Quote from: James McMurrayRadioactive man dropped fairly quickly.

Really?? Doesn't he fight, like, Thor and shit?

Anyway. I wanted to chime in with my MSH experience. . .I also recently discovered the Classicmarvel PDFs and my heart leapt for joy. Actually, the experience was very like reading the MSH book for the first time. . .because it more or less was. See, Marvel Superheroes was my first RPG when I was younger, and my friend who owned the book was kind of the "gatekeeper" of the rules. I mean, we were kids, he has this game, he says how to play, and we play. Just never thought to do otherwise. So when I discovered the PDFs, my first thought was opportunity. . .to finally learn how the game is supposed to be played. At least, as written, you know? 'Cause I know my friend wasn't following the rules very stringently at all.

So now that my curiosity has been satisfied, the findings are interesting. Yeah, our version of the game was heavily tweaked and simplified and watered down. Not from any informed decision or anything, just 'cause nobody paied too close attention to the rules. Just "common sense" decision based on the most obvious aspects of the mechanics. Looking at it now, I'd say the rules are overall more interesting and nuanced than we gave them credit for (when we pronounced them "too simplistic" and moved on to Heroes Unlimited--worst fucking system decision of my life.) while not sacrificing too much slam-bang comics feel. Some stuff I'm not sure I like so much bit I'd like to try it out and see how  it goes in actual play. Like the aforementioned Dodge and Evade and stuff. It really irks me that you can never Dodge-shift more than one color down, and many "successful" Dodge results won't even change color at all! That said, I'm finding appealing the idea put forth by Silverlion that Health is an abstraction of (partially) attack avoidance via the Fighting and Agility. I've come to a similar understanding about D&D Hitpoints since that's the only thing that makes sense of them. I'm wondering how, in MSH you would work that into the narrative--would you (given a char with say, IN F and RM A) say that the first 70 points deducted are all dodging, or say that ANY attack under a certain threshold is a miss or graze, or what?

Also: can someone show me the text on Spider-man's Spidey-sense where you to avoid all attacks on a successful FEAT? I swear to God I DID read that back in the day, but checking the PDF, that's not what Spidey's entry says at ALL.

My most intriguing find, though, was in my examination of the Karma system. We never looked at it as kids beyond 1) "Huh! You can spend Karma to increase your roll! We should do that more." and 2) "Whaaaaat??! You lose ALL your Karma if you kill someone? No exceptions? That makes Wolverine and the Punisher unplayable!"

But! On reading the entirety of the Karma rules, I have to admire the design philosophy. Karma penalties are merciless. No matter if it was an accident. No matter if you're mind controlled. No matter if you had a really really good reason. Nobody said life was fair, or heroism easy. And, yeah, you lose it all for killing. Even if you're Wolvie. But really, when you think about it, that's exactly how it works in X-men stories: "The X-men don't kill, mister" "Says you, bub!" "That's right! Stand down!" "Oh yeah? Well your flamin' dick's small!" Verrry rarely does Wolverine actually kill when with the X-men. Sure, on a solo Wolvie story, but that ain't the dynamic MSH is going for. If Logan's player loses it all when he snuffs someone, he's going to think very carefully when making that choice, and it'll mean a lot more when he DOES kill. And if the team has a Karma pool, then you get all the other X-men players shouting "No! Don't you dare!" Which is as it should be.

But even better than all that: the best part is, you get bonuses and penalties for both your heroic exploits, AND your civilian activities. "What? I lose Karma for missing a date with Mary Jane?" You bet, bucko. That civilian live IS important to you, right? So what matters more, your love life, or beating the Green Goblin? Now, the Karma gain/loss for civilian stuff is far less than stopping a robbery or saving the city. But it's enough to make you want to try to have it ALL. . . defeating Doc Ock and racing across town to Aunt May's Thanksgiving dinner. And you'll succeed. . .sometimes. ANd fail sometimes. It's the perfect dynamic for, say, Spider-man.

Mind you, this is all hypothesis: just my impression on reading the text. I haven't been able to test it in play. But it looks real exciting and I can't wait to try it (though I'll probably have to!).

Whaddya y'all think?

Peace,
-Joel

He may fight Thor, but his stats were pretty crappy. It was the basic set stats though, where his force field is both ways and his health is only 50-ish. The advanced stats up his health and his monstrous force field is a constant effect. He'd definitely have given them a lot more trouble if I hadn't been using the stats in the basic module.

My take on Wolvie's karma is that you'll notice that he almost always goes into a berserker frenzy and starts kicking serious ass before he kills someone. Since he doesn't have a Wolvie Berserker power, that frenzy would probably be best represented in the game as spending karma left and right to make sure he hits, make sure he dodges, and otherwise up his rolls in preparation for that final kill when he's almost empty anyway.

re: Wolverine and Karma

One of the Secret Wars modules -- the first one, I think -- had a stipulation that Wolverine was EXEMPT from losing all Karma for killing bad guys because it fits in with his "personal code" or somesuch; I guess personal consistency counts for something.  He'd still be liable to lose all Karma if any innocents were to be killed as a result of his actions.  Since at the time Wolvie was more or less the only anti-hero you were supposed to like (you weren't supposed to like the Punisher until the mini-series), it was kind of neat in hindsight to see how MSH dealt with it.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that--knowing you're going to lose all your Karma means you might as well spend it all on the kill, eliminating limp-dicked kill attempts.

Quote from: Melinglorin MSH you would work that into the narrative--would you (given a char with say, IN F and RM A) say that the first 70 points deducted are all dodging, or say that ANY attack under a certain threshold is a miss or graze, or what?
Peace,
-Joel

I'd probably say anything short of zeroing out your health is likely a battering--scrapes, bruises, nicks, near misses but not "critical" injury. Because you don't have to see if you 'die' (roll Endurance Loss) until you hit that 0 point (not counting Kill results. Kill results also suggest that your shot  skips normal "natural" instinctive defenses everyone is using when in danger and hits dead on thus create a live threatening wound.


It's very subtle and elegant in its way and in fact some "Health" points suggests fatigue loss as well from all the stress/strain/struggle of avoiding lethal blows. Because of how fast it recovers anyway (true its also a trope of comic books but still...)

Sounds good, Silverlion.

I'm getting more and more yen to give MSH a whirl the more I think about it.
I haven't gotten the chance to play it with anybody, but I did make a few characters. I decided to give the random method a by-the-book go and see if I could make anything viable. I surprised myself! My first was Tesla, a homeless Iron Man. That's right, a Hi-tech with Feeble resources! See, he was betrayed by corporate backstabbers and booted from the company he worked for, his research seized. He's out on the street, his only possession a big trunk containing his electrical battlesuit, the only tech he managed to keep. Now he's gotta claw his way back up from rock bottom to prosecute his vendetta.

Next I made Atlas. I rolled roughly Captain America's stats. . .but with Feeble strength. Well shit, how to make this work? I took "Raised Lowest Ability," which isn't supposed to be an actual "power," just a meta-fix for a weak character. But I made it an actual power! See, the dude was an athlete and fitness guru whose strength was sapped by a debilitating disease. . .so he developed a formula to boost it. Now he parades as a huge success story for his fitness program that "anyone" can follow and unlock their human potential. And he's a flashy, public-ID media darling hero. But the formula's unstable, he has to take it increasingly more to stay on top, and preserve his image. Can he rise above his petty deceit and find true nobility, or will it all come crashing down around him?

Damn, but I wanna play these characters!

I really enjoyed turning bugs into features with these guys. I rolled crap for resources with Tesla, then decided to go ALL the way and buy it down to Fb for an extra power. Plus, I used the "raise lowest" for him as well, on his agility, and called it a targeting computer.

I have to admit, though, the next two chars were total dogs. Though the alien guy seems pretty authentic for marvel: totally unremarkable ability scores, toting a technological gimmick.

Peace,
-Joel

My biggest problem with Classic Marvel is it doesn't do the Avengers well.

It does groups of relative power, like the X-Men, well, but in a group like the Avengers where you have a god, an unstoppable machine of unearthly strength and toughness, a mechanized suit which has a million gadgets all of which areenough to worry the stongest earthly denizens of the MU, in a group with a woman who turns into a insect sized person, a guy who is, at best, the ultimate human fighter, and guys whose only powers are shooting an arrow or weilding a sword - the power disparity is too great.

Villains strong enough to challenge Thor and Hulk and Iron Man are going to bedevil Wasp and Hawkeye and Black Knight.  A villain geared towards even Captain America is going to get pasted by the Big Three in short order.

X men are great - they are all of relative power level, except for Wolvie, but he's not a heavy damage hitter, he just hacks through armour like butter.

You really have to pay attention to the power disparity, or it will bite you big time.

I've never seen a superhero game do that setup well, so don't think it's just an issue with MSH. There are a few MSH modules written with that sort of group in mind, but I haven't read them to see how they handle the disparities.