TRASH LAB 1: Crisis of the Costumed Heroes

Welcome to the very first TRASH LAB!

Each TRASH LAB will provide a trash-culture theme, and YOU, dear reader, will suggest ideas for a game based on that theme. The objective is a collective game design effort. Some TRASH LABs will undoubtedly be total, abject failures, but we're trying to kindle that rare spark of creative collaboration that can produce surprising and wonderful results.

The theme of TRASH LAB 1: Crisis of the Costumed Heroes.

This is a game played in three rounds:

1. 
   The Golden Age of Heroes
2. 
   The Silver Age of Heroes
3. 
   The Universe-Altering Crisis

How will our heroes change in the transition from the Golden Age to the Silver Age? Will they survive the Crisis?

Constraints:
1. don't use established trademarks (including the word "superhero")
2. don't shoot people down for trying to be genuinely imaginative
3. have fun

Here are some thoughts to get the ball rolling.

1. some heroes changed relatively little in the transition between the Golden and Silver Ages (consider Batman and Superman)
2. some changed radically (Green Lantern, Atom)
3. some heroes didn't change much themselves, but their supporting characters did (Captain America lost Bucky, for example)
4. some characters just plain vanished at the end of the Golden Age (the minor JSA characters)
5. in rare cases, the Golden Age and Silver Age version of a character existed together in the Silver Age (the Flash)

Further, the villains changed with each age, too.

How can this kind of narrative be represented in a board game or a card game?

Juniper wrote:

....
How can this kind of narrative be represented in a board game or a card game?

Different coloured CUBES !

Interesting topic.

Each player would draw from a communal deck, for powers and resources for their heroes. They could play combinations of cards to represent heroes. For example, Batman would be something like Skilled + Wealthy + Utility Belt. Villains would be generated in a similar random fashion, with a mixture of obvious powers (like Gigantic or Flaming Head or whatever) and hidden powers (like Bulletproof or Strong). In the golden age, those villains would commit simple crimes like bank robberies. Golden age powers would tend to focus on skills, magic and special stuff from lost civilizations.

In the silver age, all the golden age stuff gets set aside for the time being, and a new deck of cards would get shuffled in, one with a greater emphasis on science: high tech, aliens, and mutations. The villains would become more powerful and commit crimes that were either more complex or bigger scale or both, like conquering the Earth. To meet this higher power curve, newer heroes could be created with more cards, as long as some cards were drawn from a deck of disadvantages.

For the crisis, the golden age cards are brought back in play alongside the silver age, and a randomly selected crisis will affect various card keywords in various ways, with new bonuses, penalties or even discards. Random characters will change radically, with some heroes or villains becoming anti-heroes or just switching sides. Then there will be a big co-op final battle, with all the heroes fighting all the villains at once, with all of reality at stake.

Hmmm - I think I may have (marginally) lost on points there.

Hmmm ... how about incorporating that wacky idea from Dinosaurs of the Lost World with the comic styled boards.

With 3 boards (golden, silver and crisis) you've got yourself a basic story arc. The first board could be becoming the hero (think Spider-Man, Batman Begins), the second the solidification of the hero followed by tragedy (Spider-Man 2, death of Gwen Stacy, The Dark Knight) and the third board could be the crisis board which brings all the players together for a massive assault against a Galactus type character or Secret War event or something.

Interesting discussion topic/idea.

The hardest part is trying to get a dynamic game that offers different paths that parallel popular comic book characters but not feel too scripted. Especially when you want it to move through three eras of comics.

I like MetalFace's idea of three boards. What I'd do is have an area representing a few square blocks of NYC. The three boards would reflect the same area, but over "time" being the three boards, you'll see the neighborhood change and have the art reflect the times during those eras...Aesthetics only, but I think it would be cool. For example in the Golden Age you might see "Antonio's House of Fine Italian Meats" go to "Eva's Discount Smokes" in the Silver Age to "Abandoned Crack House" in Crisis. Perhaps a few road layout changes, a few buildings demolished and rebuilt in between periords...etc.

The players play as heroes looking to start off and make a name for themselves by the deads they perform via the accumulation of Icon Points. The number of IP's determine if your character reaches the heights of Superman; Batman; Spiderman...etc, or become lower/minor characters like SleepWalker; MoonKnight; Black Panther...etc.

The game would have it's own AI which would run the villans who create all the havoc in the city. The first ones are simple enough missions like muggings, bank robberies. Basically you just have to get to a location and fight off a few guys by rolling dice and stats and what not. As the ages progress the tasks may require stops at a few areas to complete or come in multi-stages - You might have to get to a particular site to "question" some baddies, obtain information from them, and then go to where the main shit is about to go down. Crisis is when all the players have to team up to beat the big baddy at the end - Like a GOO from AK or Wu-Feng from Ghost Stories where you need to combine forces to win.

In between rounds you have the "Hereo's Store" where you can buy things like Capes, Maskes, Hire sidekicks, pick up cool gadgets...etc. Think of it like an armory in any other fantasy game. In addition there would be some event cards that you'd draw every so often. Examples may may kill your character but due to clever writing your character comes back through a space-time rift similar but with new powers. An inborn ability may manifest itself or end. It might force you to make a costume change. Force you to hire/fire a sidekick.

Basically as I mentioned the goal would be to progress your character though and reach "Comic Book Icon Status" - In other words you're collecting VPs. You'd start with a basic dude/dudette and see what happens to the character as it progresses.

Well those are just some ideas to toss out there.

LvT

Good idea with this, Juniper.

Unfortunately I'm not into superhero comics at all so have nothing to add right now.

This is a cool idea!

Sometimes, I think I have a cool idea for a game, maybe an interesting thing I'd like to see in it, but that's it. Something like this would be great for that kind of thing.

I'm not really into comics either, so I got nothin' for this one.

First of all, I love the Trash Lab idea, Juniper.

I like the idea of the first age being a sort of intro to the characters. What if we had players as both heroes and villains?

The Three Eras would go something like this:

First Era: Players receive their special powers as well as a secret backstory card (heroes and villains always have important things in their past that drive their actions). A game generated crisis must be solved to get through this era. However, players' actions would determine whether they become heroes or villains, with their backstories giving them a nudge as well: e.g. you'd get villain points for unnecessary violence, aiding the crisis, etc., and your backstory might give you villain points if your grief has twisted you psychologically, hero points, if it has driven you to do good.

Second Era: In this era, the heroes and villains go head to head as the villains attempt to execute a nefarious plot to take control of the city. Probably each villain would be given a plot individually, although working together to beat down the heroes and then stabbing fellow villains in the back should definitely be encouraged. The heroes meanwhile have to save the city (perhaps they get assigned a loved one in this phase they have to protect?)

Third Era: Some ultimate cosmic crisis forces the heroes and villains to join together to save the city and the world. The board would generate this crisis, as in the first era, but it would be much stronger.

Throughout each era, players would accumulate points from achieving certain goals. The heroes would get points from saving the city, the villains, from succeeding in their plots; heroes would lose points from losing loved ones, and gain points from getting revenge on the villain who did it, while villains would gain points similarly by getting back the heroes who foiled their plot; backstories would also provide opportunities to gain points. If the players manage to defeat the cosmic crisis at the end, then the player with the most points wins.

This way the three eras wouldn't just represent different strengths of the characters, but different relationships between the players themselves. In the first era, it's a traitor game (who are the villains? who are the heroes?). In the second era it's a team game, heroes vs villains. In the third era it's a co-op battle against a force greater than both the heroes and the villains.

Shellhead wrote:

Each player would draw from a communal deck, for powers and resources for their heroes. They could play combinations of cards to represent heroes. For example, Batman would be something like Skilled + Wealthy + Utility Belt. Villains would be generated in a similar random fashion, with a mixture of obvious powers (like Gigantic or Flaming Head or whatever) and hidden powers (like Bulletproof or Strong). In the golden age, those villains would commit simple crimes like bank robberies. Golden age powers would tend to focus on skills, magic and special stuff from lost civilizations.

I like your ideas, and I was very much thinking along the same lines. I really like the concept of combining cards to create individual characters, particularly because it's something that could be taken in a lot of different directions. The cards representing resources don't just have to be weapons and gadgets. They could also be subterranean hideouts, cool vehicles, underworld informants, and superpets.

Another possibility to consider is having a cast of supporting characters. Superman isn't really Superman unless Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen are around. The fact that Captain America's sidekick didn't survive the jump from the Golden Age to the Silver Age is hugely important to the lore. One approach that might be interesting is to have a large number of characters who may become superheroes, or may remain civilians. At the beginning of the game (and again at the beginning of the Silver Age), each player is dealt some number of Power and Resource cards, and must distribute them among his various characters. A player who puts all of his Power cards on one character has effectively created a Superman story, since the result will be a single powerful character who has a large cast of ordinary folks that he strives to protect. A player who has distributed Powers, Skills, and Resources more evenly among his characters has a Batman story, because the supporting characters aren't completely helpless like Lois and Jimmy, but low-powered heroes in their own right,
like Robin, Nightwing, Batgirl, James Gordon, et al.

There has to be a reason to defend the unpowered characters, though. Maybe the number of new Power, Skill, and Resource cards you get at the beginning of the Silver Age and the Crisis is related to the number of characters you've kept alive.

I was kind of thinking that, in each Age, you want to defeat as many of the villains as you can. Any villain that you haven't polished off before the end of his Age will reappear in more powerful form during the next age or the Crisis.

I like MetalFace and LordVonTush's ideas about the three boards, too. I'll have to think a little more about that...

Tamburlaine wrote:

the three eras wouldn't just represent different strengths of the characters, but different relationships between the players themselves. In the first era, it's a traitor game (who are the villains? who are the heroes?). In the second era it's a team game, heroes vs villains. In the third era it's a co-op battle against a force greater than both the heroes and the villains.

This is fantastic!

Perhaps an important way to determine how much heroes' powers change (for the better or worse) would be in relation to how much society (as it changes through the era's) believe in heroes in general and the specific hero (or villian). The more beloved a hero is by the public, the more fantastic their power gets, the more infamous/feared a villian becomes, the more powerful they grow.

I like MetalFace and LordVonTush's ideas about the three boards, too. I'll have to think a little more about that...

I think they could totally be meshed together. Using the cards to create the characters and the boards specify when you're drawing what. There could be multiple boards too that you could potentially get that represent the different the different kinds of stories (tragic hero, the chosen one, etc.)

This all sounds a lot like the TV series Heroes. Some "heroes" have minor powers, while some have more useable powers and can get stronger as time passes. Some are evil and some are good. Some you just don't know until the last episode what part they are/will be playing.

In that series you also have time travelling. And changing something in the past can hugely affect the future. I've always wanted to play that board game with time travel, Khronos, but I haven't managed to yet.

A lot of interesting ideas here. Great discussion topic.