Villainy Amok

[GestaltBennie]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

In summation, most of the ideas (8, quite likely 9, out of 11; just steer away of anything simian. ) you have left aside look useful and interesting. You just need to break out a bit from the silver-age, street-level mold.

 

What alternative ideas are you thinking of exploring ?

 

First, thanks for the feedback. Alternative plot gallery ideas I've brainstormed include: "Ten Riddle Crime Scenarios" (Complete With Riddles and How to Solve Them), "Ten Scenarios To Help Reconcile Fractitious PCs", "Ten Scenarios To Use After A PC's Killed A Supervillain", "Ten Ways For A City To Honor A Superhero" (and what could go wrong), "Ten Mood Changing Scenarios (to Run After the Big Storyline Wraps Up)", "Ten Superhero Christmas Scenarios", "Ten Superhero Halloween Scenarios", "Ten Girlfriends From Hell for Playboy PCs" (and the things they do), "Ten Scenarios To Introduce New PCs Into the Campaign", "Ten Scenarios to Build A Team's Confidence When The Players Think The Campaign's Too Tough", "Ten Government Conspiracies", "Ten Scenarios to Resurrect the Third Reich", "Ten Scenarios Guaranteed to Produce Radiation Accidents", "Ten Schemes For Your Evil Industrialist", "Ten Ways to Test A PCs' Code of Honor", "Ten Reasons for International Terrorists to Hit Your Campaign City", "Ten Heroic Last Stands For Your PC" (And How to Survive Them).

 

Plus I'd want to revisit some of the old scenario seed themes (especially "Gossip at a Superhuman Party")

 

While nobody would be happier to have a Villainy Amok II then me' date=' I do have to point out that we'll need to sell a lot more of #1 to justify a #2. So be sure to tell your friends how much you liked it! dw[/quote']

 

I can definitely get behind this sentiment. :-) Do you have a friend with whom you're not speaking because he's turned into a butthead who only plays M&M? Buy him a Villainy Amok and break the ice! Does your grandmother like weddings? Point out the picture of the wedding on the cover with the lovely looking angel man and repeat the phrase "grandma, $27 isn't that much anyone." until she relents. Is someone starving for new Star Wars merchandise? Start an argument on whether an X-Wing could destroy a Tripod death machine, and force him to buy the book to prove his point! Be creative! :-)

[Enforcer84]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

First, thanks for the feedback. Alternative plot gallery ideas I've brainstormed include: "Ten Riddle Crime Scenarios" (Complete With Riddles and How to Solve Them), "Ten Scenarios To Help Reconcile Fractitious PCs", "Ten Scenarios To Use After A PC's Killed A Supervillain", "Ten Ways For A City To Honor A Superhero" (and what could go wrong), "Ten Mood Changing Scenarios (to Run After the Big Storyline Wraps Up)", "Ten Superhero Christmas Scenarios", "Ten Superhero Halloween Scenarios", "Ten Girlfriends From Hell for Playboy PCs" (and the things they do), "Ten Scenarios To Introduce New PCs Into the Campaign", "Ten Scenarios to Build A Team's Confidence When The Players Think The Campaign's Too Tough", "Ten Government Conspiracies", "Ten Scenarios to Resurrect the Third Reich", "Ten Scenarios Guaranteed to Produce Radiation Accidents", "Ten Schemes For Your Evil Industrialist", "Ten Ways to Test A PCs' Code of Honor", "Ten Reasons for International Terrorists to Hit Your Campaign City", "Ten Heroic Last Stands For Your PC" (And How to Survive Them).

 

Plus I'd want to revisit some of the old scenario seed themes (especially "Gossip at a Superhuman Party")

 

 

 

I can definitely get behind this sentiment. :-) Do you have a friend with whom you're not speaking because he's turned into a butthead who only plays M&M? Buy him a Villainy Amok and break the ice! Does your grandmother like weddings? Point out the picture of the wedding on the cover with the lovely looking angel man and repeat the phrase "grandma, $27 isn't that much anyone." until she relents. Is someone starving for new Star Wars merchandise? Start an argument on whether an X-Wing could destroy a Tripod death machine, and force him to buy the book to prove his point! Be creative! :-)

 

Dude, those "Top Ten" Lists are (to borrow a phrase) TOTALLY WICKED!!!

[FenrisUlf]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

First' date=' thanks for the feedback. Alternative plot gallery ideas I've brainstormed include: "Ten Scenarios To Use After A PC's Killed A Supervillain" [/quote']

 

That could be really helpful for me. But then, I'm a guy who thinks that Batman should have broken the Joker's neck for him years ago. (i.e., I don't like/use 'killer heroes', but some villains are so far beyond the pale that a death in combat is all they deserve.)

 

"Ten Girlfriends From Hell for Playboy PCs" (and the things they do)

 

Sounds like another great one. Did you already have any ideas for this one, hopefully not drawing on personal experience? I know some preachers who've *lived* Big Fat Caped Weddings.

 

"Ten Government Conspiracies"

 

Here I dunno. I'd like to see something a bit different from the generic evil gummint conspiracy, which is why you're probably the only guy I'd trust with it. Why can't you have a government conspiracy that doesn't involve hiding aliens or killing presidents for once?

 

"Ten Scenarios to Resurrect the Third Reich"

 

Sounds like another good one. I've seen some good treatments like Harbinson's _Projekt Saucer_ and Drake's _Fortress_, but I've also seen abominations like _The Spear_. Be interesting to see what you would come up with. Bet it'd be truly bizarre.

 

Say, what if someone here were to post these ideas on the forum just to see if anyone comes up with something good? One of the things I truly like about Hero is the way you accept feedback from us fans.

 

Great ideas all!

[Susano]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

"Ten Scenarios to Resurrect the Third Reich"

 

Scenario Number 6: Make 'em all vampires.

 

[Chromatic]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Scenario Number 6: Make 'em all vampires.

 

 

Didn't they do that in City of Heros?

[Susano]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Didn't they do that in City of Heros?

 

HELLSING.

[Wanderer]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Now I have to remark, as it had previously and wholly escaped my notice, that the "Supervillain/Superhero on trial" scenario was indeed published on Digital Hero #30. Well, reading it, many kudos on the author. It is a fine, well-developed exploration of the concept. IMO it was more interesting and useful than some of the scenarios included in the book, and of general interest like say "Mad Science". As a matter of fact, I have some regrets that, since this appears to be in a full format, it wll never see hardprint in an hypothetical VA II, and I have some respectful qualms about the wisdom of choice about which scenario to discard from VA: Come on, Steve, which adventure scenario is to be more useful, and more often used, the one where supervillains (or PC !) are brought to trial, or the one where they are shrunk to ant-size ? The former I can easily see to be used several times, with variations, by many groups, the latter to be used once, if ever, by a group, and then only by ones who enjoy Silver Age cliches.

 

A fine piece of work. IMO, especially useful for those players and GM that don't have prima-facie experience with the American judicial systems, and have to rely on movies and TV. My only real qualm about it is that the author too easily assumes 3 four-color cliches as unavoidable ground work. I really would have liked some brainstorming and some ideas about how the interaction between superhumans and the trial system would work in a "realistic", Iron Age world: a) unbridled superhero "vigilantes" would not be tolerated in a realistic world. Well, true, this is the toughest nut to crack. But maybe masked superheroes are officially or semi-officially state-sancioned super-agents or super-soldiers, their secret identities a matter of national security, maybe only disclosed to the judge's confidence (then ripe for a nice little telepathy...), or maybe superhumans have before arm-twisted the Congress to pass legislation legalizing secret identities and some kind of legal immunity for superheroes (maybe all what is needed to identify a masked vigilante in a trial is a matching superpower profile, or recogntion from the superhero "guild"). This however, creates cry of unfairness from psoecution and/or defense, and the press/public. legal system will not tolerate masked superhumans who maintain secret identities in the trial. Well, this is perhaps the easiest problem to work around: as said above, for state-sanctioned heroes it would be a matter of national security ("Sorry, your honor, pursuant to Superhuman Resources Mobilization Act, USC 32-036, the identity of Invincible and Atom Lady cannot be disclosed to the general public. The FBI offers proof that they are positively identified"). For others, it would be more difficult: it is not, however, completely implausible to hypothesize that a legal precedent developed, or a statute was passed, by which the identity of a mask was kept from the public and the parts, and only disclosed to the judge, or the superpowers "signature" was used to identify the autenticity of the costumed identity (indeed, what superior interest of justice would be served by mandatory identification of the superhuman's secret identity in the process ? Full knowledge of and access to the witness' character and life history is NOT an overwhelming interest of justice in most trials...) c) superhumans and lawsuits. well, this is a tough nut to crack, too, as Incredibles shows, given the never-ending addiction to litigiousness of the American people. I can see some ways around this, too, however: 1) statutes, or legal precedents, are created by which the knowledge of a super's secret identity by the authorities cannot be legally used for suing: it may be known by the government and the police for matters of national security and law enforcement, but it cannot be used for litigation. Suing may target the costumed ID, but not the civilian ID. Or, more simply (and likely, in a "realistic" or Iron Age setting where superheroes behave like realistic persons with a healthy sense of self-preservation and loyalty to their peers), the superhuman community may just have arm-twisted, lobbyied or blackamailed government in passing statutes creatin "good samaritan" extensive legal immunity for superhumans from lawsuits when acting to protect the public: it's amazing what kind of emergency legislation the Congress may pass when given the proper incentive ("Sorry, Mr. President, this time the Justice Squadron and the Defenders won't be in the position to help your country, even if the Army of Allah is threatening to disrupt your oil supply. Your hellish lawsuit system has given us far too much abuse in the past. A people that can't be persuaded to respect its saviors' peace of mind maybe doesn't deserve saving... Don't hang us, dammit. I'll get Congress to ban lawsuits againt superhumans. Ok, I thought you'd have seen our point. Defenders Deploy !"). Or simply goverment acts to limit frivolous lawsuits on its initiative because it recognizes that the by far most likely outcome of an unbridled wave of lawsuits and legal harssment against superhumans is superhumans setting up a legal system of their own...

 

 

I would have liked some discussion of these points in the scenario, beyong handwaving them to "four-color cliches inexplicably work".

[MitchellS]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Since the Champions Universe is not an iron age world [it seems solidly situated in bronze] there was probably no reason to write the book from an iron age perspective. Personally I'm glad for that.

[fbdaury]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Got the book the other day and one of the first things I read in it were the updates of Engineer and Invictus. One question, why did you change Invictus? The original was much more to my liking, understandably not everyone will agree with me here, but I much prefered the original orgin, nature of powers and powers themselves over the newer incarnation. This makes me curious as to why you choose to make these changes- was the original not to your liking? Is this the way that you had originally intended the character but decided to alter him for the original book? On the other hand, I really liked the update of Engineer, nice work there. NOw to reaad through the rest of the book.

[GestaltBennie]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Largely the changes to Invictus's background were to give him a little more motivation, more of a reason to call himself "Invictus" and employ the motif.

 

The powers aren't changed that much: a bit of a boost and some extra powers to make him more of an embodiment of his new motif. I'm still not quite happy with autofire as a solution to the double-fire ability, but it's a little less cumbersome than the solution I tried in 3rd Edition.

 

I did feel a need to scale his position back (he's a senator in 4th edition with a lot of resources at his beck and call and a lot of political influence, while in 5th he's a relative newbie to politics who's just beginning his career). It's a little more limited for those who want to use him as a major villain, but it gives the GM some freedom to develop his career and ramp him up. And I wanted to give him (and the Engineer) a little lower profile in the official CU - when comic book authors play games of "my new creation one-ups everything that's gone before", it tends to annoy the heck out of me, so hopefully the characters don't overshadow the existing villains, but fit into the whole with relatively few seams showing.

 

As for the costume change, I was unsatisfied with his Villainy Unbound look, not because it's a bad drawing (it's one of the best in that book) but because I think I was in a phase where I was unfairly critical of some of the conventions of four color comics, and as a result, my characters from Vllainy Unbound (through to the original VIPER) haven't had quite the visual flair they should have had. I wanted to give Invictus more of a comic book look. Once again the artist did a superlative job, but I'm still not satisfied with it. Maybe Invictus is probably one of those guys who went through a lot of costumes during his career, and the Villainy Unbound and the Villainy Amok drawings represent two extremes. :-)

[FenrisUlf]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Well, myself, I like the new Invictus. He strikes me as a very long-term use villain, with the fact that he _is_ a villain something that should be concealed for as long as possible. To me, his villainy should be revealed when he makes his bid for the presidency. What do you do when you discover that the guy you're helping into the White House is the CU version of Palpatine?

 

Come to think of it, a debate between Invictus & Senator Haganstone, when both are up for the presidency, would be entertaining. Especially if their little secrets came out in the middle. It'd be more exciting than the usual debate, that's for sure.

[Enforcer84]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

I can go either way. This one has more style but the other one was a simpiler one. I kind of like the Non-costume he used to have.

[Doctor Agenda]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Heck this may be one of my favorit books so far next to CKC. Just a great amount of details and springboard ideas. The 10 ways the scenario can go wrong sections are great and those pages of ideas at the end are excellent as well. For a GM this could be one of those truely great cost versus ongoing value books and should be considered a must have.

 

I'm really getting use out of this one, I plan to use at least one of each of the classic bits.

[transmetahuman]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Apparently you've never seen the Mike Mignola/Frank Cho assessment that "everything goes better with monkeys" (shared by many others -- including Darren Watts [iIRC]' date=' I may add).[/quote']Add me to that list.

[Southern Cross]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

And me.

[Sketchpad]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

I recently did the Shrinking Heroes bit ... Foxbat, in a villainous team up with Doctor Otaku (yup, the same one from M&M), shrunk three of the heavy hitters from the hero group. Going to the local science lab, they were eventually grown back to their full height and, with the rest of the team now with them, they went out to find Foxbat

[name_tamer]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Has anyone used/planned to use the Bottled City of Naldar? Personally I think it's nice to have another bit of crunchy Silver Age goodness in the CU.

[MitchellS]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Has anyone used/planned to use the Bottled City of Naldar? Personally I think it's nice to have another bit of crunchy Silver Age goodness in the CU.

I'm not playing in the CU but I'm going to use it in my campaign as part of the possession of Markath the Destroyer [ancient evil wizard]. The PCs will eventually need to deal with it, as well as a couple of other things from VA.

[Doctor Agenda]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Has anyone used/planned to use the Bottled City of Naldar? Personally I think it's nice to have another bit of crunchy Silver Age goodness in the CU.

 

In my campaign, The Futurian (II) is married to a Malvan princess who is searching for it. Hopefully she can figure out how to get in to the darn thing so I don't have to stretch credibility by having all the conditions filled by coincidence.

[Southern Cross]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Drat,it looks like I'm going to have to buy the book.

[Kirby]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

I just received the book yesterday and am already on the second chapter. Kudos! Without posting a detailed review, I would like to comment that so far (especially with the Bank Robbery section) I've seen not just ideas I haven't thought of, but those I used to use years ago and had forgotten about. I am pleased with my purchase.

[Kirby]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

I've finished reading all but Chapter Six: "Honey, I shrunk the Superheroes!" and I must say I'm very impressed. The only chapter I didn't care for was on the superpowers drug. While I probably wouldn't use it in my campaigns anyway, it just felt (as Ian McKellan would say in The LotR commentary) "cheeky."

 

My favorite chapter has to be Chapter 2, with the Alien Probe.

 

One question about the wedding scenario. In it, it says the official version has Grond showing up; however, Champions Universe states (p. 100): "As of 2002, Grond is incarcerated in a hot sleep chamber in Stronghold...." Is this oversight, will there be an upcoming book noting this (Stronghold, perhaps?), or has it already been explained and I missed it?

[MitchellS]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

I've finished reading all but Chapter Six: "Honey, I shrunk the Superheroes!" and I must say I'm very impressed. The only chapter I didn't care for was on the superpowers drug. While I probably wouldn't use it in my campaigns anyway, it just felt (as Ian McKellan would say in The LotR commentary) "cheeky."

 

My favorite chapter has to be Chapter 2, with the Alien Probe.

 

One question about the wedding scenario. In it, it says the official version has Grond showing up; however, Champions Universe states (p. 100): "As of 2002, Grond is incarcerated in a hot sleep chamber in Stronghold...." Is this oversight, will there be an upcoming book noting this (Stronghold, perhaps?), or has it already been explained and I missed it?

I would just assume that many villains come and go from Stronghold on a fairly regular basis. I don't believe we have any information stating that no one has ever escaped from this world's Stronghold.

[Kirby]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

I would just assume that many villains come and go from Stronghold on a fairly regular basis. I don't believe we have any information stating that no one has ever escaped from this world's Stronghold.

True, the previous edition did seem to have a revolving door; however, I was thinking since he was in a deep sleep, it should be easier to keep him there. But who knows? (Well, I know someone knows, which is why I asked, but it seemed like a nice rhetorical question.)

[Kirby]

Re: Villainy Amok

 

Oh, I do hope the sales figures are high enough that a sequel is able to be in the works (whether it's called Villainy Amok II or Heroes in a Bind, as long as it came out and was of the same quality).