House Rules

The text below contains rules for the Marvel Super Heroes Roleplaying Game that have been modified by myself or others for various reason, so-called House Rules. All of them are optional and because everyone has a different type of game there are probably a lot of options that are to high-powered or complex to add to some games. I haven’t playtested all of them so I welcome any suggestions or new rules.

Thanks to everyone who send in their ideas and specially Andrew Goldstein for his ideas on Mental Health, Mental Attacks and various other rules. Also thanks to Denis Conruyt for his great work on a new FEAT table.

I have decided to follow the MSH Advanced Set Player’s Book.

1.Heroes

-Abilities:

Physical and Mental Health.

Reaction.

-Character Creation:

Point Based Character Generation system.

2.FEATs

-Combat:

Damage.

Wrestling.

Mental Attacks.

Ranged Attack Tables.

-Life,Death, and Health:

Negative Health.

Soak Rule.

3.The Campaign:

-Karma:

Vigilantes.

Superb Results, the rule of 100.

‘A little Karma’.

Power Stunts.

Appendix A

-Body Alteration/Defensive: Regeneration.

FEAT Table.

Physical and Mental Health:

In addition to a characters physical health, determined as normally by adding the rank numbers of Fighting, Agility, Strength and Endurance, the character also gets a mental health stat. The mental health is determined by adding the rank numbers of Reason, Intuition and Psyche. This mental health is used just like normal health when the character is attacked by mental attacks. Instead of inflicting normal health damage they now inflict mental health damage. Whenever a character’s mental health drops below 0 he must make a psyche FEAT or pass out for 1-100 rounds. (This FEAT must also be made each time the character takes mental damage after his mental health has dropped below 0) If the FEAT succeeds the character is still conscious but at -2CS on all FEATs. Whenever the mental health drops below a multiple of the characters normal Psyche, the Psyche drops by 1 rank. When this psyche reaches Sh-0 a character must make a Endurance FEAT to avoid dying according to the normal rules.

(Example: A character with Gd Psyche and 40 mental health is attacked by a Ty mental blast, his mental health drops to 34. Then he is attacked by an Am blast dropping his mental health to -16. This is below minus his Psyche (but not twice his psyche) so his psyche drops 1 rank to Ty. Then he must make a Psyche FEAT to avoid passing out. He succeeds but suffers an In strength attack after that. His mental health drops to -56 so his Psyche drops an additional 4 ranks which would take him below Sh-0 Psyche. He passes out and must make an End.FEAT to avoid dying.)

Mental Health is regained when the character is able to rest. It is regained at a rate of the current psyche rank number per hour. Lost Psyche ranks are regained also a rate of 1 rank for every 2 hours of complete rest.

Secondary Abilities: Reaction.

Instead of the normal initiative of 1D10 + Intuition/10 one can use 1D10 + Reaction with the Reaction stat being the following:
Reaction = ((Intuition x 3) + (Agility x 2) + (Psyche x 1))/10.
Or in english: Intuition times three, plus agility times two, plus Psyche times one, all divided by ten.

Point Based Character Generation system

This is a system originally printed in Polyhedron issue # 72 . Which is now available at the TSR website.
Click here to go there.
(I didn't put it here to avoid any TSR actions against my page.)

Combat: Damage

To create a more random effect in the damage inflicted, so that not every hit inflicts the same amount AND to enable characters to inflict damage even upon characters with a body armor higher than the characters damage rank this optional system can be used. The system does however take some of the speed out of the combat.
Damage inflicted is determined by rolling dice according to the table below. If the opponent has body armor he also rolls dice as listed below. The damage is the difference between the 2 throws (or just the attacker’s throw when the target has no body armor).

damage or armor/resistance rank	dice rolled
Fe	1d2
Pr	1d4
Ty	1d6
Gd	1d10
Ex	2d10
Rm	3d10
In	4d10
Am	5d10
Mn	7d10 + 3
Un	10d10
(Sh-X	15d10
Sh-Y	2d100+10
Sh-Z	5d100+10)

Sh-X and higher attacks should be so devastating that damage should be handled normally (optionally one could decide to do this only for CL1000 and higher attacks).
A Bullseye result could mean maximum damage (optional).

Combat: Wrestling

Because of Wrestling being a bit to hard to be an effective means of combat I have changed some of it’s effects. The column is changed as follows:

Wrestling Table
White	Miss
Green	Partial Hold
Yellow	Lock
Red	Hold

Partial Hold:

This means the attacker has managed to grab hold of some part of his victim. The attack inflicts no damage and the character can pull free if he succeeds in a normal Strength FEAT. However, the attacked character suffers a -1CS penalty to his attacks while the attacker gets a +1CS bonus on his next attack. Lock:

The Lock replaces the Partial Hold in the original rules. Still no damage is inflicted, but the target is at -2CS and must succeed in an Escape Action to get free. The attacker gains a +2CS on his next attack. Hold:

The Hold effect is still the same as in the original rules, the target may only try to escape by making an Escape Test. If the attacker does nothing else but maintaining the hold only 1 Escape Test may be made.
An Escape Test may only be performed if the attackers Strength is not more than 3 ranks above the target’s Escape Strength. (Note that this is not always the targets normal strength.)
Wrestling attacks cannot be made more than once a round, but they can only be dodged, not evaded.

Combat: Mental Attacks

For resolving Mental attacks a new column is created. The attacker rolls with his power rank at the chart and checks the following table.

Mental Attacks Table
White	Miss
Green	Hit
Yellow	Stun
Red	Kill

Hit:

A hit means that the attacker inflicts power rank damage on the target. Stun:

The attacker inflicts power rank damage and the target must check on the stun table by rolling his Psyche. A White and Green result also mean that the victim is subject to a stagger result. Kill:

Power rank damage is inflicted, and the victim must check on the kill table with his Psyche. (treat as an edged/energy attack). When he fails he begins losing Psyche ranks just like Endurance ranks with a normal Kill result. Should he reach Sh-0 Psyche he slips into a coma and dies within 1d10 minutes if no professional help arrives. The Psyche loss can only be stopped by professional medics with good equipment, or by another telepath.

Combat:Ranged Attack Tables

By M.J. Lush
These are a series of (optional) ranged attack tables.

Ranges Attacks:
	White	Green	Yellow	Red	Examples
Blunt Throwing	Miss	Hit	Daze	Stun	Rocks, Lamp Posts
Edged Weapons	Miss	Hit	Stun	Kill	Sharp pointy things
Force Attacks	Miss	Hit	Slam	Stun	Repulsors, TK
Light Weapons	Miss	Hit	Stun	Wound	'Rubber' bullets, Padded arrows
Medium Weapons	Miss	Hit	Stun	Kill	Normal Guns, Arrows, Energy Blasts
Heavy Weapons	Miss	Hit	Wound	Kill	BIG Guns, Elephant Guns, HM Guns, LAW's weapons

Wound ? Result	-1d3 CS End	-1 CS End	No effect	No effect
Daze ? Result	1 rnd stun	No effect	No effect	No effect

Combat: Fumbles

Fumble rules were send to me by Denis Conruyt along with a new FEAT table to replace the other ones at the back of the book. The table can be found here.
New general effects :
IN THE SPACE : means that your character certainly didn't miss a building or other sort of object that knocked him down!
DISORIENTATED : means that your character can take no action that round other than being nauseus and at -3CS this round and next (ex : "I see twenty pink Galactus's around my head")
The other effects are self-explicated. Feel free to variate the effects in the game.

Combat: Fumbles II (crits and fumbles)

This Fumble rule was designed by M.J. Lush
On a roll of 01, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 and 00 I reserve the right to get in my GM's Fiat and go for a little drive adding a little good or bad luck to the situation as whim takes me (my players have concluded that 99 is the ultimate roll ;-)

Combat: Defensive Actions: dodging

In addition to the normal modifiers on to hit rolls a successful dodge can impose, the same -2CS, -4CS or -6CS modifiers can also decrease the damage. This can be seen as the target being just partially hit by the attack.

Combat: Defensive Actions:Mega dodge/evade

By M.J. Lush
The character spends the entire round just trying to keep out of danger roll Agility FEAT vs ranged attacks or Fighting FEAT vs Hand to Hand. The entire round is spent dodging and weaving no other action can be taken (though on special pleading a minor action could be attempted like pushing the button that deactivates the Z-Bomb). The character can make a 1 area move on a yellow Agility FEAT, on a white result the GM determines where the character ends up.

Mega Dodge/Evade Effects
White	No
Green	-1 Col
Yellow	-2 Col
Red	-3 Col

-1 Col means all attacks are reduced by one colour (green to white red to yellow), -2 Col and -3 Col means all attacks are reduced by 2 or 3 colours.
Since these are such powerful manoevers Karma may not be used on the rolls.

Combat: Defensive Actions: evading

One can rule that if a character is able to make more attacks per round he can also evade or parry more than once. When a character declares his intention to make multiple attacks he can also declare if he wants to use one or more of those attacks to evade or parry.
A character can only evade/parry an attack from a character with a Strength of no more than 3 ranks higher than his/her own strength. Stronger characters can only be deflected partially since a lot of the damage carries through even if the blow is partially deflected. This results in a so-called Glancing Blow. If a character tries to evade/parry an attack of a character with such a strength he should roll on the glancing blow table instead of on the normal table.

Glancing Blow Table
White	Autohit
Green	-3CS
Yellow	-5CS
Red	Evade

Combat: Defensive Actions: Evading II

This evading rule was send to me by M.J. Lush
Instead of using the Evade table one can use the dodge table using the character's Fighting ability instead of Agility while evading.

Combat: Edged Weapons

When edged weapons are used against characters with body armor (either natural or artificial) roll the weapon’s material strength against the target’s body armor. (The rule of Impossible FEATs must be used here). If the roll succeeds the weapon manages to cut through the armor and inflict full damage on the target. (Remember to check for breaking the weapon when the body armor is higher than the material strength. page 45 PB).

Combat: Multiple Blasts

As with close combat and shooting attacks the Judge may rule that certain characters may make more than one Energy/Force Blast attacks in one round. Only characters that can generate their energy from different parts of their body can do this. (Cyclops would not be able to do this, while his brother Havok would.) The normal rules for multiple attacks are used (-1CS if test succeeds, -3CS and only 1 attack if it fails). The character should roll at Agility or at the power rank he uses when he attacks with his blasts. The damage for each attack is decreased by 2CS for each additional attack made. A character that can normally make an Am strength attack may make 2 Rm strength or 3 Gd strength attacks.

Life, Death and Health: Negative Health

When a character reaches negative health he should make an End. FEAT as described in the Players’ Book. When he succeeds he can function normally at -2CS. He must repeat this End. FEAT every time he takes damage thereafter until he reaches minus his health. He will then start dying as described in the PB, and no End. FEAT need to be made. For every multiple of his Endurance rank he is below this minimum his Endurance will drop 1 rank. After that he loses Endurance ranks normally.

(Example: The hero with 90 health and Rm endurance is beaten and brought down to -150 health. This means he will lose (150-90=60/30=)2 ranks of endurance and then begin dying.)

So it is possible to get so much damage that your endurance immediately reaches Sh-0. The character than has 5 rounds in which someone with Medicine or First Aid can help him, otherwise he is permanently dead (as if that exists in the Marvel Universe).

Life, Death and Health: Soak Rule.

By Stormangel
When a character takes a hit, he may make an Endurance Feat to try and soak up some or all of the damage. First, compare the attack's damage to the hero's Endurance to determine the color result neccessary to soak. If damage is less than Endurance by more than one Rank, our hero only needs a green feat. If the damage is one less, equal to, or one more than the hero's Endurance, go for yellow. And if the damage is more than one higher, our hero better pray for a red.
Secondly, compare the result of the damage dealer to the hero's Endurance to find out how much damage can be soaked. A green feat means up to the entire Endurance rank can be used to soak damage. A yellow means up to half the Endurance rank can be soaked and red means only a fourth.
Thirdly, comes the price to pay for soaking. You see Endurance cannot replace Body Armor. If you soak more than 10 points, our hero needs to make a red Endurance Feat or temporarily lose an Endurance Rank. If you take more than 30 points, make a red endurance feat or lose 3 ranks, or a yellow feat and only lose two. If you take 50 or more, just lose three ranks temporarily (no roll). Loss of Endurance is 6 hours minus one hour for every 10 points in initial Endurance (half an hour min.) and doesn't affect Health. Recovery turns hours into minutes.
Example: Captain Cheeseburger has been blasted by Wally the Wino's Kinetic Beer Blaster. Wally rolls a yellow Feat and hits with his IN (40) Force blast. Well, Capt. Cheeseburger has an AM endurance and by checking sees he needs a yellow result since it's IN damage. He rolls and suceeds. Wally had a yellow result. so the Capt. can soak up to half his AM Endurance, 25 pts.. He does just that, taking 15 points in damage after soaking. He rolls his Endurance and only gets a green result, meaning he loses an Endurance rank for an hour. He now has IN Endurance for most purposes although Power absorbtion would absorb AM Endurance still.
This system simulates tough heroes even without Body Armor taking hits. It tires them a lot sometimes, but they take hits that would cripple a normal man. Heroes include Cap America, Batman, Punisher, Wolvie, and Daredevil.

Karma: Gaining (and losing) Karma: The Vigilante or Special Agent

During character generation a player can decide to play a vigilante (like the Punisher) or some kind of special agent (like Wolverine was). This has some effects on the character, most notably in the Karma awards and penalties.
First the character must give up one of his power slots. Furthermore he always begins with 0 popularity. He does however gain 1 weapon or fighting skill.
The character gains popularity only very slowly. He gains 1 point popularity when beating costumed or organized criminals in public, but only if he doesn't kill them.
The Karma table below shows the award and penalties. The number before the slash is for the vigilante and the number behind it for the S.A.

Karma Summary Listing
Violent Crime -- Stop/Prevent	50/30	Violent Crime -- Arrest	15/15
Destructive Crime -- Stop/Prevent	35/20	Destructive Crime -- Arrest	10/10
Theft -- Stop/Prevent	10/5	Theft -- Arrest	5/5
Robbery -- Stop/Prevent	30/20	Robbery -- Arrest	10/10
Misdemeanors -- Stop/Prevent	3/2	Misdemeanors -- Arrest	-/-
National Offense -- Stop/Prevent	20/25*	National Offense -- Arrest	10/15*
Local Conspiracy -- StoplPrevent	30/35*	Local Conspiracy -- Arrest	15/20*
National Conspiracy -- Stop/Prevent	40/55*	National Conspiracy -- Arrest	20/30*
Global Conspiracy -- Stop/Prevent	50/70*	Global Conspiracy -- Arrest	25/35*
Other Crimes -- Stop/Prevent	20/15	Other Crimes -- Arrest	10/5
Rescue	25/20	Multiple Rescues(5+)	125/100
Commit Violent Crime	-60/-40	Commit Destructive Crime	-40/-30
Commit Theft	-15/-25	Commit Misdemeanor	-5/-20
Commit National Offense	-40/-55	Commit Other Crimes	-5/-10
Defeat	-30/-30
Permit Violent Crime	-25/-10	Permit Destructive Crime	-20/-5
Permit Theft	-10/-5	Permit Robbery	-15/-10
Permit Misdemeanor	-10/-5	Permit National Offense	-15/-35*
Permit Other Crimes	-10/-5
Innocent Death	-ALL/-80%	Death**	-50%/-20%
Criminal Death***	+10/+5	Self-Destruction	-/-
Making Commitment	+10/-	Failing Commitment	-10/-

*This karma award depends on the agency the S.A. is working for. It is assumed to be a government, if it is another agency replace this by crimes against this agency.
**This is for criminals that are guilty of small crimes.Or opposed agents.
***This is for criminals guilty of Murder, Drugs distibuting and other such crimes. This is also in addition to the normal awards for defeating an opponent.
Other awards stay mostly the same.
When part of a karma pool with characters that are not also Vigilantes or S.A. the karma pool is still subject to the normal penalties.

Karma: Gaining Karma: Superb Results, the rule of 100

Whenever a player throws a natural 100 on a die roll, he gains 25 karma. It is recommended to use this roll only when you play in high-level campaigns where the characters really need the karma to survive, while their karma amount is usually not that high.

Karma: Using Karma: ‘A Little Karma’

When you use karma for a die roll the minimum amount of karma you must spend is 10, even when you don’t need it. You can also declare that instead of using karma you use ‘a little karma’. This means that the maximum amount of karma you may use for that roll is 30 while the minimum amount you must spend is 5.

Karma: Using Karma: Power Stunts

In low-karma campaigns this alternate Power Stunt rule makes it a little bit easier to perform the actual power stunts. Instead of the normal rules a power stunt need only be performed 3 times for a cost of 100 karma. The first time it is done a Red FEAT must be made (additional karma may be used), the second time a Yellow FEAT and the third time a Green FEAT.

Appendix A:
Body Alterations/Defensive: Regeneration

Because the description of this power in the Players’ Book does not really match the way this power appears in comics the effect is somewhat adapted.
A character with regeneration regains his power rank of regeneration every ten rounds. (Rm regeneration means 3 health per round). There is no need for rest and the limitation of not taking damage while the power is working is dropped.

FEAT Table:

This FEAT Table was created by Denis Conruyt and features his new fumble effects and the other table from my houserule section.

It's back, you can download it here.

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