d20 Super Heroes --- coming in July '06 from WOTC

[takyris]

Guns don't interest you in a moden-day game? It's like a D&D player who is not interested in swords.

I'd suggest that there's some gray area between "guns don't interest me at all" and "guns don't interest me enough to pay money to get much more granular, nitty-gritty options I don't need for a game that isn't military themed."

If you're running a paranormal investigation game, yeah, there's combat, and yeah, stuff might get shot, but you don't a book chock full of more gun options to make it work. If you want more gun options, that's fine, but you don't need them to make that game work, any more than you need anything beyond the DMG and a little imagination to come up with all the swords your heroes will ever need for levels 1-20 and beyond.

 

[buzz]

Really? Anyone I asked which product is most disappointing and without skipping a heartbeat most say it is d20 Past.

d20P can easily disappoint if you're expecting breadth; it's just too short a book. However, I think the content within is fine. Lots of bits worth stealing. Urban Arcana, otoh, I just felt wasn't a good product. I have a review posted over at RPG.net if you want to know why.

Guns don't interest you in a moden-day game? It's like a D&D player who is not interested in swords.

The guns listed in the core book pretty much cover, mechanically, all of the permutations d20M's granualrity allows. Ergo, I didn't see a need for 200 page book of guns. Honestly, should a second ed. come, they need to just list the guns as "light pistol" or "heavy SMG" (a la classic Traveller) and save model names for the weapon descriptions (e.g., "Real-world examples of this kind of gun include the .50 caliber Desert Eagle, etc.").

To extend the D&D comparison, a sword buff could go on about all kinds of distinct longswords, but as long as all of them do 1d8, I don't need a book about them.

If I want to get pornographic about guns, I'll whip out Dark Champions.

I'm fairly certain that if d20 Superhero has more-than-enough material to easily set up a d20 Modern supers game that can (optionally) blend/crossover with other genres (Batman meets James Bond?), the product will have its own audience...

Bingo. I might not use the book to run straight supers, but I'd love to add it to a d20M game and see what happens.

 

[JPL]

Mostly, I think of it as a way of bringing my Mutant X / Nightman / Mantis crossover fanfic to life.

 

[takyris]

Mostly, I think of it as a way of bringing my Mutant X / Nightman / Mantis crossover fanfic to life.

See, and here I was just thinking, "Man, there's no way whatsoever to bring an ignominiouser end to my beloved Mantis than what Fox did."

 

[King of Old School]

Guns don't interest you in a moden-day game? It's like a D&D player who is not interested in swords.

You mean, like people who play wizards and clerics?

The WoD games appear to have achieved a reasonable measure of popularity without putting any meaningful focus on guns.

KoOS

 

[King of Old School]

(snip discussion of level-and-class versus point-buy for supers)

It is a matter of taste. For me, everything you've described is so incredibly clunky, unwieldy and limiting that I wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole. Other people might feel similarly about point-buy, of course.

As for the Mutants and Masterminds vs. d20 Superheroes issue, dedicated superhero genre gamers who were already playing M&M are unlikely to change over, however gamers who haven't dabbled in the genre much, or are already d20 Modern fans are the ones who will pick up d20SH, and are unlikely to give M&M much consideration.

I think you're half-right: people who are already d20M fans, and interested in supers, are the likely market for this book. OTOH, gamers who haven't dabbled in the genre much and don't already own d20M aren't likely going to buy and read two full books for a genre they're not mad about.

Much like Castles & Crusades is to D&D, M&M is a 3rd party product with a small but very loyal following, but isn't a big player in the larger gaming scene. Honestly, outside of ENWorld, I've barely even heard of M&M (and outside of online, I've never heard of it at all), never seen it at any FLGS, I don't recall seeing it in the dealers room at Gen Con. I've seen people in real life talk about or play superhero genre games, but with GURPS (gods help them), HERO/Champions, TSR/Marvel, even Brave New World and Silver Age Sentinels, but never M&M. It may have sold many copies to a dedicated fan base, but beyond that base its "mindspace" in general gaming seems to be quite low

Regional anecdotes are interesting, but not very conclusive. I live in one of North America's largest cities, and of the three significant FLGSes in the downtown area, all of them carry M&M; in the bigger two, M&M is very popular, is promoted by the staff, and outsells every single supplement released for d20M (though not the corebook, and possibly excepting d20 Future -- my contacts weren't 100% certain). I'm aware that means almost nothing for total sales even regionally, given the ubiquity of online bookstores. Still, it has pretty significant mindspace here.

Also, the GenCon anecdote is sort of goofy given the stupid-mad rush for copies of M&M2e.

KoOS

 

[Jim Hague]

Much like Castles & Crusades is to D&D, M&M is a 3rd party product with a small but very loyal following, but isn't a big player in the larger gaming scene. Honestly, outside of ENWorld, I've barely even heard of M&M (and outside of online, I've never heard of it at all), never seen it at any FLGS, I don't recall seeing it in the dealers room at Gen Con.

You really couldn't be more wrong. I'll let Nikki, Steve or Chris give you some insight into the actual numbers, but I believe that MnM 2e is doing very well, and 1e was one of the best-selling d20 variants out there. Sorry, but them's the facts.

 

[Jim Hague]

Even as a paraphrase, that misses an important point: i said "D20M is only better than Spycraft for running 'modern D&D'"--in all of my comparisons, i never intended to say that any of the WotC stuff is crap. With rare exception, i don't think that--I think most of it is good. I just don't think any of it is awesome. By way of analogy, I didn't say "Rush sucks", i said "in every way in which Rush is good, there is another band that is better,"--and i'll let you pick the measuring stick.

This is generally considered 'damning with faint praise'. It's also dissembling and widely considered a fairly cowardly debating tactic to adopt. You made a value statement, now you're backpedaling and refusing to back up what you've said. Nobody's misunderstanding you; you're simply not willing to back your opinions up, and state them as facts.

 

[buzz]

It may have sold many copies to a dedicated fan base, but beyond that base its "mindspace" in general gaming seems to be quite low...

Given d20 is the most popular RPG system (or family of systems) on earth, and M&M is the most popular d20 supers RPG, I"m not sure how much credence I can give such a claim.

M&M and Champions are arguably the two primary supers RPGs right now. Heck, beyond Heroes Unlimited, I'm not sure how many other SHRPGs are even being actively supported. SAS? Effectively dead. Godlike? Effectively dead. Aberrant? Dead. MEGS? Dead. DCU? Dead. Marvel? Dead.

Beyond these, all we have are SHRPGs from small publishers, none of which have much of a fanbase, and OOP favorites (e.g., FASERIP Marvel). And all that's on the horizon is Eden's City of Heroes, GURPS Powers (which isn't specifically supers, but inclusive of), the DC RPG that Black Industries has planned, and... d20 Superheroes. I don't feel that CoH is going to go anywhere, GURPS already has its established fanbase, and the new DC RPG is still a toss-up at this point. d20S has potential, IMO.

Still, as far as "mindspace"... M&M's got it.

 

[C. Baize]

It is a matter of taste. For me, everything you've described is so incredibly clunky, unwieldy and limiting that I wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole. Other people might feel similarly about point-buy, of course.
KoOS

Exactly.
I've used point-buy exactly once. Decided it was the spawn of Surtr, and vowed to never do so, again.
It's pretty safe to say that I have an undying loathing of point-buy.