Has anyone played "Wearing the Cape?"

[fdw3773]

Has anyone ever played Wearing the Cape RPG? It's a superhero themed RPG based of a series of novels by Marion G. Harmon. It runs on the FATE game engine similar to ICONS and is fairly rules-light from my understanding. It looks interesting, but am curious if anyone here sampled it as a rules light alternative to something as structured as Champions. 🙂

[Grailknight]

Read all the books but haven't seen or played the game. It's a very good setting that would be an excellent HERO  starter set.

[Spence]

It is a great setting.

I was underwhelmed by ICONS and FATE in general, far too rules light for me. 

When I heard that WtC was getting a RPG I was stoked until I discovered it was FATE driven. I had backed it and got the rulebook. 

It does a good job describing and setting up the WtC world and would be a good guide.  The 12 "Types" of supers could be used to create adjusted archetypes such the Atlas-type is a Brick and so on. 

Using a rule set like Champions could make the setting shine.

 

M&M would do an adequate job too I suppose

[Killer Shrike]

I'm a big Fate fan, but I've not checked it out specifically.

 

While I have much love for Fate and Fate Accelerated, it doesn't quite do it for me when it comes to supers. I'm fully familiar with how to "solve" for superheroes using that system and even did some modeling along those lines back when I got into Fate in the first place, but for narrative supers I greatly prefer Cortex Plus Heroic (better known from its turn backing Marvel Heroic Roleplaying) or the more recent evolution of it in the form of Cortex Prime.

 

I also really like the very similar Sentinel Comics: The Roleplaying Game; I've not yet been able to play at the table but I really dig the game design.

[Scott Ruggels]

No, as I abhor minimalist rules.

[Spence]

19 hours ago, Killer Shrike said:

I'm a big Fate fan, but I've not checked it out specifically.

 

While I have much love for Fate and Fate Accelerated, it doesn't quite do it for me when it comes to supers. I'm fully familiar with how to "solve" for superheroes using that system and even did some modeling along those lines back when I got into Fate in the first place, but for narrative supers I greatly prefer Cortex Plus Heroic (better known from its turn backing Marvel Heroic Roleplaying) or the more recent evolution of it in the form of Cortex Prime.

 

I also really like the very similar Sentinel Comics: The Roleplaying Game; I've not yet been able to play at the table but I really dig the game design.

 

 

WtC adds on a "powers" structure that is resolved using the FATE system.  Much like ICONS did. 

So it isn't a bad version of FATE.  For me the FATE engine is too broad in its resolution system.

[Spence]

7 hours ago, Scott Ruggels said:

No, as I abhor minimalist rules.

 

Fair enough.

 

I won't say I abhor minimalist rules anymore though.  Because of the GUMSHOE system.  Fear Itself is the most minimalist version while Nights Black Agents and Trail of Cthulhu arguable fight for most intricate version.  At least until Sword of the Serpentine is fully released in hardcopy.   That game divides things into two categories, Investigative Skills and General Abilities.  Investigative Skills are things related to figuring out clues and identifying problems and do not require a die roll at all.  While General Skills are everything from shooting to you health points and the die rolls use a single D6 alone with skill point spends.  While mechanically simple it is my current go to game for pure role playing fun.  Without the failed investigation type roles that plague most RPG's, a GUMSHOE game allows the players to be the great detectives that they are playing.  

 

If you get a chance I would recommend giving a read through of the basic core rules and maybe trying out a once shot at a con.  I am in the process of adjusting how skills work in Hero to have a regular roll to succeed like normal, but also have a Investigative Skill component like GUMSHOE.   I don't know if I can make it work, but I have hopes.

[archer]

On 9/21/2021 at 11:02 AM, Scott Ruggels said:

No, as I abhor minimalist rules.

 

Yeah, I had way too many "LARPing" experiences as a young child playing soldier with the "I shot you!"...."No, you missed."..."No, I didn't."..."Yes, you did."

 

If I'm going to just collaboratively write an interactive story with virtually no rules, why am I paying for a set of rules rather than just collaboratively writing an interactive story?

[unclevlad]

I love the series so I bought the system.

 

I agree that it's a little too rules-light, but that also means it handles different forms of interactions perhaps better than Hero's rigidity.  From a settings standpoint, you'd need to probably tweak. Power levels are *expected* to be all over the board, and some of the major characters work a lot better in a descriptive system...Blackstone and Chakra, for example.  And there's the plot devices like Dr. Cornelius' 3 Words.  

 

A significant issue, tho, is that in the books, with one exception (Astra, we know she lives;  her future self is quoted/cited regularly in the chapter headings)...anyone can die at any time.  In other cases, not die but take LONG term injuries (Blackstone, Megaton).  Hero's central premise is the knockout, not the injury.

 

All that said...one could define a Hero-style universe driven by the premise of The Event and breakthroughs.  And define...maybe not point levels but DC and defense bounds for each class level.  Point levels?  Maybe but it's not clear to me that hard and fast points would be a good idea.  Some ideas are just expensive...especially given that I'd strongly push for VERY limitations-light builds.

[Greywind]

I thought Edna settled this for good a while back...

 

[Scott Ruggels]

1 hour ago, unclevlad said:

I love the series so I bought the system.

 

I agree that it's a little too rules-light, but that also means it handles different forms of interactions perhaps better than Hero's rigidity. 
 

Well, if you play 4th or earlier, the rigidity isn’t as much of a problem, like 6th seems to be. 

 

1 hour ago, unclevlad said:

[unclevlad]

55 minutes ago, Scott Ruggels said:

Well, if you play 4th or earlier, the rigidity isn’t as much of a problem, like 6th seems to be. 

 

 

Is it really a system issue, or one of interpretation?  

 

I'll grant that 6E specified particulars that 3E and 4E left open...but that generally means "required a house rule."  So in some ways they're more flexible, but the overall structure is still fundamentally formulaic.

[Scott Ruggels]

46 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

 

Is it really a system issue, or one of interpretation?  

 

I'll grant that 6E specified particulars that 3E and 4E left open...but that generally means "required a house rule."  So in some ways they're more flexible, but the overall structure is still fundamentally formulaic.

To a point.  buts it’s a lot more flexible, than , oh, say, GURPS.  But in may cases, it’s up to the GM to set the tone and tempo of a game, though. 

[Spence]

51 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

Is it really a system issue, or one of interpretation?  

 

Oh, it is the system.  Definitely the system. 

Even 5thR was more flexible.

 

Figureds rule

 

[unclevlad]

Figureds are MORE rigid, in that they're coupled.  

 

The areas where I'd agree that the earlier editions might be more flexible would be

a)  SFX were encouraged to mean more;  if the SFX's seemed to clash, the earlier editions encouraged fudging the explicit rules more than 6E does.  But that's a point of style, IMO;  it's not in the rules.  

b)  ECs.  Specifically, what's allowed to constitute an EC.  There's little stated, so an EC tended to devolve to "what can I get the GM to allow me?"  

 

OTOH, 6E's VPPs are massively more versatile than 5E's, since pool size and control cost are totally separate.

 

But these are, by and large, secondary points.  A system like FATE uses SFX vs. SFX *heavily* and results are largely open to interpretation;  the GM makes more calls *during* play.  With Hero, there's calls to be made during character creation but many fewer during play...the rules dictate.

[unclevlad]

As an odd aside...The Event in WtC happened in, IIRC, the mid 2000's...post-9/11 but there's a few years before Astra has her Breakthrough.  So the world geopolitical basis is the high tension in the Middle East, and simmering tensions in several other parts of the world.

 

I just decided to re-read Dan Willis' Arcane Casebook series.  It's set in New York...starting in 1933.  The depths of the Depression.  And it kinda struck me that you could maybe set up a lower-level WtC-style game in *that* era, with the emergence of powers for the first time in *that* setting, in some interesting ways.  At least to me.  

Or back it up a bit and tie it in chronologically with the 1929 market crash.  According to the History Channel, it was really a several-day event.  The usual day marked was Tuesday...but the first part of the collapse was actually the Thursday before.  Banks tried to bolster so Friday was a rally, but Monday cracked the dam, and Tuesday's when it got swept downstream in the floodwaters.  So hey, maybe the Event was that Thursday morning.  The rise of superpowers and how to deal with them as everything else goes to hell in a handbasket could be interesting.

[Scott Ruggels]

Then you could pull out “Justice Inc.” and Aaron Allston’s supplement. Lots of period details in both. 

[Spence]

On 9/25/2021 at 4:29 AM, Scott Ruggels said:

Then you could pull out “Justice Inc.” and Aaron Allston’s supplement. Lots of period details in both. 

 

Plus Hero's 5th Ed source book Pulp Hero.  I still think it is one of the best RPG general references for the Pulp era written.  While the center reference date is 1935, the referenced period is from January 1920 to December 1939.    The detailed timeline and description of the world (with 1935 world and regional maps) plus sections covering topics like the depression, travel, 1935 wages and a general cost of items and services in 1935 make it invaluable for running a period game. 

 

I tend to use Pulp Hero as the source book for my games that run in the interwar period and Call of Cthulhu sources books for the 1890 through the 1920's, blending them when the time period falls from 1925 through 1935. 

 

Had to add another great reference series.  The American Guide Series is a group of books and pamphlets published from 1937 to 1941 under the Federal Writers' Project program a depression federal project to give authors and related professions (editors, publishers etc.) employment.  The WPA city guides and panorama guides are spectacular snapshots of the 1930's. 

[fdw3773]

Well, I went out and purchased the core rules of FATE as a pdf from DriveThruRpg.com and read through the rules. While an interesting read and providing some ideas on how to design powers for the superhero genre, it didn't generate enough interest for me to purchase the follow-on rules expansion kit(s) about magic and super powers or Wearing the Cape. 😉

 

Thanks again for everyone's comments about this topic!