New Campaign help

[Spence]

I am working up an introductory plus ongoing superhero campaign.  I have hit a block, mostly me being indecisive about the introductory campaign. 

 

Here is a little information on what I am doing.  IMO the hardest part of figuring out how to play HERO is not actual play.  It is relevant character creation.   No actual structure exists for the new player to use as a frame of reference when they build their characters.   It is OK to try and explain it with pounds of written text, but the only way to actually understand in a way that will allow one to actually apply the information and produce a character concept that is actually what you intended is to actually play one and roll dice.     Which brings me to my introductory plus ongoing superhero campaign.

 

I will kick off with an introductory campaign that includes pre-generated player characters, including backgrounds and complications.   The players will be members of the city’s premier superhero team and will assist the big guns in combating the nefarious machinations of a master villain.    In keeping with my overall plan, the players will be pitted against one of the Master Villains lieutenants.  The climax/end of the introduction will be the foiling of the master plan and the escape of some of the lieutenants and henchmen to the actual campaign city.    This campaign city has no resident superheroes or villains. 

 

My world is a very low super population one, meaning that supers of any kind are extremely rare.  Any group of supers will be accorded a lot of deference because they are powerful.  Having actually played the first mini-campaign using the pre-generated PC’s with backgrounds, the players should now have a tangible and useful idea of how HERO actually works.  Having been exposed to how to spend XP, they will see how the points translate into ability.  

 

So the players will then build their actual PC’s to play in the real, full campaign.   

 

So why am I writing this?  I am having trouble in making the pre-gen’s.

 

The pre-gens must:

• Provide a wide example of the different archetypes of supers available
• Demonstrate complications
• Establish campaign tone
  • Morality 2) Good vs bad is mostly clear-cut
  • Realism 1) Very romantic
  • Outlook 2) Almost everything works out
  • Continuity 3) Some long stories, some episodic ones
• Be interesting enough teach, but generic enough to not overshadow the player concepts.
• Be natural builds.  What I mean by natural builds is that they have no critical devices or armor.  They are 100% fully capable in their birthday suits.  A martial artist type can carry a staff, but the staff is just a staff.  It is not a focus.
• They all have Secret ID’s and are employees/detectives of the Broadmoor Justice Foundation Ltd.   Broadmoor is an international corporation that specializes in discrete investigations and has an untarnished reputation for honesty and above board services.  They are also known to cooperate with local law enforcement agencies. 

 

That is basically what I am trying to do.  But you will need some more basic information on my campaign world.

 

A first point is that in my super’s games are very Golden/Silver’ery and players have “stables”.  Or in other words players will eventually have 2 to 3 characters that they can run.  But only one PC can be active in an episode. 

 

As mentioned before, the world does not have large numbers of supers.  As with early comics (back when they were focused on superheroes, and not murder hobo’s with powers) the big concentrations will be in the US.  The Intro campaign will take place in one of the cities with the highest concentration of Superbeings in the world.  New York City.  But even there, the total count of Superbeings will be under 30 all told including villains.

 

The actual player campaign will take place in Hudson City (because I am very familiar with it) which is a city that has no Superbeings at all.  The villains that escape/flee the Intro Campaign will go to Hudson City and the heroes that follow them will be the Hero volunteers (Broadmoor Justice Foundation detectives and support technicians) to capture them. 

 

This will mean that the first PC’s the players played were fully pre-generated, and the second PC’s will be designed by the players but still required to fit inside a pre-determined box of circumstances to facilitate “learning” the new city.   Any PC’s built later will of course be 100% player driven since by that time they will have a firm grasp of the campaign world.

 

The time period and general technology will be much like the retro-modern setting of Batman: The Animated Series (1992-1994).  While cell phones and PC’s do exist.  Cell phones are just phones without a cord (no smart anything or cameras), people are still agog about flip phones.  Wireless computer networks (hardwired or nothing) or the internet as we know it does not exist.  While there are some internet resources available as is email.  It is the far more primitive version we had in the late 80’s and very early 90’s.  Data is restricted to direct connection to LAN’s or dial up (real world broadband didn’t even really get going until the very late 90’s and early 2000’s anyway).  So surveillance cameras and computers require physical wiring and recording video or files are done with physical media, video tape and floppy discs.  CB’s (citizen band radios) are still the big thing for communications that do not need a hardline.  Cell phones only work if they are within range of a cell tower, and cell towers are pretty much only found in major metropolitan areas.

 

DNA is still in it’s infancy as a crime fighting tool.

 

Digital photography is the domain of very rare specialists.

 

Morality in the campaign is Good vs Bad being mostly clear-cut.  Everyone is pretty much as they appear with the occasional bad guy masquerading as something else.  The governmental agencies are good in of themselves.  Problems occur not from the agency, but from bad people in the agencies.

 

Realism will be very cinematic and very romanticized.  Lots of heroic adventure and two fisted action, little grit except and window dressing and plot.

 

Outlook, almost everything works out.  Yes, the good guys are not only expected to win, they almost always do in the end.

 

Continuity, the campaign will consist of episodic sessions that are tied together by overreaching plot arcs.   The player that can be there every session will find an interesting and nefarious plot to foil, while the player that can only play every few sessions will be able to drop and not be totally lost. 

 

Interaction with non-supers, superheroes are known and welcomed allies of law enforcement and emergency services.  The normal citizen looks up to them in general as “the good guys”.

 

This will be the first foray into superheroic roleplaying for most of my players.  Up till now, their favorite games have been mystery/horror like Trail of Cthulhu, Fear Itself, Call of Cthulhu plus standard adventure like D&D 5^th.  Though investigative games have been their favorite.  Which is the reason that the heroes will be private investigators/detectives who are also Superheroes, with HEROES being the operative word. 

 

The campaign will also have a mystic tint with magic and Chi as a given. 

In super identity the flashy costume is a requirement.  These superheroes do not skulk in the dark; they proudly announce to the world they are HEROES. 

 

So that is it.  I need some inspiration to build the pre-generated heroes. 

• They will be standard superheroes (400pts) with straight up caps as per Champions (pg 135).  
• But they will not be focus/device monkeys. 
• I need a minimum of 6 characters.
• Each character should be unique if possible.
• Each pre-gen should not be too cool since they are to be throwaways.  Or, in other words don’t waste any really really cool ideas.   
• Investigation and detective work will play a major part of the game so their secret ID's will be active ID's.

 

Building champs characters is actually really easy.  It is the initial concept that is stumping me. 

 

I have discussed this with my player group and they are ready to go, so I want to start before the enthusiasm dies.   It has taken a while to locate a group of role-players that can click with. 

[Steve]

One resource you can use to get characters made quickly is to go through the three 6E villain volumes, find villains with builds you like and reskin them as heroes. In my current campaign, I used Shrinker this way for a new player to get him going with a character quickly. A number of villains come to mind that can be used this way: Cheshire Cat, Howler, Green Dragon, Ogre and Foxbat.

[Spence]

Not a bad suggestion.  But not actually what I am looking for.

 

I am trying to build a balanced teaching team of superheroes for 6 players without using power suits or deadly weapons as foci and I am fishing for inspiration. 

 

Power Type:

Brick (looks normal but tough / transforms into?)

Mystic Master (Western Wizard / Eastern Mystic / Anime inspired something?)

Martial Artist (type?)

Flyer (just flies / energy type / martial type)

?

?

 

Secret ID professions as Justice Foundation operatives:

Detective

Weapons Specialist

Medical Doctor/Forensic Scientist

Electrical/Electronic Engineer

Mechanical Engineer

Structural Engineer

?

 

Building them is the easy part, it is just getting the overall team concept to trigger in my mind.

 

Now you may notice I list Weapons Specialist as one of the possible secret ID professions, that may seem to against my wanting to not have foci or power suits.  It doesn't.  I want their powers to be non-foci/powered suit based. 

 

I just need so concept bullets to give me a bootstrap.

 

PS great choices on villains to reskin by the way. Once I get a decision on what the six concepts will be, I'd planned on shamelessly borrowing as it was   

 

[csyphrett]

It has been a long time since I have run a campaign, Spence.

 

So you need six guys in a hurry and you need something to get you started.

 

The old Champions book for 5e had quick roll supers that you could select powers with dice. Roll some dice, get the type figured out, name them.

 

You can got to the Create A Hero/Villains threads or the thread that Death Tribble uses to keep track of things to grab up names and power sets. there was also an international hero thread that died. Oddhat had the new circle thread for 4e but the board output is wonky so you might have problems reading the characters. The Superdrafts have teams put together. You might be able to make something out of a draft team.

 

You can go to TV Tropes and search for hero teams and see if that gives you an inspiration

 

you can do a google search for hero teams and see what shows up

 

You can redo villains like Steve said.

CES

[csyphrett]

Not a bad suggestion.  But not actually what I am looking for.

 

I am trying to build a balanced teaching team of superheroes for 6 players without using power suits or deadly weapons as foci and I am fishing for inspiration. 

 

Power Type:

Brick (looks normal but tough / transforms into?)

Mystic Master (Western Wizard / Eastern Mystic / Anime inspired something?)

Martial Artist (type?)

Flyer (just flies / energy type / martial type)

?

?

 

Secret ID professions as Justice Foundation operatives:

Detective

Weapons Specialist

Medical Doctor/Forensic Scientist

Electrical/Electronic Engineer

Mechanical Engineer

Structural Engineer

?

 

Building them is the easy part, it is just getting the overall team concept to trigger in my mind.

 

Now you may notice I list Weapons Specialist as one of the possible secret ID professions, that may seem to against my wanting to not have foci or power suits.  It doesn't.  I want their powers to be non-foci/powered suit based. 

 

I just need so concept bullets to give me a bootstrap.

 

PS great choices on villains to reskin by the way. Once I get a decision on what the six concepts will be, I'd planned on shamelessly borrowing as it was   

I always liked the beast boy and ben ten type heroes. Maybe a Girl Genius Spark would fit in.

CES 

[Spence]

I always liked the beast boy and ben ten type heroes. Maybe a Girl Genius Spark would fit in.

CES 

 

A Beast Boy type is a great idea. 

Ben Ten is a focus jockey so he wouldn't fit.  

I don't see Girl Genius in spandex trading blows with a villain though.  

 

In super identity the Heroes are full spandex. 

I am deliberately trying to avoid the regular clothing people with powers vibe that crushed comics in the 80-90's.  

[csyphrett]

A Beast Boy type is a great idea. 

Ben Ten is a focus jockey so he wouldn't fit.  

I don't see Girl Genius in spandex trading blows with a villain though.  

 

In super identity the Heroes are full spandex. 

I am deliberately trying to avoid the regular clothing people with powers vibe that crushed comics in the 80-90's.  

You have a point there. Sparks tend to set people on fire with ray guns and stuff

Maybe a demigod type from Percy Jackson. They have the powers of their parents

 

CES

[Spence]

You have a point there. Sparks tend to set people on fire with ray guns and stuff

Maybe a demigod type from Percy Jackson. They have the powers of their parents

 

CES

 

Demigod eh?  Now that's an idea.

 

Well, time for me to hit the sack.  04:00 comes early. 

Some of my best work happens during a good nights sleep...

[Lord Liaden]

I would suggest the introductory team include a martial-artist student of an aged teacher who is versed in mystical MA techniques. The teacher learned his skills from a hidden temple/city in the Orient. That would introduce a potential background for original PCs and other NPCs.

[Territan]

Excuse me, but so far it looks like nobody mentioned the "Superhero Gallery" section of the Champions 6E sourcebook.

 

The Superhero Gallery provides twenty character templates—in forms like "brick," "speedster," "telekinetic," "mystic master," etc.—which have a whole bunch of swappable parts to make a serviceable character in a matter of minutes, possibly seconds if you have the Champions Sourcebook Hero Designer add-in and good file management.

 

Attributes start at base levels for each template, and each template provides at least three sets of add-ins for customization of those (e.g. "Basic Brick," "Brawler," "Brute," "Nimble Brick").

 

Powers are typically broken down into Offensive, Defensive, Movement, and Secondary powers, and the template lists a bunch of powers in each category to draw from. Many characters are built on the traditional 60-point multipower, and templates using that list a dozen or so powers that fit the theme and tell you to pick five.

 

Each template will list a number of Skill points to invest, and provide packages of Skills and Complications that fit especially well, but there are bunches of themed Skill and Complication packages at the start of the Gallery that you can also draw from, things like "Beautiful/Handsome Set," "Cat Burglar Set," "Friends and Colleagues Set," "Hacker Set," "Hand to Hand Combat Set," "Playboy Set," "Achilles Heel Set," "Curse Set," "Radiation Accident Set"... And yeah, somewhere in the middle there I switched from Skills to Complications. It should be evident where.

 

If you're working with new players, I think the book is worth it for this section alone, and Hero Designer and this book's add-in elevate it further. You can have the entire team whipped up and printed in an hour or so (printer not included). If you have the PDF version of this book, it's also a good idea to print out 2-3 copies of the first section of the Superhero Gallery, and one double-sided page of each template. That way everyone can kind of work at the same time. Also, one copy of each template limits repetition.

 

I'd also recommend the Powers book with a caveat, because I've observed with my group that having a huge book named Powers and no accompanying volume named Skills results in power-heavy, investigation-light characters that really, really want to be overpowered. But the Powers book is easier to pick from than the combined Powers, Advantages, and Limitations of Volume 1.

[Spence]

Hi all,

 

I appreciate the inputs.  

 

But creation/build is not the problem.  

 

It is matching archetypes to build a cohesive team while at the same time expose the new players to a wide variety of build concepts. 

Also they are not meant to stand up past the initial intro-mini campaign.  

 

I have all (yes all, except a handful of pre-1985 items) the Hero related publications that have came out.  Including their electronic version where available.  

 

Plus stating out a Champs character is something I can do in my sleep once I have a concept.  

 

My mental block is coming up with the premise/concept of the 6 PC's power sets.  

 

Lord Laiden.    

Good idea, but one I will hold as a suggestion for the players when they actually build their personal characters.  

Trying to stay a little generic and not use up any of the really cool ideas on the throw away pre-gens.  

 

 

 

[Durzan Malakim]

I suggest building your demo characters around their team role and a perhaps a shared team theme. As someone who played a lot of City of Heroes, I tend to think of team roles in these terms:

• Tank: A meat shield who draws enemy attention. The primary power focus is on individual survivability/defenses
• Scrapper: A close-combat damage dealer. The primary power focus is on hand-to-hand combat.
• Blaster: A ranged-combat damage dealer. The primary power focus is on ranged combat.
• Controller: A debuffing disabler of enemies or a summoner of allies. The primary power focus is on lowering enemy abilities or outnumbering them.
• Defender: A buffer or healer who supports allies. The primary power focus is on team survivability/defenses.

Limiting your demo characters to these archetypes will highlight just how flexible the HERO system is when you allow players free reign to create their own characters.

 

As for a team theme, I have two suggestions: 

1. An element-based team where each member controls a different element such as earth, fire, water, air, light, and dark (or mind and spirit).
2. A pantheon-based team where each member represents a different god/demigod such as Zeus, Athena, Ares, Hephaestus, Hermes, and Hades.

Combine a team role with a theme and voila! you have a hero for example:

• Earth tanker
• Ice scrapper
• Fire blaster
• Air controller
• Light defender
• Dark scrapper

[Amorkca]

 

Lord Laiden.    

Good idea, but one I will hold as a suggestion for the players when they actually build their personal characters.  

Trying to stay a little generic and not use up any of the really cool ideas on the throw away pre-gens.  

 

Perhaps a cameo appearance of the master as he searches for a new apprentice?

[Anaximander]

I am working up an introductory plus ongoing superhero campaign.  I have hit a block, mostly me being indecisive about the introductory campaign. 

 

Here is a little information on what I am doing.  IMO the hardest part of figuring out how to play HERO is not actual play.  It is relevant character creation.   No actual structure exists for the new player to use as a frame of reference when they build their characters.   It is OK to try and explain it with pounds of written text, but the only way to actually understand in a way that will allow one to actually apply the information and produce a character concept that is actually what you intended is to actually play one and roll dice.     Which brings me to my introductory plus ongoing superhero campaign.

 

I will kick off with an introductory campaign that includes pre-generated player characters, including backgrounds and complications.   The players will be members of the city’s premier superhero team and will assist the big guns in combating the nefarious machinations of a master villain.    In keeping with my overall plan, the players will be pitted against one of the Master Villains lieutenants.  The climax/end of the introduction will be the foiling of the master plan and the escape of some of the lieutenants and henchmen to the actual campaign city.    This campaign city has no resident superheroes or villains. 

 

My world is a very low super population one, meaning that supers of any kind are extremely rare.  Any group of supers will be accorded a lot of deference because they are powerful.  Having actually played the first mini-campaign using the pre-generated PC’s with backgrounds, the players should now have a tangible and useful idea of how HERO actually works.  Having been exposed to how to spend XP, they will see how the points translate into ability.  

 

So the players will then build their actual PC’s to play in the real, full campaign.   

 

So why am I writing this?  I am having trouble in making the pre-gen’s.

 

The pre-gens must:

• Provide a wide example of the different archetypes of supers available
• Demonstrate complications
• Establish campaign tone
  • Morality 2) Good vs bad is mostly clear-cut
  • Realism 1) Very romantic
  • Outlook 2) Almost everything works out
  • Continuity 3) Some long stories, some episodic ones
• Be interesting enough teach, but generic enough to not overshadow the player concepts.
• Be natural builds.  What I mean by natural builds is that they have no critical devices or armor.  They are 100% fully capable in their birthday suits.  A martial artist type can carry a staff, but the staff is just a staff.  It is not a focus.
• They all have Secret ID’s and are employees/detectives of the Broadmoor Justice Foundation Ltd.   Broadmoor is an international corporation that specializes in discrete investigations and has an untarnished reputation for honesty and above board services.  They are also known to cooperate with local law enforcement agencies. 

 

That is basically what I am trying to do.  But you will need some more basic information on my campaign world.

 

A first point is that in my super’s games are very Golden/Silver’ery and players have “stables”.  Or in other words players will eventually have 2 to 3 characters that they can run.  But only one PC can be active in an episode. 

 

As mentioned before, the world does not have large numbers of supers.  As with early comics (back when they were focused on superheroes, and not murder hobo’s with powers) the big concentrations will be in the US.  The Intro campaign will take place in one of the cities with the highest concentration of Superbeings in the world.  New York City.  But even there, the total count of Superbeings will be under 30 all told including villains.

 

The actual player campaign will take place in Hudson City (because I am very familiar with it) which is a city that has no Superbeings at all.  The villains that escape/flee the Intro Campaign will go to Hudson City and the heroes that follow them will be the Hero volunteers (Broadmoor Justice Foundation detectives and support technicians) to capture them. 

 

This will mean that the first PC’s the players played were fully pre-generated, and the second PC’s will be designed by the players but still required to fit inside a pre-determined box of circumstances to facilitate “learning” the new city.   Any PC’s built later will of course be 100% player driven since by that time they will have a firm grasp of the campaign world.

 

The time period and general technology will be much like the retro-modern setting of Batman: The Animated Series (1992-1994).  While cell phones and PC’s do exist.  Cell phones are just phones without a cord (no smart anything or cameras), people are still agog about flip phones.  Wireless computer networks (hardwired or nothing) or the internet as we know it does not exist.  While there are some internet resources available as is email.  It is the far more primitive version we had in the late 80’s and very early 90’s.  Data is restricted to direct connection to LAN’s or dial up (real world broadband didn’t even really get going until the very late 90’s and early 2000’s anyway).  So surveillance cameras and computers require physical wiring and recording video or files are done with physical media, video tape and floppy discs.  CB’s (citizen band radios) are still the big thing for communications that do not need a hardline.  Cell phones only work if they are within range of a cell tower, and cell towers are pretty much only found in major metropolitan areas.

 

DNA is still in it’s infancy as a crime fighting tool.

 

Digital photography is the domain of very rare specialists.

 

Morality in the campaign is Good vs Bad being mostly clear-cut.  Everyone is pretty much as they appear with the occasional bad guy masquerading as something else.  The governmental agencies are good in of themselves.  Problems occur not from the agency, but from bad people in the agencies.

 

Realism will be very cinematic and very romanticized.  Lots of heroic adventure and two fisted action, little grit except and window dressing and plot.

 

Outlook, almost everything works out.  Yes, the good guys are not only expected to win, they almost always do in the end.

 

Continuity, the campaign will consist of episodic sessions that are tied together by overreaching plot arcs.   The player that can be there every session will find an interesting and nefarious plot to foil, while the player that can only play every few sessions will be able to drop and not be totally lost. 

 

Interaction with non-supers, superheroes are known and welcomed allies of law enforcement and emergency services.  The normal citizen looks up to them in general as “the good guys”.

 

This will be the first foray into superheroic roleplaying for most of my players.  Up till now, their favorite games have been mystery/horror like Trail of Cthulhu, Fear Itself, Call of Cthulhu plus standard adventure like D&D 5^th.  Though investigative games have been their favorite.  Which is the reason that the heroes will be private investigators/detectives who are also Superheroes, with HEROES being the operative word. 

 

The campaign will also have a mystic tint with magic and Chi as a given. 

In super identity the flashy costume is a requirement.  These superheroes do not skulk in the dark; they proudly announce to the world they are HEROES. 

 

So that is it.  I need some inspiration to build the pre-generated heroes. 

• They will be standard superheroes (400pts) with straight up caps as per Champions (pg 135).  
• But they will not be focus/device monkeys. 
• I need a minimum of 6 characters.
• Each character should be unique if possible.
• Each pre-gen should not be too cool since they are to be throwaways.  Or, in other words don’t waste any really really cool ideas.   
• Investigation and detective work will play a major part of the game so their secret ID's will be active ID's.

 

Building champs characters is actually really easy.  It is the initial concept that is stumping me. 

 

I have discussed this with my player group and they are ready to go, so I want to start before the enthusiasm dies.   It has taken a while to locate a group of role-players that can click with. 

I am in a similar boat.  I would like to run a Hero System campaign but never have done so, and likely players have not done so either and are not as keen on my ideas as I am.  I figure I have one shot to get it right.

 

Though I have no actual experience running the game, I do like writing and have taken writing classes.  With that in mind, one thing you need is a clear vision in your mind of what you want, and you seem to have that covered.  This will help you in knowing when to say "yes" and "no" to character ideas that may run a little counter to what you have in mind.

 

Also, like in other media of writing, you have to know your audience and find common ground with them where you can run the game you want while they can run the characters they want.  I, for one, do not liking playing pre-gens.  There has so far been only one pre-gen I remember fondly.  He was a dwarf named Jhaefer in the first ever ADnD campaign I ever played in.  Even then, I had a lot of freedom to develop him once he got into play.  I, of course, do not know your players, but if it were me, I would try to find out what types of characters the players want to play and build their first characters for them using the players' ideas.  This is another area where having clear vision can come in handy.  What you want and what they want might be at odds and you may have to compromise a point or two.  Having a clear vision will help you to know when to compromise and when not.

 

Then comes the first game or two.  Here is what I would like to do.  I would like to have each character get a chance to go one-on-one against common thugs.  This will allow them and me to get a fill for their relative power level to the common citizen as familiarity with basic play.  After each character has had their chance with common thugs, I would device a scenario where all the characters happen upon a crime being committed by some sort VIPER-like super gang that would be impossible to thwart by any single hero but easy with the group working together.  This will allow me to have a better gauge of group combat and how the players are likely to work out as a team and who will naturally take what roles.

 

After the getting to know each other and system adventures, then, I would start introducing some of the grand arcs of my campaign setting.

 

Also, recognizing that both I and the players are new to the system, I would create a few heroic and super-heroic NPCs at various levels to come in and save the day in case I horribly misjudged the power-levels of the bad guys relative to the PCs.  If they do become necessary, I would gradually fade them out as I and the players gain real experience with the game.

 

Also, after they had a chance to get to know the game and their characters, I would give the players a chance to redesign or replace their characters based on the new information or let those first character go into their stables in case the players need a ready backup character.

 

As for the character stable idea, I have had similar ideas except I refer to mine as a character corral.  I come from a cowboy state, and I like alliterations.  I really like the idea and developed the idea when I was still planning a Star Trek campaign using the Last Unicorn Games system.  I think this is an excellent way of dealing with characters who have limited usage.  One of the intentions I have with mine is that depending on the next adventure I want to run I could either give soft hints when certain characters would be more or less advantageous in the next adventure or even lay down strict restrictions and requirements. 

 

Another thing I am working on is allowing non-played character to receive bonus XP based on a percentage earned by played characters.  I have not determined what percentage I would use or if I would apply it evenly across all non-played characters or be divided among non-played characters at the player's choice.  The idea is that they are taking part in recorded adventures at the same time.

[Ninja-Bear]

Spence may I suggest that 400 pts is too much? If I understand correctly, that represents an experienced hero in game terms. Im going by the assumption that your players are new to the system that means with a lot of choices, a lot of bog down. The characters should have too many combat skills either so they can get the hang of finding info on sheet and adding stuff up. Then when you run a few adventures, give xp freely and let you players advance alittle more rapidly to the 400 point than otherwise ro see growth.

[TheQuestionMan]

Ninja-Bear I must disagree on Starting point levels. The Character Creation Guidelines are what really controls the power levels of your game.

 

 

IMOHO

 

 

QM

[Steve]

Actually, if the starting batch of heroes is intended to be a bunch of throwaways, using a lower power level will make the heroes they build later feel like an upgrade. I would suggest 300-350 points for that initial batch of heroes.

[Ninja-Bear]

Ninja-Bear I must disagree on Starting point levels. The Character Creation Guidelines are what really controls the power levels of your game.

 

 

IMOHO

 

 

QM

I pulled 300 out of my hat. What would be the equivalent of the old 250 pts of 4th ed?. The main point though is not so much the points or caps but how many abilities the starting characters should have. Simpler characters in yhe beginning I think would help teach the system though I would also give power tricks 11- for free for the player to try a one time stunt.

[Cassandra]

You could take a page out of the Adam West Batman TV series and have the heroes gathered at the office of the Police Commissioner.  He informs them that a series of strange crimes have taken place, and the Police need their help to track down the supervillain behind it.  This will give the heroes a place to start, and a reason to work together.  The Commissioner could even give the heroes a closed police precinct to use as a base, and an undercover van as a transport to get them started.

[pinecone]

I suggest you make one of each gender for each "type"....

 

Example: Brick, Scrapper, female version Riot Grrl

 

ST 30 to 40, Martial arts...Full on Brick defenses...some Streetwise, KS: Alternative culture World...

 

Mr. Wizard! Tech mavin, investgator...female verion The Spark! uses a Electro zapper as her main weapon.....etc

[Christopher R Taylor]

Take a look at the "create a villain theme team" thread for lots of concepts and related build types.  I would echo the suggestion of starting out lower power level, to match your campaign concept.  It sounds like you're looking at less Justice League and more Justice Society (sans Specter).

[Steve]

Maybe you could make each starting character a different type of martial artist: a blue-collar Boxer Brick, a stealthy Ninja, a Kung Fu expert, etc.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Also the "Create a hero Team" thread would be useful.

 

I agree with what others are saying though: build a bunch of standard archetypes and familiar heroes to give players a chance to get used to the idea and play.

[pinecone]

So...here is a suggested line up...I just happen to Really like MA, and MA Bricks...

 

TANK: Scrapper/ Riot Grrl  (Martial Brick, think Luke Cage)

 

Gadget Monger: Mr. Wizard/ The Spark (The "usual"  supply a pre-made list of Gizmos...)

 

Soopa Nin-jah!: The Athelete/ Olympia (More Captain America/Black Panther....)

 

Magic Mavin: Sorceress Supreme (Think Mary Wilson crossed with Zatanna )The Amazing Timothy "Some call me...Tim..?" (I'd start new players with a Multi-Power)

 

Blaster/ Air power: Dynamo! (Industrial accident, either gender, ex electrician)

 

 

Good luck!

[Spence]

OK,

 

I’ve come up with my cast:

 

 

Normal Name                                        Foundation Occupation             Super Name                 Super Type

 

Maxwell/Maxine Wentworth                   Private Investigator                   The Detective               Meta-Detective

 

Robert/Roberta Thompson                    Physics/Engineering                 Atlas                            Brick

 

Alexander/Alexandria Lockwood            Anthropology/Occult Lore          Avatar                          Mystic Master

 

Brian/Brenda Ericson                            Electronics/Computers              Arclight                        Energy Projector          

 

Lee/Lea McClain                                   Psychology/Biology/Medical      PsiStar                         Mentalist         

 

Patrick/Patricia Takahashi                     Security                                    Jade Fist                      Martial Artist

 

 

I am going to build three versions of each PC.

 

First is a full 400-point build with complications using all pertinent resources (multipowers, devices, skills, maneuvers) with all point costs visible. This version will be used in Stage 3.

 

 I will then pare them down to hide or remove portions.  The most basic will be Stage 1 and a middle ground will be Stage 2.

 

The intro will be split into 3 “episodes”

Episode 1 will use the Stage 1 PC’s

Episode 2 will use the Stage 2 PC’s

Episode 3 will use the Stage 3 PC’s

 

Each player will be able to play the same PC throughout the intro, but will be exposed to more options each time. 

 

For example, the Stage 1 version may only have Strike, Dodge, Block available.  The Stage 1 Martial Artist would only have Martial Strike, Martial Dodge and Martial Block.

 

The Stage 1 Energy Projector may only have a straight purchase Blast, Flight and Force Field.

 

The Stage 3 Energy Projector may be re-written to use a Multipower.   

 

The main point is that Stage 1 will be super simplified to all them to pick up and understand how Hero plays, phases and rolls. 

 

Stage 2 adds in some more missing detail.

Stage 3 unveils a fully developed character.