Amalgamated Knock-Offs

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

(Cross posted from http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?p=386119#post386119 )

 

Combine Bruce Wayne and Steve Rogers to get:

 

Roger S. Bruce (decendent of Robert I aka Robert the Bruce) aka Nightshield, the Crusading Patriot! From a wealthy (Scottish-) American family, he saw his parents killed by Nazi bombs as a small boy when visiting family in Kincardine, Scotland in 1939.

 

Returning to the family estates outside of Chicago in the care of Kenneth Kincade, a loyal family servant whose family has served the Bruces for over 700 years, Roger was instructed and trained by a succession of the best tutors from the world over at the direction of Kincade. Driven by a secret vow to bring justice to the evil organizations of the world (particularly anything Nazi related), the young Roger learned well and quickly, taking special delight in learning fighting arts. Roger also possessed a keen and perceptive mind, enhanced by the difficult regimine of cognitive skills Kincade made him do daily.

 

Finally reaching his majority in 1953, Roger took over as CEO of the family business, Star Spangled Steel Amalgamated (abbreviated S3A), which had been held in trust by Kincade previously. Much more significantly however, Kincade revealed to Roger that his more unusual militant training had been for a purpose. According to Kincade a line of the Bruce family had been entrusted with great responsibility since before the time of David I King of Scots; protectors of an ancient artifact and a matching ancient duty. Kincade presented Roger with the artifiact, a perfectly preserved shield bearing Sable a lion rampant Azure (a blue standing lion on black).

 

Kincade told Roger that the shield was magical. Not only was it indestructible, but it granted great strength and fortitude upon its rightful possessor, even when not carried. According to legend, the rightful inheritor of the shield was remade into the ultimate warrior, the epitome of human might. The Bruce family was intrusted with the shield and with the solemn duty to use it to protect the world from oppression, to be a bastion for freedom for the people against those who would conquer and subjugate. Kincade delivered a warning as well; should the inheritor of the shield become unworthy of it, the powers granted by it would no longer be granted upon them and the shield would become inert, awaiting the next worthy Bruce to take it up. Kincade told Roger that his parents weren't in Scotland to visit family, rather Roger's father Godfrey had planned to fight against the Nazi's but was slain before he could join the cause of freedom againt Hitler.

 

With a fervent zeal in his eyes, Roger slipped the shield onto his arm and was instantly transformed physically from his athletic but otherwise normal teenaged form into a powerfully muscled fully mature man with incredible reflexes and unflagging endurance. Wasting no time Roger donned a dark costume complete with helmet and cape and took to the streets of Chicago as a costumed crimefighter known as Nightshield, a "mystery man" as the press then called them.

 

Working from a secret base below Bruce Manor, Roger initially took the fight to organized crime in Chicago, Roger soon found himself following trails of crime connections to various cities in his war on the mafioso. As he grew in experience and confidence he expanded his battle against infamy to include powered criminals and organizations. Eventually he encountered his great nemesis JORMUNGAND, a secret society bent on world domination with Nazi roots, mystical overtones, and a snake motif [blend of VIPER, HYDRA, and the Red Skull]. Nightsheild has continued to fight crime into the modern day, his aging apparantly retarded by the powers of the shield he bears.

 

Kenneth Kincade died of cancer in the 70's, but his son Kyle, took his place as Roger's major domo and aide. Kyle was also trained by his father in the same fashion as Roger, and though he lacked the mystical gifts of Roger he sometimes joined Nightshield in his battles as the costumed adventurer known as Kestrel.

 

In 1978 Roger restructured Star Spangled Steel Amalgamated into Star Spangled Sciences (S3) after fighting off a attempted hostile takeover engineered by Nathan Numen's NumenCorp [Lex Luthor, King Pin amalgam]. S3 branched its existing Mettalurgy labs into numerous other sciences via companies aquired in the levereged reversal Roger used to counter the NumenCorps buyout. In the decades to come S3 would become one of the worlds most influential and succesful technology firms, with branches dedicated to telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, infotech, and general government contracting.

 

As Nightshield progressed to fighting world-spanning dangers (eventually joining the Freedom Society of America in the 80's as a provisional member), Kestrel tended to stay local to Chicago and battle more street-level crime whenever Nightshield left the city to pursue bigger threats. Nightshield and Kestrel were a famous duo through the late 70s and early 80's, but in 1984 Kestrel was slain by Loke, one of the leaders of JORMUNGAND, an evil genius gadgeteer and trickster [Joker parallel], at the direction of the leader of JORMUNGAND the Crimson Serpent [Red Skull parallel]. loke tortured Kyle terribly, seeking to learn Nightshields true identity, but Kyle would not betray the secret and took it with him to the grave.

 

Kyle's younger brother Kevin Kincade left college at this point and returned to the Bruce mansion outside of Chicago to don the mantle of Kestrel and take up the family duty to serve the Bruces'. However Roger, stricken by the death of Kyle, refused to allow him to take up the identity of Kestrel. Finally Kevin secretly took to the streets on his own wearing his brother's costume. Of a more inventive bent but not as skilled of a fighter as his brother, Kevin supplemented his repetoir with a number of clever devices he had designed and built in college.

 

One night Roger discovered this charade when he went looking for Kevin in the mansion and instead found the case that normally held the Kestrel outfit empty. Donning his costume and sheild Nightshield went into the city to find Kestrel, expecting the worst. However Nightshield found Kestrel fighting a gang of Fringer thugs and doing quite well. Following him for the duration of the night, he watched Kevin deal with several problems all quite handily. Beating him back to the mansion Nightshield "caught" Kevin sneaking in and confronted him about his forays. Nightshield delivered an ultimatum; Kevin could continue his crimefighting as Kestrel, but only in conjunction with Roger himself.

 

Nightsheild and Kestrel soon returned to fighting crime as a team, often referred to as the "Dynamic Duo" by the press. Additionally Kevin's inventiveness lead to Nightshield carrying a belt of increasingly clever crime fighting aids, and later a number of sophisticated vehicles were added to the arsenal of crime-fighting tools such as the well known "Nite-kite" delta-winged stealth jet, the "Night Steed" jet powered motorcycle with hover capability, and the "Nightmobile" armored (and gadget laced) car.

 

Kevin also made a number of technological improvements to the Kestrel suit, to the point that it was more properly a suit of powered armor, augmenting its wearer to be roughly comparable to Nightshield's physical capabilities as well as a capacity for sustained flight, which was slowly improved from a powered glide to full-fleged flight. These improvements allowed Kevin to fight crime on a larger scale alongside Nightshield in the final years of his career as Kestrel.

 

 

In the mid-90's Kevin passed on the Kestrel mantle to Kyle's son (and his nephew), Kenneth "Kenny" Kincade. Kevin took a more supporting role to Nightshield's operations, typically serving as a "mission control" in addition to maintaining Bruce Manor, covering for Roger's many absences, and keeping the underground base in top condition. Kevin has occasionally come out of retirement in dire extremity to assist Kenny and Roger, wearing a full-fledged battle suit he calls Sparhawk. The Sparhawk suit is piloted (rather than being a pure exo-skeleton) and is modular, but its basic focus is as a straightforward superstrong flying platform with some non-lethal crime fighting attachments [very loose Azrael parallel, with aspects of old-man-Bruce from Batman Beyond].

 

 

Kenny lacked his uncles experience, but with the constantly improved Kestrel suit and his own youthful athleticism and enthusiasm, he quickly proved himself to Roger and the "Dynamic Duo" continued with little interuption. While his father Kyle's approach as Kestral was more martial arts and gumshoe detective work oriented, andh his uncle Kevin's approach was more gadgets, forensics, and computer aided analysis oriented, Kenny's approach to Kestrel has been more focused on learning the Kestrel suit's capabilities and pushing them to their limits, like a highly trained fighter pilot. While not as capable when it comes to investigative work, and not as clever as his uncle or Roger, Kenny has become much more adept at fighting powered crime than either of his predecessors due to using the technology at his disposal to it's fullest [batman Beyond parallel].

 

In the modern day, in addition to his exploits with Kestrel, Nightshield is also a respected member of the Freedom League of America (previously known as the Freedom Society of America), though generally regarded as being somewhat aloof by many of the younger members of that organization due to his unwavering and "old fashioned" ideals. He is widely held to be the greatest example of the "mystery men" of the 50's, due largely to his longevity, and his combination of sluething skills and uncanny ability to both predict outcomes and see through villainous ploys garners much respect among less cerebrally gifted superheroes. And of course his shield-smashing two-fisted approach to crime fighting is not to be disrespected either. He frequently serves as the leader of FLA response teams, and along with Mr. Wonderful, Freedom Lady, Iron Ring, and Dr. Proportion (aka Doc Prop) is one of the founding members of the group, having been in the FSA previously.

 

Roger is starting to show signs of age as well. Though chronologically 70 years old he looks like he is in his late 30's. He has had to employ make up and later prostetics when appearing in public as himself for the last 20 years, and has limited his public appearances heavily to conceal his retarded aging. Kevin handles most of his interests publicly and was appointed as "Director of Operations" of S3 over a decade ago. Roger has had many romances over the years in both identities, but his burning need to fight crime has prevented him from settling down. Kevin frequently urges him to find a suitable wife and father an heir lest the family line be ended.

 

Nightshield is sometimes called "The Dark Knight" and "The Shield of Justice" in the press, referring to some of the alternate names used to describe him in the late 50's and early 60's before his true nom de guere was widely known.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

Appologies in advance

 

Snip

 

Penny Arcade and Gammazon -- pure gold my friend, pure gold.

[Crackerjacker]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

The Defender Society of America (well its Defenders/Avenger mix)

 

Mr.Terrific/Iron Man- "T. Terrific, the world's smartest man who died of cancer but not before programming his brain into a dozen perfect androids"

Power Girl/Vision- "Mirage, a mystical being with unbeleivable power and an unstoppable will"

Dr.Fate/Dr.Strange- "Dr.Karma, private investigator and Vishnu dreamwalker"

Catman/Namor- "Naman Grah'nt, Prince of the Jungle Realms"

Starspangled Kid/Black Panther-"Cosmic Star, president of America-Sattelite in Universe-3"

Wakeem Thunder/Rick Jones-"Rick Bolt, teenage sidekick with an omnipotent geenie"

The Atom/Hawkeye-"Atomic Eagle, cold war icon and master of precision fighting"

[mattingly]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

My favorite joke Amalgam...

 

The Incredible Quark (Hulk/Atom) -- "The madder Quark gets, the smaller Quark gets! Quark is the smallest one there is!"

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

Geek

[Sketchpad]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

Hmm ...

Black Widow: Former Russian pop star, Dinah Romanov, was offered a job with O.R.A.C.L.E. by it's director Barbra Fury. While there, she has been equipped with sonic & web grenades, as well as a varient of Night-Spider's multi-shooter.

Night-Spider: Protege of the vigilante Dark Knight, Pete Grayson had his DNA altered when he decided to drop his sidekick identity of Ibis. Thanks to the altered DNA, Grayson now calls himself the Night-Spider, fighting crime in New Haven and occasionally working with the Teen Warriors.

Dark Knight: Billionaire archeaologist Marc Wayne discovered more than artifacts while on a dig in ancient Egypt. While in one of the pyramids, he found that he was the reincarnation of the Chiroptus, one of the ancient pharohs. Returning home to find his family murdered, he vowed revenge and donned a new identity as the Dark Knight. Fighting such villains as Hyde, Goblin Clown, Black Panther, The Yuckster and Rancor, the Dark Knight has proven himself as a protector of Gothica time and time again.

Powerhouse: Xenologist Clark Banner was investigating a strange, green rock that fell to Earth one night when an explosion in the lab merged the rock with Banner. Now, in times of high stress, Banner undergoes a transformation into a grey-skinned, shard-encrusted, rampaging monster called powerhouse. Framed for the death of the other labworkers, he now wanders the country, hoping to find a cure and battling other monstrosities on the way.

Raptor: Former FBI agent Helena Moorse was working undercover in the Gothic mob ring when Dark Knight had broken them up. Inspired by his courage, she went rogue and donned a dark costume to battle crime as Raptor.

[proditor]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

Excessive: Jenni Creed is the granddaughter of two of the world's most famous heroes. The Blur was a hero with the ability to move at near relativistic velocities as she kept America safe during WW2 and the Cold War, and Savage was darn near that...A large feral man possessed of enhanced regenerative abilities, near superhuiman strength and claws. Nothing untoward occured in their children, but the genes were waiting, and when Jenni hit her 14th birthday, she suddenly became a whirling ball of fury. Combining the feral abilities of her grandfather with a slightly slower version of her grandmother's speed created a deadly combination. Content to merely live her life as normally as she could, Jenni just tried to fit in. All went well until just after graduating High School. An old nemesis of her grandmother, the nefarious ex-soviet General Winter, used his enhanced super soldier physique and Ice powers to finally kill of his old enemies, The Blur and Savage. Jenni was devatated and that very night, the good general was literally torn to pieces by the newest dark vigilante, Excessive. Since then she has dedicated her life to making sure no one else has to suffer the loss that she did. Her primary enemies are other supers, but she has been known to take out a gang or two when things are "slow". While the savagery of her attacks has greatly diminished since General Winter's demise, she is still known for using more force than needed. Upon hearing her attacks described as Excessive by the police, she now had a name to go with her mission. (XS and Sabretooth)

 

Galvanizer: When Luke Pierce walked down the corridor to Death row, he knew it was only the latest disappointment in a life of struggle and hardship. As an Olympic Gold Medal winner, Pierce was everything that symbolized success. A former Gang member, his athletic prowess was recognized early and fostered by the Deacon of his local church. Pierce managed to overcome the entanglements and peer pressure of his urban upbringing and had excelled, becoming a role model for all of those looking for something better. But fame has it's price, and once back in the old neighborhood, Pierce tried to use it for good. As a certified teacher, he took a job in the worst part of his old neighborhood and also started an after school athletics program in partnership with the Police Athletic League. This change did not go unnoticed by his former gang buddies who felt that Pierce had "Sold out". They were determined to bring the goody two-shoes down a notch or two and show him just how fragile his star position truly was. Set up for a murder he didn't commit, railroaded through the legal system that was tired of seeing the famous and powerful getting off scott free, Pierce was condemned to the Electric Chair. His last thoughts as they strapped him in were "why?" The switch was thrown...And Galvanizer was born. His will to overcome all fueled Pierce's latent psionic abilities and manifested in some startling ways. His skin now permanently radiated an electrical field that bonded with the outer layer, making him almost impervious to harm. He gained control over electricity in all of it's forms, and the power coursed through his muscles granting him superhuman speed and Strength. As the courts tried to figure out what to do with a guy who wouldn't die, new evidence came forward and Galvanizer was cleared of all charges. Now, the Living Battery tries to make a normal life for himself while also working to clean up the neighborhood that he has called home for so long. (Power Man and Black Lightning)

[proditor]

Re: Amalgamated Knock-Offs

 

One more came to me in the shower:

 

SuperNova: Richard Kent seems just like the boy next door...but only if next door is half the universe away. Born as Kal-Rie on the planet Kreeton, he is the last surviving member of that race's struggle against planetary upheaval, and an insane Artifical Intelligence determined to save itself. Found as a baby in his little rocket ship, Richard grew up like any other kid in Kansas. Well, any other kid that could lift 10 tons, was functionally bulletproof, and who could run at Mach speeds that is...But through it all, Richard felt that the supers of his day were grandstanding. He went down the path of law enforcement, first as cop in the city of Chicago, and then as a crime reporter for the Daily Bugle. He would have probably continued just helping out quietly on the side, but the decision was taken from his hands by the appearance of Brainivac. The AI from his home world had come to earth, battling the legendary Star Guardian Decurions of Xanoa to slay the last living Kreetonian. As the battle raged, Richard had to use his powers to save normal folk and supers alike. The great AI was nigh invincible, and the leader of the Decurians fell to the ground at Richard's feet. Moving the dying alien from the battlesite, Richard was surprised when the man raised his hand to touch him and said "Now you shall be the star that guides us to victory..." There was a flash of energy, both men fell to the ground, and SuperNova arose. Combining the might of his Kreetonian physiology with the gravimetric powers of the Star Guardians, SuperNova routed the AI and took his place as the foremost hero of the day. While seen as "The boy scout with Attitude", SuperNova has become an inspiration to heroes and novice heroes across the world. (Superman and Nova)