How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

[Michael Hopcroft]

The more I think about it, the more I think a campaign based on Jackie Chan Adventures (the cartoon) would be a Dark Champions campaign (or Dark Champions: the Animated Series style). We have atwo-fisted, two-legged archeologist who would seem to be in way over his head against a crime cartel yet holds his own thanks to martial arts skills, coruage, inegnuity, and a sizable dose of help from unexpected places (who would think having a disobedient little girl constantly underfoot would turn otu to be so handy?).

 

The first question i can think of before trying to write up characters 9you ahve to start with Jackie) is how to model Jackie;'s martial arts. I don;t know if there is a specific martial arts style that the real-life Jackie Chan or his animated equivalent practices: in real life, Jackie's training came in a theatrical troupe rather than a martial arts school, so his style is based on spectacular-looking mvoes rather than specific combat training. I don't know if you can assign a martial arts style out of either of the martial arts books (UMA and Ninja hERO) to either Jackie. So would ti be best to simply assign some manuvers, add a few approproate abilties, and call it a martial arts package? I don;t know enough about real-world martial arts to tell by lookign what the manuvers look like, and it's hard to tell what a martial arts style would do just by looking unless you ahve some experience with it 9or at the very least had seen a lot more kung-fu movies than I have).

 

I also wonder about his point total, although as a rule I do nto count points when modeling characters from media (I simpyl assign him the abilties he shoudl have and assign an Experience Bonus if he goes over the disad limit).

[Lord Liaden]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

I'm afraid I have no more expertise than you in this area, Michael, so the best I can do is defer to Mike Surbrook's expertise and offer you his take on Jackie:

 

http://surbrook.devermore.net/adaptionshkaction/jackie.html

[lemming]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

Jackie Chan studied various forms of Kung Fu, but in one interview (with Black Belt IIRC) he said that in movies his martials arts was Movie Style.

[Spideyguy]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

This is slightly off-topic, but if you're a Jackie Chan fan, I would definitely recommend his autobiography, My Life in Action.

 

I found it fascinating, and my only complaint about the book was that it ended too soon!

[OddHat]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

This is slightly off-topic' date=' but if you're a Jackie Chan fan, I would definitely recommend his autobiography, [i']My Life in Action.[/i]

 

I found it fascinating, and my only complaint about the book was that it ended too soon!

 

Yes, very good read.

[JMHammer]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

JCA- Very fun show with smart dialogue. Some of the Jackie character's action, and much of the opening sequence to each episode, is rotoscoped which gives it a very fluid, lifelike animation style.

 

Jackie in the show is a top-end martial artist and brawler with tremendous acrobatic abilities who spends most of his fighting time dodging around looking for an opportunity to either run away or land a strong blow of his own. Jackie isn't superhuman and he knows it; although he is brave and self-confident, he isn't arrogant and trusts both his skills and his limitations.

 

A Kung-fu style of martial arts, excellent Acrobatics and Breakfall rolls, either a great Climbing roll or a power designed to represent his ability to scale walls with the hop-jump-bounce maneuver, some "luck-based" Damage Reduction (not really a power based on luck, but subject to the same Limitations as Combat Luck), and a Hand Attack with some extra dice of damage and a Side Effect (Character can take no attack actions in next Phase because he's rubbing his hand and saying, "Ow!). Skill levels with Block, Dodge, and Dive for Cover would help to represent how he comports himself in combat and a Counterstrike martial maneuver (a strike which must follow a successful Block) would go a long way toward doing that, also.

 

JCA Jackie is an accomplished scholar, traveller, and linguist (capital "S" and capital "T" and capital "L" in Hero terms) and should have a broad familiarity with all sorts of skills. He appears to have contacts in the scholarly community all over the world. Although he reads and writes English perfectly, his spoken English proves to even a casual observer that it is not his first language so he should purchase Language (English) 2 Active Points + Literacy 1 Active Point (which will have a net cost of 2 Real Points with the Linguist cost reduction).

 

Jade should probably be built as a Follower. She causes a lot of grief for Jackie but her presence in an adventure is more often net-helpful than net-troublesome. Their relationship should be represented with Disadvantages for both but excluding DNPC.

 

I don't like what they did with Uncle in the last two seasons. He went from a scholar who could work a little magic to a super-sorceror. That made him a more active cast member but weakened the dramatic potential of the character considerably. Maybe Uncle's player had a lot of experience points saved up, but he and the GM didn't come up with a convincing way of using them mid-game.

 

John H

[levi]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

I would agree with Lemming here. Jackie Chan uses various Kung Fu Styles, Acrobatics, Gymnastics and some Jeet Kune Do for his fight choreography and fantastic stunts. He is a huge proponent of physical fitness and since he was born in 1954 and could whip any three of our asses, I'd say he's doing something right.

 

As far as a Champions (or DC) write-up goes, I would use some basic kung fu maneuvers with a ton of Weapons Elements to represent his ability to incorporate almost anything into his Martial Arts. Defense Maneuver, Acrobatics, CSL in DCV, Leaping (req Acrobatics Roll).

 

One of my favorite parts of the Jackie Chan Adventures show is very contrary to most TAS type shows. Jackie is very vulnerable and often scared out of his wits (at least initially). The inverse of Indiana Jones (the scholar who seeks out adventure), Jackie is always drawn in to these impossible situations all the while stating, "I'm just an archaeologist."

[Blue Jogger]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

Martial Arts, as the Hero Games effect, covers all sorts of Dirty Infighting, Football, and other non-martial arts styles. Sacrific Throw becomes Tackle, if that's what you learned.

 

One of the powers, I saw for a Jackie clone was 10PD,10ED Armor with a -1/4: Interposing Object., although this might just be a Block with bonus OCV.

 

He has Combat Luck, representing all sorts of takes minor damage but keeps going. The RL Jackie, however, had to keep shooting with his foot in a cast. He wears this oversized sneaker to avoid it being noticed, but for the rest of the film, he doesn't do anything with his feet. I've always thought of him as being a bit of a masochist, but that may just be me. Otherwise, give him a high BODY based on his ability to get the stuffing beat of him, but still keep going.

 

I might give him a Befuddle-like attack, where he moves in such a confusing manner as to give him impressive DCV. This might require an acrobatics roll, since sometimes, he fails miserably and gets caught. Dark Champions has several varations of the bonus DCV with limitations. At first, he looks like a panicked monkey, but near the end of the film, he's gained enough confidence (Analyze Style?) to gain the upper hand and land attacks.

[Rapier]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

One of my favorite parts of the Jackie Chan Adventures show is very contrary to most TAS type shows. Jackie is very vulnerable and often scared out of his wits (at least initially). The inverse of Indiana Jones (the scholar who seeks out adventure)' date=' Jackie is always drawn in to these impossible situations all the while stating, "I'm just an archaeologist."[/quote']

"BADDAYBADDAYBADDAYBADDAY!!"

[Michael Hopcroft]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

He has Combat Luck, representing all sorts of takes minor damage but keeps going. The RL Jackie, however, had to keep shooting with his foot in a cast. He wears this oversized sneaker to avoid it being noticed, but for the rest of the film, he doesn't do anything with his feet. I've always thought of him as being a bit of a masochist, but that may just be me. Otherwise, give him a high BODY based on his ability to get the stuffing beat of him, but still keep going.

RL Jackie Chan the artist has often said in interviews that he wishes that the American movie industry would either allow him to make or be cast in films in which he doesn;t fight. There are two basic reasons for this: the first is that Jackie is (very gracrefully) sliding into middle age and eventually he won't be able to do the stunts anymore, and he wants to have a career after that happens. The second is that he feels ethnically-Asian actors are often badly typecast in American movies, especially Hong Kong veterans like himself, and he wants to show the American moviegoing public what else he can do.

 

Jackie is actually quite a formidable comic actor, especially in his native Cantonese, and has done turns as a romantic leading man in his native Hong Kong and won considerable acclaim in the effort. it has been a long time since I ahve seen an enthincally Asian romantic lead in an American film, a fact which causes Jackie endless frustration.

 

Another interesting Jackie Chan note is that he is a bit of a patriot. While many Hong Kong film limunaries (like director John Woo) abandoned Hong Kong when the Chinese took over in 1999, Jackie maintains his primary residence there still. He sees himself as Chinese and stays out of doemstic poltiical matters brought about by the oversight of Hong Kong by China's Communsit regime.

[Enforcer84]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

TORU!

I love him...especially when he went to the side of the angels.

[Rapier]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

RL Jackie Chan the artist has often said in interviews that he wishes that the American movie industry would either allow him to make or be cast in films in which he doesn;t fight. There are two basic reasons for this: the first is that Jackie is (very gracrefully) sliding into middle age and eventually he won't be able to do the stunts anymore, and he wants to have a career after that happens. The second is that he feels ethnically-Asian actors are often badly typecast in American movies, especially Hong Kong veterans like himself, and he wants to show the American moviegoing public what else he can do.

 

Jackie is actually quite a formidable comic actor, especially in his native Cantonese, and has done turns as a romantic leading man in his native Hong Kong and won considerable acclaim in the effort. it has been a long time since I ahve seen an enthincally Asian romantic lead in an American film, a fact which causes Jackie endless frustration.

 

Another interesting Jackie Chan note is that he is a bit of a patriot. While many Hong Kong film limunaries (like director John Woo) abandoned Hong Kong when the Chinese took over in 1999, Jackie maintains his primary residence there still. He sees himself as Chinese and stays out of doemstic poltiical matters brought about by the oversight of Hong Kong by China's Communsit regime.

I got to say...there have been very (very, very) few non-western movie moguls (if I go so far in my classifying) that I truly respect for their vision and ability...Bruce Lee (MHRIP) and Jackie Chan.

 

I cannot say enough good things about either one. I, for one, would LOVE for Jackie to move more behind the camera. I think it would give him a better outlet for his creativity...and it would allow him to pass on some of his HELLA skills to the next generation of action stars...and I mean REAL action stars not wanna be Steven Segals (you ever seen Will Sasso do him? CRACKS my ass UP!).

[tkdguy]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

I read that Jackie Chan also studied Hapkido to help him perform some of the flashier kicks.

[Sketchpad]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

I would love to work on this

[bubba smith]

Re: How to do Jackie Chan Adventures

 

i think the WuXIA stlye moves from NINJA HERO would work for jackie