Core Rulebook

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BOOK NO.

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Golden Age superhero roleplaying game

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Designed and Written by
Cynthia Celeste Miller

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Edited by
Norbert Franz
Table of Contents
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Introduction 3 Combat 7 Experience Points 11
• About Four-Color Heroics • The Order • About Eperience Points
• How This Works • Turns, Rounds and Actions • PC Improvement
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• Issues and Series • The Attack Check • Revamping the PC
• Dealing Damage
Characters 4-5 Appendix 12-23
• Attributes Momentum 8 • Sample Qualities
• Facets • What Is Momentum? • Power Workshop
• Qualities • Gaining Momentum • Example Heroes
• Quick Bio • Spending Momentum • Example Villains
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• Damage Limit • Character Sheet

Hero Creation 9-11
Making Checks 6 • PCs and GMCs
• When to Make Checks • Qualities
• Rolling the Check • Facets
• The Impact Die • Qualities
• Difficulty Numbers • Keywords
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• Upgrading and Downgrading • Details

Weirdness • Damage Limit

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2 F ou r -C olor H er oi c s
 I ntroduction
About Four-Color Heroics
Four-Color Heroics is a compact superhero roleplay- against diabolical supervillains, greedy mobsters and,
ing game meant to emulate the comicbooks of yester- of course, Nazi menaces.
year, particularly the Golden Age. There’s nothing stop- You’ll need a handful of 8-sided dice (d8s), 10-sided
ping you from using it for other eras as well, however. dice (d10s) and 12-sided dice (d12s) in order to play.

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The game system is meant to be simple without sac- One of the d10s should be a different color or size than
rificing nuance. You can learn the system quickly, gen- the others. The reason for this will be explained lat-
erate some characters and dive into a world in which er. In addition to dice, you should acquire some glass
masked heroes in colorful tights fight the good fight beads or something similar to be used as tokens.

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How this Works
A roleplaying game is a type of gaming experience The characters created by the players are called
that involves one participant acting as the Game Player Characters (or PCs). All the characters they in-
Master (or GM), while the other participants act as teract with in the game — from normal citizens to the
players. Each player takes on the role of a superhero villains and everyone in between — are called Game
of their own design, while the GM acts as the world Master Characters (or GMCs).
around them in a verbalized collaborative story. This You can find more elaborate and thorough explana-
means the GM creates the basic plot and presents it to tions of how roleplaying games work online. A quick

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the players in the form of scenes. The players, in turn,
tell what their characters do, with the GM describing
the results of their actions. The rules come into play
mainly when the heroes’ success is in question.
search will uncover a wealth of information on the
subject.
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Issues and Series
If you’re keeping true to the Golden Age comics, pleted in a single afternoon or evening (often called a
your games will represent an ongoing series featur- “game session”).
ing the same characters, with each issue containing a A series can last as long as you wish. There is no spe-
complete stand-alone story. An issue is usually com- cific number of issues that a series must last.
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F ou r -C olor H er oi c s 3
 C haracters
Attributes
Every character has five Attributes that represent Ratings
their overall innate abilities. Each Attribute has a Rating that lets us know how
good (or bad) the character is in that area.
• Action measures the character’s physical prowess.
• Combat measures the character’s ability to inflict Rating 1: Severely Impaired

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harm on others. Rating 2: Poor
• Alertness measures the character’s sense of Rating 3: Average
awareness and ability to react quickly. Rating 4: Good
• Brainpower measures the character’s mental fac- Rating 5: Great
ulties. Rating 6: Slightly Superhuman

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• Charisma measures the character’s ability to in- Rating 7: Moderately Superhuman
fluence others. Rating 8: Highly Superhuman
Rating 9+: Cosmic

Facets
Whereas Attributes paint the character’s abilities • Charisma has Forcefulness (rough or overt ways
with a wide brush, Facets go into more detail. Each At- to influence others) and Persuasion (subtle ways to
tribute has two Facets: influence others).

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• Action has Athletics (traveling via running, swim-
ming, climbing, etc.) and Brawn (strength and tough-
ness).
Upgrades and Downgrades
Facets are measured by Upgrades and Downgrades.
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• Combat has Fight (close combat) and Aim (ranged • Upgrades range from +1 to +3 and ultimately make
combat). the character more efficient in that Facet.
• Alertness has Observation (perception) and Re- • Downgrades range from -1 to -3 and decrease the
flexes (quickly responding to danger). character’s efficiency in that Facet.
• Brainpower has Knowledge (know-how, street
smarts and education) and Resolution (willpower).
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Qualities
Qualities are things that not every character pos- atop a skyscraper. The Penalty is usually -1 for Flaws,
sesses. There are three types of Qualities: Skills, Flaws but they might have a -2 Penalty.
and Powers.
• Various Effects: Some Flaws are so gonzo that they
Skills need more than what a simple Penalty could convey.
Skills represent training or specific knowledge the These require the player and GM to work together to
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character has acquired. Skills are measured with Bo- craft something more elaborate. For example, if the
nuses. Most Skills create a +1 Bonus, but if the char- character suffers damage from a substance that is
acter is an expert or master at the Skill, they might harmless to everyone else, the solution could be that
instead create a +2 Bonus. the character gains a Damage Token for every ten min-
utes they’re near it.
Flaws
Flaws reflect weaknesses or vulnerabilities that Powers
plague the character. Flaws are appraised in one of two Whether they come directly from the character or
ways: from an item, Powers are functionally the same thing.
That is, they either allow characters to do things that
• Penalty: Most Flaws impart a Penalty under cer- normal humans can’t do at all or do things better than
tain circumstances. For example, if the character has normal humans. As such, they can have three differ-
a Flaw called “Fear of Heights”, the GM may require ent ways of being graded. (Continued on the following page)
the Penalty to be applied to their rolls when fighting

4 F ou r -C olor H er oi c s
 Keywords
Keywords gen-
erally have no
Hero • Female • Superhuman • Organic game effects of
their own, but
Action
Attributes and Facets

can be refer-
Athletics: +0 enced by Qual-
6 Brawn: +1 Upgrade ities and other
effects.

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Combat Furthermore,
Fight: +1 upgrade
First Appearance: they can have
5 Aim: -1 Downgrade
Animal fables #7
(Fall 1947)
significant sto-
ry implications.

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Alertness For example, if
The Princess of the
Moon was raised in a re-
a character has
Observation: +0
3 Reflexes: +0
mote area of Samark-
land, having come from
the “Robot” key-
word, Powers
a long line of warrior
women. She swore that that affect or-
Brainpower she would never marry
a man unless he could ganic flesh won’t
Knowledge: +0 best her in combat.
bother them.
3 Resolution: +0
Taking her family heir-
loom, an enigmatic rock
called the Moonstone,

Quick Bio
she left her homeland
charisma

4
Forcefulness: +0
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Persuasion: +1 Upgrade

Teaching
to travel

The
to

princess
America
in order to find Prince
Mengu, a suitor she was
fond of.
found
him working as a teach-
er under an alias and
defeated him soundly.
This

run-down
section
gives a short

what the charac-

of
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(Skill, +1 Bonus Die, 4 pts.)
In her secret identity, she is a teacher.
Nevertheless, she con-
vinced him to join her
ter is all about.
in fighting crime. She It’s a great way
Moonstone too assumed a false
(Narrow Power, +1 Bonus Die to Combat identity as Clare Lune, to learn about
Qualities

and Action, 8 pts.)

This mysterious rock makes her practi-
a teacher at the same the character’s
school.
cally invincible in battle and “superior
to any man”.
past, personali-
• Positive: +1 Upgrade in opposed checks ty, modus ope-
vs. male characters.
• Positive: Bonus affects 1 additional randi and what-
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Attribute (Action).
Keywords: Item, Magic
ever else seems
relevent. An il-
21*
Moonship
(Narrow Power, Rating 4, 8 pts.) lustration is also
This telepathically-controlled air-
ship enables the Princess of the moon Damage appropriate.
to fly. She maneuvers it using Brain- Limit
power (Resolution).
Keywords: Item
* Damage Limit is 18 without
the moonstone. Damage Limit
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This shows us
how many Dam-
age Tokens the
character can
Qualities (continued) safely take before
• Bonus: These Powers grant a Bonus Additionally, Powers may have Spe- being Incapaci-
that can affect the character’s efficiency cial Rules. These alter the way the Power tated. An Inca-
with a specific Attribute or Facet under works in both positive and negative ways. pacitated char-
certain circumstances. You’ll find more about these in the Hero acter is knocked
• Rating: These Powers function like At- Creation section. out, rendereded
tributes, with their own Rating. Such pow- Powers also have Keywords to describe helpless or even
ers don’t rely on Attributes to function, them. These function just like the charac- killed.
but instead stand alone. ter’s own Keywords. Some examples in-
• Flat: These Powers have no variation clude: Physical, Mental, Item, Ice, Protec-
in quality. tion (Physical), Protection (Mental), etc.

F ou r -C olor H er oi c s 5