If you’re the Narrator, you should read this book cover to cover and do your best to understand how the game works. If you have questions, you can check marvel.com/rpg for help.

Don’t worry if you don’t understand everything in the game at first. While the rules are fairly straightforward, this is a thick book, and there’s a lot of material to absorb. As you play, your command of the game should grow stronger, and you should become more confident in running a game.

If you’re an experienced gamer who’s going to play—rather than run—the game, you don’t have to read anything. The Narrator should be able to teach you the rules you need to know and answer questions as you go along.

Chapters 2, 3 and 4 focus on how the game’s mechanics work, how to understand a character’s profile and how to handle one of the biggest conflicts in any super-hero game: combat.

Chapters 5, 6 and 7 detail how to make your own characters. This includes how to come up with a detailed backstory for a character and how Powers work in the game.

Chapter 8 features scores of Character Profiles that depict many of the greatest Marvel super heroes and villains. This gives players the characters to play (if they don’t want to create their own) and to strive against.

Chapter 9 gives an overview of the Marvel Multiverse, for those who aren’t already steeped in its history. Most of it focuses on Earth-616, the main universe depicted in Marvel comics.

If you want to be a better player, you should read everything through Chapter 9. When you get to Chapter 10, Narration, that’s when the Narrator’s job takes over and you can stop at that point. There are no secrets in this book, though, so if you like, you can keep reading all the way to the end.