Jane's Superhumans

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

If they(human leadership) don't know for sure they can kill the super' date=' but know the super can kill them, they have to contemplate the possibility of conditional surrender.[/quote']

 

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's Superjack! Don't look now, Superjack, but Doctor DeCastro is pointing his nuclear eye beams toward the USA. What will you do? What. Will. You. Do?

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Can we call a cease-fire on the snarkiness? As a gesture of good faith, I'll promise to be good for at least 24 hours, unilaterally.

[Kirby]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Well, if said super was built like a champs villain, there's probably at least one megascale attack in her arsenal. If the consequences of a failed kill attempt are the annihilation of a political capital or population center, things look a little different.

If they(human leadership) don't know for sure they can kill the super, but know the super can kill them, they have to contemplate the possibility of conditional surrender.

Good point. Maybe the super would go after the government heads/buildings as opposed to the military. Perhaps topple governments to insure anarchy to insure tyranny follows?

 

Of course, this begs the question of *why* would they want to do this? If it was the "I can rule better" response, would the super have the knowledge and skills of running effective governments? Would they create ONE government for the planet? (And what to do with those pesky people with whom the government is totally opposite of their culture?)

[Chuckg]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Lord knows that if I suddenly developed power on the level of, oh, Divis Mal, I might have better things to do with my time than six billion scared, sullen, angry, and resentful peoples' worth of civil administration.

 

Which isn't to say I mightn't smack on a few pet peeves first(*) before going off to pursue my cosmic destiny, but organized world conquest? What's the point?

 

 

 

(*) You know -- Osama bin Laden, etc.

[Kirby]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Can we call a cease-fire on the snarkiness? As a gesture of good faith' date=' I'll promise to be good for at least 24 hours, unilaterally.[/quote']

[sarcasm] If you take away my guns, can I keep my swords? [/sarcasm]

Yes, I can comply.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

I think the scenario above leaves the super unable to determine *WHICH* capital needs nuking.

somehow I think they'll get the point.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Good point. Maybe the super would go after the government heads/buildings as opposed to the military. Perhaps topple governments to insure anarchy to insure tyranny follows?

 

Of course, this begs the question of *why* would they want to do this? If it was the "I can rule better" response, would the super have the knowledge and skills of running effective governments? Would they create ONE government for the planet? (And what to do with those pesky people with whom the government is totally opposite of their culture?)

 

pick any half dozen comic book megalomaniacs--generally it's arrogance and a belief that "only I am fit to rule".

There could also be a misguided sense of benevolence.

 

Generally I'm more interested in what kind of capabilities people think such a super would have to have to effectively accomplish such a task(withstand and defeat global armed forces including unconventional, overthrow major governments, cow or subdue populaces into submission, monitor and rule effectively).

[Outsider]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Blanked at the request of Chuckg, in honor of bblackmoor's end to snarkiness initiative.

[Chuckg]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

*edit -- blank*

[Outsider]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Can we call a cease-fire on the snarkiness? As a gesture of good faith' date=' I'll promise to be good for at least 24 hours, unilaterally.[/quote']

 

I can comply also, but my last post was started before your request, and so went through before I saw it.

 

If Kirby wants to discuss it further, he can sent me messages.

[Outsider]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Outsider -- when bblackmoor (who, to be frank, vexed me muchly yesterday) calls for an end to the snark and offers to go first /unlaterally/... and you do this... I know which one to put on my Ignore List, and which one to not put.

 

*plonk*

 

 

Sorry, as I said im my last post, my previous message (which involved reviewing and rereading a lot of previous posts) was started before he asked, and posted only just now.

 

Edit : blanked as per your request (though I did send the text of it to Kirby as a PM... took me an hour to review all that junk, didnt want to totally waste it )

[Lightray]

Generally I'm more interested in what kind of capabilities people think such a super would have to have to effectively accomplish such a task(withstand and defeat global armed forces including unconventional' date=' overthrow major governments, cow or subdue populaces into submission, monitor and rule effectively).[/quote']

Conquering supers would need to have the capability to assume all the roles that a military and government fulfills. Otherwise, he's just Super Dictator, which is likely to be ineffective, frustrating, and short-lived.

 

Really, I don't think Superman-types are world-conquerers. Maybe he can take on entire armies and rout them, but what then? How do his powers help him stop insurrection at the same time he's supposed to be governing a probably-unwilling populace?

 

I think you need to look toward the super-charisma or mass mind control type powers. Much easier to conquer nations or worlds when everyone wants you to rule them.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Conquering supers would need to have the capability to assume all the roles that a military and government fulfills. Otherwise, he's just Super Dictator, which is likely to be ineffective, frustrating, and short-lived.

 

Really, I don't think Superman-types are world-conquerers. Maybe he can take on entire armies and rout them, but what then? How do his powers help him stop insurrection at the same time he's supposed to be governing a probably-unwilling populace?

 

I think you need to look toward the super-charisma or mass mind control type powers. Much easier to conquer nations or worlds when everyone wants you to rule them.

 

you might have to have both--someone could still try to nuke you.

[Moody Loner]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Or the scads of robot followers to keep the sullen masses in line. What else are scads of robot followers good for? You can't berate them, well you can but you look stupid, and having them play "Catch the 4d6 RKA" gets old.

 

Not that I'd know.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

I do not recall seeing anyone assert that. If they have, it's been an isolated comment. I do not think the quality of the discussion (such as it is) is enhanced by bringing in dubious partisan rhetoric.

 

(For myself, I think "left" and "right" are just minor variants of the same idiotic species, so for me, a claim of "left wing" or "right wing" behavior is just noise, anyway.)

 

Did you even bother reading the post to which I replied ( with quote )??

[Metaphysician]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

And please dont misunderstand' date=' as too often seems to happen, a person's own view and a thread that is trying to hypothetically discuss what the reaction of a government might be to a situation. This discussion is - or at least, was - the latter.[/quote']

 

Which doesn't mitigate the contradiction in using a gun-control comparison while claiming the side to put it into effect would be the side opposed to gun-control.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Answer -- unless MentalMan is the only psionic in the world, have the court hire another one to mind-probe *HIM* and see if he's telling the truth or not -- via mental search warrant, which by this point in the narrative they most definitely have probable cause to issue.

 

You know, like the default CU already does, as explained in _Champions Universe 5e_

 

Dilemna solved long before we got here.

 

And, to eliminate issues of trust, have two or more telepaths do the scanning.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

To try to put the thread back on-topic: how powerful would a single superhuman have to be in order to defeat the world's military forces by themselves, in say, a period of a year or less?

 

you can answer in real-world or game terms.

 

Very, very, very powerful. Beyond that, depends on the nature of the powers.

 

One definite factor: you need the ability to rapidly work on a global level, meaning either global mobility or global range.

[Lightray]

you might have to have both--someone could still try to nuke you.

pshaw. I'll just get the Additional Group of Minds (atom bombs) adder on my Mass Mind Control power.

[Metaphysician]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Just to take a stab at it' date=' Pre Crisis Superman level?[/quote']

 

Post-Crisis would be enough. More than enough strength to wreck anything in his way, more than enough speed to rapidly do so worldwide, more than enough durability that nothing that can reasonably be thrown at him will stop him.

 

( while megaton range nukes could hurt him early post-Crisis, it would be infeasibly difficult to *hit* someone who zips around at triple digit mach values )

[Metaphysician]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

yeah' date=' I could see it taking him a few months to a year, but he could probably pull it off.[/quote']

 

I wouldn't be so sure. The explosion they whacked him with was supposedly the equivalent of Hiroshima, about 20 kilotons, and it tore him up pretty bad. While he didn't seem to be in life-threatening peril from injuries, he clearly would have taken a while to heal.

 

If he went full-on psychotically destructive, you could hit him with nukes that are 10 times as powerful, repeatedly, without hauling in ICBMs. Using ICBMs and other big strat nukes, you could manage hits hundreds of times bigger.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

I wouldn't be so sure. The explosion they whacked him with was supposedly the equivalent of Hiroshima, about 20 kilotons, and it tore him up pretty bad. While he didn't seem to be in life-threatening peril from injuries, he clearly would have taken a while to heal.

 

If he went full-on psychotically destructive, you could hit him with nukes that are 10 times as powerful, repeatedly, without hauling in ICBMs. Using ICBMs and other big strat nukes, you could manage hits hundreds of times bigger.

Wouldn't the nukes and the command structure supporting them be his first likely targets? He can move at hypersonic speeds and tear through silo walls, locate subs underwater, etc. He was trained by the government, you'd figure he knows a bit about their command structure. He might start by taking out a few smaller nuclear powers in order to test out his strategy with relative safety. Except for Russia and the US, the other nuclear powers can be disarmed relatively quickly.

[gewing]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

A: I CAN"T BELIEVE YOU GUYS HAVE POSTED THIS MUCH WHILE I WAS OFF FOR 3! DAYS!

 

b: "This act only affects Paranormals..." as someone else pointed out, where the dividing line is drawn and how it is measured could cause MAJOR complications, and have serious ramifications for the policies and the public reactions to them.

 

I'll read more as I can...

 

 

Kristopher:

 

A) True, but we never let that stop us before when we've had the draft. Now admittedly, there's a question of whether people who are drafted will ever become top of the line mentally, and the answer is probably no. On the other hand, the objective here is not to achieve perfection but to get paranormals who are usable in government service in some fashion. You have this mentality that if you can't train a paranormal to special ops level, they're useless, which I don't feel is the case.

 

Well, there's a problem with just leaving Omega Girl from walking around. You see, what if Omega Girl ever blows her lid and causes some devistation, or there's some sort of incident involving Omega Girl and property damage and/or people being hurt. Will the government be let off the hook for letting her go walk around. People are going to demand an explanation as to why the government let a walking nuclear warhead go around loose.

 

And there this little problem of foreign recruitment. Sure the United States is a sweetheart and leaves her be. The question is, will foreign governments seeing her power let her run around loose, or will they start trying to find ways to leverage her power, taking her family hostage and applying other pressures to secure her cooperation by any means necessary.

 

The fact is, when you're a 1000 point super, all of a sudden you're an important person, period. You can't pretend to be normal and you can't do what you please independent of and ignoring the existing power structures. That's not how the world works. Anyone or anything of any existing power has to be fitted into the existing power structures. You can't lead a normal life and you have to start taking sides.

 

This issue incidentally also applies to more weaker supers. Even if the government leaves that teleporting housewife alone, what happens if some terrorist group nabs her kid and demands she start planting bombs if she wants her child to stay alive?

 

You're viewing this strictly as the individual versus the government. I'm seeing a war between various power factions over the paranormal population. In the end, these people are going to have to ally themselves with a faction unless they're powerful enough to stand on their own, and that means going rogue.

 

C) Given the dangers above of terrorists and organized crime recruiting paranormals by force, as well as some paranormals secretly abusing their power, I think a "Paranormal Security Act" which requires the government to take paranormals into government service wouldn't be that difficult to pass. The families of the paranormals would be given government protection in return for the paranormal serving their country loyaly, and the government would use said paranormals to fight terrorist paranormals as well.

 

And of course this act only affects paranormals. The rest of the public would not be affected. This isn't like the search and seizure acts of the War on Drugs or all the draconian measures of the Homeland Security Act, this just covers dealing with an inherently dangerous category of individuals who form only a very small minority in this country.

 

D) There are going to be anonymous tip lines and people with the power to detect paranormals, assuming there isn't any equipment to do so. If the government is using extreme measures to flush out potential terrorists, I don't think they're going to be exceptionally stymied at underground paranormals.

 

And there's another thing to: one of the things the government wants to do is to keep paranormals quiet and from using their powers against the common good. If they're paralyzed by fear, that works just as well as anything else. If the government can't find them, neither can anyone else, and that means there's a reduced danger they'll fall into the wrong hands.

[Guest bblackmoor]

Re: Jane's Superhumans

 

Did you even bother reading the post to which I replied ( with quote )??

 

It's been a busy thread. It is entirely possible that I missed whatever you refer to, and I did explicitly make an allowance for that in my reply. Do we need to argue about it? I'm more than happy to concede the point and let it go.

[Lightray]

Post-Crisis would be enough. More than enough strength to wreck anything in his way, more than enough speed to rapidly do so worldwide, more than enough durability that nothing that can reasonably be thrown at him will stop him.

 

( while megaton range nukes could hurt him early post-Crisis, it would be infeasibly difficult to *hit* someone who zips around at triple digit mach values )

Lord, this thread has more topics than some of the fora here...

 

Superman of either era would have minimal problems completely demolishing the military infrastructure of the planet.

 

Then what?

 

He's demolished a significant portion of the planet's resources. If everyone surrenders, now he's got to run things. Entire nations are probably rebelling or rioting (given that their militaries are gone). Maybe there's famine. And Superman is one guy.

 

He's got to set up a ruling system. He needs people to help him run things. Even with superspeed there's only so many minutes in his day. He can't go strongarming people in every city on the planet to get things done.

 

And if he recruits minions, then he needs to ensure their loyalty. Even with brutal threats, his powers just aren't up to keeping him apprised of treachery -- his telescopic + X-ray vision only reach so far. While he's purging rebels in China, what are traitors up to in Australia or America?

 

Now, Pre-Crisis Superman has some additional options. With some super-intelligence and judicious time travel, he can probably set up a stable system of rule that doesn't require every moment of his day.

 

Hmm. He could also use his super-science (Pre-Crisis) or Kryptonian robots (Post-Crisis) to help out. He'd better take out Braniac, though, or his rule-by-robots might get turned against him...