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Five Man Band: The February 2020 Superdraft


Pariah

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Greetings, intrepid heroes! I am pleased to present this month’s Superdraft. You will draft five heroes that fit certain roles. You will also draft one support character, a couple of adversaries, and a couple of non-character options. And a location, of course. Here are the specifics:

 

Location: Choose a location for your team and your story. This is the first pick.

 

Heroes: You will draft one hero to fill each of the following roles.

  • The Leader: Pretty self-explanatory. This is the main protagonist.
  • The Lancer: Second-in-command and general foil for the Leader. May be opposite in personality, temperament, and/or philosophy, or may just be an irritant in general. The main function of this character is to keep the Leader in line.
  • The Big Guy: The team’s ‘big gun’. May be physically large and/or strong, or just very powerful. Imposing, in any case. This doesn’t preclude the character being smart or sensitive; they’re just more likely to use the direct approach when it comes down to it.
  • The Smart Guy: This hero solves problems with brains rather than raw power. May be a scientist, gadgeteer, scholar, mystic, or general all-around know-it-all. This does not preclude the character being very powerful; they just don’t solve problems that way.
  • The Heart: This character is the soul and conscience of the team. Often (but not necessarily) female on an otherwise all male team. ‘Heart’ should not necessarily be interpreted as underpowered, passive, or damsel-in-distress.

 

Support: Draft one character to complement the heroes. Examples may include a mentor, sidekick, team pet, occasional ally, frenemy, DNPC, etc. 

 

Adversaries: Draft two adversaries for your team. Adversaries may be individuals, small groups (no more than 5 or 6 members), or organizations. See below for specifics.

 

Options: Options may be used for pretty much anything except additional heroes, support, or adversaries. You don’t need to use them if you don’t want to.

 

Eleven picks total. We will begin on Friday, February 7th at 12:00 noon Eastern Standard Time. We will NOT take weekends off (due to the late start of the draft); we will draft each day from February 7th to the 17th. I'll post a poll sometime around February 21st.

 

Locations, Heroes, and Support are exclusive. The usual rules on characters apply: Draft the man, not the mask. If someone drafts Captain Marvel (Carol Danvers), then all other versions of Carol are of the board--Ms. Marvel, Binary, Warbird, Ultimate Carol Danvers, etc. Other versions of Captain Marvel--Mar-Vell, Monica Rambeau, Billy Batson, etc.--are still in play.

 

Adversaries may be drafted by no more than three different owners. An individually-drafted Adversary may be included as part of a team by subsequent owners, and members of previously-drafted teams may be used individually by other owners. As long as nobody appears in more than three stories, it’s all good. 

  • Example: Owner A drafts the cinematic Brotherhood of Evil Mutants--Magneto, Mystique, Toad, and Sabretooth. Owner B later drafts Magneto as an individual adversary. Owner C then drafts the Hellfire Club--Sebastian Shaw, Emma Frost, Selene, Magneto, and Tessa. Magneto is now off the board.

 

This is not necessarily a Supers draft. Choose whatever genre you're comfortable with. Just make sure your heroes fit into their well-defined roles.

 

Fiction is not required, but may earn you more votes.

 

I think that’s it. If there are any questions, please let me know.

 

We kick off in less than 48 hours.

 

Who's in?

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Rosters:

 

Owner: Assault

Title: The Weirdos of Wildwood

Location: Wildwood Cemetary

The Leader: The Spirit
The Lancer: Plastic Man
The Big Guy: Robot Archie
The Smart Guy: Detective Chimp

The Heart: Venus (Marvel Comics)

Support: Rex the Wonder Dog

Adversary: Professor Hugo Strange

Adversary: Ultron

Option: Dinosaurs

Option: A young boy named Timmy

 

Owner: Bazza

Title: The Breakfast Club

Location: Shermer High School

The Leader: Donna Troy 
The Lancer: Mary "Mary Marvel" Batson
The Big Guy: M'gann "Miss Martian" M'orzz
The Smart Guy: Gwen "Spider Gwen" Stacy

The Heart: Kamala "Ms. Marvel" Khan 

Support: Professor X

Adversary: Gorilla Grodd

Adversary: Rhino

Option: Cerebro

Option: "Don't You Forget About Me" by Simple Minds

 

Owner: csyphrett

Title: The Appalachian Trail 

Location: The Smoky Mountains

The Leader: John the Balladeer
The Lancer: Old Nathan
The Big Guy: Hellboy
The Smart Guy: Jules de Grandin

The Heart: Jennifer Kale

Support: John Constantine

Adversary: One Other

Adversary: Dormammu

Option: 

Option: 

 

Owner: Hermit

Title: What Ever Happened to Captain Atlantis?

Location: Newfoundland (the Tip of Atlantis that didn't sink)

The Leader: Aquaman (Arthur Curry / Orin)
The Lancer: Namor the Sub-Mariner
The Big Guy: Alex Summers
The Smart Guy: Brianiac 5

The Heart: Nelvana of the Northern Lights

Support: Scott Pilgrim

Adversary: Ursula, the Sea Witch

Adversary:

Option: George Orr (Lathe of Heaven)

Option: 

 

Owner: Logan.1179

Title: Three Card Jedi

Location: California (Los Angeles)

The Leader: Peter Quill
The Lancer: Jayne Cobb 
The Big Guy: Ka D'Argo
The Smart Guy: Naomi Nagata

The Heart: Baby Yoda

Support: The Doctor (Voyager)

Adversary: Harcort Fenton "Harry" Mudd

Adversary: The Ori (SG-1)

Option: Rocinante (starship, The Expanse)

Option: Ferengi

 

Owner: Lucius

Title: The Union of the Snake in: The Tower Must Rise Again 

Location: Sumer and the surrounding region, Bronze Dark Ages

The Leader: Gilgamesh, the First Hero
The Lancer: Nimrod, the mighty hunter
The Big Guy: Heracles, son of Zeus 
The Smart Guy: Pythia, the original Oracle of Delphi 

The Heart: Enkidu, from the Epic of Gilgamesh. 

Support: Python, the Titan who empowered Pythia 

Adversary: The Anunaki

Adversary: The Olympians 

Option: 

Option: 

 

Owner: Old Man

Title: The Brick Fist Club

Location: Ridgemont High School

The Leader: Terry McGinnis (Batman Beyond)
The Lancer: Ellie Phimister (Deadpool)
The Big Guy: M, a/k/a Monet Yvette Clarisse Maria Therese St. Croix
The Smart Guy: Amadeus Cho

The Heart: Nico Minoru

Support: Carl Spackler, the Groundskeeper (Caddyshack)

Adversary: J. Jonah Jameson

Adversary: Dolores Umbridge

Option: 

Option: 

 

Owner: Pariah

Title: Where, When, and Now

Location: The Alpha Quadrant, ca. 2365-70

The Leader: Captain Jean-Luc Picard, Starfleet
The Lancer: Commander Susan Ivanova, Earthforce
The Big Guy: Sergeant Juan "Johnny" Rico, Mobile Infantry
The Smart Guy: Major Samantha "Sam" Carter, USAF

The Heart: Pa'u Zotoh Zhaan

Support: General Leia Organa (Team Mom)

Adversary: Servalan

Adversary: Peacekeepers

Option: The Millennium Falcon

Option: The Gateway ("The City On the Edge of Forever")

 

Owner: Psybolt

Title: Ash vs. Chthulu vs. Glory

Location: Brainerd, MN (Fargo)

The Leader: Ash Williams 
The Lancer: Marge Gunderson
The Big Guy: Twisty (American Horror Story)
The Smart Guy: Egon Spengler

The Heart: Gizmo (Gremlins)

Support: Lorraine Warren (The Conjuring) 

Adversary: Chthulu 

Adversary: Glory (Buffy)

Option: The Darkhold

Option: 1958 Plymouth Fury (Christine)

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2 minutes ago, Lucius said:

The palindromedary says Lucius wants an adversary who's only been dead a couple of years...

 

It's not someone who could ignite a flame war and catch Simon's attention, is it?

 

PM me, and I'll take a look.

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Tricky. My first idea probably won't work, due to a lack of published heroes of certain nationalities.

 

My backup plan might work, but is dependent on obscure characters. That diminishes the "wow!" potential.

 

I'll see if I can refine it enough to keep me interested for long enough, or come up with something better.

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3 hours ago, Cancer said:

Yeah, my life is completely insane right now also, and supers are not my strong suit.  Not ruling myself out, but I need some inspiration from a source not immediately apparent at the moment.

 

Take the most brilliant scientists of fiction (They all fit Smart Guy but at least one can also be big , or a lancer etc)  the professors, the doctors.... the best of the brainiest and then...

an evil cosmic force traps them in hellscape that can only be escaped by them working together on a paper , but they must put their egos side. They must PUBLISH OR PERISH!

 

Adversaries include the evil cosmic being , and students who keep intruding because they refused to get their own projects done until the last week

 

 

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3 hours ago, Hermit said:

 

Take the most brilliant scientists of fiction (They all fit Smart Guy but at least one can also be big , or a lancer etc)  the professors, the doctors.... the best of the brainiest and then...

an evil cosmic force traps them in hellscape that can only be escaped by them working together on a paper , but they must put their egos side. They must PUBLISH OR PERISH!

 

Adversaries include 

 

  • Bean-counting administrators
  • Imbecile deans who demand Annual Performance Review forms by Friday, even though they'll ignore them for three months until they're sure there's not even enough money to give COLA raises to anyone but themselves this year
  • Service committee chairs who ask for edits on some d----d draft of a new rule proposal which has no relevance to you or anyone you know
  • Utterly clueless lumps of nonsapient fecal protoplasm that overflowed some toilet over in Liberal Arts and have taken up residence in rhe Grants and Contracts Office who cannot understand that no matter how many degrees in English or Philosophy they have, they DO NOT get to send the mandatory official grant forms back to the National Science Foundation and demand a more aesthetically pleasing grammatical construction 
  • Physical Plant, who seem to think that it's OK to have the offices on one side of the hall be 89 F at all times, and the offices on the other side of the hall be 47 F at all times, because the hallway then is a nice 69 F at all times
  • DFUA IT support cretins, who ram "upgrades" into your working machine that break all kinds of important functionality that IT support didn't take into account because they can't understand it
  • Bean-counting administrators again, who want to increase all class sizes to 38 students per so they can lay off one poor part-time adjunct making $7000 a quarter, even though there are no classrooms on campus that can actually seat 38 students at the same time
  • The Fire Marshal, who barges in without warning and declares the lab unsafe because there's too much stuff in it
  • Los Federales, who send you a nastygram requiring you to do the re-up FERPA regulation training before the end of the month
  • DFUA IT support cretins again, since the nearest printer that actually works is over in the East Camelhumping Building, to which you have no access
  • Did I mention bean-counting administrators who think they can solve the $8 million per year deficit in the budget they have f-----d up by cutting off all six scientific support staff, each of whom makes $22,000 a year or less?
  • Some reptile-sodomizing textbook publisher rep who wants you adopt a new edition of their crap book, when the changes made in it are (1) dumbing it down, (2) pushing some utterly unworkable on-line homework system onto students for no justifyable pedagogical benefit, and (3) bumping the price up another $55 a copy
  • Idiot drone underlings of bean-counting administrators who send you crap emails to get you to contribute to the Annual Fund Drive Campaign For Fatter Administration Paychecks
  • Imbecile deans again who want you to serve on the Performance Review Form Revision Committee because imbecile deans can't admit it's all a F------ WASTE OF EVERYONE'S TIME AND ALWAYS WILL BE

... Sigh, too many adversaries for one draft, I'm afraid.

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10 hours ago, Old Man said:

It's interesting that you were able to bang out 14 infuriating things about life in academia just off the top of your head like that.  Also, props for "nonsapient fecal protoplasm".

 

Well, full disclosure: I initially only made 9 or 10 of those points in a single spasm of aggravation reflex.  Then I added in a few historical ones, and changed the order for greater impact.  E.g., the fire marshal bit was from 1996; our department was in an old dorm, and literally the only permanent horizontal surface (other than the floor) in all those rooms was the top of the built-in housing of the heater, and by the fire code we were not permitted to leave anything on that surface.  I asked the inspector why we didn't pump out the building and refill it with argon so we could be sure it didn't burn.  Other items are ... more recent.

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14 hours ago, assault said:

I've got nothing. I'll have to skip this one. (As usual.)

 

Or maybe not, if I can decide on a couple of interesting potential Leaders. A couple, of course, for snipe-proofing.

 

I've already got a decent set of potential Lancers, and the rest of my hero choices are odd enough that sniping is unlikely.

 

But location...

 

OK, I guess I'm in.

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On 2/5/2020 at 4:39 PM, Lucius said:

What's the rule on real historical people?

 

Afree some consideration, I'm going to say "No" on real people, living or dead. Fictional versions of real people (e.g., Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter) and fictional characters who are clearly based on real people (e.g., the Vice President in The Day After Tomorrow) are okay.

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Know, O Friends, that between the Great Thaw, when the Endless Ice finally released its grip on the land, and the Fall of the Cities when the people abandoned their walled towns and great settlements and took to the hills and woods, was an Age Undreamed Of.

 

My setting: the lands around the Eastern Mediterranean, including Sumer, in the time of the "Bronze Dark Ages."

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary fears the Routi

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