Turning the Fantasy Party to Superheroes

We now pause our discussion of coolness in D&D for a word from our Joesky sponsor.

In the fantasy adventuring party, some of them fight and others have spells.

In the superhero party, everyone fights and everyone has one "spell."

(Except Batman.)

(And Doctor Strange.)

Superknight by John Staub.

This suggests a "medieval mutants" campaign using the standard rules of your D&D-oid system, but there are no clerics or wizards. Instead, everyone is a fighter or thief (or a scholar, with stats as a wizard and gaining experience twice as quickly).

All PCs and major villains get a mutant power that is a (d6: 1-3, cleric, 4-6, wizard) spell, level determined by the minimum of 2d6. You get an additional, thematically related spell at every odd level. If the power's level is:

Greater than twice your level: Using it knocks you out for 1 hour.
Greater than your level: You can only use it once a day.
Equal to your level: You can use it twice per day.
Lower than your level: You can use it three times a day
Lower than half your level: You can use it at will.

Also, this looks good for a psionics system in a standard fantasy campaign, with an appropriate XP tax on the lucky psionicist.