Where are the super hero games?

So I'm wondering where the super hero games at.

I'm in all of them. They died. some but not all of the various reasons that roll20.net super hero campaigns die. 1) The GM had to end the campaign due to medical problems. 2) The GM had to end the campaign due to work related problems. 3) The GM had to end the campaign due to personality conflicts. 4) The GM couldn't get the campaign started because of scheduling problems. 5) The GM couldn't get the campaign started because the players would only submit the wrong kinds of heroes. 6) The GM's roll20.net account was deleted. 7) The game is actually taking place on other software and is only using roll20 for exposure. 8) The GM goes silent, doesn't end the campaign just stops updating. 9) The GM had end the campaign due to poor attendance. But the most common reason is a universal problem for the whole roll playing game hobby. Too many players, not enough GMs.

John "No Skype" T. said: I'm in all of them. They died. some but not all of the various reasons that roll20.net super hero campaigns die. 1) The GM had to end the campaign due to medical problems. 2) The GM had to end the campaign due to work related problems. 3) The GM had to end the campaign due to personality conflicts. 4) The GM couldn't get the campaign started because of scheduling problems. 5) The GM couldn't get the campaign started because the players would only submit the wrong kinds of heroes. 6) The GM's roll20.net account was deleted. 7) The game is actually taking place on other software and is only using roll20 for exposure. 8) The GM goes silent, doesn't end the campaign just stops updating. 9) The GM had end the campaign due to poor attendance. But the most common reason is a universal problem for the whole roll playing game hobby. Too many players, not enough GMs. Sounds like you should take up the mantle! Thats a lot of failed campaigns.

Jake M. said: John "No Skype" T. said: I'm in all of them. They died. some but not all of the various reasons that roll20.net super hero campaigns die. 1) The GM had to end the campaign due to medical problems. 2) The GM had to end the campaign due to work related problems. 3) The GM had to end the campaign due to personality conflicts. 4) The GM couldn't get the campaign started because of scheduling problems. 5) The GM couldn't get the campaign started because the players would only submit the wrong kinds of heroes. 6) The GM's roll20.net account was deleted. 7) The game is actually taking place on other software and is only using roll20 for exposure. 8) The GM goes silent, doesn't end the campaign just stops updating. 9) The GM had end the campaign due to poor attendance. But the most common reason is a universal problem for the whole roll playing game hobby. Too many players, not enough GMs. Sounds like you should take up the mantle! Thats a lot of failed campaigns. Would that make him a Super Villain?

There's one additional reason that wasn't mentioned: "Superheroes" isn't standard fantasy, so there's a bit more variety in RPG systems for it - and not everyone is familiar (or comfortable) with the same ones.

Turtle Man, he can swim in the sea, has a hard exterior, but unfortunately moves very slow and is lethargic. He is determined to finish though!

Yeah, that's not just a problem unique to Roll20 or superhero games. I can't tell you how many campaigns I've been in on Myth-Weavers where either GMs or players have just dropped off for various reasons. And admittedly, there were times I've been that player or GM. Obviously, a lot of real-world circumstances dealing with work/health/family/etc issues are unavoidable. The best case scenario there is to at least let the other people in your game group know "hey guys, it's been fun, but I won't be able to continue playing due to reason X". At least that way they have a bit of a heads-up and can find a replacement player to fill out the team roster, and aren't all just wondering "when is this person gonna update?" If you are the GM and have to leave, it can be a bit trickier - I'd suggest trying to find someone that you and the group can trust and then forwarding them your game notes and such (and let the group know, of course). It might be best to "promote" from within the group you're already playing with, and then let the Player-turned-GM have the task of finding a replacement player. But hey, as far as superhero RPGs go - if someone is willing to run/play something with the Mutants & Masterminds 2nd Edition system, I might be up for that as either player or GM.

depending on he time I would be up for playing second ed

M&M2E has so many good things going for it as a system - point-buy, effect-based, lateral advancement after every adventure, universal system all contained in 1 core rulebook, pre-made character/npc sheets, d20-based so there's not a steep learning curve - just to name a few. If I was gonna be locked in a fallout bunker with 4 other people for a year and had to pick just one RPG book to take with me, it'd be the M&M2E core rulebook. Putting together a character in that system is like building with LEGO - it's beautiful. The only couple of downsides that prevent it from being my absolutely #1 go-to system are: 1) Relative obscurity. Unfortunately, Green Ronin has not put forth the marketing hype that brought a fresh dynamo like Paizo and a curmudgeonly old mainstay like WotC to the front of tabletop gamer collective subconscious. Even when speaking to people who work in game stores , most of them have unfortunately never heard of M&M. 2) Availability. Fortunately, Green Ronin has kept their online store open, and .pdf versions of the books can be purchased there. Finding a printed copy is more difficult, since GR has moved on to M&M 3rd edition (which I don't prefer), and so most of the physical copies of the books are fairly rare, and even the ones you do manage to find are mostly used ones. Unfortunately, at the time of this writing, to my best knowledge, there does not exist any official SRD (System Reference Document) or similar open-to-the-public reference site for the rules of M&M2E that a GM can direct new players to, or that a person who just wants to try out the game can glance over before making the investment in the books (although the books are definitely worth it, I encourage any superhero RPG fans to buy them if you have the opportunity). This leads me as a GM to more often run games in systems that are more openly accessible, like Pathfinder, since Paizo so graciously made nearly the entire ruleset available for free online , and it's easy for starting players who are not sure about the hobby just yet to be able to access the game material they need to play. Although I still highly recommend supporting their work as well - besides making top-notch products, Paizo as a company has shown exemplary conduct, attitude, and ethics in respecting the fans and customers that make their work possible, making characters and options that reflect what the fans have asked for in the game, rather than what a corporate committee "thinks" customers want, and generally not being afraid of more "mature" content , while avoiding being crass about it. Contrasting of course to the heavy-handed and needlessly aggressive approach that WotC/Hasbro is infamous for, while putting on the veneer of being "family-friendly". But I digress... So yeah, it's hard finding people who have even heard of M&M2E, and even fewer will have the rulebook. Even if you extol the virtues of the system to a new player, they might be hesitant to dish out $20+ for a system they've never heard of or played before, with little option to "try-before-you buy". As I said, GR has moved on to 3rd edition, so there's no more official support for 2nd. Even unofficial support is slim (again, obscurity). The Atomic Think Tank forum is still up for now (and you can find good stuff like statblocks there), but has been archived and all topics locked. There's a subsection for M&M on their new forum , but it seems to be mostly for 3rd edition M&M. As far as fan support on the old forum, two really good (and prolific) contributors I've been able to find and would recommend are prodigyduck and JoshuaDunlow . These fans have put forth a lot of unofficial statblocks, for everything from comic-book and sci-fi series characters, to D&D monsters converted to M&M2E and more. Wanna play as X-Men Cyclops , riding on the back of a D&D Cyclops , fighting the Cloverfield monster alongside Teal'c from Stargate SG-1? Now you can! :D

Voin said: M&M2E has so many good things going for it as a system - point-buy, effect-based, lateral advancement after every adventure, universal system all contained in 1 core rulebook, pre-made character/npc sheets, d20-based so there's not a steep learning curve - just to name a few. If I was gonna be locked in a fallout bunker with 4 other people for a year and had to pick just one RPG book to take with me, it'd be the M&M2E core rulebook. Putting together a character in that system is like building with LEGO - it's beautiful. The only couple of downsides that prevent it from being my absolutely #1 go-to system are: 1) Relative obscurity. Unfortunately, Green Ronin has not put forth the marketing hype that brought a fresh dynamo like Paizo and a curmudgeonly old mainstay like WotC to the front of tabletop gamer collective subconscious. Even when speaking to people who work in game stores , most of them have unfortunately never heard of M&M. 2) Availability. Fortunately, Green Ronin has kept their online store open, and .pdf versions of the books can be purchased there. Finding a printed copy is more difficult, since GR has moved on to M&M 3rd edition (which I don't prefer), and so most of the physical copies of the books are fairly rare, and even the ones you do manage to find are mostly used ones. Unfortunately, at the time of this writing, to my best knowledge, there does not exist any official SRD (System Reference Document) or similar open-to-the-public reference site for the rules of M&M2E that a GM can direct new players to, or that a person who just wants to try out the game can glance over before making the investment in the books (although the books are definitely worth it, I encourage any superhero RPG fans to buy them if you have the opportunity). This leads me as a GM to more often run games in systems that are more openly accessible, like Pathfinder, since Paizo so graciously made nearly the entire ruleset available for free online , and it's easy for starting players who are not sure about the hobby just yet to be able to access the game material they need to play. Although I still highly recommend supporting their work as well - besides making top-notch products, Paizo as a company has shown exemplary conduct, attitude, and ethics in respecting the fans and customers that make their work possible, making characters and options that reflect what the fans have asked for in the game, rather than what a corporate committee "thinks" customers want, and generally not being afraid of more "mature" content , while avoiding being crass about it. Contrasting of course to the heavy-handed and needlessly aggressive approach that WotC/Hasbro is infamous for, while putting on the veneer of being "family-friendly". But I digress... So yeah, it's hard finding people who have even heard of M&M2E, and even fewer will have the rulebook. Even if you extol the virtues of the system to a new player, they might be hesitant to dish out $20+ for a system they've never heard of or played before, with little option to "try-before-you buy". As I said, GR has moved on to 3rd edition, so there's no more official support for 2nd. Even unofficial support is slim (again, obscurity). The Atomic Think Tank forum is still up for now (and you can find good stuff like statblocks there), but has been archived and all topics locked. There's a subsection for M&M on their new forum , but it seems to be mostly for 3rd edition M&M. As far as fan support on the old forum, two really good (and prolific) contributors I've been able to find and would recommend are prodigyduck and JoshuaDunlow . These fans have put forth a lot of unofficial statblocks, for everything from comic-book and sci-fi series characters, to D&D monsters converted to M&M2E and more. Wanna play as X-Men Cyclops , riding on the back of a D&D Cyclops , fighting the Cloverfield monster alongside Teal'c from Stargate SG-1? Now you can! :D A couple of points that I'd like to make... One, there's another downfall to M&M... The system is very inflexible, as are most pointbuy superhero systems. If you want to have an ability, you have to buy it, even if it's based off of another ability. For instance, some superhero systems have "power stunts" that you can build with your existing powers, rather than taking entirely new powers to represent them. Want your magnetic manipulator to have flight? You could do that by taking it as a power stunt off of magnetic manipulation, instead of getting a separate ability. In M&M, you have no choice but to buy every imaginable permutation of your power that you may think of down the line, or you need to take a "variable effect" on your power to give you the ability to make them up on the fly. If you think I'm exaggerating... just try to build a superspeedster in M&M and see how quickly you run out of points before you run out of abilities that the superspeedster should have. You need points put into your land speed (since that's what superspeed is), initiative (if you're super fast, you should probably go first a lot), perception (you must think pretty fast on your feet if you can avoid obstacles at the speed of sound), extra attacks (those fists of fury aren't going to hit more than once a round if you don't, Mr. Flashypants), special attacks (sonic boom, tornado, etc...), special defenses (you can run faster than a bullet). That's just the start, though, since you also have to consider how much harder it should be to dodge your attacks when you're moving faster than a bullet (most people can't dodge bullets) and how much faster you can perform mundane tasks (5000 piece jigsaw puzzles are nothing to you). Let me know how many points that takes, compared to a system like the original Marvel Superheroes (FASERIP), in which you'd just take superspeed as a power, and the rest would be figured out based on that single power. Also, while I don't know of any SRD for M&M2e, there IS an online SRD for M&M3e (as parts of that system are open-sourced). You can find it at <a href="http://www.d20herosrd.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.d20herosrd.com/</a> if you want to check it out.

There's also Marvel Heroic Roleplaying , which uses the Cortex Plus system. It's much more focused on the drama rather than the numbers, and I find it preferable for that exact reason. If you like to crunch numbers during your superheroic adventures, though, there's always Champions , which uses the HERO system. It's not for the mathematically-shy, but it does what it says on the tin; it's good at what it does.

A review of the 2015-Q1 Orr Report shows that there are indeed superhero games on Roll20. This thread is off-topic for our site. When you signed up for Roll20 you agreed to abide by our Code of Conduct , which includes keeping forum threads focused on conversations specifically about Roll20 itself. There's plenty of good links in this thread for those wishing to continue the M&M discussion elsewhere.