Spence

When the distribution model changed from spinner racks everywhere to comic book stores, it all but guaranteed a reduction in circulation numbers. I've been involved in various parts of fandom for almost 4 decades, and I can't stand the "gatekeeper" nature of the denizens of comic book stores.

I can't be the only person who occasionally checks to see if his latent telekinetic powers have finally manifested. 

Chuck Dixon explained this well.  He noted that almost every little kid who started reading comics did so because he saw the covers at a store or a spinner rack or on a magazine rack.  He also pointed out that NOBODY goes into a comic shop except people already very interested in and already reading comics.  You don't get new buyers there.  Going direct distribution only cut comic book company throats.

Thanks.
 
But I think I am a perfect example of why comics are failing.  I read them in the past still find it far too confusing to try and find an entry point. 
 
I totally understand why people think comic store staff are messing with them.  You cannot get a simple answer to a simple question. 
 
Cover art no longer has anything to do with what is in the actual book.
 
There are no coherent accessible in one fricking place stories.
 
Heroes are no longer the subject, instead we have Bob the drunk/druggie/abuser/insert issue of choice that is denying/crying/whining/insert reaction of choice. 
 
I find it almost amusing in a sad way that the movies with the heroes being heroic are blockbusters but the current comic writers insist on focusing on non-heroic scumbaggery and then wonder why sales keep falling.
 
People don't buy comics because they are comics.  They buy them for the same reason they buy books and movies.  Entertainment.  Heroes overcoming great odds are entertaining.  Endlessly repeated scumbaggery is not. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

From my viewpoint here are the differences.
 
Person watches Queens Gambit and thinks "chess looks fun, maybe I should try it."
Looks for and finds chess set that has the same prices and board layout like the show. Finds rules that are just like the ones described in show. Discovers other people playing chess that is played just like game in show.
 
Person watches Supers show and thinks "this was based on a comic, I wonder if they are good too."
Goes online and gets thoroughly overwhelmed by the chaotic mess.
Goes to comic store "I just watched "Super Show" can you show me which comic that it is based on?"  and then flees the shop after their brains have turned to mush as the comic geeks argue over their favorite writers version of the story liberally salted with advice on what they should read instead. Without anything that answers the actual question, mostly because no one has any idea.
 
RPGs are worse because the few available are not ready to actually play.  You cannot buy Champs, M&M or Cypher at 3pm and have it at the table playing by the next day. 
 
 

I don't think he's referring to California and Oregon.  I believe he's using CA as shorthand for Captain America, and the OR was the word "or" but stressed (either that, or just accidentally capitalized).  In other words, I think he was trying to say "either Sam had taken over being Captain America or it was the Hail Hydra one."
 

He made a lot of good points, but ignored one of the tweets that nailed one of the biggest reasons.  To be fair it wasn't a planned video so he probably didn't even notice it.
 
"I think there are too many options.  If you are new to it & go to a CB store, there are 30 different series for one character. you have no idea which is good & then you have to buy 3-10 books to find out the ending. With chess you buy a board & find strategies online for free."
 
Manga avoids this because they do not have reboots unlike comics which seem to reboot every 35 seconds.
 
The other issue is that if a person watches one of the movies, it is virtually impossible for a non-comic reader to actually find a comic that actually reflects the movie.  Sweetcast hit the nail on the head when he mentioned a person trying to find a Daredevil comic after watching the movie. He mentioned a dozen names for writer's runs of which 90% were meaningless to me.  I actually wanted to find the Captain America I remembered after seeing First Avenger.  The books on the shelf at the local comic shop had the name, but they weren't anything near the superhero.  And when I tried to find out if I could order the storyline from the movie, they spent all their time trying to impress me with all the various versions and runs they knew.  

If I ask to buy/order something there are only three possible answers.  
 
1) Yes, we can order it and it will be $XX.XX
2) No, it is not available for order through our distributors.
3) Well, the movie doesn't follow the comic exactly but XX is as close as it gets.  
 
I left and never went back.
 
If I watch an anime and want to read the manga, I simply go find the Manga with the same title and start at volume #1.  
 
You cannot do that with movies because each comic character or team has 50 bizzilion different simultaneous comics as well as 75 bizzilion reboots and alternate timelines. 
Not to mention the stuff on the shelf is issue #10082447278 with #1 nowhere to be seen unless you wish to buy the super duper snazzy ultra collectors collection for mere cost of a small countries GDP.  Or for far too much money for anyone to spend just to see if they like something.  
 
When they release a movie, the comic label should release a TPB that contains the same characters (the same feel, not the usual blood splatter version that has replaced the superhero these days) and storyline.  And then continue to release the rest of the line in reasonably priced TPB's.  
 
Most, not all but most, of the successful supers movies have heroes being actual heroes.  Most of the comics I have seen in the few times I bothered to look in the last 10 years do not, have heroes being heroes.  Instead they portray the characters as anything but heroic. 
 
If you want new people to read comics, then they must be accessible.  Requiring a potential new reader to have to research decades of what if's just to have a guess of where to start simply means you do not want new readers.

Wow.  Around here, you can get a farm permit at 12.  You used to be able to get a motorcycle license at 14, but they upped it a few years back.  Regular learners at 15; regular license at 16 (assuming you took Driver's Ed already: you now have to have Driver's Ed to get a license here).  But seriously: the kids around here who _don't_ grow up on a farm license are, at least for now, still a minority.
 

Hero System 5th Ed Revised pg 415.
“Vitals” is defined as any particularly delicate or vulnerable area on the body; this can include the groin, the heart, a large artery, or many other areas. The GM should choose whatever effect is most appropriate for the attack and the situation."
 
I'm a Fred player so that is what you get

I think that the needle has moved on such things.  Lots of kids are driven around by their parents until they are almost ready to drive themselves and anecdotally I hear that they aren't as driven to get the permit the way me and my friends were back in the day.
It also makes a lot of difference where you live.  In my state unless you were a farm kid you had to be 15 and have a learners permit before you could drive with an adult and you had to be 16 before you could drive without one.  I grew up in the city in the 90s and got my license at 16.  There were only pubic roads to drive on around me. My wife (who grew up in the same city) didn't get hers until she was 19 because she mostly used public transit.
 
In this case, My game takes place in Horizen City (think Seattle) and the PCs live in a fairly urban area.  They either come from wealth or are literally 6 months old so none have learned how to drive.  Learning Permits will become a plot point once we get back from christmas break.  (Assuming the robotic duplicates currently impersonating them don't muck it all up first)
If someone chose to get behind the wheel I'd let them of course, then demand lots of dex rolls to avoid disaster during their madcap drive across town filled with fruit stands, guys carrying panes of glass, and similar all while screaming "I don't even have my permit!".

In a Pendragon RPG context, such a Professional Skill would probably take the form of PS: Dance Master, and they would be qualified to take on apprentices to pass their skills and the tradition(s) of dance to. I seriously doubt, however, that any Knight of the Realm would have such a thing, seeing as how their "profession" requires dividing their time between too many disciplines--with martial disciplines taking up the majority of their time--to ever become a Dance Master. But then again, if this is a "fantasy" version of Pendragon, then I suppose you could have all kinds of silly notions like Knights who are also Dance Masters who take on dance apprentices.

Regarding guidelines: A piece of advice I got many years ago was that all the characters Speed scores should vary by no more than 3.
So if the slowest PC has a 4, the fastest should be limited to 7.  If the slowest is a 5, then go to 8.  This does not apply to enemies.

The reasoning (and I've found it sound) is that if you have PCs with speeds much further apart than that it can create a lot of frustration at the table when someone has to wait for the people around them to go twice before they go again. 

I once saw a player convince the GM to let them play a speed 10 time manipulation guy & then had the rest of the table rebel when it felt like they spent most of their time waiting for time guy to roll all his attacks before their speed 5 characters could go again.  It was mechanically valid, and the DCs Time Guy had made it not terribly over powered, it just wasn't fun.

The manga industry is far more honest with itself. 
 
It has an advantage in that the works are more creator controlled. Unless the mangaka was on a bender, you won't get major characters totally changing personality or the whole story switching philosophy because the writers don't change. You might get your start in the industry with fan-fic but aside from short side stories or anime to manga adaptations you'd better come up original characters and stories if you want to make it into the major monthly publications.
 
And the competition for those weekly spots is fierce. Groups of aspiring writers and artists band together and self publish small print runs and move them from Con to Con in the hopes of building a clientele large enough to get noticed by a large magazine.
 
Also the industry is really good about keeping it's genres distinct. Books written mostly for kids are kept separate from the YA audience which is distinct from the mature readers material  and the hentai stuff is in its own corner. You'll see some crossover but usually only from one boundary to the neighboring one not across two.
 
Plus you have the purest difference. American comics are serials, manga are finite stories. Naruto ended. MHA will end. One Piece supposedly will end(I won't believe till I see it though.) Their creators had finished the stories they wanted to tell and given the characters the ends they envisioned. Sometimes the creator comes up with a new story years later and sometimes a publisher throws enough money at one to make them come back(see Dragon Ball and all its sequels) but just as often books don't get finished because of death or illness or a bender( Shiro Masmune of Appleseed and Ghost in the Shell just suddenly became a hentai creator out of the blue.)
 
Superman, Spiderman and Batman won't end. The corporations that own the characters will just keep throwing new writers and artists at them when their current arcs end. Because corporations have control of the characters not their creators. Sometimes the new guys are good, sometimes they really suck. But they feel no responsibility to the history because their only stake is their story. I doubt we'd see  the equivalent of Captain America's "Hail Hydra" from someone who'd written the original stories and grew the character through their own works.
 
 

So my feeling is this: there are comics, and then there is supers.  One is a medium, and the other is a genre.  Not only has the latter outgrown the former, it's outgrown itself to the point of supporting different types of stories and tones.  Now there is a baseline tone for the genre, idealistic and heroic, in much the same way that the baseline tone for a Western is independence and frontier justice.  The genres have matured to the point where they can deviate from that occasionally, up to a point.
 
Where comic/movie writers have really tripped up is by keeping baseline characters and taking them out of the baseline supers tone.  Creating new characters for an adult-targeted deconstructionist supers run, like Watchmen, is not a problem.  Having Joker intentionally cripple Barbara Gordon, or having Superman snap a neck, is a problem.  It's the difference between having an animated cartoon about a serial killer, and having Dora the Explorer be a serial killer.  Now you are taking a well defined character and shoehorning it into a story for which it is not appropriate.  To put it another way, this violates Brandon Sanderson's "Promise" rule of fiction writing.  In this case, the Promise of a code vs. killing and the triumph of good over evil is built into the well-established superhero character, and when Miller or Snyder break that promise they piss off their reader/audience. 
 
To skip back to the medium, I don't see a way for actual paper comic books to survive.  They cost too much to draw, too much to print, and too much to buy.  And that last point makes them inaccessible to their original audience of kids, so the target reader for paper comics is a twentysomething single guy with too much money and free time.  Therein lies the rub--how do you take a character originally intended for twelve year olds, and write a story that will get that guy to drive himself over to the FLCS and add his title to the take list?  I'm sure it's not impossible, but it's not easy either.  Meanwhile the twelve year olds are glued to TikTok, Minecraft, and Among Us.  I know because I have one.  His exposure to supers is hardcover illustrated storybooks, Flash on the CW, and the MCU.  He outgrew the first two at least two years ago.  He has never shown any inclination to reading an actual comic book.
 
Fortunately, the genre and the characters are not dependent on that medium for success.  They are dependent on good writing though.
 
 
 
 
 
 

Correct.
 
But that one of the reasons they are circling the bowl.
 
A movie comes out that actually has superHEROES in it and makes a butt load of cash.
 
Comic dude thinks Superheroes are popular writes a blood platter vigilante slaughtering supervillains and can't understand why the sales are in the toilet. 
 
 

Actually it is, 1950's/60's/70's modern legalisms maybe.  I grew up on the old westerns when they were prime time shows.  And while Gunsmoke did have a tendency to make Dodge City "modern", it was a minority among the many western TV series and movies.  When the White Hat Sheriff (or Marshall or Hero Drifter or etc.) gunned down the Black Hat gunslinger (or evil banker or evil etc.), it was celebrated and in a lot of them the closing scene had them wearing the badge.  Yes, Gunsmoke did add in some modern (at the time) sensibilities.  But many more simply went with good verses evil unless they wanted the threat of Jail/Prison/Hanging to be the dramatic theme that week.  But, taking one series as the end all "how westerns are done" only ignores all the others.
 
For the non-TV side of things, the real world law didn't actually impose a lot of that in the 1880's-1910's outside of the "heavily" populated cities of the coasts.  And even there, not as much as you would think. 
 
In Gunsmoke, Marshall Dillon didn't always wait for the other guy to draw first because of the "law".  The show had the character wait and then win with his blazing speed because it was more dramatic and presented the good guys in the best light.  But it was a TV show made in the 50's/60's/early 70's and just like F.B.I. and Dragnet it portrayed them as squeaky clean to a version 50's/60's TV moral standards where the law are Good Guys with capitol letters.  Were there movies made then that were not flattering to law enforcement?  Yes, but to air on network TV in prime time you had better not.  In the 50's and 60's most TV shows had TV couples in separate beds on the set because the networks wanted to avoid issues with the various "morality in TV" laws/rules.  Were there TV shows in the time that showed a couple in the same bed?  Yes.  But they were outliers and risked or received backlash that the studios preferred to avoid.
 
But whether a lawman has to wait or not will in no way alter whether you are adding in drama and roleplay or just rolling dice.  A PC that plays a principled lawman that would never draw first and risks the Badguy Brothers gunning him down is just as viable as a PC lawman that give a warning to them but draws first because he is outnumbered or the PC lawman that ambushes the dreaded Hole in the Wall gang because it is only him and his trusty deputy and ten of them. 
 
Whether the encounter is played out in heroic drama or just a die rolling exercise has nothing to do with the imposing more modern legal rules as much as the people playing it out. 
 
But you can do what ever you wish and I will not tell you otherwise. 

Actually it is, 1950's/60's/70's modern legalisms maybe.  I grew up on the old westerns when they were prime time shows.  And while Gunsmoke did have a tendency to make Dodge City "modern", it was a minority among the many western TV series and movies.  When the White Hat Sheriff (or Marshall or Hero Drifter or etc.) gunned down the Black Hat gunslinger (or evil banker or evil etc.), it was celebrated and in a lot of them the closing scene had them wearing the badge.  Yes, Gunsmoke did add in some modern (at the time) sensibilities.  But many more simply went with good verses evil unless they wanted the threat of Jail/Prison/Hanging to be the dramatic theme that week.  But, taking one series as the end all "how westerns are done" only ignores all the others.
 
For the non-TV side of things, the real world law didn't actually impose a lot of that in the 1880's-1910's outside of the "heavily" populated cities of the coasts.  And even there, not as much as you would think. 
 
In Gunsmoke, Marshall Dillon didn't always wait for the other guy to draw first because of the "law".  The show had the character wait and then win with his blazing speed because it was more dramatic and presented the good guys in the best light.  But it was a TV show made in the 50's/60's/early 70's and just like F.B.I. and Dragnet it portrayed them as squeaky clean to a version 50's/60's TV moral standards where the law are Good Guys with capitol letters.  Were there movies made then that were not flattering to law enforcement?  Yes, but to air on network TV in prime time you had better not.  In the 50's and 60's most TV shows had TV couples in separate beds on the set because the networks wanted to avoid issues with the various "morality in TV" laws/rules.  Were there TV shows in the time that showed a couple in the same bed?  Yes.  But they were outliers and risked or received backlash that the studios preferred to avoid.
 
But whether a lawman has to wait or not will in no way alter whether you are adding in drama and roleplay or just rolling dice.  A PC that plays a principled lawman that would never draw first and risks the Badguy Brothers gunning him down is just as viable as a PC lawman that give a warning to them but draws first because he is outnumbered or the PC lawman that ambushes the dreaded Hole in the Wall gang because it is only him and his trusty deputy and ten of them. 
 
Whether the encounter is played out in heroic drama or just a die rolling exercise has nothing to do with the imposing more modern legal rules as much as the people playing it out. 
 
But you can do what ever you wish and I will not tell you otherwise. 

Yep,  too much realism has killed far more games than it helped.  Especially when someone bleeds modern legalisms into a game world.  
I watched a great supers game dissolve in three sessions when the GM and one player decided that insurance and collateral damage lawsuits were necessary for them to "truly immerse and enjoy the game".   Then they whined when the game went from six regulars + GM to just the GM and one player.  Most gamers play for fun, not to simulate the real world. 

Actually it is, 1950's/60's/70's modern legalisms maybe.  I grew up on the old westerns when they were prime time shows.  And while Gunsmoke did have a tendency to make Dodge City "modern", it was a minority among the many western TV series and movies.  When the White Hat Sheriff (or Marshall or Hero Drifter or etc.) gunned down the Black Hat gunslinger (or evil banker or evil etc.), it was celebrated and in a lot of them the closing scene had them wearing the badge.  Yes, Gunsmoke did add in some modern (at the time) sensibilities.  But many more simply went with good verses evil unless they wanted the threat of Jail/Prison/Hanging to be the dramatic theme that week.  But, taking one series as the end all "how westerns are done" only ignores all the others.
 
For the non-TV side of things, the real world law didn't actually impose a lot of that in the 1880's-1910's outside of the "heavily" populated cities of the coasts.  And even there, not as much as you would think. 
 
In Gunsmoke, Marshall Dillon didn't always wait for the other guy to draw first because of the "law".  The show had the character wait and then win with his blazing speed because it was more dramatic and presented the good guys in the best light.  But it was a TV show made in the 50's/60's/early 70's and just like F.B.I. and Dragnet it portrayed them as squeaky clean to a version 50's/60's TV moral standards where the law are Good Guys with capitol letters.  Were there movies made then that were not flattering to law enforcement?  Yes, but to air on network TV in prime time you had better not.  In the 50's and 60's most TV shows had TV couples in separate beds on the set because the networks wanted to avoid issues with the various "morality in TV" laws/rules.  Were there TV shows in the time that showed a couple in the same bed?  Yes.  But they were outliers and risked or received backlash that the studios preferred to avoid.
 
But whether a lawman has to wait or not will in no way alter whether you are adding in drama and roleplay or just rolling dice.  A PC that plays a principled lawman that would never draw first and risks the Badguy Brothers gunning him down is just as viable as a PC lawman that give a warning to them but draws first because he is outnumbered or the PC lawman that ambushes the dreaded Hole in the Wall gang because it is only him and his trusty deputy and ten of them. 
 
Whether the encounter is played out in heroic drama or just a die rolling exercise has nothing to do with the imposing more modern legal rules as much as the people playing it out. 
 
But you can do what ever you wish and I will not tell you otherwise. 

That.  That right there.
People tend to forget that fiction = escapism.
 
We can argue all day long that fiction can be used to "explore x" or "visualize y," but at the end of the day, the _story_ is what sells it, and too much emphasis on any given aspect of the setting will ultimately _detract_ from that story.
 
 
 
Not just legalisms, but modern sensibilities of any kind.  Honestly, this is probably why it's _so difficult_ for me to appreciate the bulk of Urban Fantasy.  If I want to read about Ogres slapping the crap out of elves, I don't want to read about the huge social outcry of the blatant ethnism, racism, etc this represents.  No; I'm not a horrible person: if I am reading a modern thriller or action story, then I _demand_ people be mad as Hell about it, but it doesn't belong in certain places.  Tolkien, for example:  there was an evil race that was just evil because it was evil, and it was okay to hate them for their evil.  Not really my bag, but I am much cooler with that than public outcry begging for support and understanding of the orcs, who were good from their point of view, and we should all struggle to understand and accept it.
 
Gad; that's a lousy example, because I am not a big fan of "evil because they are evil," nor of Tolkien, but it was the most high-profile thing that came to mind.
 
Let's go with Conan wenching his way across the continent.  Not cool with modern ethics-- at least in fits, since we have a strange cycle of "sexuality is something to keep under wraps" to "sexuality is the whole purpose of society" and spins round and every every couple of decades, so again-- bad example.  But I trust you folks are getting the idea: if something is part and parcel of the setting, the fastest way to kill that game is to bring in a modern sensibility that beats it into the shape of things today.  I am reading this book or playing this game to get take a few hours to _get away_ from things today!
 
I want my escapism-- not necessarily dumbed down, but simpler, and a bit more clear-cut between good guys and bad guys; right action and wrong action, than what exists right now.
 
I don't want to play the accounting part of life; I don't want to play the courtroom part of life; I don't want to play the insurance agent part of life.  I want to play the adventure, and stop the bad guys, and have fun with some friends.  
 
 
 
 
 
There are a lot of things over the years I have seen that people feel are "must haves" for a game to "feel a certain way."  The most baffling example of this to me is complex politics in fantasy.  Way to kill fantasy, guys.   Make it _boring_.....   I mean, politics is one of the things I am DEFINITELY TRYING TO ESCAPE FROM FOR A BIT when I decide I want to play a game or read a book.
 
Politics in fantasy?  Frankly, "we've been enemies for years" is good enough, period.  I don't care why; I don't care what has transpired for the last two centuries; I don't care what sneaky subterfuge is currently in play from either side.  For me, it adds absolutely _no_ interest, can actively _disinterest_ me from the setting and the game, and worst of all: someone put a lot of work into alienating me.
 
Anyone else remember that tiny pamphlet that was the original Greyhawk setting?
 
So long as you're appropriating the classic schticks-- wizards, elves, dragons, medieval england-- that little pamphlet is really all I ever needed.  If you're going radically different (Flash Gordon, ancient China, Barsoom, I might need more actual setting detail: races, ethnicities, etc-- but I need damned little politics, hyper-specific legal codes, or absolute moralities, particularly if the exist because that's what we feel right now, and make precious little sense in the setting.  
 
Actually, I don't really need them even if they _aren't_ modern.  It's just that imposing modern sensibilities generally makes pretty much anything _terrible_. 
 
 

Yep,  too much realism has killed far more games than it helped.  Especially when someone bleeds modern legalisms into a game world.  
I watched a great supers game dissolve in three sessions when the GM and one player decided that insurance and collateral damage lawsuits were necessary for them to "truly immerse and enjoy the game".   Then they whined when the game went from six regulars + GM to just the GM and one player.  Most gamers play for fun, not to simulate the real world. 

Yep,  too much realism has killed far more games than it helped.  Especially when someone bleeds modern legalisms into a game world.  
I watched a great supers game dissolve in three sessions when the GM and one player decided that insurance and collateral damage lawsuits were necessary for them to "truly immerse and enjoy the game".   Then they whined when the game went from six regulars + GM to just the GM and one player.  Most gamers play for fun, not to simulate the real world. 

In general yes, but most western media do not concern themselves with that. The good guys can shoot to kill without legal ramifications because they are the law.

I don't use it too much.  Honestly, the only time I've ever used it is because I screwed up and balanced things too far against the players and had to make adjustments on the fly.  Rather than doing a "gimme," which I don't like to do, as it can become habit-forming (for the players, I mean), I might check a die roll and come out with "well, you didn't hit him quite square, but the flat of your sword struck the side of his helm, forcing him to step back and jerk at his visor," or Crap.  He totally blew that roll, and they kinda _need_ to find that key.  Frankly, I didn't think they come in and shove the dresser up against the door, closing the half-open drawer that was meant to tempt them to look inside.  What's wrong with these guys?  Surely they aren't _that_ concerned about _one_ C'Thuloid......   Wait-- he's searching for the hidden panel with the exit.  Wow! Spectacular success, too!  "okay, you find that one panel behind the dresser does seem to wiggle a bit when pressed.  As you're working it, trying to figure out the latching mechanism, you see the corner of a piece of paper sticking out from behind the top of the panel.  Fishing it out, you see that it's a hand-written note; it must have fallen from the dresser when you jerked it towards the door.  It reads "I could wait no longer.  I have taken a coach to meet with the others.  Take this key; you will need it to access the crypt.  Look for the corner stone whose grain runs foul to its borders."
 
 
That sort of thing.   Short version:
 
It's a tool for me to unscrew the party when I did it myself, and not something I use publicly.  I have found that "every roll means _something_ good, and bad isn't always bad" tends to result in players giving the game their half.
 
 

Marvel likely considers the comics as “R&D” for the films & tv shows. So will keep it around.