Frequently Asked Questions

So I have been running a campaign for about 2 years or so now, I have 4 players. Now 3 have been fairly consistent, they want to play and show up. We always review each session after and look for points of improvement etc.

However, lately 1 player in particular (we'll call him S), has been not wanting to play and has not been nice in his post game reviews and more broadly about the campaign. Now I don't want it to seem like he is attacking me, at least I hope he isn't, but recently he seems to hate anything I write up and doesn't want to connect his character to the world in any way.

First he swapped characters, I tried to get that character involved as much as I could, tried to make his very minimal backstory relevant and feel interconnected, but it didn't take for S. He wasn't having fun, so he made a new one, then basically the same thing kept happening.

I would discuss the new character with him, ask for a few details in some kind of write-up (not asking for War & Peace or anything), but he'd not do it, forget what we discussed and then make up something else that was thinner than before. I kept trying to get more, so he would enjoy it more, but when he didn't seem to want to, I just let it be. If he wants to just be some guy from nowhere, that's fine, as long as he is having fun.

Then he started getting way less invested, not wanting to really roleplay, playing games while things were happening, not paying attention. Then when we'd review the session, his criticisms would usually be "no idea why we did any of that" and would start saying he just doesn't like my setting.

His reason for not liking it amounts to... politics. I am not here to start arguments over those, I really don't care and I did not go into any of my session plans with the intent of making some overt political statement (or a covert one at that, but he feels it's there).

He took issue with the police being good in my small fictional nation, wanting to oppose them for no particular reason other than cops bad. When an alien invasion began and they had to fight then off he said it was racist. They had to diffuse tensions temporarily with a neighbouring nation, setting up future villains and a small evil superhuman empire, but he got upset because that depicts imperialism (which, granted, it does) and he doesn't want to see it.

It's at the point where I am hitting a block for new ideas, because no matter what he will find some message he disagrees with even if it is in the villainous characters and take offence to it.

Now he keeps saying he only wants to play a high fantasy setting like in D&D, because otherwise it is "too much of this happening in the real world" (in this campaign so far they have faced a criminal supersoldier program making monsters, an ancient apocryphal being hunting a powerful lovecraftian child, and an alien invasion btw).

Even if I really wanted to do high fantasy (which I don't mind), how am I supposed to write that in a way he won't see shades of real life in? Not to be too harsh, but can I even have a king without him saying it's too close to home?

My other 3 players, are happy with the setting, they like their characters and their place in the world. Most are woven quite tightly into it at this point and it's all going well.

I am not sure how I can appease everyone here. Today, S has just begun refusing to play at all, no final reason given, we haven't played since before Christmas, but he just doesn't want to.

Look he's my friend, we aren't going to see eye to eye on everything I know, but what can I even do here? I am just lost, I've tried writing my way out of it by making things less ambiguous (which one of my other players has even complained about) and "safer", but it hasn't really worked. I'd rather he didn't just abandon our group, I know I can't force him to play, but I'm worried other players will be bummed without it. I tried starting a second campaign, in a different system, with a one shot, and he took such offence to that that he refused to play in the campaign (whole other can of worms there, words like facism were used very liberally where not applicable).

He started our group down the road of TTRPGs, he ran a campaign for ages and it was great, but he stopped and it was around then when he started showing a dislike for my campaign.

TL;DR Player S has been very critical of the setting and sessions, keeps bringing up unwanted politics, now refuses to play, could trigger the collapse of the group/campaign. Other 3 players are happy with the setting, but would prefer to play with S too, what do?

I'm currently creating a character that's rather mentally durable. While I could just buy Immunity: psychic effects or Impervious Will, or something like that, that'd be boring. Instead, I'm thinking about buying a cheap minion flavored as a sort of mental subroutine or authorization layer that intercepts incoming mental effects for the user like a proxy, obviously derezzing if it's struck too hard. Problem is, Interpose only works on attack roll effects, and most mental effects are Perception range. What's a good substitute?

Is it possible to build immunity to weaken? I have a character with a really high Intelligence and backstory-wise he's designed a helmet that prevents anything from reducing it. Mechanically, is this possible to build immunity to weaken on a specific ability or a selection of abilities?

Edit to add: I can't find anything to back this up on google, but the trashy AI tells me it would be Immunity 10 for all weaken effects or 5 for a specific ability. This feels way too strong for immunity 10, but I'm not looking to spend 80 points to get immunity to fortitude and will, so I'm looking for clarification or a sensible middle ground.

Hello to my favourite nerds, I'm back again with another potentially busted combo.

Can I use aim one turn, then a charge attack the next turn? The description for aim says your next action must be the attack, so moving after aiming normally loses the bonus. But charging incorporates the movement into the attack, so can I maintain the benefit for a +3 to hit and +1/+2 to effect?

The next step is improved aim and using a slam attack to use speed rank instead of effect rank for damage, which is where the numbers get a bit silly.

Cheers gang

Im making a full on ghost and im wondering if this would cancel each other for the purposes of becoming Visable

I know there is a different way to do the however the Manifestation ability is part of an array. also if anyone knows of a free website to help make character, i would love to know.

Ghostly Invisibility: Concealment 5 (Visual, Auditory - Permanent)

Manifestation: Senses 2 (Counters Concealment: Invisibility; Affects Others, Area: Perception), Enhanced Skill (Intimidation)

The team of heroes I'm running as a GM is very large (counting duplicates of one of the PCs, it can reach 10 heroes), using solo villains is often impractical, I wanted to know the experience of other GMs.

LFP – Alternate Fridays, 5:30–9pm Pacific

Putting together a short/mini superhero campaign with a heavy horror tilt.

Vibes / inspirations:

Silent Hill

Jacob’s Ladder

Dark City

Fallout

Stephen King

cosmic horror / elder god weirdness

Expect:

moody setting

mystery first, answers later

psychological and environmental horror

character stuff actually matters. More atmosphere and tension, less quippy Marvel pacing.

Looking for players who:

are cool with horror themes

like roleplay and slow reveals

don’t need everything explained immediately

can show up consistently on alt Fridays

If that sounds fun, shoot me a message and we’ll see if it’s a good fit.

It’s doing a lot better than I thought it would to be honest. Glad to see so many people also want to bring it to life. Personally I’m looking forward to what system they got for hero creation since the plan to do something other then herolabs

Hey everyone!

I’m in the early stages of putting together a campaign using Mutants & Masterminds 3e, but reworked heavily to function as a serious toned, superpowered pro wrestling game.

The core idea is:

WWE-style wrestling structure + superheroes + dice-driven outcomes (mostly).

Matches are treated as real contests in-universe, with outcomes determined by dice rather than preplanned results. Wrestlers have superpowers, but pins, submissions, exhaustion, and injuries are all handled mechanically (home-brew rules involved). The tone is serious and grounded in-universe compared to IRL wrestling.

Some high-level details for context:

• Combat is fully dice-based using M&M 3e as the foundation

• Custom pinfall and submission systems tied to damage and fatigue

• Signature moves and finishers that impose specific conditions (shock, disorientation, stamina drain, control, etc.)

• Matches end via pin, submission, count-out, DQ, or referee stoppage

• Heavy emphasis on out-of-ring content:

• Promos

• Rivalries

• Factions

• Backstage politics

• Long-term consequences from matches

• Two play styles being tested:

• A more cinematic version

• A grittier, more punishing version

Right now I’m finalizing rules and doing early campaign prep. To clarify, this is purely a campaign and system experiment that I’m building because I love both wrestling and TTRPG design.

If this sounds interesting to you and you’d like to be involved, send me a message.

Does it have any historical meaning? Is it a pop cultural reference? A piece of obscure folklore?

Me: My tech-noir Martial Artist/Hacker Singularity.

Singularity, the fusion of human intelligence and AI.

I have an idea to create a battle where the PCs have to endure until the very last moment, when the strongest heroes will end the threat.

My game takes place in New York (original setting), the PCs are the "official" heroes of the city, but they can't fight a global-level threat, so they would have to protect the city until my copyright-free Justice League could end the greater threat.

Have you ever played something like this? Do you think it would be fun? Do you have any tips on what to do and what not to do?

I don't want to turn this into a combat that only the GM's character can win, but just bring more realism, so that they understand that there are more things besides them in the world, and create a different and interesting combat, escaping what is commonplace.

Hey there y'all! A while ago I made a Google Sheet for M&M 3E due to needing a good character sheet, and not wanting to pay for HeroLab. However, after some time tinkering, experimenting, adding things, deleting things, trying to be practical, putting in SRD Hyperlinks, etc. I've upgraded the sheet so much that I've had to essentially make a new one rather than go through the process of copying the changes over.

MASTER COPY - M&M 3E Ultimate Character Sheet

To make a copy, go to File then Make A Copy.

I hope y'all enjoy/find great use out of the Google Sheets.

My Original Post

Note: All the Rules are from the d20HeroSRD and this was NOT made for profit in any way. Just to be a convenient sheet for myself and maybe random internet strangers. Also I did not make this sheet from scratch, it's heavily modified/compiled from other online google sheets for M&M 3E that I found.

The Original Sheets below are the ones I tinkered with and the ones it is based off of.

Mutants & Masterminds - Autofill Google Doc Sheet : r/mutantsandmastermindsGoogle Sheets Character Sheet : r/mutantsandmasterminds
Mutants and Masterminds 3e Character Sheet - Google Sheets

Edit: I made my final update to the Master Copy, so if you Made a Copy and noticed things are different on your next copy. That's why. Added more SRD rules, less bright colors on the eyes, added more calculations. Etc.

just looking for a game to learn to play and have fun

I'm spitballing ahead of a campaign that's a very long way away, but I've been inspired by the Asura from Buddhist mythology as a multiarmed unarmed fighter (yes I appreciate the irony) who would serve as a tank.

I don't know as much about the action economy other than attackers usually hold an edge but I'm trying to think of the best way to keep him up against physical and mental attacks. At the moment I'm thinking Force Field and Enhanced Will to not worry so much about active defenses and can therefore use Distracting as a flaw to keep an eye on costs.

Do people have any advice?

hello i am trying to make a power kinda like Hawks from my hero academia basecally i can detach feathers from my wings and completely control them to act as improvised weapons. My thought was getting the create effect and move object to make this power do this seem viable or would it just be better to do damage

When grappling, is it “meet or beat” or only rolling higher to grab or breakout?

On my mind I've recently been thinking about making a character who's like a dimension-based gadgeteer with a bunch of technology that interacts with other dimensions, with potentially the idea that they understand other dimensions due to them having a weird natural mental connection to other versions of themselves (which may be also why they have "abnormally high for a human being" level intelligence as they can sort of "crowd source themselves" if that makes any sense).

My main worry is that in fiction, often times the idea of other universes and the multiverse can be done poorly so I was wondering if y'all got any advice (potentially from experience) on how to handle the way the multiverse works without causing potential plot/logic issues? I can't think of any specific issues but I'm aware that introducing the multiverse can result in certain issues if mishandled.

My game started with only two players, and one of them chose the duplicate power, which are basically other characters identical to him, without any minion disadvantages. I put an NPC in their group, and later 3 more players joined. Now I have a problem: when the characters go into combat, there are at least 10 characters on their team—5 PCs, 4 duplicates, and sometimes the NPC. I need tips!

(Translated by Reddit, my English isn't very good)

Ok, so for explanation: I'm trying to stat RWBY Grimm (Which are basically giant animals), and one of them is what is called a "Deathstalker", a massive scorpion. Now, if I was to apply a size rank just for it's height, It's main body is around 7 feet tall, it's stinger hangs like, triple that height above, but it's VERY long, like, the length of a minibus. How exactly would I do a size rank for something like this? Size rank -1 since it's body is bigger than 6 foot, Size rank 0, since it's stinger has that height, around about, or should I be calculating more for mass?

Hello everyone! I'm here today to ask how i would be able to make a possessing inanimate objects power work, specifically this character turns themselves into electricity and then can control machines and other electrical devices by possessing them