Different types of Superhero settings/universes and themes

[tecnowraith]

I am in the process of creating a a new superhero setting/universe and needing help on the the theme of said setting/universe. I looking to do something different and something that has been many times before like so many superhero setting/universe. My question what would be a good setting/universe for a superhero game for Mutants and Masterminds? I know I do not want space travel type game but futuristic is not out of the question but not to fall into the "it another cyberpunk" type setting with powers. I do want powers, big monsters, super villains and that good stuff. Any ideas and suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[Hand of Evil]

Overlapping Worlds -- 3 or more themes overlap the campaign world. This could be magic on one end, Future on the other, heros are in the middle. This way you can have demons and angels fighting robots. Powers can flux based on which way energy is flowing.

 

[Asmor]

I wrote on a setting I call Rise of the Godlings, which is super hero-meets-fantasy. The basic idea is that the universe has decided it's time for a new pantheon of gods, and so mortals are being born with incredible powers and the potential to, eventually, become gods.

 

[WizarDru]

I looking to do something different and something that has been many times before like so many superhero setting/universe.

I'm going to assume you meant to say 'and NOT something', there.


So, you want to do something unusual for a superhero campaign. You'll find that a little tougher than you might think. Superheroes have covered a pretty wide base just in the last 30 years, let alone the last 70. However, superhero RPGs cover far less ground. Let's look at a few options.

1. Film Noir / Pulp - These aren't entirely the same genre, but for purposes of our argument, let's group them. This should be a low powered setting, but it doesn't have to be. It's grim, dirty and more like a detective story than an epic of superheroes. Spiderman Noir is an example of low-powered...most of the heroes/villains are circus freaks and only barely superhuman. In the other direction, we have 'Incognito', in which Pulp science heroes and villains do very bad things just out of the sight of normal society. Heroes and villains are powerful, but their war is kept mostly out of sight and when that's not possible, covered up as to its severity. Some people exist outside the two major factions, but they live a truly dangerous life.
2. SPAAAAACE! /Cosmic - Superheroes here fall into the 'cosmic' category. Two typical examples are the Legion of Superheroes, who are your textbook future/sf superheroes and Marvel's 'Cosmic' heroes, which include the Guardians of the Galaxy and the Silver Surfer. Space heroes can just be SF with super-powers...many such characters in the genre are just aliens with racial powers. You can see this in other such titles as L.E.G.I.O.N. or S.W.O.R.D. Cosmic heroes are the Superhero genre's version of Epic characters. They deal with galactic wars, cosmic entities and Very Big Threats. Nova, Adam Warlock and anything that has Thanos or Annihilus falls into this category. Some heroes move between the genres, such as the Green Lantern Corps. They can just be space cops...or they can be the last defense against the invading undead hordes.
3. Fantasy Superheroes - Superheroes in more traditional D&D style fantasy usually eschew costumes and some genre conventions. A better example here would come from Manga and Anime. For grim and gritty, look to Berserk. For comedy, look to Ruin Explorers or Sorceror Hunters. Dozens of other variations exist. Such characters might assume what would be genre standard names: Sir Morgan the Red Axe, for example. Their super-powers might be from magic, ancient martial arts mastery or just being a half-dragon. They are, for all logical purposes, superheroes. They just don't wear spandex. Any story you want to tell with fantasy characters will work with Fantasy superheroes. You may make supers special characters, like the Deryni...rare beings from a dying race, hated and feared by others but blessed with unique powers.
4. Mythological Superheroes - Variation on the Fantasy theme. The characters aren't like gods. They ARE gods. Or at least demi-gods. The fact that so many mythical characters are used in comics should show how easy it is to reverse engineer this. A campaign based on Marvel's Thor having adventures in Asgard would easily fit this bill, or their Hercules. Conversely, you could do Percy Jackson, with mythological characters in modern times.
5. Golden Age - Revisited - Taking a turn from James' Robinson's "Golden Age" or Darwyn Cooke's "New Frontier", make a campaign set in a previous age...but with modern sensibilities. Does Batman kill? Does Wonder Woman support Vietnamese rape victims? Was Hal Jordan flying over Korea? Making a Golden Age game that isn't the simple subtext of the original stories can recontextualize everything. Of course, Alan Moore's 'Watchmen' does this at it's darkest and most brilliant.
6. Fables - Bill Willingham's Fables is tailor-made for a Supers game. Most of the characters are immortal beings with strange powers, hiding among us. Many of them are easily recognized, but changed from what we know. Little Boy Blue armed with the Vorpal Sword and the Witching Cloak fighting Baba Yaga's Knight of the Day, for example. Following the rules of Fabletown while trying to survive in a hostile world? Great stuff.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Fantasy Superheroes - Superheroes in more traditional D&D style fantasy usually eschew costumes and some genre conventions. A better example here would come from Manga and Anime. For grim and gritty, look to Berserk. For comedy, look to Ruin Explorers or Sorceror Hunters. Dozens of other variations exist. Such characters might assume what would be genre standard names: Sir Morgan the Red Axe, for example. Their super-powers might be from magic, ancient martial arts mastery or just being a half-dragon. They are, for all logical purposes, superheroes. They just don't wear spandex. Any story you want to tell with fantasy characters will work with Fantasy superheroes. You may make supers special characters, like the Deryni...rare beings from a dying race, hated and feared by others but blessed with unique powers.

See also Marvel's 1602, DC's Gotham by Gaslight and probably other What If or Elseworlds stories.

Gotham by Gaslight
Marvel 1602

Personally, one of the best received campaigns I've run was a HERO game set in the 1900s of a Jules Verne/H.G.Wells type world, largely built on the bones of the classic Space:1889 RPG.

I've mentioned it a lot 'round here:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/255927-starting-new-m-m-campaign.html

And here:

It's not online, but the best campaign I ever ran personally was a supers game set in 1900.

The way I did it:

1) Use the setting for Space:1889 as the main default.

2) Add those additional Wellsian and Vernesian elements you want.

3) Crib liberally from pulp fiction, especially sci-fi/fantasy pulp like John Carter or Leigh Brackett's Skaith stories, tales of Atlantis, etc.

4) Find some other sources: Wild, Wild West (TV show and movie), Kung Fu (original series), League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Gotham by Gaslight, William Gibson's Difference Engine, Sherlock Holmes stories... Even things that aren't strictly period can get incorporated with some clever rewriting- Hellboy, Wu Shu martial arts flicks and James Bond movies can be rewritten to make fine period adventures.

5) Put your own spin on it: in mine, the Martians were addicted to opium...and it made them into psychotic workhorses (think Alien Nation). I also stole stuff from Michael Moorcock's Bastable books (large colonial air-navies, a mysterious warlord from the East, etc.).

6) Listen to your players. If they get inspired- and almost anyone knows about this era to get stoked about this- their imaginations will spur a lot of your campaign. I was trying to figure out how to work in Atlantis, and one of my players turned in a PC background based on an anime character who was an adolescent amnesiac Atlantean with a whip. Before long, they were caught up in the struggles between Atlanteans and Lemurians (and the surface world besides- thank you Namor, the Sub-Mariner stories).

Film Noir / Pulp - These aren't entirely the same genre, but for purposes of our argument, let's group them. This should be a low powered setting, but it doesn't have to be. It's grim, dirty and more like a detective story than an epic of superheroes. Spiderman Noir is an example of low-powered...most of the heroes/villains are circus freaks and only barely superhuman. In the other direction, we have 'Incognito', in which Pulp science heroes and villains do very bad things just out of the sight of normal society. Heroes and villains are powerful, but their war is kept mostly out of sight and when that's not possible, covered up as to its severity. Some people exist outside the two major factions, but they live a truly dangerous life.

Another trope out of the Pulp era would be a Sword & Planet setting, in which- like John Carter or Eric John Stark- the heroes have mysteriously been whisked away from their homeworld(s) to survive on a far away world with only the stuff they were wearing at the time.

See also D&D cartoon, Kagome from Inuyasha, the Guardians of the Flame books, and the TV shows, Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes.

 

[Diamond Cross]

You could have an Exiles style campaign in which the heroes visit other alternate dimensions to right what went wrong, and not necessarily change that dimension's history.

 

[darjr]

Cavemen?

It might end up something like Thundarr.

But also like Mighty Mightor @ The Cartoon Scrapbook

 

[Ghostwind]

If you've read the book ExHeroes by Cline, you could draw a lot of inspiration from it. It's the Zombiepocalypse but in a world filled with superheroes and villains. The heroes find themselves trying to save humanity but not get infected themselves in the process. In the book, there is even one hero with a Wolverine-style healing factor that has been infected and struggles every single day as his body tries to fight the malicious virus.

In this post apocalyptic world, humanity exists in small pockets protected by heroes and sometimes villains. But what happens when a pocket run by a group of supervillains decides it needs the resources of another pocket protected by heroes?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Heroes at war: a common enough trope in comics, usually for WW2 settings. However, changing the war changes the setting- WW1, American Civil War, Napoleonic, Vietnam, 100 Years War, WW3, the Mars/Earth War, the war for the Asteroid Belt, Terminator style robots vs humans, Starship Troopers' Bugs vs Humans...

 

[tecnowraith]

Now i have decide do i want one, limited or multiple origins of powers in my setting. This will depend on the type powers and character types will be present in the the world.