Okay I’ve been putting this off fuckin forever now.
I’m still alive! Just been really really busy. Silent Titans by Patrick Stuart is finally off my plate, as is the Numinous Edition of Troika! by Daniel Sell. I’m helping Corey Brin put the finishing touches on Wet Grandpa (generic OSR rules) by Evey Lockhart while I plow through Fronds of Benevolence (Troika! rules) by Andrew Walters, both of which are Adventures I Would Totally Run For My Friends. There’s at least one thing I’m not supposed to talk about. Oh and Beckett might have some more of those tshirts I made in his shop.
That’s not what this post is about. This post is about superheroes.
I’m usually not one to think all that much about game mechanics, but I realized while working on Troika! that it’s the perfect system to model games about pretending to be superfriends. I’m not going to argue that point right now because that’s boring and I’m drinking and I want to get to some of the content I’ve been coming up with for it.
The biggest mechanical change is making the players roll dice one more time during character generation. Maybe two more times actually, I haven’t decided. I know, I know, that sucks, but hear me out. If you’re not familiar with Troika!, it uses a randomly determined Background to model a couple different things that, in a supers rpg, kinda need to be separate, which I’m calling Origin and Archetype. Like, Iron Man and XO-Manowar both have the Power Suit Archetype and roughly the same powers, but one is a rich inventor and one is an ancient barbarian who found an alien artifact. The Flash got caught in a freak accident and Quicksilver was born that way.
The other big difference is just giving some archetypes a few more ranks in skills than Troika! normally allows. That’s fine because they are superheroes.
(The maybe second extra dice roll is probably going to be an optional thing where you have a random day job for your alias with a couple skills at 1 rank but then you have a secret identity to maintain and close ones to protect as a tradeoff. I don’t know, I’m not there yet.)
Anyway here’s six archetypes:
FLEDGELING PSIONIC (11, jean grey, xavier, psylocke)
Powers & Specialties
-3 telekinesis (4) (((((this means 3 ranks in telekinesis, which costs 4 stamina points to use)))))
-3 telepathy (3)
-2 energy shield (3)
-2 energy blast (3)
-2 flight (1)
Complication (((((roll 1d6)))))
1 confined to a wheelchair.
2 1d6 rival personalities.
3 you don’t have a physical body of your own and must possess one to access your powers.
4 change 2 energy blast to 4 energy strike, 2 energy shield to 3 hand to hand fighting, telekinesis to 1, telepathy to 1, change 2 flight to 3 athletics.
5 test luck or destroy all electronics in ¼ mile every time you use your powers.
6 if you fail a psionics test you take damage as large beast unless you spend a luck point and test your luck.
ASSASSIN (elektra, ninjak, black widow, james bond, hawkeye, the black kaiser)
Possessions
-signature weapon (+2)
-rope & grapple
-1d6 smoke bombs
Powers & Specialties
-4 stealth
-4 signature weapon fighting
-2 hand to hand fighting
-2 athletics
Complications
1 You killed your master; your fellow students seek revenge.
2 Complex religious code; test luck the first time you make any action to see if it is permitted.
3 You have an “evil” twin who wants to steal your identity.
4 Your employers have decided that you’re no good to them alive.
5 Your past crimes are coming back to haunt you.
6 You cannot resist an honorable challenge.
BRUTE (thing, hulk, luke cage, hellboy, armor)
Powers & Specialties
-4 feats of strength
-4 absorb damage
-4 hand to hand fighting
Complications
1 feared and hated for appearance
2 must transform into a rival personality to use powers, rage triggers involuntary transformation
3 clumsy as hell — all important and breakable objects within 5’ of you have a 1/3 chance of doing just that at any given moment.
4 you look like a large but normal human, but all power ratings are adjusted by -2
5 your arms end in massive club-like stumps instead of hands with useful fingers
6 your powers only last for an hour at a time and must spend 4 hours recharging
TRANSLOCATOR (flash, nightcrawler, kitty pryde)
Powers & Specialties
-4 flight or superspeed or phasing or teleportation (1)
-3 athletics
-3 hand to hand fighting
(((((they don’t all need to have complications)))))
SHAPER (dr manhattan, franklin richards, timothy hunter, green lantern, spectre, dr strange)
Powers & Specialties
-4 shape reality (8)
-2 energy shield (3)
-2 energy blast (3)
-2 teleportation (1)
-1 flight (1)
Complication
1 completely resigned to a future only you can see (test luck to attempt anything ever)
2 you are a child (set skill and stamina to minimum, lose all powers except shape reality)
3 your powers are controlled by a rival personality with a very specific code (code should be a short sentence, test luck to determine its stance on any non-obvious issue)
4 can only create or manipulate objects and energy constructs of a certain color (lose teleportation, increase energy blast and energy shield by 1 each, replace shape reality with hard light construct (4))
5 to access your powers you must possess a human host, who becomes a rival personality
6 hunted by cosmic entities that sense the use of your powers
POWERSUIT (origin must be ITEM) (iron man, x-o manowar, luthor in his battlesuit, steel)
Possessions
-power suit (+5 superheavy armor)
-give up 1 armor point for each integrated weapon system: machine gun (2 stamina cost, as assault rifle), rocket propelled grenades (4 stamina cost), energy blast (3 stamina cost, choose an energy type)
Powers & Specialties
-4 ranged fighting (stamina cost by weapon type)
-3 flight (1)
-2 feats of strength
-1 sensory array
And here’s the origins (as of now, may change a lot):
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1. MYSTICAL
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2. BIOLOGICAL
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3. MUNDANE
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4. COSMIC
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5. TECH
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6. TEMPORAL
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1. BORN LIKE THIS
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changeling
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inborn mutation
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displaced royalty
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anthropomorphic concept
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sentient robot
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time capsule
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2. INTENTIONAL CHANGE
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faustian pact
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biohacked mutation
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oath of vengeance
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spiritual ascension
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cybernetic enhancement
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one-way traveller from the future
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3. ITEM
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magic artifact
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serum dependent
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government issue
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hyperdimensional tech
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inventor
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future tech
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4. INTENSE TRAINING
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trained by a hermit
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raised by wild animals
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rogue agent
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star god cultist
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test pilot
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centuries old
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5. ACCIDENTAL CHANGE
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possessed
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symbiotic organism
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marooned survivor
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sucked into a work of fiction
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radiation exposure
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marooned time traveller
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6. ORGANISATIONAL
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trained by monks
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experimental clone
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active agent
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alien soldier
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hi-tech entrepreneur
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active time agent
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Sorry about the formatting. I don't know what I'm doing.
Will post more soon.
