Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

[RexMundi]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Technically speaking, we could have them All back. It would be tricky, but the precedent has already been set in the scarabs stroyline anyway. Come to think of it, The Blue Beetle is an excellent example of Genere Bleed over and even mixing to some extent, as well as a fine example of a legacy character.

 

Not a fan of jaime though....not because of the evolution or the story, but because of the Art, and what they did to Peacekeeper in that story line. Other then that, plenty of breathing room, and I can at least still fall back on the good stuff from Booster Gold that at least had Ted back for a little bit.

 

~Rex

[megaplayboy]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Well, "good" Iron Age WW2 would involve superheroes directly changing both the outcome of the war, possibly accelerating the pace of technological change, maybe even pushing the progress of the civil rights and women's rights movements (and the Sexual Revolution, perhaps) faster than they did in the real world--all while dealing with lots of real debate about how far to go, and maybe also with whatever personal issues they have. It's all up to the players and GM as to what they want to do. "Bad" Iron Age WW2 would involve gratuitous gore, PCs "Mary Sue-ing" actual soldiers in the field and historic figures while making snarky and acidic comments about them, villains who are doing bad things but essentially for a "good" purpose, and superteams full of people with assorted personality disorders.

 

Golden Age moderns would:

1) rarely kill, with perhaps a niche group of exceptions(Spectre or pulp vigilante type heroes)

2) have the respect, admiration and awe of the public.

3) always beat the bad guy in the end, even if he/she somehow manages to escape.

4) the bad guys will generally be foiled before killing bucketloads of innocents.

5) have a straightforward sense of humor and be particularly fond of puns and "innocent" double entendre.

6) smash that M1 Abrams tank easily(so long as it fits the character in question), because its def and body are essentially irrelevant in a GA setting.

[RexMundi]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Heh, good point in the first paragraph, hence, why I like to keep my WWII "heroes" of the scope of something like DC's First Age, and in general why my current 6E campaign, is leaned more towards Hugo Danner and Less towards Superman.

 

Nothing wrong with a bit of Puntastic happening here and there of course. I think, the best run of handling Supers in a WWII setting, was done in the old Invaders comic. If you keep the supers to a minimum, their over all effect doesn't detract from the real soldiers out there (Go Rock!).....

 

There was a brief but fun comic from Acclaim/Valiant called Doctor Tomorrow, that did an excellent job of Age blending. Highly reccomend that one if you can find it anywhere. Great stuff, Great ideas.

 

~Rex

[OddHat]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Personally, I don't worry about arbitrary Comic Book Ages when I GM. It can be fun in a meta way; Alan Moore and Kurt Busiek both have a great time playing with / commenting on Comic Book Ages in their Superhero work. Still, meta commentary in a campaign kind of takes me out of it.

 

I do pay attention to period, which ties into comic book ages but is not quite the same. So, for example, in my WWII game all of the NPC villains (and most of the PC heroes) were based on comic book and pulp characters of the time, then fleshed out to match my ideas of what was interesting, and what contributed to good story telling. I didn't throw in anything that didn't (imo) work given the period, but I also didn't let the limitations of period media get in the way of story telling. Jess Nevin's Pages were the starting point for many of my bad guys and plots.

[Doctor Agenda]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

My current campaign could be described as Iron Age with Golden Age tropes. The morality is grayish (as are the aliens), but secret civilizations figure prominently in origins (from them, descended from them, have artifacts from them, etc.) and aliens fill the role of Nazis. Or they soon will, we're just phasing into the 'what's really going on' portion of the campaign.

 

I was actually aiming at a bronzier modern Golden Age campaign, but my players are definitely Iron Age, barely managing to avoid prosecution, so far.

[kahuna's bro]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Well, "good" Iron Age WW2 would involve superheroes directly changing both the outcome of the war, possibly accelerating the pace of technological change, maybe even pushing the progress of the civil rights and women's rights movements (and the Sexual Revolution, perhaps) faster than they did in the real world--all while dealing with lots of real debate about how far to go, and maybe also with whatever personal issues they have. It's all up to the players and GM as to what they want to do. "Bad" Iron Age WW2 would involve gratuitous gore, PCs "Mary Sue-ing" actual soldiers in the field and historic figures while making snarky and acidic comments about them, villains who are doing bad things but essentially for a "good" purpose, and superteams full of people with assorted personality disorders.

 

Golden Age moderns would:

1) rarely kill, with perhaps a niche group of exceptions(Spectre or pulp vigilante type heroes)

2) have the respect, admiration and awe of the public.

3) always beat the bad guy in the end, even if he/she somehow manages to escape.

4) the bad guys will generally be foiled before killing bucketloads of innocents.

5) have a straightforward sense of humor and be particularly fond of puns and "innocent" double entendre.

6) smash that M1 Abrams tank easily(so long as it fits the character in question), because its def and body are essentially irrelevant in a GA setting.

well said the rep buttona not working for me[it pops up but when i try to type it dissapears] could someone rep megaplaayboy for me thanks

[assault]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

A real Iron Age world would be one where superheroes prevented WW2. Superman stopped a whole bunch of European wars before Pearl Harbour.

 

What a lovely world! No Soviet Union. No Israel. The British, French, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish and American Empires would still rule the world. Egypt would still have a king. Probably so would Iraq, Iran, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Nepal... No civil rights movement in the US. Australia would still have the White Australia policy. Women would know their place. Homosexuality would be illegal.

 

Most of the world would still be working on 1930s technology, but we would have well established colonies on the Moon and Mars.

 

Heaven on earth. Disagree, and...

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

A real Iron Age world would be one where superheroes prevented WW2. Superman stopped a whole bunch of European wars before Pearl Harbour.

 

What a lovely world! No Soviet Union. No Israel. The British, French, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish and American Empires would still rule the world. Egypt would still have a king. Probably so would Iraq, Iran, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Nepal... No civil rights movement in the US. Australia would still have the White Australia policy. Women would know their place. Homosexuality would be illegal.

 

Most of the world would still be working on 1930s technology, but we would have well established colonies on the Moon and Mars.

 

Heaven on earth. Disagree, and...

 

You made me laugh and I cannot rep! (Really, I'm out.) Can somebody get this guy for me?

[OddHat]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

A real Iron Age world would be one where superheroes prevented WW2. Superman stopped a whole bunch of European wars before Pearl Harbour.

 

What a lovely world! No Soviet Union. No Israel. The British, French, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish and American Empires would still rule the world. Egypt would still have a king. Probably so would Iraq, Iran, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Nepal... No civil rights movement in the US. Australia would still have the White Australia policy. Women would know their place. Homosexuality would be illegal.

 

Most of the world would still be working on 1930s technology, but we would have well established colonies on the Moon and Mars.

 

Heaven on earth. Disagree, and...

 

Repped.

 

The American Empire would be limited compared to the Real World . The UK has some Superheroes during the war and many more after, and France has a bunch of Pulp Heroes running around through the War Years. Germany has some great Pulp Heroes that all get purged in 1943. Russia doesn't have much of not unless the mythic / folkloric heroes are hiding from Stalin. The Philipines get a bunch of Superheroes starting in 1949, so they might be able to kick out the Japanese (if oil supply problems hadn't already done so), and the Chinese Super Martial Artists might be able to counter the Japanese occupation eventually (the American Supers probably wouldn't intervene). Oil & food supply issues might force the Japanese to withdrawl to Korea all on their own.

[assault]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Stalin would have been overthrown after his boxing match with Hitler.

 

The Japanese wouldn't have taken over the Philippines. The Philippines would have become independent from the US after Batman solved his case there, and trained his Filipino equivalent.

[OddHat]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

Stalin would have been overthrown after his boxing match with Hitler.

 

The Japanese wouldn't have taken over the Philippines. The Philippines would have become independent from the US after Batman solved his case there, and trained his Filipino equivalent.

 

Looks like the Philippines Batman doesn't show up until the 50s. The Philippines get Darna in 1947. She has the full Captain Marvel power set and eventually more. Not sure when Captain Barbell shows up (another one with the full Captain Marvel set), and Lastikman doesn't come until something like 1963, but Darna alone should be able to send the Japanese home. http://marsravelodarna.tripod.com/

[assault]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

I wrote:

we would have well established colonies on the Moon and Mars.

 

Sorry, I was wrong. Obviously we wouldn't have colonies on Mars. Instead, there would a US embassy there, and a Martian embassy in Washington. Some other countries might have diplomatic relations with Mars too.

 

Venus, on the other hand, might still be hostile.

 

As for the Moon, a reliable source has assured us that the Moon belongs to America and anxiously awaited the arrival of their astro-men.

[RexMundi]

Re: Mixing Up Comic Book Ages

 

You know, a lot of that might work in a game, heh.....

 

Oh.....Kevin Anderson's book Enemies and Allies ....Great read...useful material there to for the topic, but really, a great read. One of the main reasons I opened up a 1950's arc for my current 6e campaign.

 

~Rex