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Comic and Tabletop geekdoms are somewhat entwined. Hence it's not surprising that many RPGs have handled the theme and issues of comic supers. I'll cut to the chase - this is the best of them.
We had a bi-weekly ICONs game. I mentioned this game to my GM. He grabbed the pdf, and after we quickly got to converting our game over. We played last night, and it was an unqualified thumbs up from everybody (with everyone grabbing a copy or planning to). This is not intended as a slight to any other game, but as praise at the benefits of Marvel Heroic Roleplaying.
The comic book genre is a tough one to emulate. It requires too much suspension of disbelief to model correctly using hard simulation (ex: Colossus or Superman would fine-red-mist someone on their first punch). It's also too finicky in power set details to simply hand-wave and make a couple of wide generic stat's for. This game hits all the fine notes with fair grace.
Your die pool is assembled of up to 6 or so dice of various sizes (d4 through d12). And while powers are certainly important (superhuman d10 superstrength) it only represents a portion of your die pool. Your team interplay, how you set up stunts, how good you are at creating openings for your teammates or for future actions are all as important or even more important than the raw power of your strength. This means that the classic dilemma (Batman vs Superman) could go in favor of the caped crusader (as it does in more than one comic).
The game provides enough crunch to feel like a 'game', but was simple enough that everyone at the table picked it up and was narrating stunts their heroes were performing. It also utilizes well some of the more modern game design ideas. For example the xp system (modeled after Keys from SotY or Lady Blackbird) helps motivate players to go after varied goals and sometimes clash because of it. It provides system rewards for following hooks. You can invest XP in unlockables that open up the story.
So what's the bad? The system is fantastic for modeling heroes (and we had premade heroes due to our ongoing campaign), and for organizing stories into events. It's downside as I can see it is trying to create heroes from scratch. Namely you have to come up with a superhero and then model their powers, there is no step by step, point-by, self-balancing and correcting system. This could be a problem with munchkins at the table, but ultimately the powers aren't the thing that rules the day every time.
Overall though, I've played super hero games since the 80's, and I haven't seen a game that engages the players, keeps things light, fast and simple, and models comics and comic-stories in play quite so intuitively and accurately. I cannot recommend it enough. And from the smiles and quick purchases of my GM and fellow players, it seems I'm not alone in this.
Excelsior!
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First off, presentation: I bought the pdf version, so I can’t speak to the quality of the book, but based off of the electronic copy, it’s damned pretty — a full color, high quality version of the game book, along with a player and GM (called the Watcher for MHR)…and you’ll need it the first few times. And a character sheet. The file for Marvel is far superior to the other Cortex PLus stuff — there’s not a lot of lag time on page turns on the iPad 2, unlike the previous Cortex Plus core books.
Onto the substance. First the bad — the base mechanic is nightmarish to describe; it’s, at base, pretty simple, but describing it is a pain in the butt. I’ll try to distill it: you have a dice pool based on whether you work Solo, witha Buddy, or in a Team. Add your die in a power set and/or a Distinction (a description of your character’s motivations, etc.) Take the two highest dice as your result to hit a target number based on the opposing dice pool of the bad guy (or the “doom pool” for non-character incidents.) Except it’s more complex — there’s all sorts of dice you can get from special effects on your powers, or borrowing from the doom pool with plot points, or or or… Out of the dice left over you have an effects dice — how much damage you do. Damage here is like the Fate stress — physical, mental, or emotional and rated from d4 to d12. More than that and you take Trauma — longer-term injuries that stick with you between action scenes. It’s easier to track than it sounds.
The complexity of the dice mechanic not withstanding, the game is not as unplayable as it will first read. If you cut out a lot of these options, and for the beginner I think you should ignore some of this, the system gets very manageable. The authors should have included some kind of stripped rules set for people just coming into the role playing game, or even people who don’t have a lot of time to reread the rules the half dozen times it took to get it down. Once played a few times, I think it would be easier, it just has too high a learning curve right off the bat.
The good: character creation is superb. No points. No balancing. What do you want to play? Give them the right skills, power sets (with a limitation or two to make it interesting), and go. It will require a bit of restraint from the munchkins in the party, but I think it’s pretty much the only way to do superheroes. One of the benefits here is that there are only four real levels of “strength” for a power: normals have a d6 (or lower…you’re not playing these guys), there’s the enhanced folks with d8 — the street level heroes; superhuman at d10, godlike at d12. You can reskin powers listed with new names, distinctions add characterization (as do Milestones — goals that earn you experience points), and there’s a couple dozen Marvel Universe characters to get a good idea of how to build that character you want. Gadgets are handled like powers, except you can take ‘em away.
Simple, straightforward…only the extensive list of plot pont fired options causes it to be overly complex for the beginner.
Longer review here: http://blackcampbell.wordpress.com/2012/02/23/quick-review-m
arvel-heroic-roleplaying-rpg/
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Overall the Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Basic Game is a blending of the good parts of several games. First and foremost it takes the CortexPlus system, of creating dice pools based on categories of abilities. It is like Smallville in that some abilities are relational, though nothing as complicated. It is like Leverage in that you also have abilities that are better than others, and takes the same approach with Super Powers. It has taken lessons about aspects, placing aspects of scenes, and a fate point-style mechanic from Spirit of the Century/FATE. Similar to Dresden Files, the fate points (Plot Points in MHRBG) serve as the game-play balance of heroes with disparate power levels. Taken together these create a game which traditionalists probably won't love; However comic book enthusiasts, new RPG players, and the indie crowd will love. The book itself is fairly well laid out, the art could have been punchier but its very well organized at a typeface that is comfy and a writing style that is easy on the reader. It has a good index, cheat sheets, and chapters that follow the flow of play.
The Good Parts
Good Mechanics, especially around XP, Pacing, and Super Power scope.
Has equally complex rules for duking it out with Doc Ock or negotiating for equal treatments for Mutants.
Passes the True Supers Test: Batman and Superman could fight each other, Batman could possibly win.
The Iffy Bits
The lack of super-structured Character Generation is going to leave some scratching their heads.
In long-term play I'm left a little uncertain on how to handle some particulars, what if I end partway through an adventure, what do I do if the Players want to take a new direction, what if someone dies? An experienced GM can handle this, but this book seems aimed a newbies who could use a wee bit more structure.
The book could have highlighted the fact that supers with lots of powers get less PP, those who are weaker get more. Someone naive to this might get in fights in the group over balance, without a strong guiding hand by the GM.
Read the Full Review at:
http://agameofwhits.blogspot.com/2012/02/read-through-re
view-marvel-heroic.html#more
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One of the best RPGs I ever read that deal with superheroes. We started a campaign last week and everybody loved it. One of the best games I ever bought.
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MARVEL HEROIC ROLE-PLAYING GAME (MHR)
(1) Do the rules work? Do they pass the "reality check?" -- MHR has some very innovative ideas that make the game unique. Here are a few that I particularly like:
a) Using the word “stress” for damage, fatigue, or anguish has a subtle humorous ring to it. “Yeah, the Hulk may be mad, but my telepathic surge is gonna’ stress him out REAL GOOD!” (see what I mean?)
b) Lack of ability scores and standard abilities. (Before MHR, I incorporated this concept into my VaV rule set).
c) Whether a hero performs better with others or working solo.
The rules work well; they are fairly easy to understand with the first reading and are balanced with each other. There are many options with each action and the mechanics create a three-dimensional feel to the interpretation of the dice rolls. The only drawback (if it is a drawback) is that alot of dice are required to make a roll, but this seems to be a Cortex issue, not a Marvel issue. (I like Cortex as well, so it's not a big problem for me.) -- RULES? A–
(2) Is the layout viable for the information presented? -- The layout supports the PDF version in subtle ways (like page-display quirks and view size) that can be easily missed with the untrained eye. There is a definitive “art” to MHR’s layout, something you should be able to see right away upon your first review of the PDF book.
The layout is not wasteful at all; in fact, having open space in your layout allows the design to “breath” and it provides ample space for you to add your own house rules and game notes (if you don’t mind marking your rule books with writing).
Finally, placing the last page right after the first page is an excellent idea in this case!-- LAYOUT? A
(3) Is the text easy to read and understand? Is it FUN? -- The text deviates from pristine grammar and composition with orphans and widows, and you can’t learn the rules quickly if you stay up until 3am reading them. However, the writing is fun, witty, and to-the-point when discussing rules. It is exactly what you expect from Marvel; the writing is thorough and reductive but not complex or restrictive.
For those who have played other versions of the Marvel RPG experience, you will see some “nods” to them (ex: the Doom Pool compared to Marvel Saga and overt usage of adjectives and terms from TSR Marvel Super Heroes).
Also, there is an example of play imbedded within the rules; you just have to read the rules in order (from page to page) to see the connections in the examples given. -- TEXT? A–
(4) If you do see any rule problems, how would you solve them? The only thing that I might have done differently if I designed this rule set is to include a more-mechanical system of character creation (though the system given to create other heroes in MHR is excellent for what it is). -- STABILITY? A
Overall, this is a wonderful and unique game to play, and it handles what it was designed to do very well, if you like cinematic or story-telling games. In other words, if you like real role playing games, you will like this.
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MWP's iteration of the MArvel RPG represents an intertesting method for running games in general, not just this one. As with other product lines (most notably Smallville), there is a massive responsibility for all of the players and the GM to reach accords, discuss gameplay rationally and also look to the the 'bigger picture' rather than remain selfishly introspective - which may not suit all gaming groups style of play. That said, the game is about playing superheroes, so the premise that you need to work together, think about the whole plarty and have fun aren;t at odds with the chosen genre. I'm very keen to use this game with my group as it does offer a conceptual challenge, and it will be interesting to see how they handle it.
Character creation is a process which will require some thought, but it is relatively streamlined and essentially revolves around picking descriptive aspects of your character and assigning a dice value to them (as a side note, if you don't want to play your own character, there is a datafile in the back with a lot of recognised heroes ready to play). These are Distinctions (what your character is well-known for) and Specialities (the skills at which you are adept). Different modes of play are supported by the Affiliation stat which governs whether your character is best at Solo, Buddy or Team play. The only downside to this, is that I can see those characters with Solo rated the highest being a little frsutrated given that most scenes will be a co-operative team effort, so the dice will let them down a little in those circumstances. However, this is something the GM will need to consider when deisgning play opportunities for their group.
The Power Sets are quite well-developed, but the GM should take a guiding role in development at this point, as it is easy (as with most supers games) to build a character with a single, extremely over-powered speciality. I was glad to see that most of the powers I'd expect in a supers game to be here (including sorcery so I can play Stephen Strange!).
Gameplay, as I mentioned is highly collaborative, and those with experience in the Smallville RPG will feel right at home. The dice mechanics will take a bit of time to fully grasp, and in a newer group you should expect that any event requiring dice rolling will take time due to the number of variables that can be assigned to the roll. I would have liked a much more streamlined system (like Serenity) as this would support the 'fast and furious' action that comics represent. Only time (and a lot of play) will see if I can move my combats at the optimum speed. Outside of Cortex, I can't think of any parrallel experience to which players will be able to relate; as each set of variables is assigned at the point of rolling. Add to this that you can be rolling upwards of seven different dice which contribute to your pool for very different reasons and you can see what I mean.
The layout of the book was great, and it was nice to see a collection of Marvel art running thorugh the book. Marvel has (for me) very much a 'hit or miss' with their art of late, so it was good that MWP hadn't hinged the entire book on one artists' output.
Finally, game comes with the ubiquitous and expected 'module in the back of the book'. This two-act adventure is based on the first few issues of Bendis' run on The Avengers and I'm not convinced that designing a module around already printed comic plot was a good idea. Those familiar with the first few issues of this comic won;t find too many surpirses in store. I would have preferred to see something original in this place instead.
Overall, I've not had a lot of experience with supers RPGs, mostly because the systems for these games are almost uniformly complex. I'm not sure what it is about the genre that incites mathematical complexity in game designers, but Marvel seems to be at the lighter end of the spectrum. Given its' high attention to story, drama and coi-operative play, I should be able to sidestep my initial feelings about the system and play it with great excitement - and I recommend you do as well.
Excelsior!
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Hold off until the other Event expansions are released!
This book is okay. And at $13 it's reasonably priced but there's just not a lot here. A couple dozen assorted heroes and 30-odd B-list villains. It's possible to make your own characters but there's only a couple pages of new powers.
Character creation in this game is an art. I wouldn't recommend it as a first time role-playing game, unless you're a fan of one of the very few included heroes. It's a good game for anyone who's a game designer at heart, and wants to design their own villains or heroes. I can imagine quite a few Watchers (read: GMs) making characters or powers for the entire party.
Much of this is a short term problem. Once a couple extra Event books get released the problem almost goes away. But even then, this is only if you like the standard well-known heroes. I doubt Ghost Rider or Chamber will be detailed any time soon.
Likewise, as the Events and characters are tied to the comics (and a very narrow point in the comics) it makes playing the characters from the movies or Avengers cartoons trickier.
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I am very impressed with this game. Layout wise it is gorgeous, and it looks perfect on my iPad 1 in both GoodReader and iBooks. Layout on the character sheet was excellent as well as we realized they were laid out to support the flow of play.
The content is excellent, but I will admit having to make a couple of passes through the book to fully grasp it. A full example of play would be nice. The system is innovative, and when played really supports the feel of a comic book.
Finally I want to point out the milestone XP system. This system is brilliant and is an design pattern I think a lot of the industry will start looking at.
The module in the book is short, fun, and has all the default marvel troupes (team up, super villains, redemption, etc).
Character creation makes sense when you realize it is more of an art than a science, and that it is up to the players, the Watcher, and yourself to not be the person at the time who wants to hog the spotlight and say you are good at everything. With that though a set of guidelines such as 'cosmic characters typically have..., street level characters typically have' would be nice. I for one do not want to see a point buy system for this.
Summary: Great game well worth the money. Ran it recently and my players are begging to play again.
Pro: Innovative System, Easy to Play, Great Layout that works on iPad
Cons: Book makes system feel dense. An example of play would have helped dramatically. Some sort of basic guidelines for power levels for character creation would help.
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I can't say too much more than what has been said by other reviewers here, so I will keep things short and sweet. Throw all your preconceptions of what a supers game should do- this is a game for comic and rpg game enthusiensts that love to weave stories of adventure.
The game encourages both the "Watcher" (GM) and the Players to let go of needing hard stats for super heroes and to embrace a fluid, more free-form style that, after you get used to it and embrace it, makes perfect sense!
It won't win over many of those who prefer a ton of crunch in their supers games, but there are more than enough options presented within to satisfy those willing to give it a spin. Highly recommended!
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Beautifully presented, lots of graphic novel art. System: plot points and dice pooling will appeal to modern players - it looks pretty fast play, if you remember the right formulas for mixing up the abilities dice - some help is provided by a couple of handy prompt sheets. There's plenty of the more popular heroes to choose from, but being a basic game, there's not much in the way of adversaries beyond the scenario included - so curious referees will feel obliged to buy more material pretty quickly. I like the fact that the hero stat cards are also provided in a grey format which may hurt colour printers a little less than the high contrast glossy colours of the manual.
One for the new generation of Marvel fans. :)
-Billiam B.
http://bit.ly/rpgblog
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This is an excellent story-telling game for replicating the feel and pacing of a comic book. But let's be clear, that's what it is. If you're looking for the next M&M or HERO, this isn't what you're after. This game is geared toward making the characters and the story feel right. There's no points to track and not much in the way of nuts-and-bolts. But for making the game feel like the comics, I think its ideal.
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What I really didn't like about this book is the fact that is not reader-friendly. When I put the pdf in my Ipad, some inserted drawings are displaced in the middle of the text, forcing me to use my computer to read it. I think that the editorials should put more work in creating a pdf that is 100% compatiblr with tablets. That alone is enough to low the note of the product.
THe game is ok...barely. It's not intuitive how to create a character, so if you don't like to play with established characters, or you're fan of traditional rpg games, I must discourage you about this book.
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Before you buy this product, understand what you are getting: A cooperative storytelling game, not a traditional tabletop RPG. This is not like M&M, Hero, or even the TSR Marvel RPG. This is more akin to a superhero Mu*'s then a table top game. It's light on mechanics for how to break down a wall or pick a lock, and heavy on mechanics for how to tell a story.
The dice system is very interesting, generates big pools of dice but still uses small and simple numbers because you only select a limited number of the dice and add them together. The biggest change to a traditional system is that the largest dice you don't select determines how well you do something. Rolling 1's creates opening for the gm to make things worse for the players, or lets the other players take advantage of the situatiuon. What is very different is that the mechanics are defined in terms of how the scene plays out, and pc's have as much impact over how the story unfolds as the gm.
THERE IS NO LIMITS/POINT SYSTEM FOR BUILDING A CHARACTER. CHARACTER POWER LEVELS ARE UP TO THE PERSON MAKING THE CHARACTER. BE WARNED.
This game is entirely about consensus between the GM and players themselves as to what constitutes acceptable character builds. Basically, this is a game for people who want to do more story driven games and not be so limited by mechanics as to how powerful characters are and what they can do. It's a nice change of pace from trying to gimmick the game system to make your character powerful, but it definitely requires a group thats on the same page as to what is acceptable and what isn't.
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This product feels a bit like an abusive relationship to me. I can see a lot of things about it that I know i will like, the dice mechanic looks intriguing, the story mechanic interface should be good and the book is pretty. However these things come with a price. The writing is can be condescending in places and the layout is wasteful.
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The new Marvel Heroic Roleplaying game by Margaret Weis Productions was one of the products I was one of the products I was most looking forward to in 2012. Note the past tense: WAS.
Simply put, the game is shockingly ugly and worthless as ‘pretty gaming product’ and uses rules so convoluted and ill-conceived it’s useless to me as an actual RPG.
First up, the game uses the most counter-intuitive, slow-moving, bean counting form of a dice pool mechanic I’ve seen in 20 years of rolling dice! By forcing players to build a new and unique dice pool every action, choosing one or more component dice from a variety of personal motivations, teamwork elements and power sets, the game forces the action to slow to a crawl EVERY SINGLE TIME a player attempts to do something. Anything.
Is your superhero going to: Throw a punch, fire an energy blast, hack a computer, bust through a door, bandage a knife wound, or dodge gunfire? If so, prepare to spend at least a minute on the action building up a dice pool and reading the results and assigning the result dice as desired. If you’re playing with first time gamers, expect them to spend at least 2-3 minutes per action just figuring out what the hell is going on and what dice to use.
Seriously, what’s wrong with simple percentile rolls or dice+ rolls (such as D10+ skill or D20+skill, or whatever)? They’re far quicker, and lots more intuitive, especially first time gamers, which I think this deformed specimen of an RPG was supposed to be aimed at.
And then, instead of having Hit Points, damage tracks or damage saves (ala Mutants & Masterminds), player characters accumulate stress. Seriously? The biggest threat to my superhero is getting stressed out? It’s a simple problem of terminology, but by calling accumulated damage in this setting ‘stress’ I find it impossible to take seriously. In the comics, when Sabertooth rakes his claws across Wolverine’s belly, Wolverine isn’t a little ‘stressed out’ he’s disemboweled.
Now let’s talk about the ugly-factor.
This is a licensed product that Margaret Weis Productions went to a ton of expense and effort to earn the license for. And all that effort, and the spectacular art resources Marvel Comics has to offer a licensor, is wasted. Images in this RPG are amateurishly cropped. The picture of Wolverine on the bike, which is cropped from the knees DOWN, in the section on stunts (pg 103) is probably the single worst panel in the book.
The game’s margins are so laughably huge I feel like MWP owes all the trees chopped up to make this book a heartfelt personal apology. Most of the half and quarter page illustrations in this book are shrunk so they seem more like 40% and 15% illustrations at best. Some of the images in the skill and character improvement sections are so small they may as well be punctuation, and are placed at either the extreme top or bottom of a page, shattering the visual flow. Seriously- you’ve got any piece of Marvel art you want to put into a game, so why make these images so TINY?
Finally, the game makes the same mistake the DCU Heroes RPG (Green Ronin) did before it. Most of the art in this game is from the last ten years. If I’m playing a licensed Marvel RPG, I want it to have great artwork from the entire span of Marvel’s history. I want Jack Kirby and Jim Lee art at the least, in addition to the work of more recent superstar artists like Jimmy Chueng, David Finch and Greg Land.
And speaking of art, let’s talk about the cover of the Operations Manual. The OM’s cover is an amateurishly Photoshopped collage of popular Marvel characters by several different artists. It looks like a fan product, not something officially licensed. If there was ever a time to spend the money for an original cover, putting out this hugely anticipated licensed product is it. By cheaping out, Margaret Weis Productions gives me the impression they don’t want to spend any more money on this product than absolutely necessary.
Another gripe, and this applies to Marvel products as a whole, and not just to the MWP game, is that the main book is too X-centric. While I love the X-Men, a Marvel Universe RPG should include play examples and interior art focusing equally on Spiderman, the FF, the Avengers, those quirky 3rd stringer fan favorites, AND the X-Men.
The game makes also some odd choices regarding which heroes to include, and why. The example adventure is based on the Breakout storyline, which ran through New Avengers 1-6, and the sample characters include all the heroes involved in the story line (Captain America, Spider Man, Iron Man, Luke Cage, among others) it also includes stat blocks for a variety of other popular Marvel heroes who weren’t in the comic book storyline, but could easily be included in your game group’s adventure (the Fantastic Four, Black Panther, the Beast and Storm, and several others).
Though one character was dead at that point in the comics, and the other was off planet, I’m really baffled by their refusal to include stat blocks for either the Hulk or Thor in the core book. They’re quintessential Marvel characters! This choice is especially baffling when MWP includes the relatively minor X-character Armor (who certainly hasn’t ever headlined a major motion picture of her own) and Luke Cage’s loser buddy, Iron Fist. I know MWP will soon release expanded roster books, and team supplements of some kind, but leaving Hulk out of the core book is frankly idiotic.
On the plus side…. There’s not much really.
The game uses terminology from the original TSR game and the Marvel Saga game, which is a nice shout-out to long time fans. And the “unlockables” mechanic, where the players can spend plot points (sorta like Karma in the TSR game) to activate special events and plot twists is genuinely neat. I’d love to see the unlockables concept ported over to a better RPG. The “milestones” built into each character profile, which award XP for accomplishing personal goals (or failing utterly at those same goals) add a ton of personality to the characters. Like unlockables, milestones are another idea I’d love to see explored in a more competently produced game.
In conclusion, if you want to play a Marvel supers game, either pick up your favorite edition of Mutants & Masterminds, or if you really crave the license, go to a used book store and see if you can find the TSR version. You’ll be a happier gamer than if you waste your money on this version of the license.
CHRIS
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