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With the announcement of a new Batman miniatures game from Monolith, I was wondering, what would make this one stand out from the crowd of other Batman games...

My first thought is that it needs to feel like Batman.
1)There needs to be stealth. This gives way to great strategy, picking off the weak enemy's and busting into a room, taking out a group.
2)There needs to gadgets. Explosives. Drones. Tripwires.
3) Inner monologues. Nothing beats the sound of a gravelly voice, explaining why you do, what you do, before you do it.

What are your thoughts?

Needs dead parents. Also BatMetal.

1) A massive, entirely self-centred ego.

Seriously. Think about it.

He's a multi-billionaire who takes out his anger issues by beating up the poor.

Why doesn't he instead offer to properly fund the GCPD? See all his snacky body armour, and how it's bullet proof? Think of the GCPD lives he could save if he shared that. His advanced surveillance toys? Think of the crime clear up rate if he shared that. All of his gadgets could easily be shared out en masse - and when you've got a Police Department capable of tackling criminals the way Batman does, you're not going to have a crime problem for very much longer. At all.

But no. He's not a good guy. He's not even an anti-hero. He's just a colossal, selfish phallus.

From the trailer, this show seems to cover that 'what if?' without it actually being Bruce Wayne Fox's APB

I can't wait for it to air in the UK!

Batman needs gadgets. OP is bang on with that one.

There also needs to be crime fighting. This one seems obvious but in a lot of media Batman has ended up fighting inter-galactic whatevers, and it never feels right. Batman isn't purely a street level character, but he fits best when his challenges are against mob figures and the like, not intergalactic conquering armies.

Batman needs gravitas. I think the OP touched on this with 'inner monologues' and the gravelly voice, but it is more than that. Batman is a stoic, lonely figure, even among allies he is always planning for every eventuality.

Batman needs to have a ruthless edge. He doesn't kill, but he is a billionaire who's decided to spend his evenings punching street thugs in the face. You don't make a decision like that unless you're the kind of guy who's quick to solve problems with a ruthless application of face punching.

Probably the biggest one though is that Batman needs to be the world's greatest detective. A lot of Batman stories focus on action or personal drama, and skip the mystery solving, detective work.

Finally, Batman needs great rivalries with his villains. It isn't a coincidence that Batman has such a great rogue's gallery. A lot of that comes from Batman being human with no superpowers, the same as most of his best villains. This means the conflicts are more personal, and have more scope to make the contest about personality over the interaction of super powers.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Needs dead parents. Also BatMetal.

LOL. Love it. Maybe a campaign mode where you track down the killer with evidence!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
1) A massive, entirely self-centred ego.

Seriously. Think about it.

He's a multi-billionaire who takes out his anger issues by beating up the poor.

Why doesn't he instead offer to properly fund the GCPD? See all his snacky body armour, and how it's bullet proof? Think of the GCPD lives he could save if he shared that. His advanced surveillance toys? Think of the crime clear up rate if he shared that. All of his gadgets could easily be shared out en masse - and when you've got a Police Department capable of tackling criminals the way Batman does, you're not going to have a crime problem for very much longer. At all.

You know, I have never thought of that...

In BW defense, I believe his money is not infinite. He could probably kit out 20-60 officers, but it would be determining the one he could trust. Remember, the GCPD is corrupt. How far?
And didn't BW pay for all of Nightwings bits and bobs, as well as Robins?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 sebster wrote:

Batman needs gravitas. I think the OP touched on this with 'inner monologues' and the gravelly voice, but it is more than that.

I was being comical. I don't think there is a game that uses “inner monologue cards” to preform the actions of their character.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 sebster wrote:

Probably the biggest one though is that Batman needs to be the world's greatest detective. A lot of Batman stories focus on action or personal drama, and skip the mystery solving, detective work.

It would be nice to have a REAL detective game based on Batman. But I don't think it will be this one. This will concentrate more on combat.

Yet with Wayne Enterprises (not just Brucie Boy) backing the GCPD, funds are damned near limitless.

The main issue in Gotham is getting the conviction - yet Batman has the toys to covertly record stuff via Satellite - and there's nothing stopping him running for Office on a clear, and highly plausible 'I will clean up Gotham, bigly' ticket. He's got the funds. He's got the tech. But man, he just enjoys wailing on the poor and the desperate too much....

Batman is a supervillain who decided to be villainous against criminals rather then the rest of the population.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Why doesn't he instead offer to properly fund the GCPD? See all his snacky body armour, and how it's bullet proof? Think of the GCPD lives he could save if he shared that. His advanced surveillance toys? Think of the crime clear up rate if he shared that. All of his gadgets could easily be shared out en masse - and when you've got a Police Department capable of tackling criminals the way Batman does, you're not going to have a crime problem for very much longer. At all.

Actually, there is a TV series out about a Wayne Enterprises company that develops gadgets to help the "normal" people survive the hero-villain battles called "Powerless".
http://www.nbc.com/powerless?nbc=1
The references to Bruce and Batman are quite funny, they seem to portray that Batman skims the best tech from them for his stuff.

It is a bit of a rip-off of "Damage Control" by Marvel where it is a construction company that specializes in repairs after a hero-villain battle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damage_Control_(comics)

Besides, they always portrayed the GCPD as corrupt, so no point up-gunning them to be a possible problem for the Bat.

ANYWAY on topic:

Q:What makes Batman, Batman?

Answer:

- He is angry, always has been, it fuels his malicious humor, he likes scaring the heck out of criminals, it is his #1 drive (Some abilities to cause fear would be of interest). This "darkness" in him allows him to better understand the criminals, he does refer to himself as "not nice", he only differentiates himself with a couple core rules: no guns and no killing. All this determines his core behavior. Anyone who is contrary to his rules he appears to ramp up how much he hurts them. <edit> I heard him referenced as a "Justice Fanatic" (saw a Judge Dredd vs Batman at one point) but I really do not see high ideal justice at play here: you victimize someone, you get punishment depending on his mood.

- He is smart, he is always shown being a few moves ahead, anything that can play up to that would be a winner (some activation ability when conditions met would work). He keeps being billed as "the great detective" to the point of being preternatural. This is his core "super power".

- His gadgets yes, but the creative use of them is always what seems to be showcased (again pointing to the second point). I think his best moments are using a gadget for what it was not intended. I honestly think using a whip or a pencil he can still exude "Batman" with these humble "gadgets".

- His physicality, he wants to get in close and personal, you feel he has a need to get hands-on... that is where he most gets his "therapy" out of the whole thing. Portraying him as a high level combatant human is the way to go, where it gets to unnatural status is his knowledge and planning ahead as mentioned. This is the only thing that puts him most at risk where he throws some of his impressive reasoning "out the window".

- It would be negligent without mentioning his other "super-power", he is rich. It makes much of what he does possible.

He never really needed Robin, Alfred has always been the one point of stability that seems to give the Bruce Wayne persona any grounding in the "real-world".

You know that the real Bruce is Batman.

Bats, without an obsession with bats he would just be a man. A man like Tony Stark however with an obsession for having a deep voice rather than a drinking problem.

 n0t_u wrote:
Bats, without an obsession with bats he would just be a man. A man like Tony Stark however with an obsession for having a deep voice rather than a drinking problem.

Yea Tony Stark is really an inventor who likes to play with his toys and fix the harm toys like his have done.
Bats...has issues. Without Alfred Bats would be a one man Brazilian death squad with lots of tech to help him. He would not be a good guy, just a Los Pepes with better guns.

A sarcastic English butler.

The gadgets and the Bat-fu fighting all flow from Batman's supreme feature of being the World's Greatest Detective. Therefore, a game about Batman should be a game about solving mysterious crimes. That's just the ground-level, threshold analysis. The deeper consideration is that Bats is not really Bats without his Rogues Gallery - and that is where the psychological aspect comes to bear. Every incarnation of Batman has to fess up to the fact that Sherlock Holmes didn't dress up as a bat. And Moriarty did not dress up as a clown. So the other fundamental ingredient is Batman solves mysteries and his enemies commit crimes as a manifestation of/therapy for their psychological problems.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Yet with Wayne Enterprises (not just Brucie Boy) backing the GCPD, funds are damned near limitless.

The main issue in Gotham is getting the conviction - yet Batman has the toys to covertly record stuff via Satellite - and there's nothing stopping him running for Office on a clear, and highly plausible 'I will clean up Gotham, bigly' ticket. He's got the funds. He's got the tech. But man, he just enjoys wailing on the poor and the desperate too much....

He's going to make Gotham Great Again!

As to the GCPD tangent ...

So Batman is not actually interested in ending crime. Or really even preventing it. I mean, maybe Bruce Wayne tells himself that. But if crime actually ended, wherefore Batman right? And Bruce needs Batman because [psychological problems]. The whole Batman thing is a hobby that took over the guy's life. It's the ultimate form of privilege. All of Gotham is Bruce's playground or asylum cell, whichever you prefer.

This rabbit hole goes a lot deeper TBH. If you keep in mind that crimes are the creatures of laws, and laws exist ultimately for the benefit of those who create them, and that legislators tend to be wealthy or at least in the pockets of the wealthy - Bruce's bizarre fetish lifestyle actually turns out to be "IRL" taken to its logical albeit extreme conclusion. I think this is why the Arkham series video games do such a great job of making you feel like Batman - basically Gotham is a big open-world game which Batman plays for fun.

Coming back down to Earth a little, Batman is just not that ambitious. Contrast him to somebody like Reed Richards who wants to "solve everything." Hunger, poverty, war - Mr. Fantastic honestly believes these are the products of a flawed design that can be engineered away (interesting note, Dr Doom has solved them in Latveria). Batman either disagrees or doesn't care, something closer to Judge Dredd.

You know, the idea of inner monologue got me thinking. Were you to put random, relevant phrases onto cards with in game effects, and construct a monologue deck you could encourage players to create situations where they could benefit from it. A gadget deck, or utility belt would go along well with it too- honestly, an Arkham horror style game with options to play as Batman and crew plus an optional AI deck to reverse it and try to clear the Asylum of Batman with your goon squad would best capture the feel of Batman. He needs to be constantly trying to manipulate others into his victory conditions- which constantly shift.

Although at that point, you're talking more of a fancy board game than a miniatures game.

Well we are actually talking about a fancy board game, despite OP's description.

Please, everybody knows that batmans super power is money.

So...Batman Monopoly? Instead of going directly to jail, punch a villain until he goes to jail.

We need a BrokenBack Batman!

Robin you complete me

 Crazy_Carnifex wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Yet with Wayne Enterprises (not just Brucie Boy) backing the GCPD, funds are damned near limitless.

The main issue in Gotham is getting the conviction - yet Batman has the toys to covertly record stuff via Satellite - and there's nothing stopping him running for Office on a clear, and highly plausible 'I will clean up Gotham, bigly' ticket. He's got the funds. He's got the tech. But man, he just enjoys wailing on the poor and the desperate too much....

He's going to make Gotham Great Again!

LOL, That's a great subtitle for the game "BATMAN: Making Gotham great again"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Gitzbitah wrote:
You know, the idea of inner monologue got me thinking. Were you to put random, relevant phrases onto cards with in game effects, and construct a monologue deck you could encourage players to create situations where they could benefit from it. A gadget deck, or utility belt would go along well with it too- honestly, an Arkham horror style game with options to play as Batman and crew plus an optional AI deck to reverse it and try to clear the Asylum of Batman with your goon squad would best capture the feel of Batman. He needs to be constantly trying to manipulate others into his victory conditions- which constantly shift.

Although at that point, you're talking more of a fancy board game than a miniatures game.

I'm sure there is a fine way to integrate some of that into a game like this. Look at Mansion on Madness second edition...(although there is a bit to much app involved there)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jehan-reznor wrote:
We need a BrokenBack Batman!

Robin you complete me

And an Azrael style Batsuit

His wits, as brilliantly described in CH:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?annotation_id=annotation_404665&feature=iv&list=PLAEB286C039A1A25E&src_vid=1byycwl8qgc

It's the car. Chicks dig the car.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
It's the car. Chicks dig the car.

Times have changed. I think it's more the size of his piscine, ah! Swiming Pool, than the car now days

 Talizvar wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Why doesn't he instead offer to properly fund the GCPD? See all his snacky body armour, and how it's bullet proof? Think of the GCPD lives he could save if he shared that. His advanced surveillance toys? Think of the crime clear up rate if he shared that. All of his gadgets could easily be shared out en masse - and when you've got a Police Department capable of tackling criminals the way Batman does, you're not going to have a crime problem for very much longer. At all.

Actually, there is a TV series out about a Wayne Enterprises company that develops gadgets to help the "normal" people survive the hero-villain battles called "Powerless".
http://www.nbc.com/powerless?nbc=1
The references to Bruce and Batman are quite funny, they seem to portray that Batman skims the best tech from them for his stuff.

It is a bit of a rip-off of "Damage Control" by Marvel where it is a construction company that specializes in repairs after a hero-villain battle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damage_Control_(comics)

Besides, they always portrayed the GCPD as corrupt, so no point up-gunning them to be a possible problem for the Bat.

ANYWAY on topic:

Q:What makes Batman, Batman?

Answer:

- He is angry, always has been, it fuels his malicious humor, he likes scaring the heck out of criminals, it is his #1 drive (Some abilities to cause fear would be of interest). This "darkness" in him allows him to better understand the criminals, he does refer to himself as "not nice", he only differentiates himself with a couple core rules: no guns and no killing. All this determines his core behavior. Anyone who is contrary to his rules he appears to ramp up how much he hurts them. <edit> I heard him referenced as a "Justice Fanatic" (saw a Judge Dredd vs Batman at one point) but I really do not see high ideal justice at play here: you victimize someone, you get punishment depending on his mood.

- He is smart, he is always shown being a few moves ahead, anything that can play up to that would be a winner (some activation ability when conditions met would work). He keeps being billed as "the great detective" to the point of being preternatural. This is his core "super power".

- His gadgets yes, but the creative use of them is always what seems to be showcased (again pointing to the second point). I think his best moments are using a gadget for what it was not intended. I honestly think using a whip or a pencil he can still exude "Batman" with these humble "gadgets".

- His physicality, he wants to get in close and personal, you feel he has a need to get hands-on... that is where he most gets his "therapy" out of the whole thing. Portraying him as a high level combatant human is the way to go, where it gets to unnatural status is his knowledge and planning ahead as mentioned. This is the only thing that puts him most at risk where he throws some of his impressive reasoning "out the window".

- It would be negligent without mentioning his other "super-power", he is rich. It makes much of what he does possible.

He never really needed Robin, Alfred has always been the one point of stability that seems to give the Bruce Wayne persona any grounding in the "real-world".

You know that the real Bruce is Batman.

A lot of this is post Miller Batman, no? Prior Bats wasn't so angry and physical. He was much more about the mental side. More detective than bruiser. He could throw a punch, sure, but that was not portrayed as a primary strength. He also was generally optimistic and pretty consistent on his values. Kind of a Sherlock Holmes in a costume. The tragedy of his youth, though traumatic, was shown to have shaped him more positively than later depictions. This is where Batman's no kill code originates.

Miller integrated a lot of nihilistic and fascist themes, for better or worst. He moved him a lot closer to the Punisher. Depending on writer, he varies from brooding to borderline psychopathic, and is a lot more fighty. Miller also didn't have a problem braking the "no kill" rule, and portrayed Batman as willing to use torture. He also brought in a lot od pyscho sexual conflict and, in typical Miller fashion, sexualization of violence. This is also when you see a lot of playing up of the BDSM elements of female costumes.

Then you have the animated series depictions, Schumacher films, etc.

I am just waiting for a game where vampire Batman shows up!

 jmurph wrote:
I am just waiting for a game where vampire Batman shows up!

Red Rain/Bloodstorm/Crimson Mist proves that the Dark Age wasn't all crap; in fact this trilogy is amazingly good! Not sure if I'd want to see the concept wrung out for mainstream dollars by WB. At least not as a movie. But an Arkham ____ style game less about technology and more about the twisted, gothic setting? YES PLEASE.

On the topic of Batman's defining characteristics, the trilogy emphasizes the element of self-sacrifice. It may be hopelessly romantic against Moore and Miller's psychologized vision but Bruce Wayne could have just paid for some really good therapy and moved out of Gotham. The vampire angle allows for a nice explanation of Batman aside from him being a super wealthy weirdo inflicting his fetish life style on a city of poor people.

Batman's methods won't work for the GCPD, because Batman's methods break tons of laws all the time. Break and Enter, Trespass, Illegal Search and Seizure, Assault and Battery, Blackmail, Torture, Theft, Espionage, Cybercrime, these are all tools Batman uses regularly. Giving the police a few gadgets won't help them because they can't use those gadgets without breaking due process and they'd never convict anyone.

Batman isn't even about getting criminals convicted. Most of the time he's just stopping a crime/plot in progress and the police have to pick up the pieces afterwards. This works because the GCPD could not stop these criminals without breaking all the laws that Batman is, and they'd lose their jobs.

The real mystery is how most of Gotham's criminals don't "Hang Themselves" or "Get shot trying to escape" almost immediately after arrest. A corrupt police force is NOT going to hesitate to kill supervillans that try to kill mass numbers of people, and especially kills other police officers.

It wouldn't surprise me if this new game had vampires. Bat's has to take them on without being bitten, but if he is, his objects change during the scenario. A Vampire Batman will be a good KS add on. Although I wouldn't want a Bat Mite....Marmite, yes. That's nice on toast

 John Prins wrote:
Batman's methods won't work for the GCPD, because Batman's methods break tons of laws all the time. Break and Enter, Trespass, Illegal Search and Seizure, Assault and Battery, Blackmail, Torture, Theft, Espionage, Cybercrime, these are all tools Batman uses regularly. Giving the police a few gadgets won't help them because they can't use those gadgets without breaking due process and they'd never convict anyone.

Amusingly, this was addressed - sort of - in the Batman / Judge Dredd crossover where Batman turns up in Mega-City One, and gets arrested by Dredd for vigilantism. The irony being that Dredd is allowed to do all the things Batman does in Gotham, but only because he's a Judge.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
The irony being that Dredd is allowed to do all the things Batman does in Gotham, but only because he's a Judge.

Yeah, but it's completely different because Dredd is subjected to all the checks and regulations that keep the judges in check. Like, for instance… *crickets* .

The fact that if you step out of line, the SJS will turn up and ship your sorry ass to Titan.