Okay, WTF was I thinking?

[BoloOfEarth]

I have a supevillain group in my Champions campaign, called the New Gods.  They are all androids named after various Greek gods, with powers usually semi-reminiscent of said gods. 

 

About a year or so ago, I finally got around to writing up Hera, and gave her powers the SFX of bioenergy.  Specifically, she has the following Multipower:

 

    64  Bioenergy:  Multipower 80 points; Pool and all Slots are Unified Power (-¼)       0

      6  u  Healing:  Healing 4d6, Variable Effect (+½), Limited Range (+¼), Half END (+¼)              3

      5  u  Sleep:  Drain 8d6 STUN; Limited Range (-¼)       8

      5  u  Tire:  Drain 8d6 END; Limited Range  (-¼)           8

      5  u  Weaken:  Drain 8d6 STR; Limited Range (-¼)     8

      5  u  Transmogrify:  Drain 5d6, Variable Effect (Any physical characteristic / power; +½); Limited Range (-¼)     8

      5  u  Transform I:  Minor Transform 12d6, Improved Results (Limited Group; +¼); Limited Range (-¼)                7

      5  u  Transform II:  Major Transform 6d6, Improved Results (Limited Group; +¼); Limited Range (-¼)                7

 

What confounds me are the last two slots.  I must have had some reason for doing those, but darned if I can figure out what I was thinking she would transform targets into.  (And yes, I know Hera was goddess of childbirth, but I'm pretty sure the Transforms weren't meant to turn people pregnant.)

 

Any ideas?  Wild guesses?  Or should I just drop those two slots and replace them with something else?  (If so, I'm open to suggestions.)

[unclevlad]

Probably People to Animals for the major Transform.  Pretty common retaliation in Greek myth, and IIRC, Hera did do this to some of Zeus' amorous targets.  For the minor...not sure.  That's a TON of minor transform...not sure what that's for.  Perhaps in response to hubris...but even that drew Major Transform responses.  Arachne claimed to be the greatest weaver...greater than the gods.  She got turned into a spider.  Cassandra perhaps.  She had the gift of prophecy, and said something a goddess took offense to...even tho it was the truth.  So Cassandra was cursed to never be believed.

[RDU Neil]

1 hour ago, BoloOfEarth said:

androids named after various Greek gods, with powers usually semi-reminiscent of said gods

 

 

1 hour ago, BoloOfEarth said:

but darned if I can figure out what I was thinking

 

Now, most people would say, "Well, what were you drinking in the first place?" with that idea... except on these boards, where such ideas seem eminently reasonable and worthy of serious discussion.

 

Hera sent a storm to threaten Heracles, so... weather manipulation?

 

In battle with Artemis, Hera gathered a cloud and made armor of it that was proof against all of Artemis' arrows, then flung hail and ice at her to defeat her.

 

Seems she had a lot of abilities.

[unclevlad]

Lots of abilities, but she was a goddess after all.

 

And never once used them nicely that I can recall, altho it's been decades since I read Greek or Roman mythology.  To be sure, the best you could say about any of the Greek gods is they were narcissistic.  Oh, you actually, ACCIDENTALLY, see your goddess naked.  Of course she turns you into a stag to be ripped apart by your own hunting dogs.

 

 

[steriaca]

Ok. To justify Hera's transform slots.

 

Hera is a Greek Goddess. She is the goddess associated with the hone, the hearth, childbirth, motherly advice, etc... Ok, on occasion she can be a jealous shrew, but then again her husband/brother is Zeus.

 

She can transform someone into common objects found around the home, or common animals found around the home. Mind you, they're not pets. They can be common pest animals also (mice, for example).

 

So, your hero might just get turned into a bowl, spoon, plate, cup, mouse, or cockroach. Fun.

[RDU Neil]

Hera is specifically noted to have inspired the Greeks to victory against the Trojans. She gave the big speech, convincing Athena to side with her, that stirred their hearts and girded them for battle... so some kind of combat buff?

[Greywind]

High presence. Oratory.

[unclevlad]

3 minutes ago, RDU Neil said:

Here is specifically noted to have inspired the Greeks to victory against the Trojans. She gave the big speech, convincing Athena to side with her, that stirred their hearts and girded them for battle... so some kind of combat buff?

 

Is that suitable for a Minor Transform, or as Greywind notes, is this just Oratory and Persuasion?

[BoloOfEarth]

Very interesting ideas, thank you all. 

 

I'm still baffled at what I may have been thinking (and I can't blame alcohol here - maybe early-onset dementia?).  I almost always put descriptions of what a power does into the name (e.g. Turn to Goat) or the power description (e.g. Major Transform to Any Mammal or Improved Results: common farm animals), so why I left such a bare-bones general writeup is beyond me.

 

Being androids who were originally created to help fight off an expected alien invasion until their artificial egos got the best of them, I tried to make the New Gods' abilities psuedo-technological in nature, rather than outright magical.  For instance, Zeus is effectively one honkin' big lighting rod / souped-up zap gun.  So I suspect that I wasn't thinking of turning the heroes into cows and bunnies, or better yet a dining room table with four place settings. Though the ideas certainly have merit. 

 

One of Hera's roles is the team buffer and non-STUN* healer, so some combat buffs would be in order. I think I'll probably be replacing those one or both of those slots with some sort(s) of Aid. 

 

* All team members pay points into a pool for agents and vehicles, which includes a Broadcast Power Truck (large AoE Constant Healing STUN + END, only vs. EM-powered beings**), so Hera wouldn't typically be needed to restore lost STUN.  However, one PC heroine likes to drain OCV, so restoring that could be useful.

 

** This includes one of the PC heroes, so she always gripes when her teammates seek out and trash the BPT.

[Cancer]

Transform effects also are handy for use on nonliving things.  Lead to gold, vehicles to rockpiles, tarmac into lava, water into wine.  There's also things like sailors into swine, and so on.

[Ninja-Bear]

 Since you said that her powers are bio in nature, I think the Transforms would be long term Bio enhancements or long term disability. Perhaps she can cause blindness for example or enhanced strength +5 for minor transform?

[csyphrett]

Hera is known for transforming Hercules into a madman and having him kill his family.  Also some of Zeus's lovers were turned into animals as punishment

CES 

[steriaca]

7 hours ago, csyphrett said:

Hera is known for transforming Hercules into a madman and having him kill his family.  Also some of Zeus's lovers were turned into animals as punishment

CES 

Forgot about that. 

 

Moral of the story...don't have sex with Zeus. Either you're humanity is going to be taken away by Hera, or Hera is going to mess up your demigod child's life.

[csyphrett]

5 hours ago, steriaca said:

Forgot about that. 

 

Moral of the story...don't have sex with Zeus. Either you're humanity is going to be taken away by Hera, or Hera is going to mess up your demigod child's life.

The Twelve Labors was Hera trying to kill Hercules by proxy and failing.

CES 

[Matt the Bruins]

Didn't she send serpents to poison him in his crib when he was an infant, too?

 

Cosmetic Transform in the hands of someone modeled after a jealous goddess whose husband had a wandering eye suggests spoiling someone's looks to me. Maybe image inducers, or nanotech that doesn't do any real harm but makes hair fall out, features coarsen, skin go unpleasant colors/textures, etc.

[csyphrett]

2 hours ago, Matt the Bruins said:

Didn't she send serpents to poison him in his crib when he was an infant, too?

 

Cosmetic Transform in the hands of someone modeled after a jealous goddess whose husband had a wandering eye suggests spoiling someone's looks to me. Maybe image inducers, or nanotech that doesn't do any real harm but makes hair fall out, features coarsen, skin go unpleasant colors/textures, etc.

I think so except even as a baby, Herc could strangle anything in reach. Makes me wonder how his babysitters handled him.

CES

[Lord Liaden]

On 8/20/2018 at 8:43 AM, steriaca said:

Forgot about that. 

 

Moral of the story...don't have sex with Zeus. Either you're humanity is going to be taken away by Hera, or Hera is going to mess up your demigod child's life.

 

Except Zeus can look like anyone or anything, so you usually don't know you're having sex with him until it's too late. Sadly Hera doesn't seem to care about extenuating circumstances.

[LoneWolf]

Hera was also a goddess of vengeance so the minor transformation could be used to bestow low level curses.  She was also known for transforming people to animals (Mostly lovers of Zeus), so the major transformation could be people into animals. 

[RDU Neil]

1 hour ago, LoneWolf said:

Hera was also a goddess of vengeance so the minor transformation could be used to bestow low level curses.  She was also known for transforming people to animals (Mostly lovers of Zeus), so the major transformation could be people into animals. 

 

Hera android is sounding positively hideously terrifying. Spraying nano-bots at people the forcibly transform them on a physical and genetic level into an animal. I'm picturing this semi-sentient mist/sludge spewing from her outstretched hand and engulfing the unlucky victim who screams and screams until their screams become the honking cries of a goose or braying of a donkey.

 

Nastiest... supervillain... everrrrrrr.

[Badger]

On ‎8‎/‎17‎/‎2018 at 7:08 PM, unclevlad said:

Probably People to Animals for the major Transform.  Pretty common retaliation in Greek myth, and IIRC, Hera did do this to some of Zeus' amorous targets.  

 

And surprisingly, didn not really slow Zeus down from the pursuit of said targets.  

[unclevlad]

Well, DUH.   Not like it hurt HIM any.  He'd already had his fun.  Zeus was very much a love em and leave em kinda guy, if I recall.

[Oruncrest]

Since your Hera's a channeller of Bioenergy, I would suggest making one transform an Empower Minion Hero, giving a normal person low-level superpowers along with Hera-related disads/comps, and the other, like Lonewolf suggested could be a 'curse' that gives her opponents unluck.

[Oruncrest]

Sorry for the unintentional Thread Necro. This is what happens when you just wake up in the morning after having looked for old posts the night before.😕

[L. Marcus]

This isn't that bad a thread necro. Hekk, the thread's not even a year old!

[assault]

20 minutes ago, L. Marcus said:

This isn't that bad a thread necro. Hekk, the thread's not even a year old!

Speaking of Hekk, back in my less serious days, I used it as the name for my fantasy world's underworld.

 

This was the underworld you could reach by catching a lift on the Sun chariot/boat/beetle, or the Moon equivalent. They were a bit like magic buses you could catch if you knew the right magic. With no relationship to a song by The Who, obviously.

 

I always felt a little embarrassed by my blatant silliness. I know (and knew) I shouldn't have been, but it's hard to break the habit.