Help me decide what superhero rpg to play

[Stacie GmrGrl]

But I have to mention: isn't Wild Talents designed for more gritty/realistic play? It would be important for someone to know that if the preferred less of that, then Wild Talents might be edged out by M&M or HERO. We'd still have to consider BASH in the final comparison, but I've been told the style something is designed for should be important when choosing a game system.

By default yes, Wild Talents is a fairly gritty/realistic game, but it has optional rules in it that are easy to implement. Core rules of the game, yes its gritty.

There is a rule in it called "Shaking it Off," which allows people to spend Willpower to reduce the amount of damage they take when they get hit.

If you don't want to deal with Killing damage, you can change it so all damage is Shock damage instead, thereby taking away much of the grittiness.

If you don't want to use the hit location system, which is sheer genius, then you can just give everybody a single allotment of Body Points and have the damage apply to that single pool instead.

If you want to use the Wound Shift option, this allows a target to spend a point of Willpower to shift the height of the attack either one up or down, so this could potentially change the location of your body that was hit.

This game can be as gritty or as four color as you want it to be, the options are there, and it plays fast..... almost as fast, if not a little bit faster, than savage worlds.

I have no idea how it plays compared to BASH, I haven't gotten to play that game yet, but it looks neat... and so does the upcoming ICONS.

 

[Stacie GmrGrl]

I honestly don't understand why M&M is so popular. But that's me. I would recommend that one after Heroes Unlimited. M&M just doesn't make any sort of logical sense to me at all...I don't get it. And I'm not a stupid person. If I can use Gurps and Hero system for supers, I should be able to get M&M. But I don't.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I honestly don't understand why M&M is so popular. But that's me. I would recommend that one after Heroes Unlimited. M&M just doesn't make any sort of logical sense to me at all...I don't get it. And I'm not a stupid person. If I can use Gurps and Hero system for supers, I should be able to get M&M. But I don't.

I think a big part of M&M's popularity is that it is a D20-derived system- arguably the best D20 supers game out there- and as a result, there is a HUGE installed base of people who are familiar with the underlying system and how it works.

There are significant alterations, of course, but the framework of skills & feats, with the powers, etc. replacing spells and so forth...its just easier for a lot of people to grasp.

 

[Aus_Snow]

I honestly don't understand why M&M is so popular. But that's me. I would recommend that one after Heroes Unlimited. M&M just doesn't make any sort of logical sense to me at all...I don't get it. And I'm not a stupid person. If I can use Gurps and Hero system for supers, I should be able to get M&M. But I don't.

It's not hard to 'get', and is every bit as logical and sensible as any other game I've seen referenced on these boards. But, liking it. . . well, that's very subjective. You don't like it? Hey, you're hardly the only one -- I don't 'get' why that's even an issue at all! Every system, even every popular one, has detractors.

For example, I dislike D&D fourth edition, RIFTS and Mage: the Ascension, to name a few. But there are sufficient numbers of gamers who like them, that there must be something to them.

Likewise with M&M. And, by the way, I suspect that you're right in thinking you're not a stupid person, so it's probably not that either. Could be, it just doesn't work for you. Happily, there are so many games to choose from these days, that not liking a few here and there just shouldn't matter whatsoever.

 

[Pig Champion]

Personally, I'd go with M&M. It's a easy system to learn if you've ever played any other D20 game and it's really fun for your over-the-top style.

 

[Silvercat Moonpaw]

I honestly don't understand why M&M is so popular.

The D20 aspect has already been mentioned. When D&D is popular that you can generally count on people having started with it M&M provides them with a relatively easy transition.

Also M&M has a lot of support, both from its parent company and third party publishers. People like support because it means something they don't have to come up with on their own. (As well as for some people like me it means something to read as we actually use RPGs more as reading material.) Plus wider use of the name means more chances for someone to come across it in a random search of a PDF site or more chances for a book seller to have picked it up. For some people they may not really be aware that other systems exist.

M&M just doesn't make any sort of logical sense to me at all...I don't get it. And I'm not a stupid person. If I can use Gurps and Hero system for supers, I should be able to get M&M. But I don't.

You may be mentioning the issue right there: logic. M&M is design at default for illogical types of superheroes. One sentiment I read on the M&M foums is "M&M isn't about phsyics. M&M is about tying physics to a chair while you fly around shooting laser beams from your eyes."

Does that help? Or is it some other aspect? From my point of view I've never had a problem "get"ing a system like I think you're saying you have. It kind of confuses me as to what there is to "get".

 

[Mallus]

You may be mentioning the issue right there: logic. M&M is design at default for illogical types of superheroes.

There are logical superheroes?

I mean isn't Champions/HERO the same as M&M in this regard? Nothing prevents me from designing a Champions character, system-wise, that can throw a boomerang which does more damage than a railgun or another whose impervious force field is composed of "the luck of the Irish".

Champions doesn't care about in-game logic (ie, it's effects-based). M&M merely continues this fine tradition.

 

[Silvercat Moonpaw]

1. I don't know what type of logic she's talking about, so I made a guess.
2. I don't know how the HERO system works, so I made an assumption based on the previous guess/assumption and it's use as an opposite to M&M.

 

[Stacie GmrGrl]

Well, it being d20 derived is one strike against it for me...to me its just a very boring game.

As for 'logic' with systems, I either understand them or I don't. M&M just doesn't make sense to me. I understood Gurps and Hero system upon first reading, to me they have an internal system within its structure that makes sense to me. I read M&M, and, well, it just seems like a mess. The Power Level restrictions don't make sense to me, to me and this is just me, it seems to codify things to much within its structure. It's like everything is seperate from each other... Abilities then Feats than Powers than Saves than Skills. Its like, in a way, they are each sub systems withiin the system and nothing really ties them together but the fact that its d20 derived and therefore Feats just had to be kept because of its d20 origins, same for Saves... the game doesn't make sense.

I don't like the Power scales, I mean, the default game is PL 10, and the distances of powers at rank 10 are sometimes just ungodly to me. Give me Silver Age Sentinels, give me BASH, give me Gurps Supers (and Gurps sucks for a supers game), those all make sense.

M&M just seems like it kept to much from its d20 heritage and its just one, large, clump of subsystems within a system that, for me, just do not mesh well with each other.

Just because i don't grasp it myself doesn't mean I don't see the good in it. It's use of Hero Points for characters is great. It does 'seem' simple for people who get it, it does play fast and loose at times, and for people who really like d20 games, then they will like this one also because of that familiarity. I see why people like it, but its not for me.

 

[Aus_Snow]

Well, it being d20 derived is one strike against it for me...to me its just a very boring game.

And yet, here your own signature (not to mention, IIRC, your rather enthusiastic posting about e20) betrays you. . . Now, *I* am confused.

(. . .) Feats just had to be kept because of its d20 origins, same for Saves... the game doesn't make sense.

And again. . .

M&M just seems like it kept to much from its d20 heritage and its just one, large, clump of subsystems within a system that, for me, just do not mesh well with each other.

And again. . .

It does 'seem' simple for people who get it, it does play fast and loose at times, and for people who really like d20 games, then they will like this one also because of that familiarity. I see why people like it, but its not for me.

And one last time, just for good measure!

Pop quiz: what are our rules about attacking other people? If you find yourself writing posts to try and embarrass someone else, don't post. And no, smilies matter not at all. This post is an excellent example of how NOT to win a disagreement. Please handle it differently in the future. It's okay if people disagree with you.

PM me if this is somehow unclear. ~ PCat