Last summer, scheduling conflicts temporarily wrecked my D&D Basic live campaign. When play resumed only half the players were able to make the game. Instead of grinding through some side quests, and especially because the player characters were at an important point in the campaign; we transitioned to a completely different RPG. Knowing that we would likely get only a handful of sessions in before our regular game resumed, I decided to give the group a choice among a number of RPGs from my reviewer slush pile.
Though we only got in a handful of sessions, OneDice Supers certainly faired adequately as our fill in game. In hindsight -as the Game Keeper, I was really glad this RPG was chosen. The simple mechanics helped us hit the ground running and most importantly with minimal hiccups.
Every mechanic of this RPG is resolved by rolling one d6. When player characters want to perform an action and if the Game Keeper (GK) determines the action has risk, the GK sets a Target Number (TN) and announces it; the player rolls and adds any bonuses afforded by his character. If the total exceeds the TN, the action is successful. Something interesting about the system is that the bonuses which are added to the Task Roll are calculated at a one to one basis. Bonuses are not derivative. If the character has 2 points in a skill, +2 is added to the Task Roll total. If the Game Keeper determines that one of the character’s other abilities is also relevant -this is added to the roll as well, again on a straight one to one basis.
Character creation is very simple. Heroes have four primary abilities Strong, Clever, Quick and Power. With the first step of creation, players distribute eight points among the primary abilities, with the caveat that no ability can be higher than 3 or less than 1. From these, three additional abilities are derived: Health, Defense and Move. Next players receive 5 points to distribute among Gifts. The special ability of any superhero will be defined by the Gifts the player chooses, perhaps the hero’s ability to fly, or be invulnerable to certain types of attacks or have supernatural stretch abilities etc. Last, players receive six points to distribute for their heroes skills, from a list of around 30. Though, no skill can be boosted to higher than 2 during character creation.
Playing the game and creating a superhero characters is succinctly defined, however the Game Keeper chapter has a lot of options should the GK want to adjust from the standard ruleset. These options should assist for a more heroic or epic level game, or a game with less power and/or something much more gritty. This RPG comes with a choice of three different Skins, for the type of superhero theme you want to run and includes an adventure, which considers each of these skins, to get you started.
The PDF digitizing before me is 132 pages front to back, in single column format, and includes a printable character sheet. Illustrations are in black and white, and limited to depictions of superhero characters posing without background. The layout is simple and includes a Table of Contents (no hyperlinks) and 12 pregenerated characters, optional as quick start player characters or NPCs.
In conclusion, this RPG was a decent fit for our group as a fill-in game and I don’t think it’s a stretch to imagine, and despite its simple mechanics, you could run a campaign with it. If you’re looking for a simple and succinct RPG, OneDice Supers might be the one.
Disclosures: This review uses affiliate links. OneDice Supers was provided by the publisher free of cost.
contributed by Jeff Duncan
Though we only got in a handful of sessions, OneDice Supers certainly faired adequately as our fill in game. In hindsight -as the Game Keeper, I was really glad this RPG was chosen. The simple mechanics helped us hit the ground running and most importantly with minimal hiccups.
Every mechanic of this RPG is resolved by rolling one d6. When player characters want to perform an action and if the Game Keeper (GK) determines the action has risk, the GK sets a Target Number (TN) and announces it; the player rolls and adds any bonuses afforded by his character. If the total exceeds the TN, the action is successful. Something interesting about the system is that the bonuses which are added to the Task Roll are calculated at a one to one basis. Bonuses are not derivative. If the character has 2 points in a skill, +2 is added to the Task Roll total. If the Game Keeper determines that one of the character’s other abilities is also relevant -this is added to the roll as well, again on a straight one to one basis.
Character creation is very simple. Heroes have four primary abilities Strong, Clever, Quick and Power. With the first step of creation, players distribute eight points among the primary abilities, with the caveat that no ability can be higher than 3 or less than 1. From these, three additional abilities are derived: Health, Defense and Move. Next players receive 5 points to distribute among Gifts. The special ability of any superhero will be defined by the Gifts the player chooses, perhaps the hero’s ability to fly, or be invulnerable to certain types of attacks or have supernatural stretch abilities etc. Last, players receive six points to distribute for their heroes skills, from a list of around 30. Though, no skill can be boosted to higher than 2 during character creation.
Playing the game and creating a superhero characters is succinctly defined, however the Game Keeper chapter has a lot of options should the GK want to adjust from the standard ruleset. These options should assist for a more heroic or epic level game, or a game with less power and/or something much more gritty. This RPG comes with a choice of three different Skins, for the type of superhero theme you want to run and includes an adventure, which considers each of these skins, to get you started.
The PDF digitizing before me is 132 pages front to back, in single column format, and includes a printable character sheet. Illustrations are in black and white, and limited to depictions of superhero characters posing without background. The layout is simple and includes a Table of Contents (no hyperlinks) and 12 pregenerated characters, optional as quick start player characters or NPCs.
In conclusion, this RPG was a decent fit for our group as a fill-in game and I don’t think it’s a stretch to imagine, and despite its simple mechanics, you could run a campaign with it. If you’re looking for a simple and succinct RPG, OneDice Supers might be the one.
Disclosures: This review uses affiliate links. OneDice Supers was provided by the publisher free of cost.
contributed by Jeff Duncan
