Metaphysician

Re: Alien Invasion Ah, here you go. http://besmvanguard.pbwiki.com/Game+Logs The first half dozen or so transcripts are the invasion arc.

Re: Alien Invasion I started my Vanguard game with an alien invasion. It was the impetus for the team to gather, ala "Secret Origins" for JL:TAS. In this case, the way the team became a 'turning point' was by virtue of them, for various reasons, not being taken down by the initial surprise attack. And thus, they assembled, formed the JLA, and proceeded to kick alien ass up to the mothership, etc. OTOH, that only works if your going for a JLA/Avengers level game. Other general tips. . . try and keep in mind reasons for the aliens to *not* engage in ruthless orbital bombardment. 'Arrogant pride' is a legitimate reason, note, if not overdone.

Re: A Thought Experiment: The Buffest Heroes vs Dr Destroyer Hmm, probably someone like Holocaust or Firewing. Powerful, too powerful to be beaten on simple slugfest, but ( just barely ) able to be beaten through clever tactics and versatile powers. Gravitar is the turnover point, IMO. While she does have weaknesses, I don't see any reasonable 350 point team exploiting them sufficiently before she smashes everyone with 50 Gs of gravitational force. Most of the other 800-1000 point energy controllers don't have her defense or area attacks.

Re: Istvatha V'han - why can't she conquer Earth? Heh, no, the Death Star is still bigger. . . somewhat. Going off Wikipedia, the first Death Star had a diamter between 120 and 160 km, while the second was somewhere between 160 and 900. Even the low end of those estimates would have the Death Star at least as big, if of a different shape.

Re: A Thought Experiment: The Buffest Heroes vs Dr Destroyer Nope.

Re: WWYCD Genocide - or Genocide? There's "moral quandaries", and there's "Your CvK Superhero is *wrong* if he isn't willing to kill thousands, mwahaha!" This scenario, what with the aliens being entirely intelligent, but also utterly unpersuadable, falls into the latter category.

Re: Causing a heart attack Another possibility: Continuous and Uncontrolled, with the cancelling condition "being given heart attack meds or similar treatment."

Re: Istvatha V'han - why can't she conquer Earth? I think the Executor would do fine; I generally prefer my planet busting weapons as missile, rather than guns. But yeah, given that Billion Worlds Tech allows for near tank level durability in the form of inobtrusive ( if top end ) cybernetic implants, the kind of things it can do via ship emplaced ( if top end ) tech should be proportionally horrifying. Think, um, Kang Dynasty. Sure, Station Damocles is just hanging up there, big and obvious; its just that all the heroes flying up to try and punch through its shields *won't work*.

Re: Istvatha V'han - why can't she conquer Earth? Well, even using the canon stats for V'Han herself, theoretically speaking your never going to encounter her without *also* encountering her Imperial Guard, armies, and probably the bigass star destroyer she's got her throne room in. Personal power matters less, thusly. Its just, the stats for her actual forces need revamping, as those basic infantry and vehicles are pathetic. Thats not a conceptual problem, thats a mechanical screwup. Going off the canon timeline, whatever her personal power level is, it has to be low enough that, theoretically speaking, a group of world-class superheroes could hold her hostage *if* they could get within range of her. Which, admittedly, required her to make a minor mistake in actually coming *to* Earth in the final stage of its conquest. . .

Re: A Thought Experiment: The Buffest Heroes vs Dr Destroyer He can't keep up the Force Wall and make attacks from any of his multipowers. At least, none of the damaging attacks.

Re: A Thought Experiment: The Buffest Heroes vs Dr Destroyer I haven't played it out yet, but I figure the Justice Squadron, especially, has a major shot. Admittedly, alot of the gameplan boils down to "Block shots and make opennings for Drifter", but meh. The Sentinels, comparatively lacking in firepower, have some more trouble.

Re: Istvatha V'han - why can't she conquer Earth? I wouldn't necessarily say "toehold" is the right term. My impression was, yeah, she didn't physically occupy the entire universe. She did, however, establish enough of a presence in the dimension that she effectively had hegemony. Once she has a sufficiently big beachhead, she can bring in enough forces easily enough that the Dimensional Empire is the biggest force by far in that universe, and so everyone has to do what she wants. Given that what she wants isn't usually especially stringent or demanding, for the most part everyone goes along with it. Especially since it includes protection against extradimensional invaders far more unpleasant than her. In practice, though, her control is *probably* limited to galaxy scale within the universes she rules, except for those with preestablished transgalactic societies.

Re: Calling all lawyers--Supers and unique legal issues Yeah, alibi depends on a logical reason why it couldn't be you who committed the crime. If you can teleport or duplicate, well, you could still have an alibi, but faking one would be virtually impossible. And even proving a *real* alibi would require things like exacting time measurements, or very detailed info on how your powers work. ( "Yes, I can teleport, but given my appearance here, here, and here, at these times, attempting to teleport to the scene of the crime within the timeframe required would involve exceeding my safe range, leaving me in no condition to perpetrate the alleged crime." )

Re: Calling all lawyers--Supers and unique legal issues Hey, I didn't say it'd necessarily turn out *successful*. Though this does remind me, if the character *does* basically teleport someone somewhere else, and can retrieve them, he could use it as one hell of a Get Out of Jail Free card. "You can put me in jail for life, or you can have back the people I 'kidnapped', which would you prefer?"

Re: Calling all lawyers--Supers and unique legal issues Well, I'm pretty sure trying to do *that* would guarantee the most unfavorable judge and jury response. OTOH, better a sentence for kidnapping than murder, and better still a successful plea bargain.

Re: CHAR: Winter Yeah, but he doesn't have an END reserve to feed it to. And I'm pretty sure an Absorb to Endurance as a characteristic doesn't work that way.

Re: CHAR: Winter Ran across this. . . Like the writeup, but there's one thing I'm not so sure about: what his Absorption feeds. From my reading of the comics, it always seemed as if the absorbed energy went into a supply, which he could use to do his various tricks, including boosted strength. I'm thinking he should have something like an END Reserve, fed by his Absorption. Either that, or it should feed Strength, with the limitation applied to his various *other* energy tricks that they bleed away his absorbed Strength.

Re: Calling all lawyers--Supers and unique legal issues Another off-the-wall defense tactic in a case like this would be for the defendant to claim his power *isn't* disintegration, but teleportation or dimensional travel or such. He's not killing people, he's just sending them on one-way trips somewhere else. This might be enough to create reasonable doubt of murder, and get a reduced charge ( kidnapping or similar ). Obviously only useful if your already dead-to-rights for having disappeared the guy.

Re: The Tiger Squad Sourcebook (Fan Project) Was just looking at the list of names, and quite a few of them are not even resident to China.

Re: Your characters, favorite by Archetype Well, of my supers characters. . . Microman II is primarily a Metamorph, with aspects of Brick and Energy Blaster. Diomedes is a Martial Artist. Jack Frost is an Energy Blaster. Hermes is a Speedster.

Re: The Tiger Squad Sourcebook (Fan Project) Um, by "Tiger Squad Sourcebook", you mean "China Sourcebook" basically?

Re: Prison facilities for super-human criminals in your Campaigns? Depending on the prisoner, maybe it shouldn't be a *small* nuclear charge. . .

Re: Prison facilities for super-human criminals in your Campaigns? Not in my campaign. OTOH, one problem with that idea: a lot of the people who are prime candidates for Hot Sleep, are also the type who would be exceedingly hard to execute. Even if your no longer thus restricted to humane means, you may have somebody you can't feasibly kill ( especially if you need to keep the execution secret ).

Re: Prison facilities for super-human criminals in your Campaigns? In my campaign, I currently use basically Stronghold, though I haven't fixed exactly where it is, or how its set up entirely yet ( its introduction was part of a minor offhand setting comment that exploded into a subplot unintentionally ). I have established a lack of Magic Power Nullifier Collars, though. Some powers can be jammed or disrupted, but there is no technique that will equally depower a cyborg brick, a mutant psychic, and a magically empowered energy blaster, say. For example, the applicable inmate, Meltdown, was kept in his cell via a thick DU lining ( to keep him from being exposed to ambient radiation ), and structural hardening ( to keep him from forcing his way out via whatever metastrength he retained ). Anybody thats too powerful or too difficult to otherwise contain gets Hot Sleep.

Re: Your version of the Champions Since CU Update, the new Champions have grown on me. I'd be halfway inclined to have a "Earth 1 / Earth 2" setup, where the Champions are the 4e and 5e rosters, more or less. With regular crossover and such.