M&M: How does a villain get a word in edge-wise?

[Ben Robbins]

I'd second the PL guidelines Jim laid out, but with the caveat that a lot depends on the combination of characters. Characters with more extreme trade-offs have a lot less effect against opponents with the opposite trade-off -- even if they are same PL, a speedster who has a 15 attack/5 damage trade-off will have a hard time hurting a powerhouse with a 5 defense/15 toughness trade-off, and vice versa (assuming defense trade-offs match attack trade-offs for these character types). The powerhouse will never hit the speedster, and the speedster will never hurt the powerhouse -- which is just as it should be, and encourages both sides to get creative. Can the speedster Trick the powerhouse into punching the pole that drops the high tension electrical wire on him?

But no matter how carefully you set your villains, damage in M&M is unpredictable. I think that makes a good imitation of comic book action, allowing very fast dynamic fights, but as Scholz and others mention, it means as the GM you have to master GM's Fiat to smooth out those unexpected bad rolls. You also have to be careful not to overuse GM's Fiat -- you can literally make the fight go on forever if you want to.

Developing a good sense of when to use Complications and when to use GM's Fiat, giving the players Hero Points in return, is an important part of being a good M&M GM.

 

[Asmor]

That link with all the fights is pretty cool... Also not very realistic since I don't think "disarm" or "cover" are even in my players' vocabulary. >_>

I'm also still not sold on the idea of GM fiat... I don't care if it is in the rules, it still feels like cheating to me.

 

[scholz]

I'm also still not sold on the idea of GM fiat... I don't care if it is in the rules, it still feels like cheating to me.

It takes a little getting used to. One thing that helps is seeing the players using Hero Points.
That isn't cheating. Well GM Fiat is basically the same thing (in fact they used to have a mechanism called villain points) which basically did the same thing.

One reason it might seem like cheating, is that coming from the D&D tradition, of set EL adventures that the players do anything they can to defeat it.

You can run M&M like that. But, it you want the stories to seem more like comic books, you almost must use GM Fiat, as well as complications in order to achieve the STORY elements that are a part of the genre. If the heroes KO the master villain in short order every adventure, it won't seem much like the comics. But, if they are initially thwarted, only then to rise up and defeat the badguy in the end, then you will have the classic story arc.

It only seems like cheating because you are in the DM vs Players mode. That is not the prime mode of the genre.

 

[Treacherous_B]

That link with all the fights is pretty cool... Also not very realistic since I don't think "disarm" or "cover" are even in my players' vocabulary. >_>

I'm also still not sold on the idea of GM fiat... I don't care if it is in the rules, it still feels like cheating to me.

To be fair, if I knew the effects of things like cover, I'm sure that it would look like a more appealing option. Well, if my character was different, obv..

 

[Corsair]

Get a battlesuit with an autofire blast (chaingun?) to lay down cover fire, and it is surprisingly useful.

 

[The_Universe]

It takes a little getting used to. One thing that helps is seeing the players using Hero Points.
That isn't cheating. Well GM Fiat is basically the same thing (in fact they used to have a mechanism called villain points) which basically did the same thing.

One reason it might seem like cheating, is that coming from the D&D tradition, of set EL adventures that the players do anything they can to defeat it.

You can run M&M like that. But, it you want the stories to seem more like comic books, you almost must use GM Fiat, as well as complications in order to achieve the STORY elements that are a part of the genre. If the heroes KO the master villain in short order every adventure, it won't seem much like the comics. But, if they are initially thwarted, only then to rise up and defeat the badguy in the end, then you will have the classic story arc.

It only seems like cheating because you are in the DM vs Players mode. That is not the prime mode of the genre.

Agreed. GM fiat is an absolute necessity for the comic book feel. Read a few comics - bad guy confronts heroes, heroes start to lose (GM fiat), heroes regroup and defeat the bad guy.

In D&D terms, that never happens, because if the heroes can't beat the villain at the beginning of the fight, they cannot possibly do so at the end. RPG stats, as a general rule, don't encompass the "get better as the dramatic potential of the story becomes greater" mechanic. M&M gets as close as it can with GM fiat (and the player reward for using GM fiat - Hero Points).

It's a different mentality, but a superior one for this type of game, IMO.

 

[Threedub]

Another thing to think about is keeping the players busy so that they can't all team up on one villain. I like to have some mooks, or have the villain launch an attack against a nearby school bus or building. That way, someone has to go save the kids, or put out the fire, and the big baddy can fight a hero one to one, or one to two.

In my experience this is the best way to handle the situation, in addition to upping the super-villain's PL. Place fights in population centers and have a list of possible non-super targets (which you can save and use again). Find out just how much of a "hero" they are.

What it does is give the supers something else to use their powers on so that they can feel useful and have fun. Fighting an uber-villain who is impervious to most of the groups powers is frustrating and worse boring. Give them something to do instead of punishing them for being to good.

 

[hong]

From a hidden speaker pipes in the Real SuperMandrill's voice. "You fools, while you've been playing with my Mandoids, I have been having a "chat" with Madam Mayor.

And I gotta say, I just hate it when people play with my Mandoids.

 

[Jim Hague]

RE: Monologuing, I was using "get a word in edge-wise" metaphorically... In the case I mention, the villain was really just a powerful experiment, not a mastermind or any sort of plotter.

Thanks for the advice on PLs. Jim, how tough in your experience would that be for 5 heroes? Appropriate for one-per-session or should I save that for really big, hard things?

I use those guidelines as an everyday/every game sort of thing - mind you, I have a big (8 heroes plus a couple of full PL NPCs) group that both runs in a regular campaign and playtests things like The Vault of Dr. Mechaniaikal, so YMMV. For Big Bad Supervillains, I usually go with the higher end of the scale, and stick to the lower end for minor league, common or lieutenant villains. For a group of 5, it should provide a challenging but not impossibly difficult fight.

Remember, though, that villains can cheat - the rules for creating one are somewhat different, if you check around pp 20-30 or so in the main book. And I have to jump on the GM Fiat wagon - it may feel like cheating, but remember that when you use it, you're also rewarding the players with Hero Points, which takes a great deal of the sting out of it. Honestly, I think Fiat is badly named - no offense to Steve here - because it doesn't represent what it's truly doing, which is expediting fun for everyone at the table.

 

[Kenson]

Honestly, I think Fiat is badly named - no offense to Steve here - because it doesn't represent what it's truly doing, which is expediting fun for everyone at the table.

Fair enough. I actually considered GM Expediting the Fun for Everyone at the Table but it didn't fit quite as well as a section header as GM Fiat.