paigeoliver Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Ok, we are starting up a new Champions campaign with a few guidelines. The city of choice is St. Louis. The time is an unspecified time that encompasses 1980-1988. The exact year is unimportant and will never be mentioned. The characters are all going to be younger characters, but not quite a full fledged "Teen Champions" setup. Ages should be 17-21. Points wise we are doing 200 points + 100 points in disadvantages. Secret ID is required. Also, as an added twist all the characters know each other in both secret ID and hero ID, but none of them KNOW the other character's secret IDs. (An added bit of Paranoia-esque fun). Here are the characters so far. I made one for myself too, as I am HOPING that the GM role can rotate around from time to time. Katie Keene (No, not that one). Katie is a speedster-brick. Doesn't quite have that ULTRASPEED, but doesn't have that 60 STR either. She has a 40 STR, a multi-power that consists of lots of +1/2 naked advantages for her STR (and HA, and superleap), and then she separately has a lot of running. She has a really high PD and ED, but no resistant defences. Katie is a bit slow (int 8), and mildly cute (COM 12) but far from a knockout. She is 17 years old and in her last year of high school. She takes X2 effects from mental illusions, likes to listen to the GoGo's, her favorite video game is Ms. Pac-Man, her favorite movie is "The Goonies", and has a crush on both "The Coreys". Katie's powers are mutant in origin, and when she isn't fighting crime she tends to like to drive around in her light blue 1980 Mercedes 280SE, which was handed down from her parents (that is the 4-door Mercedes, not the cool convertible one). The other two characters are. Mr. Perfect (or Mr. Wonderful or something like that, 19 years old). He is a "radiation accident" type hero, and he is an energy projector with control over gravity and force fields. I don't have all his details yet. (Unsure of name) - a 20 year old trailer park mentalist with a mullet. Claims he was kidnapped by aliens, and he wasn't lying. Likes heavy metal. Anybody have any good ideas for some good 80s based gaming? One of the characters (the Mr. Wonderful one), has a KS Defender (the arcade game), so I am thinking about working some sort of arcade game contest in there (I also have a Defender machine in my living room, not far from the game table, so maybe that part could go live action!!!). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paigeoliver Posted October 18, 2004 Author Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Also to help build the 80s atmosphere and to help flesh out the secret IDs (since I plan on this game being half secret ID action), I am asking for this list from each character. Favorite movie Favorite song Favorite video game Favorite TV show Car owned (or wanted) and any other juicy 80s tidbits. Also, I could CERTAINLY use some NPCs or stock heros to hand out to walk on players, so if anyone else wants to make any fitting characters then go ahead and post them here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OddHat Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Sounds like a very local, America based game, but the big world events of the 80s could be used for plot seeds. The USSR is on the way out and getting desperate, Hong Kong is still under the control of the UK but is looking at 1997 and feeling nervous, Middle Eastern terrorism is getting seriously noticed outside of the region, Libya is a major player on the world bad guy scene, China is starting to seriously modernize, and Japan is at the top of its bubble. Jackie Chan is making some very cool Kung Fu comedies and modern action films, Anime is gaining Saturday Morning visibility in the US, the Super Friends are still Super and the almost good Legion of Doom stories are coming, Blue Falcon and Dynomutt fight crime, Hong Kong Fuey is the number one super guy, and Alan Moore is doing his Marvel Man / Miracleman stories in Warrior Magazine and about to spearhead the UK Iron Age influence in American Comics. X-Men is still worth reading in the 80s. Hana Barbara is remaking Space Ghost and airing a bunch of 60s cartoons again. Live action Television Super Heroes from the late 70s and early 80s include the Bionic Man / Bionic Woman series, Wonder Woman, Captan Marvel, Isis, Electra Woman and Dynagirl. Manimal, the Man from Atlantis, The Invisible Man, The Incredible Hulk, Knight Rider, the Misfits of Science, the Greatest American Hero, Puma Man, and others. The A-Team is fighting for justice and to clear their name, and the Master Ninja is an old white guy tooling around the American South and South West in a van. All the TV heroes have vans. In 1978 Christopher Reeve was Superman, and Superman 1 & 2 were proof that you really could do a great live action Super Hero film. One easy and cool theme for an 80s campaign: All of the 70s and 80s live action TV and Movie heroes are real. Heroes may or may not wear costumes, villains usually don't, Super Villains are rare, Aliens are real. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paigeoliver Posted October 18, 2004 Author Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions When I discussed this campaign with my player's at IHOP we talked for quite a while about AIDS, and how in the 80s i was this giant massive scare, but how today no one even talks about it much any more. The same thing with the idea of nuclear destruction. That seemed a whole lot more possible back when the USSR was kicking and was considered a major threat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OddHat Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions When I discussed this campaign with my player's at IHOP we talked for quite a while about AIDS' date=' and how in the 80s i was this giant massive scare, but how today no one even talks about it much any more. The same thing with the idea of nuclear destruction. That seemed a whole lot more possible back when the USSR was kicking and was considered a major threat.[/quote'] The End of The World / WWIII thing would make a good threat for an 80s campaign; Terrorists will probably eventually manage to destroy a major city, but actually destroying the entire planet takes a national government. AIDS is killing millions world wide, and it really did change sex in America. We're just used to it, and the nighmarish full heterosexual AIDS epidemic that was predicted in the late 80s never happened in the industrialized world. It could make for a plot element, but I'm not sure how I'd work it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paigeoliver Posted October 18, 2004 Author Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Specifically with the AIDS stuff I am remembering maybe 1984 or so, and being 7 years old and hearing on television that you could get AIDS from a whole bunch of stuff that we now know you can't get it from. I was more scared of AIDS back in 1984 when I was 7 then I was in 1997 when I was (sort of) sleeping around a bit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheEmerged Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Are you going serious, semi-serious, or full on parody? The old joke is that if you remember the 60's you didn't live through them. A newer but just as true joke is that if you remember the 80's you probably wish you didn't. Character ideas: it's not the 80's without at least one Atari reference. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lightray Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Much of the flavor of the 80s -- especially to teens -- was from the fashions. The Miami Vice "pastels and no socks" look, the parachute pants, those fingerless gloves... "Flock of Seagulls" hairdon'ts. When you're GMing, I'd suggest you make sure to describe these. They could serve to distinguish the "good guys" (cool fashion) from the "bad guys" (no fashion). Catchphrases and slang are also good. That was when Star Wars didn't suck, so "May the Force be with you". Valley Girl slang. If you're doing a nostalgia campaign, you might as well emphasize the differences between now and then. Clunky desktops that feature ASCII text. No (or limited) internet. Cell phones the size of your head. Also a good idea to have theme adventures -- pulled from pop culture. One week it's Miami Vice, then the A-Team. Cameos from pop celebrities -- one of the Coreys, or NKOTB -- might also amuse. I don't really remember any significant 80s events in St. Louis, other than Thompson Twins and Duran Duran concerts and such. Didn't the Mayor and the County Exec have those riverboat races back then? And the VP Fair was still the VP Fair (i think it started in the late 80s). They're teens, though, and in St. Louis so play up the high school stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions 80's? Grotie to the max. Gag me with a spoon. I tend to remember 80's music more than anything else. Wouldn't a villainous version of Madonna be a great and annoying villain? The slutty popstar badly dressed who leads legions of teenage girls in wannabe gear to commit crimes? How about if the PMRC were right and rock music DID lead to satanism. How about leagues of kids sitting around smoking pot and conjuring up Lucifer by playing a specific album backwards. How about a villain, knowing that everyone will tune in to see "who shot J.R." proceeds to use that exact moment to launch his television hypno device which freezes viewers in front of the sets. Since kids didn't give a damn about this only the adults are frozen. Anarchy ensues. Ala "The Last Starfighter", the game Space Invaders it turns out is a training device to desensitize youth to the pending invasion of aliens and train them to kill by boosting hand-eye coordination. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lightray Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Sheesh. At least 60s flashbacks get, well, flashbacks to their acid trips and such. I don't know what this 80s thread is inducing but embarrasement is definately one of the symptoms... How about if the PMRC were right and rock music DID lead to satanism. How about leagues of kids sitting around smoking pot and conjuring up Lucifer by playing a specific album backwards. Along those lines, there was a "D&D shooting" incident at Parkway South Jr. High in '84 ('83? '85? one of those). Typical "loner brings gun to school, menaces people, shoots himself, find D&D books in his backpack." Rather NOT up to Columbine levels, but there was a huge furor by "concerned parent" groups. Now, imagine if D&D books could actually give someone like that superpowers. Teen supers have to deal with the issues -- and wonder how many others are out there just waiting to show up. On a related note: weren't the 80s where we got "going Postal" from? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Worldmaker Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions This sounds like a campaign me and Torii are currently running... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlestaff Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Ah, the 80's, what memories... Eddie Murphy was HUGE. ("I got ice cream and you don't, cause you're daddy's on welfare.") Indiana Jones had just come out. Whips weren't for just kinky stuff anymore. Reagan was in the White House. At the beginning of the decade, people were still afraid of the evil commies ("they're in Central America, only 150 miles from the American border.") By the end of the decade, tensions were easing a big. Towards the end of the decade (or was it the 90's) you had Ollie North and Iran-Contra. The 80's saw the influence of TV on pop-culture to a level I don't believe was seen in previous decades. MTV was born ("Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Buggles was the first video). Miami Vice influenced fashions around the country. Members Only and Jean jackets were big (at least where I was). Thriller came out. God, I could go on, but now I have to sit and wax nostalgic about my lost youth...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlestaff Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Oh, and I forgot, everyone upon entering high school was issued a copy of Pyromania. And in my high school, they also got a copy of the Purple Rain soundtrack. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ulryk Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Name: New Wave Knockout Female, 19 High DEX, COM, INT Low EGO, PRE Martial Artist Dresses in Day-glo, thin silver studded black leather belts, wrist bangles, and pastel sneakers with leg warmers. Has big hair, always has a can of Aquanet handy (may even give her a fire based cone EB using the can and a bic) Knows all the new wave dances and can gator, spaz and backflop like a pro (like a foward flip but you intentionally fall flat on your back, the peanut does it in the Mr. peanut Saturday Night commercial that is currently running if you dont' know) Favorite movie: American Ninja Favorite Song: Turning Japanese Second Favorite song: Kung Fu Fighting Favorite video game: Karate Champ Favorite TV show: Original Kung Fu reruns Car owned (or wanted): DeLorian (what else??) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
assault Posted October 18, 2004 Report Share Posted October 18, 2004 Re: 80's Champions Of course, there were a lot of people who rejected and were appalled by the aspects of the 80's that are being highlighted here. My tastes (in the early '80s) had been firmly shaped by the '60s and '70s: big guitar bands, moderated by punk and reggae influences. I regarded yuppies as scum, Reagan as the greatest and most evil threat to humanity ever, and Madonna, Duran Duran, Kylie Minogue and so on as his musical equivalents. Later on in the decade I moved away from the big guitar bands, and grudgingly began to accept the legitimacy of Madonna and Kylie (but not Duran Duran) after they failed to vanish like the rest of the wannabes. A lot of the bands I was listening to in the late '80s were local (Brisbane) live acts. Usually the choice was between tacky thrash or hippy-ish folk, with a few decent acts in between. I pretty much dressed the same way I dress now. I never bothered to follow fads. I didn't have a mobile phone. I don't have one now. I didn't have internet access then. I do now. That's probably the main difference that isn't directly related to my age. The main one that _is_ related to my age is that I was playing a lot more Champions then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steriaca Posted October 19, 2004 Report Share Posted October 19, 2004 Re: 80's Champions On a related note: weren't the 80s where we got "going Postal" from? Yep. Basicly it was about some post office emploie learning that thay were fiered, so thay themselves fire people. With there gun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthewcelis Posted October 31, 2011 Report Share Posted October 31, 2011 Re: 80's Champions When I discussed this campaign with my player's at IHOP we talked for quite a while about AIDS' date=' and how in the 80s i was this giant massive scare, but how today no one even talks about it much any more. The same thing with the idea of nuclear destruction. That seemed a whole lot more possible back when the USSR was kicking and was considered a major threat.[/quote'] If you're starting in 1980, AIDS was not anything yet. It wasn't a big deal until the second Reagan Administration. I was there. I remember. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthewcelis Posted October 31, 2011 Report Share Posted October 31, 2011 Re: 80's Champions I regarded yuppies as scum, Reagan as the greatest and most evil threat to humanity ever, and Madonna, Duran Duran, Kylie Minogue and so on as his musical equivalents. Right, because Reagan built a wall to keep citizens under his thumb and shot them if they dared try to escape. Oh wait, that's the evil empire Reagan brought down with no help from kneejerk liberals who would sooner surrender their freedom than fight for what's right. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Teflon Billy Posted October 31, 2011 Report Share Posted October 31, 2011 Re: 80's Champions If you're starting in 1980' date=' AIDS was not anything yet. It wasn't a big deal until the second Reagan Administration. I was there. I remember.[/quote'] Right' date=' because Reagan built a wall to keep citizens under his thumb and shot them if they dared try to escape. Oh wait, that's the evil empire Reagan brought down with no help from kneejerk liberals who would sooner surrender their freedom than fight for what's right.[/quote'] You do realize that this thread has been dead for 7 years, right? TB Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Dude Posted October 31, 2011 Report Share Posted October 31, 2011 Re: 80's Champions You do realize that this thread has been dead for 7 years, right? TB Newbie is as Newbie does. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Posted October 31, 2011 Report Share Posted October 31, 2011 Re: 80's Champions You do realize that this thread has been dead for 7 years' date=' right?[/quote'] And the thread says "Braaaaaiiinnnnzzzz!" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steriaca Posted October 31, 2011 Report Share Posted October 31, 2011 Re: 80's Champions OK. I know it is 7 years old...so to put the topic back on track, what movies/tv shows/books would be of use to get the feal of the decade? I vote "American Psycho" (the movie...othoe if you have the stomic for it read the book). It basicly ozzes 80's overindulgances. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthewcelis Posted November 2, 2011 Report Share Posted November 2, 2011 Re: 80's Champions Newbie is as Newbie does. Why do you care? Nothing better to do with your time? That's just sad. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danbuter1 Posted November 4, 2011 Report Share Posted November 4, 2011 Re: 80's Champions Stuff I remember from the 80's: Ronald Reagan Gorbachev "You're momma!" "Psyche!" GI Joe. He-Man. Thundercats. Parachute Pants. Japanese flag headbands. Big hair. D&D was sorta cool still. Jamboxes. Beatbox Breakdancing. Prince and the Revolution Madonna Def Leppard Genesis Van Halen Guns n Roses Motley Crue Metallica Cigarettes and chew were legal. Guys chewed in school, just weren't allowed to smoke. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orion Posted November 4, 2011 Report Share Posted November 4, 2011 Re: 80's Champions More 80s stuff: Legwarmers Blue eye shadow Cyndi Lauper Disco was very uncool Rock power ballads (Styx, REO Speedwagon) Hair/makeup bands on MTV (Poison, Ratt, etc) Men's hair combed back over the ears - we called them wings or feathered hair, but I'm sure the style had other names In rural areas it was still common to carry rifles and shotguns in the back window of your pickup In the early 80s interest rates on home loans was 15-20%, depending where you lived Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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