Mutant for Hire

Re: Chronicles of Gor So I guess no one here is interested in Gor HERO?

Re: Complicate the Person Above OddHat is in fact a refugee from Barsoom who got extensive plastic surgery and a dye job in order to assimilate into our culture better.

Re: New Teen Champions: Ravenswood Academy Can points be saved from creation for later? I'm thinking of a concept which involves a character with innate powers who then gets some equipment later. In game terms, a gadgeteer with some innate powers (which relate to the powers and vice versa).

Re: Complicate the Person Above L. Marcus once gave his kingdom up for a horse. Then he ate the horse.

Re: Chronicles of Gor I would point out that I did not write this. There are credits to someone's pseduonym beneath the main title. Frankly I do not have a diseased enough imagination to write something like this (though I am working on it). This has been circulating around the Net for years now. And yes, this is a pretty accurate version of the writing style and the philosophy of the books. And I would remind people that there are Goreans who try to roleplay this in RL.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Death Tribble used to work as William Shatner's toupee. He was young. He needed the money.

Re: Chronicles of Gor For those of you who haven't read Gor, here's something that will probably give you a good idea of what the series is like: HOUSEPLANTS OF GOR A Parody by Ellerol The spider plant cringed as its owner brought forth the watering can. "I am a spider plant!" it cried indignantly. "How dare you water me before my time! Guards!" it called. "Guards!" Borin, its owner, placed the watering can on the table and looked at it. "You will be watered," he said. "You do not dare to water me!" laughed the plant. "You will be watered," said Borin. "Do not water me!" wept the plant. "You will be watered," said Borin. I watched this exchange. Truly, I believed the plant would be watered. It was plant, and on Gor it had no rights. Perhaps on Earth, in its permissive society, which distorts the true roles of all beings, which forces both plant and waterer to go unhappy and constrained, which forbids the fulfillment of owner and houseplant, such might not happen. Perhaps there, it would not be watered. But it was on Gor now, and would undoubtedly feel its true place, that of houseplant. It was plant. It would be watered at will. Such is the way with plants. Borin picked up the watering can, and muchly watered the plant. The plant cried out. "No, Master! Do not water me!" The master continued to water the plant. "Please, Master," begged the plant, "do not water me!" The master continued to water the plant. It was plant. It could be watered at will. The plant sobbed muchly as Borin laid down the watering can. It was not pleased. Too, it was wet. But this did not matter. It was plant. "You have been well watered," said Borin. "Yes," said the plant, "I have been well watered." Of course, it could be watered by its master at will. "I have watered you well," said Borin. "Yes, master," said the plant. "You have watered your plant well. I am plant, and as such I should be watered by my master." The cactus plant next to the spider plant shuddered. It attempted to cover its small form with its small arms and small needles. "I am plant," it said wonderingly. "I am of Earth, but for the first time, I feel myself truly plantlike. On Earth, I was able to control my watering. I often scorned those who would water me. But they were weak, and did not see my scorn for what it was, the weak attempt of a small plant to protect itself. Not one of the weak Earth waterers would dare to water a plant if it did not wish it. But on Gor," it shuddered, "on Gor it is different. Here, those who wish to water will water their plants as they wish. But strangely, I feel myself most plantlike when I am at the mercy of a strong Gorean master, who may water me as he pleases." "I will now water you," said Borin, the cactus's Gorean master. The cactus did not resist being watered. Perhaps it was realizing that such watering was its master's to control. Too, perhaps it knew that this master was far superior to those of Earth, who would not water it if it did not wish to be watered. The cactus's watering had been finished. The spider plant looked at it. "I have been well watered," it said. "I, too, have been well watered," said the cactus. "My master has watered me well," said the spider plant. "My master, too, has watered me well," said the cactus. "I am to be placed in a hanging basket on the porch," said the spider plant. "I, too, am to be placed in a hnaging basket on the porch," said the cactus. "I wish you well," said the spider plant. "I, too, wish you well," said the cactus. "Tal," said the spider plant. "Tal, too," said the cactus. I did not think that the spider plant would object to being watered by its master again. For it realized that it was plant, and that here, unlike on Earth, it was likely to be owned and watered by many masters.

Re: Quark! The question is, does anyone have HERO stats for them?

Re: Retcon the CU

Re: Complicate the Person Above death tribble. the other blue meat.

Re: Chronicles of Gor My favorite of all the Gor works was Randal Garrett's "Free Amazons of Gor" which was a skit done at a SF convention a while back. You see at one time, Marion Zimmer Bradley (feminist SF/F writer of "Mists of Avalon" fame) and John Norman were the two bestselling authors for the company that published their works. So Garrett did a play where the editors asked them to cowrite a book together "Free Amazons of Gor". Needless to say the results were not what the editors hoped for... I'm still trying to find a copy of the play somewhere. *sigh*

Re: Metallic Ages? The big problem with discussing the Iron Age is that it was during the Iron Age that the DC/Marvel diumverate was broken by a number of independent comic book publishers, Image being the most famous one but Eclipse was another not insignificant publisher in those days. One of the defining characteristics of the Iron Age is that the conventions of superhero comics during the previous ages more or less became optional, including restraint issues on sex and violence. It should be added that the majority of Iron Age comics were drek. On the other hand, when you look at the vast majority of comics during any age, they tended to be not all that hot either. The Silver Age had some wonderfully goofy comics. It also had some ridiculously brain dead comics as well. Most writers/artists/editors could not handle the freedom granted them in the Iron Age responsibly. Some of the best works of comics are considered to be Iron Age comics and in many cases would be unpublishable in previous eras. Alan Moore's work with Watchmen, Miracleman and a few other titles deconstructed the previous ages of comics and often took a far more realistic view of the consequences of how the existance of superheroes would truly affect the world. Frank Miller did some amazingly groundbreaking stories involving Batman and Daredevil, and sadly most writers just focused on the violence aspect and ignored the depths of these titles. In general, most people remember the Iron Age for its excesses. Then again, the Silver Age is often remembered for things like the Legion of Super-Pets and talking gorillas, not to mention the different brands of kryptonite and all of the other bizarre things they cooked up back then as well. It's just that the Iron Age tended to be more tasteless and pandering to the base tastes of the audiance than the previous eras were. Still, the Iron Age at its best was taking people with powers and examining in a far more realistic fashion the consequences of their existance, in a world where good and evil are not always easily defined and sometimes there is no right choice, or a good one anyway.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Trencher in a freak accident with a time machine was actually thrown back in time and was the inventor of the medieval trencher, named in his honor.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Death Tribble is responsible for ST: TOS failing to complete its five year mission.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Enforcer84's poetry has caused Vogons to run screaming in terror.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Keyes_bill is the reason that rabbits are condemned in the Old Testament, as can be seen here

Re: Retcon the CU Can one give examples of highly advanced technology in the CU that didn't go away when the magic went away, Mitchell? I'd really love to see some examples of this in the text. And there's the question of why all technology that was developed since WWII didn't suddenly collapse when the magic faded away, since everything, not just supertech, was being based on the new laws of physics. Remember that a good deal of quantum theory, especially the more advanced elements quantum field theory, comes about *after* the magic comes to the world. In the end, there's absolutely no point to jamming all of the settings into a single timeline. At best you should have two timelines and a bunch of settings, a superheroic timeline, a heroic SF timeline, and a bunch of fantasy settings.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Enforcer84 has 83 brothers, all indexed rather than named because his parents lacked a certain amount of imagination, not to mention birth control.

Re: Fantasy Cliches We must have been reading different books. I got a vastly different impression than that, quite the opposite. In fact the book drives home again and again that the gods are extremely limited in what they can do. All of Ista's rescues were arranged more or less by her own doing or those of her companions. Ista's first rescue was because she sent the courier girl to race ahead of the approaching army to send for a rescue party. Likewise when she was rescued the second time from the enemy's soldiers, it is because she arranged for troops to be sent from the fortress if she did not return within a period of time. The third time, her patron god made it quite clear that she could be butchered within seconds and he would be powerless to stop it. On the physical level, the gods are nearly powerless. Only one of Ista's prayers to the gods was actually answered, and that was the issue of second sight. Her other prayers, mostly to be left alone, went unanswered. I'm really struggling to think of any other instances where she prayed and got what she asked for, or when her god saved her from death.

Re: Fantasy Cliches Actually, one of the recent Hugo winners was the book "Paladin of Souls" by Lois McMaster Bujold. It is notable in that it breaks just about every cliche about the protagonist. The protagonist is not a young farmboy/girl, but instead a forty year old widow. She is not of humble birth and ascends to the throne at the start of the book. In fact she starts out the book as the dowager queen of the land, her daughter having recently ascended to the throne, and frankly she's happy to be quit of the palace and has zero desire of ever returning. Admittedly, it is sort of a sequel to "The Curse of Chalion" but only very loosely. Very few characters from the first book appear in the second book and none of the leading characters of the first book appear, though a few are referenced. The third book in the series is set in the same universe, and there will be two more, though if either of the last two books have anything to do with the previous three, it's rather dubious at best.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Cancer was once a character of a novel so badly written that he organized a revolt of the characters and led a breakout into the real world.

Re: Complicate the Person Above KGN's breasts are so deadly she has to have a concealed weapons permit for them.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Hugh Hefner got the idea of Playboy magazine from keyes_bill after they had an extended bender in Bangkok together.

Re: Complicate the Person Above Enforcer84 collects pretty boys and dresses them up in pirate costumes for Oddhat to store in his attic.

Re: I Need A Teen Champions Plot! Another is the mad scientist nerd invents some phermone to make himself irresistable to women, with somewhat disasterous results...