Valiant Adventures Superhero TTRPG Coming From Green Ronin

Mutants & Masterminds powered standalone game coming to Kickstarter in January.

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Green Ronin has announced that it's Mutants & Masterminds-powered superhero RPG, Valiant Adventures, will be hitting Kickstarter on January 16th.

The game was originally announced in April 2023, and will be a standalone RPG based on the Valiant comic book universe, which features characters such as X-O Manowar, Bloodshot, Harbinger, Shadowman, and Archer & Armstrong. The initial launch will include three books--Valiant Adventures Hero’s Handbook, Gamemaster’s Kit, and the Worlds of Valiant sourcebook.
 

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Squared

Explorer
I'm surprised. And I'm thinking that a three book game for a universe most people haven't even heard of might not be the best idea. I went to college with the guy who wrote the characters for the DC books, and I know he read Valliant titles, so I'd expect the writeups to be very solid if they bring him back in.

I wonder if this will be a stealth 4th edition for the system.
Close, I heard about is a few months back. Supposedly the idea is that this will be more of a 4e beta, or maybe a 3.5.

In other words, clean up the system, try out some new ideas, and use this as a launching point for a new edition. So a new edition will follow, probably only if this new game does well.

^2
 

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They've said that it'll be entirely based on the existing 3rd ed system. Hopefully they'll tidy up some sore points, like the overpricedness of Shrinking, the messiness of Affliction, and the lack of anything resembling 2e's Independent modifier, which sorely limits the flexibility of the point-buy power building system. But i wouldn't bet on it. It sounded like they were just going to do a straight system lift and drop.

I was surprised, and to be honest, a bit disappointed to hear about this, to be honest. I don't know much about Valiant, but I have no interest in the sort of grimmer-and-gritter supers type genre that was being talked up by GR in the various announcements, and it does seem very niche and lacking in broader appeal beyond a few hardcore comic fans. I mean, I love M&M and I'll buy almost anything that comes out for the system, but there's nothing for me here. I wonder if GR made any sort of attempt to get the Marvel licence at all? It would seem to make sense, given their experience with licenced properties and M&Ms status as one of the big superhero games, but Marvel went with something completely brand new from Matt Forbeck instead (maybe they wanted to do it all in-house rather than licence out?) Or maybe GRs history with making a DC game counted against them there?

But honestly, I've been a little concerned about how M&M in particular and GR in general are going for a long time. There's been quite the revolving door of people running the line, there's been very few new products in recent years, the third-party publisher scene for the system is pretty much dead except for one mob pushing out pdfs containing statblocks for Marvel expys, the patreon is just access to periodical dev chats etc now rather than any game material, and GR had to run a kickstarter a little while back in order to afford to be able to reprint the core rulebook, which only achieved limited success. And a lot of their business model seems to be heavily based around licenced games that have a very limited shelf life once the property they're based on takes a back seat in people's minds. Game of Thrones, the Expanse, Fifth Season, Dragon Age etc etc have taken up a lot of their attention.

Still, they're still in business after 20 years, so they're obviously doing something right. They're nothing like the industry presence they were in the d20 era though, they're distinctly minor players now.
Good question. I’ve definitely used the Game of Thrones and Expanse products in my gaming life, and I remember Green Ronin being a big(ish) deal once upon a time. I wonder what happened? Or maybe nothing happened and the market just got ahead of them for a while?
 

SteveC

Doing the best imitation of myself
I have really liked Green Ronin's products over the years and have a lot of them. If I'm honest, though, they have really made some decisions I've had to shake my head at, and it's really been a while since I've been excited by something they've put out. But I do like M&M so I'll probably buy it electronically if it's available that way.
 

JEB

Legend
I have really liked Green Ronin's products over the years and have a lot of them. If I'm honest, though, they have really made some decisions I've had to shake my head at, and it's really been a while since I've been excited by something they've put out.
This is where I am. I used to be a pretty big GR fan, but the way they handled the harassment allegations in 2017-2018 was a big turn-off, and I've not bought any of their new products since. The only product that tempted me was the M&M time-travel book, but not enough to wanna support them again; I don't think this product is going to change that.
 

Von Ether

Legend
I'm a GR fan. Perhaps the biggest slowdown to my purchases was the downtime between releases for their AGE system. Until recently, there wasn't coming out for it.
 

corwyn77

Adventurer
They just renamed them "Advantages".
I am still kind of stupefied that GR didn't completely abandon the ogl for 3e. It was barely needed and a few more changes would have done it. As for brand recognition, it's a third ed. If you don't know about M&M by now, you don't care and OGL on the back cover isn't going to change your mind.
 

I am still kind of stupefied that GR didn't completely abandon the ogl for 3e. It was barely needed and a few more changes would have done it. As for brand recognition, it's a third ed. If you don't know about M&M by now, you don't care and OGL on the back cover isn't going to change your mind.
I suspect it probably didn't even occur to them. 3e is nearly 15 years old now, the OGL was still seen as pretty much rock-solid at the time it was first published (and in the wake of WotC trying shenanigans with the GSL around that time, GR withdrawing from the OGL would probably not have been received charitably in the community). Besides, M&M 2e had done very well out of its OGL licencing, attracting a large 3pp ecosystem. OGL probably looked like an all-upside proposition for them, than. I suspect that, should a 4th ed ever materialise, it'll either be OGL or move to ORC or CC licencing too.
 

Thomas Shey

Legend
I am still kind of stupefied that GR didn't completely abandon the ogl for 3e. It was barely needed and a few more changes would have done it. As for brand recognition, it's a third ed. If you don't know about M&M by now, you don't care and OGL on the back cover isn't going to change your mind.

Until the recent events I suspect there was simply no reason, and that way they covered it if by accident they were still stepping in IP (or Someone thought they were).
 


teitan

Legend
I am still kind of stupefied that GR didn't completely abandon the ogl for 3e. It was barely needed and a few more changes would have done it. As for brand recognition, it's a third ed. If you don't know about M&M by now, you don't care and OGL on the back cover isn't going to change your mind.
It has some rules in it from the OGL from 3PP and they have their Superlink license as well as adding to the OGC for each edition. When 3e was published... a decade ago... the OGL was the best model for their business and the standard for everyone. Nobody who used it for a game tossed it no matter how much changed.
 

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