Quote from: Soylent Green;418510You are of course correct. It is easy enough to do point based character creations with ICONS.

I think the point Tetsubo is making is that he has already a lot of superhero games. If he doesn't like random character generation and like to "fiddle with the details" when building a character why should he choose ICONS over a game one of the other supers system he probably already owns that support this natively?

One question though Tetsubo, how do you square this with your passion for TSR's Gamma World 4th edtion? That was pretty darn random.

Eh, I think most people like something now and then that runs completely counter to their normal tastes.

I will say that while there isn't much to the point buy in ICONS...I, personally, can't handle much more than that before I get annoyed and look for a different game...(BASH UE pushes my upper ceiling for point-buy complexity...Mutants & Masterminds shatters it, which is why I don't do M&M).

Quote from: RPGPundit;418494You know you can just pick the items on the list instead of having to roll the little cubes that offend you so much, right?

This mentality always astounds me.  Those of us who think that random determination is the best literally CAN'T just randomly determine stuff fresh out of the book if the system is point-buy (at least, we'd have to make our own rudimentary table of some kind, but the reality is probably far more complicated); but people who don't like random CAN literally just pick an option instead of rolling; and yet they get pissed off at random tables and often even lobby to try to get rid of them, screwing everyone but themselves.

RPGPundit

Wow there big fella. I said no such thing. I said that *I* don't like random generation systems. Have at it if you do. But breath once in awhile.

I actually prefer generating characters using the "modeling" rules from advanced Marvel FASERIP.

Of course, "modeling" is just a fancy way of saying the player and GM get together and decide what's appropriate for the character.

Though random is cool too. A lot of players come to the table with no idea what they want.

There was a time when I loved the mathematical precision of Hero, but then I got old.

Quote from: Vigilance;418592I actually prefer generating characters using the "modeling" rules from advanced Marvel FASERIP.

Of course, "modeling" is just a fancy way of saying the player and GM get together and decide what's appropriate for the character.

As do I. To this day, it's my preffered method of chargen for any longterm campaign.

Both with ICONS and MSH what I've tended to go for is a semi-random type of character creation; first roll up the character as normal for inspiration followed by horse trading between player and GM to tailor it a bit more to taste. Either that or, with ICONS and Gamma World, I'd sit the players in front of the character generator and told them to keep rolling till they found something that grabbed them.

I do think that for superheroes, where there are so many options and combinations, the random element can really help as an encouragement to try some of the more exocitc powers. For instance in my current game one of my players' character ended up with "Aquatic" and "Plant Control" powers. It's not a set of powers I expect the player would have come up on his own, but in play it's worked out very well.

That siad if a player came to the table with a very clear character concept I'd be happy to work with them.

Quote from: Soylent Green;418733Both with ICONS and MSH what I've tended to go for is a semi-random type of character creation; first roll up the character as normal for inspiration followed by horse trading between player and GM to tailor it a bit more to taste. Either that or, with ICONS and Gamma World, I'd sit the players in front of the character generator and told them to keep rolling till they found something that grabbed them.

That siad if a player came to the table with a very clear character concept I'd be happy to work with them.

Best way to handle it really. I've rolled up some strange doozies, and then rolled up some awesome things that blew the level of the campaign through the roof, I'm willing to take adjustments to fit the campaign and tailor the character a bit to fit it as well as my own ideas.) My current MSH hero: Professor Prometheus, dropped several power ranks to get a boost to one, and to fit the campaign.

I think he's cooler for it too.

Then again these days, I've a lot of fun being creative with what I have, than with what I wanted.

Yes, I think with any random hero thing you have to be watchful that the powers make some semblance of sense.

RPGPundit

I can't say that Icons is hitting a lot of high marks for me right now but I haven't had a chance to see it in action yet so... I'm going to be doing a bunch of one-shots using all the Vigilance Press stuff I've gotten to review.  Every Saturday in December I'll be running a game for the Montana Roleplayer's Club, so here's hoping everything actually works when the book hits the table.  I'm not too worried but the game just feels kind of uninspiring to me.

I do really like the way that Determination is handled.  That's brilliant.

Well, if it helps you feel more inspired, here's some genuine feedback on an ICONS game I got in email today.

QuoteI forgot to say how much I enjoyed last week's session.  Icons really does seem to have nailed the problem of capturing superpowers without loading everything down with a ton of math, issues of scale or killing the fun by making every attack and defence boil down to the same mechanic.

Seaweed's powers are easy to grasp, colourful, fun and varied enough to keep things interesting – but I also love the fact that she can just leap into a fist fight without a real plan and not horribly embarrass herself.

The way Aquatic works is seriously fun, too – fights in water are uncommon enough to make it a treat to see how well she performs in her element.

I have to say, she's the most fun superhero to fight that I've ever played & I think the system deserves much credit for that (along with the GM of course for his "not so loose it feels too easy, not so tight it feels too restrictive" handling of the rules).

Of course with roleplaying games there is no "one size fits all", and the very same things which might please one player can really annoy another.