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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Wofano Wotanto" data-source="post: 9377042" data-attributes="member: 7044704">You kind of have to do that these days, right?  Back before, say, 2000 I could confidently say that I was at least familiar with every supers RPG out there even if I'd never played some of them.  Not in 2024.  The proliferation of rule sets in the last couple of decades has made that nearly impossible, and stuff flies under the radar so easily on sites like DTRPG.  Always need to keep an eye on what other folks are talking about if you want to avoid missing stuff, even within this fairly small subgenre.Just imagine the insanity of trying to keep up with every new fantasy TTRPG release...  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />   Most of the groups I've played Sentinels with (and all the ones I've run for) use Method Two (ie, the not-random one) by default, although if you're struggling for inspiration the random one is also a legit choice.  The Method One "Guided By the Dice" approach is helpful for newer players (it greatly reduces the number of decision points) but as you said it's not great if you have a character concept in mind already.  I have a particular dislike for the idea of rolling to determine your personality, especially since it's a 2d10 roll and doubles can really shaft you pretty hard.  We used to use Guided when we in a rush (ie in pickup games) and it is faster than Method Two even for vets, but honestly if you need the time that badly just using a pregen (either official or <a href="https://villainyunpublished.blogspot.com/2023/04/superheroes-index.html" target="_blank">any of the numerous homebrews</a> floating around) is even quicker.Admittedly, some character concepts are a strain to make even with Method Two, but there's the "secret" Method Three freeform option.  I've played/run quite a bit and only seen two players come up with a hero that needed to go that route (with GM okay), and even those just needed to take a couple of powers and/or qualities that a Method Two build couldn't have due to menu restrictions.  I think one of them had a custom homebrew Yellow ability too, but I've seen those crop up somewhat more often (again with GM okay) when tweaking characters at the point you earn a collection.In a perfect world (or a second edition, which seems highly unlikely) the whole CharGen system would be more streamlined and rely less on arbitrary restrictions from 80 different menus while retaining a simpler approach with fewer decisions needed for new players, but even the existing one seems preferable to the common "archetype" approach you see in many supers games.</blockquote>

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