Old School Marvel Super Heroes RPG

so, we were scheduled to continue a pretty awesome LAMENTATIONS OF THE FLAME PRINCESS campaign yesterday, but our friend who's running it had to drop out at the last minute.  i volunteered to run a few games on super-short notice - i offered up X-PLORERS and the old school TSR MSH RPG. we've played a bunch of XP lately so the vote was in for MSH.

original basic set

i've been re-reading the old rulebooks for this game off and on for the past year or so. i've looked at ICONS, BASH!, and the new MARVEL RPG (which almost made my head explode), but i always fall back on the ol' OG MSH RPG when i need my super hero fix. i think it's a great generic hero system...but the stuff i like about it is spread across 3 compatible systems.

advanced set

the original boxed set is my favorite. i'd be happy playing and running this version - and i pretty much am using the original BASIC BATTLE BOOK as my base.  i like the chargen from the advanced rules, however - it's the most complete. i'm not talking power generation - i'm talking what type of hero you are, the attribute generation tables and the way it fills in some blanks from the basic book (like contacts). for actual power/talent generation i like the REVISED BASIC SET that came out in 1991 or so.

i simplified the heck out of everything else. for example: you do something heroic and you gain 30 karma. you do something unheroic and you lose 30 karma. your hero kills someone and you lose all your karma. to raise a stat or a power up a rank it costs the rank's value times 100 in karma. stuff like that.

i also want to revise some of the weapon damage. a handgun does 6 points of damage? that means that a bullet won't drop someone who has all FEEBLE physical stats...so that needs to change.

revised basic set

anyway, i ran a session of my totally kit-bashed MSH RPG yesterday and it went over pretty well. i think i want to create a rules document that collects all the stuff i like about the game into one easy to use source - and then share it with the internet. i can't get in trouble for this, can i? the game is FREE over here so i'm guessing both marvel and wotc gave up claims to it...?     i'm pretty sure there's also a clone of this system floating around somewhere.  after i finish DUNGEON STRIKE (and my other "top secret" *HINT HINT* project) maybe i'll take a crack at typing this bad boy up.