Supernatural Handbook: Heroes of Horror
over 1 year ago
– Thu, Dec 08, 2022 at 05:30:00 AM
Hey Heroes!
We're in the final stretch now, and Steve Kenson is back today with a few words on the one and only, Supernatural Handbook. Let's see if we can hit those goals before the clock runs out!
Perhaps it is just because we’ve passed through October, but it seems like the Supernatural Handbook is one of the most often-referenced Mutants & Masterminds, third edition, sourcebooks when we are discussing various topics on Mutants & Masterminds Monday. Whether it is fear, horror, monsters, creature creation, corruption, madness, or any number of other topics, we keep coming back to Lucien Soulban’s expertly-written game- and Gamemaster advice and resources for horror gaming with the world’s greatest superhero RPG.
The book packs a lot of punch into its 152 pages: an overview of the horror genre, with series styles and time periods; a complete player’s guide to character creation with archetypes and templates, along with how to investigate mysteries; a Gamemaster’s guide to horror filled with useful tools, game systems, and resources; monster archetypes and a modular monster-building system; a collection of four “case file” adventures, and the American Research Center for Arcane Defense of the Earth (ARCADE) an organization useful to support player character heroes and suitable for any M&M campaign.
Some particular standouts of the Supernatural Handbook include:
Monstrous Templates that offer over twenty overlays you can add to characters to give them the abilities of everything from an alien to a werewolf, ghost, vampire, or spirit.
Corruption, an optional system for modeling slow changes and deterioration or transformation for characters from madness to mutation to moral degradation, with a lot of options, useful for all kinds of scenarios—not just horror.
Horrifying the Powerful advice on incorporating horror elements into adventures involving superhumans with tremendous powers.
Know Their Fears, a detailed dissection of different types of fears and their focuses and how to use theatrics, ambiance, and an understanding of fear in the game.
Build-A-Critter system with pre-set packages of abilities, skills, attacks, and defenses to quickly put together a tremendous variety of horror creatures and adversaries.
It’s no wonder the Supernatural Handbook has been a go-to for so many different kinds of resources for M&M over the years, and another useful tool we want to get back into the hands of both players and Gamemasters.
Cosmic Handbook: Go Big or Go Home
over 1 year ago
– Tue, Dec 06, 2022 at 05:26:09 AM
Hey there Heroes!
Steve Kenson is back with another article, this time all about the Cosmic Handbook stretch goal! This is a book very near-and-dear to yours truly, as the very first comic book I ever purchased was a certain silver-hued alien who hangs ten on the cosmic space lanes, followed quickly by the emerald guardian of sector 2814 who wielded the very power of manifesting his own imagination! The "cosmic" comics from the big two have always held a particularly fascinating interest, and I can't wait for this book to get back in to circulation so that even more fans of M&M can add this remarkable supplement to their games!
Once we reach this stretch goal, you'll be able to add this book to your pledge!
Take it away, Steve!
“Cosmic” is a funny genre for comic books, as the Cosmic Handbook points out. It is both about the vastness of space and the endless cosmos—often including alternate dimensions and the like—and also about the high power level characters and stories that tend to take place beyond the bounds of Earth.
The overlap between those two aspects of the cosmic genre is that it is big. Rather than neighborhoods and cities or even countries, characters are involved in protecting (or endangering) worlds, solar systems, even entire galaxies or the whole of the universe. Those characters are likewise larger-than-life, with powers and abilities beyond those of their Earth-bound counterparts, if only to survive and get around in the vastness of the cosmic void. When powers talk about “unlimited” distance do they really mean unlimited? Is there much point in counting the ranks between the distance between planets and the distances between stars? Galaxies?
If you want to run a high power level Mutants & Masterminds game, then the Cosmic Handbook is filled with advice and ideas. It looks at the power levels above 10 in greater detail, including the higher scales of the measurement ranks, dealing with the vast distances of space, essential powers for cosmic adventures (like Immunity, Space Travel, and Comprehend for those alien languages), and ways to modify existing power effects to reflect their use beyond just one planet. Plus there are ready-made cosmic level hero archetypes, from the Cosmic Corsair to the Strange Visitor, a mix of power level 10, 12, and 14.
On the Gamemaster side of things, the Cosmic Handbook delves deeper into the Power Level X concept, asking “Well just how ‘unlimited’ is this character’s power?” It offers different levels of “cosmic” power to differentiate vastly powerful beings from each other, while still keeping them far above the levels of player character heroes. It offers guidelines on everything from black holes and cosmic disasters to exactly how high a Damage rank you need to destroy a planet. Plus, of course, villain, minion, and NPC archetypes and templates for your cosmic adventures.
“The Freedom Cosmos” chapter makes a great context and companion for the Starhaven setting. It details the galaxy and universe beyond Earth-Prime, including alien civilizations, cosmic entities, Earth’s solar system and the greater galaxy, and interstellar factions. It even goes beyond with the “Freedom City 2525” setting, a future Earth with superheroes spanning the known galaxy, suitable for cosmic-level adventures.
What Comes Next
over 1 year ago
– Thu, Dec 01, 2022 at 12:19:41 AM
Hey there Heroes!
We hope all our US backers had a great holiday, and everyone else a fantastic weekend. Here is a quick update outlining the next steps for our campaign.
The great news is that since all these books are written and finished already, we will be able to go to press very quickly. We are currently waiting on one last editing/proofing pass for the second novel and making sure that if there is any errata that needs to be applied to this edition of the books, all the I's are crossed and the T's dotted.
We are setting up the pledge manager in Backerkit this week, and once the above has been approved, we will start sending out the "smoke test" surveys to make sure everything is running smoothly, just before the remaining surveys go out to all backers. This will be your opportunity to add any extra copies of books to your pledge, change your pledge tier if needed, download your digital copies, and enter in your shipping information so we can get your books to you as soon as they are ready. And if you have any friends who missed the campaign and would still like one last opportunity to get these books at their original prices, we will have a late backer/pre-order store in Backerkit, with all the same options from this Kickstarter available.
Currently we are expecting the books to be ready to ship to backers in early second quarter of 2023, but if the last two years have taught us anything, it is that unexpected delays and a global crisis can strike at any time, so by necessity this is only an estimate.
That's a wrap!
over 1 year ago
– Wed, Nov 23, 2022 at 06:00:35 PM
Hey Heroes!
Thanks so much for helping us cross the finish line on this campaign, and to get some of our most requested out of print books back into circulation!
We'll be back next week after the US holiday, with more information on what happens next, how the pledge manager is going to go, and when you'll be able to access your digital rewards.
From all of us here at Green Ronin Publishing, thank you so much for making this campaign a success!
We Funded!
over 1 year ago
– Tue, Nov 22, 2022 at 09:15:26 PM
Thanks to you, heroes, we have hit our basic funding goal! That means we will for sure reprint Gadget Guides, Power Profiles, and the Deluxe Hero’s Handbook. This funding also lets us print and release the Arcane Secrets Duology so brand-new M&M fiction is coming your way. Now we get to the fun part: chasing stretch goals. The way they work in this campaign is straight forward. The more stretch goals we hit, the more books we reprint. Our first goal is the Cosmic Handbook and when we unlock it, the book will become available as an add-on. If you want it, you simply add it to your existing pledge. Ultimately, we can reprint up to nine Mutants & Masterminds books and accessories! Here’s some more info about the Cosmic Handbook, but we'll have another update from Steve Kenson later this week, going into more detail on this book too!
The cosmos is a vast realm of primal powers, alien empires, and wonders and dangers beyond imagining. In the Cosmic Handbook players will find advice and rules for creating characters and adventures in the depths of space, while GMs get ready-to-use villains—from space tyrants and aliens to nigh-omnipotent cosmic beings—and an expanded look at the universe beyond the bounds of Earth-Prime.
I think we’d all like to see more books come back into print, so make sure to tell your friends about the Mutants & Masterminds Reprint Extravaganza today.
Thanks again from Team Ronin!
