MilkmanDan

Re: GM Question: Social Equity The violence during the civil rights movement was markedly less than mutant violence in the Marvel universe. Futhermore, there was a long-established power relationship in the South that civil rights threatened to upset, so you were suddenly unbalancing several centuries worth of an established power relationship. There's none of that history with mutants, and there's certainly a lot more violent behavoir. Again, much smaller-scale. I know of no "Homosexual Registration Act" ever put forth by any credible source. I know of noone building machines capable of detecing a "Gay Gene" and attempting to eradicate those carrying it. No, we don't. We have people preaching genocide just like we have people talking about how the aliens on Venus are mind controlling us or how the squirrels in my yard keep telling me to whack the head of my homeowner's association. Are there people who believe such things? Sure, but they're miles out on an extreme wacko fringe in our society. Fred Phelps has a couple dozen followers and gets a lot of press, but nobody would say that his presence means that our modern society thinks homosexuals should be rounded up and slaughtered. Reaction against mutants in the Marvel world has far, far, far more people leaning that way. It may not be a majority, but it sure as hell isn't fringe. Well, my original point was that negative feelings would be towards superhumans in general and the fact that mutants are specifically called out for special persecution. When the Human Torch misses Doom with a flame blast and accidentally blows up a school bus full of children nobody cares where his powers came from. There's nothing even remotely logical about the fact that non-mutant supers are given a great deal of latitude and mutants are not. It's a heavy-handed attempt to comment on racism in our society, but it doesn't make sense. People would be scared of the power, not the "X-Gene".

Re: [Online Game]New 'Marvel: Next Generation' game First Stilt-Man, the Batroc. Suddenly Electro seems so . . . capable.

Re: GM Question: Social Equity Please. The nature of mutant prejudice in the Marvel universe is just plain goofy. It's not that people wouldn't be prejudiced in some way against mutants. Sure, some would. What makes the mutant hysteria so silly is the way it's handled. You've got overt and apparently socially acceptable violence against the mutant population. You've got a rotating set of proposed laws that make Jim Crow laws look comic. You've got people preaching and actively working towards genocide. All of this is happening not with the castes of pre-industrial India or feudal Japan or authoritarian Nazi Germany. It's happening in an open, democratic U.S. society. That's what makes it loopy. A few gay-bashing religious loonies aside (Fred Phelps, call on line one, Fred Phelps, call on line one), that sort of extremism is not even vaguely characteristic of modern, democratic, capitalistic societies. The notion that people would go from "Hooray, the glowing pink chick saved my life, I love her" to "Oh God, the stinking mutie touched me, I'd rather die in the fire" makes no sense. What makes even less sense is a society that at least implicitly if not overtly supports Genosha, the Sentinel Program, and other initiatives. Apparently Marvel is now moving into some kind of Superpower Registration Act, but for years it talked about a Mutant Registration Act specifically. I would argue that people would have always wanted to know which of their neighbors was capable of firing an eye beam capable of blowing through the side of a battleship, regardless of how that power showed up.

Re: [Online Game]New 'Marvel: Next Generation' game "He's not very good at robbing things, but the female supervillains seem to LOVE working with him." Wait, scratch that. Every comment I can think of regarding Stilt Man's son is obscene enough to be immediately tossed off the Hero boards.

Re: [Online Game]New 'Marvel: Next Generation' game I actually may need to modify my character sheet to reflect a rivalry with Arachne, as I took her dad (Peter Parker) as a Contact. Another thing, assuming my character is deemed intriguing enough to be selected for the game, I like the fact that about everyone is basing their kids on these massive, world-conquering villains and my character's father is a putz who got beaten up once trying to take over the Daily Bugle. "MY FATHER . . . IS DOOM! He ruled an entire nation for years! He once stole the power of Galactus! He was the most feared man on the planet for decades!" "My dad got hit by lightning and wore a funny star mask with lightning bolts on it. He tried to rob banks every once and a while, but wasn't very good at it. Uh, nice to meet you."

Re: WWYCD my hero a villian? Well, the biggest threat at the moment is clearly you. I would inform Undertow (if that's a Tool reference, good one, just don't name a character Aenima please) that the team would be going to get those missiles. After all, the team leader told everyone where it was. We would be getting those missiles, and he would be staying home while we did it. And then, likely, the team would beat him silly.

Re: GM Question: Social Equity That's pretty much the logical way to handle Genocide in the world. What's going to scare people is that there's a 10 foot tall guy who can bench press a battleship jumping around their neighborhood. Who would actually care that his powers came from an evolutionary burp vs. a mystic ring vs. falling into a vat of radioactive green goop? The fact that people like Captain America and the FF are comparitively embraced by the public while the X-Men are branded as outlaws has always been the silliest thing about the Marvel Universe.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Great. Now I've wasted 15 minutes trying to figure out the best way to build a flaming-exploding-shark-firing bear in Hero. Is the shark a vehicle? An EB with a simultaneous HKA that has a delayed RKA explosion? A HERO games based on everyone riding flaming, exploding animals would actually be kind of fun to play . . .

Re: [Online Game]New 'Marvel: Next Generation' game Quivering nether-region of doom? I think I dated her for a while.

Re: What power would you buy (with a twist) I think every married man gets this one after a few years. Darkness to Hearing Group 1" radius, Trigger, Wife Nagging (+1/4), Reduced Endurance 0 END (+1/2), Persistent (+1/2) (11 Active Points); No Range (-1/2) 7 Real Points of blissful silence.

Re: Presented for your perusal: The Troll With Burnout, no less. I assume the special effect is him standing, hands on knees, wheezing a lot?

Re: [Online Game]New 'Marvel: Next Generation' game OK, I admit it. I tend to be verbose, and it's been a boring two days of work. Not sure if I did this right, haven't played much in a few years. Electron Val Char Cost 13 STR 3 26 DEX 48 26 CON 32 15 BODY 10 18 INT 8 18 EGO 16 20 PRE 10 16 COM 3 7/23 PD 4 14/38 ED 9 5 SPD 14 8 REC 0 52 END 0 41 STUN 6 6" RUN 0 2" SWIM 0 2 1/2" LEAP 0 Characteristics Cost: 163 Cost Power END 25 Electrical Powers: Elemental Control, 50-point powers 25 1) Electric Shield: Force Field (16 PD/24 ED), Hardened (+1/4) (50 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 5 12 2) Ride the Wires: Teleportation 15", x32 Noncombat (50 Active Points); Limited Power, only through power lines, must enter/exit within 1" of some kind of circuit, Power loses about half of its effectiveness (-1) (uses END Reserve) 5 25 3) Ride the Lightning: Flight 20", Reduced Endurance 1/2 END (+1/4) (50 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 2 35 4) Shocking Touch: Energy Blast 3d6 (vs. ED), Reduced Endurance 1/2 END (+1/4), Damage Shield (+1/2), Offensive (+1/4), Continuous (+1), No Normal Defense vs Force Field Standard (+1) (60 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 3 22 5) Living Battery: Aid: END 4d6, Area Of Effect (4" Radius; +1), Selective Target (+1/4) (90 Active Points); Limited Special Effect, Electrical Devices Uncommon SFX (-1), Only Restores to Starting Values (-1/2), Costs Endurance Costs END Every Phase (-1/2) (uses END Reserve) 9 60 Electrical Powers: Multipower, 75-point reserve, all slots: (75 Active Points); Noisy, Audible and registers across entire EM spectrum, Power loses about a fourth of its effectiveness (-1/4) 6u 1) Electrical Blast: Energy Blast 15d6 (vs. ED) (75 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 7 6u 2) Killer Shock: Killing Attack - Ranged 5d6 (vs. ED) (75 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 7 6u 3) Nerve System Short-Out: Energy Blast 7d6 (vs. ED), No Normal Defense Standard (+1) (70 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 7 6u 4) Nerve Deadening: Drain DEX 5d6, Ranged (+1/2) (75 Active Points) (uses END Reserve) 7 4u 5) EMP Explosion: Killing Attack - Ranged 1d6 (vs. ED), Does BODY (+1), No Normal Defense, Defense is not being an electrically-powered device Standard (+1), Area Of Effect (36" Radius; +1 3/4) (71 Active Points); No Range (-1/2) (uses END Reserve) 7 3u 6) Power Damper: Suppress END of electrical devices 6d6, Area Of Effect (3" Radius; +1), Selective Target (+1/4) (67 Active Points); No Range (-1/2), Only electrically-powered devices, Power loses about a third of its effectiveness (-1/2) (uses END Reserve) 7 4u 7) Mind of the Machine: Mind Control vs. Machines 12d6, Telepathic (+1/4) (75 Active Points); Stops Working If Mentalist Is Stunned (-1/2), Normal Range (-1/4) (uses END Reserve) 7 12 High Range Radio Perception 32 Electrical Sense: Spatial Awareness (Discriminatory, Increased Arc of Perception: 360-Degree) 15 Endurance Reserve (120 END, 5 REC) Reserve: (17 Active Points); Limited Power, in order to use an action for a recovery (any REC that is not post-12), requires full concentration/0 DCV and no other actions, Power loses about a fourth of its effectiveness (-1/4) 9 +14 REC for END Reserve (14 Active Points); Only when around active electrical sources Power loses about a third of its effectiveness (-1/2) 8 Charged Metabolism: Power Defense (8 points) 30 Power Converter: Absorption 4d6 (Energy), Variable Effect Two Powers Simultaneously (+1/2) (30 Active Points) Powers Cost: 345 Cost Skill 3 Electronics 13- 3 Computer Programming 13- 3 Systems Operation 13- 3 Security Systems 13- 3 Mechanics 13- 3 Persuasion 13- 10 +1 Overall 9 +3 with any three maneuvers or a tight group of attacks (Multipower) 8 +4 vs. specific OCV modifier on a tight group of attacks 3 Power (INT-based) 13- 5 Rapid Attack (Ranged) 2 PS: Electrical Engineer 11- 1 Language: Russian (basic conversation) 3 AK: Northeastern U.S. Power Grid (INT-based) 13- 3 Scholar 2 1) KS: Power Systems (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 2 2) KS: Electronics (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 2 3) KS: Mathematics (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 3 Scientist 2 1) SS: Electronics (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 2 2) SS: Magnetism (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 2 3) SS: Computer Science (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 2 4) SS: Physics (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- 2 5) SS: Metallurgy (INT-based) (3 Active Points) 13- Skills Cost: 81 Cost Perk 5 Contact (Contact has: useful Skills or resources, Good relationship with Contact) 12- Perks Cost: 5 Cost Talent 3 Absolute Range Sense 3 Bump Of Direction Talents Cost: 6 Total Character Cost: 600 Val Disadvantages 10 Dependent NPC: Max Dillon, father 8- (Normal) 5 Vulnerability: 1 1/2 x STUN Water-based attacks (Uncommon) 5 Vulnerability: 1 1/2 x BODY Water-based attacks (Uncommon) 10 Susceptibility: Immersion in water 1d6 damage, per Minute (Common) 15 Social Limitation: Public ID (Frequently; Major) 10 Reputation: Doctor Octopus-killing daughter of supervillain 11- 15 Enraged: Mothers threatened (Uncommon), go 11-, recover 11- 20 Enraged: Father threatened (Uncommon), go 14-, recover 11- 15 Hunted: Various former partners of her father and their children 8- (As Pow; Harshly Punish; PC has a Public ID or is otherwise very easy to find) 10 Distinctive Features: Electric field shooting around her body during use of powers (Easily Concealed; Always Noticed and Causes Major Reaction; Detectable By Commonly-Used Senses) 15 Psychological Limitation: Vengeful (Common; Strong) 15 Psychological Limitation: Dislikes public attention (Very Common; Moderate) 5 Rivalry: Professional (Arachne; Rival is As Powerful; Seek to Outdo, Embarrass, or Humiliate Rival; Rival Aware of Rivalry) Disadvantage Points: 150 Base Points: 450 Experience Required: 0 Total Experience Available: 0 Experience Unspent: 0 Background: Max Dillon had had a long and frequently embarrassing career as a supervillain named Electro. He'd tried to become a major player in the world of crime but, as he liked to say with his typical humor, he wasn't a particularly "super" supervillain. He was insecure and angry and stupid and he tried to take what he could for years. He was, as he said, not particularly "super" at, no matter what he tried, he never stayed out of jail for long. Then, one day after yet another prison break, he met Allison's mother, Lucille. Lucille laughed at his false bravado and smiled when he got flustered and, surprisingly, stuck around. Not too long after, Allison came along. Staring at her sleeping in her crib, Max decided he owed his infant daughter better. He kissed her and his wife goodbye and walked into the nearest police station and surrendered. Max became a model prisoner, volunteering his time when he could, never responding to taunts or getting into fights, and began counseling younger metahuman prisoners as to how they could change their life. One day, he was asked to go speak at a non-metahuman prison to talk about how, even with all his power, his life had seemed empty and that a life of crime, regardless of your capabilities, is a dead-end street. The lecture was also to be attended by some teenage "Scared Straight" participants, delinquent teenagers who were going to be given the opportunity to see that even a powerful supervillain could come around. The other prisoners took this as an opportunity and rioted, figuring that with teenagers as hostages and Electro on their side, they could get what they wanted. Max refused to help or use his powers in any way (even to defend himself, he'd made a promise he wouldn't), and was badly beaten by the rioting prisoners. Max would never walk again, but the fact that he'd sacrificed himself to save children was picked up by the press. It didn't hurt that the uncle of one of those children was a United States Senator from New York, and the resultant public upswing of sympathy meant that, on Allison's 11th birthday, her father was paroled from prison. Max, at that point, dedicated himself to raising his family, still going out whenever asked to give his speeches and try to change the life of people around him. The next ten years were happy, as Max, thankful for his new life, spent every moment he could with his daughter, seeing her through high school and encouraging her to pursue an electrical engineering degree at a local college. Electrical engineering was appropriate, as it was clear from an early age that Electro's powers had been passed on to the next generation. Allison could power lightbulbs in her early teens and her father did everything to encourage her to safely practice those abilities. Still, life was largely typical in their household, and neither Max's past nor Allison's abilities seemed to much matter in life. Allison's 21st birthday was supposed to be a simple, family affair. Doctor Octopus, on the other hand, had different ideas. Otto Octavius, along with a number of Max's former "business" associates, had been frequent targets of ridicule and less-than-flattering references during Max's speeches. Rhino's body odor, Scorpion's whining, Kraven's love of interior design; noone much liked Electro anymore. Octavius, for whatever reason ("He was a just a jerk," Max would later explain), was the target of the worst of it, with Max getting great laughs out of everything from his accent to graphic suggestions as to what the good doctor did with those tentacles when noone else was watching. Max was just trying to get laughs and get people interested in his speeches. Octavius had decided what he wanted was revenge and somehow had figured out that the whole Dillon family would be at the park that day. A perfect, public opportunity to get his revenge. She could still see it all happening in slow motion. A man, suspended on four giant metal limbs, running impossibly fast across the lawn. Her father, trying to respond, sending a brushed-away weak electrical blast at the man. The man laughing. The metal arm coming forward towards her mother. The arm bursting through her mother's back. The blood. The look of smug self-satisfaction on the man?s face as he turned towards Allison. The rage she felt. Her body tingling and then something exploding out of her. The look on the man's face changing from a cruel smirk to horror in the fraction of a second it took for the massive bolt of energy to erupt from her arms and hit him in the chest. A scream. Burnt flesh. One blood-soaked severed metal arm furtively wiggling on the ground for a few moments, before stopping forever. After that, it was a blur. Investigations and interviews by the police, and then SHIELD. Worst of all, the media. The media was everywhere. On the day in the park, some local news team was in the park filming a piece about a new playground built by a local superhero team when they spotted Doctor Octopus running across the lawn. Their cameras caught every moment and, within a day, the footage had spread around the world across the internet and to other TV stations. From that day forward, Allison was known everywhere as the girl who killed Doctor Octopus. For a while, she refused interviews, dodged the press, and tried to hide until it went away, but her father pulled her aside and told her that, if his life could teach her one lesson and one lesson only, it would be that you can't run away from your problems. Allison, at that point, came out of the proverbial metahuman closet, giving several press conferences and interviews stating that she had inherited powers from her father and that she would be using them as a superhero. Choosing the name and costume as a deliberate homage to her father, Electron was born. While she has spent the last year actively employed as a superhero, she realizes that the resources available as a member of the Thunderbolts would offer her the opportunity to make a much bigger difference in the world. Personality/Motivation: Allison didn't become a superhero to make up for her father's past actions. Instead, she does what she does because he inspired her to do what he can. "A guy I know told me something really important one night," Max told her. "With great power comes great responsibility." "The guy" (Peter Parker) and her father have subsequently become good friends after years of fighting each other, and he's become a bit of a crimefighting mentor to her. She dislikes attention and the media in general, which is unfortunate, as the media seem to love her. Being the child of a former supervillain who killed Doctor Octopus in front of the world does, not surprisingly, tend to make you the center of attention, but Allison would greatly prefer just to be left alone. Allison is, above all, fiercely protective of her father, and anyone threatening him will be immediately and extremely violently dealt with. Early in her career several supervillains attempted to kidnap or injure her father, and her extremely violent response has served to inspire most people on the wrong side of her law to give her father a wide berth. Between having rarely seen her father for a portion of her life and having lost her mother right in front of her eyes, Allison is very sensitive about protecting children and anyone who attempts to take a parent away from a child or the reverse tends to become an immediate target for her. Quote: "Listen, I could make some smart-*** comment about you being in for a shock or something, but I'm not in the mood. Give up or I'll hurt you." Powers/Tactics: Electron is a classic flying blaster, and always chooses to fulfill that role. Knowing that with her ED and Absorption she is a far more formidable opponent against energy projectors than bricks, she invariably chooses to use her flight and teleportation to keep her distance from hand-to-hand opponents and instead blast away from a distance. She will frequently half-move away from an opponent to get more distance and then blast away, trusting her excellent sniping skills (and skill levels vs. range) to give her an advantage in any ranged combat. Electron is not at all a quiet fighter, however, as her electrical blasts are loud both audially and register across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, meaning she tends to briefly interrupt radio and radar signals every time she uses her power. Stealth is not exactly her forte. At her relatively early age, she has already achieved an impressive mastery over her powers. Besides a stable of traditional ranged attacks, Electron is capable of disrupting the response time of a target's nervous system (a DEX Drain), setting off a powerful EMP explosion (a no-range area effect NND RKA vs. devices), and taking control over various electronic devices. She can also teleport via electrical lines and, if necessary, act as a living battery to power devices in the area. She also has the ability to "see" the world around her via an "electrical sense" (Spatial Awareness), as she can "feel" the electromagnetic charges left by the various objects around her. Her powers run off an END reserve and she is able to refill it somewhat via ambient electromagnetic radiation in the atmosphere, but in the presence of electrical infrastructure (in cities), she is able to much more greatly draw on local power sources to refresh her energy sources. Because of this, she clearly prefers fighting near some sort of power system, as her reserves can run down quickly out in the middle of nowhere. Electron, being more or less a living battery, does not much care for water, as it tends to short her out. While she can suppress the effects briefly (bathing is generally a good idea), being wet causes her actual pain. Appearance: Allison is about five and a half feet tall with brown hair and blue eyes. As she was rather overtly outed as a metahuman, a mask seems kind of pointless, so she doesn't bother to wear one. Her costume resembles that of her father, except hers is primarily yellow with green electrical markings coming up over both shoulders.

Re: [Online Game]New 'Marvel: Next Generation' game I've never done an online roleplaying session, and haven't even done face-to-face gaming for, gee, about 21 months (when my second child was born), but this is sounding interesting. Just finishing up Electron, Electro's daughter. Even if you're full up, it's been something to keep me interested during two incredibly boring days full of conference calls. Will post the character in a bit.

Re: The thing's I've learned playing a Brick... AE: One Hex for 60 STR costs 30 points. Those 30 points will buy you +10 OCV with Punch, Grab, and Sweep, or just plain +15 OCV with Punch. You can dive for cover from my AE attack. Good luck dodging my punch with +15 OCV.

Re: Advice for a team of unfortunate supers I'd set them up in a cage match fight to the death against the Civic Minded Five.

Uh, yeah, but if you have total life support for the planet, you may want to also add in some form of megascaled transform birth control, or we all are gonna be running out of room before long. For me, I'd probably go for some resistant defenses, wealth, and life support for safety purposes, and then a big honkin' Cosmic VPP. I wanna do whatever I want, whenever I want. I'd go for mental powers, but this is being a hero, right? I doubt I could control myself properly if I had Mind Control or Telepathy.

I actually had a villain named Klansman myself once (probably a reasonably common schtick). OIF armored robes (hooded), and OAF HA (defined as "lumber", seemed redneck-ish), and a mystical amulet that allowed him to project flaming crosses. A bit cheesy, but certainly fit the archetype. He was basically a low brick/MA with some energy projection abilities.

I tried something similar once, except it was a Teleport damage shield. Wanna hit me? Go ahead. *poof* One of my classic evil abuse of rules powers was doing this, except the teleport was just 5" total. Straight down.

Sounds like a fascinating campaign, and you really need to step in before the players COMMIT ABSOLUTE SUICIDE. You have to find a nice, subtle way to explain to your team that, if they move forward, they're going to die. Painfully. For an example, put your PCs up against a 30mm gatling gun (don't have TUV, but I'm guessing 3d6 AF10 RKA minimum, lots of targeting). Unless their defenses are just ludicrous, they'll go night-night even if they take no body. Sounds like you have a great tone. Keep it going as long as you can.

I continued watching it, and after their powers became public it got a lot more interesting. Darker, a bit edgier, not quite so damn perky. What bothered me? Let's see. The kids are at a dance. I don't care. Oh look, they're having a party. I don't care. Annoying high school-esque crushes, concerns about grades, that junk. It's just boring. Furthermore, there's lots of silly stuff. Avalanche attempts to kill Kitty and her family in one of the early episodes, yet she kisses him in later episodes. Riiight. Another one, a mind controlled Kitty kicks Wolverine in the shin and he hops up and down in agony. A 14-year-old girl kicks a man with adamantium bones in the shin, and he's the one who's hurt. Stuff like that. Lots of internal inconsistencies. Like I said, the show's improved with the later episodes, but the early episodes annoy me.

The alternative is what we had in 4th edition. 10 points for FTL travel, about 100 points to go supersonic. Made no sense. Megascale's great. Very in-genre.

Had a few good ones this week. The team consists of Tesseract (my character), a martial artist/brick/teleporter; Kushi, a anime brick babe; The Shadow, a mentalist with darkness and desolid; and Rom, basically a Tron clone. Kushi gets hit by a tunneling brick and the knockback drives her up and into the ceiling. "Hey, somebody knocked Kushi up!" Ba-dum-ching. Also, since technology didn't work too well in the underworld we were in an Tron's technological, he had to hide somewhere. He desolids into conductive materials, so we got him a frying pan to live in for a while. The puns on that one should last for a few sessions.

Or, if the villain's modeled after Troy McClure, aquatic animal prostitutes.

Re: Evil things to do to your players: Something Positive is the funniest comic in the world. Those even vaguely easily offended should probably avoid it (just click on the first comic, if it offends you, run away, it gets worse). I'm working up stats for Choo-Choo Bear and need to use him in a campaign sometime.

I'd like to thank you in advance for this opportunity. A planet where men are ruled by apes? It's a madhouse! A maaaaaaaadhooooouuuuuse!!!!!!