Miracle Materials

[Lord Liaden]

One of the staples of mainstream comic books is the "miracle material": a substance with extraordinary properties that allows for super-technology, unusual abilities for characters, plots involving acquiring or overcoming these materials, etc. Adamantium, vibranium, unstable molecules, and so on. The official Champions Universe has several "uncanny metals" and the superpower-inducing mineral kelvarite.

 

I was wondering what miracle materials other Champions gamers have introduced into their campaigns? Some of the above-mentioned classics are to be expected, but I'd particularly like to hear about original substances that you've created to serve particular needs or purposes in your campaign - the exchange of ideas could be profitable. Some that I've used include:

 

Ballisdex. The infamous "bulletproof spandex" that so many superhero armored costumes seem to be made of. Difficult and expensive to manufacture, the material has "chainlinked molecular bonds" (comic pseudoscience) which allows the energy of impacts to be dispersed throughout the material rather than staying at the point of impact;

 

Catalyte. This rare element (probably of extraterrestrial origin) vastly increases the efficiency of nuclear reactions, so that they require much less energy to start. Makes compact fusion reactors practical, and even allows for "cold fusion" devices;

 

Questonite (not "Questionite"!). I salvaged this material from the pre-Fifth Edition Champs Universe. It's not metal, but an ultra-strong plastic. It can be made transparent, suitable for windows in deep-sea submersibles, visors for armor, viewports in super-prison cell doors, and the like. Also a nasty suprise for all those magnetic-based supers with metal affecting powers.

 

Anyone else?

[Tom McCarthy]

I always wanted to do an Iron Man clone called Queston Knight. I also like kelvarite. It's so in-genre I have to love it.

 

I found Promethium (from DC) a ridiculous concept, but certainly fodder for stories. It was a gross reversal of the laws of physics; you could tap it as an energy source and it would grow. An uncontrolled Promethium-driven reactor soon destroyed itself as the reaction grew to uncontrolled levels. While rare, Promethium was not a health risk like uranium or plutonium.

 

Vibranium and adamantium seem relatively tame by comparison.

 

I've toyed with including the extra-terrestrial metals from Captain Atom (from DC). The military decides to test a piece of a crashed alien spaceship by detonating a nuclear device on top of it. That parts semi-logical, but for some unexplained reason they want a human being to be wrapped in the metal at the time of the test. And when the test subject disappears, they repeat the experiment. Being the military, the test subjects are military personnel convicted of major criminal behaviour. being comic books, one of the convicts is falsely accused while the other is his scumbag nemesis. Oh, and the general in charge of it all is of dubious moral fibre (upgraded to villainous and traitorous by subsequent writers). Anyhow, the metals gave one guy superstrength, flight, armour, energy blasts and absorption (to END Reserve; side effect if absorption exceeded, extra dimensional movement (forward in time) kicks in). The other guy got superstrength, armour, and physical blasts.

[MarkusDark]

Plastisteel - Plastics that have the same strengths as steel but at reduced weight and half the thickness

 

Flexisteel - Flexible metals that become temporarily rigid when stressed.

 

Synthisteel - Synthetic (cloth like) flexisteel.

 

Beta particle - a non-hazardous energy radiation from gold. A gold coin can run a semi-truck for a year.

 

Synthiskin - latex style skin that will graft to any subject.

[Darkstar]

Protomatter - an other dimensional material gathered from Shuggoths. Super tough living tissue, used in numerous biological technology applications.

 

Carbon Nanotube composite - made from a mesh of carbon nanotubes, produced by a secret US government agency (Majestic 12) using alien technology. It has incredible tensile strength and resistance to heat. Very light weight, used for external armor and internal implants either full sub-dermal or in spots to protect joints and internal organs.

[Dynamo]

Some of these are pretty good.

 

MarkusDark, you might want to consider a different name for your Beta Particle. The beta particle is a real world product of certain nuclear reactions. Nothing fancy, it's just an electron, emitted from the nucleus when a neutron decays into a proton.

 

The only miracle material currently featuring in my campaign is biofibre, inspired largely by Aberrant's eufiber. Biofibre is a multicellular colony organism that tends to grow in a film only two cells thick. The resulting fabric is extremely tough for its weight and will accept dyes of a specific formulation only. These characteristics, combined with two more exotic properties, make biofibre very useful for spandex-like applications.

 

The first of these exotic properties is a small measure of cellular mobility, making a tight-fitting garment of biofibre self-fitting to a certain extent. Additionally, biofibre exhibits an unusual exothermic metabolism. When worn by a living entity, biofibre metabolism will differentiate between its inward and outward cellular layers to either cool or warm the wearer in response to external environmental conditions.

 

All of this puts a high demand on a limited supply of biofibre, but it's the fabric's interaction with the exotic metabolisms among the superhuman community that make it truly miraculous. After a short period of acclimatization, biofibre will adapt to energetic or metamorphic powers. Thus, a biofibre costume can stretch, grow or shrink with the wearer and will not be incinerated, frozen or otherwise damaged by power bolts, protective shields, or other energetic emissions projected by the wearer.

 

Also, many supers have developed a secondary level of symbiosis with their biofibre costumes. Their biofibre colonies have exhibited superpowers of their own. These powers are often useful variations of the wearer's powers, but just as frequently they are defensive or metamorphic in nature.

[Syberdwarf2]

okay, but hear me out...

 

I just got done watching "The Core", and while I don't think the movie was very good and it certainly won't be winning any awards it did have a pretty unusual idea that i liked...

 

Unobtainium - a carbon? based material formed in a buckyball chain that, because of it's configuration, becomes stronger and more heat-resistant as more heat and pressure is applied to it.

[keithcurtis]

We called our bulletproof spandex Kevlex. (Kevlar + Spandex)

 

I agree with the poster who brought up Prometheum. Even worse than disregarding physics (and what super worth his cape doesn't do that sixt times before breakfast?), the writers never could seem to keep straight what it did and how it worked. Sometimes it worked as described. Sometimes it was a regenerating metal. And sometimes it was just another name for Adamantium.

 

Keith "Looking for a material as protective as Spandex but as flexible as Kevlar" Curtis

[BNakagawa]

Back in the days of the dreaded Comics Code, I figured every hero's jock and heroines bra was made of Codium, an indestructable fabric designed to protect the tender minds of the readers from the horrors of superhuman nudity.

[Killer Shrike]

In the past, Ive had a variety of 'super metals' in play. I dont remember them all, but some follow:

 

Flexionite: this was actually a class of metals (A,B,C) derived from a real material that is used in real life for avionics and expensive eyeglass frames. Its main advantage was that once manufactured the material effectively has 1 true shape which it will return to. A secondary attribute was a molecular bonding capability; if you put to pieced of Flexionite alongside one another exposure to a different band of radiation would cause the 2 pieces to bond together seamlessly.

 

Type A does not require exposure to a particular band of radiation to return to its natural state, but only forms in cylindrical shapes.

 

Type B requires exposure to a particular band of radiation if it is deformed to return to its original state. Its advantage is that once its shape is frozen it is rigid like other metals, and easier to work with in the production of complex machinery than Type A because it can be made in any shape.

 

Type C is made up of many micro-cylinders of Type A material arrayed together in sheets and bonded. It makes flexi-sheets of metal basically which will allow some moulding (enough to style a car for example, but nothing too minute in detail), and is useful in the creation of deforming-reforming panels and the manufacturing of vehicles. A car made with a Type B frame and a Type C body for example is exceptionally resilient and structural damage is easily repaired by a trained mechanic with Flexionite-moulding equipment.

 

A trained armor smith or manufacturer working with highly specialized (and high-tech) tools can construct and repair items made from Flexionite very quickly, allowing damaged equipment to be returned to the field in like-new condition. Flexionite revolutionized the personal armor industries, the automotive and avionics industry, and a wide assortment of odd products (more as a novelty than anything else, like Flexionite-B Baseball bats & tennis rackets and Flexionite-C Chainlink fences).

 

 

 

 

Rebarium: A titanium/Flexionite-A alloy intended for construction use. Rebarium has a very high tensile strength, but also has a flexion point. Basically, when its tensile strength is exceeded, rather than breaking or permanently bending it will deform to a high degree before permanantly breaking/bending, and after the stress is removed it will return to its original shape. Primarily used for support struts and seismic adjustors, it found a suprisingly lucrative application in the construction of oil platforms and cranes.

 

 

 

Ularium: this material served as a common-source rationale for a campaign that I was planning but which never got off the ground back in 1996.

 

A strange material discovered in a single meteorite found embeded on the moon in 1969 by the US government. The material was brought to earth by the astronauts that discovered it and a team of scientists were assembled to analyze it for possible use in the US nuclear program.

 

Even in the present, the scientists that have studied the material are not sure if it is a naturally occuring element not previously discovered or not native to earth or an advanced compound created either artificially or by an alien intelligence. What they do know is that Ularium emits a wide range of energy wavelengths, and is far more radioactive than Uranium or Plutonium. Prolonged exposure to the material results in serious radiation poisoning and a rapid cellular failure for the wide majority of humans and other terrestrial organisms.

 

In 1970 the scientists began testing the properties of the material, and as part of a larger effort they assemled 300+ monkeys of various varieties which were exposed to the material in short bursts over the course of a month. By the end of the month, over 275 monkeys either died or were in the process of dying from the radiation poisoning. However, 19 of the monkeys showed no sign of radiation poisoning and of those 19, 4 of them were begining to demonstrate elevated intelligence and altered behavior. Intrigued by this phenomenom, the scientists got funding for another batch of 300 monkeys, and left the original 19 survivors in with them.

 

After another month the results were similar, with 22 survivors from the new batch, and all 19 from the 1st batch still showing no signs of poisoning or other ill effects. Of the 22 new survivors, 6 were showing signs of elevated intelligence like the original 4 'brainy' monkeys. This elevated intelligence was not drastic, but it was noticible. The surviving 41 monkeys were put in a holding status while the scientists attempted to make sence of thier data. Primatologists were brought in. Many arguments ensued, and further the team working on this aspect of the project encountered difficulties getting funding over the more 'practical application' teams.

 

While this was happening, several of the monkeys formed mating pairs and after half a year had passed several new little monkeys had been born. The primatoligists noticed a few things almost immediately: the new baby monkeys were not like thier parents in all respects. They had less hair, larger cranial capacity, smaller teeth, straighter spines, and more human-like attributes. They seemed to have evolved in 1 generation!

 

The potential of this new discovery was obvious, but problematic. Human trials were desired, but with the death ratio suggested by the monkey trials not viable in the current iteration. However, one scientist, Dr. Tyler Sean Greene, recommended a diffusion/dispersion approach. His recommendation was to expose more people to minute quantities of the material. By expanding the test base, the decrease in the amount of the material to which the subjects are exposed would balance out.

 

This drew some attention, and soon the entire project was bundled up, reclassified, and moved to a new location and formed into a group called Directorate for the Advancement of Radioactive Waste Identification and Neutralization (DARWIN), with a cover mission of environmental correction. The group was restructed into the EPA in 1983, but in reality the true purpose of the branch has always been under the control and cognizance of the NSA.

 

Greene's plan was put into action in 1972 by piggy backing on an ongoing program run by the CIA for a variety of purposes at the time, using college student 'volunteers' who would agree to just about anything for some much needed money. The subjects were told they were helping to develop a cure for the common cold, and a suitably convincing charade was maintained.The project was codenamed Protocol Pygore-5 and was conducted nationwide for a period of 6 years, exposing over 12000 subjects for the alloted 6 months each. 87 subjects died from effects believed to be caused by the material, and a handful of others died in more mundane fashions such as car accidents. Of the survivors many were mated pairs that started the treatments together, and others met during their time in the program and formed subsequent relationships; 347 pairs of subjects had relationships that resulted in the birth of at least one child between 1972 and 1982.

 

DARWIN maintained casual surveillance of all its test subjects, paying close attention to any children resulting from a subject. This children typically displayed abnormal precociousness and were well above average in intelligence and often athletic capability as well. Meanwhile they continued thier monkey experiments, and explored other uses for Ularium. The monkey experiments saw the occurance of a small population of advanced primates. Continued exposure to the material in succeeding generations revealed that the mutated children were significantly more resilient to the harmful effects but also the mutagenic effects. Another interesting fact came to light; some of the monkey-men exhibited psychic capabilities, including psychokinesis, pyrokinesis, and psychic blasts. In 1996 one of the 4th generation monkeys with human level intelligence, the ability to speak English and a limited precognitive ability, Maku, managed to break himself and 4 cage-mates out of the holding facility in western Pennsylvania where they were held. He managed to lead his little band into Canada, where eventually they came to the awareness of the Canadian government and sought asylum. The Canadian government started investigating the situation covertly.

 

Meanwhile, several of the children of the earlier human test subjects were now in their teens and in some cases were starting to show signs of psychic capabilities themselves. DARWIN was directed to collect these children for closer examination.....[cue campaign]...

 

 

 

Plaststeel: basic plastic thats as hard as steel material but lightweight and mass produced; vulnerable to heat/lasers but very resilient to cold and impact.

 

Blasteel: a more advanced version of Plaststeel, it is almost indestructible but also very difficult to work with; it must be poured into moulds and shaped prior to a catalyzation process.

 

 

 

There were others, but this is what I remember off hand....

[pinecone]

Yeah I called bullet proof spndex "Resistiweave" it was a sure fire way to identify someone with government sanction cause the feds were the only known source...this is cool I've got to start using more weird stuff storys...

[lemming]

We had Tuffonium which was for a standard wall, 20 def, 20 body hardened.

 

For really tough items in there was also Krell Metal which was 60 def, probably double hardened. Krell was IIRC was actually from "Forbidden Planet", a great 50's SCI-FI film.

 

I haven't introduced either into my current campaign, but there are some hi tech carbon fiber materials that haven't been named yet. I'll probably be borrowing some from this thread.

[Crimson-Hawk]

Originally posted by keithcurtis

Keith "Looking for a material as protective as Spandex but as flexible as Kevlar" Curtis

 

Um... yeah... uh.... Run that one by me again?

[ShinDangaioh]

Nuetrallium. This elemental metal's position on the periodic table is in the Noble Gas. Heavy(All known electron shells are at full capacity.) acid nutreal. Since it is heavier and denser than lead, radiaton resistant as well. More for spaceship hulls than anything else. Unless you have superstrength, you can't use it as weapon material. It's just too heavy.

 

Just something to give it a feeling of vermestitude.

[SkyKnight]

I introduced Regilloy in my old campaign. It was an alloy of Titanium and Lithium. I didn't get very far with it, but it was intended as an airship frame for a mastermind villain. The composition was based on an article I read on the Russian space program.

[Oruncrest]

Codium? Naaah...

 

Originally posted by BNakagawa

Back in the days of the dreaded Comics Code, I figured every hero's jock and heroines bra was made of Codium, an indestructable fabric designed to protect the tender minds of the readers from the horrors of superhuman nudity.

 

Nope. It's some sort of chemical treatment. In Sensational She-Hulk #4, Shulkie had spemt half the issue being stomped into the ground. Her outer clothing was shredded leaving her only in lingerie. After the fight was over, the guest star (a golden age mystery woman) asked Jen how her undies survived unscathed after such a viscous battle. Jen merely revealed the tag on her undies that said 'Protected by the Comics Code Authority'.

[BarryB]

There is actually a very interesting material out there called Ferrium C69 that I've incorporated slightly into my current campaign. It's a metal that has been designed to have specific properties. The manufacturer, QuesTek, can design the metal on a computer to have particular properties. It might be hard to keep an edge or softer to resist breakage. It's supposed to have been used to forge a Dragonslayer sword, incorporating meteoric iron. I don't know if that was actually done, though.

 

In a previous campaign, I've used a metal called Adaptium. Supposedly the molecular bonds were such that it was extremely stiff; bonds on the compression and expansion sides of the bend were very strong, making any deformation extremely difficult. Thus the metal adapted to any deformation.

 

With regards to 'protomatter', I've used that terminology as well. I used protomatter to refer to (steel yourselves) the information content of an arrangement of mass-energy. This refers back to a notion that mass and energy are different forms of information, a notion present in simulational physics and current efforts to simulate quantum mechanical systems with computers. As I applied it, protomatter is the information that tells matter and energy how to organize. Without protomatter (literally 'pre-matter') matter and energy would be in a state of maximum entropy.

[Uncle Shecky]

Some great stuff on this thread. There was a story in Scientific American this month on a new light-weight anti-radiation fabric, Demron, that y'all might find intersting.

 

http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=0008EC7E-C5D6-1E8C-8EA5809EC5880000

[Supreme]

Originally posted by Uncle Shecky

Some great stuff on this thread. There was a story in Scientific American this month on a new light-weight anti-radiation fabric, Demron, that y'all might find intersting.

 

http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=0008EC7E-C5D6-1E8C-8EA5809EC5880000

Reads like the first part of a super-hero origin.

I remember reading in "Red Mars" how the martian colonists began incorporating copper mesh into their clothing to protect themselves from the radiation.

[Supreme]

I figure at this point its best to let this thread win out over my own "Super Substances" thread. So let me re-post my Miracle Material.

 

"Isotope X"

A space-born isotope of Lawrencium (atomic number 100, IIRC, which sounds so cool). Iso X is actually somewhat stable, but the nuclei do occassionally shift to lower energy states. However, in the case if Iso X, instead of releasing radiation is releases the "X-Effect" which amounts to localized disturbances in the laws of physics. The most common effect of this is to create super-powers. Some scientists have tried to provoke the X-Effect out of samples of Iso X, but due to its inherently unpredictable nature results are never consistent. Occassionally Iso X accidents have caused super-substances to come into being. Such substances are always unreproducable (inpenetrable shields and all that).

[Lord Liaden]

Originally posted by Supreme on the "Super Substances" thread

I think the fact that bulletproof supers should have their costumes shredded everytime they get shot has probably contributed more to the anti-tights sentiment of the current era than anything else. I guess that particular can of worms has been opened and no one knows how to get it closed. I've seen virtually all comics and games in recent times have to go into often tedious explanations for why their characters aren't perpetual super-nudists. I think Byrne's "Man of Steel" probably did the best explanation thus far.

 

Dynamo's suggestion for "biofiber" earlier on this thread is one of the best super-costume ideas I've seen: living fabric that mimics the cellular structure of its wearer, including natural powers. Makes more sense than "unstable molecules"; biofiber may be unrealistic, but at least it's logical.

 

OTOH, one thing I really liked about the old Power Man and Power Man and Iron Fist series was that Luke Cage's costume did get shredded regularly - he had a professional costumer make up multiples of his shirts and pants at a time. (One brief scene in one issue showed Cage followed into the costumer's by a somewhat-obscured "Dr. Banner" who was picking up his purple pants.)

[Lord Liaden]

Originally posted by Uncle Shecky

Some great stuff on this thread. There was a story in Scientific American this month on a new light-weight anti-radiation fabric, Demron, that y'all might find intersting.

 

http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=0008EC7E-C5D6-1E8C-8EA5809EC5880000

 

It's neat to see how closely real-life science is snapping at the heels of science-fiction these days.

 

But with something like Demron, I can't help fearing that a real-life Project: Sunburst might be in the offing.

[GamePhil]

Nevadium: Commonly referred to as Power Crystals, this is a material of variable atomic weight that contains vast, but finite, amounts of energy. Usually, it requires sophisticated technology to coax this energy out, and this depletes the Crystal. It can also be used to make other energy sources work, and enabled cold fusion in the late 20th century (in the future, it enabled the creation of zero point energy sources), which does not deplete its energy or does so very slowly.

 

What few people realize is that certain humans can coax energy out and shape it by a simple act of will. If this depletes the Crystal, it does so very slowly. Thus, it was in my game the basis for numerous bits of superscience and two Green Lantern like characters. The substance is about as hard as diamond, and can be cut like one.

 

Depleted Nevadium: When the normally red Nevadium has run out of energy, it turns white and unbreakable. Due to the rarity and usefulness of the substance, this has only rarely been taken advantage of.

[Dynamo]

Re: Biofibre

 

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

Dynamo's suggestion for "biofiber" earlier on this thread is one of the best super-costume ideas I've seen: living fabric that mimics the cellular structure of its wearer, including natural powers. Makes more sense than "unstable molecules"; biofiber may be unrealistic, but at least it's logical.

Thanks for the kind words.

 

There's more: Although biofibre is currently being grown commercially in ever greater amounts, the original colony was extruded by a metamorphic/power-copying super who'd mastered shapeshifting down to the genetic level and could engineer portions of his body into biochemical factories. Genetic matching tests available in the Cannibal Comics setting (2008 + super inventors + tech salvaged from crashed starships) are capable of turning up some intriguing similarities between biofibre DNA and that of metahumans. The companies that manufacture the material have thus far kept these similarities out of the public limelight.

 

At the metagame level, the facts about biofibre provide clues for the players to pursue concerning the common origin unknowingly shared by all supers except those of purely magical or purely technological origin.

[Thirdbase]

Re: okay, but hear me out...

 

Originally posted by Syberdwarf2

I just got done watching "The Core", and while I don't think the movie was very good and it certainly won't be winning any awards it did have a pretty unusual idea that i liked...

 

Unobtainium - a carbon? based material formed in a buckyball chain that, because of it's configuration, becomes stronger and more heat-resistant as more heat and pressure is applied to it.

 

 

I've been looking for a source of Unobtainium for a long time, but I can't seem to find any.

[Prometheus]

Adapted from a description in Ultimate Super Mage:

 

Qliphothium:- "...this residue is denser than mercury, chemically inert, has the superfluid properties of Helium II and is an almost perfect electrical and thermal insulator. It has all the properties of a vacuum except the absence of matter."

 

One of my villians, Darqling, produces small amounts of it as a side effect of his powers. Imagine what you could do with that.