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"It Was Just a Doom-bot!"


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One of the players in my Necessary Evil game (using Champions rules natch) is running a Dr. Doom-esque villain called LORD RUIN!! (And yes, it's always spoken in all caps with at least two exclamation points.) He wanted to be able to create Doom-bot style copies of himself so that if he gets killed, we can bring him back to life and "reveal" that the dead character had actually been a Ruin-bot all along.

 

My first obvious thought for this was to use Duplication. But the character explicitely did NOT want to have multiple characters in play at the same time. He just wanted a plot device for coming back from the dead. So instead we built it as Healing/Resurrection, with the whole "it wasn't really me in the first place" as just sfx.

 

It Was Just A Ruin Bot!:  Healing BODY 4d6, Resurrection, Trigger (Activating the Trigger requires a Zero Phase Action, Trigger requires a Turn or more to reset; +1/4) (75 Active Points); Extra Time (1 Day, -4), Resurrection Only (-1/2), Must Heal All The Way To Full BODY Before "Waking Up" (-1/2), Conditional Power Character must have access to a robotics lab to create Ruinbot BEFORE character is "killed" (-1/2), Requires A Roll (SS: Robotics Skill roll; -1/2), Concentration (1/2 DCV; -1/4) [10 Real Cost]

 

What do you think? I threw in Trigger and a bunch of time & effort Lims to reflect that his character has to spend some time in the lab building the Ruin-bot ahead of time, but then once the Ruin-bot is dead, the "real" PC can step out of the shadows whenever he likes.

 

We killed him off for the first time last week. Most of the other players assumed there was something Meta going on, given how casually I killed off a PC, but at least one player fell for it hook, line & sinker. Afterwards when they got back to their base, there was the "Real" LORD RUIN!! sitting calmly in the command center sipping brandy and congratulating them on their escape. Funniest PC death ever!

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It Was Just A Ruin Bot!:  Healing BODY 4d6, Resurrection, Trigger (Activating the Trigger requires a Zero Phase Action, Trigger requires a Turn or more to reset; +1/4) (75 Active Points); Extra Time (1 Day, -4), Resurrection Only (-1/2), Must Heal All The Way To Full BODY Before "Waking Up" (-1/2), Conditional Power Character must have access to a robotics lab to create Ruinbot BEFORE character is "killed" (-1/2), Requires A Roll (SS: Robotics Skill roll; -1/2), Concentration (1/2 DCV; -1/4) [10 Real Cost]

 

Resurrection requires a circumstance when it doesn't work, so "Requires a robotics lab beforehand" probably isn't a valid Limitation. It's just the circumstance that prevents coming back to life. I used something similar for the Transhumanoid.

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Is Regeneration and Resurrection even nessesary in a Champions game?

At least as I understand the Genre, Killing attacks are rather rare. As such body damage is rare. Much less Character Death that would need a power to be prevented.

He is the villain of his game. Doom-bot is really just a special effect for "Nobody could have survived that" as well as to prevent the "Worf effect" (it was really just an inferior Doom-bot that was defeated, not the real deal).

 

I honestly would not expect any character in a Champions game to loose thier life(negative body), an arm (can heal limbs) or take BODY damage in general. So I would write any such ability off as "What not to spend points on".

 

If you write it up, Indiana has a point: It needs one lockout condition where you can make certain the guy does not come back.

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Resurrection requires a circumstance when it doesn't work, so "Requires a robotics lab beforehand" probably isn't a valid Limitation. It's just the circumstance that prevents coming back to life. I used something similar for the Transhumanoid.

Good point - thanks!

 

Is Regeneration and Resurrection even nessesary in a Champions game?

In general, probably not. But this particular game is a lot grittier than most; the aliens like their RKAs with a helping of AP, so we've had a couple PCs get close to 0 Body already. In last week's case, RUIN had been captured by the aliens and they summarily executed him on the spot. Obviously not something I would've done if the player hadn't been eager to play the Ruin-bot card.

 

He is the villain of his game.

More like antihero, in this case. If you're unfamiliar with Necessary Evil, the idea is that all the superheroes were killed off trying to stop an alien invasion. Now the aliens have conquered Earth, and the only people left to form any kind of Resistance...are the supervillains. So yeah, for an NPC villain I'd just handwave it; but for a PC I feel better having somethign statted out.

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Is Regeneration and Resurrection even nessesary in a Champions game?

At least as I understand the Genre, Killing attacks are rather rare. 

Then you only understand one aspect of the Genre.  While 4-color or Silver Age no kill games/worlds are common, Golden Age material is closer to Pulp in regards to death and outside of the big name, very old/established DC and Marvel characters that were forced to play nice in the Comic Code days, there are plenty of Bronze and Iron age characters and games where death could be possible (if somewhat less likely than, say, fantasy).

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Is Regeneration and Resurrection even nessesary in a Champions game?

At least as I understand the Genre, Killing attacks are rather rare. As such body damage is rare. Much less Character Death that would need a power to be prevented.

 

Depends on the exact nature of the setting. Necessary Evil isn't the Champions Universe. Its  a Superhero setting but not really 4 Color as I understand but fairly gritty. All/Most of the Heroes have died or vanished in the wake of an alien invasion so the villains (mostly "2nd Stringer" Rogues Gallery types) step up.

 

Actually, at least in 5th Edition, allot of supers have died permanently in the back-story of the setting, come to think of it. But the premise is pretty four color.

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