True20 vs. M&M2e

[Andrew Ellis Troubio]

I know there have been topic like this in the past..so link em if you got em. What's there to tempt me to buy Ture20 if I already own M&M 2e besides the fancy pants settings...?

[RedFox]

Nothing, really. M&M2e wins, hands down. It's awesome.

True20 has Mecha vs. Kaiju, but that's about it.

Listen not to the others! They shall attempt to sway you with honeyed words and stuff, but you know better. You have seen the glory of M&M.

[Simple Man]

There are actually quite a few differences.

True20 is geared more toward lower-powered play than M&M, and has various elements that facilitate that sort of play. Some games M&M2 seem more suitable for, and some are more suitable for True20.

Enough to tempt you? I dunno. Depends on what sort of games you like. I own both.

[Simple Man]

Listen not to the others! They shall attempt to sway you with honeyed words and stuff, but you know better. You have seen the glory of M&M.

:rolleyes:

[RedFox]

:rolleyes:

http://blog.portugalmail.pt/mac/archives/mm.gif

[Skywalker]

I know there have been topic like this in the past..so link em if you got em. What's there to tempt me to buy Ture20 if I already own M&M 2e besides the fancy pants settings...?

True 20 is a different beast from M&M altogether. They both share some design elements in streamlining d20 but they do quite different things.

M&M is a points system for use with Supers. It can be used for wider purposes but this is not its design.

True 20 is closer to d20. This does make it is easier for converting d20 material to it. It also has a broader goal as to the type of stories it can tell. It is primarily designed to handle characters without powers or characters where a special group has powers (mages, psionics etc). As such it covers quite a bit of the fantasy, modern and sci fi genres.

[cjh]

There are actually quite a few differences.

Not the least of which is that True20 hews a lot more closely to its d20 roots than M&M does. True20 is still very much a class- and level-based game system. The only real points of commonality are the Toughness save and Hero Points (called Conviction in True20). Of course how character get Conviction is different than Hero Points in M&M as well.

True20 is a streamlined version of the d20 rules that (IMO) plays a lot more quickly than d20 does. However, if you don't like class- and level-based games...then True20 probably isn't the game for you.

Really they are too different systems with two entirely different design goals behind them. Since each is intended for different types of play, I don't see how they have to be mutally exclusive. But then, I also don't think that one system fits all situations either.

[Chuckie Fort]

True 20 is a different beast from M&M altogether. They both share some design elements in streamlining d20 but they do quite different things.

M&M is a points system for use with Supers. It can be used for wider purposes but this is not its design.

True 20 is closer to d20. This does make it is easier for converting d20 material to it. It also has a broader goal as to the type of stories it can tell. It is primarily designed to handle characters without powers or characters where a special group has powers (mages, psionics etc). As such it covers quite a bit of the fantasy, modern and sci fi genres.

No more true than saying HERO is a 'system for use with Supers.' Yes, True20 is closer to its source rules-set, but that in now way invalaidates MnM as a generic rules-set all its own.

[Will]

I say buy both, and swap liberally between them. That's what I do.

One big difference is that powers are more uniquely designed in True20 than in M&M; while in M&M, everything is built out of effects (so that magic blast of lightning is essentially akin to using a rifle), in True20 magic/powers have a particular way of functioning.

It would, of course, be a very simple matter to bring in elements of M&M; True20 magic, for example, has a 'rank' equal to adept level, and costs 1 feat. If you wanted to use M&M powers more directly, you could probably do something along the lines of 'reduce cost per rank to 1, each power gained costs 1 feat, rank equals adept level.' Just off the top of my head.

Personally, I like the True20 powers a lot... they are really reminiscent of the magic as it appears in a lot of the fantasy novels I'm familiar with. I'm generally happy with much of the system, though I dislike intensely the wealth system (which derives from D20 Modern, which in turn I think was inspired/lifted from Trinity?) I'd be inclined to use True20 with M&M equipment rules.

[Reverend Keith]

I have a hard time not seeing myself choose True 20 for my future fantasy gaming needs, however I'd love to see someone put out a campaign, netbook, thread, webpage, whatever showing a practical example of how to run a relatively gritty fantasy campaign using Mutants and Masterminds 2e.

I dig True 20, but I'm not going to kid myself. I'm always open to new options, however I'd like to see some worked examples.

[Will]

I've been running a fantasy campaign M&M2 game. I don't have a page that really explains how I make the rules do what I want (it's mostly flavor info), and it's not full-bore gritty...

All that said, the primary way to make a M&M2 game gritty is limit Protection powers, particularly Impervious Protection. Second is to limit healing/regeneration.

A M&M game with mundane equipment-only (and, perhaps, magical equivalents or limited to a few extra ranks of protection) will be pretty deadly, at least. If you want one-shot kills, might use the option 'damage fail by 20+ = Dead.'

Though, really, the 15+ 'dying' is good enough, IMO.

If your vision of gritty fantasy includes low magic, that's a matter of avoiding spells that do flashy things. Or limit how much you can get. A good rule of thumb might be 'you cannot have more than PL x 2 in any one magic power.'

[Will]

Elaborating slightly, I would require armor to always be bought as a device, not equipment (armor is very important to a character in-game).

If you want wizards never to wear armor, you could make magic have a power loss drawback 'not while in armor' or 'unreliable in armor.'

Armor and Defensive Roll will be valuable ways to avoid being hurt, but _limited_ ways.

[Green Karl]

Personally, I would not use M&M2nd ed for anything but supers. It is GREAT for 4-color heroes, and it can handle comic-style games also. I personally (again) don't feel it does gritty-realist heroes very well and I would not try and run low-level 'non-super' games with it.

Just a personal feeling is all. Unless you dump 'Trade-offs' and a few other rules, it just would not really feel like fantasy or anything else to me.

True20 on the other hand is GREAT non-supers games, and I am about to start running a Fading Suns game using the system this weekend. I like the 'feel' and 'fit' for me. The 'super-natural' abilities are better defined, etc.

BUT if you feel M&M is perfect for non-supers game I promise NOT to come over to your house and tell you to stop ;)

So in the end, I say get both if you plan on running lots of different styles of games. If you are more into superheroes game, M&M would be a better fit. If you want fantasy or 'mystic-modern', etc. I feel True20 is a better fit.

IF you want realistic... well I personally don't feel ANY game is going to be realistic but GURPS is about the closes I would want to try to get to without bogging down TO much on rules, etc

[Mostlyjoe]

Try this little game. Use M&M to build the classes out of True20. Does it work?

[Green Karl]

Try this little game. Use M&M to build the classes out of True20. Does it work?

Not within the normal M&M 2nd ed rules. IF you dropped Trade-Offs and some of the max Attack vs. Damage and Defense vs. Toughness, then it could work. Otherwise if you were playing in a PL4 game, your Super-Strong Fighter with an 18 (+4) strength could not use a sword (+3 damage) unless his Attack Bonus was no higher then +1

If you drop that aspect it could work... you would need some other balancer...

"Spells" are a bit different also, and would take ALLOT of work, even with the Masters Manuel to figure them out.

At least for me ;)

[fisty]

Green Ronin rocks. I have run M&M and will soon be playing in a fantasy M&M game. I have also just bought True20 and I think the differances are slight for the players, but huge for the ref. Character gen for M&M took days, especially when it became very obvious that, just as in HERO, there are probably at least three different ways to build any given power. I look forward now to running everything using True20 as my core because it is so much simpler, but using M&M to build stuff.
I can't imagine Character gen taking more than a few minutes in True20, as long as the players know what they want to play.

M&M is definately worth having, though, if only because it is so insanely versatile that, given an hour or two, I can probably use the rules to describe ANYTHING, and then port it into my True20 game.

[Tim Gray]

There does seem to be a lot of reanimation afoot at the moment...