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Message: <blockquote data-quote="GDGD" data-source="post: 9505287" data-attributes="member: 7038631">I still own all my DC Heroes books, which is a testament to my admiration of the game, since I've long-since purged most of my older gaming materials. I would say, however, that by modern standards the system is a bit clunky. It suffers from a forced symmetry that doesn't always work.Here's an example: In DC Heroes, there are 9 attributes, 3 each for physical, mental, and mystical. In each set of attributes, one is your acting value, the next your effect value, and the last your resisting value. Sounds logical, but it produces attributes like Influence and Aura. What's the difference? Well, Influence is a character's ability to influence others, while Aura is the extent to which that influence actually does anything. That's an awfully nuanced distinction to require two separate attributes. I'd love to see the example of someone with high Influence and low Aura or vice versa.Super happy to see the game back in print, but I'd be happier if someone took on the task of modernizing the system. Fundamentally, the system has two earth-shakingly amazing ideas. The first is using an exponential progression rather than linear. Someone with a Strength of 4 is twice as strong as someone with a Strength of 3. So when you see that Superman has a Strength of 25, it gives you some idea of how cosmically strong he is, and also how elegant it is to fit that sort of power scale into a manageable number range. The second is defining every value in the game using the same metric, called APs (and I mean everything). So you aren't dealing with kilograms, kilometres, kilometres per hour, metres per second squared, you are dealing with APs. How fast can I run? It's your Dexterity in APs. How much can I lift? It's your Strength in APs. If you preserved those two ideas and streamlined the system around them, you'd have a truly amazing RPG.Random other thoughts:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">I think the rights to DC Heroes is and always has been owned by DC Comics, not Mayfair Games, so it would be interesting to know how Cryptozoic managed to get a license.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Pulsar Games Inc. published a version of the game, with all references to DC characters stripped out, called Blood of Heroes.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Mayfair used the DC Heroes system in another game called Underground back in the 90s. I recall reading but not playing it; my memory is that it was a worthy homage to the distinctly subversive comics of the era, like Hard Boiled and Marshall Law</li> </ul></blockquote>

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