What's your favorite superhero TTRPG and why?

[billd91]

Champions is good, but we liked V&V better back in the 1980s. And, for me, M&M has eclipsed Champions when it comes to point-buy superhero games. I would still play Champions if the opportunity came up, it’s just not my first choice for superhero gaming.

 

[Lord Mhoram]

Champions/Hero - I've been playing it for 35 years plus. It just fits my approach and preferences for RPGs in general, and superheroes in particular. My avatar is my longest played character in that system (something like 12 years).

I've looked at others, currently Sentinel comics (for a really different kind of experience than HERO) and looking forward to the supers supplement for Cypher. All other superhero systems I've tried just didn't hit the sweet spot for me - so I never played them long term.

 

[DammitVictor]

Weirdly, aside from the D20-Modern-compatible "Four Color to Fantasy" I wrote (and as such, needed to playtest)...

I loved that, by the way. Bought both versions, had the Revised version printed out and bound and carried it with me for years. I even repurchased (I think) both versions a couple of months ago.

 

[Randomthoughts]

Wow, so little love for Champions here.

I have a love/hate view of Champions. It’s the system that I’ve ran my longest superhero campaign, and it really support progress - power increases, buying off disads and vehicles and bases. But combat can take long. So, looking for shortcuts. Bought Champions Now, but it wasn’t what I was looking for. Toying with dice roller apps to quickly tally BODY and Stun. Prep is major concern (who has the time), but there is a lot of pre-made stuff out there now. Would run it in a heartbeat with the right group - finding that is the hard part.

Otherwise, Cortex+/Prime is my go to, but it does scratch a different itch than Champions.
And I’m a fan of FASERIP so I’m seriously considering ICONS.

EDIT: Another note for Champions: I find HERO to be perfect for Dark Champions (street level heroes). There’s enough “crunchy bits” you can use for character creation - and vehicle and base rules - that made my part DC campaign shine. This is what I’d like to run if I found that perfect group.

 

[Grendel_Khan]

EDIT: Another note for Champions: I find HERO to be perfect for Dark Champions (street level heroes). There’s enough “crunchy bits” you can use for character creation - and vehicle and base rules - that made my part DC campaign shine. This is what I’d like to run if I found that perfect group.

I used Fuzion for a relatively street-level, but very gritty supers game, and it worked beautifully. Way less crunch, and almost none of the fiddly tweaking of powers and cosmic-level stuff. I get why that didn't take off--the presentation was weird, esp. if you weren't already super familiar with Champions/Hero--but it's a bit of a shame.

 

[zarionofarabel]

Marvel Heroic RP (Cortex+). I've read a lot of superhero comics, but it was the first Supers game that made me interested. It plays well, though on the GM side it can take a little while to get the hang of Doom Pool management.

Agreed.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Hiya!




I'd give Champions a shot...but watching a Champions game at a con back in the late 90's required TWO GM's for the 5 players; at 10am they started a fight, round 1. When I left that day I checked in with them; it was about 8pm, and they were just wrapping up...that fight! O_O Sorry, but 10 hours to play ONE battle with only 5 heroes and a roughly equal amount of bad guys? No Thank You, Evil!

Just a comment; while Hero isn't the fastest moving system in the world (its got a fair number of moving parts, and a lot of meaningful decisions) this is either the sign of a group with some serious decision paralysis, a large number of people who didn't understand the mechanics at all, or GMs who, in one fashion or another, didn't know what they were doing. Or combinations of the above. I've run combats for 8 players in less than a third of that time. by myself.

 

[Thomas Shey]

As to the question--well, I have a problem. I've probably run more supers games than, well, anything else over the last 40 years. I've run Champions, DCH, Superworld, M&M, V&V and probably one or two I've forgotten.

And these days nothing quite works for me. Though I respect the people that heavily narrative style systems work for, I'm just a bit too much of a trad guy not to want a heavy dose of that, even in my supers games.

These days, if I were to start another, it'd probably be Champions Complete, Mighty Protectors (V&V 3e), Supers! RED, BASH UE, or the new version of Prowlers and Paragons--but all of them have some issues or another to go with their virtues. And they're not issues I can entirely ignore.

 

[Richards]

My favorite has to be Champions, but that's because it's the only superhero RPG I've ever played. We played first edition back when I was in high school and early college, and then I picked up the 4th Edition book some 15 years or so ago and I ran my son through about a dozen adventures of a solo campaign before we started up our current D&D 3.5 group. Yeah, the combats are really slow, but it's not so bad with one hero fighting one villain.

Johnathan

 

[Neonchameleon]

Just a comment; while Hero isn't the fastest moving system in the world (its got a fair number of moving parts, and a lot of meaningful decisions) this is either the sign of a group with some serious decision paralysis, a large number of people who didn't understand the mechanics at all, or GMs who, in one fashion or another, didn't know what they were doing. Or combinations of the above. I've run combats for 8 players in less than a third of that time. by myself.

That may be - but as a 4e fan three hours seems like far far too long for me.