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5 Things Superhero RPG’s Should Have, in my own biased opinion

I have been thinking alot about Superhero RPG’s lately. I am a fan of them and I have been since the TSR Marvel Super Heroes Role Playing Game came out in the 80’s. I went on to run multiple games in multiple systems, but Champions certainly got most of my time. 

 

I love comics…let me restate that…I LOVE COMICS!

 

I read a whole bunch of comics. I have been reading them pretty much since I learned how to read. Most of them were superhero stories, so enjoying superhero RPG;s ties into that. I fell off playing the superhero RPG’s about a decade ago. Over time as the design sensibilities of RPG’s  moved on, but a lot of the superhero games did not follow those changes. There have been a couple of major games developed since I stopped running them, so maybe they caught up.

I recently started watching Calisto6 rpg streams. It is a superhero game set in a cyberpunk future, using the Cypher system, and involving the players from the Star Trek RPG stream, Shields of Tomorrow. They are doing a good job with the games and it has refreshed my desire to make a good superhero RPG of my own.

 

With that in mind, here are some design guidelines I would use and look for in a superhero RPG.

 

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The Basics of the Game on running a game for newbies

I recently ran a game for newbie D&D players. Here are my thoughts on the experience.  I recommend it to people because not only does it bring in more players, but it is remarkably satisfying.

I also talk about a game I played later that evening with Francois Letarte and company.

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Recent Reads

As a slight change of pace, I decided to review some books I have read recently.  I do read things beyond game books. I know it comes as a surprise.  I felt like I had things to say about these books and recommendations to make.  I enjoyed these 4 books and thought I would share my thoughts on them with you. I am unlikely to waste time on books I didn’t enjoy, after all.
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The Machine for Modern Age

 

 

Let me tell you about my love for Persons of Interest.  The show was on the air between 2011 and 2016 and dealt with a range of complex notions in the framework of the shows premise, which is described in the opening narration.

 

You are being watched. The government has a secret system: a machine that spies on you every hour of every day. I know because I built it. I designed the machine to detect acts of terror, but it sees everything. Violent crimes involving ordinary people, people like you. Crimes the government considered irrelevant. They wouldn’t act, so I decided I would. But I needed a partner, someone with the skills to intervene. Hunted by the authorities, we work in secret. You’ll never find us, but victim or perpetrator, if your number’s up…we’ll find you.

 

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Audiobooks, Google and the hard road to walk to get what you want.

I am going to stray away from game design for a moment. I should start with, I am big fan of audiobooks. I have listened to hundreds of them, over the years, maybe a 1000 or more. I like them as a thing to have in my ear as I do other things. I listen to them while I do housework, walks, exercise in general, and long drives. Anytime there is empty time when I am doing something more or less mindless, I have my headphones in.  This may make me anti social but between podcasts and audiobooks, I take in a lot of stories and information all the time.

So a friend shared the Boing Boing post about Googles new DRM free audiobook options. Cory Doctorow has banged the drum for a DRM free option on audiobooks for a while. In general, I tend to agree with him. Audible keeping the DRM format in place on the audiobooks is galling. There is no real argument for keeping it that make sense. The people who want to pirate can with little effort. It is only inconvenient to legal purchasers. They absolutely should have removed it years ago.  So, we have reached the DRM free utopia with Google Play store.  Huzzah!

Well….not so much.

I decided to try the Google audiobook offerings and see how they operate.  I have had an Audible subscription for a very long time now and I have something to compare it to.  Google offering a discount on your first audio-book is also a fine inducement.  Let compare.

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The Way of the Grasping Hand: a Midgard “monastic” Tradition

I am writing this for use in the Midgard setting, but I should state upfront that this can be used for just about any setting. A grappling style Monk would fit in just about any setting that allows monks. I recently wrote a blog post about the weird misconceptions held about martial arts and how they shape their presentation in D&D. One of the reasons I wrote that was because I could see some specific archetypes for Monks in Midgard I wanted to make.

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