M&M2e: No HP!? What were they thinking?

[Denaes]

M&M used the damage save and had like a side bar for using HP. Heck, from what my friend told me (I havn't touched M&M) it had sidebars and optional rules for many things. It was a toolkit book that made it suitable for many things.

He got M&M2e yesterday and kept complaining that they destroyed the game and made it into just... and I quote this: "just another bland @** super hero game by taking out the toolkit approach that made M&M good to begin with"

Another player says that there will be another book to give it the basic fucntionality M&M had and thats when my friend when livid at having to buy another $20+ (probobly $30 or $40) to get basic use out of M&M2e.

My response was "It's a supers game, they have everything in there for SUPERS".

Regardless half our group refuses to play Damage Save becuase they are married to HPs. They think it's "Fing Retarded" (to use another quote) to hit your opponent, maybe even crit... and then deal no damage. My response was that it was "Fing Retarded" that a 5th level character with HP will never die from a single "lethal" blow (just because I'm always the Devil's advocate and like to argue).

I understand both have their pro's and con's in terms how life is represented.

I personally find it an awful (and probobly arrogant) move for Green Ronin to leave out the HP option when they know that so many gamers won't use the Damage Save. It's like they're saying "Well... the Damage Save is popular now... we have True20 and people like M&M.... so rather than spend that .5-2 pages on HPs the majority of RPG players can buy a seperate book to make use of M&M.

My friend insists that M&M2e is unplayable for us right now and I insist he's a drama queen since the Damage Save is pretty much the same as M&M1e & True20 and we have the HP conversions for both of those, thus we have the HP conversions for M&M2e.

I think it's more of a morals/pride issue at having the parts of the book he liked stripped down and put into another book he has to buy. Which he might not. He's thinking of selling M&M2e or someting.

::Shrugs::

I think it's just foolish not to include a small conversion for something so popular.

 

[Michael Tree]

Its a shame your players are being such drama queens. Few other games have house rules written into their core rulebooks. Does your friend complain that D&D doesn't have alternate systems in the PH? Besides, is using HP for M&M really that popular? I've heard people complain about not liking the toughness save, but almost never have I heard about people actually running the game with HPs.

I for one am glad that the descriptions of how to tinker with the system have been moved into their own book. The core book had limited space, I'd much rather that the space be used for developing the core game, rather than how to change it into a different game. Besides, M&M1e could only fit in a few broadly described ideas, but when you have a whole second book of house rules, the designers can take tons of ideas and flesh them all out completely. On the M&M boards, every time someone brings up a house rule, or asks "what if I did X like Y", Steve Kenson almost inevlitably pops up and says "Oh, that'll be in the Mastermind's Manual."

 

[EditorBFG]

My friend insists that M&M2e is unplayable for us right now and I insist he's a drama queen since the Damage Save is pretty much the same as M&M1e & True20 and we have the HP conversions for both of those, thus we have the HP conversions for M&M2e.

Yeah, drama queen kind of seems to fit.

I don't think there was a huge portion of the M&M gamer population out there converting to hit points. Hit points do not fit as well for a super-hero system, which is why Kenson created a new system. When the consumers who weighed in the 2nd Edition to whatever degree (playtesters and people on messageboards, etc.), I have seen little to suggest that a hit point conversion was a major concern.

If someone very badly wants something to be in a revised edition of a game, there are means for getting your opinions to designers-- e-mails, forums, and what-not-- especially if that element is a make-or-break for you. Designers, in general, want to know what people want.

When there are existing conversion rules in print, as there are in this case, as you said-- I really don't understand this need to complain.

 

[Ranger REG]

Yeah, drama queen kind of seems to fit.

More like an understatement the way the thread starter puts him. Methink his spandex is forever wedged up there between the buttock's cheeks, like one of them Ambiguously Gay Duo.

Personally, I don't know if MnM is meant to have a toolkit format. It is much like Champion, a standalone superhero genre rulebook. If you want, petition Green Ronin and Steve Kenson to come up with a toolkit supplement of variant rules.

You should give him a hot pink "I'm married to HP" T-shirt to show his pierced navel.

 

[Kenson]

If you want, petition Green Ronin and Steve Kenson to come up with a toolkit supplement of variant rules.

That'd be a most successful petition, since we're already doing one including, yes, hit point rules.

 

[buzz]

Keep in mind, GR will be publishing a GM's guide for M&M, which may very well have alternate rules, e.g., hit points.

IMO, complaining about the lack of them in the core book is silly. I never got the impression from the M&M boards that many people ever used hp's in their games. And if you really must, well, the rules are there in your 1e copy.

Gamers are a weird lot.

 

[buzz]

That'd be a most successful petition, since we're already doing one including, yes, hit point rules.

See?

I repeat, gamers are a weird lot.

 

[Greg K]

That'd be a most successful petition, since we're already doing one including, yes, hit point rules.

I was actually hoping that you would not include the hit points rules. I would rather see the space used for other things.

 

[Denaes]

Keep in mind, GR will be publishing a GM's guide for M&M, which may very well have alternate rules, e.g., hit points.

IMO, complaining about the lack of them in the core book is silly. I never got the impression from the M&M boards that many people ever used hp's in their games. And if you really must, well, the rules are there in your 1e copy.

Gamers are a weird lot.

Well it wouldn't be silly as M&M1e had them. There wouldn't be a reason to expect that options from 1e would turn up missing in 2e.

 

[Denaes]

I was actually hoping that you would not include the hit points rules. I would rather see the space used for other things.

While I like damage save, I'm sorely dissapointed by the omission of something so basic. Basically saying "We don't need your kind" to Players/Groups who don't like the damage save.

Pony up the quarter page and put them in. It wouldn't force anything else out of the game.

You're not talking about taking out a chapter or set of powers for more space.

All in all, a GM toolkit will be helpful for M&M GMs, but even once it's out people arn't going to buy both books just to get basic functionality out of them.

Right now the best Green Ronin could hope to salvage their offense to HP Gamers would be to throw up a little PDF explaining how it works. Not saying they would want to care about HP gamers as they really have no obligation.

Apparently there arn't notes on converting d20 products to M&M then... because that would deal with HP as well.

As far as my friend goes, I think he is being a drama queen because we have the conversion rules in two different books we own. So I don't see a problem for us playing M&M using HP.