THE BASICS

Mutants & Masterminds provides a framework for your imagination. It has rules to help you decide what happens in your stories and to resolve conflicts between characters and the challenges they face. With it, you can experience adventure as a character fighting against the forces of evil. Any adventure you can imagine is possible.

RULE NUMBER ONE

The first, and most important, rule of Mutants & Masterminds is: Do whatever is the most fun for your game! While we’ve made every effort to ensure RPd20 is as complete a game system as possible, no system can cover every situation an imaginative group of players may encounter. From time to time, the rules may give you strange or undesirable results. Ignore them! Modify the outcome of die rolls and other events in the game as you see fit to make it fun and enjoyable for everyone. It’s your game, so run and play it the way you want!

THE CORE MECHANIC

Mutants & Masterminds uses a standard, or core, mechanic to resolve actions. Whenever a character attempts an action with a chance of failure, do the following:

• Roll a twenty-sided die (or d20)

• Add any relevant modifiers (skills, abilities, powers, or conditions)

• Compare the total to a number called a Difficulty Class.

If the result equals or exceeds the Difficulty Class (set by the GM based on the circumstances), your character succeeds. If the result is lower than the Difficulty Class, your character fails. This simple mechanic is used for nearly everything in Mutants & Masterminds, with variations based on what modifiers are made to the roll, what determines the Difficulty Class, and the exact effects of success and failure.

THE GAMEMASTER

One of the players in a Mutants & Masterminds game takes the role of Gamemaster or GM. The Gamemaster is responsible for running the game, a combination of writer, director, and referee. The Gamemaster creates the adventures for the characteres, portrays the villains and supporting characters, describes the world to the players, and decides the outcome of the characteres’ actions based on the guidelines given in the rules. It’s a big job, but also a rewarding one, since the Gamemaster gets to create the whole world and all the characters in it, as well as inventing fun and exciting stories. If you’re going to be the Gamemaster, you should read through this whole book carefully, particularly Chapters 9 and 10, which talk about how to run Mutants & Masterminds games and how to create your own game settings for adventures. You should also have a firm grasp of the rules, since you’re expected to interpret them for the players to decide what happens in the game.

THE characterES

The other players in a Mutants & Masterminds game create characteres, the main characters of their own adventures, like an ongoing comic book or animated series. As a player, you create your character following the guidelines in this book with the guidance of your Gamemaster. There are several components to creating a character, described in detail in Chapters 1 through 6, and outlined here.

ABILITIES

All characters have certain basic abilities. These are Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. They each have a numeric ability score averaging 10 or 11 for a normally capable human being. Higher ability scores grant bonuses while lower ability scores impose penalties. As part of creating your character, you decide how strong, smart, and tough your character is by choosing the appropriate ability scores.

SKILLS

Skills represent training in a particular sort of task, everything from complex acrobatics to defusing bombs, programming computers, or piloting a plane. A skill acts as a bonus for actions involving those tasks. Someone trained in climbing can climb faster and with more confidence than someone who isn’t trained, for example. Skills are measured in ranks, reflecting how much training a character has in the skill. You choose the skills your character knows and how well trained the character is in them.

FEATS

Feats are special abilities—talents or knacks. A feat allows your character to do something other characters can’t normally do, or makes your character better at doing certain things. They give the character an advantage over others. You select your character’s feats based on what you want your character to be able to do.

POWERS

Powers are special abilities beyond those of ordinary human beings. They’re like feats, only more so. Whereas a feat might give your character a minor special ability, powers grant truly superhuman abilities. You choose the powers you want your character to have. Chapter 5 presents a wide range of powers, along with power modifiers and power feats, allowing you to mix and match to create nearly any super-power you desire.

DRAWBACKS

Finally, characteres often have challenges to overcome. They have drawbacks. Overcoming these drawbacks is part of what makes a real character. Drawbacks range from physical disabilities to unusual weaknesses or vulnerabilities. You choose your character’s drawbacks, allowing you to define the sorts of challenges your character must overcome in the game

UNDER THE HOOD: WHAT’S DIFFERENT? Experienced gamers will notice differences between Mutants & Masterminds and other popular d20-based RPGs using the Open Game License. These changes adapt the world’s most popular roleplaying system to the fast-paced world of supercharacterics. The most important differences are outlined here, but players should read the rules in this book carefully, as they may differ slightly in other ways from what they’re used to. Other differences include: • No classes: Characters are not defined by classes or set “packages” of traits in Mutants & Masterminds. Characters can have any combination of abilities and powers, within the limits set by the campaign’s power level and the available character points. • No other dice: The Mutants & Masterminds system uses only a single twenty-sided die (d20) to resolve all actions and checks. No other dice are required. • No attacks of opportunity: The combat system in Mutants & Masterminds is simplified for the kind of fast-paced action seen in the comic books, so there are no attacks of opportunity. Instead, characteres are encouraged to try maneuvers that would normally be quite dangerous (such as an unarmed character taking on a number of armed opponents, for example). • No tactical combat: Combat in Mutants & Masterminds is meant to be fast-paced, like the action in the comics, so the game doesn’t use systems of tactical movement. Given how fast some characters can move, that would be difficult, at best. • No hit points: Characters in Mutants & Masterminds do not have “hit points” and damage is not rolled using other dice. • Conviction: Characters have a resource called Convictions, allowing them to temporarily increase their abilities and influence the outcome of die rolls. WHAT’S NEW? Players familiar with the first edition of Mutants & Masterminds will notice some differences in this edition of the game. Among the most important are: • Ability Scores: Ability scores now scale up from 1 to as high as the GM and the character’s power level allow, without a split between abilities and super-abilities. • Attack and Defense: Attack and Defense bonus are independent of ability scores and purchased separately. • Skill Cost: Skill ranks now cost 1 power point per 4 skill ranks (rather than 1 power point per skill rank). • Feat Cost: Feats cost 1 power point per feat (rather than 2). • Powers: Powers have generally been tuned-up, expanded, and refined. • Weaknesses: Weaknesses are replaced with drawbacks of variable intensity and value, allowing for more detail and fine-tuning, and complications, ways of earning Convictions in play. • Conviction: Conviction have been refined and the method by which characteres acquire them is different, focusing on the development of the adventure. • And More! This new edition offers more feats, more powers, more equipment, campaign advice, and other material to make the game more enjoyable to play and run. Players familiar with the first edition of RPd20 will want to read through this book carefully and become familiar with its rules. Some of them differ from the systems you know, while others will be quite familiar.

GAME PLAY

A session of Mutants & Masterminds resembles an issue of a comic book or an episode of an animated series. The Gamemaster and the players get together and tell a story by playing the game. The length of the game session can vary, from just a couple hours to several hours or more. Some adventures may be completed in a single session while others may take multiple sessions, just as some comic book stories are told in one issue, while others span multiple issues. The episodic nature of the game allows you to choose when to stop playing and allows you to start up again at any time at which you and your friends agree.

Just like a comic book, a Mutants & Masterminds adventure consists of a series of interrelated scenes or encounters. Some scenes are fairly straightforward, with the characteres interacting with each other and the supporting cast. In these cases the GM generally just asks the players to describe what their characteres are doing and in turn describes how the other characters react and what they do. When the action starts happening, such as when the characteres are staving off a disaster or fighting villains, time becomes more crucial and is broken down into rounds, each six seconds long, and the players generally have to make die rolls to see how their characteres do.

DIE ROLLS

There are a number of different die rolls in Mutants & Masterminds, although they all follow the core mechanic of a 20-sided die + modifiers vs. a Difficulty Class. The three main die rolls in RPd20 are checks, attack rolls, and saving throws.

CHECKS

To make a check, roll d20 and add any modifiers for traits (abilities, skills, or powers) relevant to the check. The higher the total, the better the outcome.

Check = d20 + modifiers vs. Difficulty Class

DIFFICULTY CLASS

Some checks are made against a Difficulty Class (DC). The DC is a number set by the GM which your check must meet or exceed in order for you to succeed. So for a task with a DC of 15 you must roll a check total of 15 or better to succeed. In some cases, the results of a check vary based on how much higher or lower the result is than the DC.

DIFFICULTY CLASSES

DIFFICULTY (DC) EXAMPLE (SKILL USED)

Very easy (0) Notice something in plain sight (Notice)

Easy (5) Climb a knotted rope (Climb)

Average (10) Hear an approaching security guard (Notice) Tough (15) Disarm an explosive (Disable Device)

Challenging (20) Swim against a strong current (Swim)

Formidable (25) Break into a secure computer system (Computers)

Heroic (30) Climb a slippery overhang (Climb); overcome a sophisticated security system (Disable Device) Supercharacteric (35) Convince the guards to let you into the building, even though you’re not wearing an ID badge and aren’t on their list (Bluff)

Nearly impossible (40) Track a trained commando through the jungle on a moonless night after 12 days of rainfall (Survival)

OPPOSED CHECKS

UNDER THE HOOD: USING OPPOSED CHECKS Opposed checks offer the Gamemaster a useful tool for comparing the efforts of two characters quickly and easily. This applies not only to skills, but also powers and, in some cases, ability scores. If two or more characters compete at a particular task, you can resolve it with an opposed check. The character with the highest check result wins. Of course, you can play things out if you want, but sometimes it’s good to be able to resolve things with a quick opposed check and move on. As Gamemaster, if you find yourself without a particular rule to resolve a conflict or contest between characters, the opposed check is your friend. Pick the appropriate skill, power, or ability, make checks for the characters and compare the results to see how they did.

Some checks are opposed. They are made against a randomized number, usually another character’s check result. Whoever gets the higher result wins. An example is trying to bluff someone. You roll a Bluff check, while the GM rolls a Sense Motive check for your target. If you beat the target’s Sense Motive check result, you succeed.

For ties on opposed checks, the character with the higher bonus wins. If the bonuses are the same, roll d20. On a 1–10 one character wins and on 11–20 victory goes to the other character; decide which character is “high” and which is “low” before rolling. Alternately, you can just flip a coin to see who wins.

OPPOSED CHECK EXAMPLES

TASK OPPOSING SKILL SKILL

Sneak up on someone Stealth Notice

Con someone Bluff Sense Motive

Hide from someone Stealth Notice

Win a car race Drive Drive

Pretend to be someone else Disguise Notice

Steal a key chain Sleight of Hand Notice

Break computer security Computers Computers

TRYING AGAIN

In general, you can try a check again if you fail, and keep trying indefinitely. Some tasks, however, have consequences for failure. For example, failing a Climb check may mean the character falls, which makes it difficult to try again. Some tasks can’t be attempted again once a check has failed. For most tasks, when you have succeeded once, additional successes are meaningless. (Once you’ve discovered a room’s only secret door using the Search skill, for instance, there’s no further benefit to be gained from additional Search checks.)

If a task carries no penalty for failure, you can take 20 and assume the character goes at it long enough to succeed, or at least determines the task is impossible at the character’s level of ability (see Checks Without Rolls).

CONDITION MODIFIERS

Some situations make a check easier or harder, resulting in a bonus or penalty to the modifier for the check or the check’s Difficulty Class. The GM can change the odds of success in four ways:

1. Grant a +2 bonus to represent conditions improving performance.

2. Impose a –2 penalty to represent conditions hampering performance. 3. Reduce the DC by 2 to represent circumstances making the task easier.

4. Increase the DC by 2 to represent circumstances making the task harder.

Bonuses to the check and reduction in the check’s DC have the same result: they create a better chance of success. But they represent different circumstances, and sometimes that difference is important.

TOOLS

Some tasks require tools. If tools are needed, the specific items are mentioned in the description of the task or skill. If you don’t have the appropriate tools, you can still attempt the task, but at a –4 penalty on your check. A character may be able to put together impromptu tools to make the check. If the GM allows this, reduce the penalty to –2 (instead of –4). It usually takes some time (several minutes to an hour or more) to collect or create a set of impromptu tools, and it may require an additional check as well. Characters with the Improvised Tools feat suffer no penalty for not having the proper tools to perform a task. They can make do with whatever is at hand.

CHECKS WITHOUT ROLLS

A check represents performing a task under a certain amount of pressure. When the situation is less demanding, you can achieve more reliable results. Applying these rules can speed up checks under routine circumstances, cutting down the number of rolls players need to make.

TAKING 1

If your total bonus on a check is equal to or greater than the DC minus 1, you will succeed regardless of what you roll on the die, even under pressure. In this case, the GM might not require you to roll and just assume you succeed, since the task is a trivial effort for someone of your skill. If the check has varying levels of success, you’re assumed to achieve the minimum possible (as if you’d rolled a 1). You can choose to make a roll to achieve a greater level of success, or the GM may assume a greater level of success, depending on the circumstances.

TAKING 10

When you are not under any pressure to perform a task, you may choose to take 10. Instead of rolling the check, calculate your result as if you had rolled a 10. For average (DC 10) tasks, taking 10 allows you to succeed automatically with a modifier of +0 or greater. You cannot take 10 if distracted or under pressure (such as in a combat situation). The GM decides when this is the case. Characters with Skill Mastery can take 10 with some skills even while under pressure.

TAKING 20

When you have plenty of time and the task carries no penalty for failure, you can take 20. Instead of rolling the check, calculate your result as if you had rolled a 20. Taking 20 means you keep trying until you get it right. Taking 20 takes twenty times longer than a single check, or about 2 minutes for a task requiring a round or less. If there are penalties or consequences for failing the check, such as setting off an alarm or slipping and falling, you cannot take 20 on that check.

COMPARISON CHECKS

In cases where a check is a simple test of one character’s ability against another, with no luck involved, the character with the higher score wins automatically. Just as you wouldn’t make a “height check” to see who’s taller, you don’t need to make a Strength check to see who’s stronger. When two characters arm wrestle, for example, the stronger character wins. If two flying characters race, the faster character wins, and so forth. Note this does not include the use of extra effort to temporarily increase a character’s score, which can affect the outcome of a comparison check. In the case of identical bonuses or scores, each character has an equal chance of winning. Roll a die: on a 1–10, the first character wins, on an 11–20, the second character does.

AIDING ANOTHER

Sometimes characters work together and help each other out. In this case, one character (usually the one with the highest bonus) is considered the leader of the effort and makes the check normally, while each helper makes the same check against DC 10 (and can’t take 10 on this check). Success grants the leader a +2 bonus for favorable conditions. For every 10 full points the helper’s check exceeds the DC, increase the bonus by +1, so a result of 20–29 grants a +3 bonus, 30–39 a +4, and so forth. In many cases, outside help isn’t beneficial, or only a limited number of helpers can aid someone at once. The GM limits aid as he sees fit for the task and conditions.

TYPES OF CHECKS

You use three main traits for checks: skills, abilities, and powers: • Skill Checks: A skill check determines what you can accomplish with a particular skill. It is a roll of d20 + your rank in the skill and the key ability score of the skill against a Difficulty Class. Skill checks sometimes have gradations of success and failure based on how much your total roll is above or below the DC. For example, if you fail a Climb check, you don’t make any progress. If you fail by 5 or more, you fall.

• Ability Checks An ability check is like a skill check, but measures raw ability, without any skill, like strength, endurance, or intellect. It is a roll of d20 + your ability modifier against a Difficulty Class. Ability checks tend to be all or nothing (you can either accomplish the task or you can’t) although there are sometimes gradations like skill checks. Attempting a skill without training (in other words, without ranks in the skill) is an ability check.

EXAMPLE ABILITY CHECKS

TASK KEY ABILITY

Breaking a board Strength

Tying a rope Dexterity

Holding your breath Constitution

Navigating a maze Intelligence

Recognizing someone you’ve seen before Wisdom

Getting noticed in a crowd Charisma

• Power Checks: A power check uses one of your character’s powers as its modifier. It is a measure of what the character can accomplish with that power. It is a roll of d20 + the power’s rank, which measures how strong the power is, against a Difficulty Class. Some powers do not require power checks; they just work automatically, while other powers have some automatic aspects and others require checks.

ATTACK ROLLS

An attack roll determines whether or not you hit an opponent in combat. It is a d20 roll + your attack bonus. The Difficulty Class is your target’s Defense, which measures their ability to avoid attacks. If you equal or exceed your target’s Defense, your attack hits. Otherwise, you miss. A natural 20 on an attack roll (where the die comes up 20) always hits and may be a critical hit . A natural 1 on an attack roll (where the die comes up 1) always misses.

SAVING THROWS

Saving throws are efforts to avoid different forms of danger, ranging from damage and injury to traps, poisons, and various powers. A saving throw is:

1d20 + the appropriate ability modifier + your base save bonus+ any bonuses for powers

Constitution is the ability modifier for Toughness and Fortitude saves, Dexterity is the ability modifier for Reflex saves, and Wisdom is the ability modifier for Will saves. The Difficulty Class is based on the strength of the hazard, such as the power of an attack or the strength of a disease or poison. Like skill checks, there are sometimes gradations to a saving throw. For example, a Toughness save against damage results in no damage at all if you beat the DC, but could result in a glancing blow, a stunning blow, or an immediate knockout if you fail, depending on how much the save result misses the DC.

THE COMBAT ROUND

When things really start happening in a Mutants & Masterminds game, time is broken down into six-second segments called rounds. A round isn’t very much time. Think of it like a panel in a comic book, just long enough for a character to do something. The types of actions your character can perform during a round are standard actions, move actions, full actions, free actions, and reactions. During a round you can:

• Take a standard action and a move action.

• Take a move action and then another move action (in place of your standard action).

• Take a full action.

You can perform as many free actions and reactions in a round as you wish, although the GM may choose to limit them to a reasonable number to keep the game moving.

STANDARD ACTIONS

A standard action generally involves acting upon something, whether it’s an attack or using a power to affect something. You’re limited to one standard action a round.

MOVE ACTIONS

A move action usually involves moving. You can take a move action before or after your standard action, so you can attack then move, or move then attack. You cannot normally split your move action before and after your standard action, however. Move actions also include things like drawing weapons, standing up from being prone, and picking up objects.

FULL ACTIONS

A full action, or full-round action, occupies all your attention for the round, meaning you can’t do anything else. Full actions include a fullspeed charge at an opponent which ends in an attack, or spending the whole round moving as quickly as you can. Certain powers or maneuvers require a full action to perform, as do some skills.

FREE ACTIONS

A free action is something so comparatively minor it doesn’t take a significant amount of time. You can perform as many free actions in a round as the GM considers reasonable. Free actions include things like talking (characteres and villains always find time to say a lot during a fight), dropping something, ending the use of a power, activating some powers, and so forth.

REACTIONS

A reaction is something you do in response to something else. A reaction doesn’t take any time, like a free action. The difference is you might react when it’s not even your turn, in response to something else happening during the round.

CHARACTERPOINTS

Heroes in Mutants & Masterminds have Convictions players can spend to improve the characteres abilities in various ways. You can spend a Conviction to improve a die roll, push an ability or power beyond its normal capabilities, bounce back from being hurt, and achieve various other effects (see Conviction.