Reed Richards Is Useless: Difference between revisions

** ''Aberrant'''s Player's Guide provides options for keeping "super-science" from changing things excessively; basically, provides those running games the means to enforce this trope as they see fit.

** Prequel game ''Adventure!'' also has super-science. In this case, only the Inspired, the pulp heroes of the setting (not to be confused with ''Genius'''s Inspired, below), can create super-science inventions, but plenty of them are attempting to use said inventions to change the world. By canon, they largely fail; when the supers of ''Aberrant'' arrive on the scene, the world looks much the same as it does in our timeline.

* ''[[Genius: The Transgression]]'' features many of the [[Mad Scientist|Inspired]] ''trying'' to stop being useless, but it's not going well because normal humans cause Wonders to break, dissolve, or start hungering for their creator's blood.

** This trope was played with in the [[Old World of Darkness]]. Spectacular changes like a Universal Translator or a superpowered healing magic were certainly available to player characters, especially in [[Mage: The Ascension]]. However, they were prone to malfunction because the world was a [[World Half Empty]] running on [[Clap Your Hands If You Believe]] and humanity just didn't believe in the super-tech or old magic. Many supernaturals and human groups also had very good reasons to enforce [[The Masquerade]], and would make sure any Reed Richards who drew too much attention was discredited and then buried in a shallow grave. However, using your power to make the world subtly better was certainly possible. Running around the hospital ward curing folks like a [[Dungeons and Dragons]] cleric was right out, but having a "health spa" that believably helped assuage sicknesses was possible. The Technocratic Union from Mage, in particular, were creating super-science and trickling it out to normal humans when "reality" could handle it, averting this trope.