Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

[phoenix240]

By "People with powers" I mean settings where superhuman power exist (and are, generally pretty recent but that's not a requirement) but the don't otherwise follow the traditional conventions of comic books, at least not by default. There aren't really any superheroes or villains, or code names. The setting is more like the real world with the addition of superhuman powers. While I enjoy comic book games a great deal I've found people with powers can be a refreshing change or pace, an interesting way to look at the idea of superpowered individuals in a world like our own.

[kahuna's bro]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

you mean like the tv shows heroes,no ordinary family and alphas?

[Christopher]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

There are a lot of origin games on Herocentral.

 

My experiences are mixed. Mostly you would need to know details of how things work out in theh end to plan an intersting Hero that fits the world. But most GM's are stingy regarding any such information.

It's really difficulty to make a hero for a modified world, when I lack most of the information about that world.

[phoenix240]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

you mean like the tv shows heroes' date='no ordinary family and alphas?[/quote']

 

Yep, those would be good examples (well, Alphas and Heroes. I casn't speak for "No Ordinary Family. I haven't seen it).

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I might try one, but I suspect I'd get bored with it pretty quickly, truth to tell. I'm a big fan of the whole costumes, code names, public acts of daring-do type of supers. I'd rather my characters get to flaunt their abilities than have to sit on them.

[Hermit]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

It depends really. Too often "People with powers" is more often run/written as "Selfish dysfunctional jerks with powers" and that holds little interest for me. I deal with enough jerks in the real world and would like to think that SOME folks at least would be decent if they somehow gained such abilities. Also, I LIKE the tropes. I like colorful costumes, weird encounters that seem to defy probability and so on. If in a costumeless campaign, I'd probably be playing the guy who actually puts one on and darn the ridicule.

[Xavier Onassiss]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I've found that in some campaigns, there are a multiple layers: in public the supers behave like 'superheros' but behind the scenes in their personal lives (especially with other supers) it's very much like the 'people with powers' scenario described above. Keeping the two separate while the press follows their every move adds another layer to the shenanigans, of course.

[phoenix240]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I've found that in some campaigns' date=' there are a multiple layers: in public the supers behave like 'superheros' but behind the scenes in their personal lives (especially with other supers) it's very much like the 'people with powers' scenario described above. Keeping the two separate while the press follows their every move adds another layer to the shenanigans, of course.[/quote']

 

 

Yeah, I can agree with this. Our games can be amusingly soap opera between the punching and blasting.

[phoenix240]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

It depends really. Too often "People with powers" is more often run/written as "Selfish dysfunctional jerks with powers" and that holds little interest for me. I deal with enough jerks in the real world and would like to think that SOME folks at least would be decent if they somehow gained such abilities. Also' date=' I LIKE the tropes. I like colorful costumes, weird encounters that seem to defy probability and so on. If in a costumeless campaign, I'd probably be playing the guy who actually puts one on and darn the ridicule.[/quote']

 

Its my pet theory that if there were superpowers some would try to be comic book superheroes (and villains). The archetype is just too well known and ingrained in popular culture (especially recently). So I don't think you'd be alone. The main difference would be that going costume and code name just wouldn't be the assumption but one of many options.

[Vulcan]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

As a player, I've found that these plotlines almost always degenerate into 'innocent people who just happen to have powers vs. ridiculously paranoid people without powers but in positions of power and influence trying to destroy them.' See the TV show Alphas for a modern example.

 

It's a plot that goes all the way back to early X-Men, that people with powers are not trusted no matter how much good they do. And frankly, my personality runs toward the 'Oh really? Then a pox on you and your house, save the world YOURSELF next time!' solution to that.

[Epiphanis]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

Certainly "People with Powers" can be fun. However, I quite like the stylized aspects of superhero culture, including costumes and "code names."

 

One thing I absolutely despise is someone who tries to play in a "People with Powers" style in a game set up in a more traditional superhero fashion. This applies to fiction as well. I quite liked Brian Michael Bendis' "Alias" series, which was really a "People With Powers" book that cleverly had protagonist Jessica Jones constantly stumbling into actual superhero culture and situations, whereupon she would bend over backwards to get out of them as quickly as possible. Then Bendis made her marry Luke Cage and become a supporting character in the Avengers titles. She almost immediately went from a character I adored to one I hated. It was instantly: do not, do not, do NOT continue insisting you are not a superhero after you moved into the freaking Avengers mansion. You immediately go from being charmingly neurotic but grounded to being completely hypocritical, deluded and/or halfassed.

[sinanju]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I like that kind of game. Of course, one of my earliest gaming experiences was spending years playing what was nominally "Traveller"--but with powers (mutant powers, psionics, etc.) kitbashed in from Gamma World, Metamorphosis Alpha, and every SF/F story, novel, movie, tv show or comic we found entertaining. The game had a horrific death toll, but we had more fun than humans should be allowed. And many, if not most, characters had superpowers (as did a great many NPCs, as well as countless critters from "random encounters" we, uh, encountered in our travels). There was also endless super-tech, also cribbed from every conceivable source.

 

It was a superhero game without costumes or codenames in all but name. Steamteck remembers all this, I imagine. It was his game, after all.

 

For that matter, I think most Urban Fantasy novels would qualify too. Okay, a lot of them are really heavy on werewolves and vampires, but there are plenty of other sorts of weres, as well as wizards, sorcerors, witches, demons, gargoyles, ghosts and spirits, the fey, etc. They all have powers and regularly engage in conflicts with other powered creatures. Again, superheroes (and villains) without names or costumes, mostly.

 

The Wild Cards books skirt this concept too. Most characters have a name--but most of them don't have secret identities (a few keep their identities hidden, but in conventional fashion), and very few have actual costumes or call themselves superheroes.

 

It doesn't HAVE to be a rehash of The Fugitive. That's got more to do with Hollywood's tendency to rehash anything that was ever successful than the nature of the stories.

[kahuna's bro]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

two of the origina people with powers tv show was the six million dollar man and it spinoff the bionic woman

[McCoy]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I like colorful costumes' date=' weird encounters that seem to defy probability and so on. If in a costumeless campaign, I'd probably be playing the guy who actually puts one on and darn the ridicule.[/quote']

+1

[Guest steamteck]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I like that kind of game. Of course, one of my earliest gaming experiences was spending years playing what was nominally "Traveller"--but with powers (mutant powers, psionics, etc.) kitbashed in from Gamma World, Metamorphosis Alpha, and every SF/F story, novel, movie, tv show or comic we found entertaining. The game had a horrific death toll, but we had more fun than humans should be allowed. And many, if not most, characters had superpowers (as did a great many NPCs, as well as countless critters from "random encounters" we, uh, encountered in our travels). There was also endless super-tech, also cribbed from every conceivable source.

 

It was a superhero game without costumes or codenames in all but name. Steamteck remembers all this, I imagine. It was his game, after all.

 

For.

 

 

I certainly remember but the big difference from the normal definition of people with powers was still the characters were larger than life as was the environment even without codenames or costumes, The normal people with powers has no appeal to me. My SF game is still way over the top but even without code names they are not people with powers becuase they are no way even vaguely normal folks with powers. I kind of tolerate shows and movies of "people with powers because there's always the small possibilty it will evole into something more interesting.

 

If you wanted to run basically a superhero game without costumes or code names though, I could get behind that.

[TheQuestionMan]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

Game Mastering style and quality are really important to me when it comes to People with Powers style games? It is equally important that the Players like and understand that from the begining. Keep in mind if you want to avoid fictional tropes than call it something else and add Superpowers. Buffy and some of the Scoobies could be concidered Superpowered. The thing to remember most is having the right Players for the Right campaign. Action or Superbattles if you like also breaks up the slow moments or sessions.

 

 

Keep in mind I learned this the hard way.

 

 

QM

[CrosshairCollie]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

What is a 'Scobbies'?

[McCoy]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

What is a 'Scobbies'?

Buffy's associates sometimes referred to themselves as the Scoobies, a comparison to the Scooby-Doo cast.

[ghost-angel]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

The problem I keep running into is these games always devolve into "the PCs" vs "Ubiquitous Nearly-Omniscient Government Organization style of paranoia campaign that leaves the whole look, feel, and analysis of "people with powers" in the dust. All in the name of "realism" where the Government/Corporation/Etc... would never, ever, ever, leave the plot line because they must Control.

 

The other thing that happens is the GM fails to leave the "supervillains are the enemy" trope behind common to Superheroes - in this style it really helps to place superpowers in the role of zombies in a good zombie movie: They are the environment which shapes the drama, the real threat is emotional and personal, the powers are there, constantly, but not the actual threat. Otherwise you become Superheroes Without Costumes.

 

Unless the purpose of the campaign to climax with the sudden reveal to the World At Large that Superheroes Really Are Really Real, Really!

[phoenix240]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I like to run this style of game as a sandbox with as little preset plotting as possible. The PCs (and others) gain powers then they can do what they want with them: for their own agendas and goals and the world will react and act in accordance. I think that generates some of the most intereseting play for this style of campaign but it take aggressive pro active players. Traditional superheroes tend to be a reactive genre: the main characters wait for something to happen then respond. This style of play requires them to go out and make something happen (though I suppose they could wait for NPCs to do something and react to that).

 

 

 

And please, don't get me wrong I don't dislike regular superhero games. I like them allot. I just find People with Powers (and Super Agents) a fun change of pace

[Enforcer84]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

Prefer the costumes. People with powers generally ends up being too dark and disturbing.

[assault]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

The question is: what are "people with powers" actually supposed to do? Go on dates? Go to work? Pay the rent?

 

Dull, dull, dull - unless you are into romance stories or sitcoms. But even those can benefit from superheroic trappings. No Heroics was a British "superhero" comedy based around supers hanging out in a pub. Love and Capes is a very neat webcomic, whose main focus is the romance between the two main characters, with the superheroics largely offstage.

 

But the reality is that that's not what "people with powers" is about. In fact, "people with powers" tend to be very much defined by their powers, and the use of their powers is what the story is about. It's usually actually either "superheroes without costumes" or "secret agents with powers".

 

Both of those are fine and can be fun, but they're certainly not about ordinary "people".

[phoenix240]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

The question is: what are "people with powers" actually supposed to do? Go on dates? Go to work? Pay the rent?

 

Dull, dull, dull - unless you are into romance stories or sitcoms. But even those can benefit from superheroic trappings. No Heroics was a British "superhero" comedy based around supers hanging out in a pub. Love and Capes is a very neat webcomic, whose main focus is the romance between the two main characters, with the superheroics largely offstage.

 

But the reality is that that's not what "people with powers" is about. In fact, "people with powers" tend to be very much defined by their powers, and the use of their powers is what the story is about. It's usually actually either "superheroes without costumes" or "secret agents with powers".

 

Both of those are fine and can be fun, but they're certainly not about ordinary "people".

 

Having run a few games like this I disagree. Yes, there is a soap opera element but there also using your powers for fame, fortune, exploration, to change the world in ways that generally aren't explored in superhero comics. There's also dealing with morality issues, the difference between right and wrong when its not assumed you (the PCs) are always going to be on the side of the angels or the morality will be black and white.

 

The last "people with powers" game I ran had character like a beat cop, a secretary and a former grocery store clerk. The drama was generated by their new abilities effect on their lives, the choices they made in using (and not using their powers) and the repercussions. It was (and isn't) "dull" and there is no omnipotent super organizations and the characters aren't "supers without customes" or "super agents" (though to be fair, one PC is working for the intelligence community on a freelance basis and there is a group seeking to study and regulate the growing population of metahumans which only seems reasonable. So, I can't disagree with the above more strongly given my own experiences running and playing in such games.

[Zen Archer]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

I've never played in a Supers-based People with Powers game, but I played a character like that in a superheroes game. He was the night watchman at the supers' headquarters, and he proved to be so good at certain things that he kept getting dragged into the adventures.

[assault]

Re: Does anyone ekse like People with Powers style games?

 

The worst kind of People with Powers game is the political strawman game. "Let's all fight the New Hitler of the week!"

 

That's why my character would end up in the pub. It beats disagreeing with the GM in a world where he sets the rules. And my character's actions would be entirely on the "white" side of "black and white" - he'd be using his powers to help people, not hurt them.