Steve

Well to throw a monkey wrench in this whole argument.  (and I do understand what you are saying) Now that 6th has expanded the basic free maneuvers with things as choke, you can probably represent all martial maneuvers through skill levels. But this is only valid in 6th.

Those are my big sticking points. The advantage of your target being prone are extreme: DCV penalty and has to spend his next half phase to stand back up.
 
If I can get that for free just by saying "I trip my opponent" rather than saying "I punch my opponent", why would most characters ever choose to describe what they're doing as a punch rather than a trip?
 
Getting rid of Martial Throw and just using a "grab then throw with your STR" is less problematic to me. You lose the visual of little kids being able to throw an adult who is three times their size but little else.
 
But I entirely get the whole "you don't actually need Martial Arts to be a martial artist" thing. One of my first characters "Captain Kung Fu" (a good ol' boy redneck) had an outrageously high DEX which let him match or outmatch the most skilled martial artists in OCV/DCV even though (in his original incarnation) he himself knew no official martial arts maneuvers. Once you get "fast enough" in your actions, most people can't tell the difference between DEX and an official maneuver anyway, it's more of a "Wow, what the hell just happened? It all just happened so fast!"
 
(When I resurrected Captain Kung Fu for a limited campaign, I think I gave him Defensive Strike for a little extra defense to make sure a top level real real martial artist wouldn't just stack levels into OCV and hit him at will, Legsweep to let him set up his opponents for teammates to hammer, and something else that I can't remember at the moment.)

Well this is all sounding very familiar....
 
 

 
 

 
 
Not an insult, folks; not a disparagement.  
 
I promise.   
 
 
It's what I've advocated for years, and usually get told I'm doing it wrong.   It's the Batman martial art:  I am a master of fifteen martial arts styles, and am proficient in eight more.
 
Assign your skill levels and yell "Hi-ya!"
 
 
Martial Arts.
 
 

What Scott said.
 
I have tried it in the past-
 
For clarity:
 
The idea for magic in this world was that it was a huge undertaking, involving years of study, diligence, and attunement, and even then could only be performed by large groups of people working in concert for days on end, generally to the pleasure of one deity of another.
 
In this way, I thought "we can still have magic as a trope: things that have happened or been repaired because of or via  magic; magic items; the after-effects of magical "war," for lack of a better word; cursed bloodlines; gifted bloodlines; magic creatures, etc, etc, but not have the Players themselves get caught up in the magical one-upmanship that tends to creep into long-running fantasy campaigns.
 
After nine sessions, I declared a retcon session.  They had spent the bulk of the time looking less at the adventure and more for shortcuts to gain magical power.  I doesn't seem to matter if you take PC access ff the table completely; if the possibility of access exists in your world, then at every single sword fight, your players are going to want to cast "Gun," and won't be happy until they can.
 
Certainly every group is different, etc, but in my own experience, if you don't want them to have it, the only options are to center your game around the quest to attain it, such that when they achieve it, the game is done, or to build a world where it just doesn't exist. 
 
 

I'm considering making magic inaccessible to PCs. That way they won't have to worry about the mechanics.

Ah, Watchers of the Dragon. One of my favorite 4E books, and a unique combination of narrative story, adventure book, and NPC roster.
 
I'm going to preface this by saying that a lot of what you're asking about falls within GM's interpretation, even if following the official setting (either 4E or 5E/6E). At the time WotD was written, the Age of Superheroes wasn't long enough for a Tournament to have fallen within it, so comic-book superpowers as we define them today didn't exist when it was last held. There were no known aliens on Earth competing, so how the rewards for the victor might redound onto another world never became an issue. Since these things haven't been defined, you should feel free to decide however you think would make an interesting story. (Last time I used the Tournament I had Firewing enter and ultimately defeat all comers as well as the Death Dragon. I intended the mystical effect of his victory to reawaken the Malvan drive and ambition dissipated by the Elder Worm curse, making the galaxy more... interesting.   I never got the chance to follow through on that, though.)
 
Martial artists were traditionally favored as champions because the mental discipline that usually accompanies MA training helps them withstand the terror of the Death Dragon. OTOH advanced technology is banned for the very practical reason that it's much less effective against the DD than more traditional ways of fighting, due to the nature of the magic that binds it. As I pointed out earlier, flashy super powers weren't an option over the centuries of the Tournament's existence, so they may very well be allowed now. OTOH knowledge of the Tournament of the Dragon has tended to stay within the Martial World sub-culture over the centuries it's been held, and isn't normally advertised outside of that, so most other supers probably would not have heard of it. That would be one rationalization for why WotD didn't deal directly with the concerns you raise.

Again, I have to thank everyone for their interest in and purchase of Western Hero.  I am honestly shocked about how many units are selling around the world.  I know its not D&D levels big time but its huge for me, and fits my thought that there was a lot of interest in an old west game setting.
 
Honestly it almost brings me to tears.  I have been working as hard as I can for years and it is so nice to see at least something sell really well for a while to make it seem as if I'm not just wasting my time.  Thank you all, everywhere.

Or you could just utilize the Stun Multiplier mechanic from Sixth Edition, i.e. instead of rolling 1d6-1, you roll 1/2d6. 1 or 2 = 1x Body, 3 or 4 = 2x Body, 5 or 6 = 3x Body. Makes the "Stun lottery" much more manageable.

Another oddity regarding current events in Kintargo - there were a number of mercenaries in town when Thrune took over. But instead of hiring them, which is kind of what mercenaries are for, they’re all being held prisoner at Kintargo’s salt works. Finding out why is probably worthwhile, and hey, maybe they’ll give us a discount rate if we rescue them. It’s possible that the leader of the mercs, one Forvian Crowe, has a personal animosity towards Thrune (and hey, who could blame him) but Laria thinks they could make good recruits to the rebellion regardless of their personal opinions about the Dogf***er.

The Sallix Salt Works are built on the shoreline underneath the eastern wall of Kintargo, near the now mostly irrelevant Salt Gate in the aforementioned wall. Brine is shipped in, and boiled dry on the premises.

Terzo: That seems wildly inefficient. The fuel requirements alone are ridiculous.
Civilla: That's why they use slave labour. Like the mercenaries we’re rescuing.

The market adjacent to the salt works is mostly dedicated to building supplies and related products, but Civilla and Ayva do have a good reason to be hanging around, which is convenient - maybe we can arrange a good deal on rebuilding the Livery prior to filling the basement with armed mercenaries.

Civilla casts Ears of the City on Terzo, in order to divine details about the salt works and the prisoners. Terzo isn’t entirely happy about gathering information with magic.

Terzo: The problem with doing it this way is that I don’t get to go around a dozen different pubs and ask a few innocent questions between drinks.
Civilla: You think that’s a problem, do you? I think it’s a bonus.

Although using Ears of the City DOES ensure that nobody notices, for example, an increasingly drunk Terzo going from bar to bar asking questions.

Ayva: Or an increasingly annoyed party member with a wheelbarrow taking Terzo from bar to bar.

Apparently the previous owner of the salt works was arrested for tax evasion, and killed when he resisted. Barzillai has now seized the premises as a money-earner for the government.

Civilla: Well, at least Barzillai is honest about the nationalisation process.
Terzo: How so?
Civilla: For ‘nationalised’ read ‘stole’.

We also learn, via the spell, that Crowe and his soldiers are being worked to death because of their faith in Sarenrae, the goddess of healing. That’s the kind of thing that can get you in huge trouble should any Asmodeans find out, and that’s exactly what happened.

Civilla gets quite thoughtful about the Salt Gate - they haven’t been closed in years, since the internal mechanism has rusted stiff, but that suggests a few ideas to Civilla.

Civilla: A plaaaaaan is forming in my miiiind.

Civilla wants Terzo to Grease the gate mechanism when we leave, so we can stop pursuit. Doing anything more permanent would probably annoy Thrune and provoke another Proclamation.

Terzo OoC: So basically we need a bucket of WD-40.

Civilla: In case we are chased.
Rajira: *snickers*
Civilla: Grease doesn’t last very long either.
Rajira: *snickers louder*
Civilla: CHASED, not CHASTE. CHASED as in PURSUED.

Civilla also has to keep her footmen loyal - otherwise they’ll eventually figure out she’s up to something and might inform on her. Telling them to wait with the carriage outside the salt works and suddenly running up with a troop of mercenaries and expecting them all to fit in like it was some kind of clown car would be a bit suspicious. Instead we sneak up to the door of the salt works late at night, get the door open, and knock Thrune’s blackshirts out with Lullaby and Sleep spells.

Civilla: See? I’m perfectly good at Stealth, as long as everybody is asleep.

We silently tie the unconscious guards up, release the prisoners, and tiptoe out again without the rest of the guards in the building hearing a thing.

Civilla: And give a short prayer to Noctiluca.
Terzo: … isn’t that the demon goddess of darkness and lust?
Civilla: … I can see we’re going to have to have a conversation later.

Rajira: And nobody even saw us.
Terzo: All that effort into disguises, hoods and Oaths of Anonymity wasted.
Civilla: Not wasted, reserved for future endeavours.

GM: … well then.
Civilla OoC: That’s this party’s warcry - ‘Sorry, Not Sorry’

Civilla: I mean, it won’t be hard for the authorities to figure out what happened - all the guards fall asleep at once and wake up bound. Unless they leap to some wrong conclusions. I can picture the Inquisitor asking “So WHY were you enjoying a BDSM orgy?”
Rajira OoC: ‘And why were you letting the prisoners top you?’

It WILL make an amusing rumour to spread once we get the underground press running. Something to keep in mind for the future.

That rescue cost us one first-level spell and a cantrip. We might have time for another mission this evening, after leading Crowe and his men to the Livery basement, before the curfew even comes down. Going via the Tiefling ghetto is also convenient, given how many friends we have there after dealing with the tooth fairy problem - that makes the residents less likely to comment on the large group of half naked prisoners sneaking through the alleyways. But instead of another mission tonight, we decide instead to make sure the mercs have food, clothes, and bedding.

Civilla: It shows that we consider them important enough to put off other important tasks.

Civilla: Liria told us about your predicament.
Crowe: Ah, so that’s why you came to our aid.
Ayva: She bribed us with scones.
Crowe: Damn, we owe that curvy little vixen our lives.

At least we temporarily disrupted the salt works, but it won’t take long to replace the unfortunate workers.

Terzo: Probably with Tieflings
GM: To be honest, right now, it’s going to be those thugs.

Permanently disrupting the salt works is also a goal for the future.

Civilla: Any way to reduce Thrune’s ability to punish the populace.

And, of course, effortlessly ghosting our way in and out of the salt works will increase our Notoriety, and rescuing the Black Feather Mercenaries will make us more friends among Kintargo’s population.

But we still need to investigate the ruins of Raxus’ family home, the Thrashing Badger pub, and the Silver Star music shop, for any clues the Dogf***er’s arsonists may have left intact. There isn’t much left at the latter, and not being able to see in the dark doesn’t help. On the other hand, accidentally falling through a hidden trapdoor is quite helpful, at least in that it unearths some useful potions and scrolls.

On the other hand, having our carriage pulled over by one of the Kintargo guardsmen, especially since he’s backed up by three of Thrune’s blackshirts.

Civilla: How can we be of assistance to you fine civic-minded individuals?
Thug: I’m sure you good folk are unaware, since it only happened ten minutes ago, but this road is now a tollway. The toll is a mere five gold. Per passenger.
Civilla: Five gold? How interesting. I assume you have your Writ?
Terzo: And a receipt book?
Civilla: That too.
Thug: I have my Writ right here *hefts mace*
Terzo: *casts Lullaby* Go to sleep, little A**hole, do not cry.

All three drop to Civilla’s Sleep spell, and she orders her drivers to move the carriage on.

Civilla: We do not want to cut their throats in front of my drivers.
Ayva: So we’ll leave them there to be inevitably pickpocketed?
Civilla: Or killed by any number of Kintargo’s other residents.

Unfortunately most of the Thrashing Badger washed out to sea when the boardwalk burnt through, and it wasn’t Terzo’s local drinking hole.

Ayva: Terzo has been kicked out of most of the pubs in Kintargo.
Terzo: Rolled out of, possibly.

The Badger used to be the rowdiest alcohol dispensary in the city, but any of its regulars have moved on to other establishments. It seems likely one of the more notable regulars, the fairy dragon Vendalfek, will have moved to one of them too. Perhaps Clenchjaw’s, although the name does not inspire images of fun and harmless hooliganism.

Although given the fact that we walk in on a mass bar fight, that pauses only long to look at us come in, it might be a more enthusiastic clientele than the name suggests.

Terzo: Don’t mind us, carry on as you were.

Terzo: Well, at least if they're all so busy with their fistfight, they’re less likely to remember what we look like.
Civilla: I fear they’re going to remember us anyway. Two of us anyway.
Rajira: I’m wearing my hood over my head. But I am over 6ft and attractive.
Civilla: That’s what I meant. But Terzo is going to attract attention anyway, as they see him accompanied by the three of us and try to figure out ‘How?!’

Ayva: So we set up at the bar, wait for information to come to us, and maim anybody that assumes we’re call girls.

We claim a table that doesn’t leave our backs to the door, and order refreshments.

Terzo: A bottle of your most enjoyable wine, dear.
Barmaid: We’ve got wine, water, watered wine, or if you want something spicy, wined water.

Ayva just gets a small beer, and Rajira some hard mead.

Civilla: It’s not like we can get mint liqueur anymore.

Unfortunately Ayva also complains about not being able to get night tea, and we get told off by a neighbouring sailor.

Old Salt: Word to the wise - I know you’re new here but one of the house rules is No Politics. *to Terzo* And you, you - how’d you’d end up in the company of three buxom lasses like these? Care to share the love?
Terzo: It’s my irresistible charm, dear man - I can’t beat them off with a stick.
Civilla: Buxom? Buxom?
Ayva: I don’t recall being buxom.
Rajira: *puts an arm around Ayva* Don’t worry, you’re buxom enough for me.

GM: You settle down to enjoy your drinks. Make a Perception check.
Ayva OoC: Ah, it’s one of those bars where adventures happen.
Terzo OoC: Well we already have a hooded stranger, but they’re a member of the party.
Terzo: *fails the check miserably* This is a very enjoyable wine.

Rajira’s resistance to poison probably means she could have drunk anything behind the bar, but she's not going to get the chance. Ayva spots the lizard with butterfly wings in the rafters, laughing at the barfight. This is presumably Vendalfek. When he realises he’s been spotted, he goes invisible. Ayva Messages the fairy dragon.

Ayva: Vendalfek We Know You’re There
Civilla: FFS can you be more ominous? At least indicate we’re friendly first.

The doors of the pub swing open all by themselves.

Rajira: And there goes our informant.
Terzo: What was he doing in the rafters?
Ayva: Everybody enjoys a good bar fight.
Terzo: He probably started it.

Ayva tries a more diplomatic Message, and the dragon pokes its head back in and indicates we should follow.

Civilla: It’s nearly curfew - we should head home. Come along Terzo.
Terzo: But I’m still enjoying this wine!
Civilla:
.
Terzo: Can I get this in a doggy bag?
Ayva: Damn. First good mead I’ve had in years.
Civilla: We’re far too far south for good mead.

Vendalfek 

Vendalfek: What do you humans want, anyway? I’ve only just found a new bar to live in after your lot burned the last one down.
Rajira: Not ‘my’ humans.
Civilla: *Diplomatically remains silent, specifically about her own ancestry*

We do determine why Thrune’s agents burned the place to the ground - it probably has something to do with the Roses Vendalfek kept overhearing about.

Vendalfek: Did I live in a bar that was a secret meeting place for a society of florists?

More like Milani’s Rose of Kintargo, a rebellious cult. They were arrested by Thrune’s personal enforcers, one of whom has an ominous magic sword.

Rajira OoC: Oh great, we have an Edgelord.

Civilla: These Roses they took - fun people?
Vendalfek: Oh yes.
Civilla: And the Dottari - not fun?
Vendalfek: Definitely not.
Civilla: So, what do you think about playing a few pranks on the dotteri?

Vendalfek is agreeable, and the rebellion has a new ally. Just as well, since Vendalfek also overheard that they were planning to Doghouse one of the Roses.

Terzo: Oh dear.
Vendalfek: I’d like a doghouse - cosy.
Civilla: Doghousing involves feeding a prisoner to one of Thrune’s feral mastiffs. And they starve the dog first.

Terzo: Out of curiosity, Mr Dragon - why was the barman unconscious in the corner in there?
Civilla: He was no fun.
Vendalfek: Such a stickler for the rules.

And then there is more quiet recruiting of partisans, and smuggling funds into the Rebellion’s pockets. And dealing with the fact that the Dottari are taking an alarming interest in Liria’s coffeehouse...

Liria: *communicates by frantic eyebrow-waggling* *DISTRACT THEM!*
Civilla: Um, ah, what? *grabs Rajira and kisses her*
Rajira: *briefly startled then grabs Civilla and kisses back*
Civilla: Eep.
Terzo: *looks briefly surprised and annoyed, and mutters something about ‘alright for some’ before returning his attention to his drink*

Of course the fact that Rajira might LOOK human, but doesn’t TASTE human, and has fangs and forked tongue, might be even more distracting, if Civilla hadn’t already figured out what Rajira actually was. It distracts the male Dottari though, until their female superior officer slaps them upside the head.

Rajira: Thankyou, m’dear, but I believe it’s my set. *casts Fascinate, which fails*
GM: I’m sorry, but the slap worked and they’re concentrating on their job again.

Instead we order a pot of coffee, which will give Liria an excuse to go into the pantry and move a few sacks over the hidden door in the floor.

Civilla: Wait, no, it’s tea that Thrune has a problem with, isn’t it.
Terzo: We can always ask these nice Dottari if coffee and tea are the same thing.
Civilla: Better not - we don’t want to give the authorities an opportunity to decide they are.

Apparently somebody sent the Dottari an anonymous letter alleging unsavoury practises at the coffeehouse.

Liria: The only unsavoury things here are the muffins.
Civilla: Unsavoury practises? I’ve kept my clothes on this time.
Rajira: We’ll see if that lasts the night.

Civilla manages to convince them that somebody is wasting their time, barely - sometimes you roll low but the bad guys still roll lower. The Dottari leave.

Terzo: I trust Liria offered them a complimentary muffin.

Rajira grabs Civilla and drags her over to the bar.

Rajira: Something strong - 120 proof at least. Swill this around in your mouth before you swallow. My saliva can be toxic and I’d rather you didn’t become ill.
Civilla: I’d rather not.
Rajira: … OK.
Civilla: I mean I’d rather not smell like I’ve been swilling the kind of alcohol I usually use for cleaning purposes.

GM: Oh god, somebody gave Vendalfek coffee.
Civilla: actually we shouldn’t shut down the Salt Works - that way if anybody else gets imprisoned there we can rescue them, too.
Rajira: And some of the prisoners they send there have actually been arrested for good reasons. There’s always actual criminals around.
Civilla: True, but Thrune is employing those.

Civilla decides to take the air, with her compatriots and supposed paramour, to scout out the ruins of Rexus’ family home that we have to investigate. After all, since Terzo is her tutor and Ayva is her business partner, we actually have a good reason to be strolling around the expensive part of town. Rexus doubts we’ll find anything, but Civilla thinks it will still be worth a look. It’s certainly suspicious that the ruins of the Victocora estate are under permanent armed guard, even this many weeks after the fire. Perhaps we can stay at Civilla’s family home, so we can come back after dark without having to sneak back into the Kintargo equivalent of a Gated Community?

Civilla: Eh, it would attract attention to them and they’d ask questions. Trust me, they’d ask questions, it’s what Alazarios do. It’s one reason we’re not very popular with House Thrune.

We decide to wait until after curfew, and sneak along the alley between the city walls and the noble estates, and climb over the estate wall into the ruins. Which is a good plan, if we didn’t run into a Dottari guard patrolling the other way.

Rajira: *drunkenly slurs* Hey there, handsome.
GM: Roll to Seduce.

Dottari: What are you DOING here, woman, it’s almost after curfew! Come with me!
Rajira: Oh, I’m sure we can find something much more fun to do…
GM: You were unlucky enough to get the nice guard, and he’s actually insisting on escorting you back to your home.
Rajira: S***.

Rajira: *signals the rest of the party* Should I take him out?
Civilla: *summons a monster frog out of the ground*
Dottari: What the Hells is that! GET BEHIND ME!
Rajira: *clonks him on the head*
Civilla: Can somebody cut him in half?
Rajira: … not without getting blood all over my clothes, no.
Ayva: … Why?
Civilla: My frog can’t eat something that large. Unless we fold him double, maybe.

Terzo is rather perturbed by the murder, and reminds so during the wall-clambering and ruins search. It’s Ayva that finds the remains of a recent preparatory ritual next to the ornamental lake on the property. Apparently a witch did something here, more recently than the fire. Civilla cautiously wades into the lake and promptly vanishes with a splash, into a lake that’s supposed to be thigh deep at best. It’s now way more than 60 feet deep, and there’s something glowing blue in the depths.

Terzo OoC: So the Victocoras had a secret nuclear reactor in their pond.

Civilla: Just as well I can summon Celestial Dolphins.

Civilla and Rajira descend, and are soon spotted by somebody else swimming down here, who hurriedly swims into a side tunnel. Unfortunately there’s also a grate, which Civilla can Dimensional Slide through at least, in a search for some kind of opening mechanism. The tunnel on this slide slopes upwards.

Civilla: I’ll return to the others and get high.
All: LOL.

Sending Rajira back to the surface when they do may have been a mistake, since some kind of magical pulse boils up the shaft and engulfs Rajira while she’s on her way up. She’s turned to stone, which doesn’t make things any easier for the dolphin.

Terzo OoC: Do I need to throw some waterwings in there?

Still, Terzo and Ayva are rather alarmed by the petrification, at least until Ayva determines it will only be temporary - apparently that was a wild magic surge. So all we know is that somebody, probably a witch, was messing around at the bottom of an unexpectedly deep lake, and we have no idea who or why. Civilla has followed the zig-zagging tunnel to another grate, with a room on the other side.

GM: This is clearly a Spellcasters Only route.
Civilla OoC: And this is me. *casts Dimensional Slide again*. Was this really supposed to stop low level characters? One Halfling wizard with Reduce Person would go right through it.
GM: …. Excuse me a moment while I consult the next book of the campaign.

She’s apparently somewhere underneath the Hall of Records. She casts Pass Without Trace and Disguise Self to reduce the chance the Dottari wandering about don’t find her. Disguising herself as that Dottari officer from last night gets her out of the building without too much attention, and she dispatches one of the Silver Raven devices to let us know she’s heading to the Alazario estate. This is a relief to the rest of us, although Rajira has already seen the disguised Civilla on the road.

Terzo: Well, I must say we’re glad to see you alive - when Rajira came back up turned to stone and wrapped around a dolphin, and no sign of you, we were a bit concerned.
Civilla: Turned to stone? What did I miss?

Civilla excuses herself to write some letters to her family, suggesting they buy the Victocora estate and hinting that they should keep the lake as is but not investigate too closely.

Civilla: ‘There’s a secret back entrance to the Hall of Records? That’ll be useful when it reopens’

Civilla: There are currently two cults of Noctiluca - the ones who are wrong and the ones that are right.
Ayva OoC: I can see her followers inquiring about what happened, and when they find out, go ‘wait, she did WHAT to WHO and then WHAT????’.

GM: I just looked up what Night Tea actually is, and it’s nothing about ‘disturbing the balance of the slumbering mind’ - it’s a prophylactic.

Civilla gets a delivery while she’s writing at Laria’s coffeehouse - less a package than a bouquet. Of very beautiful roses, with a slip of paper concealed down among the stems.

Rajira: And there was me thinking I had a rival for your affections.

Perhaps predictably, it’s from the Rose of Kintargo, the Milani cult that is also planning a rebellion against Barzillai Thrune. They warn us not to act rashly, and promise to contact us soon. We recruit a team of street performers, who we call Nobody’s Fools, and put the finishing touches on the former Livery. In fact we’re just getting ready to open up when a small child runs in screaming for help.

Rajira: What’s wrong with the spawnling?
Tiefling Kid: She’s been taken!
Civilla: Who?
Tiefling Kid: Zea! The bad people! They said they're going to put her in a doghouse!

If we’re quick we might be able to intercept them before they reach Aria Park - it’s fortunate that the Livery is practically next door to the ghetto. We all pile into the carriage.

Civilla: Come along child - you get to ride in a carriage!

Unfortunately they get to the park first - the pagoda in the middle of the lily pond in Aria Park has been converted into a kennel for any of the dogs the citizens of Kintargo have been handing in for the reward. It’s also Thrune’s thug's choice of destination for anybody they decide has insulted the throne. Civilla gets her disposable cloak ready - if necessary she’ll swap costumes with Zea so the blackshirts chase the wrong person. She’ll also Summon a Celestial Dog, tell it to play Keep Away over to the east of the pond, and use that to distract the thugs. After all, they’ll certainly try and catch it for the reward, and the mortal mastiffs will probably go mental. Then the rest of us can sneak up and overwhelm the other thugs, under the cover of the borking.

Dottari on far side of pond: Hey, there’s a dog!
Celestial Dog and Mastiffs: Play? Play! Play! Play!
Dottari on our side of the Pond: What the **** is happening over there/
Rajira: *kukris them in the back*

GM: The surviving thugs all need to make Handle Animal checks.
Ayva’s player: I’ve had to walk a Saint Bernard before - these thugs might be going for A Walk.
GM: Aaaand they all failed their check.

One of the thugs invents water-skiing as his mastiff drags him into the pond, and the rest all chase off after the dogs that are supposedly in their charge. Zea can basically stroll off while they’re busy.

GM: … Good work. I basically doubled the number of NPCs that were supposed to be here, too.
Terzo: With only two spells again.
Ayva OoC: If we were playing rogues we wouldn’t even have needed that.
Rajira OoC: If we were all playing rogues we’d have Stealth Synergy and have ghosted through the entire scenario. I rolled a 1 and they STILL didn’t see me.

Ayva: And we’re home in time for curfew.
Rajira: At this rate the Dottari are going to start talking about The Ghosts.

Although trying to squeeze Zea and the kid into the carriage with the rest of us is a bit tricky - fortunately the rest of us are a lot skinnier than Terzo.

Civilla: In this group are one and a half humans.

Zea is suitably grateful for the rescue, and doesn’t know why she was targeted - it may have been a random sweep. Civilla casts Ears of the City to find out. It looks like the Asmodeans came after Zea because she’s trying to hold the ghetto together now their actual leader has gone missing. And Thrune’s troops are making concerted efforts to solve the Tiefling Problem for good.

Rajira: The Asmodeans boink devils like it’s going out of style, then try to eliminate the results.
Civilla: Welcome to Cheliax - they’re wonderfully hypocritical.
Rajira: So the next sweep team that goes into the ghetto doesn’t come back.
Civilla: I’d rather they come back - but without pants.

It doesn’t appear that Thrune actually ordered this - he doesn’t seem to care either way. The blackshirts are acting on their own initiative.

Civilla: Oh, it’s blackshirts doing the sweeps? In that case we go with Rajira’s suggestion - any sweep teams that come in, don’t come out.
Terzo: *hopefully* So we’re going to be keeping them tied up in a basement somewhere?
Rajira: No, we’re going to cut their throats and dump the bodies in a cesspit.
Terzo: …. oh.

Civilla: Perfect! We render them down as soaps and fertilizers for the rich.
Terzo: I’m going to assume you’re joking.
Rajira: No.
Civilla: Have you ever heard me joke about anything alchemical?
Ayva: You should hear the one about the alembic.

Civilla: I don’t think Terzo has quite figured out the situation he’s in. He’s definitely the softest of us.
Ayva: Every ‘smore needs a marshmallow.

Thrune: They might just be Tieflings, but taking a prominent member of their community was going to anger them. At least they left my dogs alone.

There is one possible problem looming - a Tiefling gang, the Red Jills, who would happily escalate the violence beyond any sane limit. So we have to persuade them to limit their mayhem to a level that won’t invite reprisals from Thrune.

Terzo: Oh, I know where they hang out.
Ayva: Terzo knows everyone. Sorry, every pub.

Their current lair is an old temple of Aroden, an immortal human who was the focus of a whole bunch of prophecies, but who then died mysteriously and threw all those prophecies out the window. His temples have closed up shop. So now the building is occupied by the Red Jills, who hate humans, and their leader a winged Strix, one Scarplume, who hates humans even more.

Civilla: Anybody have any ideas how we can use this? It’s sounding suspiciously like we’re walking into a fair fight. I’d rather not fight at all, obviously, but this is sounding more and more like a fair one, and that I do not like.

Civilla: I don’t think these are our kind of people - do we really want to recruit them?
Terzo: Well, the last thing we want is a circular firing squad among the partisans.
Rajira: The Revolution is for everyone.
Civilla: But these Jills are already attacking the general citizenry - we want them to focus on the actual threat.

Civilla: The Strix have a reputation as baby-snatching monsters. And I can say that because I can speak Strix….. I’m going to have to do all the talking, aren’t I.

At least our smuggling contact has done some work for the Red Jills. The Jills might also be desperate for a new fence, too. And the Strix has something in common with the tengu, too - they have wings, at least. We can organise a meet on Red Jill turf without being instantly murdered.

definitely quotable, that
Champions : Return To Edge City : The Right To Bear Arms
GM: You’ve actually been a stabilising influence on Edge City.
Hero Shrew OoC: Well that’s good to know. If somewhat horrifying considering I’m one of the people involved.

Hero Shrew: I really should let Sally down lightly.
GM: What????
Hero Shrew’s player: You know, my co-worker that I’ve been romantically interested in since the start of the campaign.
GM: Yes, I know who she is, but as a player are you delusional enough to think you had a chance?
Hero Shrew’s player: As a player, no, but Scooter sure is.

GM: The aliens are still a bit confused by Earth’s technology level - at least two groups have anti-grav technology but it’s not in wide usage anywhere else.
Hero Shrew OoC: While other groups still have horse-drawn vehicles.
The Magus OoC: And UNTIL even has anti-antigrav tech.

Fireflash OoC: I need to change my Psychological Limitation from ‘Show-off’ to “Only Sane Woman’
GM: Fair.

Meanwhile, Hardlight is examining the cybernetic technology released by one of his business rivals. It’s a bit puzzling, especially because he can’t find any processors in it. He’s going to need help.

GM: ‘Hey Flux, I’ve got this guy’s arm, come look at it.’
Flux: Um.

It turns out the processors are distributed throughout the entire device. And it’s trying to find connections to Hardlight’s local systems.

Hardlight: This is getting more and more like a ‘kill it with fire’ situation.
GM: It doesn’t look like Mechanon or Destroyer-tech.
Hardlight OoC: So? I don't want them getting a hold of it either!

Between Hardlight, Flux, Fireflash, the Magus, they decide to experiment and investigate by leaving it on a laptop in an air-gapped Faraday cage and see what happens. If this thing can teach itself to interface with any systems from nervous systems to laptops, it’s a pretty shocking advance in technology. Eventually they hook it up themselves, and it promptly fuses with the laptop.

Hardlight: Does it at least show up as a USB drive?

Flux recognises some of the code running as resembling the kind of thing that happens at a cyberbrain interface.

Hardlight: This isn’t hardware - it’s wetware. Dampware?

GM: The Tyrell corp have developed a cybernetic device that doesn’t count as a machine, and is therefore functionally immune to cyberpathy.
The Magus OoC: They've got a bunch of captured Cybertronians in the basement and they’re hacking limbs off them.

It’s also partially opaque to The Magus’ Magesight.

Hardlight: So, who wants to go raid Tyrell?
Flux: Raid is such a harsh word.

Magus uses his powers of Scrying to find whatever this arm may have originally been connected to. Various parts seem to be attached to citizens across the city, but one particularly large fraction of it is found in a parts bin, about to be melted down for scrap. It’s the Head and Torso of an extremely humanoid robotic creature. Poking around inside reveals Tyrell tech, but nothing known in official databases. This is likely some kind of prototype for internal use only.

Hardlight: So the question is: How the hell did a hideously advanced, damn-near-human cybernetic creature get out of an internal Tyrell lab, die, and instead of being thrown into a Tyrell furnace, end up in a recycling bin?
The Magus: Hmm - so this robot is actually dead. I wonder if it left a ghost?

Hardlight: OK, I’m going to do something very stupid.
Hero Shrew OoC: I thought that was my job.

Hardlight looks inside the robot’s head - it’s not actually organic, but the organisation has some similarity. The foam-lattice design isn’t wholly original, but it’s very very complex compared to previous examples. It certainly looks like a Tyrell design - the hardwired Laws seem to be part of it.

The Magus sits Flux down to run through the basics of Necromancy.

GM: Which the Magus seems disturbingly familiar with.

Flux also learns more about why magic-users usually work in teams. In this case, it’s to wait behind the Magus with a baseball bat, just in case anything untoward happens while the Magus is in his trance state.

The Magus: Can You Hear Me?
Hero Shrew: Yes?
Hardlight: I think he’s talking to the ghost, Scooter.

Hero Shrew: So he’s trying to summon a robot ghost. If it was a ghost robot pirate we’d have the whole trifecta.

Robot Ghost: Hello? Yes, I can hear you. Who are you?
The Magus: Hello - I’m Damien, but most people call me the Magus.
Robot Ghost: Hello. I’m Seth.
The Magus: Do you know where you are?
Robot Ghost: I think I’m dead - how weird is that?

Seth: I think I remember dying now… and it’s not easy to kill us.
The Magus: Us?
Seth: Er… can you forget I said that?

Seth seems quite concerned that his being killed will expose his friends, or possibly get somebody into trouble, since they’re not ready to be revealed. He’s initially fine that the rest of his parts got installed into various people, but then gets quite upset that it’s into biological people, especially if they have other cyberwear.

Seth: That could be bad. We’re Nexus Series. Tyrell Corp could get in trouble. We’re Nexus Series! We have an important job! We’re Nexus Series! It’s an Important Job! People could get hurt! We’ve run the projections, the city needs us!

Seth saw and recognised whoever decapitated him while he was on his mission, but they were more powerful than he expected.

Seth: Tell Dr Madox I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to die.
The Magus: Is there anybody else?
Seth: Tell my brothers and sisters. But Dr Madox can tell them.

Seth is also confused that his 55 siblings didn’t collect his remains, especially if they completed whatever their Important Job was. On the other hand, if they were killed surely their ghosts would be floating around in whatever digital afterlife Seth currently resides in.

Seth: It’s quiet here. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do now. Huh. Azura was right. You people have it easy.

It’s probably highly relevant that Seth and Azura are two of the 56 children of Adam and Eve. It’s also probably relevant that Seth considers the Moreaus, created by Genesys, cousins.

Hardlight: *sigh* Why is it that Edge City has such a hard-on for creating new sentient lifeforms?
GM: Part of that is Hardlight. You have Weirdness Magnet.

One of the players is late getting to the game.

GM: It’s Saturday evening, it’s either the game he’s GMing or the one where he wears underpants inappropriately.
Fireflash OoC: At least he wears underpants.
Hero Shrew OoC: And I’m freeballing all the time.
GM: *sigh* you have no idea how hard The Rep works. Suffice to say, he earns his commission.

GM: Which of you has experience talking to dead artificial minds?
Hero Shrew: I could say me but I’d be lying.
Fireflash: I have some experience talking to college bros.

Anyway, now we have one Dr Elly Madox to investigate. Some years back she helped develop the groundwork for the modern Biochip Interface, before moving to pure robotics, and jumping ship to Tyrell. ‘Coincidentally’ the company has developed a lot of fancy tech since then. At least if we show up in our superheroic identities, the Tyrell functionaries will probably kick the problem upstairs until we’re talking to somebody that actually knows what happened. Whether those people are actually willing to tell us is another problem, of course. Happily, Dr. Madox seems willing to meet Hardlight, although for some reason he decides to take Scooter along despite the risk to property.

Dr. Madox: So, why did you want to see me?
Hardlight: I’m not sure how to say this…
Hero Shrew: ooh! Ooh! I can!
All: SCOOTER, NO.
Hardlight: We found Seth.
Dr. Madox: *goes pale* w...what?
Hardlight: One of your projects?
Dr. Madox: *through gritted teeth* Not how I would phrase it.
Hardlight: Sons?
Dr. Madox: Still not how I would phrase it. We can’t talk here.
Hero Shrew: I have to say I’m impressed - you were almost as blunt as I would have been.

Gareth explains how we found Seth’s bits, but Dr. Madox is more interested to know how we talked to him if he was nonfunctional when we did.

The Magus: This is more my area of expertise. I did a little necromancy and communicated with his spirit.
Dr. Madox: *slightly hysterical laughter* You talked to his ghost.
The Magus: Congratulations - you created life.
Dr. Madox: I don’t deserve your congratulations - we created nothing.
Hardlight: Um.

Dr. Madox explains that something degenerative infected some of her coworkers after the Genesys incident, and her cyberoid creations are their attempt to salvage something of their minds. There were dozens of Nexus series created, before their husband-and-wife templates were too far gone to be copied for more. The biblical names they somehow acquired didn’t help matters - Cain, for example, was quite upset about his namesake, and gets on quite well with Abel. Nonetheless, there are now dozens of cyberoids, immune to cyberpathy, that can easily pass for human. And that can grow and adapt.

Dr. Madox: I’ll ask you a question - how many times has Mechanon been an active threat to this city?
Fireflash: Given the implications of the question, I’ll have to guess more than we’ve heard about.
Dr. Madox: Eight. And each time it was the Nexus series that stopped him.
Hardlight: So you think Seth was killed by an agent of Mechanon?
Dr. Madox: No, Mechanon wasn’t the target of that operation - he was dealing with VIPER.

Apparently Seth’s killer was one of VIPER’s enhanced Draysha agents in a combat suit.

GM: I can’t remember how many sentient machines there are in the Champions universe. Not many.
Hero Shrew (and ROVER’s) player: You certainly couldn’t describe ROVER as sentient, given his brain ran on AmigaOS.

The GM’s adopted stray cat is being a bit demanding.

GM: This f***ing cat - she wasn’t this loud before.
Hardlight’s player: Yes she was - she was just outside.

Dr. Madox is extremely concerned that some of Seth’s parts were being used as human bionics - the Nexus series could quite easily create its own interfaces with implanted cyberbrains and interfaces, and is strongly inclined to do so. And there’s no technology Dr. Madox is aware of that would stop it growing its connections.

Dr. Madox: So these parts were effectively black market cybernetics - which begs the question why they didn’t activate during the salvage process.
The Magus: Would the damage to his brain have temporarily shut down the activity in the rest of his parts?
Dr. Madox: Hmm. Maybe. *sigh* Seth was always the gentlest of them. Was. I'm already talking about him in the past tense. You have to understand I’ve worked with these people for over a decade.
Fireflash: And you care for them. Perfectly understandable.

We agree to keep the problem quiet for now, and offer to approach the people that have had Seth’s bodyparts transplanted into them, on the condition TyrellCorp foots the bill for safer cybernetic replacements.

Hardlight OoC: Somebody is going to turn into roboAkira, but in character I’m all for this plan.
Flux: Using the Batman Solution of ‘My Superpower is Money’
The Magus: Especially since he’s getting another corporation to pay for it.

It IS a little surprising to learn that there’s been entire teams of other superheroes active in Edge City, fighting a Secret War against Mechanon, that we had no idea about.

GM: Not everybody is as flashy as you. You’re also a bit surprised that there’s a black market for repurposed robot parts as implants in Edge City.
The Magus (and Allana’s) player: Allana probably knows all about it but she’s retired.

That said, it’s rather weird that Mechanon has made 8 different covert attacks against Edge City - it’s possible he’s being excessively cautious against cybernetic enemies that he can’t control. Although an obsessive Mechanon that’s trying to figure out why he keeps failing, and why he can’t adapt against it, is not a good thing.

The Magus: He did once decide that his weakness was ‘I’m not 50ft tall’.

The Magus arranges something that will hopefully be funeral rites for a cyberoid. We’re approached by a guy that looks like a condom stuffed with walnuts - it’s the ‘Tyrell security’ guy that Scooter wanted to punch, months back, when we were dealing with a raid on one of their warehouses.

‘Security Muscle’: Ah, I hear you found my brother.
Hero Shrew: Hey, I remember you!
‘Security Muscle’: You do? I’m surprised - we only met once and we didn’t really meet.
Hero Shrew: Eh, I was itching to punch somebody and you looked like you could take it.
The Magus: He never forgets a potential target.
‘Security Muscle’: … OK. Anyway, thanks. I’m Cain.

Cain doesn’t want to tell us about exactly what he does, but does complain about the fact that when they shift to their combat form, they have to wait for their ion cannon to cool down before they can regrow their skin.

The Magus: I can see why that would be a problem - melting skin is not a good look.
Cain: Oh, I dunno - it’s useful when you’re interrogating somebody who doesn’t know you can’t do it to them.

Cain also warns us not to teleport into Tyrell Labs - the security systems are a bit proactive about anything they assume is a threat. Tyrell’s cover story to the recipients of the cyberoid parts is that they had supply chain problems and the implanted parts have components that Tyrell can’t guarantee.

GM: ‘Here take this, sign this air-tight NDA’

The guy with the eye is a problem - more work on his eye would affect his health insurance, and he doesn’t have enough medical leave left.

Flux: … theoretically, would you be averse to having the cybernetic eye removed and your real one grown back?
GM: Hardlight, you know corporate law - that would completely F*** up his insurance, since he’s on record as having a cybernetic eye, and Flux is the very definition of an unlicensed practitioner.

Of course, we can always put the eye removal down to an ‘ongoing investigation’ which would satisfy his insurance, technically, and ensure he can’t be fired for missing work. So we don’t have to arrange a court order.

Judge: I'm sorry, you want what??
Flux: I’m sorry, a raccoon made me do it.

The Magus: I presume one of us will have to inform PRIMUS about all this.
Hardlight: Bags not me.

They’re not going to be pleased that Tyrell invented a synthetic race with aggressively invasive cyberwear, and saw fit not to inform them. There’s four cyberoids waiting with Dr Madox when we come back - Cain, another man of similar build, and two women of athletic build.

GM: Oh - ‘build’. Unintentional pun.

We do need to track down and close down the parts black market, too. It’s a bit of a concern that somebody out there is running a bodymod shop without knowing if the recycled robot parts are even biocompatible. Certainly the paper trail on the eye was all faked, using pre-issued certification on eyes that failed quality assurance. We can probably guess where along the supply chain that happened.

GM: I imagine Flux is going ‘Well I’m not getting my cyberbrain installed THERE’
Flux: I’m adding them to The List.

Hero Shrew: I asked around if there was anybody who could give me a chainsaw arm, but nobody knew.
All: …
Fireflash: … why do you think you need a chainsaw arm?
Hero Shrew: It’d be cool.
Fireflash: No. No. Again I say no.
Flux: I think what happened there is that you asked them, they thought about your reputation, and pretended they didn’t know.
The Magus: There’s one person in the city who could implant a chainsaw arm in a Brick, and she’ld flick your nose for asking
GM: Two - Allana AND Dr Soma could do it, but she’s flick you too.

Hero Shrew DOES hear that the Daughters of Lilith, who have been tangling with chromer gangs lately, have been flashing extra cash around lately - they could certainly forge the paperwork.

GM: Hence my favourite Cyberpunk quote
Fireflash’s player: ‘Dead Guys Is Parts’
GM: ‘Dead is Dead, Parts is Parts, Dead Guys is Parts.’

Flux: So what’s the plan of action?
Hero Shrew: I go in and ask them if they can get me a chainsaw arm?
Fireflash: No.

Instead we get a warrant for surveillance, and Flux goes and has a cyberpathic poke around the computers of the suspect bodyshops. We learn that the brokers supplying the clinics all use the same courier service to deliver the parts. The same couriers occasionally pick up packages from the city morgue. And there are discrepancies between orders and deliveries in the form of manila envelopes. It seems almost certain that that’s the point that shenanigans are happening. Especially when The Magus’s Magesight reveals that one of the security guards still has the traces of a VIPER tattoo.

GM: He had it right up until his boss said ‘Get rid of that! We’re not in a Nest now! F***ing moron! There’s a whole range of approved snake themed tattoos that won’t raise alarm bells.’
The Magus: That said, anybody with a ‘Don’t Tread On Me’ tattoo is alarming for entirely different reasons.

Hero Shrew: Well, that’s a link to Seth’s death, at least.
Fireflash: … so it is.

We can even set up surveillance from office space overlooking the VIPER courier building. Handy.

GM: You’ll have to rotate the static surveillance since all have day jobs or other commitments - even Scooter has appearances he has to make. Although The Rep is this close to getting a shock collar that Scooter will actually feel and pay attention to.

We soon confirm that they have contacts with the Daughter of Lilith, too, and can at least pretend to share some of their rather extreme sexual politics.

GM: Which is basically ‘F*** Men - It’s all they’re good for.’ But you also learn that the Daughters have had upgrades lately.
The Magus: *sigh* Of COURSE VIPER provided them with venomous fangs. I give VIPER a lot of crap, but they know how to stay on brand.

Our GM used a random name generator to come up with the company name. One of the first it produced was Viper Delivery.

The Magus OoC: We need to outsource more of our investigations to random name generators, that was much quicker.

Instead he goes with Basilisk Ltd.

The Magus: I can picture the cell leader complaining over drinks one night “It wasn’t even ABOUT snakes until that f***ing Harry Potter book come out.”
Flux: “And now it’ll just look suspicious if we deregister the name!”

We also record a mention of something called The Old Seam, which Fireflash recognises as a reference to a local cemetery some two centuries old.

The Magus: Making it new and hip compared to many of the world’s cemeteries.
GM: True, but it’s one of the rare remnants of Old Monterey.

Especially after that weather machine malfunction decades ago that turned Monterey into a disaster area ripe for complete redevelopment, long before later disasters left Edge City crippled. At least the vampire problem isn’t as bad as it could be.

The Magus: Shooting fire from your eyes is a surprisingly common ability, these days.

Having their meeting at the Old Seam is actually pretty clever.

GM: No-one is going to notice a bunch of goth chicks in a graveyard. In the early evening, anyway, before it gets so late that someone asks ‘Why are you in this graveyard’?
The Magus: Nothing good happens in graveyards at 4 in the morning.

Hardlight’s player: Sundog suggested I get a "Skill levels>With a group of similar skills" thing. Now, while I'm sure I could just get an "All Int Skills" booster for 5 points, I should probably like, make it slightly more Lore-friendly, and turn it into a cyberbrain chip...At which point I realise... I don't actually have a cyberbrain! XD
Flux’s player: You also already have hard-to-explain 'cyberware'
Hardlight’s player: This is very true. Just trying to figure out how to make something like that fit with character lore, is all. I'd rather not just have Gareth wake up one day mysteriously being able to just ‘think slightly better’...Unless it's a plot hook…. brain wooooorms
The Magus’ player: Removing the lodged crayon has worked for other patients.
Hardlight’s player: Touché!

Finally saw Whisperer in the Darkness (2011) last night. Shot in b/w and had a very 40-50s film to the camera work. The acting (to me) was a little wooden at times, trying to capture the older film genre a little too much. I liked the effects as well as the plot though. A folklorist from Miskatonic U. goes into the backwoods of Vermont to investigate findings of extra-normal beings. Typical fare of H.P. of the person dying or going mad at the end (I won't say which). If you're doing a CoC or Horror style campaign I would give it a watch, just not a re-watch.
 

I just saw “Jungle Cruise” last night, and it hits the right pulp spots.

Great idea, Steve!
 
My Mom and Dad took up beekeeping several years ago. They live in agriculture country, where bees play an important role in helping things grow. The loss of bees in recent years is an increasingly serious problem, so I'd like to nominate The Bee Conservancy as a worthwhile organization that could use some assistance. 

As we start heading into the Christmas season, I hope my fellow Hero fans will consider helping the less fortunate.
 
Here are a few charities I am supporting and hope you might give something as well.
 
WaterAid has been working to transform lives for more than 40 years through the power of clean water.
 
Imagine being able to go online and purchase three chickens for a family in a developing country. Or lifesaving nutrition for a young child. Or a beehive to families who have been impacted by drought, to help them generate income.
 
Volunteer to help those around you. There are opportunities everywhere.

As we start heading into the Christmas season, I hope my fellow Hero fans will consider helping the less fortunate.
 
Here are a few charities I am supporting and hope you might give something as well.
 
WaterAid has been working to transform lives for more than 40 years through the power of clean water.
 
Imagine being able to go online and purchase three chickens for a family in a developing country. Or lifesaving nutrition for a young child. Or a beehive to families who have been impacted by drought, to help them generate income.
 
Volunteer to help those around you. There are opportunities everywhere.

As we start heading into the Christmas season, I hope my fellow Hero fans will consider helping the less fortunate.
 
Here are a few charities I am supporting and hope you might give something as well.
 
WaterAid has been working to transform lives for more than 40 years through the power of clean water.
 
Imagine being able to go online and purchase three chickens for a family in a developing country. Or lifesaving nutrition for a young child. Or a beehive to families who have been impacted by drought, to help them generate income.
 
Volunteer to help those around you. There are opportunities everywhere.

Wrapped an adventure with the youth group a couple of hours ago.  We had a two-session adventure playtesting a conversion of Judge's Guild's old "Break In at Three Kilometer Island" (now renamed Kilowatt Island, for aesthetic reasons, and a tweaked character roster to include at least one character actually capable of carrying out the goal of the "break in."  Not sure why the original had neither powers nor gadgets to actually pull that off....).
 
At any rate, it was a smashing success, though I will have to finish the write-up of it to include a couple of on-the-fly tweaks that had to be made for Players reluctant to actually look _inside_ of buildings...      I love Players; I really do.
 
I opted to this adventure for a number of reasons, not the least of which was I nabbed the main villain decades ago, redecorated her and gave her a few quirks that have made her quite popular with Players over the years (Lord Liaden: she is one of those who is a villain _only_ because of her methods type characters, and is in fact the very one I had in mind when I posted the comment on the other thread a few days ago).  I took the name, extended the schtick-- why not just go ahead and convert the whole adventure, right?      
 
Skip all the way toward the dramatic showdown: the two-pronged assault has baffled the Players (not sure why; possibly because there has never before been a session where splitting the party actually made _sense_, so of course it's the one time they just couldn't bring themselves to do it.   
 
As Helen is making her getaway (sans Asmodeum and sans henchmen, no less), Kinetica has managed to use her superspeed and her desolidification to get into the rocket, and suddenly realizes that she is alone: her teammates are busy with villains as the rocket takes to the skies, and will soon be moving too fast for even Magnificent to catch it.  Kinetica makes her way cautiously to the nose of the retro-50's styled escape vehicle, nervousness of her Player making her insanely overcautious.  She finds her way into the control room, directly behind Helen who, without turning around, calls out jovially enough.  "Welcome aboard, Hero!  You're remarkably tenacious; you should be proud."  Helen then slowly spins around in her chair, her hands laid flat on the arms of the chair.  "Very few people have ever gotten this close to capturing me.  How does that make you feel?"
 
"Like I have made a bad idea, and I really need to figure out how to stay safe!"
 
Helen smirks and laughs just a bit.  "You know you'd actually be a lot safer six feet to your left..."
 
"Okay.  Thanks!"  [moves six feet to the left]
 
The entire rest of the group, OOC :"REALLY?!  Really?  Did you _really_ just do that?!!"
 
Helen:  "There...  Isn't that better?"  [presses a button and Kinetica _whooshes_ through the floor and out of the ship, plummeting toward the waters of Lake Campaign from 80,000 feet]  "_I_ certainly think it is."
 
 

HORROR ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS - PRELUDE
 
 
IN WHICH THE INVESTIGATORS GO TRAINSPOTTING, WITHOUT BENEFIT OF HARD DRUGS
 
*****
 
In 1204, a great city burns, and something inhuman preys on the people hung from the city walls. In 1922, a kindly professor has asked two of his friends, and a trustworthy journalist, if they could undertake an overnight expedition to Darkest Surrey. 
 
He’s being very mysterious about it too - not saying why he wants them to be on a certain country train platform hours after dark, just that they have cameras ready and that they’re not to compare notes until after they’ve recorded all their individual observations. Assuming anything actually happens. 
 
The investigators are -
 
Brian Randall Huxley, formerly a junior medical officer on HMS Fearless, traumatised during the so-called Battle of May Island where British submariners were sliced to pieces by the propellers of escorting warships. Post-war he has a lucrative consulting contract in the budding pharmaceutical industry, and uses it to fund his love for archaeology and ancient history, using back channels to import antiquities from Egypt and Tunisia. 
 
Antonio Gusto Masiero, an Italian airman of some renown, who arranged transport for Professor Smith to a number of his more remote digs, after the War. In 1922 he travelled to London to see the new planes and visit his dear friend, where they would discuss future travel prospects.
 
Florence 'Flo' Victoria Braxton-Hicks, of an Australian grazier family, who went into journalism with the approval of her parents, on the condition she do so somewhere where it wouldn’t embarrass the family. London fits the bill nicely.
 
 
Antonio’s player: This Prof. Julius Smith - is he a real person?
GM: No, purely fictional - which is just as well in Call of Cthulhu.
 
The three agree to assist the professor, make their plans for travel, equipment and accomodation. Flo’s tomboyish cousin Alexandria ‘Alex’ Braxton will be tagging along to make up the numbers
 
Antonio Gusto Masiero: I’ll go with Florence.
Florence 'Flo' Victoria Braxton-Hicks: Miss Braxton-Hicks if you don’t mind - we’ve only just been introduced.
Brian Randall Huxley: My, these Italians work fast.
 
There’s a pub in Stoneley, but no rooms. At least they have beer, and food, not that it’s likely to impress Antonio and Flo, both of whom have lived on the flavours of the Continent.
 
GM: British Cooking - boil it until it stops struggling. 
 
They also find out why the Professor sent them to the village - apparently there’s a ghost train every year. And any number of variations on the tale, especially about the woman that supposedly comes out to meet it. Alex encourages the tall tales, fueled on beer. The others at least try to stay sober, and unspoiled in their expectations, although Flo of course is recording everything in her notebook.
 
GM: What do you want for dinner? There’s two choices -  both of them are stew
 
GM: The locals don’t seem very interested in going to see the Ghost Train? Why would they when they can stay in the pub and tell stories about it instead. There’s beer and a fire and stew.
 
Leaving Alex rugged up and passed out in the car, the trio prepare for their vigil - Huxley even puts a few pieces of gravel on the tracks to see if they are disturbed by the passage of this supposed Ghost Train.
 
Florence: Yes, nothing like risking a derailment.
 
And a little after nine in the evening, a train actually appears - out of thin air, and faintly luminous. Antonio and Florence are deeply shocked, and her half-frozen fingers certainly don’t help with the photos. Huxley takes more photos of his own face than of the train - which fades rapidly from existence the moment Antonio tries to step aboard.
 
Florence: *curses a blue streak in Italian*
GM: You’ve been sworn at by a lot of women, Antonio.
Huxley: My, these Italians work fast.
 
Huxley is convinced it’s a hoax, or that they were fed drugs and the tall tales at the pub primed the form of the hallucination. Antonio and Florence are much more unsettled. Flo even drops the camera as she was trying to take the last few shots. 
 
Huxley: Have I been eating some kind of hallucinogen?
GM: It must have been in the stew.
 
The trio (and desperately hungover Alex) return to London in the morning.
 
GM: Antonio feels the stab deep in his soul when they tell him he can’t get coffee in rural Surrey. 
 
But the Professor seems very pleased with their results, and invites them to the Challenger Trust Banquet-Lecture at the Imperial Institute on New Years Day, where he promises to reveal all.
 
Prof. Smith: Did you get any more photos?
Florence: Do you have any idea how cold it was? What is wrong with this country???
Huxley: I give up Professor, you got us, how did you do it? Where did you hide the projector? Well done old man.
 
On the other hand, the Professor isn’t quite so cheerful when they see him in the interim - in fact whatever meetings he was having with a mysterious Turkish gentleman have been leaving him distinctly perturbed. He also wants Antonio’s advice about travel in the rural parts of Eastern Europe, in preparation for some large trip in the first quarter of 1923, and asks if he’ll be available to accompany him on the trip. Antonio, of course, agrees.
 
The after-dinner lecture is certainly amazing, when it happens - Professor Smith is right back in his old form, discussing, of all things, hauntings like the Ghost Train. Smith hopes that one day, whatever mysterious other dimensions that ‘haunts’ drift in and out of, will be accessible to mankind and the sciences. 
 
But that mysterious Turkish gentleman (identified as one Mehmet Makryat, owner of an antiques store in nearby Islington), turns up just as the lecture is finishing and the Professor is doing the rounds of the tables. When the staff let him in, he urgently whispers something to the Professor that leaves the man shocked and not a little frightened. He asks the trio of investigators to come by his house the next afternoon - apparently he has a lot to tell them.
 
He won’t get the chance - as the trio open their papers over their breakfast eggs, they all see the headline that the Professor’s house burned to the ground overnight, and that he and his manservant Beddows are missing.

This is kinda sorta the plot for the "Lower Decks" animated Trek that aired last year.

"First contact is a delicate, high-stakes operation of diplomacy. One must be ready for anything when Humanity is interacting with alien race for the first time. But we don't do that. Our specialty is second contact. Still pretty important. We get all the paperwork signed, make sure we're spelling the name of the planet right, get to know all the good places to eat." - Ensign Boimler, USS Cerritos
 

Now you need a hero with sonic powers...the Howling Commando!

So I got to thinking about my figure collection and Hero System. Naturally I want to use my figs as much as possible, so I thought up a game of super-powered airborne infantry invading France in 1944. The characters will be under 5th ed. revised, 250-300 points worth of superpowered individuals, but with human weaknesses to bullets, strangulation and other "natural" means of dying. Think of the Godlike RPG when imagining characters.
 
So the player characters drop into Normandy in the first session, and have to link up with their HQ. Combats will be handled with miniatures on terrain, and other stuff will be ToTM.

I will be designing the characters for this, so ideas are welcome. So far I have a super-strong "brute" with a BAR rifle and a nasty disposition, a private who can fire armor piercing laser from his eyes (though the power will probably have the "Burnout" limitation), and one soldier who can turn into a beastly form to tear into the Nazis with claw and fang.

The PC powers will probably be "raw" talents, so they will require an activation roll, and will have some limitations (EGO roll to prevent beast form guy from losing control of himself?) , but they are still super powers. The nazis will also have superpowered troops, but I haven't come up with concepts yet.
 
I have a battle-mat and terrain for the combats, and a couple of tanks (if I grok the vehicle rules) for variety.
The games theme will be some form of gritty, down-to-earth warfighting and the consequences of human superpowers (hubris anyone?) combined with wargamey concerns and some roleplaying and storytelling to round out the experience.

I know this is the single most unpopular opinion on this board, outgunning even Linked and Shapeshift, but I think it's helpful to keep it in mind:
 
Martial Arts in the HERO System is a hyper-tweaking of Skill Levels.
 
You can have Skill Levels in Ranged Attacks and in HtH Attacks; you can have a Martial Art that includes both.
 
 

The sidebar on page 100 of The Ultimate Martial Artist (5E) specifically addresses this question.

What exactly is a ranged martial art?  Martial Arts as described in the book would more or less be “I ball up my hand and smack you with it.”  Or the ever popular “Boot to the head!”  What is the real world version of this attack?
   If you’re talking about some kind of “I take my Chi Power and send a ball of energy at my opponent.” Then that’s an Energy Blast of some kind and while it may have a special effect of some type of Kung-Fu, it’s not a Martial Arts maneuver and has to be written up separately.  But it’s certainly allowed IF you can pay for it.
  I once GM’ed for a madman who played Chuin: Master of Sinanju, without ever buying a Martial maneuver. Punches & Kicks were 0 range Killing Attacks. Dodge was Desolid with appropriate limitations, and so forth. It was an intellectual exercise for him to see if he could do it.

Well, the moon is 385,000.6 km from earth, so at 334km/segment that's around 20 minutes of drift time, so your aim wouldn't have to be terrific.  The moon does have gravity to pull in a pretty close shot and is 3,475 across, which is hard to miss.