As a GM I am generally not much a fan of the players like most modern day games tell you that you must be. Do not get me wrong, I am not against them and I like to see them succeed and ave fun in the process but I do not show bias there way for bias sake. The game is about the players but the GM is a neutral role that is there typically to mediate actions, not to play God in any way shape or form. I present a situation, they respond, I adjudicate. Unless the heroes are Supers and then it seems that all I want to do is say yes to them!
Last night saw me return to a supers campaign with the idea of playing a campaign and not a one shot. It felt really good to have broken out Super Squadron again and introduced three of the four players to this classically elegant super hero genre, completely Australian game. What is more exciting is that I am putting in my death matters policy – that is if a character dies they player will give up their seat at the table to someone else who wants to play in the game. The player can rejoin the queue but have to wait until they are called up to the supers game. You may think it a little harsh but all the players were told the situation and agreed to play. I think it will add a lot to the way they play.
On top of that change, I am also using Realm Works – the Lone Wolf development campaign management software live in this game. A couple of the players have the players copy and are trialling it for me and it is really coming along nicely. In fact, it seems to be an incredible tool at this stage with material I am updating whilst in a “Current Game” mode transferring seamlessly to the players as I opened up new information to them. This has really excited one of my players who is building up a solid amount of notes and information himself into the database.
The review for that is coming in this week and it is largely going to be from the word of my players who are using the tool. They seem to love it. Besides that being very cool I found running this supers game to be an absolute breath of fresh air. I actually found everything about running this game so much fun. It has reinvigorated me and I find that I am actually being a massive fan of the players. The reason why is because they are super heroes!
I grew up devouring typically British comics like Buster and Beano which were definitely not super hero comics. When I started making some pocket money I bought a little graphic novel of Doctor Strange and another of Spiderman and I was hooked. The problem is that I did not get much pocket money or have parents that gratuitously gifted stuff on a monthly basis and so I never really got a lot more comic books until I was an adult myself. However, I got smart about it and when I was 11 I saved up my money and bought a superhero role playing game called Super Squadron (hint: the same one we are playing now).
It was my first ever RPG purchase and one of the smartest. I bought it because a) it was a cheap boxed set at $12 and b) I could not afford comic books on a regular basis so I would make my own superhero stories using the game. It worked perfectly.
So I am back with this game. We are big timing the superhero action. The players are getting used to the bold superhero style as opposed to the gritty fantasy style I normally run and they are having fun with it. From Libby Furr’s character Shatter catch call of “Fizzle” with her Disintegration Beam and her over confident antics right through to James Wallace’s Jet Boost who realised that all he can really do is fly and is feeling a bit outclassed (but still pulled out one of the most fantastic moves of the night). The heroes of Titan City are right up there with my favourite heroes. Rounding out the team we have the Cosmic Comet who is a 1950’s retro space pilot with a grav belt and ray gun – tied in with a bit of psionics. And last of all there is Xtend, who has the power of elasticity and the ability to travel through time as well!
So thanks to the players who have joined in with me and I thank the players that will join us in the future. This is looking to be one great campaign, and one that will be keeping me smiling for a long time to come. Keep rolling!
Legalese: Image included in this blog post is used under a Creative Commons Attribution – Non-Commercial – No Derivative Works 3.0 License and was created by Pramod Koshy George who has a Deviant Art Page here.