M&M 2nd Edition: Underwhelmed?

[philreed]

But now there's the true20 system for all your generic toolkit-type needs, right?

That was my thought, as well.

 

[jdrakeh]

But now there's Hero FRED for all your generic toolkit-type needs, right?

Fixed your typo You're absolutley right, though - M&M is no longer my tool-kit system for supers or anything else, as they've decided to forego that approach in the core book. The less flexible a system is, the less I tend to like it, generally speaking. Given that I loved M&M more for its flexibility than its genre coverage, though, my dropping it like a hot rock as soon as it cut most of the customization options out of the core book should hardly come as a surprise. I'd keep playing 1e, but we all know what a chore it can be to find players for earlier versions of a wildly popular game system - so instead, I reverted back to Hero (as it's plenty easy to find players for that).

 

[Drowbane]

Underwhelmed

I too was underwhelmed by the new M&M. I own two copies of the 1e... one for myself, and one to share with my players. If I end up buying the 2e, it will only be to plunder any new feats, powers or flaws.

I expected more, I'm thinking they should've left well enough alone.

 

[Ranger REG]

I expected more, I'm thinking they should've left well enough alone.

What do you expect? More boost in existing powers? More ambiguity?

 

[Kylara]

What do you expect? More boost in existing powers? More ambiguity?

More streamlined, more ease of use. Things are much more complex now, and making things more complex isnt a big selling point for me.

 

[Jim Hague]

More streamlined, more ease of use. Things are much more complex now, and making things more complex isnt a big selling point for me.

Where're you getting this? Seriously. Just for eliminating tactical movement, things've gotten simpler. Same with Hero Points, subtracting Villain Points...

 

[Bretbo]

In 2E costs have varying PP costs per rank, based on what they do, but there are leaps involved in each level of cost: For example, at 1PP/rank, Deflect allows you to block Slow Moving Projectiles, Fast Moving Projectiles, Energy Attacks, or Mental attacks. At 2pp/Rank you block everything but Mental attacks, but what happens when you fall between the cracks, when you don't want to block energy attacks. Your forced to get the GM to make an arbitrary ruling of how much a cost break not deflecting energy is worth.

The FAQ has been posted and suggested how to deal with issues like this. Although the example given is not exactly like the situation you describe, it seems to follow suit.

The values of the Value Progression Table can be kind of “grainy.” How, for example, do I get a character who has only three additional limbs, or who can elongate only 15 ft.?

The progression skips over some intermediate values simply so it can fit the necessary scale into a reasonable range. M&M needs to cover powers able to affect a single room to those able to affect continents and planets. That results in a certain amount of “graininess” in the resolution of the progression chart.

There are basically two ways of handling intermediate values, and it’s up to the GM to decide how they are handled in each individual game. The first is to charge for the next highest value and allow the player to voluntarily limit the character: you can take rank 3 Additional Limbs, for example (which is normally up to five extra limbs) and decide your character only has three. It’s a minor difference, worth only a fraction of a power point, so hardly worth quibbling over.

Alternately, the GM can allow some characters to take a drawback to reflect that the power doesn’t exploit its full value. This is a 1-point drawback at best, and its often problematic, since it’s greater in actual value than the point difference. In the previous example, a character with Additional Limbs 3 with the drawback “Only three Additional Limbs,” gets the power for an effective 2 power points, which is the normal cost for two additional limbs. The character is getting the benefit of the third limb for “free” (although it’s a fairly minor benefit).

The GM should decide which approach is best, but generally it’s easier to allow players to voluntarily limit their characters to fit their concept and not worry about a fraction of a power point here or there than it is to assign tiny power drawbacks to “shave” points off various powers.

 

[arkham618]

I can't muster any great excitement over M&M2e either. The book is bloated with near-duplicate powers, unnecessary distinctions (between equipment and devices, between constructs and vehicles, etc.), and "fixes" to 1e rules that weren't particularly broken. Hero creation has been made tedious, which is a feat in itself. Much of the flexibility of 1e is gone, and the additions do not IMO make up for it. I'll be sticking with 1e, house-ruled as necessary.

 

[amethal]

I had high hopes that this thread would help me decide whether to buy the 2nd edition or not.

If anything, I am now more undecided than ever!

 

[Aaron2]

Just for eliminating tactical movement, things've gotten simpler.

I'm not sure what you mean by that. Page 33 has the normal d20 tactical movement rules. Unfortunately, I can't find how normal movement and super movement relate at all. Normal movement is given in feet per round and super movement is given in miles per hour. Is 10 MPH the top speed (using a all out run which is 4x the normal speed) or the speed you can run in one movement action? I'm no athlete but I can run faster than 10 MPH (at least for a few yards). You still need the grid because almost everything in combat is measured in feet: range increments, size of area attacks, even the Rapid Attack feat for super-speed is measured in feet. I can't see how these rules (really, a lack of any rules) makes the game simpler.

My main problem with the book are the Hero Archetypes. They don't specify how much the various powers cost. In order to modify one you have to reverse engineer the entire character which is more work than creating one from scratch. They are more than useless; I just stopped looking at them cause they were making me more confused.


Aaron