Basic Action Super Heroes!

Didn't know if this should be in the lab or not...

I actually haven't been to these forums in almost 6 months, but despite a lot of people expressing their love for the "new shiny" that is MWP's MHR, an unusual resurgence of forum love for Supers!, and my own re-consideration of M&M3, BASH UE remains my superhero game of choice.

I'm not even playing a supers game at the moment, but a thought occurred to me the other day that I thought I'd share. The default XP assumption in the rules is no XP. I like that just fine, but my players certainly don't. But I thought BASHMAN's optional XP system was actually a little too far in the opposite direction (i.e., advancement was a little too fast). So I came up with an alternative based on BASHMAN's own idea of setting point totals for individual games or even individual sessions.

(Forgive me in advance if my idea is neither new nor novel. If I'm submitting an epic fail here, please feel free to just move along. )

When a campaign begins, the GM sets the point level and people make characters accordingly. As the campaign continues, the characters don't earn XP, but the point value of the campaign continues to steadily increase (at a rate appropriate to the campaign and the players). So, for example, a 30-point campaign would eventually reach, say, a 40-point level. No one actually gets new powers, but everyone gets more Hero Points and/or fewer Setbacks based on the new point level, which allows people to use Hero Dice to accomplish a lot of the same things that they might have spent XP on, but with a lot more flexibility, and while maintaining character consistency.

In this way, a valid version of an experienced Captain America might still only be a 25-30 point hero, but if the "Avengers campaign" is presently at 50 points, then Cap gets 4-5 Hero Dice per session to accomplish powerful tricks. Meanwhile, 40-point Thor only gets 10 Hero Points, but back at the "beginning" of the campaign, he was having to deal with maybe 10-15 points of Setbacks.

Anyway. That's my idea. Does it work? There's a teeny, tiny chance I may get a solo game of BASH going, and I'm thinking of using this.

That's a neat idea. Does this automatically assume that the villains the players are dealing with become stronger over time or does this only reflect the player's heroes becoming gradually cooler.

An idea would be to allow the player to "upgrade" his/her hero to match the new campaign level. This might reflect how, in the comics, some heroes seem to discover new abilities. Those that enjoy the extra hero dice and points, and like their hero as is, probably would not like to do this.

I worked out an XP system that is a combination of BASH and the Dresden Files. It awards XP and allows different ways to spend them depending on the level of challenge overcome.

If anyone wants, I will post the details.

MrJupiter wrote:That's a neat idea. Does this automatically assume that the villains the players are dealing with become stronger over time or does this only reflect the player's heroes becoming gradually cooler.

An idea would be to allow the player to "upgrade" his/her hero to match the new campaign level. This might reflect how, in the comics, some heroes seem to discover new abilities. Those that enjoy the extra hero dice and points, and like their hero as is, probably would not like to do this.

I hadn't thought about what effect this would have on villains. My first impulse is to say that it wouldn't matter at all. This is why Spider-Man can take on a half dozen B-grade villains at once: in part because of the extra Hero Points and in part because he's still fighting 25 point villains.

To put it another way, BASH doesn't really provide a clear corollary between a campaign level and/or a character point total, and the point totals of the villains he or she faces. So a "high campaign level" hero (e.g., the 25 point hero in the 50 point level campaign) would rely on his 25 hero points against low level villains in greater numbers or as a way to deal with higher level villains. Make sense? (I'm not sure if I'm being clear or not.)


Your upgrade idea is a good one for those who don't want extra Hero Points - though I'd be strongly inclined to limit that (otherwise, it kinda defeats the purpose of the idea).

I also think it is a good idea/concept.

In general, how to handle Experience is a matter of taste. In my experience players love it when their characters/heroes develop and earn new or better abilities. This was the reason for me to allow real hero-development. We make it a slow process though and the golden rule is that advancement has to be * and appropriate. So I generally would not allow a tank to buy fly if he does not come up with a really good explanation (eg Rogue from X-Men who got ith through her draining ability or a gadget). Always fine are intense training Powers and the Asset Powers (houserule).

One idea to handle XP might be to leave the Campaign Level as static and just measure advancement in Bonus Hero Points. In otherwards one XP gains one bonus Hero Point. The rate that experience points are earned would need to be worked out so that the heroes don't become TOO AMAZING too quickly and are able to trash every and all villains with oodles and oodles of Heor Points!

This setup would allow a Thor type hero to gradually offset his setbacks for being in a Street Level campaign as he/she gains XP.

MrJupiter wrote:One idea to handle XP might be to leave the Campaign Level as static and just measure advancement in Bonus Hero Points. In otherwards one XP gains one bonus Hero Point. The rate that experience points are earned would need to be worked out so that the heroes don't become TOO AMAZING too quickly and are able to trash every and all villains with oodles and oodles of Heor Points!

This setup would allow a Thor type hero to gradually offset his setbacks for being in a Street Level campaign as he/she gains XP.

Do you mean to calculate bonus Hero Points at the same rate that the book suggests awarding XP? That might work also, though I think my original suggestion could better control the speed of Hero Point gain.

As a follow up to the idea of combining my idea with SOME XP development, how about this: every time the Campaign Level gets to a certain increment higher (say, every 5-10 points), a character can optionally choose to add or change a single element of their character, and then recalculate points and Hero Points accordingly.

In this way, every time the campaign "levels up," as it were, a character can add to or adjust his character (whether that's a 1 point tweak or a 5 point new power), but characters still maintain a high degree of consistency from their origin at the beginning of the game.

If you want to do something like this I would control it as GM and make it part of the story. The Norse God travelling to the Norns learning how to use yet unknown aspects of his powers, the man in the high tech suit getting new ideas, how to improve it and so on. This way, there will be no surprises and new powers will be in line with the original concepts of the characters.

(Again, sorry for adding to old posts but I'm just now getting into BASH and tackling some of these issues. BASHMan, if you'd prefer me not to, just let me know.)

I'm creating a campaign where xp is not only used along the lines of the rules presented in BASH Sci-Fi but also as a way of basically measuring what is in other RPGs traditionally considered the character's level. Certain rewards are only available once a character reaches x amount of xp (i.e. reaches Level Whatever). Once a player accumulates that number of xp then the reward is automatic. For example, once a character reaches 50 exp he gains a level in Rank. In addition, once that bar is reached then it opens the option of spending experience on campaign-specific mundane powers that add role playing opportunities and additional benefits (such as being able to form his or her own clan.)

ubrgeek wrote:(Again, sorry for adding to old posts but I'm just now getting into BASH and tackling some of these issues. BASHMan, if you'd prefer me not to, just let me know.)

I'm creating a campaign where xp is not only used along the lines of the rules presented in BASH Sci-Fi but also as a way of basically measuring what is in other RPGs traditionally considered the character's level. Certain rewards are only available once a character reaches x amount of xp (i.e. reaches Level Whatever). Once a player accumulates that number of xp then the reward is automatic. For example, once a character reaches 50 exp he gains a level in Rank. In addition, once that bar is reached then it opens the option of spending experience on campaign-specific mundane powers that add role playing opportunities and additional benefits (such as being able to form his or her own clan.)

This sounds pretty cool. I like the automatically gaining "Rank" idea; reminds me of old-school D&D fighters and wizards getting strongholds and towers with followers!

Thanks! And yup. What I'm trying to get a handle on is if the target numbers I'm setting are right. If in general Narrators use the guidelines in BASH Sci-Fi (and I'm guessing they're similar in the other books) and gives no more than 5 exp/session then I think I'm about right.