Captain Liberty

Re: What Age?

Golden Age. My current campaign (M&M, as it happens) is set in an alternate world in which some of the events of the Golden Age, like WWII, did not happen and now seem about to happen in 2007. I generally have to amend my campaigns to accomodate the Silver to Bronze Age sensibilities of most of my players.

Oh, and the emblematic comic book of the period is, of course, All Star Comics featuring the Justice Society of America

Re: [Character] Sybyl

Have we come to the point where "fully covered" implies "bare midriff?

Re: Regeneration/Healing

I have a whole group of characters, both villains (Lung Hung, Lupus, et al) and heroes (Corsair [Nemesis of Evil]) who have regeneration from death and heavy damage reduction to model the "instant recovery", but with the kicker that the damage reduction does not work UNTIL they have suffered the effects of any stunning or death results. Of course, they wear okay armor and have good CONs.

Re: CHAMPIONS OF THE NORTH -- What Would You Like To See?

Actually' date=' Scott Bennie spruced her up nicely for Fourth Edition's [i']Classic Enemies[/i], with a snazzy look courtesy of Patrick Zircher.

Really? I've been using Classic Enemies for years and I don't recall her being there. Not doubting your word, understand, just wondering how I missed that. Can't recall the Zircher artwork at all. Was she changed appreciably?

Ladybug always struck me as almost a Canadian version of Lady Blue, a "gentlelady thief." I must admit that her propensity for flitting south of the Canadian border to bedevil American heroes tickled my Canuckian ego.

 

But with her original patriotic motivation it wouldn't be that difficult to turn her into a hero. That's how I used her in my own campaigns; her shame at stealing the money to perfect her armor led her to become an independent hero to atone.

The original description didn't say anything about whether she was up for killing or not. I remember using her as a VOICE recruit, back in the day, and she didn't have a problem then.

But having her as a Canadian hero who twits American heroes seems very appropriate.

Re: CHAMPIONS REVISED -- If We Do It, What Would You Like To See?

What one of the core books really needs is a return of "Goodman Says."

Re: CHAMPIONS REVISED -- If We Do It, What Would You Like To See?

What Resource Kit is that? Last time I checked, and that was some time ago, the Resource Kit was long out of print. And Steve was saying they were not going to reprint it. Of course, things may have changed in the 3 years or so I have not been able to access the Hero servers at work. What changed, by the way?

Re: CHAMPIONS OF THE NORTH -- What Would You Like To See?

What the book needs is a writeup of Ladybug, the true (viallainous) champion of Canada. From Enemies book #1 (or was it #2?), and neglected ever since.

Re: CHAMPIONS OF THE NORTH -- What Would You Like To See?

Well there was no Canadian comic book industry in the Silver Age and of course the Americans weren't going to create any Canadian characters but that doesn't mean that the Champions Universe Canada was quite that dry. After all Alpha Flight and Wolverine retrocontinuity has put a couple of characters back into that timeframe. Although perhaps the world would be a better place without Major Mapleleaf.

I believe Captain Canuck - a very good "Canadian Captain America" - qualifies as Silver Age, at least if you extend the Silver Age into the 70s. I also remember a Northstar or something similar amongst the early Indy titles that was a Canadian product.

And I definitely vote for an RCMP hero, perhaps the latest in a long line of heroic mounties. He might even be the "Batman" of Canada.

Re: MancerBear's Art Den

Nice stuff, Mancer. I have grabbed all the Terror Inc pics. Now I'll have to get DH 44 to find out what Liaden has done with them. Though I seem to have a private message from him waiting. Hmmmm.

Re: VOICE of DOOM

Hi folks,

For some reason I was just notified now about this thread. Wish someone had mentioned it when it got started.

No problems, I really like some of the writeups. Unfortunately, I don't do .hdc, but I've copied everything I could. Particularly like the Hardhat and Dimension Man writeups. I never did a writeup of Hardhat, he was just a concept. Dimension Man was a character I did a couple of stories for for the early comic book fanzines in the 60s and I did have a writeup on him.

I'm really short on time these days, but if someone wants to do an updated writeup on Dreamer, feel free. Shouldn't you have one for Lupus, too?

Since the Perrinverse (check out my website at http://www.perrinworlds.com) uses actual comic book characters, Snapdragon is an operative for Kobra in the Perrinverse.

I also contributed writeups for Lung Hung in the 1950s and 1900s in that earlier thread, feel free to work with them.

Keep up the good work!

Re: Building the Animated Justice League

Anyone can survive a few seconds of hard vacuum. I doubt Mars in the DC Universe has the same low pressure that it has in the RW. That MM would have no problem at the top of Mt. Everest I can well believe. He may even, with his control over his own molecules, be able to survive for minutes in space. But probably no more (though in the Invasion comics series I think he space flew with just a breather. But I'm not sure about that). Superman has worked with just a breathing mechanism many many times, including in the animated series. He and J'onn must have been intending to be EVAing for quite a while for him to need a spacesuit.

Re: Building the Animated Justice League

MM and Superman were both in space suits in the War World episode. I don't think he has that life support function. Not at all sure he does well in high pressure, either. I don't think it has come up in the show.

Re: VOICE List

When we get around to it, I imagine. Things are a tad busy (not with game stuff, alas) just now.

Re: VOICE List

Hey Steve, how're you doing ?

 

On an unrelated note, was just looking over Trouble For Havoc the other day and am still impressed with the job you guys did on that.

 

Don't know how impractical this'd be, but any chance of you guys getting leasing rights for 5th ed. and re-releasing an updated version of the sourcebook for Champions and maybe a few other contemporary systems ?

Since I haven't been affiliated with Chaosium for almost 20 years now (I left in January of 1985), I am not the person to be talking to about such projects. In fact, I was no longer with Chaosium when I wrote VOICE of Doom.

And Havoc was actually written by about three other people, who would have to be consulted. I am in touch with one of them, as it happens, but not the others.

All told, probably not going to happen.

Re: VOICE List

Someone wants to take a crack at updating VOICE, it's fine with me. I actually have done some of that and will happily pass along what I have as long as I get all the writeups back (that is, I get copies of all the writeups).

I use metacreator, though, which I imagine doesn't mesh well with the current official software. Never saw any need to change. If the new software can do rtf files, that would be fine.

When I did Dr. Photon and Szybko, I was actually running a Silver Age Sentinels campaign, so I didn't upgrade them to 5th edition. The campaign has since gone back to Champions. It's on hiatus at the moment - one of my players is running an Angel campaign instead.

Re: Recombining Schizophrenia

Might I suggest as a name what you might call the opposite of a Cavalier, that is a Puritan or Roundhead or "Iron-something" I forget the exact term.

You could even make him English.

Just a thought

Re: Lack of Power coverage

Can you clarify this a bit? Object DEF isn't really that high (heavy wood furniture 4; 20 STR; concrete wall 6 DEF, 30 STR). Stats like that wouldn't be very competetive in most Supers campaigns. Maybe if they were additive, but then 2d6, Standard Effect of this power gets 38 points worth of effect (+30 STR no figured and +6/+6 Armor), limited by needing a 6 DEF object (call that -1/4 and I guess we're in the game).

 

ASIDE: a SMART Absorbing Man would carry a chip of Uru or wear a belt of adamantium, wouldn't he?

Absorbing Man never got anywhere absorbing the structure of wood or concrete, but you may have a point. It might have to be additive or have a multiplier in there somewhere. Perhaps that's the base power and multipliers are available just as they are for movement. Absorbing Man, after all, is the epitome of the power. Amazing Man from the old All Stars Squadron is probably not in the same league (though a lot faster).

As I said, I am working on it, and not exactly full time.

Another modifier would probably be something like "Duplicates other effects."

There are a lot of possibilities, and I really hate VPPs unless they are being used for a situation where the user can literally do anything.

Re: Lack of Power coverage

First thing to do is realize you can't have everything listed, so just keep track of the important stuff. And, as a GM, if a player showed up with the power, insist on seeing a list of substances and their Defs MAINTAINED BY THE PLAYER. Let the player do the work.

But vet the list and keep a copy, just to keep the player honest.

Re: Lack of Power coverage

No, I am advocating the same 15 points gets you 1d6 of effect mechanic that Transform (and RKA) uses.

In this case (Matter Duplication), one matches the roll against the Def of the substance. If the roll is greater (or maybe twice the #) then the user becomes the substance. Body doesn't change, but the character's PD and ED equal the matched DEF and are fully resistant (with allowances for some substances like matching cotton candy by mistake). The character's STR also equals the DEF x 5.

Duration is until the character absorbs some other material's characteristics. This is compensation for the fact this is a touch power, rather than ranged like Transform.

For duplicating Energy, I figure the Duplication matches the roll against the DC of the energy. The DC becomes the DEF, as before, the character can damage a target with a touch, and can essentially teleport, using the active points of the power as the points in Teleport. Limit, of course, is that he has to see where he is going.

Just rough ideas so far. I'll toss my Absorbing Man HeroClix at my players sometime soon and see if he does any better this way than he did using a VPP.

Re: Lack of Power coverage

I think this is the most solid defense for use of a Transform-based mechanic for a lot of unusual constructs. Most such characters tend to be seen as "absolutes"' date=' but encounter characters their powers fail against on occasion.[/quote']

 

Just as there are other powers that use the same mechanic, even though they are distinct powers in the Hero lexicon, I am a firm believer that there is a need for more powers, just for simplicity in description. Since I think I invented the idea of how Transform is used (an early Champions version of Firestorm that used RKA for the transformation, used in games with the original Heroes), I am all for using a variation of the mechanic on all kinds of other powers.

 

Right now I am working on the Absorbing Man's Matter and Energy Duplication abilities...

How about something a bit more down to earth?

This is Percival Prentiss, my character in a 1930 pulp game. The goggles are just glasses (which he actually only needs for reading).

I based the character on Hiram Holliday, a pulp era hero created by a very famous author in some of his first stories. Unfortunately, I have just had a senior moment and cannot remember his name. He wrote a lot of great stories over the years.

Percival, like Hiram, has been studying to be a hero for the last ten years. He's taken shooting lessons and boxing lessons and learned a bit about driving and piloting. Now he's found he is one of the Sons of K. D. Elder, a very diverse group who have inherited their fathers' estate and their father's penchant for investigating conspiracies...

Recent VOICE activity

Recently, the St. Louis Gatekeepers came under attack from VOICE as part of a recruiting drive, or so they thought. In fact, it was all a machination by the most recent American Eagle (the 4th of the name) who was feeling dissed by his more experienced teammates in the current Freedom Squad (Okay, current as of the last game of it I ran, sometime in the mid 80s). Black Phantom and Jo-Tan are both members of the Gatekeepers these days (BP as a sort of Elder counselor and Jo-Tan because the Japanese automotive company he works for sent him to their St. Louis plant after several years back in Japan). The new AE decided to impress them by "saving" the Gatekeepers after a bunch of wannabe VOICE types almost had them on the ropes.

Unfortunately, the pawns he picked actually had some smarts and enough contacts to actually contact VOICE, which brought them to the attention of Dr. Photon and Szybko.

Things did not end well for the villains (minus Dr. P and S, who had just checked in to see what was going on) and the ploy of AE was discovered.

Ramifications are still going on about that.

Nightwind's appearance

Nightwind appears in Millenium city.

Lung Hung in earlier times

Thanks for the prodding, I am now attaching my files for Lung Hung in 1901 and again in 1951. They are both zipped together. I had to do some manipulation. It turned out the last time I used the 1951 version I was still using Wordstar and I needed to reformat.

Keep in mind that the 1951 version appeared in a game I ran in 1991 and the 1901 version showed up in a game I ran about two years ago, so there are some definite changes in approach. And both are essentially 4th edition characters.

American Avenger

The attached was drawn for me by David Wong, an artist who hits a lot of the California conventions. It's for my character in Scott Bennie's Gestalt campaign, which may get published in pdf form by Hero some year.

Essentially, AA is a telekinetic brick who likes flashy cowboy clothes. His wings are an illusory construct that help him focus on flying - they have no material existence - which is why they are just an outline.