MechaGM

two quotes...
 
Well, back in high school, my D&D group would regularly write down quotes that we found amusing. (Something that my current group doesn't do... sadly... most of our good quotes get lost)
 
The two best exchanges that I can remember are:
 
The party is in a tough fight, and one of the Wizards, who is operating under a polymorph self spell, decides he needs to "tactically withdraw"
 
Matt: okay, I can polymorph myself into any monster I have seen, right?
Sam (DM): Right...
Matt: Alright, I'll turn into an invisible stalker and slink away.
Me: Matt... have you ever *seen* an invisible stalker?
Matt: Err....
 
The other exchange came from a situation where we badly needed a city-wide distraction so that we could bust someone out of prision... someone suggested inciting a riot of some sort...
 
Me: Okay, so if we want to incite a riot, we could bribe a large portion of the citizens into revolting.
Peter S: You realize this is a huge city... We'd have to deliver a bribe to over a thousand people, in just one night, and get them to rise up...
Me: You're right... we'd need Santa Claus to pull that off.
Sam (DM): "Ho ho ho! Revolt against your leaders! Ho ho ho! Revolt against your leaders!"

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group...
 
GM: You recognize the symbol on the priestess clothing, she worships the drow god of...(cue evil music)...vengenace and suffering.
Me: I was hoping for rainbows and kittens.

Re: The New Circle
 

Re: The New CircleThe Mighty Atom! (Golden Age)
OppenheimerAdam Oppenheimer

Val Char Cost 25 STR 15 23 DEX 39 23 CON 26 15 BODY 10 18 INT 8 14 EGO 8 20 PRE 10 10 COM 0 11/37 PD 0 11/37 ED 0 5 SPD 17 10 REC 0 46 END 0 40 STUN 0 9" RUN 0 2" SWIM 0 7"/13" LEAP 0 Characteristics Cost: 133
Cost Power END 6 Quick and Strong: Running +3" (9" total) 1 2 Skilled Athlete: Leaping +2" (7"/13" forward, 3 1/2"/6 1/2" upward) 1 6 You can't slip that by me.: +2 PER with all Sense Groups 0 12 Tough and Lucky: Combat Luck (6 PD/6 ED) 1 Amazing Health: Life Support (Longevity: 200 Years) 0 10 Faith and Will: +5 with Ego Rolls 89 A Lifetime Of Adventure!: Variable Power Pool, 45 base + 44 control cost, Cosmic (+2) (111 Active Points); Limited Class Of Powers Available Limited (Only Super Skills and Martial Arts; -1/2) [Notes: Keep the special effects in mind when choosing powers gained through a Lifetime of Adventure; this is not a Wuxia or Chi power pool. If it is not an ability that an action movie hero might display, or a Super Skill that you would be willing to allow in a Dark Champions campaign, it should not be allowed here. However, the range of powers that is possible within those limits remains vast. If one of the Super Skills listed would cause trouble in your campaign, don't use it.] 0 1) Serpentine!: Desolidification (affected by anything that would bypass Combat Luck) (40 Active Points); Cannot Pass Through Solid Objects (-1/2) Real Cost: 27 [Notes: The Serpentine technique may look strange, but it will allow the user to avoid almost any attack and to escape many bonds.] 4 0 2) It's All In The Reflexes: Missile Deflection (Arrows, Slings, Etc.), Missile Reflection, Reflect At Any Target (40 Active Points) Real Cost: 40 0 0 3) Expert Timing: Hand-To-Hand Attack +9d6 (45 Active Points); Hand-To-Hand Attack (-1/2), By Default Placed Shot Against Living Target Power loses about a fourth of its effectiveness (-1/4) Real Cost: 26 [Notes: This blow represents expert timing and precise placement; it should not be used with placed shots, as it is already hitting a vital location by default. It does not add to Knockback, and should not be used against objects or individuals without Hit Locations.] 4 0 4) Amazing Throwing Skill: Killing Attack - Ranged 3d6 (45 Active Points); Range Based On Strength (-1/4), IIF (Objects of Opportuity; -1/4) Real Cost: 30 [Notes: Even seemingly harmless objects can be thrown with deadly force and accuracy using this skill.] 4 0 5) Fight Through The Pain: Force Field (18 PD/18 ED), Hardened (+1/4) (45 Active Points); Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Takes 1d6 KA after power is deactivated; -1/2) Real Cost: 30 [Notes: Pure willpower is the key to this trick, tensing muscles to hold bones in place and ignoring the pain even as it tries to consume you. After concentration fades, the pain returns.] 4 0 6) Shaking It Off: Healing Standard Healing 4 1/2d6 (45 Active Points); Self Only (-1/2) Real Cost: 30 [Notes: This ability to shake off the effects of many sorts of injury should not be used to repair the internal damage caused by the use of such powers as In The Zone or Fight Through The Pain.] 4 0 7) Impossible Stealth: Invisibility to Sight and Hearing Groups , Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2) (37 Active Points); Only When Not Attacking (-1/2) Real Cost: 25 0 0 8) Incredible Insight: Retrocognitive Clairsentience (Sight Group), +2 to PER Roll, Rapid (x10) (45 Active Points); Retrocognition Only (-1) Real Cost: 22 [Notes: This is a form of Sherlock Holmes style Super Detective Work, allowing incredible insights into what happened in a given area in the recent past. If it would interfere with a plotline, apply perception modifiers or simply allow it to fail.] 4 0 9) I've Been In This Situation Before: +7 DEX (21 Active Points); No Figured Characteristics (-1/2) Real Cost: 14 [Notes: A favorite when in combat, this ability represents years of experience against a vast range of foes.] 0 10) Amazing Acrobatic Skill I: Gliding 7", Position Shift, combat acceleration/deceleration (+1/4) (15 Active Points) Real Cost: 15 [Notes: A lifetime of experience has granted Oppenheimer enough skill to leap from an air-plane and still land safely on the ground.] 0 0 11) Amazing Acrobatic Skill II: Leaping +6" (7"/13" forward, 3 1/2"/6 1/2" upward) (Accurate), combat acceleration/deceleration (+1/4) (15 Active Points) Real Cost: 15 1 0 12) I Can Climb Anything: Clinging (normal STR) (10 Active Points) Real Cost: 10 0 0 13) Damn Lucky: Armor (8 PD/8 ED), Hardened (+1/4) (30 Active Points); Restrainable (-1/2), Conditional Power Power does not work in Uncommon Circumstances (Must Be Aware Of Attack; -1/4), Nonpersistent (-1/4) Real Cost: 15 [Notes: This skill is often switched off with I've Been In This Situation Before, depending on what is most needed at a given time.] 0 0 14) Burst of Superhuman Strength: +45 STR (45 Active Points); No Figured Characteristics (-1/2), Instant (-1/2), Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (Causes 1d6 KA to self; -1/2), Nonpersistent (-1/4), Conditional Power Power does not work in Uncommon Circumstances (Real Strength; -1/4) Real Cost: 15 [Notes: Through use of leverage tricks and deep concentration, a Strongman can accomplish seemingly impossible feats of Strength. However, the price for such an effort is high, and may be paid in torn muscles and snapped tendons. This skill carries the Limit "Real Strength". Real world strong men have snapped thick chains, flipped large cars, pulled trains, and performed amazing feats that looked impossible. This skill should allow all of that, as well as allowing the breaking of holds and escape from bonds. However, it should not allow the strongman to lift aircraft carriers and perform genuinely impossible tasks.] 4 0 15) I Can Spot That Trick: Clairsentience (Sight Group And Detect Magic), Analyze, Discriminatory, Reduced Endurance (1/2 END; +1/4) (44 Active Points); Limited Power Power loses about two-thirds of its effectiveness (Only to detect evidence of Magic; -1 1/2) Real Cost: 18 [Notes: Long training has allowed the user of this skill to detect evidence of Magic] 1 0 16) Amazing Ventriliquism!: Hearing Group Images 1" radius, +/-5 to PER Rolls, Invisible Power Effects, Source Only (Fully Invisible; +1/2), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2) (40 Active Points) Real Cost: 40 0 0 17) In The Zone: Aid SPD 3 1/2d6 (standard effect: 10 points), Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Minute; +1/4) (44 Active Points); Side Effects, Side Effect occurs automatically whenever Power is used (1d6 KA after last of SPD fades; -1/2) Real Cost: 29 [Notes: An athlete In The Zone can briefly exceed his body's normal limits, running faster, striking more accurately, pushing harder. Afterwards, the body must pay a price for such exertion.] 0 Powers Cost: 126
Cost Martial Arts Maneuver Boxing and Wrestling 4 1) Block: 1/2 Phase, +2 OCV, +2 DCV, Block, Abort 4 2) Manly Boxing: 1/2 Phase, +2 OCV, +0 DCV, 9d6 Strike 3 3) Hold: 1/2 Phase, -1 OCV, -1 DCV, Grab Two Limbs, 45 STR for holding on 4 4) Reversal: var Phase, -1 OCV, -2 DCV, 50 STR to Escape; Grab Two Limbs 4 5) Crush: 1/2 Phase, +0 OCV, +0 DCV, 11d6 Crush, Must Follow Grab 8 6) +2 HTH Damage Class(es) Martial Arts Cost: 27
Cost Skill 3 Scholar 1 1) KS: Arcane and Occult Lore (2 Active Points) 11- 1 2) KS: Cults and Secret Societies (2 Active Points) 11- 1 3) KS: Jewish Theology and Philosophy (2 Active Points) 11- 1 4) KS: Mystic World (2 Active Points) 11- 1 5) KS: Strength Training and Nutrition (2 Active Points) 11- 1 6) KS: Superhuman World (2 Active Points) 11- 1 7) KS: Supernatural Creatures (2 Active Points) 11- 1 8) KS: Western Martial Arts (2 Active Points) 11- 12 +4 with Martial Maneuvers 20 +2 Overall 3 Oratory 13- 2 PS: Performer and Strength Coach 11- 2 PS: Small Business Man 11- 3 Linguist 0 1) Language: English (idiomatic; literate) (5 Active Points) 1 2) Language: German (completely fluent) (3 Active Points) 1 3) Language: Hebrew (fluent conversation; literate) (3 Active Points) 1 4) Language: Russian (basic conversation; literate) (2 Active Points) 1 5) Language: Yiddish (completely fluent) (3 Active Points) Skills Cost: 57
Cost Perk 5 Money: Well Off [Notes: Income from books, infomercials and merchandise] 2 Reputation: Old-Time Hero, Fitness and Self Help Guru (A medium-sized group) 11-, +2/+2d6 Perks Cost: 7
Val Disadvantages 10 Reputation: Strange Little Self Help Guru and Old Time Hero, 11- 15 Social Limitation: Public Identity: Adam Oppenheimer (Frequently, Major) 10 Social Limitation: Known Weirdness and Trouble Magnet (Frequently, Minor) 10 Distinctive Features: Short, Extremely Over-Muscled Old Man (Concealable; Noticed and Recognizable; Detectable By Commonly-Used Senses) 10 Dependent NPC: Various students and people in need of the week 8- (Normal) [Notes: Oppenheimer tends to fall naturally into the position of grandfather, and his many young students and friends often turn to him for help.] 20 Psychological Limitation: Will Not Kill Humans (Common, Total) 15 Psychological Limitation: Devout Reconstructionist Jew (Common, Strong) 15 Psychological Limitation: Protective of the Innocent, Supports hard Luck Cases so long as they seem to be trying (Very Common, Moderate) 15 Psychological Limitation: Endlessly Optimistic and Encouraging (Very Common, Moderate) 15 Hunted: Watched by the Trismegistus Council 8- (Mo Pow, NCI, PC has a Public ID or is otherwise very easy to find, Watching) [Notes: The Council has called on Oppenheimer's help many times over the decades.] 15 Hunted: US Government 8- (Mo Pow, NCI, PC has a Public ID or is otherwise very easy to find, Watching) [Notes: Several factions within the US Government are aware of Oppenheimer's connections to the Mystic World, and have used him as a liason to less law abiding supers.] Disadvantage Points: 150Cost Summary:Base Points:200Disadvantage Points: 150Total Experience Available: 0Total Character Cost: 350Height: 1.62 mHair: GreyWeight: 100.00 kgEyes: BlueAppearance: Oppenheimer is a short, extremely muscular man with short grey hair and a trimmed grey beard. Facially he appears to be in his early sixties, but his physique is that of an athlete in his prime. In combat, he prefers to wear a black wrestler’s singlet. Out of combat, he prefers a conservative and extremely out of style blue wool suit.Personality: Adam Oppenheimer is wise, experienced, and relentlessly optimistic. The intensity of his personality can be enormously charming or deeply disturbing. He has made and lost fortunes, learned and forgotten esoteric skills, and encountered many of the greatest heroes and villains of the age. He knows that true super-humans have an advantage when facing a merely human foe, yet he has also proven many times that experience counts.Quote:“There is nothing you can not do, so long as you have both faith and will.â€Background: The blood red creature drifted in the air, crimson crown upon its head. It grinned as the chanting of the acolytes neared a fever pitch. The sacrifice, limp upon the Alter, found her throat too raw for wailing. 
The skylight exploded.
 
A figure dropped amidst the acolytes. Wasting no time, the small man leaped forward, grabbing the sacrifice as he passed and landing lightly across the room. He then bounded up again and fled the way he had come, covering nearly twenty feet in a single extraordinary jump.
 
The blood drenched thing roared its anger. It flew through the air in pursuit, the acolytes forgotten.
 
On the roof the short, stout man put the exhausted girl down, whirling to meet his rising foe. The beast snarled as it hovered against starlight. A lance of crimson light struck from the crown towards the small man, and missed.
 
“You!†The tone of the blood soaked thing was incredulous. “You have no power! No hint of magic! You dare to interfere?!†The beast punctuated this with another burst of blood red light. Again the small man dodged, with the slightest shifting of weight.
 
The small man tumbled forward towards his hovering foe, stopping just before the shattered skylight and lashing out with a powerful, and accurate, uppercut. The blow landed squarely between the thighs of his target.
 
The blood drenched creature tumbled back through the air, landing stunned on the rooftop. The small man leaped forward again and let loose a series of brutal jabs and crosses against his stunned foe. Bones hard as metal deformed, flesh hard as stone gave way. The demon that had been a man passed into unconsciousness. The small man wrenched its crown from its head, and then collapsed, shaking. A few seconds later he returned to the side of the girl, carrying the beast over his shoulder.
 
“Can you walk?â€
 
The girl looked up into the face of her strange rescuer. The man was old, short and ridiculously over muscled. Grey hair and beard framed a broken nose, large blue eyes, and a wide smile showing uneven yellowed teeth. He was covered in blood and bruises. To the girl, at that moment, he was beautiful.
 
“How did you do that?â€
 
The little man grinned widely. “There is nothing in this world you can not do, so long as you have the will.â€
 
In 1920 Aaron Oppenheimer returned home from World War One to Chicago and to his beloved wife, Elsie. Aaron had fought bravely, but bravery was no defense against mustard gas and machine guns. Aaron would never fully recover from his injuries. His only son was born two years later. Named Adam, the boy was small and sickly, born over a month premature. Doctors told the young parents that the child would not survive. They were wrong.
 
Adam grew slowly, and was always small. Harassed and sometimes physically attacked over his size, poverty, and ethnicity, Adam saw athletics as his path to acceptance. He boxed, wrestled, and ran. He begged for work from local Physical Culture clubs to learn how to lift weights, and begged again for work with every passing circus and fair to learn what he could from strongmen and acrobats.
 
When the Great Depression hit the Oppenheimers lost what little they had managed to save, but by that time Adam was already well along his path towards a lifetime’s pursuit of health and fitness. He perfected his own system of weight training and callisthenic exercises, achieving astonishing increases in strength. In his teens Adam was able to make a modest living through bare-knuckles boxing and the earliest form of his Strongman act.
 
Laughter would give way to shock in theaters and circus tents as the little man bent and unbent horse shoes in his bare hands, smashed bricks with his fists, and lifted cart horses with the use of a specially made harness. He would snatch arrows from the air, dodge bullets, and perform astounding acrobatic stunts. It was at this time that Adam made his first contact with the Mystic World.
 
Her name was Hellene Zeidner, but her stage name was Arcana. She and her father, The Amazing Arcanum, hid their power in plain sight, performing stage magic to wow the crowds and using real magic to fight the evils that stalked the night. Adam, then 16, loved her at first sight. Her father was happy to accept Adam’s help both on stage and in his battles with the strange cults that haunted Chicago. In that time Adam began to learn methods that allowed even an ordinary man to face the supernatural and emerge triumphant. He also met and trained with several of the great Mystery Men of the time.
 
The forties saw Adam join the Army, where he was assigned to the European theatre. Despite his great strength and athletic skill, Adam’s size and ethnicity held him back, though he still saw combat. It was a war, and Adam Oppenheimer killed the enemy. His beloved Hellene and her father traveled to Europe as well, hoping to stand against the mystic Evils controlled by the Third Reich. They did not return.
 
Adam was assigned as an interpreter when the war criminals were tried in 1946 at Nuremberg. The men he interviewed were ordinary. They had been soldiers. One, a barber in civilian life, told Adam of rooms in Maidanek where 2000 human beings could be killed at a time. The rooms had steel doors, and peep holes so that the SS could watch as prisoners died.
 
Adam knew that he would never willingly take a human life again.
 
After the war, Adam returned to America and resumed his career both as a strongman and an adventurer. His skills could not match the superhuman abilities of the adventurers that had appeared during the war, but a man can accomplish anything if he has courage, faith and will. He fought mobsters and foreign agents, unrepentant Nazis and strange supernatural monsters, villains of every description. More than once he fought the minions of the Master, a Japanese villain who refused to accept that the war was over. Always, in the background, there was Demon and the Circle of the Scarlet Moon.
 
The new costumed adventurers were all the rage, and the crowds who came to his strongman and stage magic shows began to fade. Adam did not lose hope, nor did he envy his costumed colleagues in the war against crime. Through shrewd marketing and self promotion Adam sold Oppenheimer’s Secrets of Strength and Fitness, Oppenheimer’s Liniment Rub, Oppenheimer’s Atomic Protein Power Powder, and a dozen other products. The years passed, and Adam devoted the profits from his many business ventures to helping those he could.
 
In 1955 Adam traveled to New York in pursuit of a rumor. It was said that a sorceress was battling crime in that city, a sorceress who called herself Arcana. He did not find her. Instead, he found a trap, and a cult lead by a mage of true power. The mage struck Adam down, but Adam did not die.
 
He was found, and healed, by an old Japanese man seeking death. The two spoke. Within a year, the First American Circle was forged.
 
Adam adventured with that circle of young mages for just over two years, but these young men and women loved the shadows, and Adam had always craved the spotlight. His skills sharpened by his time under the Master’s tutelage, Adam returned to show business, adventuring less over the years. From time to time he would join a group of younger heroes and offer advice and training, but through the next decades Adam Oppenheimer became far better known as a strongman and strength training guru than he had ever been as a crime fighter, and that was, he thought, all to the best. Adam never married.
 
One year ago, an old Japanese man entered a small gymnasium and health club in Chicago. He spoke with the club’s owner, an old man who had once been a hero. The two men left together.
Powers/Tactics: Adam Oppenheimer is an absolute master of the strongman’s art, an extraordinary boxer and wrestler, a fine stage magician, and an acrobat in the great tradition of the European circus. Age has barely begun to impede his near-legendary skills. While his magical training has never allowed him to cast true spells, it has allowed him to refine his skills and abilities to a degree to which few humans can begin to aspire. It has also apparently slowed the aging process. 
Adam will usually move into combat in defensive mode, his Lifetime of Adventure arranged to keep him Damn Lucky, support his Amazing Acrobatic Skills, and guide him with the wisdom that comes from having Been In This Situation Before. Once he is able to assess the situation, he will switch super skills fluidly, and will use Multiple Power Attacks and other tactics to put down single foes as quickly as possible. If Adam is overmatched, he is willing to flee, recover, and return; he will not fight foolishly or make beginner’s mistakes. He will only Fight Through The Pain if facing the most dangerous of foes.
Campaign Use: Oppenheimer makes a good mentor for a team of young heroes, experienced enough to offer valuable advice and instruction, powerful enough to offer significant support, yet not so powerful as to overshadow the other players. He is also well suited to act as a bridge between the world of traditional Supers and Mystic Heroes, and can serve as a model for mystic martial artists. To make him more effective in his role, add as many skills as you feel he needs, and consider giving him some of his favorite Super-Skills outside of his VPP. To make him less powerful, drop the VPP and replace it with skills and Super Skills. He could also use some contacts and other perks. 
Plot Seed: A beautiful young sorceress appears in the campaign city, dressed in the fashion of the classic stage magician’s assistants of the 1930s. She calls herself Arcana, and claims that her father is trapped in a hellish alternate world. She speaks of someone called Adam Oppenheimer, and seems shocked to learn that he’s still alive. What’s going on?
 
Plot Seed: Swift flying saucer-shaped ships have been attacking Anchorage, Alaska. Anchorage’s own team of heroes has already fallen. A photograph shows that the ships are decorated with swastikas, and analysis of the wreckage of one ship shows a strange mix of alien technology and the technology of the 1940s. There is a hero from World War Two who once published a book claiming that the Nazi’s had these sorts of ships. Perhaps he could help?
If you ever want to read an incredible true story, Google for The Mighty Atom.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group...
 

 
NP: Everyone's picking on me. This game is too hard. I quit.
 
GM: Why is my player base so stagnant?
 
Hero Games: Why are our sales not going up? Where are all the new players?
 
Off topic to the thread, but maybe the new player would have a better time, and be up to speed faster, if someone actually helped them, instead of yelling at them and abusing them for making errors. I like to get an experienced player to "buddy" the new player for a few sessions (freeing the GM from this task).