SCOTT HEINE

[RDU Neil]

Re: What made the Protectors great

 

Originally posted by Lord Liaden

I've noticed that the fondness of longtime Champions players for To Serve and Protect, and particularly for the Protectors themselves, is pretty widespread (including myself). They seem to have struck a nerve for many of us. That prompted me to consider why I, at least, find them so appealing:

 

Depth. The character writeups showed the kind of originality of thought, attention to detail and well-rounded concept that comes with characters actually created and run by good players for a long time in a well-GM'd campaign;

 

Visuals. Scott Heine's illustrations are sharp and striking, and the characters' poses and expressions are highly evocative of their attitude and personality;

 

Balance. This team has all the bases covered: frontline and ranged fighters, bricks for slugging and martial artists for finesse, fliers, mentalists, sorcerors, scientists, detectives... it's an excellent example of how to maximize a team's strengths by filling all the necessary niches;

 

Tactics. As Captain Obvious pointed out (which seems somehow appropriate ), the Protectors employ coordinated battle strategies to increase their effectiveness in combat, one of the most valuable lessons I and my players learned from the original adventure;

 

Cool Accessories. The Protectors had several roundout items that gave them a distinctive team "feel" and just made sense for a major superteam: personal communicators and protective/sense-enhancing contact lenses for all members, agent backups/associates providing additional resources, a classic amphibious superplane, and one of the neatest team bases I've ever seen.

 

All this richness really helped the impact of the adventure in To Serve and Protect. In my experience the player-characters readily come to admire and care about these NPC heroes, and become concerned when they start to go bad, for the Protectors' well-being as well as for their own skins when they have to confront them!

 

One additional note in the "plus" column for that adventure - the Skull Pendant is one of the best plot-generating McGuffins ever put into a Champions book. I got quite a bit of long-term use out of that dingus.

 

All these things are true... and in my opinion, we're doubly true from the only other supplement BETTER than TS&P... The Zodiac Conspiracy. (Well... the art in ZC wasn't as good, but the color made up for that.)

 

A solid group of individuals that have a REASON for working as a team. Very important. While the Protectors were the old guard that helped usher in new (read PC) heroes over the years... and the death of Quasar, saving another PCs loved one, was very moving in my campaign... the Zodiac ended up being my lynchpin group. Their "villains... sort of..." motiffe (or at least I played up that angle quite a bit) lead by an immortal scholar powerhouse character like Taurus was great for driving plots forward and working both for and against the heroes.

 

Kudos to both these supplements for the source material for absolutely great games.

[death tribble]

I back Lord Liaden and RDU Neil on this.

 

And I have both modules.

 

(Sits up in a tree and gloats)

 

And I really want to see Quasar in colour. Dr Wraithe I can wait for but Quasar should be good.