Jeff Dee's Mighty Protectors (Villains & Vigilantes V3) on Sale in PDF

I never owned Villains & Vigilantes growing up as a gamer but I sure played it. We tried about every supers game in the late 70s and early 80s and while none stuck around and were played for any length of time, V & V stuck around in our minds. How could it not? The ads in Dragon Magazine just looked so damn cool.

Well, the latest edition of Villains & Vigilantes just released in PDF and its called Mighty Protectors.

You can combat the forces of evil! Find their hidden enclaves with your super-senses, and bust your way in with powerful fists! Use your incredible agility or invulnerability to ward off their attacks as you blast away with energy bolts, or confront them with your martial arts or weapon skills! Drag them squirming and cursing to prison, to be brought to justice! Become a champion of truth and an idol of millions! 

Villains and Vigilantes TM - the world’s first complete superhero role-playing game - is back again. V&V 3.0 Mighty Protectors® features dynamic random & point-balanced character creation, accessible fast-paced rules, brand new powers, streamlined mechanics, all-new illustrations, and an imaginative, far-ranging campaign setting - The Mighty Protectors® Multiverse - created by Jack Herman and Jeff Dee! 

Mighty Protectors is a registered trademark of Monkey House games. Villains and Vigilantes is a trademark of Scott Bizar, used with permission.

Mighty Protectors is $14.99 in PDF.

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Kickstarter - Villains and Vigilantes™ 3.0: The Mighty Protectors™ RPG

I had an opportunity to talk with +Jeff Dee at NTRPG Con this past June. His excitement for the latest version of Villains and Vigilantes just oozed from him.

I never played V&V's earlier editions, although I do remember creating characters for it back in my High School days. I do remember it was referred to among my friends as "the playable" superhero game (as apposed to Champions, which was simply too crunchy for us)

I'll be backing Villains and Vigilantes™ 3.0: The Mighty Protectors™ RPG the moment my first pension check comes at the end of this month. I think that's going to be the hardest part of retirement - adjusting to once a month checks ;)

From the blurb:

The new 'third edition' has a name, and not just a number: it’s called MIGHTY PROTECTORS™ after the player group from the very first V&V campaign in our official setting – the Mighty Protectors Multiverse. 

Mighty Protectors features a new streamlined and expanded revision of the V&V rules, an intro to the Mighty Protectors Multiverse (about which we've only provided scattered details before), and all-new artwork.

Yep, I'm in.

Monkey House Games (Jeff Dee and Jack Herman) Reaches Settlement to Publish Villains & Vigilantes

It's been a long road, which included a GoFundMe to help pay for the legal costs, but Jeff Dee and Jack Herman now have the rights to publish Villains & Vigilantes.

Here's the relevant wording from the recently updated Villains & Vigilantes page at OBS:

This latest version of the game- dubbed version 2.1- revives the 1982 version with a few corrections and rules additions. It also features brand new illustrations from co-creator Jeff Dee. Villains and VigilantesTM is a trademark of Scott Bizar, used with permission.

Jee and Jack didn't win the final lawsuit, but at least there is a settlement.

You can read a much more detailed article over at Workbench. Rogers does a nice job following the case through the courts. Give it a read. It's well worth your time.

Tip of the hat to +Harley Stroh

Jeff Dee Retains / Regains the Legal Right to Publish Villains & Vigilantes

Looks like +Jeff Dee has the rights to publish Villains &Vigilantes and Scott Bizar does not.

Here's the posting from Jeff's V&V Facebook page:

Update on the Legal Battle 

We stated in a previous post that we expected it to take at least 3 months for the courts to issue a ruling on the appeals surrounding our victory in the lawsuit over the publication rights to V&V. 

Well, it didn't take 3 months. We have the court's ruling in hand. The appeals court is sending the case back down to Arizona to re-visit several issues. But on one particular issue - the one that's most central to our case - the judges were absolutely clear. Quoting from their ruling: 

"Reviewing de novo, Lopez v. Smith, 203 F.3d 1122, 1131 (9th Cir. 2000) (en banc), we hold that summary judgment in favor of Dee and Herman was proper on the copyright claims. The 1979 contract granted to FGU, Inc., publication rights to the 1979 Villains and Vigilantes Rulebook. The parties’ course of conduct extended the contract to apply to the 1982 Rulebook, as well. But the contract expressly provided that the agreement would terminate by operation of law if FGU, Inc., ceased to do business for any reason. The agreement also prohibited the assignment of any rights under the contract without the written consent of the other parties. By the terms of the agreement, when FGU, Inc., was dissolved in 1991, all rights to the 1979 and 1982 Rulebooks reverted to Dee and Herman. Accordingly, all sales after the 1991 dissolution of FGU, Inc., of the 1979 or 1982 Rulebooks were infringing acts." 

In plain English: we have the legal right to publish our superhero role-playing game, and Scott Bizar does not. 

As we said, the judges sent several other issues - most notably, the question of the trademark - back down to the Arizona courts. We remain confident that all of our rights will ultimately be upheld. 

Thanks for your continued support! 

-Jeff Dee & Jack Herman

Villains and Vigilantes - New and the Same

I'm sure you've already heard the Villains and Vigilantes has been redited and reformated with new artwork from co-creator Jeff Dee. 

Strange thing is, V&V missed me in its first incarnation.  Not that I didn't know about it.  My gaming group back in the 80s was always torn between V&V and its random chart charactrer generation, and Champions' "lets set a session or two aside to create some heros... point based... advantages... disadvanages... tweaking...mixing... arghh".  The few times we decided to try a Supers game, we defaulted to Champions.  I think we ran one session of gaming amidst all the sessions of character gen.  So sad.

I've often wondered if  we had chosen Villains and Vigilantes instead, maybe we would have gotten past character generation and actualy gotten to play a bit.  Now I can give it a shot and find out (although I do have one hugely anti-supers player, so we will see ;)