CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

[teh bunneh]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

w00t!

 

 

I'd like to see an "Iron Age" setting. A combination between Marshall Law and The Authority; a world in which super-powered gangs have taken over the streets and super-powered super-celebrities don't do anything about it. A handful of mid-powered heroes have taken it upon themselves to clean up the streets, weed out corruption, and change the world for (what they see as) the better!

 

Not everybody's cuppa, I know. But just something to show what could be done.

[kahuna's bro]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

w00t!

 

 

I'd like to see an "Iron Age" setting. A combination between Marshall Law and The Authority; a world in which super-powered gangs have taken over the streets and super-powered super-celebrities don't do anything about it. A handful of mid-powered heroes have taken it upon themselves to clean up the streets, weed out corruption, and change the world for (what they see as) the better!

 

Not everybody's cuppa, I know. But just something to show what could be done.

i take it that marshal law refers to the 1990's tv show starring sammo houng and kelly hu

[lemming]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

i take it that marshal law refers to the 1990's tv show

 

I'm not aware of a TV show, but I'm betting on this comic

 

It's not to everyone's taste. Not sure I'd want to play a campaign of it, but an occasional game would work.

 

edit: Did find the Australian TV show. Almost positive it's not what teh bunneh referred to.

[teh bunneh]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

I'm not aware of a TV show' date=' but I'm betting on this comic

 

It's not to everyone's taste. Not sure I'd want to play a campaign of it, but an occasional game would work.

 

edit: Did find the Australian TV show. Almost positive it's not what teh bunneh referred to.

 

Lemming is correct. I meant Pat Mills' and Kev O'Neill's violent superhero distopia.

[gojira]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

There's been some discussion of and requests for some mini-settings in the book. So I wanted to think out loud about that a bit.

 

woot, part deux!

 

Some random ideas. Personally I'd like to see some more standard type stuff, things that can be related to easily. However whatever tickles folk's fancy.

 

1. Pulp Superhero. In the 1930's, the supers start to arrive. Lower the power level, and mix in standard pulp heroes. All aliens have the Complication "Don't understand Earth culture." All mutants have the Complication "Hated by 90% of the population." There's plenty of martial arts, magic, and weird science to go around, but characters like Psychic Detective and Flying Ace should still be effective and recognizable.

 

The other ideas are cool too, just wanted to toss that one out there. The "1602" idea is darn nice.

 

EDIT: Of the five Steve lists, School Spirit, A Plague Upon Thee and Avatars sound the most interesting. The other two seem like they'd lie a bit too far outside of people's expectations (i.e., most people buying the book, of who many are going to be new) to work for a mini setting. They might eventually go together in a book (PDF?) of their own, I think.

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

1. Pulp Superhero. In the 1930's' date=' the supers start to arrive. Lower the power level, and mix in standard pulp heroes. All aliens have the Complication "Don't understand Earth culture." All mutants have the Complication "Hated by 90% of the population." There's plenty of martial arts, magic, and weird science to go around, but characters like Psychic Detective and Flying Ace should still be effective and recognizable.[/quote']

 

I second that! The best campaigns I ran started during the Pulp era and added supers as we went along!

[James Gillen]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

The Malvan idea really interests me.

 

JG

[mallet]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Not a mini setting, but some discussion/rules to handle games designed as "Graphic Novels", and by that I mean, campaigns where there might be adventures last 8-9 sessions (a single "graphic novel") and then the next adventure uses the same characters in the same setting, but might take place years later (in the character universe). Kind of like "Batman: The Dark Knight" and "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns" GN's. So rules and suggestions for character growth/changes during these "years" between adventures would be cool. Not just for Champions, but eventually for all genres.

 

I seem to remember WOD having some rules of that nature to handle the long lives of Vampires and how years might go by between big events ("Adventures").

 

This is also seen in lots of comics now days (especially Marvel) where it seems most titles just have "filler" issues for most of the year leading up to the "BIG SUMMER MEGA CROSSOVER EVERYTHING YOU KNOW CHANGES" event. For the other 7 months of the years nothing much happens, then the big event goes down.

 

Some talk of handling things rule wise and character growth wise between these big events, if you just want to have time passing by in your characters lives and the setting, would by good.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

There's been some discussion of and requests for some mini-settings in the book. So I wanted to think out loud about that a bit.

3. Since the book already does a great job of discussing "typical" Superhero campaigns of various sorts, the mini-settings would need to be in some way unusual or distinctive.

 

I like that idea, with the specific comment made in the intro to the mini-settings that these are deliberately not "typical" Superhero campaigns, which are covered in more detail in [CU, other books already published].

 

--The Golden Hunters: Some of you have heard me discuss this setting before -- ultra-powerful Malvan warriors versus ultra-powerful Elder Worm sorcerers for control of the Galaxy 500,000 years ago. Definitely not your typical Superhero setting. Unfortunately I couldn't do much more than present the basic idea; I won't have time to really delve into it as it needs (though I still hope to, somewhere, someday).

 

--School Spirit: A mystic-oriented quasi-Teen Champions campaign in which the PCs are all students at Millennium City University. (Go Vanguards!)

 

--A Plague Upon Thee: A "unified source" campaign in which all superpowers result from some sort of disease, which (a) limits the types of powers characters can have, and ( makes supers feared by most of the populace, even when they're heroic.

 

--Avatars: A relatively high-powered campaign in which the superhumans are all avatars, incarnations, manifestations, or children of mythological gods and similar beings.

 

--Voyagers Of The Infinite: In which the PCs aren't superpowered per se, but have super-tech, and use it to explore the Multiverse, fight bad guys, solve mysteries, and pick up alien chicks.

 

Third Tier - Playing low (or even normal) powered Supers in a world where there are 1-2 big powerful, nearly omnipresent Super Groups, getting all the press, doing all the deeds. Regular Heroes coping in the shadows of others.

 

Villains Rise - (alright, the premise is far from original these days) The worlds heroes are gone, vitims of an alien invasion. The invasion stopped, the worlds villains are left squabbling over who should rule, some are just selfish and are running amok... but some villains, see that the balance is off - and in their own ways set about to become the next heroes.

 

I'd like to see an "Iron Age" setting. A combination between Marshall Law and The Authority; a world in which super-powered gangs have taken over the streets and super-powered super-celebrities don't do anything about it. A handful of mid-powered heroes have taken it upon themselves to clean up the streets' date=' weed out corruption, and change the world for (what they see as) the better! [/quote']

 

1. Pulp Superhero. In the 1930's' date=' the supers start to arrive. Lower the power level, and mix in standard pulp heroes. All aliens have the Complication "Don't understand Earth culture." All mutants have the Complication "Hated by 90% of the population." There's plenty of martial arts, magic, and weird science to go around, but characters like Psychic Detective and Flying Ace should still be effective and recognizable.[/quote']

 

Given these are to be off the standard Supers, I'd also like to see as little relationship as possible, and the widest possible ground covered. Given that, and having no great ideas of my own:

 

I like the Golden Hunters, and if this exposure gives it some legs, maybe a future sourcebook expanding it more broadly would be in the offing.

 

Plague Upon Thee/Avatars both play on the common origin theme. I'd like to see one, probably Plague rather than Avatars.

 

Voyage would be cool, but I'd cut it before the other two. It could also make a Star Hero minisetting, and it seems similar to Golden Hunters (galactic in scope, etc.)

 

Low power Supers in a classic Supers world seems like an interesting idea. Can we splice that in with the Iron Age setting? The Boys comes to mind in that regard. I'm not a big Iron Age fan, but I think something on an Iron Age line should be included.

 

Villains Rise seems reasonable. I'd like to see a focus on "the heroes are gone - what next", whether that be villains or a new generation of Supers rising some time after the old has vanished.

 

Pulp Supers is another great cross-genre idea, and a revised 6e Pulp Hero seems less likely than Star Hero.

 

So, with 3-4 being suggested, I'd choose:

 

- Golden Hunters (pretty much as set out above)

- Plague (or some other 'common origin/restricted abilities' setting)

- Pulp Supers

- Iron Age in some fashion (whether 'the low powered Supes", maybe the "Villains Rise" riff, since these won't logically be your Daddy's superteam, or otherwise); Plague could have an Iron Age bias as well, but I'd rather avoid tainting that one.

[IndianaJoe3]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

If I finish the Superhero Gallery in Chapter Five this week (giving me a couple extra days next week before the day or so needed to wrap the manuscript up and send it to Fred)' date=' and [i']if[/i] I feel like writing up some mini-settings, what sort of mini-settings would you like to see?

 

Villians as Heroes - The world is collapsing. Society is decadent. Governments are corrupt. Now is the time for beings of power to overthrow the social order and lead mankind into a new Golden Age!

[BobGreenwade]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Villians as Heroes - The world is collapsing. Society is decadent. Governments are corrupt. Now is the time for beings of power to overthrow the social order and lead mankind into a new Golden Age!

One could also see the reverse, even under the same title: some great calamity (like an alien attack) has wiped out all the most powerful heroes, and a ragtag group of villains decide that Earth's freedom is more important than personal monetary profit. Not that they'll pass up the profit if it happens to make itself available, of course....

[Matt Holck]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

more base powers not defined but some contortion of other powers

like

Light 5 points 4 Hex radius

 

Just saying ...

[megaplayboy]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

On the villains-as-heroes thing, I did once have an idea called Warlords of Earth, a sort of "Post-Apocalyptic Champions", where the planet was divided up amongst mega-villains, and the PCs can be either among the few remaining heroes, trying to take back the planet, one province at a time; proxies of the mega-villains, working toward some interim common goal; or the mega-villains themselves, forced to work together to deal with some external threat to the whole planet.

Considering the assortment of personality disorders villains tend to have, roleplaying a group that actually manages to work together would be a real challenge, imo.

[The Main Man]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Here's an easy one: put X-Men and District 9 into a blender and you get stranded, superpowered aliens coping with human persecution.

[kahuna's bro]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

 

Pulp Supers is another great cross-genre idea, and a revised 6e Pulp Hero seems less likely than Star Hero.

r

perhaps a combined pulp goden age book is called for

[gojira]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

I like that idea' date=' with the specific comment made in the intro to the mini-settings that these are deliberately not "typical" Superhero campaigns, which are covered in more detail in [CU, other books already published'].

 

 

This is a good point. Considering that there will be some new folks, at least, reading Champions, there should be several references to Champions Universe. Explain, like, in twelve different places, that CU is where you go to get the world with all the details (tone, morality, power levels, people, places, things) worked out. Side bars are great for this. Also the introduction to the Champions book should mention it too.

 

The mini settings (should they appear, we shouldn't get too worked up about it until it's confirmed) are ideas that show how a setting *different* from CU can be constructed. They're teasers, not full worlds, and not the only info that's available (CU again, hint hint).

[Steve Long]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

there should be several references to Champions Universe

 

[gentle, humorous sarcasm]

Yeah, I definitely needed this suggestion, because I never, ever cross-reference other pertinent Hero books when I write a book.

[/gentle, humorous sarcasm]

[The Main Man]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Okay, if you do decide to put a couple of mini-settings into the book, Mr. Long, I just had this possibly crazy idea.

 

GURPS 4e has Infinite Worlds, which involves a multi-genre campaign setting that is meant to flex the system's versatility.

 

I think that HERO could use something like that.

 

Something along the lines of that, TORG, Rifts, etc.

 

And here's the basic idea: a campaign setting that is split into multiple connected mini-settings, each of which appears in a separate genre book as both a stand-alone setting but also as being part of a greater whole.

 

Champions, as the first genre book for 6e, presents the unique opportunity for this to start.

 

I'm thinking that it could easily begin with a Challengers of the Unknown/Fantastic Four feel for its superhero setting.

[James Gillen]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

[gentle' date= humorous sarcasm]

Yeah, I definitely needed this suggestion, because I never, ever cross-reference other pertinent Hero books when I write a book.

[/gentle, humorous sarcasm]

 

Well... I think in terms of gojira's point, it could use CU as the obvious base (keying in to those people who are introduced via the MMORPG) and then refer to other media as examples of how a team would otherwise be constructed.

 

JG

[Steve]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Some ideas I'm considering:

 

--The Golden Hunters: Some of you have heard me discuss this setting before -- ultra-powerful Malvan warriors versus ultra-powerful Elder Worm sorcerers for control of the Galaxy 500,000 years ago. Definitely not your typical Superhero setting. Unfortunately I couldn't do much more than present the basic idea; I won't have time to really delve into it as it needs (though I still hope to, somewhere, someday).

 

--School Spirit: A mystic-oriented quasi-Teen Champions campaign in which the PCs are all students at Millennium City University. (Go Vanguards!)

 

--A Plague Upon Thee: A "unified source" campaign in which all superpowers result from some sort of disease, which (a) limits the types of powers characters can have, and ( makes supers feared by most of the populace, even when they're heroic.

 

--Avatars: A relatively high-powered campaign in which the superhumans are all avatars, incarnations, manifestations, or children of mythological gods and similar beings.

 

--Voyagers Of The Infinite: In which the PCs aren't superpowered per se, but have super-tech, and use it to explore the Multiverse, fight bad guys, solve mysteries, and pick up alien chicks.

 

I'm sure more will occur to me, but those are some that I'm thinking about. I probably can't go more than 3-4 though.

 

So... what ideas to you have? Please try to keep your descriptions generic but specific -- ya gotta leave me some work to do, after all.

 

Out of this list, I'd put my votes for:

 

The Golden Hunters: I've heard talk about this setting before, and it intrigues me greatly.

School Spirit: Anything involving Teen Champions gets my vote.

A Plague Upon Thee: The Wild Cards universe as interpreted by Steve Long!

Voyagers of The Infinite: This one gets my vote.

 

And my one no vote would be Avatars. It's interesting, but I think it is covered pretty well by Gestalt.

[FenrisUlf]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Some ideas I'm considering:

 

--The Golden Hunters: Some of you have heard me discuss this setting before -- ultra-powerful Malvan warriors versus ultra-powerful Elder Worm sorcerers for control of the Galaxy 500,000 years ago. Definitely not your typical Superhero setting. Unfortunately I couldn't do much more than present the basic idea; I won't have time to really delve into it as it needs (though I still hope to, somewhere, someday).

 

--Avatars: A relatively high-powered campaign in which the superhumans are all avatars, incarnations, manifestations, or children of mythological gods and similar beings.

 

--Voyagers Of The Infinite: In which the PCs aren't superpowered per se, but have super-tech, and use it to explore the Multiverse, fight bad guys, solve mysteries, and pick up alien chicks.

 

 

I defintely like the sound of these three.

[The Main Man]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Come to think of it, the very thing I described fits the Voyagers of the Infinite like a glove.Or to put it another way, I think that Voyagers of the Infinite could be campaign setting that is divided into mini-settings that appear in different genre books.For instance, if the next genre book was Fantasy HERO, there could be a Fantasy spin to VotI in which it deals with magical artifacts that do the same, but it also directly connects with the original Superhero version.The Star HERO version would easily put a Doctor Who spin on it and so on and so forth.

[BobGreenwade]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Come to think of it' date=' the very thing I described fits the Voyagers of the Infinite like a glove.Or to put it another way, I think that Voyagers of the Infinite could be campaign setting that is divided into mini-settings that appear in different genre books.For instance, if the next genre book was Fantasy HERO, there could be a Fantasy spin to VotI in which it deals with magical artifacts that do the same, but it also directly connects with the original Superhero version.The Star HERO version would easily put a Doctor Who spin on it and so on and so forth.[/quote']I really, really, really like this idea.

[The Main Man]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

Thanks.

 

And now that I think of it, I think that it would be interesting if there was a certain method by which it can be implied that VotI can find its way into any HERO campaign setting, which I suppose is somewhat implied in its setup.

 

To further relate my idea for what Voyagers of the Infinite could be like, I point to two things:

1) a serial novel I read as a kid called The Monsters of Morley Manor.

 

2) The Marvel comic book series Exiles - this one could make things especially interesting and expansive if each genre book does have its own spin on the original concept.

[megaplayboy]

Re: CHAMPIONS 6E -- What Do *You* Want To See?

 

As a stopgap, one easy way to model high-powered superheroes is to take high-powered supervillain writeups, replace their hunteds and psych lims, and rewrite their back stories. Gestalt has some nice writeups for "iconic" and "legendary" supers, and I think there's one or two high level NPC groups in some of the CU 5th ed stuff, but yeah, it'd be nice to see this topic get at least 4-5 pages in the basic genre book. Even low level games, played long enough, will reach fairly high levels of points and relative ability, even if they're not tossing around nova blasts and chunks of skyscrapers.