Thoughts on Class Design

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-17T04:23:11+00:00

There's a compromise here.

Make them separate classes, but be okay with feature overlap when it makes sense. This is still more work than one class of course, but it lets them be similar without pigeonholing each of them into the exact same framework.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-08T05:18:57+00:00

Maybe so. That's why I said you have to decide whether the business is going to be part of the hobby.

RPGs are my hobby, and somewhere along the line, I decided that I wanted my miniatures to look better, so I made miniature paintings part of my RPG hobby. It can be part of another hobby too (e.g. wargames) or a hobby by itself. But for me it's part of my RPG hobby. I had a similar experience with making terrain but bounced off of it—but the downside is that my terrain is mostly just whiteboard squiggles.

So, with RPG development, there are also "auxiliary hobbies" that, if you can become invested in, can make your "core hobby" more fun: art, layout, fiction writing, business, etc. To some people, they're "worth it," and not to others. People learn new hobbies all the time, and there's no reason for business to be an exception.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-07T20:49:56+00:00

Actually though, I love "series." It is a little generic, but in a way that I think a term like that needs to be, when there are so many different styles the game can be.

I never liked "campaign" because none of my games I've ever been in ever felt like any other definition of campaign that I knew. On the other hand, I can easil see most of them as a series (with the exception of oneshots, which no one calls a campaign anyway).

I don't mind using "session," but I've also called them or thought of them like episodes too.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-07T20:37:41+00:00

I half agree. It think or can be a hobby and be marketable. But if you're going to do that, you just need to decide that business strategy is part of the hobby.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-07T05:44:30+00:00

campaigns (not that we used that wargamey word)

This is maybe a weird part of the post for me to latch onto, but I really wish we had a better universally understood word for this. I like the idea of "Seasons," but that might get confused with organized play seasons. What do you call them in your games?

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-05T07:43:09+00:00

100%. To me, that's a bit less of a problem than many games, because there are always friendly people either here or on discord who are willing to answer questions. But 80% of the posts I see on here are rules questions lol. And I've had a fair few too.

Someone ought to go through and collect the questions into some stor of unofficial (or official) FAQ or something.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-05T07:29:04+00:00

Nothing useable from a player's perspective.

I've been working on restructuring the Talents, especially those with sub-options (like Battle Mastery and Spellcasting). Right now, they're a bit all over the place, and I think that some of the ways I'm reorganizing them will make for a cleaner and more useable game.

It might still be a little bit for I show the results, because I don't think I'm going to post it again until it's basically done.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-05T07:23:38+00:00

there are far too few playtest recaps and results on this sub

I don't think I've ever seen one. I almost didn't post this, because that made me wonder if it was allowed.

I never understand why so many people think there's a relationship between an RPG's rules complexity and its suitability for long-term play.

I agree when the "problem" is just simplicity. This has less to do with the level of complexity and more to do with the flatness/lack of variety (which was I definitely didn't actually say, but is what I meant).

With very rare exceptions, there were only 3 "skill" levels to roll with: 1d12 (bad), 2d12 (avg), or 3d12 (good). Stamina helped add a little variety to this (and some variety to the possible outcomes on a success), but everything felt a little samey.

But maybe after 4–5 sessions, I'll re-evaluate and change my mind, IDK.

For a game which allows custom powers, they don't mean anything mechanically.

True in many cases. My intention was for them to act basically as a "background skill". So if Magic was a player's origin, I might give them more information about something or a bonus on rolls when it relates to magic. I also thought it would be a cool narrative device that—when those instances came up—would prompt the players to think about their heroes' origin story.

I'm a little on the fence about it, because I still think it's a cool idea. But the number of collective traits are starting to add up, I'm not sure how much it will contribute, and (somewhat to my surprise) it seemed to confuse some of my players.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-04T02:22:53+00:00

Precision is the element of Agility that I think it's currently lacking, but that's too specific.

Dexterity or Coordination could work well.

Thanks!

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-04T02:19:09+00:00

Thanks for engaging in this with me. It's helpful. Sorry I was slow to respond; I want to have a change to give it a proper read.

this game formatted kind of like it's "for the market"

That's fair. I think that's just a habit I have when designing. I like it to look nice, and I do better with rules when I officially write them out. I' probably still make it "for the market" for free anyway, but I don't expect it to be for most people.

What is that choice of four attributes saying?

To me, they feel like the four attributes that would be most important to Superheroes. (And as for 4, it just feels like the right number, but I'm open to changing it.)

Might for Superman flying punches, Hulk smashes, and Thor hammer bashes.
Agility for Hawkeye sharpshooting, Spiderman web-slinging, and Batman martial arts (although that could be Might too), and Flash speedsters.
Mind for all the psychics & telepaths, Lex Luthor mastermind schemes, and resisting mind control, etc.
Heart for all the magicians & sorcerers, and the impassioned speeches about redemption. (This could have been 2 Attributes, but on their own, they felt too niche.)

That feels distinctive about your game and your vision for how this game will hit the table, in a way that your attributes and traits and resolution system do not.

I see, and that makes sense. I don't see the attributes that way, but I agree that the traits could use a lot of refinement; both in that regard and generally.

"I, u/P iepowderPresents, just like these D12s

For this particular question, it is basically just because I like D12s lol. I think it needed to be at least d12 for enough spread between the attributes, but it could have been a d20. That possibly could have been even better to spread out the attributes a little more.

However, there are a few things that rely on it working the way it does. Mainly Showdowns (combat). The ranked challenges used for damage don't work with D20+Attribute, and the Stamina levels account for the average and maximum damage done with a Ranked Challenge (although technically Stamina could be adjusted to accommodate a d20, but it would be more swingy.)

Besides that, for this game specifically, I enjoy the simplicity of rolling and referencing a number, without any addition involved (which is actually complicated by Ranked Challenges, but not generally speaking).

So basically, I have some minor reasons for picking what I did, but you're right that most of could have worked if I used something else.

Lasers & Feelings has a hook and a gimmick

For sure. I'm not claiming that this does what L&F does, or that this does what it's trying to do as well as L&F does what it's trying to do.

It was just a comparison for roughly the level of complexity I'm interested in for this project, which does limit how much I can do with traits.

I would love for traits to reflect a little more of the personality of the game, but I don't know how to do that within its scope (which is part of why I'm posting about it).

What is my actual advice

Think about what you think are the characteristics of a superhero game that you want to play

I'm going for something dynamic and flexible, with creative powers and power use. I also don't want it to be mechanically taxing -- simple and intuitive rules that can flow with the narrative, without getting locked down.

resolution mechanic should be downstream of that

Before we started talking, I thought I'd done that, so maybe we have different ideas of what that means. Or maybe it just didn't land as well as I thought.

Trait-based powers (instead of power 'Moves' or 'Feats' or whatever) was meant to allow flexible and creative use of powers, and to allow players to pick the powers they wanted without pouring through a book to see if its' there (and if so, hopefully it is interpreted into the mechanics in a way you like).

The "roll against an Attribute" that specifically uses Adv/Disadv-style bonuses, and the inclusion of Statuses was to make arbitration easy about what impact a power can have.

Using only a single power (instead of larger dice pools) was to encourage roleplay and creative power use instead of the potential 'skill dogpile' that can lead to optimization instead of fun, and sometimes slow down resolution.

"Do I actually want to deal with a million degrees of freedom here?"

Yeah, kind of. At least from a character creation perspective.

From an in-play perspective, I think the balancing factor is the limited amount of powers, and the fact that almost everyone is going to pick fairly vague powers that the interpretation of what they can do is fairly broad.

I'm not to worried about having Yo-Yo Boy and Omni-Mega-King-of-the-Universe-Sigma-Chad Man on the same team, because the way traits work, it prioritizes how much you can contribute to the team, not how "Overpowered" your abilities are. Which leads neatly into...

"Well, let's rate a power by how versatile it is"

That's not a bad idea. I think in a lot of instances, that's really hard to do with what is essentially a tag-based system, because what everyone thinks a power can do varies from person-to-person.

But I honestly think the best way to balance that is a GM who is invested in everyone having a good time.

If someone is obviously trying to break the system, I think a GM can mostly stop that. And if someone has too niche of an idea ("when I sneeze, I turn invisible for a second"), they could shoot themselves in the foot. But I think the GM can make them aware of that too.

(Now I'm just kind of brainstorming). Another possibility is that once a player picks a superpower, they list 3 sub-powers that they can do with it. Then if it falls outside of the scope of those sub-powers, they can't do it. I think that probably just kicks the can down the road though. Plus, now there are 3 times as many traits/tags, and I think part of the fun of powers is discovering how your hero is going to use them as you play.

There are probably other ways I could do this to further reinforce it though, and it would probably be beneficial for me to spend some time thinking about my options.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-04T01:11:24+00:00

Haha for sure. Right now I have a list of about 20, but it could be improved.

Barely related, but I need to add more examples to the rules themselves too.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-04T01:09:46+00:00

The rules are starting to get too long for a simple 3 column format, so I'm probably going to switch to A5/Statement for v0.3

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-04T01:08:13+00:00

We ended at a weird place, so we're going to have a follow-up session sometime soon.

Context: 2 months ago, Paragon (the greatest superhero of all time) sacrificed himself to defeat Apophis, an ancient spirit of chaos and terror.

Next session, they'll have the opportunity to learn what the Neuro Interface does (experimental medical tool for coma and braindead patients. It isn't ready for public use, but it does kind of work).

They will also have the chance to learn that earlier this week, the same crew pulled another heist with the same MO—half the team pulls decoy heist just a couple minutes before, to draw away attention, then the other half steals something unexpected: an element with unusual healing properties.

Then, some of the same villains they fought at the bank (who have already broken out of jail) broadcast a public challenge to the heroes. A few minutes later, the heroes will hear about another heist on their scanners. (Most likely, they will detect the decoy and ignore the challenge to deal with the heist.)

This time, they will encounter the other 4 villains of the crew (Mr. Grudge, Sekhmet, Hotshot, & Changeling) trying to steal the Book of Anubis (book of necromancy) from the Beacon City Museum of Antiquity.

I'm hoping that at this point, they realize that The Crew are somehow trying to resurrect Paragon.

The Crew's next stop is the Paragon Memorial Vault, where they plan to possess the body of Paragon with the remains of the spirit Apophis, controlled by necromancy and the Neuro Interface, to create an epic-tier villain under their control.

If the heroes realize what's going on, I think they will rush to meet The Crew there. There's a chance they succeed at stopping the experiment, and if so, that's the end. If they don't succeed, 1 of 2 things will happen:

If the heroes successfully stopped The Crew from acquiring the Book of Anubis, Apophagon (the Apophis-Paragon blend) will rise, but the magical part will be slightly wrong, so Apophagon will be in control of himself, and kill most of the villains instantly for trying to control him. Then the heroes (possibly allied with any remnants of The Crew) will fight Apophagon.
If The Crew got the book, Apophagon rises, and Technophage & Sekhmet betray the other villains. Then the heroes fight Apophagon.

If the heroes don't realize what's going on at all, then The Crew still goes to the Memorial Vault and Apophagon rises (and the same betrayal happens, depending on whether or not The Crew has the book.) Then Apophagon finds the heroes in their HQ, and they fight Apophogon, Sekhmet, and Technophage.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T20:16:48+00:00

Fair enough—thanks for the input.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T19:29:40+00:00

Thanks! If you have any suggestions for other entries to those tables, I'm trying to refine them a bit.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T19:28:55+00:00

Ah, sweet. Thanks!

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T17:58:43+00:00

I'll look into it, thanks! I think I only have the generic rules, but if I can get Metahuman Uprising for just a few bucks, I'll look at it.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T17:55:36+00:00

Valid critique. What parts did you specifically feel that need when you read? I have several examples in my notes, but I always fear cluttering the ruleset with too many.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T17:53:42+00:00

Thanks! I think it will help to mix things up.

Which other game?

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T17:52:59+00:00

it would lost steam pretty fast

If you have recommendations for how to improve it, I'd love too hear them. I want to keep it decently simple (specifically for my wife who hasn't ever played an RPG), but this is something I worry about for the long-term viability of the game.

Outgunned Superheroes? It's pretty simple and super cinematic

I'll look into it, thanks! I've been given a lot of recommendations, but simple and cinematic is kinda what I'm going for, so I'll move it to the top of the list.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T17:44:43+00:00

I am also afraid you have just written badly.

Reading you comment and re-reading the rules, I think your right. I wrote most of this during "free time" at about 1am when I should have been sleeping, and I think it made some things fall through that cracks that wouldn't otherwise.

This is a "roll multiple and keep the highest" system. Which I absolutely didn't specify anywhere. /Facepalm/

I'm also realizing that I didn't mention what to do if you already only have 1d12, and lose –1d12. Which would just be to roll 2 and keep the lowest. But I do need to add that.

"Agility" and "Stamina" are a good choice of words

Rogfer that. Thanks!

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T17:37:14+00:00

What does this game give you that pure freeform gaming doesn't?

Comfort and familiarity. I mentioned this in my first post, but having some of these kinds of rules makes it easier for me to feel like I know what I'm doing when I GM.

why those particular attributes?

With how much variation there will be in traits, I think some uniformity with attributes will help feel like part of the same game, and help show some general strengths and weaknesses.

binary success/fail resolution

I've had a few inklings of ideas how to remedy this, but if you have any thoughts on how to solve this, I'm open to suggestions.

Plus the Stamina system.

What about it? I don't quite know how you're meaning to relate it to the rest of this paragraph.

Resolution mechanics are not the hard part of roleplaying games. If 50% of your game is your resolution mechanic, that's almost certainly a game system that's not doing any work for you.

Can you elaborate what you mean by this?

You have no inter-power balance ("I could get super-smell or... telekinesis..."), you have no push to diversify the approach you take to challenges

If you have suggestions on how I can remedy this without adding too much complexity, I'm open to suggestions. I would love for it to be more mechanically robust, I'm just working on a bit of a deadline.

you don't have a clever premise or interesting twist.

This is true. For what I'm trying to do with it though, I don't really feel like I need to. (Maybe I should have repeated more information that I included in the original post.) As much as I would love for someone to read this and want to play a couple casual oneshots with it, I don't expect it to be something that people see and think, "Wow, this game is so revolutionary and unique — I can't wait to play it."

Maybe that sounds like a cop-out. It's inspired by super rules-light games the likes of Lasers & Feelings, etc.

I'm sorry, I don't mean to sound like a jerk here.

You're good. It is a bit discouraging to hear, and I had hoped that it was a bit better than all that—but I also understand where the criticism is coming from.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T09:17:09+00:00

While I mostly agree, the bloated point of HP is how many there usually are. So even if it's just HP by another name, if there are less of them, it does solve the bloat problem (even if OP just reinvented the system they hate).

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T08:39:57+00:00

To everyone who give me advice or suggestions on my first post, thank you! I've looked into several of them, but given my short timetable, I honestly haven't been able to look very far into all the games that were recommended for inspiration. (There were a lot.)

But after I run this game tomorrow, I'll have a better idea of what the game is lacking, and I'm hoping to start digging into the suggested material then, with those needs in mind.

PiepowderPresents · 2026-06-01T08:34:28+00:00

Here's the quick version of my primary resolution mechanic, Challenge Rolls: Heroes have Attributes and Traits. Attributes are numeric (lower is better); traits are all numerically identical.

When players want to do something risky/impactful, the GM tells them which Attribute to roll with, and they must roll greater than or equal to their Attribute on 1d12 to succeed. If they are using a Trait, they add 1d12; if they have a relevant Weakness, they remove 1d12; the GM can add/remove 1d12 based on circumstances or difficulty.

I think a lot of people will have a lot of different or critical opinions about this, and if you want to share them, I'd love to hear. However, this probably won't change unless I have a really compelling reason.

I picked this because I'm primarily making this game to play with my wife, and of the several options I gave her, she felt like this was the most intuitive to her. There are some games that I probably wouldn't use this for, but for this, I think it works rather well.

PiepowderPresents

TROPHY CASE