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Whatever happened to Panda & Raccoon?


Philip Nicholls

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Very different background from EE's Zephyr, actually. The current official villain Zephyr is closer to Bora in that they're both mutants and criminals, but there are also some significant differences between their Powers. I suspect Steve Long simply chose the name "Zephyr" as appropriate for a primarily wind-based character, without trying to evoke one from the past.

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Actually, I thought that husband/wife duo Thunder and Lightning--I think that was their names--was more interesting. 

 

Seconded.  In fact, I said in this post that it would be interesting to bring them into a campaign at the beginning of their story, where they're sentenced to become superheroes and assigned to the PCs' team to keep an eye on them.

 

I think Panda and Raccoon are two atypical martial artists which I like.

 

I could be very well miss reading you but I take your post to mean that Panda and Raccoon aren't point efficient.

 

No, actually I liked the powersets for the characters--I should have made that more clear.  My apologies.  It's that their villainous IDs really don't do anything for me.  Like William Chow, who has a nifty background and the potential to make a great deal of trouble for the players--and the best he can do for a supervillain name is to call himself Utility.

 

All three of those characters could use a makeover from Fabian Bartleheimer--although I doubt he made it into either the 5th or 6th Edition universes.

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It's that their villainous IDs really don't do anything for me.  Like William Chow, who has a nifty background and the potential to make a great deal of trouble for the players--and the best he can do for a supervillain name is to call himself Utility.

 

You absolutely have the right not to like a particular name. The way I look at it, though, is that because of Batman's famous belt, the name "Utility" actually has some comic-book cachet.

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Actually, I thought that husband/wife duo Thunder and Lightning--I think that was their names--was more interesting.  Of course, I also think they should have kept Bora alive and on Eurostar so what do I know, lol.

 

Interesting datum about Thunder and Lightning: they were actually brought back for Sixth Edition, after a fashion. Booklet of the Empress is a PDF supplement to Book of the Empress which was provided to backers of the BOTE Kickstarter (of which I was one). It contains additional superhuman Imperial Battalioneers serving Istvatha V'han, and bonus Crusaders of the Infinite Realities who oppose her, which Steve Long wrote up based on concepts submitted by backers.

 

One such Battalioneer is Turanda ("Thunder"), an inhabitant of an alternate Earth who was accidentally imbued with the spirit of "Living Thunder." Her husband similarly received the "Living Lightning," and called himself "Lightning" in their language, or Fulmoru. The couple started out as superheroes, but after their secret identities were accidentally revealed they were constantly hounded by their enemies and by people seeking their help. This drove them to become criminals, until the police killed Fulmoru. Turanda's bitterness made her ripe for recruitment when Istavatha V'han invaded her Earth.

 

Booklet of the Empress credits Paul Atkinson with the idea for the character, but the inspiration behind it is obvious (no offense intended to Mr. Atkinson -- the revision is quite clever IMHO).

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I think I'm going to use Panda and Raccoon as agents for Beamline in my kids game. They make good inflitrator type agents.

 

They would--assuming they can put up with Beamline's "I'm-smarter-than-you-therefore-better-than-you" nonsense.  That can get old really fast for some people.

 

I did have the idea in this post that Beamline would attempt to recruit other science/tech oriented supervillains to his "cause," calling the group The Society for Scientific Supremacy.  Feel free to use the idea if you think you can.

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I did have the idea in this post that Beamline would attempt to recruit other science/tech oriented supervillains to his "cause," calling the group The Society for Scientific Supremacy.  Feel free to use the idea if you think you can.

 

That's essentially what I did with the official Champs villain team, the Ultimates. Their name begs the question, "ultimate what?" and their membership is already preponderantly scientists, so I jiggered their roster a little to make them all scientists. Like Beamline these Ultimates believe in rule of the world by the scientific elite, who as the most knowledgeable and "rational" thinkers are best suited to govern and apply science to the benefit of all. They do actively recruit other scientists (not just supervillains) into a larger network they call the International Scientific Elite, or ISE (pronounced "eyes"). ISE has established research centers, or "Secret Plan Bases," in hidden locations around the globe (financed by the Ultimates' thefts) where they work to develop super-weapons with which to blackmail Earth's governments into submitting to them. The Ultimates also try to steal breakthrough technologies invented by others.

 

(Long-time Champions players will probably recognize the inspirations for several of the above-mentioned elements. I never claimed to be an original thinker.) :P

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They would--assuming they can put up with Beamline's "I'm-smarter-than-you-therefore-better-than-you" nonsense. That can get old really fast for some people.

 

I did have the idea in this post that Beamline would attempt to recruit other science/tech oriented supervillains to his "cause," calling the group The Society for Scientific Supremacy. Feel free to use the idea if you think you can.

Funny that you say that cause I chose Beamline as the arch nemis because my daughter's character is Shrinker, a scientist and my nephew's character is Cybercat a cyborg tiger. Beamline hopes that Shrinker will help in his cause and he can control Cybercat as a minion like Half Jack.

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Seconded.  In fact, I said in this post that it would be interesting to bring them into a campaign at the beginning of their story, where they're sentenced to become superheroes and assigned to the PCs' team to keep an eye on them.

 

 

I have done just that in our game.  Granted we are a bit of an antique as I run 4e, but the three kids have a team based in Chicago and I have set it up so that they are the ones tasked with keeping Thunder and Lightning on the 'straight and narrow'.  It has been an entertaining sideline that they can't just ignore but can't really 'pound into line.'

 

We also have Panda and Racoon as 'background' in our game.  The kids hear about them, but have never actually met them.

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As the mentalist member of my group for many years, I often found Bora a useful "tool" as her Mental Defenses were nonexistent.

 

Depends on group capability, composition, and circumstance. Not all groups have players who like to play mentalists. Not all groups were capable of handling the 4e Eurostar -- who were disproportionately DEX 30, SP 7, 14d6 in a DX 23, SP 5, 10-12d6 world. For beginning to mid-range groups you often had to cut down Eurostar's 7 member roster to run them. Bora can be taken down easily by a Mentalist if 1) you can beat a DX 30 and SP 7, 2) You get the drop on her (she's visible and you don't have to waste time on a mind scan), and 3) you don't have Mentalla running interference for her. However, if you are slower than she is, have to waste a phase (or more) on mind scan, have to beat your way through Mentalla to get to her, or have her teammates zeroing in on your team mentalist (Eurostar isn't stupid) then she's not, invariably speaking, easy pickings for a mentalist. You can get the drop on her -- but god help you if you don't. And if you regularly do get the drop on her, then your GM needs to stop and consider whether they're playing Eurostar "smart" or not.

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  • 5 years later...

I have to resurrect a thread that has been inactive for six years, but this is the first Google result that comes up when searching "Champions Panda and Raccoon".  I just want to point out that Panda and Raccoon along with Thunder and Lightning have apparently been updated to 6th edition in Forgotten Enemies #5.

 

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/266604/Forgotten-Enemies-4--Valentine-Special

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On 12/23/2014 at 2:50 PM, Vondy said:

 

Depends on the comic books. It certainly doesn't fit golden or silver age comics, but some bronze age titles see heroes who aren't carrying their own titles die. Of course, whether they stay dead is another question... And then there is the iron age. Villains, however, have always been more, ahem, disposable.

 That squeamishness is precisely why I left silver age as fast as I could and four color eventually to Fantasy Hero, and Danger international. I liked reading comics, but the enforced genre conventions just grated on me.

 

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5 hours ago, JmOz said:

Little bit of hi jacking,

 

I think the fact that we are all wallowing around in the rotting corpse of an old thread makes all good, Amigo.  ;) 

 

 

5 hours ago, JmOz said:

 

but we all know that many early Champions characters shared DNA with Marvel or DC characters.  Did these two also share some and if so with whom?

 

 

I couldn't tell you; I don't know enough about comics.  However, I got the feeling way back when reading them that the creators were working on that "Cloak and Dagger" vibe-- the who mutually co-dependant, blah-blah-blah ....

 

(HA!  Didn't think I knew enough to know that, did ya?!

 

And you'd be right.  It was suggested to me many years ago by a player that actually read comics ;) )

 

 

4 hours ago, Scott Ruggels said:

 That squeamishness is precisely why I left silver age as fast as I could and four color eventually to Fantasy Hero, and Danger international. I liked reading comics, but the enforced genre conventions just grated on me.

 

 

Yeah, I understand that.  I got the _weirdest_ reactions on this board when I mentioned in passing that a lot of our old PCs are dead, doing that "died in a blaze of glory" thing, and that we actually have a tradition of trying to "go out as heroes" when we are ready to retire a character.

 

People reacted like I had a fourth eye or something....

 

 

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32 minutes ago, Duke Bushido said:

 

I think the fact that we are all wallowing around in the rotting corpse of an old thread makes all good, Amigo.  ;) 

 

 

 

 

I couldn't tell you; I don't know enough about comics.  However, I got the feeling way back when reading them that the creators were working on that "Cloak and Dagger" vibe-- the who mutually co-dependant, blah-blah-blah ....

 

(HA!  Didn't think I knew enough to know that, did ya?!

 

And you'd be right.  It was suggested to me many years ago by a player that actually read comics ;) )

 

 

 

Yeah, I understand that.  I got the _weirdest_ reactions on this board when I mentioned in passing that a lot of our old PCs are dead, doing that "died in a blaze of glory" thing, and that we actually have a tradition of trying to "go out as heroes" when we are ready to retire a character.

 

People reacted like I had a fourth eye or something....

 

 

I didn't lose too many, but almost did. No, my problem was certain GM's having pet villains that, well... Remember that cold eyed defender of Liberty quote from another thread?  Yeah, only once was a character of mine having to face a grand jury for excessive force, but then  the comics I read at the time, other than X-Men were war comics.  Most of my characters had military or paramilitary backgrounds and CVK was never a requirement. We kind of presaged the Iron Age by about 3-4 years and Dark Champions by about 10. :snicker:. It was GMs outside of our group that made the most fuss, So by then I switched to Fantasy Hero, and/or Danger International almost exclusively after that. In general they followed the LEO rules of engagement,  i.e. the Las Vegas PD rules of engagement :snicker:, but I would follow the orders of the leadership, at least.

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On 12/26/2014 at 11:00 AM, Ninja-Bear said:

I think I'm going to use Panda and Raccoon as agents for Beamline in my kids game. They make good inflitrator type agents.

And sadly this game never went any further. 😢

 


well reading some of my old posts brings back memories and realize how old I’ve gotten since then. My aforementioned daughter is now working part time and driving! 😳😩😢. Where the 🤬 time gone?

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