Why Not Supers?

Best Selling RPGs - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com
some more 90s goodness...

1fn2c.jpg


FGzII.jpg


image06.jpg
 
Here's the trick to supers - they aren't a genre, they are a character archetype that can fit into ANY genre.

Mystery/Detective, Space Opera, Espionage/Political Thriller, Horror, Coming of Age, Soap Opera, Teen Drama, etc. Superheros effortless slide into all of these.

You want to have fun with a superhero system - grab a module from ANY other game - Call of Cthulhu, Boot Hill, Star Frontiers, whatever - and just insert the players as superheroes into it.

That's what I've noticed about the MCU as opposed to the DCEU- many of the MCU movies are just genre movies with supers thrown on top of it. If they make a good spy thriller (winter soldier), war movie (first avenger), shakespearean drama (Thor, Black Panther) and put supers on top of it, you have a firm foundation that people can unconsciously base their belief on.
 
must be that lower space gravity
 
One thing I'd say about supers. that you're locked into that game. I don't think it has the same longevity as other stuff. I mean, in fantasy you can do a shedload of different types of games, and the same in Sci-Fi (even more so!). As opposed to donning the cape an fighting crime every week. And the same beats in each episodic (or comic issue).

I couldn't possibly disagree more. One of the most brilliant things about the supers genre is that it is such an elastic premise that can handle SO MANY different sub-genres. You can have a four-color stopping the villain robbing the bank one week, stop an alien invasion the next, journey to WWII the week after, then travel through the galaxy for a cosmic threat following that. I've done straight-up fantasy, horror, comedy, and a whole host of other flavors within this genre, and it all works perfectly!

As for longevity, my current campaign is now 30 years old (being played quite regularly all that time), and right now we have five different groups/superhero teams with literally dozens of players. Recently we had a game where there were like 18 of us participating (not everybody could make it) at the same time.
 
That's one of the reasons H&S while it focuses on "Why people put on tights and do good." Fight crime is only one possible choice. Save lives, explore the strangeness of the universe with superpowers, explore other universes, etc are all options.
 
One issue I have encountered in supers RPGs is that many published adventures are just a series of fight scenes. I usually add or incorporate lots of investigative stuff. But I also try very hard to make the action scenes big and colorful. Races against time, environmental hazards, etc.
 
Y'all are reminding me why I quit reading comics from April '92 until December '99.
 
Y'all are reminding me why I quit reading comics from April '92 until December '99.

I only got back into comics when G.I.Joe came back in September, 2001 by Devil's Due Publishing and I started reading JMS/Romita Jr Amazing Spider-Man, which (no pun intended) was amazing at the time.
 
One issue I have encountered in supers RPGs is that many published adventures are just a series of fight scenes. I usually add or incorporate lots of investigative stuff. But I also try very hard to make the action scenes big and colorful. Races against time, environmental hazards, etc.


Yeah, most supers modules are uninspired and uninteresting. It was part of the reason I had a prejudice against using published modules for RPGs for the longest time
 
I only got back into comics when G.I.Joe came back in September, 2001 by Devil's Due Publishing and I started reading JMS/Romita Jr Amazing Spider-Man, which (no pun intended) was amazing at the time.

That was my last gasp of modern Spider-man comics, up until JrJR's departure after issue 500, and JMS caught stupid with his Gwen Stacy retcon

Issue 500 was a pretty good endcap to the original series though, maybe not my ideal ending, but it was a pretty damn epic way to go out - that two page spread by Romita Jr of Spidey re-fighting all his greatest battles is still one of my favourite images from Spidey comics of all time
 
Y'all are reminding me why I quit reading comics from April '92 until December '99.
I read a LOT of comics in the 90s, they just weren't superhero comics. Love & Rockets, Good Girls, all the great 'indie' stuff. Like with WOTC/GW, supers might have paid the rent but there was a whole lot of other good stuff on the back shelves at our local comic shop.

I'd never liked super comics as a kid because the first ones I saw were mid-story, with copious links to other comics, "* see issue 405 of Platinum Ferret." There's no way I was going to be able to keep up with that.
 
I read a LOT of comics in the 90s, they just weren't superhero comics. Love & Rockets, Good Girls, all the great 'indie' stuff. Like with WOTC/GW, supers might have paid the rent but there was a whole lot of other good stuff on the back shelves at our local comic shop.

I'd never liked super comics as a kid because the first ones I saw were mid-story, with copious links to other comics, "* see issue 405 of Platinum Ferret." There's no way I was going to be able to keep up with that.

Yeah, I've now gone back and read plenty of comics from that era, and there was definitely some good, weird, interesting stuff.
 
There were...clues...regarding JMS before that point.

When he went after that one villainess...Shakra? Shakira? and started yelling at her about how shed attacked the thing most important to him, his reputation...I was like

45f1b6751137f07087cb2d90c2271193.gif
 
I blame three people: Joe Quesada, Axel Alonso, and Stephen Wacker. The latter liked to go on CBR and rile up marriage supporters.
 
I'm not familiar with Wacker


that must have been a hard childhood though....
 
I couldn't possibly disagree more. One of the most brilliant things about the supers genre is that it is such an elastic premise that can handle SO MANY different sub-genres. You can have a four-color stopping the villain robbing the bank one week, stop an alien invasion the next, journey to WWII the week after, then travel through the galaxy for a cosmic threat following that. I've done straight-up fantasy, horror, comedy, and a whole host of other flavors within this genre, and it all works perfectly!

Sorry. Perhaps I wasn't quite clear... Sure, you can change the backdrop (location, type of villain, etc.). However, for the most part you're donning the cape and fighting a bad guy in very similar parameters. Now, you can change it up and make it more complex or nuanced. But as a 'general rule' Supers are pretty cookie cutter games imo.
 
Yet all those things can feature in a superhero game.

Yes, that's very true! And comics certainly do that, a lot. But the experience and tone of the game will be decidedly 'supers'. Which may not suit some folks. I've often read people describing high level D&D games as supers in fantasy land. I'd tend to agree with that statement. However, I prefer low level style games overall (that would go for supers too).

So I guess it depends what you want from your sci and fan games.
 
Here's the trick to supers - they aren't a genre, they are a character archetype that can fit into ANY genre.

Mystery/Detective, Space Opera, Espionage/Political Thriller, Horror, Coming of Age, Soap Opera, Teen Drama, etc. Superheros effortless slide into all of these.

You want to have fun with a superhero system - grab a module from ANY other game - Call of Cthulhu, Boot Hill, Star Frontiers, whatever - and just insert the players as superheroes into it.
Someone who gets it! I'm sorry I didn't see this earlier! Yes, this! I've been pointing this out for years! Thank you! Sincerely, thank you.
 
One issue I have encountered in supers RPGs is that many published adventures are just a series of fight scenes.

I always thought this too. Most of the published modules that I've read are pretty pedestrian.

That said, I do love the genre when it's grim and gritty... But I can appreciate that it's not everyone's cup of tea.

If I was GMing supers now. I'd be more inclined to play something along the lines of Scanners (Cronenberg), Akira, Sin City or Watchmen (NOT the recent tv show).
 
A Little bit of H&S2E after Introduction and the silly what is Role-playing that I'd honestly cut out but people complained:


High Trust Adventures Design Begins with a solvable problem. The problem then has several layers and pops—aspects of the problem or side problem. What is the Problem?



Five Ingredients:
Problems Worth Solving
Stakes Relevant to PC's
Characters worth Meeting
Places Worth Exploring

and why its never just that easy!
 
Sorry. Perhaps I wasn't quite clear... Sure, you can change the backdrop (location, type of villain, etc.). However, for the most part you're donning the cape and fighting a bad guy in very similar parameters. Now, you can change it up and make it more complex or nuanced. But as a 'general rule' Supers are pretty cookie cutter games imo.

I think the nuance missing is that you can run Supers that way. Just like you can run Fantasy as just dungeon crawls. I haven't played in nor run a Supers game that was just you put on a cape and fight a bad guy since high school when we were playing FASERIP.
 
I think the nuance missing is that you can run Supers that way. Just like you can run Fantasy as just dungeon crawls. I haven't played in nor run a Supers game that was just you put on a cape and fight a bad guy since high school when we were playing FASERIP.


Funny enough, I was running my game in early playtests (High Valor), and the players went to a dungeon, only to find an actual dungeon, cells, torture devices, that sort of thing. No big mazes, of craziness. They were surprised. It amused me :grin:
 
Yes, that's very true! And comics certainly do that, a lot. But the experience and tone of the game will be decidedly 'supers'.
Well, you mentioned Scanners... and to me that's very much a 'supers' story. Not necessarily super HERO though... and certainly no capes or costumes. Similar to Unbreakable in that the guy has powers but its up to him what he does with them.
So maybe, rather than labeling a game as 'superheros', just go with the PCs maybe obtaining or discovering they already have powers.
Or does it have to have 'superhero' on the label?
 
Well, you mentioned Scanners... and to me that's very much a 'supers' story. Not necessarily super HERO though... and certainly no capes or costumes. Similar to Unbreakable in that the guy has powers but its up to him what he does with them.
So maybe, rather than labeling a game as 'superheros', just go with the PCs maybe obtaining or discovering they already have powers.
Or does it have to have 'superhero' on the label?

That's the way to go... :smile:

Actually, come to think of it, I can't believe I forgot about Dare Devil, Jessica Jones, and The Punisher (the TV shows!). They were fantastic. These would be the type of supers games I would love to play in.

Basically one large evolving dramatic arc with some very interesting subplots. And it's pretty grim at the same time. Despite the characters prowess they go through physical and emotional hell. But get there in the end... :smile:
 
I think the nuance missing is that you can run Supers that way. Just like you can run Fantasy as just dungeon crawls. I haven't played in nor run a Supers game that was just you put on a cape and fight a bad guy since high school when we were playing FASERIP.

Sure, you can... BUT most people don't, and as OP pointed out, that a lot of the published scenarios are pretty 2 dimensional. Of course, I'm painting a 'broad' picture of the genre, in an attempt to answer the topic.

I think a few people here think I actually don't like the genre. I certainly do... But I like street level stuff with violence (Sin City).

Regarding fantasy... Yes, you can certainly just play dungeon crawls. Like you (with supers), I've not played in a Dungeon Crawl since I was a kid. In fact, they put me off D&D for nearly two decades. WFRP took center stage. I just loved the tone and style of the adventures and not a dungeon in sight. :smile:
 
If I see mandatory advancement system in a supers game, that’s a good way to lose me without going any farther.

You make Kevin Siembieda cry.


Also I find it utterly baffling that one could see the silliness of superhero stuff while simultaneously not seeing the silliness of fantasy.

My gaming group, to a T.

I generally prefer my fantasy as lowly rat catcher makes good vs. Conan on a hill of skulls... but that ain't 5e.

How are those mutually exclusive? (I loved that WFRP2 had Norscan Berserker as a possible starting career.)

90s comics were trash fite me

I will fight at your side. (It’s driving me crazy that Alex Macris, one of my favorite designers, is writing a superhero RPG and the whole aesthetic is patterned on OTT 1990s Iron Age crap.)

Here's the trick to supers - they aren't a genre, they are a character archetype that can fit into ANY genre.

Mystery/Detective, Space Opera, Espionage/Political Thriller, Horror, Coming of Age, Soap Opera, Teen Drama, etc. Superheros effortless slide into all of these.

A fun way to look at it; I have certainly had a measure of success with more focused games that might be described as “supers in ____” e.g. Godbound.

You want to have fun with a superhero system - grab a module from ANY other game - Call of Cthulhu, Boot Hill, Star Frontiers, whatever - and just insert the players as superheroes into it.

There’s an intriguing ideaI will give it some thought.

Despite my absolute naivety in the genre, I want to put in a good word for Palladium’s Heroes Unlimited books — Century Station and Gramercy Island — the only “supers sandbox” books I have ever seen.
 
My own experiences trying to run, or even play supers have been sad, in that my gaming group consists almost entirely of self-avowed comics fans who were unable to play as anything other than murderhobos with an adolescent sense of humor. They do not even consider adherence to four-color tropes, despite The Talk.

I might have some success with a tightly focused premise (Godbound certainly went well), maybe a mission-based game. Or maybe a gritty supers sort of deal like Aberrant or most Wild Talents settings (Progenitor was intriguing).
 
Banner: The best cosmic horror & Cthulhu Mythos @ DriveThruRPG.com
Back
Top