World Building How much detail would you like in a superhero "classification" system?

[FoolsErin]

So I've recently been craving some superhero roleplaying, but there really aren't any non-fandom ones that are really clicking with me. So, although my previous failures are screaming otherwise, I'm thinking maybe I'd like to start my own superhero roleplay. Okay, no big deal. But me being me, I decided I wanted to sufficiently world-build it out beforehand. Alright, that's fine, I'm pretty good at thinking up ideas in my opinion. So I'm going along, coming up with stuff, when it comes to mind that maybe a superhero "classification" of some kind would be nice. Y'know, to ensure the ones with the weaker powers are out dealing with the tiny crimes and the ones with planetary scale technology are off fighting some equivalent to Galactus or whatever. So I start laying that out. Types of abilities/skills/whatever, a 6 level ranking scale, and so on. Now, I have this friend who I often toss my ideas to (yes it is you marc122 ), and when I was describing my initial classification, he cautioned that I should make sure that I don't go overboard and make something too big to read (not his exact words, but a rough idea). Now, I didn't initially think about this very much, but a few days ago when I was thinking up a "level of control" scale, his words came to mind.

"Wait, is anyone going to actually care about this stuff? Like, actually read through it?" I thought, now worrying that I could be adding a little too much to the point that people would find it intimidating and not think about joining my possible roleplay. So here I am now, asking essentially the title question. How much detail do you think is appropriate in a superhero "classification" system?

 

[rae2nerdy]

So here is what I do.

1. Make the powers and weaknesses equal in the CS. Meaning that for every superpower the individual must have a physical weakness. Either tied to that exact power or just something that prevents them from using their powers in general.

Ex. One of my current ideas is a character who can see the truth. (not for roleplay because the power is too OP but just as a writing excerise). Their weakness is they must have either direct eye contact or physical touch for their powers to work. Which means if you cover their eyes/blind them OR just cover their skin their powers are useless. Their powers also work inwardly as well, meaning they cannot tell a direct lie without their powers turning on them.


2. As for power levels I think it's not necessary as long as the characters have control. After all technically Superman could stop a mugger and Batman can stop intergalactic invasions despite their power levels seemingly being unsuited to those particular activities. So what I would do is have your players give examples of how their powers can be used. Don't have them just say "Character X can read minds" have them explain how reading minds might be useful in a superheroic sense. Can they use it to stop muggers? Or find enemies in the group? Or turn alien invaders into catatonic vegetables?

3. Lastly maybe assign team specialties if that is relevant to the roleplay. For instance so you don't have like fifty people that are essentially some flavor of psychic. Maybe have it be set up so that each grouping of characters has one psychic type character, one physical type character, etc.

3b. Or if that's too much simply have it be so each power can only be used by one person. So if Player A makes a telepath than Player B cant make a character that also reads minds. They have to make someone who is empathic or super strong or whatever.

 

[Idea]

It depends on how you want your system to be viewed, what it's purpose is on the overall RP. In a story of prejudice, unfairness and in other instances where you want the system to be flawed, having that system focus on one or two characeristics at most (thus, a very simplistic classification system) makes a lot of sense, as by design it excludes unpredicted talents or skills. On the other hand, if your system is meant to seriously balance your RP's power level, then you're going to want to make it as complex as the powers can be diverse- the more freedom and options there are, the more nuanced and complex a system to properly classify them must be.

That said, I personally am a bigger fan of more concrete and solid information, and as such tend to prefer well-developed and adequately complex systems, over simpler ones. More importantly, I want systems to measure things, as much as possible, under concrete metrics and criteria, rather than gut feeling or vague notions. This is because, as a player, the last thing I want is to pour my heart and soul into a character only to find that I can't have that character due to a whim of the GM. If the rules are subject to the tyranny of whims, that's a type of environment I can't work with.

Edit: Regarding power levels, one principle I use is that I never measure powers by what players will do with them, but by what they could do with them. The fact that your character has a sense of honor and won't use that ability to create blades to form them inside someone's body is only as reliable as your character remaining eternally immutable, and you never falling to the temptation of abusing the power when the stakes are high.

 

[Idea]

1. Make the powers and weaknesses equal in the CS. Meaning that for every superpower the individual must have a physical weakness. Either tied to that exact power or just something that prevents them from using their powers in general.

Ex. One of my current ideas is a character who can see the truth. (not for roleplay because the power is too OP but just as a writing excerise). Their weakness is they must have either direct eye contact or physical touch for their powers to work. Which means if you cover their eyes/blind them OR just cover their skin their powers are useless. Their powers also work inwardly as well, meaning they cannot tell a direct lie without their powers turning on them.

I'd like to really, really disagree with this method if I may. I find it to be an extremely easy to abuse system, because unless the GM is actively making sure that the impact of the weakness is actually proportional the power of the ability (which is, unfortunately, often not the case) then you have very powerful abilities with rather insignificant weaknesses by comparison. Furthermore, you'll often see weaknesses built in extremely poor ways that will not actually come up when the stakes are high- things like something on the character's emotional state (which, granted, you did exclude in the mention of "physical" weaknesses), energy costs (example: "using ability makes the character really tired/is quite exhausting" ) ; or incredibly specific weakness others cannot seriously be expected to be able to perform, especially when it matters (examples: "catching the mind reader unaware" or "kryptonite"-type weaknesses).

 

[rae2nerdy]

I'd like to really, really disagree with this method if I may. I find it to be an extremely easy to abuse system, because unless the GM is actively making sure that the impact of the weakness is actually proportional the power of the ability (which is, unfortunately, often not the case) then you have very powerful abilities with rather insignificant weaknesses by comparison. Furthermore, you'll often see weaknesses built in extremely poor ways that will not actually come up when the stakes are high- things like something on the character's emotional state (which, granted, you did exclude in the mention of "physical" weaknesses), energy costs (example: "using ability makes the character really tired/is quite exhausting" ) ; or incredibly specific weakness others cannot seriously be expected to be able to perform, especially when it matters (examples: "catching the mind reader unaware" or "kryptonite"-type weaknesses).

That is addressed in my second point actually. Where I say that the GM ask for specific examples of how the power is used. I should have clarified that this would also apply to the weaknesses though so that’s my bad.

 

[Idea]

That is addressed in my second point actually. Where I say that the GM ask for specific examples of how the power is used. I should have clarified that this would also apply to the weaknesses though so that’s my bad.

Ah my bad as well, I didn't realize your points were meant to be connected.

 

[FoolsErin]

So here is what I do.

1. Make the powers and weaknesses equal in the CS. Meaning that for every superpower the individual must have a physical weakness. Either tied to that exact power or just something that prevents them from using their powers in general.

Ex. One of my current ideas is a character who can see the truth. (not for roleplay because the power is too OP but just as a writing excerise). Their weakness is they must have either direct eye contact or physical touch for their powers to work. Which means if you cover their eyes/blind them OR just cover their skin their powers are useless. Their powers also work inwardly as well, meaning they cannot tell a direct lie without their powers turning on them.


2. As for power levels I think it's not necessary as long as the characters have control. After all technically Superman could stop a mugger and Batman can stop intergalactic invasions despite their power levels seemingly being unsuited to those particular activities. So what I would do is have your players give examples of how their powers can be used. Don't have them just say "Character X can read minds" have them explain how reading minds might be useful in a superheroic sense. Can they use it to stop muggers? Or find enemies in the group? Or turn alien invaders into catatonic vegetables?

3. Lastly maybe assign team specialties if that is relevant to the roleplay. For instance so you don't have like fifty people that are essentially some flavor of psychic. Maybe have it be set up so that each grouping of characters has one psychic type character, one physical type character, etc.

3b. Or if that's too much simply have it be so each power can only be used by one person. So if Player A makes a telepath than Player B cant make a character that also reads minds. They have to make someone who is empathic or super strong or whatever.

That's....not...exactly...what I was looking for....

But thank you for your two cents.

Edit:

To specify, I was moreso looking for advice on how much detail I should put into a smaller part of the world this roleplay is taking place in. You sorta gave me advice on how to achieve party balance with the roleplay group and how I could run powers altogether. To be broad, I was moreso asking a question about the detail in worldbuilding and you gave me in response...not that.

 

[rae2nerdy]

Well world building is honestly more for you than your players.

So you can add as much of it as you want to your world. I tend to make a series of google docs for my world with each one dedicated to a specific aspect of the world.

I will use Harry Potter as an example;

I have one document dedicated to the magical world in general, one document dedicated to the American Wizarding community, one dedicated to magical animals, one dedicated to various locations, and lastly Magical notes that are just stuff I research for specific characters or scenes (ex. How to run a farm or buy a house)


Now what I do for my players is I give them only the information relevant to the plot. And if they have questions I will either copy and paste from the documents OR answer the question as it comes up then add it to the relevant document for later.


Ex. Say I want to make a Harry Potter roleplay about a magic farm in Britain. Most likely I will only copy and paste the information about keeping magical animals and how to run a farm and send that to my partner. If they have specific questions about say a location I’ll either write it up from scratch or copy and paste from the location document.


In your case I would make a document or some kind of location for all the information you currently have for your world. I would not make it publicly available unless your players directly request it.

Instead I would simply make the parts relevant to the plot available and make sure your players know they can ask for clarification or additional information.

Trust me as someone who regularly spends months on world building and consistently chases partners away because of over organization you want to start out only sharing the relevant info.

 

[Spoiled Bread]

I would say, it varies. If the roleplay has lot of emphasis on battle, then having a specified role or classified rank can be good. It helps in keeping character's battle style and power level in check. If the roleplay is about something else, like slice of life or drama, then I don't think power level need to be adressed much.

 

[FoolsErin]

slice of life or drama

Hahahaha...

NO.

 

[FoolsErin]

slice of life

In all seriousness, slice of life really isn't my thing. If someone gives me an interesting enough idea, then maybe. But usually, it's no because acting out something I'm already experiencing isn't exactly fun in my book, and I roleplay and write for fun.

 

[Shotagonist]

I would suggest to use a system similar to One Punch Man where each hero takes an aptitude test in part physical, in part written exam. And based on the results, they are put into different categories. Likewise, monsters are scored based on the potential of their destruction whether they are a threat to a person, a city or humanity as whole etc.

 

[FoolsErin]

I would suggest to use a system similar to One Punch Man where each hero takes an aptitude test in part physical, in part written exam. And based on the results, they are put into different categories. Likewise, monsters are scored based on the potential of their destruction whether they are a threat to a person, a city or humanity as whole etc.

That's actually what inspired this whole debockle somewhat.