I can't wrap my head around a....

[Hermit]

What character concept, archetype, or origin can you just not wrap your head around and why? I know some folks who just can't do an alien to save their lives. One guy I knew, decent guy, just couldn't understand flagsuit characters, something in him balked when it came to seperating governments and their national dreams I guess. I myself have a hard time playing certain iron age concepts, or really uber dark characters.

 

This thread is because I'm curious, and if anyone has trouble with a concept of some sort, but wants tips, maybe those who are good at them could give some tips.

[dbsousa]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Brooding, antisocial loners. Why play a character who doesn't want to interact with other characters, or wants to antagonize them?

[nexus]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I'll second the above. Hard to get close too, quiet and withdrawn or hard to relate to, I can get but unwilling to interact with the other PCs? What's the point?

[Bloodstone]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Most advanced tech based heroes, which tends to included Gadgeteers and Power Armor types. It's not that I don't understand them or what not, it's that I hate how people tend to ignore their impcat on the rest of the world.

 

If you are a non villian with uber advanced tech that could change the way the world lives, then I think you are a asshat to withold that tech from mass production.

 

Any game where a Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Hank Pym, Forge, Hank MCCoy or Bruce Banner type character exists needs a tech level for the common man that is way more advanced then what we have or what the Marvel Universe tends to demonstrate.

 

Similarly, at the point where every common street vigilante has skintight, lightweight bullet proof armor, it's time to upgrade the police and most branches of the military, which will eventaully trickle down to others...

[AliceTheOwl]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I can't conceive of a simple, straightforward character. I have to complicate them, usually in ways that make them not fully understand the world.

[BNakagawa]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

CAPTAIN EVERYTHING! That guy who can do everything as well or better than anyone else in the game.

 

I would get bored playing such a character. I have always believed that limitations are a better way of defining a character than abilities. IMO, a character with no limitations isn't worth playing.

[TheRealVector]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Just like you mentioned Hermit; for me its aliens. I've always liked to run my superhero worlds with as much "realism" as possible, trying to ground the characters in the real world as much as possible. Maybe I lean towards what some have called a "people with powers' sort of game. I've used the approach in both my own superhero world for previous games and in my current game where I use my own modified version of the Marvel Ultimate Universe.

 

I can deal with genetic mutations and "science gone wrong" origins. Hey, those two are almost like real science. LOL

I can also deal with high tech gadgets and armor. Although, Bloodstone has a good point so I limit the kinds of tech I allow and try to play out the consequences when possible. Even more similar to real science.

When it comes to aliens (and to a slightly lesser extent magic) I just think they ruin the "real" world feel. No invading alien fleets, exiled alien princes, or stuff like that for my world. Or, if there just has to be such things I like to keep them subtle and in the realm of government cover-ups and conspiracy.

 

DISCLAIMER - This is just my opinion so if you love aliens you just go right ahead and have them in your game. Have fun.

[Hyper-Man]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Mentalists..

 

that are part of a team of non-mentalists. Mine always seem too generic. What's the best way to blend the physical and mental abilities without overshadowing the non-mentalists?

[DEFCON Clown]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Speedsters. I just can't understand the appeal. To me they are just about the most boring type of super out there.

[ghost-angel]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

The Flagsuit. I can't get into the mentality. I cannot, for the life of me, become that zealous (positively or negatively) about something like that. Either Patriot or Nationalist, they look the same to me.

 

Can't play 'em. Can play with 'em just fine, don't get it, but I can play with them. Couldn't play one to save my life.

[Logan D. Hurricanes]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

The normal human with training schtick. Martial artists and gadgeteers, really. I've only made one martial artist that I can recall, and I was never happy with him. I'm not real up on most gadgeteers either. Honestly, Batman is a character I would never create or imitate. I really like the injection of the fantastic into my supers. I want to see them fly, lift trucks, walk through walls, etc. I have to very careful regarding Dark Champions. If it allows super powers, even low level, i'll probably enjoy it. But if everyone is an ex-boxer turned hero or some such, i'll get bored very quickly. Or, to put it succinctly: Batman's out, but Daredevil is in.

[ghost-angel]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I want to see them fly' date=' lift trucks, walk through walls, etc.[/quote']

Flying is the big one for me. I try and get it on every character - I want all my Supers to fly. Even if it doesn't quite fit the concept I'm just "That's fine, they need to fly though, so they fly. Because Superheroes Fly, that's why."

 

I'm silly stubborn about it.

[Ockham's Spoon]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Antisocial loner characters are fun in concept and good for comics, but poor for RPGs unless you are playing a solo campaign, because the other players are going to get fed up with the loner.

 

There are a lot of character concepts I have difficulty with just from a plausibility standpoint. Like the idea that almost all mutations result in cool superpowers and rarely in horrible handicaps. In my campaigns, mutants always arise from someone's tampering with the gene pool.

 

Super high tech is a problem too for reasons mentioned by Bloodstone. For me part of the solution is that the technology does not lend itself to mass production, so "giving" the technology to the masses is not practical. In a similar vein, if the building the technology is as much an art as a science then only a few individuals would even be capable of doing it. Another "fix" for that problem is to say that the government has declared the technology top secret because of its destructive potential in the wrong hands and won't let it become common knowledge. Finally, if the technology comes from aliens or the future or something, the character may be able to patch it if it breaks, but couldn't duplicate it.

 

I used to have problems with alien characters too. I still do to some extent because I have trouble putting myself in their skin. So what I find crucial is to expansively define their culture and technology. You can't just come up with a personality for the alien character, you need to know what that personality is in relation to the rest of its ilk. And make sure that you figure out what impact the alien's "superpowers" have on their society. I will let players run alien characters, but they have to jump through more hoops in defining that character than someone playing a human would.

 

__________________________________________________________

"

[dbsousa]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Most advanced tech based heroes, which tends to included Gadgeteers and Power Armor types. It's not that I don't understand them or what not, it's that I hate how people tend to ignore their impcat on the rest of the world.

 

If you are a non villian with uber advanced tech that could change the way the world lives, then I think you are a asshat to withold that tech from mass production.

 

Any game where a Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Hank Pym, Forge, Hank MCCoy or Bruce Banner type character exists needs a tech level for the common man that is way more advanced then what we have or what the Marvel Universe tends to demonstrate.

 

My gadgeteer's background takes this into account...

 

Golden Eagle: Dexter Morache was born into abject poverty. Orphaned at an early age, he went to MIT on a full scholarship, but dropped out after 2 years, having sold six patents for 3 million dollars. In three years, those patents were worth half a billion dollars, so Morache went back to school to study patent law, and became fascinated by criminal law in the process. Morache spent the next 10 years “hanging out†at universities around the world, never receiving a degree, but making his first billion by applying the knowledge he gained, patenting the applications, and selling the patents to someone else. Occasionally, he would work with venture capitalists to start a business, but as soon as it was feasible, he would sell controlling interest to a larger company, leaving him free to flit to his latest pet project. On September 11, 2001, Morache took a hard look at his life, and reflected on the trivial life he was leading. His personal fortune rivaled Bill Gates, but he had no responsibilities. Every patent he developed was owned by a large corporation, any good he might have achieved had been co-opted in the name of profit. Morache spent the next two years using his enormous wealth to build his own corporation, dedicated to defending the world from madmen, gangsters, and robber barons. DEXCorp is now the 10th largest corporation in the world, and the largest privately held corporation in history by any measure. The current Golden Eagle is believed to be a suit jockey, most people believe that Morache is too busy changing the world to play with force fields and boot jets.

[FenrisUlf]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I don't know if it counts, but for some reason I have a hard time making characters with flight. It's either a major part of who they are, which is rare for me, or forget it.

 

That and stealth experts. Not all of my characters are up-front brawlers/fighters, but many of them are.

[assault]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I'm not particularly into mentalists, mystics, power armour and gun bunnies. I prefer bricks, energy projectors, speedsters, martial artists and gadgeteers. In the latter case, gadgeteers that are also one of the other archetypes.

 

In terms of origins, I tend to prefer aliens and Hidden Land types, with the occasional trained or intentionally enpowered character. I will play mutants or science accidents, but I tend to find them a bit generic. Mystical origins are definitely "meh", aside from certain flavours of Hidden Landers.

 

Patriots are right out. Even if I was to play a character on a government payroll, they wouldn't be a Patriot.

 

I prefer lighter characters to darker ones. Even if I was playing a Batman type, he wouldn't be Mr Angst.

 

The character I am currently working on is a Speedster/Brick, who is basically a variation on Superboy. I'm trying to tweak the details of his origin to maintain the "epic" feel, without it being a straightforward copy of Superboy's origin.

 

I also read a lot more DC than Marvel. I prefer the JLA, the Teen Titans and the Legion of Superheroes to the X-Men.

[Blue]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Nothing specific. It's more a matter of not being able to make the character live up to my designs during play; I usually can make whatever I want. It's an RP issue.

[OddHat]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

The Anti-Social Loner is never welcomed in my games, and I don't design them except as NPC opponents.

 

I can't enjoy player characters who pick fights with or take the piss out of other PCs, unless both players are clearly enjoying it. I've asked players to tone that down, and once had to ask a player to leave.

 

Dimmension hoppers and time travellers make good NPCs, but I rarely allow them as PCs in any but solo campaigns and one shots.

 

It's more personality types than power sets that I tend to have trouble with.

[TheRavenIs]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I seem to have a probleam with creating C's that are not in some way either gadgeteers, martial artists, or both. I love gadget's and stuff like that, to me it's fun to do the special equipment they need to be effective.

 

But lately that seems to be changing, after 20+ years I've made so many C's that aren't gadgeteers, martial artists, or both. That I can do any kind of C, but the ones I love to do are the ones above.

 

Now, I am GMing again after a few years break and I am having to do alot of other types, which is fun. I am only playing one C right now that you would have to call a gadgeteer, but that wasn't true for this C until lately. He was a combo of Dawnstar and Wildfire. Now he's back to just being a Dawnstar type.

 

I have alot of different C's that I am playing right now, a Wolverine type; that is not a kill crazy loner, a Human Torch type; young mutant, a C that is a combo of Aquaman and Namor, a C based on the viedo game Xenosaga KOS-MOS, the Dawnstar type; an alien, a EBer that uses air and earth as the SFX, a member of the Bloode; a time/dimensional meddler, and in a PBEM; a brick.

[JmOz]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Kill crazy characters, the ones who figure a dead enemy is a good one (ala the Punisher), In supers I prefer CvK characters.

[DEFCON Clown]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I don't like characters with a CVK I prefer Reluctant to Kill, same point value but this way your character can kill someone if they have to. It seems like a better fit to me.

[McCoy]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Gun bunnies.

[Rapier]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

What character concept, archetype, or origin can you just not wrap your head around and why? I know some folks who just can't do an alien to save their lives. One guy I knew, decent guy, just couldn't understand flagsuit characters, something in him balked when it came to seperating governments and their national dreams I guess. I myself have a hard time playing certain iron age concepts, or really uber dark characters.

 

This thread is because I'm curious, and if anyone has trouble with a concept of some sort, but wants tips, maybe those who are good at them could give some tips.

 

I've always had a problem rationalising the true-blue Superman types. At some point you can't be the boy-scout and you need to kick some ***. I can enjoy it as a story, but personally, I just have a problem playing and rationalising that true-blue-boy-scout.

[Jhereg]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

I've never played a straight-up Martial Artist in a Supers game. It just doesn't seem fun to me. I've done plenty of characters with some MA, but they had powers too.

 

I'm not too crazy about Flagsuits either, however as a GM I had a really compelling NPC who was a paraplegic, disillusioned "fallen flagsuit" from the Golden Age.

[OddHat]

Re: I can't wrap my head around a....

 

Thinking about it, I never do three of the classics:

 

The dirt poor hero who won't use his or her powers to help make a living. I'm not really talking about heroes who won't take money for saving lives; I'm thinking more of heroes like Peter Parker or Buffy Summers, people with serious money problems they could solve completely if they'd just use some fraction of their superhuman Strength, Speed and Reflexes on a pro sports team or in Hollywood. Some people like that genre bit; I don't.

 

The meek, mild mannered victim of bullying who, in his Secret Identity, is really a Hero. It goes right back to the start of the genre, but I just can't write up a man who can throw tanks but lets office bullies spill coffee on him and trash his work area.

 

The seventy hour a week Hero. Plenty of heroes in comics are very successful in incredibly demanding fields, fields where a seventy hour week is standard. If I work fifty hours in a week, I barely have time to eat and work out, and I set my own hours. Even if a Hero needs no sleep, I just can't see him in the office twelve hours a day and fighting crime the other twelve. Not unless the bad guys agree on a schedule.