Champions: New Schticks

[Metaphysician]

Okay, every one of the Champions has a pretty standard schtick. Defender is a powered armor guy, Ironclad is a brick, etc. Presumably, as they gain experience, they will gain greater power in their schtick.

However, a little diversification is good. Hence, what if we assumed all will pick up one "secondary schtick," however you care to define it, eventually. This may be a second source of "power," or a type of ability completely different than their current set.

What kind of secondary schticks can you think of??

( I have two, that I will post later )

[Monolith]

• Defender will become a Gadgeteer.
• Ironclad will become a Energy Projector as he learns to do super-breath and other STR feats.
•Nighthawk will stay the same. He just likes who he is too much.
• Sapphire will gain some mental powers when she learns that the sapphires she has been wearing are psionically empowered.
• Witchcraft will become the Archmage, and as such will be able to do anything she wants.

[Storn]

I have a different take:

Defender will move into the Prof X role to power suit characters, building, training and maintaining a large corp across the globe of like minded individuals who have to fight the good fight, all the while being, totally normal.

Sapphire will retire from the Champs, after her next album goes Platinum. Having gained sonic modulation powers that tie into her crystals, she then teams up with Brian Eno and David Bowie and does the best album of her career, critical acclaim... but the sales of the album suck. Her label drops her, she finds perscription drugs and her next appearence is The Surreal Life contestent.

Witchcraft: Gains a rubic's cube granted from some unknown benign mage society. It is called Widgit. The rest is written in other dimensions of too many Kirby dots.

Nighthawk: Pisses off Witchcraft one too many times after she has acquired the tesseract Rubic's cube called Widgit. She curses him with a spell that turns him into Manhawk. He now flies and broods among the stone gargoyles of Hudson City, for he only has claws for hands and all those years of training as a martial artist and gadgeteering are only marginally useful in his new form.

Ironclad is thrown into the Mariana's Trench by a smart villain. The alien hasn't been seen since. Unknown to any of his former Champions, he has found a much more conducive society to live in among, the deep dwellers. An offshoot of Atlantis.

Kinetix: Has learned to slow down when needed. He enjoys life and makes a fortune delivering super important packages for Fortune 500 companies and hospitals. Happily married, has two kids, both of them superspeedsters too... his new skill set falls under the heading Father and Husband.

[Mutant for Hire]

Defender will at first invest in Multiform, changable only at base, to have a range of different powered armor designs. I like to think that he's eventually going to end up handling the political end of the Champions as they rise in prominence and the government starts paying more attention to them. He's not the gadgeteer.

Sapphire, true to most mutants, is probably going to have a radiation accident at some point that retools her power. One of the things I'm tempted to do is to give her a phyiscal mutation, like giving her a blue crystaline body, in other words, making her a living Sapphire. Power boost because of it, making her more bricklike (sapphire is one of the hardest substances short of diamond) and giving her an energy boost, but it's probably going to be hell on her music career.

Witchcraft I would have her VPP growing in power, though it requires gestures and incantations. Once she started hitting active point caps, I'd start investing points in magical artifacts, ala Doctor Strange and his magical gear.

Nighthawk: I would either make him more of the gadgeteer, ala Batman, or I might take him in a more mystic direction with martial arts. Strip him of his gear and rebuild him up from the inside out on some spiritual progression where he looks for power within him. Either way, fix the costume.

Ironclad: No clue. Bricks in general are hard to work with. Frankly I find him the least interesting of the Champions.

[Agent X]

Defender will become the gadgeteer by saving points by building his improved SUITS as vehicles.

Sapphire learns how to fight.

Witchcraft boosts her power with an odd sort of focus she calls a Widget.

Nighthawk is horribly injured and is given cybernetic implants plus artifical wings.


Ironclad gets a follower, a young alien stuck on the planet and they develop a father/son relationship.

[Metaphysician]

My ideas:

-Ironclad, having too many tough fights turning on whether he can get in melee, decides to dust off the marine skills he let atrophy while fighting in the arena, and has Defender acquire him one of PRIMUS or UNTIL's highest power blaster rifles to wield.

-Nighthawk gets exposed to an experimental psi-activation drug during a battle with PSI. Gradually, he starts seeing odd things, little things at first, later, visions of the older sister of his that died ( and even brief glimpses of himself pre-scarring ). This gets worse and worse overtime, until he has a near breakdown, when he finally confronts himself, and realizes that he's been hiding the truth from himself: that the second VIPER agent he took down was his sister. Given some time to stabilize after this realization, he eventually figures out that he gained low level telepathic abilities.

[Killer Shrike]

Ironclad the former Gladiator becomes a martial artist, in a quest to learn more about the ancient fighting customs of his new homeworld

Sapphire has a widely publicized engagement with a famous superstar, makes a couple of terrible movies with him and then has an equally public break up with him. Her popularity plummets as the lamb-like public finally becomes inundated with her image and grows to detest her. She become embittered and in her anger starts using her powers in more directly dangerous ways (becoming a blasters blaster).

Defender starts making a legion of robotic versions of his armor which he can control from a single high-tech control center, and becomes a stay at home scientist tech character (ala Batman in Kingdom Come and Stark in Earth X).

Nighthawk mysteriously disappears while working one of his solo cases, and repeated investigations come up blank. Not to worry, Nightwind eventually joins the team and is much more effective. He replaces his handguns with stun blasters made for him by Defender for Political Correctness/Publicity reasons.

Witchcraft becomes more and more reclusive as she gets more serious about her magical studies, and eventually seperates from the team, though she makes infrequent cameos when magical stuff occurs.

Kinetic officially joins the team about the same time, and after a near-death experience in combat starts wearing a high tech light-armor suit designed by Defender to give him an on-board computer with various widgets including a Spectral Analyzer (FW), and a few combat tricks (in an MPP).

Eventually the Millenium City 8 falls apart when El Aguijon dies after throwing himself into danger one more time, and Maegara leaves to do more with her sisters. Rakktor (sp) wanders off into the woods to find himself, Stalker goes solo to wage his war on CHOIR, Psiphon disappears (and PSI aint talking), and Lady Liberty isnt heard from for weeks.

Sapphire's growing bitterness pushes her too far and she accidentally kills Binder. After a much broadcasted and lengthy trial she goes to Stronghold, putting Mutant-human relations back about a decade.

Ironclad tires of the constant media attention that hampers the teams every action during the media blitz and decides to depart for a while, traveling to the orient to seek out aged masters of various martial arts in his ongoing journey into Terran martial arts.

Defender invites Commando Rubberbando and Steadfast to join the group to fill the holes in the roster.

After a few weeks with the Champions, an image of Lady Liberty appears again before Steadfast and CR and tells them that she is in trouble; she is the prisoner of a Morbane! Steadfast and CR seek the help of their new comrades in the Champions, and together they seek out Lady Liberty, with assistance & a cameo by Witchcraft and free her. LL reveals her mystic background to the Champions, and Defender invites her to join the group too. She agrees, and quits her real job as a cop in her Secret ID (easy to do since she had gone missing for several weeks while captured by DEMON).

Thus, in about 2 years time, the Champions number 6 and the only original member is Defender.

Kind of Avengers-esque, dont you think?

[Killer Shrike]

Later Nighthawk appears, having been captured and experimented on by VIPER. With his new freakish powers and a deep anger that his so called team mates didnt come find him and save him from the terrible things that VIPER inflicted on him, he becomes a major nemesis for the Champions.

It is eventually revealed that Binder didnt really die -- it was all an elaborate hoax designed to discredit the Champions. Unfortunately Sapphire had already attempted to escape from Stronghold and had her sentence increased. Plus its difficult to prove that a supervillain is still alive without capturing said supervillain which the Champs consistently fail to do. Finally Defender builds a new suit and leaves the control center to "do-it-in-person". He manages to capture Binder and takes him into custody. Harmon Industries secretly funds a new legal effort to free Sapphire, in conjunction with a media awareness project to garner a sympathetic public. Sapphire is eventually released, but her time in Stronghold have had an effect. She had sunk into a deep depression and put on a lot of weight. No longer a glamorous, fit pop star, she quietly retires from the public eye.

Defender, with his new suit, realizes that field work is more fun than sitting in a control center and takes to the field with the Champions once again, but by now Commando Rubberbando has become the defacto tactical leader, his years of military service making him the most qualified. There is some initial friction between the two, but eventually Defender lays out the law -- he is the unconditional leader of the Champions -- its his team. CR takes it in stride, but several tactical snafus follow raising concern among the other Champions. Kinetic feels like CR, whom he has come to respect as a role model, is being unfairly treated by Defender and says so. Defender gets in his face to. Steadfast and Nightwind are conflicted, and Lady Liberty remains silent on the whole affair.

Tension builds quietly among the team, until in a fight with Holocaust Defender is knocked out of the fight by a powerful blast. The Champions fight on, trying to distract Holocaust, giving Defender time to recover, but when he does come back into the fight its with a vengeance! Defender unleases everything he has and, no longer holding back, rocks Holocaust with a staggering blow. Defender, seemingly in a rage, draws back to coup de grace the stunned Holocaust, but Steadfast jumps in to stop him. Defender becomes manic, and the Champions have to turn their efforts to defeating him; Holocaust escapes in the confusion.

The Champions manage to subdue Defender eventually, and take his unconscious form to Dr. Silverback. After prolonged testing, Dr. S comes back with a suprising revelation; the cybernetic controls in the new Defender suit were not correctly attuned to Harmon's mind and were causing a subtle feedback which would induce mild megalomania which would only get worse over time -- because this Harmon is a clone!

Where is the real Defender? The last time the Champions are sure that the real Harmon was around (now that they know his secret ID) was at the ceremony when Sapphire was released. Harmon has been "in seclusion" ever since according to Harmon Industrys.

The Champions seek out Sapphire in her remote inhabitance in Montana, and discover that she has lost all the extra weight she gained in prison via Tae Bo and Pilates! When they tell her of the dissappearance of Defender and that he was really Harmon, she vows not to rest until he is rescued. Rejoining the team (with a new costume that shows off her ripped physique of course), she takes command showing a hard determination never seen in her before.

Will the Champions find Defender? Stay tuned.....

[Killer Shrike]

bump?