I've been a gamer for over twenty years. For the vast majority of those years, I've been interested in superheroes games. There have been long stretches I didn't play D&D, because, let's face it, Tolkenian fantasy is only so interesting, and, some iterations of the game have had some serious flaws, but I always had some superhero game that caught my eye. And there have been a lot of those, Two different iterations of Marvel Comics based games, the old DC heroes game, GURPS, HERO, Villians &Vigilantes, two White-Wolf based superheroes games, and two iterations of Heroes Unlimited have all taken up space on cheap bookshelves in my life before I picked up a copy Wild Talents.
So, believe me when I say I know the genre. And, with that, I know the people who tend to play it and the sorts of characters you tend to see. And, it's with that in mind that I ask why we as players have clung so tightly to boring tropes from the Justice League? I know that seems almost painfully oversimplistic, but the vast majority of characters fit one of the following molds: Brick (Superman/Wonder Woman), Martial Artist (Modern Batman), Gadgeteer (60's Batman), Speedster (the Flash), Blaster (Black Lighting), Magician (Green Lantern/Zatana/Dr. Fate), or Psychic (Martian Manhunter), okay, that last one is kind of a stretch--most PC psychics are either Jean Grey or Professor X--but he does read minds.
My problem isn't with these characters, they're classics of the genre who largely defined what four-color superheroes look like. My problem is that there are myriad alternative models of what a superhero can look like, why aren't there that many models of what superhero characters in RPG's look like? I understand that in the early days of superhero games, you had a shopping list of powers and those powers tended to push you into one of those molds, but, most modern games use some kind of point buy system like GURPS, HERO, or ORE. In a point-buy system, there's no inherent reason to link powers thematically, nor to combine powers into those molds.
To put it another way, if the power to ignore an attack is defined by effect, turning intangible and being bullet-proof are the same power. In a world like that, there's no reason to connect travelling quickly to thinking and acting quickly (And certainly, there are classic characters who can do one, but not the other), nor is there inherent reason to connect invulnerability to inhuman strength. But people still do that.
My question is why?
My guess is that it's laziness. There's no inherent reason to connect invulnerability and super-strength, there is a practical reason that a strong character should be able to take a hit or survive a super-fistfight, but there's no reason that the power making that possible has to be invulnerability, or that those two have to imply flight (Superman, Captain Marvel, and Hawkgirl, I'm talking to you). It's just way easier to go there than to think about a more interesting combination.
Because I don't just want to be a jerk who pisses all over everyone's favorite way of making superheroes, I'll add that what most people are really doing with these is buying three powers, an offensive power (or two--usually one hand-to-hand and one ranged), a defensive power, and something interesting outside of a fight. Certain hero types are weighted a little differently, but, really, it all comes down to those questions.
My theory is that, with a couple of very specific exceptions, or powers that fit multiple categories, all superpowers are really either: An attack, a ranged attack, a defense, a means of moving quickly, or a means of doing something interesting outside of combat. So, I'll provide a non-exhaustive list of sample powers, and characters who have them from comic-books based on that breakdown.
Melee Attack: Super strength (Superman), Martial Arts Training (Batman), Fantasy-Style Weapon (Wonder Woman/Black Knight), High speed punches (The Flash), Pulling out Opponent's heart which then immolates (Evil Shaman from second Indiana Jones film)
Ranged Attack: Shooting lasers/Energy Blasts (Superman/Black Lighting), Specialize thrown weapon (Batman), Throwing objects normal people couldn't move (Hulk), Telekinesis (Marvel Girl), Prehensile Hair (Medusa), Guns (Punisher), Archaic Ranged Weapons (Green Arrow), Gadget Ranged Weapons (Green Arrow), Illusionary/Telepathic attacks (Mastermind), Specialized Teleportation/Temporarily invoking demons (I made those up)
Defense: Invulnerability (Superman), Intangibility (Shadowcat), Turn into a hard substance (Absorbing Man/Collossus), Invisibility (Invisible Girl), Shrink really small (Atom), Dodge (Batman), Martial Arts Defense (Batman), Specialized precognition (Midnighter), Regeneration (Wolverine), Illusion/Telepathic mind clouding (Mastermind), Create forcefields (Green Lantern), Shield (Captain America), Specialized Shapeshifting (The T-1000 in Terminator 2) Large quantity of Hit Points/Exceptional Toughness
Means of moving quickly: Flight (Superman), Cool high-tech vehicle (Batman), Teleportation (Nightcrawler), Swing on webs (Spiderman), Astral Projection (Dr. Fate), Become intangible/out of phase (Shadowcat), Turn other people into you (Agent Smith from the Matrix movies)
Useful outside of combat: Regeneration (Wolverine), Turn into something really small (Atom), Mind reading (Martian Manhunter), Tongues (Cypher--Maybe my favorite metahuman ever), Shapeshifting, Many mundane skills
So, next time, rather than make a super-strong character who is invulnerable and flies, consider a character with a sword, the ability to turn invisible, and the ability to walk through walls. Or maybe don't do that, it's a little too "ninja" for my tastes, but, you get my point.
