Speedball

Re: Storn's Art & Characters thread. I can honestly say that when we were at a party together, years ago, I thought my girlfriend was going to run off with him...He's a charming bloke.

Re: Character for review:Ran A couple of comments on the character: 1) The whole thing, as a big picture, fits together well conceptually. No glaring omissions and it all makes sense. 2) I was under the impression that the campaign had a SPD upper limit of 8, and this character has SPD 9 3) If the character loses her sword (for a -1 lim, you've got to expect that to happen every once in a while), she's going to lose her whole multipower *and* access to a lot of her MA moves--will the player flip out if this happens? If so, I would recommend changing from OAF to OIF... 4) Is the vulnerabilty to cold based on the skimpy costume? It isn't given any explanation in the character write-up.

Re: Seeds of Change PBEM Nexus, What sort of pacing do you imagine for the game? Will there be weekly posts, more often, less often? The opening a week or so got me excited and I sent a response and would love to know (roughly) how often we should look for a new round of email from you or the co-GM. Thanks, Geoff/Hurricane/Simon

Re: journal of a hero First off, thank you for the kind words. Second, when you think back to your complex, genius-level sorceress, how did you get into her head? How did you find yourself thinking differently? I mean, presumably we all operate with some level of GM understanding that these heroes we play are the 'better' than ourselves--higher int, ego, pre, etc., and I'm still wondering how, independent of that fiat, we do our best job of fitting into those moulds. Anyway, thanks again for any insight you can give. Still hungry for critiqies of the posts from everyone else, too...

Re: Character for review -- Carnage I liked his multipower a lot--especially the hooks that give knock back resistance: that was a great image to describe the power in game terms rather than just mechanical terms. One thing I'd consider adding: a damage shield of maybe 2d6 HKA--Armor piercing x2, composed of small jagged pieces of metal constantly surrounding the character. It'd make bricks think twice about just wading up to the guy to smack the carp out of him... [edit: you know, I'd initially meant to write "smack the crap out of him," but "carp" is now hilarious to me. I mean, I literally visualized a carp flying out of a guy's puss after a blow that gave him whiplash..."Carp" indeed. ]

Re: journal of a hero OOC: I'd love to pause here for a moment. For those who're reading, I'd like to hear some constructive criticism. If you could think of this as a "character for review" post, it would help me out a lot. Feel free to comment on either writing style or on character development--both could use some work. Thanks in advance for any guidance you all can give.

Re: journal of a hero OOC: finally--some action. [editor’s note—below we find the first description of Windsor acting to stop a crime. Although he was not in the costume he would come to adopt and had not even settled on a code-name, most scholars agree that this episode was, in fact, the birth of the hero later known as Hurricane.] Journal Entry #11, dated August 7, 2004 Toronto’s a wonderful little city. Owens and I are staying at the Four Seasons, doing a little sight-seeing and attending a couple of fundraisers to cover the real reason for the visit. Of course, I don’t mind attending parties with more gorgeous young Canadian women than I can shake a stick at. The wonderful thing about these Canadian women is their…open relationship to sex. It makes me wonder why England let her leave the Empire. I’ve always heard it said that the Empire was founded by men looking for a better meal and a better class of woman. Now, I’m not complaining about our home-grown women, but I met an Inuit woman last night who absolutely knocked me out. Or she would have if events hadn’t gotten in the way. I was at the Art Gallery of Ontario for an opening of a new Canadian artist’s show. I honestly can’t even remember the name of the guy whose show it was. I thought the art was forgettable, though he seemed nice enough. Plus, one of the other guests turned out to be Krist Novoselic, and since I’ve been a big Nirvana fan since grammar school, it was a real blast to meet him. Anyway, after half an hour of mediocre wine and truly substandard brie, I decided to sneak off to see the museum’s permanent collection. I was swinging through the hall of German expressionists when I saw a couple of guys on the cleaning crew taking some paintings off the wall, one of them an Otto Dix oil I’d written a short paper about my first year at Cambridge. I asked the chap to give me a moment to look at it, figuring they must be swapping it out as a loaner to another museum. They shot each other such looks that I immediately knew something wasn’t quite right. I glanced down towards their feet and there were several other paintings rolled up, out of their frames. It was then that I realized that their blue jumpsuits didn’t fit right and as I looked back up to their faces with my mouth open to ask a question or two, one of the men drew what seemed at the time to be a rather large revolver and pointed it at my face, the muzzle not 6 inches away from the bridge of my nose. Reflexively, I put my hands up and took a step back. The crooks started jabbering at me in an accented Quebecois that would’ve insulted my ears if all my attention wasn’t on the gun. Intermittently they gave me orders to shut up, to tell them who I was—but wait didn’t I look familiar?, to turn around, to sit down. They obviously didn’t expect to be interrupted and their plans went out the window when they were. I decided to make myself as harmless a target as possible and so I knelt down with my hands on my head like I’ve seen in the police dramas from the States. They liked that as much as they were going to like anything at that point and began gathering up the canvases they’d already rolled, leaving the Dix (thank God) where it was. I looked up, quickly, as they were getting ready to go and the one with the gun spotted me looking at them. He took a step to me as the other started heading for the exit and swung the gun at my head, butt-first. It landed with a satisfying (for him only, I assure you) thud and I winced more from the surprise than from the pain—in truth, it had been a while since the episode with the boulder in Greece [see entry #2—ed. ] and I my mind forgot that I don’t seem to get hurt as easily as I used to. The man wheeled to leave and started walking quickly away, following his partner. For my part, I stayed down, but reached a hand to follow them, like I might have grabbed them if they were closer. In fact, the oddest thing happened just then. The man who had left first began swaying a bit and then began spinning wildly and within a second dropped the satchel that held the paintings. It was like he’d been spun around like God’s own top. His friend, half a second later, did the same and as he spun around, the gun dropped from his hand and onto the museum’s marble floor. It was a medium caliber gun, I’ll grant you—a .38, but when it went off, the bullet came straight at me. The only reason that a) I know that and I’m here to write about it is that when the bullet hit me in the right pectoral, it had all the force of a hard poke in the chest. It seems that Owens has his answer about how tough I am—I am fucking bullet proof. Security came running of course, and as the two men were struggling to get their bearings and figure out what happened, they were jumped by about 10 men. Security eyed me suspiciously at first, too, but it was all sorted out with some explanation and from the would-be crooks’ own admissions. I was just someone who stumbled onto their theft and they’d been unlucky—slipping on a newly polished floor or somesuch. The morning edition of the Toronto Star covered it on the society page, just noting that I’d been there to witness the whole thing and not that I’d stopped it, thank goodness. What a rush—my first act of heroism! I was shaking a bit after it was all over—not out of fear, as everyone thought, but from excitement over the things to come: this is the sort of thing I would do from now on. I’ll keep the bullet as a souvenir, of course. It’s the least I’m owed after ruining a perfectly good dinner jacket.

Re: Why that costume

Re: Why that costume The character I recently started playing, named Hurricane, designed his costume as an homage to the Hawker Hurricane--a plane that his grandfather flew during WWII. It's olive drab with a red, white, and blue bull's eye on the chest; He also has a commando knife, side arm, and a pouch-belt, strictly for utiltarian purposes.

Re: Cannonball well, I'm going to assume that your movement power is built on more than 60AP. If so, I would build the EB like this: 12d6 Energy Blast, Linked to Accelerated Movement Power(-1/2), No Range (-1/2); Cost: 30 points

Re: Seeds of Change PBEM ditto.

Re: Cannonball

Re: journal of a hero Journal Entry #10, dated August 5, 2004 These long flights have proven really, really important. Owens and I got to talking, of course, about how we go about making me into what I guess I’m going to have to start calling a superhero. Absolutely hilarious, that, but there it is. I should pick up some comics, or something, to make sure I get all the rules right, not to mention the costume and the secret base. When we get to the hotel I’ll have the concierge send a runner out to get a selection of the Yank comics. I don’t think Judge Dredd would be the right role model somehow. When we were kidding around (Owens was more relaxed than I’ve seen him in a week) all of this was flying back and forth, we both stopped short at the secret base comment. As laughable as it is to imagine, I’m going to have to come up with some way of maintaining the secret of who I am. The last thing I want is someone coming after Owens—or worse, Margaret. The press is bad enough and it isn’t as though our family hasn’t had to deal with kidnapping attempts in the past. [Windsor and his sister had both been the subject of kidnapping attempts for money; the boy when he was 12 and the girl when she was 15--ed.] Now that I’m in a position to give over more than money, I can only assume that there are some people who might want to make off with someone I care about to get me to do things I wouldn’t otherwise do. Maybe I’m being paranoid—I probably am, but if that’s the case, at least I know Owens is even more paranoid than I am. He not only agreed with the idea of some kind of ‘batcave,’ but he ran along with the idea as well. We also decided that I’ll need access to money not as Simon Cooper Windsor, but as…whomever I wind up being. That means heading to the Caymans, so Owens will head out day after tomorrow to set up an account to work from. I’ll call the accountants when we land, since it won’t be office hours until then anyway. A couple million pounds to start and then some real money when I get closer to being ready. Owens is asleep now and I’m stuck here, bored. Right before he dropped off, he made some strange comment about figuring out just how tough I am. What’s he got in mind, I wonder? I think I’ll go fly the plane for a bit. The crew won’t mind the break and flying always relaxes me. Funny how I’ve stopped needing to sleep.

Re: journal of a hero Levi--I'll work your PC in if you let me know a little about him or her. Drop me a line or just post something here. grchunt@hotmail.com

Re: Der Psychology of der Super Human There's a JLA graphic novel that deals with precisely this issue called "Superpower," in which a man radically alters his physiology to become more capable of helping people and ultimately comes to blows with the Justice League over proper methods.

Re: Seeds of Change PBEM Ready, willing, and able. For those who might be interested, I've been posting a prequel journal for Hurricane here

Re: How would you build this wind-based power? Thanks. I agree that it seems a little high, but we're dealing with characters (and, presumably, villains) built on 750 points, so that explains my...caution.

Re: How would you build this wind-based power? OK, so if I use change environment, this would be the build I'd choose: "I...can't...hear...you!" Change environment: -7 perception to hearing group; 8" radius, personal immunity (+1/4) 51AP Does that sound about right?

Re: journal of a hero Entry #9, dated August 3, 2004 I’m sleeping less and thinking more. I feel somehow…inactive. I hear my father’s voice in my head telling me to go make something of myself and not rely on reputation and wealth. I was sitting in my bedroom earlier, thumbing through some of my old school books from A levels and came across this passage: “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close up the wall with our English dead! In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man As modest stillness and humility: But when the blast of war blows in our ears, Then imitate the action of a tiger; Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, Disguise fair nature with hard favoured rage; Then lend the eye a terrible aspect.” The world is conspiring to tell me something and I am beginning to sense what it is. Dad used to talk about the responsibility we had to help others and I thought it was just some sort of noblesse oblige left over from colonial days, but I think now he was talking about something older and at the same time more modern. I have a chance now to move beyond working in soup kitchens and attending charity balls. If Owens and I are right, there will be other people who are like me and some of them might not be so friendly towards England. If that’s the case, then I’ll need to be ready for them. If not, then there are still other things I can do and ways to help. I don’t want to be part of the government—they can create their own problems sometimes—I have resources enough to work on my own, or maybe with others who will have the same ideas. What’s important is to get started, and soon. I’m going to tell Owens that Canada won’t wait for next week. We leave tomorrow.

Re: How would you build this wind-based power? Thanks to you all for the help. Darkness seems like the way to go for this character. So, if I'm reading it correctly, I could build it as: I can't hear a thing: darkness to hearing group; 10"; special effect: Hurricane summons a wind so noisy that no verbal communication can be heard from within the area of effect. ranged (+1/2); cost: 75 points yes?

Re: journal of a hero Entry # 8, dated August 2, 2004 Wrangled myself an invitation to Lord and Lady Cummings’ for drinks and dinner two days ago to discuss, among other things, Lord Cummings’ work with The Firm [british Intelligence, MI-6—ed.]. It’s an open secret among a number of us that he was heavily involved with The Firm at the highest levels and I always knew that dad had some sort of business relationship with it as well. Lord Cummings and I walked the gardens and caught up a bit; he spoke about my father in glowing terms. They were only a year apart at Sandhurst, which I didn’t know. Apparently he and my father raised a bit of Hell there when they were junior officers. At any rate, my mission (as it were) was to gently prod him for information about other meta-humans. He was either clueless or played that he was exceedingly well. I didn’t let on about my own particular circumstances—I’m not ready for that yet and I’m not sure whether he’d value my life and well-being over duty to Queen and country and maybe hand me over to the SIS in the interests of national security. And it isn’t that I don’t care for England—I want to help, but I want to do it in my own way and in my own time. I have to prepare and make sure I know what I’m getting into. There must be others like me and not all of them will have been raised to believe in right and wrong—or worse: they will have been, but the people who’ve raised them will be off their nut. At any rate, I left it vague with Lord Cummings; I told him I was doing some research for a book, a typically dilettante-ish thing for me to do. Said I’d keep him on deep background and all that sort of thing. He looked at me slightly cockeyed when I told him the nature of the book—people with strange abilities and the various government attempts to use them—or develop them—in the cold war. I thought that would be far enough back in history not to raise any alarm bells and I checked to make sure there were a couple of books out already on the subject so that I wasn’t doing anything too ground breaking. I made sure to have the whole conversation seem off-hand, but I made sure to get a promise from him to look into it and get back to me. Said he’d call within the fortnight. I enjoyed the drive back to the Croft in the roadster, top down. Nothing beats an English country evening in August. I got home early and thought about calling Lucy over, but decided against it for the evening. There was business to get to. Owens has been doing a bit of shopping for me—fun stuff. He said he wanted to do it all through channels just to make sure there wasn’t any way for these things to get traced back to me. The take? Well, as I walked into the cellar area we’d cleared out for our purposes, I rounded the corner into the biggest gun barrel I’d ever seen on a pistol. Owens said he was making a point: that if he could take me by surprise, someone else could, too. I swear, I’ve seen shotgun barrels smaller than the muzzle of this revolver. Apparently he wants me to start carrying the damn thing around with me. I don’t know about that. Owens also came up with a full Kevlar body-suit and some electronics that might come in handy—hands free radio, a new PDA with all sorts of features that even my blackberry doesn’t have, and some handcuffs. That reminds me—must ring Fiona. She’s called twice and she’s still mad at me for missing Ascot this year. Anyway, toys aside, Owens and I talked at length about trying to figure out exactly what my abilities are. A good idea, I think. We’ll need some place secluded, but not so far out of the way that I can’t get some medical attention if something goes wrong. We agreed on Canada somewhere, which is perfect, since I have to be in Toronto next week for Tim’s benefit gala anyway. Near as I can tell, I keep getting stronger and the more I fly, the more I feel like it isn’t really like I’m flying as much as the wind is carrying me and I’m just telling it what to do. If that’s the case, then I might be able to make the wind move other things, too, and not just me. Better to wait until Canada, though, to try anything too grandiose. Margaret comes home tomorrow. Owens and I agreed not to tell her anything for the time being. She goes back to Oxford the following week and this is too much for her to process before she has to leave.

Hey all, Background: I'm experimenting with building a multipower for a wind-based energy projector (named Hurricane) and I'm trying to come up with interesting powers that might have unique applications. How would you build the following, keeping in mind that the campaign has a 80AP limit and that the multipower is thus built on a 80 point reserve? Power: a wind so loud that it interferes with verbal communications within a given area, even if these people are trying to speak with people who aren't present-through electronic means (radio, tv, etc). Thanks in advance.

Re: Seeds of Change PBEM Any word, Nexus?

Re: Question for the legal eagles re federal arrest warrants A few things: First, McCoy is right: warrants are normally legal documents open to all. If they are sealed, they are still subject to motions filed under the Freedom of Information Act. Second, bounty hunters are not used by the government to serve warrants in the real world, though I can see it making a certain amount of sense in a metahuman game. If this is an initial arrest warrant, it should be served by an officer of the Federal government, usually someone from the Dept. of Justice. If the PC has a bounty hunter after him, I would assume that means he's already skipped on bail at some point. Third, McCoy is right again: if there's no way to unseal the warrant, do whatever you can to keep this guy away from the feds, since if he gets caught, you probably won't see him again for years--or if you do, he'll be in bad shape. Take a look at this week's New Yorker for the article titled "Outsourcing Torture: the battle over extraordinary rendition." Fourth, if your friend gets caught regardless and the feds won't pony up with a warrant, someone needs to get the guy some representation. The cases making their way through federal courts now seem to indiciate some limited success in getting detainees/defendants legal help and access to their lawyer. One important question to determine just how screwed the PC is: is the guy an American citizen, or is he the citizen of another country? If it's the latter and you're playing in a close-to-real-world campaign, have the player make himself a new character to play...

Re: Where'd this base come from rrrrrrep'd!