Batman swoops down upon a burglar from his perch high atop a deserted warehouse. The burglar gets a lucky and rare hit on Batman, and then takes off running. Before the burglar can even take four steps Batman quickly throws a batarang and trips up the burglar. When the burglar looks up and finds that he is already tied up and Batman is nowhere to be found. Within minutes the Gotham police arrive on the scene to find the familiar tied up criminal with a little calling card in the form of a bat symbol on the burglar.

In this scenario we see the classic example of a super hero in many RPG's today. Now lets take a look at another scenario. Shadowhawk swoops down upon a burglar from his perch high atop a deserted warehouse. The burglar gets a lucky and rare hit on Shadowhawk, and takes off running. Before the burglar can even take four steps Shadowhawk quickly creates a dark force portal and appears in front of the burglar. The burglar strikes and misses, while Shadowhawk raises his electro claws to attack. The claws rip through the burglar and shock him into a coma. Shadowhawk quickly forms a new portal and disappears. Within minutes the police arrive on the scene to find the all too familiar criminal laying on the ground bleeding and in a coma.

This is the work of heroes in many of today's comics and comic RPG's. In both examples we see and don't see the now famous Spider-Man quote "With great power comes a greater responsibility." Being a DM for many super hero RPG's such as Marvel Super Heroes, DC and Champions, I have found a trend in comics to affect the trend in my campaigns. So what do you do when your super heroes run amok? I asked myself the same question many times in the past. So here is what I came up with and can be fitted to work in just about any type of super hero RPG.

Step One: Add some media pressure on the heroes. Take an episode of the Spider- Man animated series as an example of media pressure. Spider-Man had been accused of killing a student at Empire University. Little did anyone know that this student turned out to be Morbius the living vampire. The Daily Bugle put up a one million dollar reward for the capture of Spider-Man. This not only changed the attitude of the common people towards the heroes, but brought in many merc's onto the scene such as the Punisher to cash in.

Step Two: What a DM can give he can also take away. What if that nice pad your super heroes call home was taken away? A few back payments could take a drastic turn on your hero's war on crime.

Take the current story arch in the X-men comics. With the end of Operation Zero Tolerance the X-men find themselves coming home to an empty mansion. Their enemy had taken away everything they had ever had. No Shiar technology to save the day anymore. No Danger room to practice in. Now the danger is a little too real for the X-men and could be for your team too.

Step Three: In all super hero RPG's there are a couple of rules and procedures for the case of super heroes doing unheroic deeds. In the Marvel Super Hero RPG karma can be taken away from the heroes if they kill or just plain act evil. Soon the heroes will either find themselves without the power to do any simple everyday feat.

Step Four: This is the final step and in a dire situation the best step. What happened when the human population decides that they can no longer handle the super hero population? In the case of the now Classic DC story arch Kingdom Come, the super hero population runs rampant. They no longer follow the rules of man, they make their own rules. They are both judge and executioner. In order for the heroes to fully understand what they have done and had become the leaders around the world launched a nuclear device at a brawl between super heroes. Now, I'm not saying that you should nuke your heroes but just think to yourself what would happen if heroes crossed the line? What happens in today's society when people or nations crossed the line?

There are many ways in which you as the DM can keep your heroes on the right path. These are just a few ideas that you can find just about anywhere, such as comics, books and even TV.

This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web.
Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com