Superhero Template Ideas

[Anthony]

It might be worth splitting up civilian adventurer a bit, it's something like half of all superhero origins. Maybe something age-related.

Another category I'd probably consider is the tester. Hal Jordan, for example, was a test pilot before he was a superhero, and Steve Rogers was a test subject for the supersoldier serum.

[LowManaMovieMagic]

Don't forget Doctor, as in medical practioner. Stephen Strange didn't attend all those years of medical school to be called Mister.

[Infornific]

I think you might be making this a little more complicated than necessary. If you have Action 4, it might be simpler to start with a few basic 100 point templates (Smart guy, Strong guy, Talented Guy, etc.) and add a couple of 25 point professional lenses from Action 4. How many points were you thinking for the pre-power templates? And how much use of Wildcard skills?

[Phantasm]

Originally Posted by Infornific

I think you might be making this a little more complicated than necessary. If you have Action 4, it might be simpler to start with a few basic 100 point templates (Smart guy, Strong guy, Talented Guy, etc.) and add a couple of 25 point professional lenses from Action 4. How many points were you thinking for the pre-power templates? And how much use of Wildcard skills?

I was thinking 250 for pre-powers (remember that I'm treating a number of cinematic traits as "super-normal 'powers'" for this). For the Wildcards, I was going to offer a "wildcard alternative" on a number of templates.

And I don't have Action 4 (in fact, I forgot it exists)... I should pick it up soon, but my entertainment budget for this month is already spent as I cut back on a lot of stuff to have my car's rear end worked on. I had taken a look at Action 1, which I may permit a few templates from.

[Infornific]

Originally Posted by Phantasm

I was thinking 250 for pre-powers (remember that I'm treating a number of cinematic traits as "super-normal 'powers'" for this). For the Wildcards, I was going to offer a "wildcard alternative" on a number of templates.

And I don't have Action 4 (in fact, I forgot it exists)... I should pick it up soon, but my entertainment budget for this month is already spent as I cut back on a lot of stuff to have my car's rear end worked on. I had taken a look at Action 1, which I may permit a few templates from.

I was thinking of the Pointless Dungeon Looting/Monster Hunting from Pyramid which relied on Wildcard skills among other things.

Action 4 has a character generation system which works more or less like this:

Archetype - 100 pt combination of Attributes and Characteristics (e.g., Talented Hero, DX 12, IQ 12, HT 11, Speed 6.0, Per 13.)

Generic Advantages - 25 to 30 points, possibly some fixed.

Everyman skills - 10 to 15 points in skills every character should have

Disadvantages - -50, possibly grouped by theme

That brings you to a net 100 points. Then you have 25 or 50 point lenses to pick, which would cover the skill sets for soldiers, students, etc.

It's a different approach but it seems to me that superhero backgrounds are so varied making a template for each might be too complicated. On the other hand you've already put work into specific templates for spies, students, etc so that might be for the best.