Description of the Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Game:
The Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Game is the latest RPG set in the Marvel Universe. I played the original TSR Marvel Super Heroes RPG in high school, tried Marvel SAGA RPG later and got the books (but never played) the Marvel Universe RPG. When I saw Margaret Weis Productions would be producing the latest iteration of a Marvel-based supers RPG, I was excited.

The Marvel Heroic RPG uses the Cortex Plus system and is fairly different from the other RPGs I have played. There are great moments of picking up handfuls of dice, lots of opportunity for storytelling and giving detailed descriptions of fantastic actions in this system.

The key mechanic in the Marvel Heroic RPG is the dice pool. You decide your intended action then choose your hero’s traits that support that action. Each trait is assigned a die between a d4 to d12. You add the appropriate die for the supporting traits and form a dice pool.

After you roll, you select two dice you add to get your total and select one die for your effect. The actual number of the effect die doesn’t matter. All you care about is its type (d4, d6, d8, d10 or d12). The bigger, the better.

Your hero’s biggest resource in the game is Plot Points. They allow you to add dice to your pool (before and after rolling), add extra effect dice, use some of your tertiary super powers and counter-attack bad guys when they miss you.

The Watcher (Game Master) has a similar resource. Theirs is a pool of dice called the Doom Pool. They may use these dice basically the same way the heroes use Plot Points.

If you roll a 1 for your hero’s action the Watcher can give you a Plot Point and add a d6 to the Doom Pool. The Watcher may instead choose step up (or increase by one die type) the smallest die in the Doom Pool.

Most everything your hero does (that is not automatic) will require you to form a dice pool. So a hero with Enhanced Reflexes (d8) will add that to their pool when evading or possibly when leaping into battle.

Each hero has Milestones they are working on and so should most adventures. These Milestones give your hero XP and allows them to advance their powers. They also give the Watcher elements to incorporate into the story.

A Quick Review of the Marvel Heroic Roleplaying Game:
The Marvel Heroic RPG is a fantastic blend of storytelling and roleplaying. You get the chance to play your favorite heroes or make your own. If you enjoy describing your character’s turn with action-packed prose, you’ll enjoy this system.

The Watcher and heroes really feel like they are telling a story together. The dice and mechanics matter but they don’t totally trump the story or fun. I had played more “crunchy” RPGs before playing Marvel Heroic RPG and enjoy the blend of action and mechanics. It fits the Super Hero genre very well.

The book looks great. It has excellent art and the layout is beautiful. The rules are organized a bit awkwardly. After reading through the rulebook you should check out the play example. This can help really pull everything together. I even listen to part of a podcast of a play session to help me get a better handle on the rules and timing of things.

I know more materials are coming out but there needs to be more characters and villains. There are many site that have fan-made data files and these are a good place to start if you are looking to write up a hero that is not in the book.

Until more materials are release there is an intro adventure (event) in the rulebook. It is based on the Avengers break out story line and should give you a good starting point to learn the game.

I plan to play this with my group and post session reports. They are going to make their own characters and I am going to try to adapt some old TSR adventures. Check back and see how things are going. In the meantime you should check out and try the Marvel Heroic RPG.