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Foreword

Appearance

I’ll start with the positive one: art. There is a trend to have the art in rules-light supers games be of a cartoony or humorous style. It’s something I addressed in my Truth & Justice review. I have nothing against having a few of those in the book, but to have them be the majority, implies that the game is also a comedic one, even though it doesn’t advertise as one.

Well, that’s not a problem with BASH UE. I wouldn’t call this game rules-light – it’s more rules-medium, but still way less crunchy than Mutants & Masterminds --, however it’s approach to art gets two thumbs up. Danilo Moretti and Thom Chiaramonte, the interior artists, did a great job evoking a super-hero feel.

Most of the pieces have a “Timmverse” style (like in the DC Animated series), but a few break the mold and go with a more traditional super-hero appearance, like the ones on pages 45 and 113. Oddly, I found two pieces that seem to be printed in reverse (pages 36 and 108).

Now, the negative one: proofing. I understand some amount of typos and editing mistakes are bound to get past scrutiny. Usually, I only mention it in passing, but there were times while reading BASH UE that I found at least one error per page, which became annoying.

Most were innocuous enough, like the extra n in “branchiate” (page 43, first paragraph, fourth line). Some waste space in the book, like the repetition of the static soak value alternative (page 125, under Static Soak Values and Static Defense Values).

A few had me rereading the text to understand what was said, such as the Ricochet entry (page 40). To be fair, my copy of the PDF is one year old, so it’s very possible that Chris Rutkowsky has fixed everything already.

So, you want to be a super-hero?

Then, we delve into character creation. BASH UE uses a streamlined point-buy system. I say streamlined because, unlike Mutants & Masterminds, where points have different per-level values according to trait, in BASH UE everything costs 1 point, except Stats. This makes character generation math easier.

The amount of points available to create a hero is derived from the Character Scale, which has four levels: Mystery Men (20 points), Street Level (25 points), World Class (40 points) and Cosmic (60 points). Stats and Powers are bought from this pool, there’s no separate grouping, like in Unisystem, where you have Attribute points, skill points etc.

Playtest: I used the Street Level scale for the playtest, but I was surprised with the competence of the PCs. In my mind, street level supers are more Robin or Iron Fist types, but in BASH UE this category encompasses characters like Spider-man and Cyclops, as a cursory look through the archetype examples in the appendix illustrates. These truly are “mid-powered Heroes who usually protect a city or neighborhood”, as Street Level is defined in the book.

The first thing you buy with your points are Stats, the game’s attributes. There are three of them: Brawn (strength and toughness), Agility (reflexes) and Mind (IQ, willpower, social interaction). They range from zero to 5, with regular joes/janes having 1 in all of them and levels 3+ being the province of super-humans.

Stats can go higher than 5 through modifiers and powers, but the idea is that base levels will stay within the zero-to-5 range, unless you’re playing with the Cosmic rules (I talk about them below). This has the effect of squashing a bit the power levels found in comic books for different characters.

For example, the Champion of Justice and the Behemoth (Superman and Hulk analogs, respectively) both have Brawn 5, the ability to lift hundreds of tons. That may be appropriate for the Green Goliath, but not the Man of Steel (I’ve been spoiled by the DC Heroes RPG write-up).

In my mind, Superman is way stronger than Hulk, so they shouldn’t have the same base level of strength/toughness. By my calculations, the Last Son of Krypton should have Brawn 8. Anyway, the point is that BASH UE has a low granularity and if you are looking for a higher level, you may be disappointed.

Stats cost 2 points/level and have significant weight in the task resolution system. In BASH UE, whenever you want to perform an action, you roll 2d6 and multiply the result by one of the three Stats. So, a one-point difference in a Stat can have a quite a bit of impact in the test result.

Skills are divided in 16 Mental (based on Mind) and eight Physical (based on Agility) ones. These are broad skills, like Pilot, which allows you to handle all flying vehicles, from biplanes to spaceships.

Your rank in the Stat is the number of slots you have to spend in skills governed by that Stat. By spending a slot, you acquire a skill, meaning you get to use your full Stat in rolls pertaining to that area of expertise. You also get a Specialty for free – a specific application where you shine brighter, i.e., roll twice and take the better result.

Extra slots can be invested in the same skill to either buy other Specialties or increase the multiplier. So, if you have Agility 3 and bought Stealth with the Hiding Specialty, you’d be rolling 2d6 x 3. If you invested another slot, you could roll 2d6 x 4 or buy the Moving Silently Specialty, for example.

Defaulting – using a skill you do not know – can be attempted using Stat-1 as a multiplier to the roll. If this penalty takes your Stat to zero, you only roll one die.

You will notice that BASH UE does not include any combat skills. That’s because the game assumes that all super-heroes know how to fight. The advantage is that even characters that are not obviously engineered for combat won’t be too shortchanged.

On the other hand, if you want to be a superfighter, you will need to have high Stats or use the Boost power, which increases a Stat for a focused application.

I found the skill system a bit convoluted when compared with the rest of the BASH engine, which is simple. Also, depending on the character scale, PCs won’t have many slots to invest. There’s a way around that if a player wants to have a superskilled character: buy the Skillful power (I talk more about powers below). Each level gives you two extra skill slots, to a maximum of 10 slots

Playtest: In the end, skills weren’t that important and I can only remember Athletics, Stealth, Computers and Technology getting rolled and then not that much. My players also thought that skills didn’t contribute much. But that, of course, may have more to do with the style of the adventure than a lesser importance of skills.

BASH UE also has Advantages & Disadvantages. Advantages don’t cost points – if you want them, you must select an equal number of Disadvantages. The book doesn’t state a limit for how many Advantages a character can have, but the Quick Build Sheet at the end tells you to “Take up to 3 Ads”.

The selection is adequate and covers the usual stuff found in super-heroes’ lives, like Alter Ego, Contacts, Arch-Enemy, Public ID etc. However, some Advantages/Disadvantages are more powerful than others.

For example, take Instant Change and Jack of All Trades. The former allows you to instantly transform into your super ID. The latter changes the Stat-1 defaulting rule to just a -1 modifier to the die roll, which is a huge improvement. So, both changing costume and being proficient with all skills have the same cost.

Headquarters and super-vehicles are Advantages as well. When you choose them, you get an allotment of points to build them. Since you don’t have to pay points for them, it’s possible for a Mystery Men or Street Level character to start the game with them. If you don’t want that, you need to inform your players.

I had minor nitpicks with Vehicles and Headquarters. I didn’t understand why Gravity-cycle had Super Speed 3 [Limitation: Move Only] instead of Super Running. The Heavily Defended Headquarter Advantage doesn’t explain what kind of defenses are activated if the intruder fails the check. Also, I could find no mention of Headquarters hit points. What happens if someone wants to blow up you base?

Playtest: One of my friends, the powergamer, filled up on Advantages and Disadvantages. He had everything: a wife, a ninja cult enemy, a super-vehicle and even an orbital HQ, among other things, even though I said it was a Street Level game.

This led to a running gag where whenever he complained that the level of opposition was way higher than what he expected from a street level campaign, I reminded him he had an orbital HQ. Anyway, I nixed his laundry list of Advantages using the Quick Build Sheet note as a rule.

BASH UE has a nifty trick to try and balance characters of different power levels. The Character Scale pool of points is more of a guide – players can spend more or less points in building their heroes. Points not used become Hero points and those used in excess turn into Setbacks.

For example, if you spent only 20 points in a Street Level (25 points) campaign, you get 5 Hero points. If you spent 30, you have 5 Setbacks. Hero points can be added to the final result of a roll. Say you needed a result of 30, but only got 27. Spend 3 Hero points and you made it.

Setbacks, on the other hand, are used by the GM to decrease your result or increase the villain’s. Both Hero points and Setbacks replenish every session. These points are not really that much of an equalizer, but if you have five of them, you can exchange them for a Hero die, which can be used in the more usual ways associated with dramatic editing.

During character creation, you buy the hero’s powers as well, but I’ll talk about them in the next section. So all that’s left is for you to choose the character’s Mental Malfunction (not a disadvantage, more like what drives the hero) and, if you want, a Weakness. It can be a Negating Weakness (loss of powers) or a Damaging one (vulnerability to attack). Having one gives you more points to spend.

Playtest: Although I spent over 1,400 words explaining character creation, the process itself is way simpler. Only two of my friends made it for the first playtest session. One was the powergamer, who had already dissected the rules and had his character ready, which I had to adjust, as explained above.

The other one had never heard of BASH UE. After a few minutes of explanation, he was able to choose the Wild Warrior archetype from the book and tweak it to his satisfaction. I’d say the adventure started after 20 minutes.

In the following sessions, I had three other friends who created their own characters from scratch in half an hour or so, maybe less. All of them found character creation to be a fast and easy process.

Creating NPCs wasn’t a problem either. One of the things I look forward in a super-hero system is easy statting up of adversaries and such. I have to say BASH UE pass the test with flying colors. You can find write-ups of two villains I used in the playtest here. There’s even a comment by Chris Rutkowsky about the way I statted up one of Fatality’s power in the following post.

Ultimate power!

Some Limitations seemed to be too similar, like Burn-Out and Finite. The book advises not to take the Limitation Disorienting (lose the next round every time you use your power) for abilities used in combat, but I don’t think Disorienting would really be a limitation for non-combat powers.

According to the book, a level 3 power is one in which you invested 3 points, but if you add Enhancements or Limitations, the final cost will be different from the level. This might create some confusion during the game, especially because there are powers that have only two levels of different costs, such as Super Speed (3 or 5 points).

BASH UE has a good selection of powers, including staples of the genre. They are divided in seven categories: Movement, Combat, Bio-Manipulation, Intense Training, Mastery, Mental and Perception powers.

The low-granularity aspect appears here again. For example, the Flight power allows a hero to move 5 feet per round per level. That’s it. If you want your character to fly faster, you’ll need to get into the Cosmic rules, but then he will be way faster, cosmic fast.

The point is: the powers as presented work within a useful, but limited frame. Expanding from this might not be easy and I’m not sure it’s the style of the game. If you want a system that allows extensive fine-tuning, BASH UE might not be it.

A curious thing, given the low-granularity, was the presence of a power like Hovering. It costs 1 point (no levels) and gives the hero the ability to hover up to three feet from the ground. On the other hand, you have a power like Scan that turns the character into a living tricorder.

I don’t understand what was the reasoning for not having Hovering be a feature of the Flight power and, on the other end, not requiring the player to specify what he is capable of detecting.

The Intense Training powers get a special mention. They are the abilities that can be gained through rigorous training, such as Attack Weak Point, Martial Arts Mastery and Skillful, among others. They are designed for the super-normal characters and do a good job of equalizing these heroes with their superpowered counterparts.

Playtest: My players found the selection good, but wanted a few powers that were not covered by the rules. We improvised some of them, however it felt like we were just rehashing the basic mechanic of the Daze power, for example. I hear there’s a powers book in the workings for the line, so that might not be a problem in the future.

They also thought some of the abilities were unbalanced, like Scan, and offered more for the cost than other. A problem I mentioned regarding some advantages and disadvantages.

It’s all in the system

As I said before, task resolution involves rolling 2d6 and multiplying by the appropriate Stat. You compare the result to a difficulty number (10, 20, 30, 40 or 50) or to your opposition’s roll. There are three types of modifiers to the roll: Dice, Multiplier and Result.

Dice bonuses/penalties are added to the 2d6 roll (such as situational adjustments); Multiplier ones are added to the, well, multiplier (like certain powers); and Result modifiers are added to the final number (Hero points, for example). In order of importance, the Multiplier one is the more powerful, followed by the Dice and Result modifiers, in that order.

But that’s not all. If you roll the same number on both dice, they explode (not literally) and you get to roll another d6 and add its result. If you roll the “doubles” number again, you add it and re-roll again until a number that doesn’t match comes up. It reminds me of Mayfair’s DC Heroes, which had a similar mechanic.

With this open-ended roll, it’s possible – although unlikely – that a low-power character could hit and damage/affect a more powerful one (think Robin against Superman). This might be a bug or feature, depending on your preferences. I thought it was interesting, because it doesn’t happen frequently, but allows those moments to exist within the game.

Playtest: My group is not math-shy, but I thought the multiplication might give us pause. I was wrong. Since most of the time the multiplier varies only between 1 and 5, the calculation is not that hard. This narrow range also helps balance confrontation between characters of different power levels. But make no mistake: a foe with a x5 multiplier is hard to beat.

For example, the Wild Warrior character in my playtest, Jaguar Negro (Black Jaguar), had Agility 3 and Martial Arts Mastery (Defensive Style), an Intense Training power that gives +2 to Agility for defending in hand-to-hand combat, for a final multiplier of x5. It was very hard to land a blow on him.

Combat is straightforward. One character rolls for his attack and his target rolls for defense. If the attack connects, then there’s a roll for damage and one for soak. The result of the soak roll is subtracted from the damage one and the rest is applied to the target’s Hits – heroes and villains have 100 Hits.

Playtest: At first, I didn’t like everybody having the same amount of hit points. It seemed to penalize brick types, but during play it turned out to work. Physically-oriented characters still had an edge in their soak abilities and lasted longer in slugfests.

Not everybody has this surplus of hits. Less important characters (second-tier supers, minions, normal people) have decreasing numbers, from 50 to 10.

There are also Special Combat Rules: maneuvers like called shots, stapling someone to the wall etc. I found them all to be genre-appropriate. This section also includes the usual stats for weapons, including improvised ones, although I found the table covering the latter confusing.

Playtest: The combination of maneuvers and judicious use of Hero points and dice can turn a simple combat into an epic fight. The last fight in the playtest pitted a wounded PC, The Inexorable (Street Level), against Captain Schizo, a World-Class flying brick.

The odds were definitely against The Inexorable and knowing he was going to lose unless he did something, his player asked for options. Remembering an actual play example Chris Rutkowsky had posted in the forum, I told him he could Go for Broke, taking 50 damage in exchange for a Hero die.

The Hero die could be used to Power Stunt the Intense Training power Attack Weak Point, which allows you to inflict double damage if you hit by 20+. By spending one Hero point, you can use your attack toll as your damage roll too. The player did this and rolled, getting doubles.

He managed to knock out Captain Schizo with that punch and fell unconscious, because the 50 hits from Go for Broke had put The Inexorable at negative hits. If that doesn’t have super-hero written all over it, I don’t know what has.

BASH UE includes simple and effective Minion rules (with two pages of stats). Basically, minions don’t roll – they have a static value: 7 for attack/defense and 5 for soak (and less hits, as stated above). Plus, you can have groups of minions act like just one adversary (Gang Rules) by adding 5 to their results per extra minion.

Minions can also operate as mobs, which translates as a single large opponent, making them effective at grabbing opponents. This is unfortunate, because when a mob has grabbed a target, it automatically hits with a regular attack each round it maintains the grab.

Playtest: At the playtest’s final confrontation, one of the main villains, Baron Karma, summoned a mob of zombies. This proved very useful for him, because there were only two heroes, neither of whom was especially resistant to damage. The zombies, though not particularly strong, were definitely dangerous thanks to the mob rules.

There’s a whole chapter in the book dedicated to settings. These include both main genres and supers subgenres, including Modern Age, Pulp Heroes, Golden Age, Silver Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Super Teens, Science Fiction, Fantasy and Cosmic.

The write-ups include the appropriate Scale, which players or groups would be interested in that setting, tropes usually associated with it, and a list of recommended reading and viewing. There are also mechanical bits, like new rules, Advantages and powers, write-ups of minions and adversaries etc.

A special note goes to the Cosmic setting description. It adds a new mechanical layer to the game so that you can run campaigns with space police officers or heralds of planet-devouring aliens. Most of the Cosmic rules are just expansions of the basic mechanics, so it’s not like the game suddenly becomes too crunchy.

I appreciate the inclusion of a section dedicated to cosmic adventures. It seems this subgenre gets forgotten a bit in other games, being the subject of sourcebooks instead of being included in the core book. I thought of doing the playtest with the Cosmic setting, but decided it would be too specific and not completely representative of the game. Maybe in the future.

After a list of ready-to-use characters, like the Wild Warrior I mentioned earlier (by the way, her entry lists 11 points for powers, but 12 were spent), distributed by Character Scale, BASH UE ends with an appendix on alternative rules, which includes miniature use and a fame mechanic, among others.

More BASHing

The super-hero genre is not the only one addressed by the line. There’s also BASH Sci-Fi and Fantasy editions, as well as a swashbuckling supplement, Island of the Forgotten Tomb. So you can plunder the other genre books for new rules, characters and scenarios, expanding the info already present in BASH UE’s settings chapter.

Conclusion

STYLE: 3

• Layout: 3
• Art: 4
• Coolness: 4
• Readability: 2

SUBSTANCE: 4

• Content: 4
• Text: 3
• Fun: 5
• Workmanship: 4

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