Man o' War

[Beazulbob]

This character was inspired by a picture I found for the villians and vigilantes character, Night Stalker. I don't know what the write-up of this character is, but it triggered an idea in my head that led to this character - I think it looks like a giant jelly fish behind the guy with a sword. He isn't for a specific campaign right now, but I was hoping to get some feedback/suggestions regaurding him. Is he too powerful? Does he need finessing? Is Timmy stuck in a well?

 

Also of interest is his personality & past - While I've got a preliminary write-up, I'm not satisifed with him yet. It could just be that I need to give it more time to gel, but I'm hoping to make him a solid persona.

 

Please, fire away.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]43111[/ATTACH]

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

Initial Concept: The image reminded me of a giant jellyfish behind the martial artist, which gave me the name Man o' War, and led to a force construct that protects him or envelops his enemies. His ability to manifest a force construct led me to him being a mentalist, though I've avoided the standard MC/MI/Telepathy mix of powers. He just seems like he should be unusual/non standard. I'm not sure what led me from having a sword to a utility belt with weapons, but it just seemed like a good idea.

 

Background: Atticus was born with mutant abilities that put him ahead of the curve his fellow humans were stuck behind. Starting at 15, he began fighting crime, limiting himself mostly to mentally bashing criminals. He decided this wasn't enough, so he began training in martial arts, something he continues to this day. Combined with his superior strength, he had another outlet for stopping crime. Having focused his life so much on justice, he couldn't bring himself to work a regular job - so he became a cop and fought crime at work, too. His two lifestyles don't leave him with much free time, but as a hobby and a job, he finds it quite fulfilling.Just this year, he discovered his ability to exude the Man o' War field. It remains painful to do, but he finds it grants him a dizzying array of options in combat.

 

Personality: Man o' War fights crime because he enjoys it. While he does occasionally use deadly force, he has yet to kill a foe - something he's proud of. He enjoys a good battle, whether it is physical or mental, and rarely backs out of a fight. In his civilian life, he's still trying to make detective, though both his youth and his constant multi-tasking interfere with him making the grade.

One of his battles against a villain was caught on film. Unfortunately, the foe kept getting back up, so Man o' War struck him while he was down to keep him there. This earned him his reputation for using excessive force. Since then, he has learned to be more cautious when camera crews are within sight.

Man o' War believes in justice, and that it is a higher calling then law. He's also aware that enforcing justice is difficult, and impossible while he's acting as a police officer. He does his best to mete out justice when he is active as a hero.

Some say he is too serious, and if someone were to know him in both identies, they would call him monomanical. He needs to find another outlet for himself and learn to enjoy life - but currently he only has this one aspect of his life to focuse on. His fellow police officers find him too serious.

 

Power/Tactics: Man o' War is not straightforward. He's a demi brick (30 strength) martial artist who uses a Katana. He's a mentalist. He's... something else - he is able to produce a jellyfish-like field that follows, surrounds, and sometimes strikes from him. He has OIHI for this field, which he must painfully extrude (taking 2d6 damage) to express it in the physical world. He either maintains a defense in both MP (a force field in the mentalist MP, a damage field in the Man o' War MP) and fights with his sword, or will use an attack from either MP and a defense from the other.

He doesn't like to back out of a fight and enjoys getting into them - it's takes a lot of arguing or a decidedly superior force to make him consider exiting the battlefield.

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]43157[/ATTACH]I forgot, not everyone has HD, so here he is in acrobat.

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

I've re-written his personal info -

 

Background: Atticus was born with enhanced physical attributes and an immense psionic potential. These traits, though, didn’t begin developing until he turned 12 years old. From birth, though, he showed signs of a borderline personality and obsessive/compulsive traits. He had a difficult time emotionally relating to other people – including his brother and his parents. He slowly grew in power, but he withheld knowledge of his powers from his family and friends. He reveled in his power and debated with himself how to use his powers – what to be. He decided against being a villain, luckily, and instead focused on what being a hero would require.

 

By the age of 15, Atticus began using his mental powers to incapacitate criminals – mostly shop lifters and thugs. While initially exciting, he felt he was missing out on what was the most satisfying aspect of crime fighting, physical combat. While he was very strong, he had no fighting skills. To eliminate this weakness, he enrolled in martial arts classes and obsessed about perfecting himself. By 17, he physically interrupted a crime, a group of three thugs beating a forth man. It was a resounding success. He was thrilled with the rush of adrenaline and the physical exertion. He continued to fight crime, alternating between his mental powers and physical assaults. He didn’t mind the fact that those who resisted him occasionally ended up with fractured or broken bones. Any consequence they suffered was the result of the criminal action they precipitated.

 

Graduated from high school, Atticus found himself facing adulthood. A college education was a desperate bid to avoid having to face a job, ultimately bound to fail (you can’t go to college forever), it bought him time to contemplate what he was going to be. Attending logic and philosophy classes, he was taken with how, while a society can strive for, but will always fail to achieve, justice. This, he felt, was wrong. Governments may not be able to dispense justice, but someone should. There is a right and wrong and far too many slip through the laws grasp. He found his focus – both as a hero and for what degree he would pursue – law enforcement.

 

At 21, he graduated from college and began working as a police officer. Aware that justice was beyond his ability to dispense while ‘on the job’, he used his resources as a cop to identify criminals he would ‘visit’ as a hero. The month before he turned 23, he was tracking a drug dealer in his secret identity when nausea struck, dropping him to the ground, heaving. It took him over 2 minutes to finally expel the Man o’ War field, time spent filled with pain and dizziness. Horrified, he tried to get away from the field, only to have it follow him. He attempted to fight it, only to pass through it with no effect. Finally, after some experimentation, he found himself able to control it. The drug dealer got away that day.

 

He thought that his aura looked like a jellyfish – and so he named it Man o’ War, the only jellyfish he knew by name. Still without an identity as a hero, he adapted it as his secret identity as well. Unable to sew and having no resource for the fancy suits that other heroes wear, he decided to wear a martial arts gi with a hood. Inspired by the equipment he wore on his belt as a police officer, he developed his own utility belt.

 

Personality: Man o’ War believes in justice and he sees himself as its avatar. He fights crime and enforces the law in both his secret identity and as a police officer, but his higher calling is creating justice – usually done separately from enforcing the law. He obsesses on justice and agonizes over the proper methods to dispense it. He takes his true calling very seriously and strives to prevent his own personal feelings to interfere with his interpretation. He has ‘adjusted’ evidence from crime scenes twice now, in order to ensure that the guilty were punished, though since then he has reprimanded himself and now sticks to the letter of the law while acting as a police officer.

 

While he wields a sword in battle and has grievously wounded foes, he has never killed another man. This remains the one step he has yet to take in enforcing justice. Killing is reserved for when no other action will stop the opposition. Mayhem, on the other hand, is firmly embraced. He enjoys brawls and inflicting bone breaking strikes. He tends to be disappointed when a foe opts to surrender. He has been caught on film using excessive force and has developed a reputation for his brutal tactics. He is tenacious, pursuing his enemies and preventing escapes. The one tried and true method to prevent him from doing so is creating havoc among the civilians, forcing him to rescue innocents.

 

He is a bit grim and almost always serious. He has a hard time interpreting emotional issues and sticks to the facts when in doubt. He does his best to be a social chameleon, though he tends to come across as a stick in the mud rather then a non-descript persona. When involved in a setting of camaraderie, he smiles a bit too much and agrees too often, all in an attempt to blend in with the other people. He’s not aware of this, but he barely passed the psychological test to become a police officer. He owes this more to his ability to determine what answers people want then to honest answers.

 

Powers: The Man o’ War field is expelled from his body – now with practice in single phase, rather then 2 minutes. The act of expelling the field is painful, inflicting damage to him. Re-integrating the field does not cause damage and is done over a phase. He can overlay his body with the field, allowing him the option of absorbing incoming attacks, radiating an aura that blinds or chokes foes, can be used to lift him in the air (flight), and if he shrinks the field over his body, he can even pass through solid objects. He can enfold another creature (he is unable to use his field for anything else while a foe is entangled), and he can ram the field against a foe, burning them. By holding onto the edge of the field, Man o’ War can glide. While it is on or adjacent to him, it anchors him to a single location, resisting knockback.

 

Campaign: Unusual for a mentalist, he loves to get into melee with his foes and bash them with his sword and his Man o' War field. His love of battle and his dislike of leaving before winning a fight is as much a weakness as it is a character trait.

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

Bump

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Man o' War

 

That's an interesting combination of abilities. I'm a little confused by the different Limitations on the 2 separate Multipowers. I would probably try to combine them both into 1 pool that's double the active points of any slots. That way you can potentially use 2 slots from one of the current pools simultaneously if appropriate. I would strongly suggest giving a unique name to each Multipower slot. Another option to consider (or at least pricing out) would be to trade out the Multipower for a Variable Power Pool. There is always a break point depending on Advantages and Limitations where paying for more Multipower slots is more expensive than building an equivalently powered VPP. The Martial Arts seem a bit thin. I noticed no Block or Escape meaning the character has no way to 'get ahead' of a higher DEX opponent and has few options to escape from a grab if his powers are unavailable (which is arguably likely considering Unified and other Limitations).

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

Ok – character concept w/out mechanics.

 

Man o’ War is a sport psychic (non-standard psionic powers) who is able to manifest his id (per the movie Forbidden Planet) as a jellyfish-like field that obeys his commands. It must stay within 20” of him, and it has a variety of effects. It acts semi-independently from him (I thought about getting it as a separate entity & character sheet but decided against it). He can manifest his mental powers while the Man o’ War field does its thing. The Id field is bright, making stealth impossible while it is manifested. He must vomit the field up, harming himself to activate it, and swallow it to get rid of it, so if he desires to be stealthy (or at least not stick out like a sore thumb), he must either not extrude or put away the Man o’ War Id field. In practice, the PC is based on mixing the three MP at once, choosing 1 or 2 offenses and maintaining a defense and or movement. He is supposed to function even if one of his MP is impaired.

 

I’ve dropped the physical attributes of the Id field and added an NND.

I’ve changed the limitations on the powers some too.

The updated character sheet has replaced the original posting.

 

One fear I have with this PC is that with his focus on Justice –he’d be too obnoxious to play well with others.

[Orion]

Re: Man o' War

 

One fear I have with this PC is that with his focus on Justice –he’d be too obnoxious to play well with others.

 

I think that would completely depend on the campaign. In most I have played in, he would have been considered somewhat normal, if maybe a little irritating, but no more so than the code vs killing / honor code types. I think in most Dark Champions campaigns he would be considered normal. If Batman can exist on teams, I'm sure he can.

 

Personally, I'd play him as cooperating with the other heroes because it's the only way to solve certain problems. For all the other stuff, he is assumed to be doing solo adventures in his off time. Now, he doesn't like having to be the nice guy that the group requires, so he bitches and moans a lot and tends to be somewhat of a grumpy old man. The group puts up with him because of his obvious skills and abilities, but also is driven crazy by him at times. This type of group tension would pretty much a standard in my old campaigns. Maybe have a secondary character that can be played when he is unavailable because he's off doing other stuff, or is tired of dealing with all the rules.

 

I'd even seriously consider giving him two costumed identities - one as the solo avenger concerned only with justice, and then the white knight good guy in the group. Eventually, the group figures it out of course, which makes for a lot of fun roleplaying.

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

I like the idea of having 2 costumes - but to make it work, he'd have to refrain from using his Man o' War field in his 2nd hero costume (it is too unique a signature)... oh, and his sword & bokken. Damn, two out of three MP. Well, he can focus on fighting normals and limit himself to his mentalism MP & martial arts. That would make the battle much more challenging, but I could see him doing it.

 

As to being a grumpy old man - I am that! He should be easy for me to play!

[Orion]

Re: Man o' War

 

I'm bored at work. Shouldn't be - I have way too much to do - but I just can't concentrate today. So, I took what you had written above, edited a bunch, added some, and now have a working character for Montreal in my campaign. It had just been a "unnamed psionic" so far, so having this is nice.

 

-----

 

Atticus Jones, white, 5'10”, 170 lbs, 26 years old. Lives in Montreal. Father was French Canadian from northern Quebec and mother from Nova Scotia who met in college. He speaks French as first language, but is fluent in English as well. Does not want Quebec to be independent, and easily annoyed by those that do. His brother is a staunch supporter of independence, and the two fight about it regularly. He is considering moving to Ottowa or Toronto, as he thinks he would fit in much better there, but is unwilling to give up his friends in Montreal.

 

 

 

He suspects he has psionics, but has never confirmed it, and has told no one about it. He has never met another psionic to his knowledge. Can lift about 1.5 tons, but must be physically touching the item – he cannot project force at a distance. He has briefly manifested a force field three times, but these were not conscious actions, and he hasn't been able to figure out how he did it. He uses his psychokinesis to make his punches much stronger, and this is his primary method of attack. He regularly gets visions of events happening elsewhere in the city. These are usually events happening at that time, but also gets visions of events that happen up to a week later. 90% of all visions involve some obvious crime or emergency; the remainder drive him nuts because he wonders if he missed something. He tends to see the visions as being sent to him, and that he is supposed to do something about them, rather than as random flashes of clairvoyance. He will occasionally get flashes of what other people are thinking when he touches them, but this is not under his control. While he would like to get proper training in his abilities, he is more scared of being publicly identified as a metahuman or psionic.

 

 

 

From birth Atticus showed signs of a borderline antisocial personality and obsessive/compulsive traits. He has a difficult time emotionally relating to other people – including his brother and his parents. He started getting visions at 14, and within a year he was reacting to emergencies as he was able. He wanted to stop crimes as well, and so started training in martial arts, which quickly turned into another obsession. He has found that mixed martial arts fighting style suits him best, but also does karate, as the discipline he finds in it is helpful. On his 17^th birthday he stopped a gas station robbery, and has been active fighting crime since then. When his psychokinesis appeared the next year, he quickly incorporated it into his fighting style. He slowly grew in power the for the next five years, but they haven't changed in the last three. He has withheld knowledge of his powers from his family and friends out of fear of what they would say.

 

 

His college education was a desperate bid to avoid having to face a job and acting like an adult. He had no real goal and so switched majors three times. Attending logic and philosophy classes his sophomore year, he was taken with how a society can often fail to achieve justice because of its values or laws. This, he felt, was wrong. Governments may not be able to dispense justice, but someone should. There is a right and wrong and far too many slip through the laws grasp. He found his focus – both as a hero and for what degree he would pursue – law enforcement.

 

 

Aware that justice was beyond his ability to dispense while on the job, he uses his resources as a cop to identify criminals he would visit as a hero. He fights crime and enforces the law in both his secret identity and as a police officer, but his higher calling is creating justice – usually done separately from enforcing the law. He obsesses on justice and agonizes over the proper methods to dispense it. He takes his true calling very seriously and strives to prevent his own personal feelings to interfere with his interpretation. He has adjusted evidence from crime scenes twice now, in order to ensure that the guilty were punished, though since then he has reprimanded himself and now sticks to the letter of the law while acting as a police officer. Because he spends so much time as Man O' War, he puts in only the minimum required amount of time at work, and some think him not devoted to the job. This is holding him back from making detective grade, something he very much wants.

 

 

His fellow police officers find him too grim and serious, and he has no close friends on the force. He has a hard time interpreting emotional issues and sticks to the facts when in doubt. He does his best to be a social chameleon, though he tends to come across as a stick in the mud rather then a non-descript persona. When involved in a setting of camaraderie, he smiles a bit too much and agrees too often, all in an attempt to blend in with the other people. He’s not aware of it, but he barely passed the psychological test to become a police officer. He needs to find another outlet for himself and learn to enjoy life, but currently he only has this one aspect of his life to focus on.

Man O' War fights crime because he enjoys it. He enjoys a good battle, whether it is physical or mental, and rarely backs out of a fight. It takes a lot of arguing or a decidedly superior force to make him consider exiting the battlefield. He is tenacious, pursuing his enemies and preventing escapes. He is known to use excessive force, and has developed a reputation for his brutal tactics. He doesn’t mind the fact that those who resist him occasionally end up with fractured or broken bones. He see any consequence they suffer as the result of the criminal action the did, or where about to do. The propensity of being rough on suspects has gotten him two reprimands at work, and he faces suspension if it happens again. He has yet to kill a foe - something of which he is proud – and he feels this makes him better than other vigilantes like Orion. After one of his battles was filmed by a bystander and shown on the TV news, he learned to be more cautious, and has even let a criminal go rather than chancing the encounter being seen by the public. The one tried and true method to stop him is to create havoc among the civilian, thus forcing him to rescue innocents.

 

 

Atticus received the name Man O' War from a kidnap victim, who described his fight with the gang members as a Man of War amongst rowboats. He tries to do his work anonymously, and so normally wears regular street clothes when acting as Man O' War. He has a stylized black mask he got at a costume shop, as well as a ski mask, that he will wear sometimes. He has intervened in enough emergencies and been recognized that he is starting to get a reputation at work. Some of his superiors on the police force, as well as a local reporter, are starting to question why he shows up so often when off duty, but rarely when on duty. It is only matter of time before someone figures out the truth.

[Beazulbob]

Re: Man o' War

 

I like the alternate write-up! Very well developed. I tend to gloss over a character's past, a habit I've got to break. The write-up you've done gives him definition. I think I'll go over what I wrote and try to add more depth to it.

 

I'm glad you found a use for the write-up!