Marvelous Phile: Marvel Super Heroes RPG Game Mechanics and Using Karma
Hey, guys, Professor Bill of Comic Book University (where tuition is always free) and I’m bringing you the second article of the Marvelous Phile, an homage to the excerpt in Dragon Magazine back in the 80’s.
Game mechanic
Professor Bill opens the pages of the comic book universe in Season Two of Marvel Super Heroes, produced by War Eagle Keep
On the second adventure of our group for the Marvel Super Heroes RPG “FASERIP” live game our heroes had to fight the Porcupine. This is a very low-level Captain America villain from the ’80s who wasn’t particularly effective. However, as a first adversary for our up-and-coming heroes, he was more than enough of a challenge.
This encounter brought into play the dreaded “kill shot.” A civilian (expertly played by Tony Thompson) charged the villain and attacked him. Porcupine could not see as his vision was obfuscated (watch the live stream for more on that) and accidentally rolled an attack on Tony.
It was a very high roll and Tony receives a kill result.
Now, a kill result does not mean instant death in MSHRPG. Rather, when someone receives a kill result, he or she must roll against his or her Endurance. The way the rules are set, Porcupine’s attack was at EX (20) while Tony’s endurance was at PR (4). Since the attack was higher than Tony’s Endurance, Tony has to make the roll at minus one column shift (-1CS). According to the Universal Chart (found on the back of all the Player’s and Judge’s books, a player who receives a kill result must role in the yellow or red on his or her Endurance or they will lose one Endurance rank per round. When a character reaches Shift Zero (Sh 0) endurance, then the character has effectively died.
Clearly, certain powers (like Immortality) will affect this, and we’ll cover this in a future Marvelous Phile, but for all intents and purposes, the character is dead.
Some steps a player can do to avoid death:
- Spending 50 karma will prevent Endurance loss per turn. Clearly this is a “Band-Aid on a bullet wound” method and it gets expensive quickly.
- Spend 200 karma to make a reroll on the original Endurance feat.
Even if someone comes and performs first aid on the character, it will only stop the further Endurance loss as long as the character stays with the fallen character. So, in the game, if Dave (playing Marley O’Malley, aka Moshpit) was only able to stay with Tony for three rounds, then Tony would begin losing Endurance ranks each turn again. In this case, Moshpit was able to allow a paramedic to take over for him, so Tony was stabilized throughout.
Once stabilized, the character will remain unconscious for 1-10 rounds. When he or she wakes up, other negatives can take effect. More on that in another Marvelous Phile.
Character profiles
That’s all for this week. See you next week right here and on the live stream.
Professor Bill
Comic Book University
Class dismissed
Join us for some karma
The Universal Table determines the outcome of all the action in the Marvel Super Heroes RPG
Marvel Super Heroes Roleplaying Game streams live on Mondays at 8 p.m. EST on the Nerdarchy YouTube channel. Viewers in the live chat are encouraged to get their percentile dice and join in as Professor Bill leads Season Two players Nerdarchist Dave, Travis Boles from WebDM, writer and YouTuber Davae Breon Jaxon, Nerdarchy web editor Doug and staff writer Megan R. Miller through a street-level campaign featuring original superhero characters.
You can learn more about how karma is gained and used by viewers in the live stream chat here. Live chat participants can use karma to affect the results of dice rolls using the same mechanic as the players. Before rolling the dice, a player can spend karma to add to the result on a 1:1 ratio. After a dice roll, karma can be added to the result on a 2:1 ratio, with a minimum of 10 karma spent. For example, if Ash is about to make a roll to use his Fire Manipulation power, Megan can choose spend five karma to add an equal amount to the dice result. If Megan decides to roll without using karma, and rolls a 60 (a green result), she could spend 22 karma to add 11 to the result, bringing to total to 71 (a yellow result).
Marvel Super Heroes Roleplaying Game Season Two is produced by War Eagle Keep, creating overlays, running sound and a million other things that make to make this live game awesome in the Mighty Marvel Manner! Check out War Eagle Keep on Instagram @war.eagle.keep
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