Resolve & Adversity

Resolve and Adversity are points you can spend to alter the game in your favor. Heroes use Resolve, while Adversity is reserved for the Game Master. Both are discussed below.

Resolve

Heroes begin every issue — again, that's every game session — with some amount of Resolve. This is listed on each hero's sheet. As discussed in the core rules, a hero's starting Resolve varies depending on how powerful they are — the more powerful the hero, the less Resolve they have per issue. In this Quickstart, Resolve doesn't carry over between issues, so spend away! You can earn extra Resolve in the following ways, plus however else the Game Master deems appropriate.

Defeats

Suffering a brutal defeat and then coming back stronger than before is a classic comic book trope. That being the case, you earn 1 Resolve any time you suffer a significant defeat, failure, or setback.

Flaws (Resolve)

You can use your Flaws to earn Resolve. Any time you decide that your hero succumbs to their Flaw in a way that causes problems for you or your allies, you earn 1 Resolve. A few Flaws work differently. These Flaws grant you extra Resolve at the start of every issue (this is already accounted for on your hero sheet) but the Game Master is the one who brings these Flaws into play and you don't earn extra Resolve when that happens. These Flaws are marked with an asterisk on your hero sheet.

Roleplaying

You earn 1 Resolve whenever the Game Master feels you've done something exceptionally clever, dramatic, funny, heroic, or just plain cool. Great roleplaying, brilliant comedy, clever problem solving, and strategic thinking could all merit this reward, as could taking the time to help a new player along.

Spending Resolve

You can spend Resolve to do each of the things listed below. Additionally, the Game Master is always free to expand how players can use Resolve in their games.

Assisting Others

You can spend Resolve to assist your allies, giving them however many points you wish. You have to describe what you're doing in the game world to help them when you do this. This is purely for the sake of the narrative — you still get to take your regular turn to act on that page.

Challenge Rolls

You can spend Resolve to add extra dice to your challenge rolls on a one-for-one basis. You can spend any amount of Resolve on any roll, and you can decide whether or not to spend them after rolling the dice. You can also spend 1 Resolve to reroll a challenge roll completely. If you've already spent Resolve to add extra dice to the roll, you can reroll those extra dice as well.

Lucky Breaks

You can spend 1 Resolve to make up some minor detail about the game world, often some lucky break that works in your favor. For example, if you get knocked off a rooftop, you can use this to say you land on a pile of discarded mattresses. This is always subject to the Game Master's approval.

Power Stunts

You can spend 1 Resolve to use one of your powers in a way that imitates another power, as long as you can explain whatever it is you're trying to do. If the stunt is even remotely reasonable, the imitated power will have the same rank as the power used to imitate it. If it's kind of a stretch, the imitated power will have a rank equal to half that of the power used to imitate it.

Recovery

If you get defeated by an attack that inflicts damage or a special effect, you can spend 1 point of Resolve on your next turn to act to recover and get back into the action. If you were defeated with damage, you regain consciousness and recover 3 points of Health. If you were defeated with a special effect, you break free of it. Either way, you can then move and perform actions as usual on that same page. You can only do this once per scene.

Seizing The Initiative

You can spend 1 Resolve to jump ahead of everyone else in combat. From that point forward, you get to go first on every page of the action. If multiple characters exercise this option, they all get to go before everyone else, but their Edge scores determine the order in which they act.

Adversity

While players have Resolve, GMs have Adversity. As the Game Master, you begin every issue with 1 point of Adversity per hero in the group. Like Resolve, Adversity isn't carried over between issues. As Game Master, you can earn extra Adversity in the ways listed below.

Challenge Level

Especially challenging or dangerous scenes will often have a Challenge Level. Challenge Levels run from 1 to 3, indicating the amount of Adversity the Game Master earns per hero at the start of that scene. For example, the Game Master will earn 6 Adversity when 3 heroes begin a scene with a 2 Challenge Level.

Unheroic Actions

Heroes are expected to act like heroes. Whenever a hero performs a cowardly, selfish, treacherous, or otherwise unheroic action, you as the Game Master immediately earn 1 Adversity.

Spending Adversity

As the Game Master, you can use Adversity to do anything players can do with Resolve. If the rules say you can use Resolve to do something, you can use Adversity to do the same thing for any non-player character. Additionally, there are three other things you can do with Adversity.

Flaws (Spending Adversity)

Unlike heroes, non-player characters generally succumb to their Flaws whenever the opportunity presents itself. In fact, clever heroes who learn a villain's Flaws can often use this to their advantage. However, the Game Master can spend 1 Adversity to have a villain or foe resist or overcome one of their Flaws, if only for a moment — in this case, for the rest of the current scene.

Misfortunes

You can spend 1 Adversity to throw a misfortune at the heroes. Misfortunes are random problems, obstacles, and instances of bad luck that make the heroes' lives more difficult. They include things like having a hero's weapon malfunction or run out of ammo, having a stray attack cause collateral damage that endangers civilians, or having a hero's mask get torn off in a fight.

Villainy

Once per story, you can spend 1 Adversity have a villain automatically perform any act of villainy, meaning anything necessary to further the plot of the story. This can be used to have villains do things like throw switches, grab hostages, or escape in order to face the heroes later in the story.