deuxhero]

Also a thing in M&M.

 

[JamesDixon]

Also a thing in M&M.

Look dude you asked for what people's favorite superhero RPGs. I gave mine. Accept it and move on. I could care less about your worthless d20 superhero game. Real superhero players uses Hero System or GURPs Supers.

 

[Poseidon00]

City of Heroes by a huge margin. One of the best create a characters of all time, just about any power you can think of, you can choose to be evil or somewhere in between, it's all good.

Hero System

Now that's a ruleset I haven't heard about in a long time.

 

[JamesDixon]

City of Heroes by a huge margin. One of the best create a characters of all time, just about any power you can think of, you can choose to be evil or somewhere in between, it's all good.

Hero System

Now that's a ruleset I haven't heard about in a long time.

I've been playing it since 4th edition. I do recall playing a game of Villains & Vigilantes as well. I still prefer Hero System.

 

[deuxhero]

Also a thing in M&M.

Look dude you asked for what people's favorite superhero RPGs. I gave mine. Accept it and move on. I could care less about your worthless d20 superhero game. Real superhero players uses Hero System or GURPs Supers.

I asked for the pros and cons. Doing a thing a lot of the genre does doesn't help me distinguish them.

 

[JamesDixon]

Also a thing in M&M.

Look dude you asked for what people's favorite superhero RPGs. I gave mine. Accept it and move on. I could care less about your worthless d20 superhero game. Real superhero players uses Hero System or GURPs Supers.

I asked for the pros and cons. Doing a thing a lot of the genre does doesn't help me distinguish them.

You do realize that Hero System is the second oldest superhero rpg in existence right? It started out as Champions and published in 1981. Superhero: 2044 was published in 1977 and used a point based system. V&V was published in 1982. So if anyone stole from someone it's M&M stealing from Hero System. I view M&M as NotD&D in tights.

Hero System is not a level based system. It is a point based system that strives to maintain a balance via using character points. Typical normal characters range between 0 to 150 points. Lower powered superheroes are 250-300 points. Standard superheroes are 350 points. High powered superheroes are 350+ points.

Hero System uses advantages and disadvantages for the characters themselves to the actual powers. That's been that way since Champions 1st Edition.

Did I mention you can model any power or printed superhero in Hero System rather easily?

So if you want a real superhero system then play the second published superhero RPG. If not then stop whining about the existence of the second published that NotD&DInTights stole from.

Edit: Changed some facts due to me learning about Superhero: 2044 that was published prior to Champions.

 

[Rilmani404]

I'm playing in a D&D 5e campaign set in the My Hero Academy setting's future. All of us built subclasses (with GM approval every step of the way) for the standard 5e classes (Monk, Fighter, and Cleric) with a class of NPCs who each have a class and subclass. Our GM drew bits and pieces from existing subclasses and spells for these quirk-subclasses. The most awkward mechanic have been Rests and them being ambiguously long or sped up by a medic so that we would have all abilities prepared for the biggest battles. Other differences... I believe our Cleric has spells known instead of preparing them daily. Our Monk traded out Deflect Missile for some sorcerer goodies (that did not make the sniper boss fun). My dice rolls haven't been the best, but I've had a good time roleplaying and fighting in this campaign.

I still have criticisms for melee combat in 5e, but I've survived this far with that downside. Good luck to anyone else who tries a highschool anime setup with DnD 5e as a framework, it will put a LOT of work on your GM's shoulders.

 

[Caim]

Mutants & Masterminds isn't very easy for character building and the combat is a bit iffy, but I just love the sheer variety you can pull off with the system.

 

[mediocrepoet]

City of Heroes by a huge margin. One of the best create a characters of all time, just about any power you can think of, you can choose to be evil or somewhere in between, it's all good.

Was this a tabletop game too or just that online thing?

Some of my friends were really into COH and COV. I hated that you had to colour your own super suit since I'm artistically impaired. I had this old Champions character concept that I was converting into COH and was like: I dunno, his hat should be... brown... and his coat... brown... pants... brown. Wow, this looks awful!

 

[deuxhero]

Mutants & Masterminds isn't very easy for character building and the combat is a bit iffy, but I just love the sheer variety you can pull off with the system.

What do you feel makes the combat "iffy"?

 

[Eldagusto]

I want to say Trinity: Aeon/Aberrant/Adventure 2nd ed but man a lot of the fluff is cringe.

 

[Semper]

I've gotten a hold of a few of these and wanted to hear the Codex's opinion on which they like best since I'm sure people here have played more of them then me (only some M&M experience here) and what the pros and cons of them are.

i really like heroes, but it plays rather slow and is heavy on crunch. yes, it's modular and you can drop half of its systems without losing a lot. but why playing a ruleset when you homebrew it to something different? as an alternative there's fuzion. that's a fusion, hence the name, of cyberpunk's interlock and champion's hero system. it's 70% interlock and 30% hero and plays a lot faster. i've not done much with it, but i've fond memories.

there's also wild talents using the one roll engine. it's also a point buy superhero game capable of doing gritty street level or four color comic book style. its power system is really flexible, imo more so than hero's. it's also based on the one roll engine, where one roll of a d10 pool is used to get the most information out of it. as an example an attack roll: you roll 5d10 looking for sets. a set is a minimum of two identical numbers. that's a width of two. three identical numbers would be a width of three and so on. the width is used as the initiative - the wider your set the faster your action. tie breaker for identical width is the height of the roll - the actual number rolled. the higher the better. both width and height of the roll are also used for damage calculation and hit zones. width is the damage, a gun does width +1 in shock and killing, and the height tells you where you hit your target. the height is also used for difficulty or quality levels. like, you need a minimum height of 5+ to succeed. every set lower than this is ignored.

besides pure storyteller games like fate or rules lite games like pbta or fitd there's not much left playing faster than the one roll engine, and being a somewhat crunchy game.

this year there should also be design mechanism's supers game "destined", using the mythras ruleset - if d100 is more your schtick.

 

[HeroMarine]

I've played Marvel Super Heroes (1984) and had great fun as a kid. Later, in the late 90s, I played GURPS Supers and we had more fun creating the characters than playing the game, but that's GURPS and not-too-nerdy teenagers.

 

[Caim]

Mutants & Masterminds isn't very easy for character building and the combat is a bit iffy, but I just love the sheer variety you can pull off with the system.

What do you feel makes the combat "iffy"?

Mainly how saves work. You've got to have them around your PL to not get shitblasted the moment fists start flying, so the saves become a tax that you need to have. Since saves cost five points per PL to increase, you'll end up with spending a third of your points per level boosting up your saves. Every point you are behind is a 5% decrease in durability, and having a toughness two points or lower than the PL will open you up to being one-shotted in a fight. On top of that, active defenses (dodge, parry, toughness gained through dodge rolls) can be circumvented by either surprise attacks or a big pot of super lube. If Superman falls on his face he's still bulletproof: Green Arrow is not. The issue with active defenses worsens the higher your PL is: getting your Dodge halved at PL6 is a lot less impactful than it is at PL16.