Marvel Merc Mayhem

Just in time for the release of Deadpool & Wolverine, Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe is a one-shot adventure for use with the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game. Of course, this is not the first time that Deadpool has made an appearance in roleplaying, but that was only in solo format. First with You Are Deadpool and then You Are (Not) Deadpool. However, this is a proper roleplaying game scenario requiring both a Narrator and up to six players in which the infamous ‘Merc with a Mouth’ puts together a team of minor superheroes—many of whom only dedicated Marvel Universe devotees will have heard of—and sends them off on a mission. These consist of ex-Valkyrie, Annabelle Rigs, the attack macaque Hit-Monkey, the secretive mercenary Paladin, the Inhuman-infused Ren Kimura, the alternative She-Hulk, Lyra, whose strength weakens as she gets angrier and angrier, and the undead Terror, cursed to suffer immortality! Alternatively, stats are included for Deadpool himself, along with Wolverine, so that a smaller group of players could play through Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe.

Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe opens with an eight-page comic strip that introduces each of the Player Character options for the scenario—and not just for the Narrator, but also the players which can read this strip to get an idea of how each of the cast should be played. Then it is into the scenario and explaining what the Narrator requires to run it. This is no more than the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game core rulebook, from which the Narrator will need to draw several NPC villains who will appear in the scenario. The advice for the Narrator is to keep it moving and to keep it light and not too serious. This affects the tone of Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe, but it is more tongue in cheek and slyly snide, rather than in your face and obnoxiously insulting. So, it is not adult in tone and thus is suited for a teenage audience.

The scenario starts with the Player Characters individually hired by Deadpool and asked to meet at a shipyard. This triggers the first action scene in the scenario as the Player Characters have to make a run in between and over the shipping containers, all whilst under attack, before they get to meet up with their employer. At this point, Deadpool explains that he is trying to set up his mercenary agency, but all of a sudden, the pool of soldiers for hire seems to be shrinking and he suspects that something or someone is behind it. Deadpool wants the Player Characters to investigate and if they are successful, he might have more work for them. This assignment will take the Player Characters around the world and back again, starting in New York at the Lower Manhattan Mercenary Job Expo. This is a fun scene in which the Player Characters get to attend a jobs fair where the possible employers are A.I.M., The Hand, Hydra, Latveria, and others, and sell themselves as well as investigate who might be hiring all of the hired guns. The persons or organisations responsible are present, but the other potential employers lend themselves to further missions for the Player Characters to undertake beyond the pages of Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe. Subsequent chapters will see the Player Characters participate in an underground tournament over the skies of Madripoor, before having to fight to save the day, and lastly, confront the scenario’s actual villain in a deathtrap maze!

There are a few notes on continuing the adventure after Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe, but the scenario is rounded out with all of the write-ups for its Player Characters and some of its NPCs. The others appear in the pages of the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game core rulebook. Included here is the new Power, ‘Power Slider’. This specifically for the version of She-Hulk which appears in the scenario as her power wanes when she gets angry. ‘Power Slider’ is for powers that change due to certain circumstances or situations.

Physically, Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe is bright, colourful, and exciting, with lots of Marvel Universe artwork as you expect and want. The writing is decent and if you are not reading the Deadpool dialogues in the style of Ryan Reynolds, then you are not fulfilling that secret contractual obligation you signed when you purchased the book. In which case, Ryan Reynolds’ lawyers will be in contact with you shortly.

Deadpool Role-plays the Marvel Universe is an action-packed, fun scenario for Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game which should take a session or two to play through. Although the players could create their own, it gives a chance for the players to roleplay some lesser-known characters from the Marvel Universe and throw them up against a threat that Deadpool could deal with, but honestly can’t be bothered. Which makes for a good one-shot and the chance for the players to make these lesser lights their own rather than necessarily adhering to their portrayal on the page or on the screen.

[Free RPG Day 2024] X-Men Expansion Preview

Now in its seventeenth year, Free RPG Day for 2024 took place on Saturday, June 22nd. As per usual, Free RPG Day consisted of an array of new and interesting little releases, which are traditionally tasters for forthcoming games to be released at GenCon the following August, but others are support for existing RPGs or pieces of gaming ephemera or a quick-start. This included dice, miniatures, vouchers, and more. Thanks to the generosity of Waylands Forge in Birmingham, Reviews from R’lyeh was able to get hold of many of the titles released for Free RPG Day.

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Of all the items published for Free RPG Day 2024, the X-Men Expansion Preview is not the shortest—that honour goes to the Lost Tome of Monsters: Free RPG Day Edition from Foambrain Games which consists of a Pinature and an encounter—but it is the release with the lightest of gaming content. It is a preview for the forthcoming Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game: X-Men Expansion, which explores and presents the X-Men, their origins, rosters, members, associated teams, events, and threats for the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game. The Marvel Multiverse X-Men Expansion Preview provides a snapshot of what is going to be contained in the supplement and a bit more. The more begins with its opening section, a ‘Rules Primer’, which explains the Marvel 616 System used in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game. It is quick and simple, but it does not include any examples.

The bulk of the Marvel Multiverse X-Men Expansion Preview is dedicated not to the X-Men, but a team which it always preferred to keep secret—X-Force. As explained in this potted history, X-Force carried out the tasks which the X-Men could not. As the leading protectors of Mutants in the Marvel Universe, the X-men had to be heroic and be seen to be heroic—in all senses of the word. Not so the X-Force. Its members could use force, subterfuge, and militant means to carry out its mission of dealing with threats to Mutant-kind. They could even kill if necessary. A cross between spies, vigilantes, and special forces operatives, they did the dirty work that the X-Men could never do and never sanction. In game terms, this means that members of X-Force are not always heroic and their operations often stray into morally grey areas. The history of the X-Force includes seven different line-ups and details locations important to the team, such as the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning, S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier Pericles, and Cavern-X. Floor plans for the latter, a case base in Arizona, are also included.

There are notes on playing as members of X-Force, noting its darker themes of clandestine action and secrecy, as well as its proactive approach. Joining the team is done by invitation only, based on what the current leader wants. In the case of Cable, frequent leader of X-Force, this means combat skills, discipline, and the ability to undertake dangerous missions. Potential members must be Mutants and they should ideally have some military or espionage background. It also notes that there is sometimes a commonality in terms of powers between team members, such as the health regenerating abilities of Deadpool, Wolverine, and X-23. Rounding out the description of X-Force is a couple of sets of adventure hooks, five suitable for any X-Force roster and five for the Krakaon X-Force, the most recent roster. These are no more than a paragraph in length and will need a fair bit of development upon the part of the Game Master.

Rounding out the Marvel Multiverse X-Men Expansion Preview are stats for the Mutants Bishop, Dazzler, and Gambit. Although nice to see these, only one of them, Bishop, has been a member of X-Force.

Physically, the Marvel Multiverse X-Men Expansion Preview is clean and tidy, and very readable. And that is really the best that can be said about it, since it would actually take quite a bit of effort to really turn any of its content into something playable and ready to be played at the table. Many of the characters across the different rosters are not here or given in the core rulebook for Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game, such that it would be difficult to assemble a full team. A team of all-stars—sans Cable—would be possible. Then the Game Master would need to develop one of the adventure hooks included in its pages. Of course, a preview like this, is only designed to give you a snapshot of what in the forthcoming game book and the Marvel Multiverse X-Men Expansion Preview does a good job of that—and actually it is not a bad read either.

Getting Marvelous

It is surprising to think that there have been five roleplaying games based on Marvel Comics in the last four decades, going all the way back to Marvel Super Heroes published by TSR, Inc. in 1984 before coming all the way up to date with the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game published by Marvel Universe in 2023—and even that was not the first roleplaying game published by Marvel. The Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game lets you play using a huge cast of characters—heroes and villains, from Abomination, Agatha Harkness, and Baron Mordo to Ultron, Venom, and Vulture, from American Chavez, Ant-Man, and Beast to the Winter Soldier, Wolverine—both Laura Kinney and Logan, and Wong. There are over one-hundred-and-twenty-eight villain and hero writeups in the pages of the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game, a mix of the well-known and the lesser known—and all of them playable. A group can play at street level with characters such as Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Ms. Marvel, Spider-Man—both Miles Morales and Peter Parker; join the Avengers with heroes like Black Widow, Captain America, Hawkeye, Hulk, Squirrel Girl, and Thor—both Jane Foster and Thor; stand up for mutants such as the X-Men with Beast, Colossus, Cyclops, Iceman, Professor X, and Storm; or go to the stars with Captain Marvel, Gamora, Groot, Nebula, Nightcrawler, Rocket Raccoon, and Star-Lord. Thus, it allows the players to roleplay a wide variety of the Marvel Universe’s heroes from both the comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe—both on the big screen and the small screen. Or alternatively, the players can create heroes of their own, from heroes of the street to heroes of the cosmos.

The Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game leaps into the mechanics first. It uses what the game calls the Marvel 616 System. This is named for Marvel-616, the universe where the majority of the stories are told in the Marvel comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That conceit aside, the Marvel 616 System uses three six-sided dice. The middle one of these is called the Marvel die and is either a die of a different colour or an official Marvel Multiverse die which has the Marvel logo on the six face. To have his hero undertake an action, a player rolls the three dice or ‘d616’, adds the relevant ability score, and if it is equal to, or exceeds, the Target Number succeeds. A Target Number typically ranges between eleven and sixteen, but can be further adjusted depending upon how trivial or absurdly difficult the action is. There are three possible special outcomes. One is if the result on the Marvel die is the Marvel logo or a six on the die of a different colour. This is a Fantastic Success and will typically double damage inflicted in combat or grant an ‘Edge’ or bonus on the hero’s next action. It is possible to roll a Fantastic Failure, meaning that the result on the Marvel die is the Marvel logo, but that the roll has failed. This means that although the action has failed, something beneficial has still happened to the hero. This is handled as a narrative effect. There is no critical failure mechanic. There is however, an ‘Ultimate Fantastic Roll’. This is a roll of a six on the two standard dice and the Marvel logo on the Marvel die, which guarantees a success on the action no matter how difficult, and enables the hero to ignore any Troubles besetting him. The dice can also be modified by Edges and Troubles. An Edge comes from favourable circumstances and allows one die per Edge to be rerolled and the highest value used, whilst a Trouble comes from unfavourable situations and forces a player to reroll one of his highest dice results per Trouble and use the lowest value. Edges and Troubles cancel each other out.

Combat uses the same mechanics, beginning with rolling for initiative. This roll cannot fail, as it determines the order in which the combatants act. The fun wrinkle here is that if a Hero or a villain rolls a Fantastic Success, then they have a bonus round in which only they act! A Hero can take one standard action, such as attack, dodge, escape, grab, move, and so on per turn, as well as a reaction like escape, fastball special, help teammate, skulk, and more. Attacks are made against a defender’s Defence Scores—derived from his abilities—and the damage determined by the result of the roll of the Marvel Die, which is then multiplied by the attacker’s Rank. The multiplier for the damage can be altered by the attacker’s powers and decreased by the defender’s powers. It is easy for a Hero to inflict sufficient damage to kill, but the default assumption is that any character with the Heroic Tag will hold back sufficiently to inflict enough damage to take a defender out of a fight, but not kill him. If the Heroes or villains are members of a team, then together they can also perform a team manoeuvre, such as “Avengers Assemble!”, once per fight, which can be an offensive, defensive, or rally team manoeuvre. It costs Focus per participant to activate a manoeuvre. The rules also cover attacking and ploughing through objects, whilst a knockback effect requires the Mighty power and a Fantastic Success to succeed.

Some twenty powers—or rather power sets—are described in Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game, from Elemental Control, Illusion, and Magic to Telepathy, Teleportation, and Weather control. Each power consists of at least one basic power and then extra powers which alter or improve the basic power. These are ranked, so that the basic power is Rank 1 and then the other Rank 2, Rank 3, and so on. For example, Phase Self is the Rank 1 power for Phasing, but Phase Object and Partial Phase are Rank 2. In addition, there are Basic Powers. These include Brawling, Combat Trickery, Flight, Iconic Weapon, Mighty, and more. Most require the Special Training Origin to have, but Special Training is the means by which highly skilled characters, such as Hawkeye or Shang-Chi, can be created. Overall, the powers and power sets cover most of the hero types that a player might want to design, but what they are not, is necessarily flexible. Each power does a set thing and what a Hero is in general not trying to do is push the envelope beyond those limits. There is scope for it narratively, at least, if a player rolls a Fantastic Success.

A Hero in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game has a Rank, which determines how much damage he can suffer, how many points can be assigned to ability scores, and how many powers and traits he can have. The Rank ranges from Rank 1 and Rookie to Rank 6 and Cosmic. He has six abilities. These are Melee (which also covers strength), Agility, Resilience, Vigilance, Ego, and Logic, and together they form the acronym, M.A.R.V.E.L. They can be zero or less, but they can be much higher. Each works as a straight modifier in the Marvel 616 System. Health is how much damage a Hero can suffer, whilst Focus represents his concentration and willpower. A Hero has karma equal to his Rank. Karma is spent to inflict Trouble on a villain or to give a Hero an Edge. Once used, it is earned through good roleplaying, being heroic, use of a Hero’s catchphrase at the appropriate time, and if a Trait causes the Hero a problem.

A Hero will have several Traits and Tags. Traits typically provide an Edge, whilst Tags are roleplaying hooks. For example, Ms. Marvel has the Traits of Determination, Glibness, Honest, and Quick Learner, and the Tags of Heroic, Inhuman Genes, Mentor: Captain Marvel, Obligation: School, Secret Identity, and Young. Glibness allows her to talk to anyone for the first time and persuade them to give her a hand, which gives her an Edge of her Ego checks, whilst Obligation: School will cause her problems if she fails to attend school or do her homework. A Hero’s Traits and Tags are derived from the two elements of his Backstory, his Origins and Occupation.

Creating a Hero is a matter of a player making choices based upon the Hero’s Rank, assigning Ability points, and then choosing Origins and Occupation, followed by powers. Notably, if a Hero has powers from fewer Power Sets rather than more, he gains a bonus number of powers. A player can also choose to reduce the number of powers his hero has to increase his abilities or add traits.

Codename: Mother Penitencia
Rank: 2
Karma: 2

Real Name: Violetta Santillan
Occupation: Health Care Worker
Origin: Magic: Demonic
Base: Chicago

Melee 1 Defence Score 11
Agility 0 Defence Score 10
Resilience 2 Defence Score 12
Vigilance 1 Defence Score 11
Ego 3 Defence Score 13
Logic 3 Defence Score 13

Health 60 Focus 90

Powers
Magic (Demonic): Sense Sins, Penance Stare, Hellfire Chains
Magic: Sense Supernatural
Teleportation: Blink, Teleport 1, Blink Barrage
Brawling

Tags: Chaotic, Supernatural, Obligation: Family, Obligation: Night School, Heroic
Traits: Clinician, First Aid, Out of Shape, Skeptical, Secret Identity

Background: Violetta Santillan is in her thirties, a health care worker who works in a care facility. She has been studying to be a doctor, but illness in the family meant she had to drop out of school and then she had a family of her own. As the children have got older, she has been trying to go back to school to study. After one of the residents died, he left her a book. When she opened it, she was suddenly cast into Hell and told that she would be the next wielder of the powers of penitence. She is deeply conflicted about her new role, especially as it transforms her, her eyes blazing black, black horns curling from her head, her fingernails turning jet black. So far, she has stopped a couple of attempted robberies at the care facility, and dealt with a street robbery. Worse, she is taunted by the demon, Irzollath, who claims that the gift of penitence was not hers to take and taunts her to act immorally.

Almost a fifth of Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is dedicated to detailing its powers and power sets, whilst two fifths are dedicated to detailing the one-hundred-and-twenty-eight heroes and villains. The chapter on the Marvel Multiverse itself packs in a lot of information, covering history, the current state of Earth-616, other universes and dimensions, and moving between. However, it is a broad overview at best. For the Narrator there is solid advice on setting up and running a game, the scope of a game—from single issues to ongoing series, as well as on how to handle some of the more difficult aspects of the setting and super heroics. This includes interdimensional and time travel, mind control, illusions, and more, as well as hero death—and return. Oddly, this chapter is also where social interaction is covered, which essentially boils down to Logic and Ego attacks versus a target’s Logic Defence or Ego Defence. Overall, the Narrator advice is more than decent.

Unfortunately, Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is not without its issues. One is a matter of choice, given the number of heroes and villains in the roleplaying, there is likely to be characters missing for some reader. Notably, both Silver Surfer and Kate Bishop are missing from the list, whereas Titania of Gamma Fight is included. The A.I.M. Agent, Average Civilian, and Night Nurse are the only Rank 1 characters listed, but not police officer. The writing tends towards the succinct, leaving Narrator and players alike unclear as how powers work or in particular, tags, work. In this, Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is better suited to the experienced Narrator, who is likely to be more aware of the storytelling style of roleplaying. The powers could have been better organised. The powers are listed alphabetically rather than by power set, and the power set trees, showing the reader what power he needs to choose for his Hero before getting the one he wants, placed at the back. So, there is a lot of flipping back and forth during creation and there are no page numbers listed in the power set trees making it even more awkward. Lastly, there is no scenario in the book, unfortunately. In this, and in the lack of an example of play, the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game does not necessarily serve the Marvel fan coming to roleplaying for the first time. More experienced roleplayers will have no issue picking up and playing the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game, but may want to look at other superhero roleplaying games if they want more choices and greater flexibility.

Physically, the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is a fantastic looking book. How could it not be? After all, it has access to, and does draw from an incredible back catalogue of artwork. A nice touch is that the chapters are colour-coded for ease of access. However, it does need a slight edit in places.

The Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game does give what you want with a roleplaying game based on a huge comic book universe and franchise. It lets you play your favourite heroes from the Marvel universe, but it also lets you create your own heroes and take them on their own adventures in the Marvel universe. It feels fantastically comprehensive in the choice of Marvel heroes to play and the types of Marvel-style heroes to create and play. Overall, the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is a very solid, very serviceable, and very playable superhero roleplaying game that will be appreciated by fans of the Marvel Universe.

Quick-Start Saturday: Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook

Quick-starts are means of trying out a roleplaying game before you buy. Each should provide a Game Master with sufficient background to introduce and explain the setting to her players, the rules to run the scenario included, and a set of ready-to-play, pre-generated characters that the players can pick up and understand almost as soon as they have sat down to play. The scenario itself should provide an introduction to the setting for the players as well as to the type of adventures that their characters will have and just an idea of some of the things their characters will be doing on said adventures. All of which should be packaged up in an easy-to-understand booklet whose contents, with a minimum of preparation upon the part of the Game Master, can be brought to the table and run for her gaming group in a single evening’s session—or perhaps too. And at the end of it, Game Master and players alike should ideally know whether they want to play the game again, perhaps purchasing another adventure or even the full rules for the roleplaying game.

Alternatively, if the Game Master already has the full rules for the roleplaying game for the quick-start is for, then what it provides is a sample scenario that she still run as an introduction or even as part of her campaign for the roleplaying game. The ideal quick-start should entice and intrigue a playing group, but above all effectively introduce and teach the roleplaying game, as well as showcase both rules and setting.

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What is it?
The Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook is not as its name suggests a quick-start. Instead, it is an introduction to and preview of the rules and a then chance to provide feedback to the designers of the roleplaying game, the fifth to be based on the Marvel Universe. It includes the rules combat and action as well as the means for players to create superheroes of their own, ten superheroes from the Marvel Universe, and a short scenario.

It is a one-hundred-and twenty-page, full colour softback book.

The book is lavishly illustrated with comic book art.

The rules are clearly explained, but more complex and detailed than would be found in a quick-start.

How long will it take to play?
If the pre-generated superheroes in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook are used, its, ‘Enter; Hydra’, can be played through in one session. If the players want to create their own, another session will be required.

What else do you need to play?
The ten pre-generated superheroes in Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook consist of three six-sided dice per player, one of which should be a different colour to the other two.

Who do you play?
The six Player Characters in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook consist of the Black Panther, Captain America, Captain Marvel, Groot, Iron Man, Rocket Raccoon, Spiderman, Storm, Thor, and Wolverine.

How is a Player Character defined?
A Player Character in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook—and thus the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game—has a Rank, Archetype, scores in six abilities, Health, Focus, Karma, Power Sets and Powers, as well as a Backstory and Traits. Rank ranges in value from one and ordinary human to twenty-five. Rank 5 is equal to Daredevil, Rank 10 to Spiderman, Rank 15 to Captain America, Rank 20 to Doctor Strange, and Rank 25 to Captain Marvel. Rank determines how many points a player has to spend during character creation and the values of various secondary factors. Archetypes include Blaster, Bruiser, Genius, Polymath, Protector, and Striker, and suggest how a superhero’s powers might work. The six abilities Might, Agility, Resilience, Vigilance, Ego, and Logic, their initials spelling out ‘Marvel’. Backstory includes Origin and Profession, which grant Traits that Traits cover talents, skills, circumstances, vulnerabilities, minor superpowers, and more.

What Does a Sample Player Character Look Like?

Heaven Granado is a struggling medical student studying in New York. To make ends meet, she volunteered for program of medical trials, thinking they were new vaccines. Unfortunately, Heaven had an allergic reaction to one of the drugs and was hospitalised and had to abandon the trial. In the weeks following her recovery she discovered that she was suddenly very stretchy and resilient to damage, the first when absentmindedly reaching across a room and the second when she was hit by a car. She still does not quite know the extent of what she can do, but wants to wrap her head around it.

Real Name: Heaven Granado

Codename: Wraparound

Origins: Weird Science

Profession: Health Care Worker/Medical Student

RANK: 5

ABILIITIES – Score – Modifier – Defence

Might – 2 – +3 – 14

Agility – 2 – +5 – 16

Resilience – 3 – +6 – 17

Vigilance – 3 – +8 – 19

Ego – 4 – +9 – 20

Logic – 4 – +8 – 19

Initiative Modifier: +8 Speed: 27

Fight Damage: 3d6 Ranged Damage: 3d6+4

Health: 45 Focus: 55

Karma: 3

POWERS

Inspiration

Plasticity: Extended Reach 1, Flexible Bones 1

Tactical Mastery: Battle Plan, Change of Plan

TRAITS

Clinician, Extra Career (Student), First Aid, Mentor, Obligation: School, Poor, Prescription Pad, Quick Leaner, Weird

How do the mechanics work?
Mechanically, the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook—and thus the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game—uses the d616 System. To have his character undertake an Action Check, a player rolls three six-sided dice, adds an Action Modifier, whether from ability or a power, and if the result is equal to or higher than the Target Number—which can range between eight and forty. One of the three six-sided dice is a different colour. This is the Marvel die. If the result on the Marvel die is a one and those on the other dice is any number except one, it counts as a Fantastic Roll, triggers a triumph result, and the one on the Marvel die counts as six towards the total. The Ultimate Fantastic roll is a six on both of the standard dice a one on the Marvel die. This means the task automatically succeeds and ignores any Trouble. A roll of one on all three dice is a Botched Roll and counts as a failure.

If the Player Character has the Edge or an advantage due to a special skill, ability, or the circumstances, the player can reroll a single die and take the better result. This often to achieve a Fantastic Roll. Trouble, whether due to lack of skill or equipment, forces a player to reroll a die and take the worst result.

Heroes and villains have Karma equal to half their Rank to spend each day. karma can be spent to give a Player Character the Edge on an Action Roll. The Narrator can reward more Karma for good roleplay.

The aspect of a Fantastic Roll, derived from a roll of one on the Marvel Die and any numbers other than one on the other dice, but the roll of one on the Marvel Die still counting as a six towards the total is, mechanically, counterintuitive. However, the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is set on the default Earth of the Marvel Universe, Earth-616, so thematically it makes sense.

How does combat work?
Combat in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook details initiative, the various types of movement, use of firearms—mostly the province of NPCs and villains, numerous conditions, and damage inflicted to objects, including ploughing through them. It covers most of the typical eventualities that might turn up in a superhero roleplaying game.

How do Powers work?

Powers are divided between those organised into related sets and those not. A set suggests origins and effects, and within the sets, the powers are arranged as trees which the hero can progress along as he grows in his abilities. Every power has a narrative effect, the mechanical effect handled via the Action Check.

Power Sets included in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook consist of Battlesuit, Blades, Cybernetics, Energy Control, Firearms, Martial Arts, Plasticity, Shield Bear, Spider-Powers, Super-Strength, Tactical Mastery, and Weather Control. These specifically support the pre-generated heroes included in the book.

Focus represents a superhero’s mental fortitude, but also has to be spent to activate certain powers.

What do you play?

‘Enter Hyrda (An Adventure)’ is the shortest section in Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook. It is designed for three to six characters of Ranks 10 or 15—most of the pre-generated characters in Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook are of the appropriate Ranks—who must face a squad of Hydra agents with powers remarkably similar to their own. It is specifically designed to showcase the rules, especially the combat rules, in practice. That said, it is a cliché and it is one note, good for a single session, but absolutely no more.

Is there anything missing?
Yes and no. There numerous types of powers not included, such magic, phasing, psionics, and teleportation. Beyond the ten heroes included, there are also no stats or details of actual Marvel Universe villains. Of course, space is limited in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook, but the inclusion of a villain would have been useful.

There is also no PDF version available.

Is it easy to prepare?
The core rules presented in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook are relatively easy to prepare. There is a lot of information in the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook though and it is tightly packed, so it require a close read through.

It helps that it includes a good combination index and glossary and a reference sheet for Action Checks for the Narrator.

Is it worth it?
Yes and no. Yes, because it does include everything necessary to play at least a single session and even a few more should the Narrator and her players want to create their superheroes and associated villains and run a few sessions of the roleplaying game. No, because it is not readily available in PDF. This is a shame because the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game does need an introduction or quick-start and the Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook would fit that bill.

Where can you get it?
The Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game Playtest Rulebook is available through retail at comic book shops and on Kindle.

There is no PDF version available.

Triumphant & Super

Triumphant! Super Heroic Role Play Game is a superheroes roleplaying designed to be simple, but at the same time cover most aspects of the genre whilst scaling up and down from street fights to cosmic confrontations and back again. Designed by the author of Barbarians of Lemuria and published by Beyond Belief Games it uses simple dice mechanics with a twist here and there to account for the genre, it has the heroes combat villains and supervillains as well as disasters—natural and unnatural, and is supported with example heroes and villains, rules for random character creation, and advice for the Game Master. If it is lacking anything, it is a setting, although the author has promised a setting in the form of The Sovereign City. Of course, an archetypal campaign based in the Game Master’s hometown or big city of choice is easy to create and run. Running a campaign on a cosmic scale will likely take a bit more effort.

Everything in Triumphant! Super Heroic Role Play Game is defined by die type. This runs from a D3 and D4 up to a D8 and D10 and beyond to DD6, DD8, and DD10. Together, these rate a Superiors’ or Player Character’s Priority (or initiative die), Conditions, Skills, and Powers, the structure, handling, speed, and weapons of vehicles or giant robots, and the threats of natural disaster, like the rising waters, sudden surging waters, or the cold of the water of a flood. And when it comes to the action, confrontations are handled as a series of opposed dice rolls, and when they fail, the Hero has a Triumph dice to help him save the day and the Villain, Villainy Dice to help him succeed or make a successful get away when needed! A Superior in Triumphant! has a Priority die and set of abilities—Conditions, Skills, and Powers. Conditions are passive and represent a Superior’s mental and physical state. They are divided in three, Ego, Health, and Mobility. Skills are broad, for example, Aircraft, Fighting, and Shooting, but can have Specialisations such as Helicopters or Jet Packs, Karate or Baseball Bats, and Pistols or Throwing Knives. The extensive Powers list includes Armour, Duplication, Flight, Immortality, Mind Blast, Precognition, Shapeshifting, Teleportation, and more. To these can be added Enhancements or Limitations, which Drop the die type down or Bump the die type up, respectively. Each Power has its own set of Enhancements and Limitations, but there are generic ones which can be attached to any Power. For example, Density Control, which enables a hero or villain to increase his body’s density to imperviousness or decrease it to intangibility, has the Enhancement of being able to alter the density of other people or objects and the Limitation of being able to increase or decrease the body’s density, but not both. Generic Enhancements and Limitations include Area Effect, Multi-Strike, and Ranged Touch Attack, and Burnout, Conditional, and Hard to Control.

To create a character, the player simply assigns dice to Conditions, Skills, and Powers. The default die type is the D4, representing the average person, but the number of dice, die types, Triumph dice, and Priority die is determined by the Power Level of the campaign. There are four options—Street Vigilantes, Local Guardians, Planetary Champions, and Stellar Defenders. So, a Street Vigilantes campaign might be similar to Daredevil or the Birds of Prey; Local Guardians to Batman or The Defenders; Planetary Champions to The Avengers or the Justice League; and Stellar Defenders to The Guardians of the Galaxy or Legion of Super-Heroes. Mixing these Power Levels up is possible, but difficult to do on more than an occasional basis as in a classic crossover storyline. The process is straightforward enough, a player assigning dice, adjusting the dice for Enhancements and Limitations, selecting Benefits and Drawbacks, and so on. The rulebook does not make the process that easy because there is no single step-by-step breakdown of the process and the player will need to refer to several chapters in the book to work out quite what to do.

Rat Pack
Sawyer Garrett is an ex-army dog handler who retired after several tours in Afghanistan. Preferring a life of quiet she now works with the city pest control dealing with issues in the city sewers. There she began hearing voices, squeaking voices and thought she was going mad. Even after the Veterans Association gave her a clean bill of health, she still thought she was going mad, but then a rat in the sewer actually spoke to her—in her head. Sawyer came to realise that she could communicate with rats, even control them. Soon she made friends with them and they in turn came to see her as a guardian. When members of the homeless began dying more than usual in the sewers and tunnels under the city, the rats told her what was happening and Sawyer discovered that a local gang was selling them a bad batch of drugs on the cheap and it was killing them. It was then that she decided to clean the rats off the streets, only with her better rats by her side.

Rat Pack
Name: Sawyer Garrett
Power Level: Street Vigilantes
Priority Die: D6
Triumph Dice: 5

POWERS
Burrowing D4, Enhanced Senses D6, Mind Control D4/Limitation: Rats Only D8, Mind Read/Send D4/Limitation: Rats Only D8

CONDITIONS
Ego: D4
Health: D6
Mobility: D6

SKILLS
Animal Handling D6/Rats D8, Fighting D6/Boxing D8, Streetwise D6/Sovereign City D8

BENEFITS
Companion, Hideout
DRAWBACKS
Someone Needs Me, Flashbacks

Rat Swarm Companion
POWERS
Burrowing D4, Enhanced Senses D6
CONDITIONS
Ego: D4
Health: D4
Mobility: D6
SKILLS
Fighting D4, Stealth D6

Mechanically, Triumphant! Super Heroic Role Play Game is simple enough. For a Superior to undertake an action, his player rolls the appropriate die for the Skill or Power, aiming to roll high. However, the Power always trumps the Skill and consequently, the Task Difficulty for the Skill roll is always higher than for the Power roll. For example, if Allen Barrington wants to run at thirty miles per hour, but uses his Athleticism Skill, the Task Difficulty for the Skill roll is eight, but if he wants to use his Powers of Super Speed as the Pacer, the Task Difficulty for the Power roll is two. Further, the Task Difficulty for the Power roll is two if he wants to run at sixty miles per hour, six if he runs at two-hundred-and-forty miles per hour, and so on—but these speeds are impossible unless the Superior has the Super Speed Power. In addition, Skills and Powers can sometimes be in sync, which means that a player can roll dice for both the Skill and the Power and the highest result counts.

A Superior also has Triumph dice to enhance his actions. These can be used to negate damage, bounce back if a Condition is reduced to zero, takedown more Extras, increase the roll on a die to its maximum, to protect nearby civilians, to Bump a die up and reroll it, and to temporarily add an Enhancement or remove a Limitation. All of these require the player to roll the Triumph die beforehand and the player can only chose one of these effects if the result is even. Otherwise, the Triumph die is returned to the Superior’s pool. Alternatively, a Triumph die can simply be used to perform a Power Stunt not usually related to a Power or the Superior can make a Spectacular Recovery if all three of his Conditions have fallen to zero. The Game Master has Villainy dice for his Supervillains and these work in the same fashion, except that the Game Master to roll an odd result instead of an even one for them to work. Villainy dice can also be spent to make Deadly Attacks, create a Meat Shield using an innocent bystander or not so innocent minion, and either make a Miraculous Escape or suffer a Mysterious Death.

Combat and action scenes use opposed rolls. For example, Torchlight with his Power of Energy Control (Light) D6 faces a pair of bruisers or Extras armed with submachine guns and a Skill of Shooting D4. To attack them, Torchlight’s player would roll for Energy Control (Light) D6, whilst the Game Master would roll the Mobility D4 Condition for the thugs to avoid the attack. When it comes to the thugs shooting back, the Game Master would roll Shooting D4 for the thugs, whilst Torchlight could attempt to blind them with his Energy Control (Light) D6. In combat, the Priority die is used to determine order action, and the rules cover aiming, delaying actions, taunts, offensive and defensive stances, teamwork—which requires that the Superiors practice during Downtime, knockback, mobs, minor Superiors, and more, all supported by an example of combat. Damage itself reduces a Superior’s Conditions, effectively limiting his capacity to respond. Throughout a combat, a Superior can only really use a Power, Skill, or Condition the once to defend or attack, but ideally, a Superior should have a decent array of options to choose from and a player should be inventive in deciding how his Superior uses them. Disasters are handled in a similar fashion which makes interacting with them as dynamic as combat.

Downtime covers the various options that the Superiors can undertake when not actively adventuring. These include Personal actions such as Charity, Patrolling, Publicity, or simply Work; Training which can be Solo or Teamwork; and Research & Development, which covers Devices, Investigation, and Team HQ. The latter is designed using the same number and type of dice as per the Power Level of the campaign, adding facilities such as a Secure Cell or a Magical Workshop. In this way, it becomes, at least mechanically, much like a Player Character with abilities of its own that the team members can work with to patch up a wound in the Medical Centre or gain alerts or the very latest surveillance in the Communications and Security Centre. Similar to how a Superior can grow and change, a team’s headquarters can also be improved and upgraded. Another Downtime activity is the design and building of gadgets, which requires time spent on raising funds and doing the design work before a device can be built. Gadgets built this way can also be upgraded. Alternatively, Triumphant! does suggest how a Gadgeteer Power could work in the game, enabling a Superior to build and devices on the go that emulate other Powers, have limited uses, or is simply just the once, for that exact situation. Either way, the gadget rules are designed with both simplicity and  flexibility in mind, much like the rest of the roleplaying game’s Powers. This includes Powers which can often be difficult to handle in superhero roleplaying games such as magic and summoning.

For the Game Master there is advice on running combat and disasters, handling NPCs from innocent bystanders to supervillains, and designing adventures. The advice is solid, but not extensive and nor is backed up with a scenario. There is though a handful of sample Superiors which the Game Master can use as NPCs or ready-made Player Characters. There are also tables for a player or the Game Master to create a Superior randomly.

Physically, Triumphant! Super Heroic Role Play Game is cleanly and decently laid out. The artwork is decent too, done in a mix of colour and black and white.

Triumphant! Super Heroic Role Play Game provides a comprehensive means to handle most superheroic situations and Powers in a relatively uncomplex fashion. There is still some complexity given the abilities and powers that the roleplaying game has to cover, but that is down to the nature of the genre and Triumphant! does a good job of making it as simple as possible. Where Triumphant! does come up short is in not making it as easy as it should be for the player to create a Superior and in not exploring the differences in the types of scenarios that can be run at the different Power Levels and thus campaign types. Consequently, Triumphant! Super Heroic Role Play Game very much assumes some familiarity with the genre upon the part of both the player and the Game Master, but get past that and what you have is a solid, medium-to-lightweight roleplaying game with the means to create and play a superhero game.

Solitaire: You Are (Not) Deadpool

After coming to comics with You Are Deadpool, the solo adventures of the ‘Merc with a Mouth’ switches to the traditional format of text paragraphs with You Are (Not) Deadpool. This is the first entry in the ‘A Marvel: Multiverse Missions Adventure Gamebook’ series published by Aconyte Books and unlike almost every other Solo Adventure book it promises not to put you at the centre of the action. As the title suggests, you do not play as Deadpool in You Are (Not) Deadpool. Instead you are an innocent bystander approached by Deadpool who identifies you as ‘Six’ and asks you to help him. In effect, whereas you are not Deadpool, the character you play could actually be YOU THE READER if you were in New York when Deadpool bounds over to you like a happy puppy. With no mention of what happened to One, Two, Three, or Four, let alone Five, you find yourself accompanying Deadpool on his mission. For the most part he follows your suggestions, where to go, what to do, acting as both sidekick and conscience, much like his best friend, Weasel, or Dopinder the taxi driver from the film. However, there are moments where you shine and Deadpool definitely handles the fights—with relish, often his own—whilst you huddle in the corner, having rolled the dice to determine the outcome.

The plot in Deadpool in You Are (Not) Deadpool is this. Daredevil gives a Deadpool a mission. Alien guns—Chitauri guns—are flooding the city and Deadpool has to find the source and stop them. The investigation will take the pair of Deadpool and Six above, below, and across New York, meeting Bob the Hydra Agent along the way, up and down the USA’s eastern seaboard because the budget does not extend as far away as Hawaii, although it does take them somewhere else… As Six, you and Deadpool will also play the worst game of Jenga in the Marvel Universe, fight a Psychic Octopus, lie about having found a sledgehammer, and a lot more besides. They might even jump book to the next entry in the series—She-Hulk goes to Murderworld!

Mechanically, You Are (Not) Deadpool is more sophisticated than the average solo adventure book. Standard six-sided dice are required, no more than three. Deadpool has three stats—MERC, MOUTH, and FOCUS, which are to do with physical, social, and mental stuff respectively. Initially, they are rated two each with the reader increasing the value of one of them by on, but they do change over the course of the adventure. They come into play whenever you want Deadpool to take an action. This typically involves rolling a single six-sided die and adding a stat to beat a target equal to five or six. This varies though. Sometimes, the reader will need to roll two or three six-sided dice and beat a higher target to see if Deadpool succeeds, and even then, this may not be enough. In certain challenging situations, the reader will need to roll another round or two other rounds to succeed. In addition, Deadpool can acquire Qualities such as GUARDS, GUARDS, RESOURCEFUL, and CHAOS, but never, ever KUMQUAT. Really. Not KUMQUAT. Not once. Each enters play with a value of one, and again, can fluctuate in play. Deadpool can also carry up to five objects, some of which, occasionally, can be used to improve his stats. Along the way, there games and puzzles too, such as decoding a lock in an underground base or playing the slot at a crummy casino in Atlantic City, and both Six and Deadpool can pick a wide array of achievements. 

You Are (Not) Deadpool is well written, with lots of in jokes and nods to Geek culture (especially Lovecraftian Geek culture), but beyond the cover, it does lack illustrations bar entry ending silhouette clipart. As a consequence of being all text, You Are (Not) Deadpool lacks that dual sense of wondering what situation a piece of artwork illustrates and how to get there via the numbered paragraphs, but on the other hand, it does retain much more of sense of mystery.

In the comics and the films, Deadpool is known for breaking the fourth wall (and the Marvel Universe if truth be told), but in You Are (Not) Deadpool he never does that. There is the interaction between Deadpool and Six throughout, but since you as Six are directing Deadpool’s actions, there is a gap between the two, as if you are directing or roleplaying the actions of someone who is directing or roleplaying the actions of someone else. In this case, Deadpool. It might not be breaking the fourth wall, but it is breaking the immediacy of the roleplaying if you think about it. So do not do that. It would spoil the fun.

You Are (Not) Deadpool has three hundred entries, so there is lot to explore and multiple plot threads to follow and investigate, plus some tough challenges, puzzles, and fights to overcome. Deadpool is definitely going to need more than the one run at this—unless he/you/Six are really lucky, and if all three of you fail, then at least Deadpool can come heal and comeback. As for Six? Just cross out his name wherever it appears in the quest and write Seven (or Eight or Nine or…) instead. No one will notice. 

Not quite the traditional Solo Adventure Book—but than what did you expect, this is Deadpool, after all, You Are (Not) Deadpool is an entertaining often ridiculous romp alongside the infamous ‘Merc with the Mouth’.

Solitaire: You Are Deadpool

The solo adventure book is no stranger to the comic book. In the nineteen eighties, Diceman was a five-issue series from Fleetway which published stories involving characters from its sister publication, 2000 AD, including Judge Dredd, Nemesis the Warlock, Sláine, Rogue Trooper, Torquemada, and ABC Warriors. Diceman also ventured into political satire with the comic strip ‘You are Ronald Reagan in: Twilight’s Last Gleaming’ and Fleetway would continue this theme with the separate solo adventure book, You are Maggie Thatcher: a dole-playing game in nineteen eighty-seven. Marvel Comics satirised the solo adventure book format with a comic book mini-series all of its own and with the only character it could—the fourth wall breaking, genre busting, Marvel Universe killing Deadpool. In You Are Deadpool, Al Ewing—who has also written for 2000 AD—and Salva Espin and Paco Diaz let you take the ‘Merc with a Mouth’ on another romp through Marvel’s back catalogue after a job goes wrong, and in the process pokes fun at some key moments of Silver Age, Bronze Age, and Modern Age comics across the history of Marvel Comics.

The set-up is simple and one which you can ignore or dive straight into the action. The Tomorrow Man hires Deadpool to steal a Time-Travel Helmet stolen from the Time Variance Authority by the Roxxon corporation and stored in a high-security facility. All Deadpool has to do is get in, steal the helmet, and get out again. Nothing could be simpler. Except, it goes all wrong and Deadpool gets flung back in time. Each of the five issues, or chapters, of You Are Deadpool is set in a different time period. For example, in chapter two, Deadpool lands in nineteen sixties New York where the storylines see him become a beatnik poet and pop artist—complete with de rigueur beret, and potentially be at the birthplace of both the Fantastic Four and the Incredible Hulk! In the third chapter, he dumped in the swamps of the nineteen seventies where he encounters Man-Thing, Dracula and a host of classic monsters, as well as a certain Richard Milhouse Nixon turned antihero in spandex! In chapter four, Deadpool returns to New York, but not of the nineteen sixties, but the nineteen eighties where he up against Kingpin alongside Daredevil and the Punisher, all before doing a quick run through history and back again in chapter five.

You Are Deadpool is no mere ‘Choose You Own Adventure’ book. It includes rules and mechanics. As explained at the being of the first chapter by Deadpool himself directly to the reader—because Deadpool is of course going to break the fourth wall—along with author (though not of this comic, though there is a Warhammer fantasy Battles gag in there at his expense. Twice), Kieron Gillen, Deadpool has two stats, Badness and Sadness. These start at zero and as he progresses through the story, he gains points of Badness for acts of violence and being a badass, and points of Sadness for learning things which make him feel down. These do not have any effect on the mechanics per se, but depending upon which one is higher than the other, they will direct the reader down one path or another. Combat is handled by rolls of six-sided dice. If Deadpool and the reader roll higher than equal to their opponent’s roll, he beats him. Otherwise, Deadpool and the reader lose. The reader rolls two six-sided dice for Deadpool, whilst also rolling one, two, or three dice for his opponents. Typical security guards might only have the one die, but the Incredible Hulk rolls a total of four six-sided dice! Unlike other solo adventure books, the character of Deadpool has an advantage—a healing ability which means that he cannot actually die. Which means he can take a lot of damage, recover, and the reader can keep playing. Well, mostly. There are paths down which Deadpool can go and which do end the adventure.

Along the way, Deadpool can pick and hold three a total of three items to store in his inventory, anything from a doughnut, yo-yo, and shuriken to a deck of playing cards, a teapot, and a Rubic’s Cube—and more. Some of these will prove useful in Deadpool’s adventure. Interspersed in the storylines are several mini-games, including a simple ‘roll and move’ board game and a roll your own slam poetry poem. At the end of You Are Deadpool is checklist of achievements, which the reader can chose to tick off or not.

Structurally, You Are Deadpool consists of five chapters. Chapters one and five form the beginning and the end, whilst chapters two, three, and four can be played in any order. Either amusingly or not, at the end of chapter one, the reader is directed to chapter two or chapter three. This is not an issue and therefore not amusing if reading the collected You Are Deadpool, but of course, You Are Deadpool was released as a five-part mini-series of comics, issue by issue, month by month. So when You Are Deadpool #1 was published, the reader had to wait a month for You Are Deadpool #2 or two months for You Are Deadpool #3 to continue playing. Depending upon the ratings of Deadpool’s Badness and Sadness scores of course. Very droll.

Each issue or chapter itself, consists of between eighty and one hundred panels. Not all are non-sequential as you would expect for a solo adventure book. Certain series of panels can be read sequentially, just as you would any other comic or graphic novel, but for the most part, the panels are placed in non-sequential order. There is one consequence of You Are Deadpool being done as a comic book though. When reading or playing a solo adventure book, it is not uncommon to look at the illustrations as you flick past them to another paragraph and wonder what they depict and how you get there. In You Are Deadpool this is exacerbated because it consists of nothing but illustrations or comic panels…

Physically, You Are Deadpool is adroitly done. The artwork varies from chapter to chapter, so the second chapter, set in the nineteen sixties has a very pop art style. In between, the graphic novel collects the mini-series’ variant covers, including the ‘You Are Deadpool: The Antiheroic Role-playing Comic’, a parody which fans of TSR, Inc.’s Marvel Super Heroes will enjoy and a parody of Errol Otis’ cover to the B/X edition of Basic Dungeons & Dragons. At the end of You Are Deadpool, the author provides the story maps for each of the five chapters.

You Are Deadpool works as both a solo adventure book and a Deadpool story, but unlike most solo adventure books, it does not have much in the way of replay value—even with the achievement list at the end of the collection. This is primarily due to everything in each of the chapters’ different paths being drawn and thus on show—the blocks of text in standard solo adventure books being easy for the eye to gloss over, the panels of this comic strip not so much. So there are fewer surprises and hidden details, though the authors and artists do work hard to hide some. Nevertheless, You Are Deadpool is an entertaining and fun, if light parody of the solo adventure book, as well as the Marvel Universe.

2001: Godlike

1974 is an important year for the gaming hobby. It is the year that Dungeons & Dragons was introduced, the original RPG from which all other RPGs would ultimately be derived and the original RPG from which so many computer games would draw for their inspiration. It is fitting that the current owner of the game, Wizards of the Coast, released the new version, Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition, in the year of the game’s fortieth anniversary. To celebrate this, Reviews from R’lyeh will be running a series of reviews from the hobby’s anniversary years, thus there will be reviews from 1974, from 1984, from 1994, and from 2004—the thirtieth, twentieth, and tenth anniversaries of the titles. These will be retrospectives, in each case an opportunity to re-appraise interesting titles and true classics decades on from the year of their original release.

—oOo—

As much as the noughties was a decade dominated by the d20 System and the rise and fall of the third-party Dungeons & Dragons publisher, it was also the decade of two genres. One was pirates, the other was World War 2. The former was certainly given a big push by the release in 2003 of Pirates of the Caribbean, and would see titles such as Swashbuckling Pirates, Pirates of the Spanish Main, and Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies being published. The latter was spurred on by the anniversary of the USA’s entry into World War 2 with the attack on Pearl Harbour, and indeed, in that sixtieth anniversary three World War 2 roleplaying games would be published—Gear Krieg The Roleplaying Game from Dream Pod 9, GURPS WWII from Steve Jackson Games, and Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946. Over the course of the next decade, numerous World War 2 themed roleplaying games, from the small such as Battleforce Bravo from Deep7 Press to Weird War Two D20: Blood on the Rhine from Pinnacle Entertainment. These five represent the differing approaches taken to what is a defining period in twentieth century history. Both Battleforce Bravo and GURPS WWII played it straight and kept it to the history (that is, until GURPS WWII Classic: Weird War II), but the others would go in a different direction, adding another genre. Weird War Two D20: Blood on the Rhine added horror, Gear Krieg The Roleplaying Game added combat walkers, and Godlike added superheroes.

Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 did superhero roleplaying and superheroes in World War 2 like no other. In supplements like Glory Days for Brave New World and scenarios like All This and World War II for Marvel Super Heroes, the focus is traditionally on the superhero first, not the soldier. Although Godlike was a superhero roleplaying game and an alternate history game in which superheroes existed and influenced the course of the war—and beyond, they would not change the outcome of the war. The World War 2 of Godlike would still be won by men and machinery, by grit and determination, and when the Talents—those blessed with the superpowers or miracles which set them apart from ordinary men—of the Allies met the Übermensch of the Axis powers, they were soldiers first, superheroes second. Godlike is not a superhero setting in which the superheroes, the Talents, wear spandex. Instead, they wear a uniform and they serve their country. It is also not a Four Colour setting, but gritty. Despite their amazing abilities, Talents do die, whether that is due to combat with an Übermensch or an artillery barrage.

The alternate history of Godlike begins in 1936 when Der Flieger—‘The Airman’—appeared in the skies over the Berlin Olympics. He was the first Talent, and as Europe moved towards war, more would appear. Pevnost, a Czechoslovakian resistance fighter who could step through one door and out of any door he had previously stepped through, enabling him to traverse hundreds of miles in an instance. He would support the underground resistance throughout the war. As Der Flieger destroyed the Polish airforce, a Polish Talent, Cien appeared, who was capable of manipulating objects touched by his shadow, the Finnish Viljo, became one with the arctic snow and fought the Soviet invaders, and the Danish schoolboy, Vogel, found himself invulnerable to any attack he was aware of. As the Nazis occupied more and more of Europe, more Talents appeared amongst the local populations, many of whom would become heroes of their nations. The first British Talent was Jumping Johnny, capable of leaping twenty-seven miles in a single bound and land with a destructive bang, whilst The Indestructible Man, the USA’s first Talent, immune to any damage he was aware of, up to and including as was tested after the war, a ten-megaton nuclear bomb. More and more Talents would manifest throughout the war and around the world, as men and women were subject to the stresses and strains of the war. Despite the Soviet attempts to ‘biologically re-educate’ subjects into manifesting as Talents, the resulting Baba Yaga escaped, mad and willing to attack Soviet and Nazi forces alike. The Nazis conscripted its Übermensch into special SS brigades, whilst the Allies transferred its Talents into Talent Operations Command and trained them as commandos before organising them into Talent Operation Groups, or squads, which would typically be attached to standard forces or used on special missions.

In Godlike, player take the roles of Talents, soldiers with superpowers or miracles who serve in Talent Operation Groups. A character has six stats, Body, Brains, Command, Cool, Coordination, and Sense, rated between one and five, with two being average. Similarly, skills are rated between one and five. Beyond this, stats and skills can have Hyperstats and Hyperskills, so a Talent can have Hyper-Body and be super strong, or Hyper-Intimidation, and be incredibly imposing! Then there are Miracles. Certain traditional superpowers are unknown in the world of Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946—mind control or reading, absorption or imitation of other Talents, the ability to create Talents, time travel, unlimited healing powers, and actual super-science—though Goldberg Science and the creation of gadgets is possible. A wide array of cafeteria-style Miracles is given. This ranges from Aces, which makes the Talent incredibly lucky, Break, which enables a Talent to puncture or smash objects beyond Human capability, and Dampen, which allows him to reduce or negate a physical effect of a Talent to Side Step, with which a Talent can avoid a disaster or attack, Time Fugue, which enables a Talent to stop time for a single object or creature, and Zed, which can be used to negate the ability of another Talent. All of the Miracles come with Power Stunts, Extras, and Flaws, which all adjust the cost of the Talents, and there are also prebuilt, ready-to-play, Cafeteria Power-Sets—though only a handful of them. They include The Blaster, The Brain, The Bruiser, The Flyer, and so on.

There is also the option for a player to build his Talent’s Miracles as per other point-buy systems in other superhero roleplaying games. Fundamentally though, the tone and power level of Godlike means that certain superhero archetypes are challenging, even impossible to build. To build a Talent with the powers of flight and blast rays is possible, but expensive, but add in invulnerability, and it becomes prohibitively expensive. This is because Miracles—and also Hyperstats and Hyperskills—are bought as die types. Standard dice are the least expensive, Wiggle dice the most expensive, and Hard dice in between. Figure in Qualities—Attacks, Defends, Useful out of Combat, and Robust—and the cost also goes up, although a player could remove them to reduce the cost, but with the loss of utility. Miracles can also be modified by Extra, Flaws, and Power Stunts, which in turn adjusted the cost. Another limiting factor is the number of Will Points a Talent is built on. Godlike gives the stats for the first ten Talents to appear, their costs ranging from twenty-five to one-hundred-and-fifty Will Points, but the majority have Miracles way out of the league of beginning Talents. In the default campaign setting of the Talent Operations Group, a player is given twenty-five Will Points with which to purchase Hyperstats, Hyperskills, and Miracles. It is not a lot and it makes it challenging to create Talents without resorting to Hyperstats or Hyperskills. Nevertheless, it is possible to create interesting Talents, not all of them necessarily designed for combat.

To create a Talent, a player assigns six points to his Talent’s stats—which already begin at one, assigns twenty points to skills, and if playing in the Talent Operations Group campaign, receives training in another eighteen points’ worth of skills. Lastly, he has twenty-five Will Points to spend on Hyperstats, Hyperskills, and Miracles. As well this, a player should determine his Talent’s background, nationality, age, family, education, motivations, and so on, to flesh out the character.

Our sample Talent is Technician Third Grade Theodore Huffman, who was studying piano at the Juilliard School of Music in New York when his draft number came up 1943. After basic training he was assigned to Special Services and performed piano concerts in the USA, and then England and North Africa. In early 1944, the convoy he was in, was ambushed by the Germans and the truck he was driving blown up. He was thrown from the vehicle and knocked unconscious. It was then that his Talent manifested—Billy Bones. Whilst Theodore was unconscious, his skeleton got up, grabbed a machine gun and proceeded to fight the ambushers, killing most of them, and driving the rest off. When relief arrived, they discovered Huffman asleep and Billy Bones brashly playing jazz on the piano and smoking a cigar. As a Talent, Billy Bones fights when Huffman cannot, and is stronger and faster than Huffman. He also smokes when Huffman does not, and whilst Huffman is a classical pianist, Billy Bones plays music more popular with his fellow soldiers.

Technician Third Grade Theodore Huffman, ‘Billy Bones’, TOG-242
Body 2 Coordination 2 Sense 2
Brains 2 Command 3 Cool 1
Base Will 4
Current Will 4
Motivations: Survive the war; Become a better musician
Skills: Brawling 1 (3d), Climb 1 (3d), Cryptography 2 (4d), Dodge 1 (3d), Drive (Automobile) 1 (3d), Education 2 (4d), Endurance 1 (3d), Explosives 1 (3d), Grenade 1 (3d), Hearing 2 (4d), Knife Fighting 1 (3d), Language (French) 2 (4d), Machine Gun 1 (3d), Map Reading 1 (3d), Navigation (Land) 1 (3d), Perform (Piano) 3 (6d), Perform (Sing) 1 (4d), Pistol 1 (3d), Radio Operation 1 (3d), Rifle 1 (3d), Sailing (Sailboat) 1 (3d), Stealth 1 (3d), Submachine Gun 1 (3d), Survival 1 (3d), Swim 1 (3d), Tactics 1 (3d)

Talents (25 Will Points)
Alternate Form 2hd (Qualities: Attacks, Defends, Robust, Useful Outside of Combat. Base Cost: 5/10/20. Extra: Endless +1/+2/+4, Extra: Unconscious +1/+2/+4; Flaw: Peace of Mind (Asleep) -2/-4/-8; Flaw: Mental Strain -2/-4/-8; Final Cost 3/6/12; 12 points).
Hyperstat: Body +3d (Base Cost: 2/5/10. Flaw: Attached to Alternate Form -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/3/6; 3 points).
Hyperstat: Coordination +3d (Base Cost: 2/5/10. Flaw: Attached to Alternate Form -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/3/6; 3 points).
Hyperstat: Cool +3d (Base Cost: 2/5/10. Flaw: Attached to Alternate Form -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/3/6; 3 points).
Hyperskill: Submachine Gun +2hd (Base Cost: 1/3/7. Flaw: Attached to Alternate Form -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/1/3; 2 points).
Hyperskill: Perform (Piano) +2hd (Base Cost: 1/3/7. Flaw: Attached to Alternate Form -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/1/3; 2 points).

Although there is a wide range of Miracles listed in Godlike, the list is not extensive, and it would not be until the supplement, Will to Power when the roleplaying game received Miracles such as Size Shift and Unconventional Move. (The supplement also added a range of aircraft which were not included in the core rules—an issue potentially if one of the player Talents could fly.) Nevertheless, between the Godlike and Will to Power, both Game Master and player had access to a decent range of Miracles, enabling both to create interesting Talents. (The following example Talent was created using the extra content from Will to Power.)

Dorothy Murray was fourteen when she was evacuated from London. Unhappy with life away from her parents she ran away and returned to life in the capital. When the family house was bombed, and she found herself buried under rubble, her Talent manifested—she was able to tunnel her way out. At first she thought it was luck, but during later raids, she could hear the cries of those trapped and knew where they were. She began to experiment her powers and by the height of the Blitz, was going out nightly to tunnel into the rubble of bombed houses to rescue the survivors. Anyone pulled free always remembered the glow of the girl who came to rescue them and carry them to safety. The newspapers nicknamed her the ‘Angel of the Blitz’.

Dorothy Murray ‘Angel of the Blitz’
Body 2 Coordination 2 Sense 2
Brains 2 Command 2 Cool 2
Base Will 4
Current Will 4
Motivations: Help people with her Talent; Finish school
Skills: Athletics 1 (3d), Education 1 (3d), First Aid 1 (3d), Health 1 (3d), Hearing 1 (3d), Inspire 1 (3d), Language (Latin) 1 (1d), Mental Stability 1 (3d), Perform (Violin) 1 (3d), Run 1 (3d)

Talents (25 Will Points)
Unconventional Move: Tunnelling 4d+2wd (Qualities: Attacks, Defends, Robust, Useful Outside of Combat. Base Cost: 5/10/20. Extra: Endless +1/+2/+4, Extra: Passenger +1/+2/+4. Flaw: Beacon -4/-8/-16, Flaw: Glows -1/-2/-4, Flaw: Specific Material (Rubble) -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/2/4; 12 points).
Hyperstat: Body +8d (Base Cost: 2/5/10. Flaw: Attached to Unconventional Move -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 1/3/6; 8 points).
Detection: Humans 4d (Qualities: Defends, Robust, Useful Outside of Combat. Base Cost: 4/8/16. Flaw: Human Trapped in Rubble/Underground -1/-2/-4; Flaw: Attached to Alternate Form -1/-2/-4; Final Cost 2/4/8; 4 points).

Mechanically, Godlike uses what would become known as ‘Ore’ or the ‘One-Roll Engine’. This is a dice pool system, usually formed of the appropriate Stat plus Skill, for example, Coordination plus Rifle or Command plus Perform (Piano), the aim being not to roll successes, but get matches—pairs, triples, and so on. Neither player nor Game Master roll more than ten dice—although actually rolling that many dice is not common. If any of the dice match, then the character has succeeded. However, the more successes rolled, the wider the result is and the faster it is, and the higher the set of matches, the more effective it is. Carried over into combat, the width of the roll will determine the speed of the attack and how much damage is inflicted, whilst its height will determine exactly where the hit was made. Taking damage is not only physically injurious, but will negate dice in an attacker’s pool, so going first is almost a must, but dodging can ‘gobble’ up dice if successful, potentially breaking up matching sets. Although damage inflicted can be stunning, killing, or stunning and killing, combat can be brutal in Godlike, so players had better be warned ahead of play. Leaping into a game and expecting bullets to bounce off your hero’s chest just because is a sure-fire way to get him killed. Overall, the system is elegant, easily handles multiple actions, and plays fast, although it does take some adjustment from the traditional rote of rolling for initiative, rolling to hit, rolling for damage, and so on.

However, there are a couple interesting wrinkles which comes into play once Hyperstats, Hyperskills, and Miracles are figured. There are two other die types beyond the standard type. The medium cost die type is the Hard die. When this is in a pool and rolled, it is always set at a ten. This means that with a pair of Hard dice, a Talent will not always succeed, he will always do so with the maximum effect possible. The most expensive die type is also the most flexible. The Wiggle die can be set to any number, either to create a set or widen a set. Effectively, both give a player more control over his Talent’s ability to bring his Hyerstats, Hyerskills, and Miracles into play, especially as the dice pools for these increase in size—and it is generally easier to improve an already existing Talent rather than select a completely new one.

Perhaps the most enjoyable aspect of Godlike is the extensive timeline which covers the ten years from the Berlin Olympics of 1936 to the beginning the Cold War in 1946. It is richly detailed, mixing in both the actual history with the alternate history of Godlike, but keeping the two sperate. The entries which involve Talents are clearly marked with a bullet hole. This is supported by an equally interesting exploration of the wider background to Godlike and the appearance of Talents, especially how society at large reacted to them. The racism and sexism rampant throughout societies in the period is also acknowledged, but notes that despite that the targets of both played major roles in the global conflict. In the main, the role of Talents in Godlike—at least in Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946—is focused upon military and special operations style campaigns. This is understandable given that it is the major role of Talents throughout the war, and perhaps other types of campaigns, perhaps with a more diverse range of characters might have come had the publisher had the opportunity. Nevertheless, there is nothing to stop the Game Master using the content in Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 and backed up with research of her own from running other types of campaigns set within the Godlike universe.

Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 is further supported with a wide arsenal of equipment used by both the Allied and Axis powers, from small arms to armoured vehicles. The Game Master is given good advice on running a Godlike campaign, and the following details of the Talent Operations Group campaign is accompanied by a complete write-up of a sample TOG squad. This nicely showcases some of the possibilities using the Miracle creation rules earlier in the book. Alternatives and options suggest ways in which a campaign can be adjusted to allow Talents to be even more ‘godlike’, right up to a Four Colour-style campaign, but these do push the setting away from its gritty and very much soldier-first feel. Rounding out the book are the aforementioned write-ups of the first ten Talents to appear and since the book was published in 2001, rules for running a Godlike campaign under the d20 System. These are decently done, but feel superfluous now.

Physically, Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 is sturdy black and white hardback. It perhaps feels a little odd in its ordering of its content, with explanations of the rules, mechanics, and character creation coming before the roleplaying game’s detailed background. Without the latter, the rules do lack context, but with perseverance the reader will get to the richly detailed background and begin to put everything together. The book is well written and illustrated throughout with black and photographs manipulated to add in the presence of the Talents in each and everyone. There is something quite odd about many of them, their slightly off kilter perspective giving them a sense of the unearthly.

Godlike is lacking a number of elements. Mostly obviously a scenario, but World War 2 is such a familiar setting that a Game Master should be able to develop something of her own with relative ease. It is lacking details of the aircraft—of either side, but that would be addressed in Will to Power. Perhaps its major omissions are the lack of perspectives from either a female point of view or a non-American point of view—and to be fair, there is some truth to both omissions. Yet the focus of Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 is on the soldier on the front lines and beyond them, and not necessarily on the home front, and the role might very well have been more fully explored in subsequent supplements—for example, if a supplement devoted to the Russian Front had been published. The authors did publish scenarios in which women played a significant role, and to be fair, there is only just so much that can be covered in a book, even a core book like Godlike. Plus again, there is nothing to stop the Game Master, backed up with some research from running a campaign where women can play a major role. The other emphasis, that of the US soldier and the role of the USA in World War 2 is present in Godlike, but again to be fair, the roleplaying game was published in a year which was the anniversary of the entry of the USA into World War 2 and that emphasis could be found across all media. However, throughout the alternate history of Godlike, the roles of non-US Talents and their stories and contributions are highlighted again and again, each time working as potential inspiration for stories and scenarios which do not necessarily involve the USA. So ultimately, that emphasis is not strong as it could have been.

Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 would go on to spawn a number of supplements and scenarios, including Will to Power and the campaign, Black Devils Brigade: The First Special Service Force and the Italian Campaign, 1943–1944. Its mechanics would have a wider influence, the One-Roll Engine appearing eventually on its own in Wild Talents, a sequel of sorts to Godlike, but which also stood alone and enabled a Game Master to run a more traditional style of superhero campaign. It in turn would give rise to some wildly imaginative campaign settings, including Wild Talents: Progenitor, Wild Talents: The Kerberos Club, and Wild Talents: This Favored Land.

Then published by Hawthorn Hobgoblynn Press, but later Arc Dream Publishing, Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 would be one of the first roleplaying games I reviewed and certainly the first I reviewed after being contacted directly by the publisher and asked to review. I can remember the surprise when it happened, even when it happens today, I am still surprised and even humbled by the trust that publishers place in me in asking me to review their books. Godlike was worth that trust, because it was a great game in 2001 and it still is in 2021. The combination of Greg Stolze’s elegant mechanics with Dennis Detwiller’s richly developed background is a grim and gritty take upon the superhero genre, something that still stands out today as being different and stood out even more in 2001 against the backdrop of the d20 System boom and the tone taken by the other World War 2 roleplaying games then being released. Godlike: Superhero Roleplaying in a World on Fire, 1936-1946 is an amazing piece of writing and design which shows how even as miraculous powers change the world, the soldier—even the soldier Talent, not only has to survive that world, but stand up and still be a hero in that world.