Arrowverse - Season 2 - Mirakuru for your campaign

 

The Mirakuru serum is not a power, not in the traditional sense. It is an infection, a curse, and a miracle all in one vial. Created in the shadows of World War II as a super-soldier experiment, Mirakuru didn’t fade into history like it was supposed to. It survived, whispered about in secret labs and forgotten bunkers, waiting for someone desperate enough to use it.

In game terms, Mirakuru isn’t a casual thing you toss on a character sheet like a new piece of gear. It’s a story choice. The moment a character injects Mirakuru, they step onto a path that changes every fight, every relationship, and probably the campaign itself.

How it works in play:

• A Mirakuru character gets a serious boost right away. Strength jumps by +4 APs, Body by +3 APs, Dexterity by +1 AP. Suddenly that street-level vigilante who was scraping by is tossing cars and shrugging off bullets.

• The serum also grants Regeneration (3 APs). Wounds heal in hours, scars vanish, and injuries that would kill anyone else barely slow them down.

• Age stops mattering so much. The user can potentially live decades longer.

But there’s a price. Mirakuru doesn’t just amplify the body, it shreds the mind. When combat or emotional stress hits, the character has to make a WILL or SPIRIT check. Fail, and the rage takes over. That means friendly fire, broken alliances, and wrecked safe houses. The serum also knocks −2 APs off any WILL-based resistance to Manipulation or Mental Powers. Mirakuru makes you powerful, but it makes you easy to push into doing something you’ll regret.

Now you're probably asking yourself, "What if I want my character to start with this?"

You can, but only if you’re willing to let the story bend around it. A character who begins play as a Mirakuru subject should be treated like someone with a built-in time bomb.

• Option One - Pre-Serum Origins: Your GM could let a character start with Mirakuru already in their system, but that means writing in some serious baggage from the start. Think “Fugitive Experiment” or “Haunted Soldier.” They’ll begin play with the boosts and the drawbacks, but they’ll also have a constant struggle to keep control.

• Option Two - The Serum Arc: The cleaner choice is to have Mirakuru be something the characters find later. Maybe a vial shows up in a gang war, or an old enemy offers it to one of the heroes as the only way to stop a bigger threat. Once they take it, the campaign shifts. They are not the same hero anymore.

Mirakuru should feel rare. If you allow it at character creation, it’s the kind of thing that defines that character for the rest of the game. If you drop it mid-campaign, it becomes an earthquake in your story. Either way, you don’t “get” Mirakuru like you get a new gadget. You survive it.