ZootSoot

Re: Superhero Showdown #8: Mr. Fantastic v. Plastic-Man

 

Originally posted by Hunter1

Mr. Fantastic

aka Reed Richards

Powers: his body is elastic and he can stretch his body parts. It also makes him incredibly durable.

Skills: he among the most brillant scientists on Earth. I suppose Victor Von Doom is slightly smarter.

 

Plastic-Man

aka Eel O'Brien

Powers: his body is even more elastic. He can stretch his body parts and alter his shape into practically anything.

Skills: he was a thief who fell into a vat of chemicals. Aside from that, I don't know of any usefull skills for him.

 

I think it could go either way. Head to head, Plastic-Man wins. He is the master of stretch-type heroes. However, Mr. Fantastic could easily trick Eel, because he is not that smart a guy. If Reed had time to plan, then he would win.

 

Reed's intelligence is all technology and abstract science. Eel is not the freaking moronic @ss that DC potrays him as now but a very clever guy whose mastery not only of malleable body tricks but tactics and strategies involving them is supreme. Reed Richards cannot beat him, unless we give him access to a whangzoom lab of Kirby-esque fascist tech.

Originally posted by keithcurtis

Drat Marvel comics! Next thing you're going to tell me is that Loki isn't Thor's brother

 

Keith "Everything I know about Red Sonja I learned from Marvel Comics" Curtis

 

PS. How many of you, when you were kids, pronounced Sonja and Mjolnir with hard "J"s? Don't be ashamed, now.

 

Norse mythology is not of the same kind as Greek. The relationships of the gods varies more from place to place, because Scandinavia never had the history of being conquered that Greece had (Poseidon is god of the sea,and the creator of horses!!!), so a dominant deity matcing the patron of the dominant race never emerged. While the most common (Snorri Sturlison's?) version has Loki bneing Odin's adopted brother, his being Thor's brother is certainly possible insome of the myths. Similarly Odin All-father seems to have been cobbled up as an answer to the Christian singular god; in many myths Thor is the ruler of the gods of Asgard and is clearly, overall, more powerful than all the others. The worst thing Marvel did with Norse mythology was the demonization of Loki who, as the Norse face of the trickster archetype, moved freely from good to evil and back again with relative ease.

Re: My 2.5 cents.

 

Originally posted by NuSoardGraphite

About the books:

 

I understand where people are coming from when it comes to Brooks. His first Shannara book is heavily Tolkien influenced (i.e. practically ripped off) but since I read that before I read LoTR, I happen to like it quite a bit (though I did read The Hobbit before I read Sword of Shannara, but those stories are nothing alike)

 

Personaly, I don't understand where people are comming from when it comes to Jordan. I can understand if you don't like his style of writing or you find much of it boring (I do, sometimes, but just when I think I can't stand the boredom, he has his characters do something that catches my attention again) but I so often hear of Jordan's writings as being "bad" but with no explaination of how or why it is bad (just that it is). I want an explaination now!

 

About the movies:

 

My vote for Worst Fantasy Film of All Time goes to:

 

Wait for it...

 

 

DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS

 

Duh!

 

That movie was soooooo awful I got the urge to walk out (I didn't though) and I never walk out of movies, regardless of how bad they may be.

 

I kinda liked the Deathstalker movies...especially the first one. Its very, very fun if you don't try to take it seriously at all.

 

and finally...

 

 

LEAVE Hawk: The Slayer ALONE!!!!

Thats one of my favorite movies ever!

 

okay, well, not ever, but I like it a lot. I also happen to eat a lot of cheese, so its no problem for me to stomach it...

 

An explanation on why Jordan is bad? All right, first there is the premise of a world in which the same story happens over and over and over again for all eternity with people only being saved fom the boredom inflicted on the readers because their memories fade; and all the little sub bits of nonsense such as legendary heroes whose legends grow of the course of many re-incarnations but with the heroes themselves having no memory of having lived before when they are alive (how does that multiple lifetime legend thing work again?). Then there is the hodge-podge of invention, with him coming up with random magical notions to cover his butt as he goes along (the gholam, the resurrection of the Forsaken when they are slain, etc). There is his painful geography (an excellent match for his painful history) as the entire story is set on a square continent. The tiresome and predictable misogyny (probably not really Jordan's fault, as he did attend the Citadel). His endless dissection of military maneuvers (probably not really Jordan's fault, as he did attend the Citadel). His use of the tiredest cliche in all fantasy fiction, the BAD. Finally, and probably wrst, his hero is endlessly successful in his opposition to the Bad, never once suffering a setback at the hands of his foe, combined with the central premise of the story, Jordan renders the experience of reading his prose about as intriguing as reading the ads in the real estate section of your local big city newspaper.

Originally posted by Black Rose

I've had a friend (Nu Soard Graphite) tell me that the Thomas Covenant series gets better after the first couple (well, it'd have to, wouldn't it?) but I simply have better things to do with my time than read crap-that-thinks-it's-good fantasy. I'd be much more willing to plunge into the Gender In Writing thread on the old boards (and I tried, but it managed to eat itself) than read Donaldson.

 

I despise Donaldson, but not because Thomas Covenant is unsympathetic. That was the only good thing about his writing, if it had been placed in marginally more competent hands (say those of Koko the gorilla) it would have been a welcome respite from tiresome, pure-hearted cretins saving the world. But Donaldson has the Midas touch, anything he touches turns into mufflers . . .

Re: Worst. Swords and Sorcery. Ever.

 

Originally posted by FenrisUlf

Well, having posted what turned out to be a surprisingly robust thread on the /best/ heroic fantasy, now I'm curious as to what you folks think of as the /worst/ heroic fantasy ever.

 

Though that might be a very long list, I will narrow it down by asking that you not post the 'cheese' -- the stuff that is bad but in a good way (i.e., no MST3K material). I'm asking for the just plain *bad* -- the books that you either tossed in the direction of the nearest trashcan or that made you want to track the author down to demand he return the hours you put into reading the book or seeing the movie.

 

There is always something worse out there. There's Piers Anthony's Xanth, Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time, Stephen Donaldson, Eragon,there are endless numbers of books titled Sword(blank), or (blank)Dragon, there is endlessly repulsive selection masticated and vomited up Celtic mythology (in fact, I don't think I have seen any fantasy in at least the last 20 years that wasn't Celtic influenced), and there are any number of second-rate imitations of J.R.R. Tolkien's boys' adventure stories, there is E. Nesbitt and her disciple Edward Eager, and as good as J.K Rowlings' Harry Potter is, it has its share of cheese as well.

Originally posted by keithcurtis

Doomsday was a poorly-conceived villain in an otherwise very enjoyable story arc.

Hey, you can't bogart that stuff, share what you're smoking. The Death of Superman was so bad I wouldn't use it as toilet paper, and it could have been good. They could have introduced Doomsday as a real character with real motivations, they could have had Superman behave rationally ("I'm sorry little boy but if I break of to rescue your sister, and there are only about fifty other superheroes around here who could probably save her, who knows how many people Doosmday will kill before I can get back to the fight").

The problems of his non-flight were addressed in subsequent appearances. In short, he adapts VERY well to whatever defeated him the last time.

 

As for the first time around and shooting him into space, you might ask the same question about the Hulk.

 

Keith "Superfan" Curtis

 

Bah, the post Death story lines have only made Dosday more ridiculous and brought further contempt upon DC's conception of how the universe works. Death is the quintessentially awful DC-type story (not that there aren't good DC type stories just as there are bad Marvel-type stories and the good and the bad of each type appear in all super hero comic publications).

Originally posted by farik

I prefer to play, because I'm so used to the effort required to run a game and create a setting and NPCs it's easy to pour all that energy into a single character I mean when you're used to having to role play a town of NPCs it's easy to role play a single character and real feel invested in what that character does.

 

By far though the best expierence as a GM and Player is the shared campaign it only works if the GMs who rotate all want the same thing from the campaign; but you really get the best of both worlds. You get to develop world spanning plots and create new setting elements but at the same time new elements and eventualities throw you a curve both as a player and a GM. Of course this requires an event driven style of campaign, rigid meta-plots could easily ruin the whole experience for everyone.

 

Definately the best experience, but you don't all have to want the same thing, you have to respect each other's desires and respect game continuity.

Re: Would you rather game as a player or a gamemaster, and why?

 

Originally posted by Kevin

Would you rather game as a player or a gamemaster, and why?

 

Tough one. I prefer being a player because it lets me develop a single individual, a personal history, personality and to explore the possibilities of someone very different from myself. On the other hand, so many games are pedestrian, unimaginative or offer no room for doing new things, that I much prefer to GM than play in them. I am a good GM, I can create a detailed world and I can run things off the cuff, and I will step in to offer to run when things are getting out of hand; but I do prefer to be a player.

Just had to ask

Strange trivia? Strange is so powerful that when a group of villains defeated the Defenders (you know, the most fearsome superhuman non-team ever), including Strange himself, he transfered a fraction of his power to another and that one wiped the floor witrh the villains. So what? That other was Howard the Duck!!! Fate is in serious trouble here . . .

Originally posted by Korvar

Thus giving the characters the incentive to use their killing attacks against, well, anything and everyone? Let's rampag through the city, shooting at passersby - the GM will ensure that none of them die!

 

I'm pretty sure that using a killing attack irresponsibly is off-genre!

 

The Human Torch is a mess of killing attacks. Superman should kill just about anyone he lays a hand. While Wolverine does kill, he also uses his claws in combat without killing. Almost every comic book character out there regularly uses dangerous, KA type attacks, sometimes exclusively, without causing irrevocable havoc. I am not suggesting that there be no consequences for reckless use of force; but if you wish to simulate the genre then it is incumbent on both players and GMs to work to achieve it. You can have all sorts of in game consequences for poorly conceived actions, but if you allow the characters to murder bystanders willy-nilly then, in genre, the only appropriate in game consequences will be to end those characters' careers; I would think this would not be fun for either the players or the GM.

A standard genre convention is not tht characters do not have or do not use killing attacks, even irresponsibly; it is, rather, that, for some reason, such use never results in truly ugly events. If your players choose to use KAs against targets that cannot withstand them, have events conspire to save the targets or reveal the targets are more than they seem. This is probably the simplest way to reconcile their actions with your vision.

Re: Re: Re: How to make the Villains Interesting

 

Originally posted by Kristopher

Could you expand on that for me? I'm curious as to what you mean.

 

Well, for example, in DC Hell is a place with a zip code and a civic government. Good always triumphs. The Amazo Android literally has all the powers of the Justice League regardless of who is in that membership (and when the League was disbanded it had no powers at all). Essentially, in the big DC plots there is only one possible solution and it generally involves working with these sorts of "meta" rules and until the heroes figure out this approach nothing works. That's fine in a comic, the heroes figure things out when the writer wants them to; in a game, the players figure it out way too early to allow the story to work (the most common outcome; GMs who want the story to work out must alter the basic idea of what they have been doing, a players will see things being switched around and it will upset them), they fail to come up with the solution at all (the GM has to give them the solution if the story is to continue, and the players will resent this), or the players figure it out very slowly (and the GM has to retard the story in a number of awkward, silly and obvious ways and the players will resent this). Plus, this approach means that if the players' clever solution isn't the one, it won't work. Also, bnecause of the nature of the DC universe, players know that they have to come up with a "clever" solution, again and again and again.

Re: How to make the Villains Interesting

 

Originally posted by Ghost who Walks

I thought I would start this thread, since we seem to be getting a lot of people new to Hero on these boards. While many of us can remember Grond from 3rd edition, and regard hims as classic, ne players/GMs may simply see a modified "Hulk".

 

Here are some guidelines I use:

1) Who is the Bad? A big decision to make when you start, is who is going to be the big bad? Who is going to fight your players on a regular basis? Myself, I prefer to have the players fight the minor league villains at first, while the Big villains operate in the background, usually against NPC teams. don't spend to much time developing your first master villain...the players will usually smash him quick.

 

Also, don't make your villains , generally (preferably ever, but some people are hung up on this), evil. Nothing gets tired faster than characters whose motivations are senseless. Rather than have the big villains being opposed by NPCs to start with (a sure way to make your players feel like a side show) have their early moves be subtle and non-criminal and built up their plans simultaneously with your players gaining experience so that both are ripe at approximately the same time.

 

2) A Little Evil goes a long way: Villains don't have to massacre entire shopping malls to be bad. Make the villainy personal. Does the Hero have a public Id? Have the villain trash his car. Do the heroes have a team vehicle? Have VIPER steal it, along with their ice chest filled with beer in the back.

 

Bad guys as members of a rival frat? Villains shold not be primarily interested in attracting the heroes' attention; that is counterproduictive. Instead they should be pursuing their own goals, which as GM you can tailor to intersect with the pcs' own.

 

3) Have NPC heroes around, who get in to trouble. The players may be the greatest heroes in the cosmos, but can they fix their car? Or do they have to go somewhere? NPC heroes can liven up the game, by providing rivals, romances, and babysitters. If the players seem to enjoy a certain NPC hero, have him get captured by the villain next week.

 

4) Avoid huge supervillain teams in combat. They take forever to fight...they are best done at the conclusion of a series of scenarios, leading up to them. One or two villains is often all you need...remember they will usually be prepared, while the heroes may not know the villains powers.

 

5) Use hunteds for Paranoia: Keep a mystery going as to who the villain may be for as long as possible. Leave clues that might point to other villains, especially ones that heroes have as hunteds. The villains who are suspected may not be involved at all...

 

6) A villain is usually better at his powers than the heroes. He usually has more practice with them, since he has a "looser" code of ethics. Villains in the DC universe are a good example of this. The Heroes are usually ridiculously more powerul...but are limited by morals. The villains aren't, and are usually very good with the one or two powers they have.

 

DC comics do not translate well into the games. Symbolic/ideal rules have real physical force in DC, one can accomodate this in a game only by railroading the players. It gts tiresome fast.

 

7) Let your villains get captured. They can always break out later. If they have friends, the friends will threaten witnesses, ruining the court case. These witnesses include the hero who captured them.

 

If you don't want your players to grow so frustrated that they start "accidentally" killing the bad guys, make the justice system fairly reliable and keep the prison break-outs down to a bare minimum. Also, while the recurring villains are a comic staple, inexplicably unbeatable villains who keep coming back in a game can be very annoying for the players.

 

8) Truly Psychotic villains are really only fun if your players are interested in either killing them or curing them. Never have more than one or two around at once, unless you are running a very dark campaign. Try and tie a hero into the origin of the psychotic, this will may make the player feel somewhat responsible for them. (Think Batman and Twoface)

 

9) Master plots are meant to be foiled. Make sure you provide a way to do this.

 

The big secret to doing this isn't in preparing a method by which the villain's plans can be unhinged (after all the way you want him beat may not fit within the players' viewpoint), it is allowing the best plan the players come up with the be workable (not that it will necessarily work, but their ideas be appropriate even if this involves considerable transformation of the npcs plans and powers to do so).

 

10) Don't hesitate to alter published villains, modify comic villains, or whatever else you have to do to keep a villain entertaining. Example: Grond has four arms. A Race in the "Terran Empire" Sourcebook has 4 arms...

 

Thats all I know, anyone else?

 

Good stuff.

Hmmn, I don't have a problem designing games where telepathy and other mental powers are useful but not gamewreckers. But, the fun thing to do with the mentalists (for me as a GM) is to provide situations that tempt them to do unethical things . . . and every player cracks and does them. This can be sort of fun, but it does get frustrating for the other players, can even ruin their fun entirely. In general, most mental powers just aren't very, um, heroic. I mind f

Originally posted by Markdoc

Several quick points:

 

Bartman's "No currency and eating gruel" peasant is a common view but is based on outdated ideas of history. It really only holds for impoverished areas.

 

Here in Copenhagen one of our gaming student works for the national museum - her speciality is pre-industrial agriculture. A relatively small town like Copenhagen in the 12th century - it was not the capital or even a very large town then - imported roughly 500 tons of meat a month, much of which was paid for in coin. Coin hoards are routinely found on even quite small farms. So many/most peasants used coins, even if their daily business was carried out by barter. And this was in a small city or large town on the edge of Europe. Business was far better evolved in France, Germany, Italy - even Spain and Britain - at the time. Also not all cities were small - at the same time, Palermo and Constaninople had populations in the hundreds of thousands, with trade netrworks stretching from Africa to China (indeed, indian and chinese coins have turned up in the hoards from some small scandinavian farms....)

 

So... the easiest thing to do is decide what your specific area looks like - squalid poverty and widespread barter (Say, Ireland in the 14th Century), a moneyed, literate mercantile and noble class built on a large, relatively affluent peasantry (Say, England in the 15th century) or a sophisticated society with widespread literacy, a preponderance of cash transactions and continent spanning travel and trade (Augustan Rome or Han China) and then base your currency system off that, with appropriate tweaks.

 

Cheers, Mark

 

Absolutely, also (and this is one reason for the presence of "exotic" coins in obscure locations) coins were not "money" in the way we think of it; instead, they were an aspect of the barter economy and relly had no more fixed value than anything else someone might be tying to trade.

Originally posted by Bartman

First remember that 90%+ of the people in a 'realistic' pre-modern setting won't deal with currency at all. They will spend their entire lives without having so much as a single copper penny. They live in a largely barter economy. And most peasants won't barter much either. They generally will produce most or all of the the items used in their lives themselves. An ancient or medieval peasant had virtually nothing and little chance of changing that. Here are some highlights of the average person's economy.

 

This is an exagerration. Archeological evidence shows that currency was widespread in many pre-industrial societies. Pennies are pretty common throughout twelfth century British sites. But, yes, many times individuals would be more willing to trade something of obvious utility than simply accept currency (which might be clipped or debased in some form anyway).

 

Food - This would of course be grown entirely by the peasant. 99%+ of the calories would come from grain. And most of that was in the form of some sort of gruel. Most villages had a central bakery as the firepits in the average home were too crude to bake properly. This bakery charged a fee (again generally paid in barter not coin) which most locals would only be able/willing to pay once or twice a week. So the standard was two meals of gruel a day. This would be suplimented by vegitables and occasionally whatever might be locally availible and in season (nuts and berries). Ocassionally some bread, milk and or eggs would be added and very occasionally a little meat (generally only on feast days).

 

This varies according to particular environments. Some locations will have natural surpluses. Also, in northern Europe, beer was probably at least as common as gruel as a form in which grains were consumed (and much safer than the water available, too).

 

Clothing - The medieval European peasant changed clothing only twice a year. In some places this wouldn't even be fully removable. The clothing would be sewn into place around the individual. And six months later they would be cut out of it. This was more likely in winter than summer. If the peasant took a bath at all, the semi-annual changing of the clothing is when they would take it. This clothing would generally be made by the owner or a family member and would be made from locally availible materials.

 

Lodging - The peasant was once again responsable for building and maintaining their own. Generally this would be a single room building as small as possible. Think 4m x 2m. They were kept small because it took a lot of work and energy to build them, and because they were vastly easier to keep warm if if the space could be limited. Very little was actually done in the building. Anything that climate and weather allowed was generally done outdoors.

 

Furniture and other belongings - First virtually nothing would be metal. Everything from the utensils to the plow would be made of wood. The hovel itself would have a single table (maybe), at most, a couple of stools and a blanket covered straw 'nest' on the floor that would be used as a bed. The only likely metal objects, for an entire household, would be a knife or two and a cooking cauldron. Everything would be made as needed, so there would be very little in the was of goods. But there may be a small trunk which would hold the handful of family posessions. This trunk would likely be used as a stool as well.

 

Moving on from the peasants to the townspeople results in a great deal of improvement. But only because there the barrier is set so low. They account for almost all the rest of the people in the setting. Most of their economy is driven by barter as well. But in general they will have a few coins and be able to pay and charge in monetary terms.

 

Food - Unlike the peasant the townsman is likely to buy much of their food. But not all. Most towns had plenty of space for gardens and animals within their wall. And most families will grow their own vegitables and have chickens, goats, and or pigs. Cows would only be availible to the wealthier townspeople. The daily staple however would still be gruel and or bread. This would not be prepaired by the townsperson themselves though. The dangers of fire meant that individual fireplaces were generally regulated by law. Cooking would be done by in central bakeries and most meals were eaten cold.

 

Clothing - Although better off than their village cousins, most townsmen still relied on what could be made by the family. Tailors were only really availible to the burghers. Journeymen had to rely on family for clothing and would only buy a change or two a year.

 

Lodging - Most townsmen rented not owned their homes. Rent was usually very modest, the equivalent of a days pay per month or thereabouts. Inns of course were all but unheard of. If one was travelling, one was expected to have made arangements with family or friends. Most homes were situated on the second floor, generally above the shop operated by the resident. These were down right roomy in comparison to the hovels in the countryside. Think 4m x 6-8m.

 

Furniture and other belongings - Pretty much the same thing. A single family bed in the corner. A single table. And a collection of stools and a couple of trunks. Metal is more likely to be used. But most things would still be wood. In any case the room would look completely barren to a modern eye.

 

Above this you find the wealthy. They live in unspeakable luxury in comparison to the other two groups. Any PC almost inevitabley comes from this group, namely because nobody else can afford to adventure. They may be "second sons of second sons" with no lands or future beyond what they make for themselves. But in comparison to the above they are unimaginably wealthy and well connected.

 

These are the people who will be paying for goods in a FH campaign because nobody else has the coins to do so.

 

That said let me address your specific points.

 

1- I think pricing things according to a day's unskilled labor is a bad idea. An unskilled laborer can buy virtually nothing. He will work 25-26 days in a month and will have absolutely nothing left over after paying for a space on the floor of a hovel to sleep on and 60 meals of gruel. And in fact he is unlikely to be payed directly anyway. He probably will be payed in food and board rather than coin.

 

2- I don't know of any single place that lists a broad variety of how long it takes to do something. But that isn't a very good reference for determining prices anyway. Even if a shirt takes as long to make as a sword there are many other things that will make the sword much more expensive. The raw material is more expensive and the training required is much more specialized. Any goodwife of the period could make a shirt, only a very skilled smith could make you a sword.

 

3- If your players are killing people for their goods there are better ways to resolve the issue than changing the prices of goods. In fact a sword or horse were very rare and expensive items. Their prices should reflect that. Society will have a system in place to resolve who gets them. Even if a killing is justified by law the dead man's property will generally go to his heirs or the state (inheritance tax don't ya know), not his killers. Looting bodies was pretty much universally a hanging offense. If someone is killing people and looting their bodies. It won't take much for the 'officials' to figure out who did it. After all a very large city like London, Paris or Florence had fewer than 10,000 people. There won't be many people in town trying to hawk the dead men's horses and weapons. They do this even once and they are likely to end up outlaws and/or in a noose pretty quick.

 

On the other hand, it was a tradition in war to loot the bodies of the slain and the equipment that made a man a "knight" was traditionally forfeit to the individual who defeated him in single combat, even when such combat resulted in one combatant's death. And an outlaw, by definition, was outside the protection of the law.

Re: Creating a fantasy $ system

 

Originally posted by slaughterj

For those of you who have set up prices for a fantasy world or thought much about it, I had a few issues:

 

1. It seems the basis should be as FH has it, setting a rate for manual/unskilled labor rates for a day's work, and then pricing everything else accordingly, i.e., basic food/drink/lodging/clothing must be affordable for that rate (lodging may be tight with family/roommates, and food may be pretty basic, but more than mere bread and water, and occasional extras like clothes (or at least materials to make them), containers for water/food/etc., and minor other objects need to be available). It seems that prices for adventures for these things would generally be higher, e.g., temporary lodging is always more pricey than long-term lodging, especially with privacy desired, food is prepared hot at the inn rather than bought at a market and self-prepared or is prepared for traveling, etc. All that reasonable? Any additional thoughts?

 

Remember also that much of one's labor is compensated directly through food (you grow) housing (you build it) etc rathr than through wages. Another reason why you can charge more is that adventurers are, quite often, in a non-mercantile setting and what they want may be disproportionately valued because it is necessary for the locals. I avoid fixed price lists and instead set ranges and require appropriate skill rolls (though I always make Haggling an everyman skill in this sort of setting).

 

 

 

2. I think it would be useful to know how long it takes to make certain items, from a shirt to a sword, and the costs of materials involved, in order to properly set prices for the sale of such items - any good place to get that sort of info?

 

I am sure there are, but some things are simply not going to be available at any price or at any budget. Importing goods is rare and many communities might have either no one with the skills to make a particular weapon or lack the necessary raw materials (or both). Also time, quality and price are interrelated; to some extent manipulating one can effect the other two. Again, Haggling skill is useful for identifying the difference between actual difficulties and negotiating techniques.

 

3. Certain items like swords or horses often can be priced to a point in a system that it is an incentive for PCs to take them and sell them (e.g., kill 2 thugs in the alley, take their swords and sell them), which seems not very heroic, fantasy-literature-oriented, exciting, etc. This seems to be a factor of (1) such item's prices, (2) the amount of loot handed out, (3) trade-in / sale values of such items (especially as they are used), etc., but other than those, does anyone have any suggested controls for such? One can't have the guards showing up everytime and running them off before they can collect the swords...

 

Any other thoughts?

 

Swords are expensive in more ways than simple monetary value. They require considerable training to use, so anyone openly carrying one probably knows how to use it. Don't give thugs expensive weaponry for the players to barter off. Also, swords are difficult to craft (in most tech levels where they are used) each one can be fairly unique and identifiable so that they can't be easily pawned (particularly if the only person likely to buy them in a particular area is the person who probably forged them in the first place). Swords that are cheap aren't worth selling, more valuable swords are harder to take off their rightful owners and harder to sell.

Re: Low fantasy, anyone?

 

Originally posted by tkdguy

I just want to know how many people prefer low fantasy to high fantasy. I used to love high fantasy, but my interest in it gradually declined. I enjoy historical fantasy; ie set in the real world with little or no magic. I'm talking about stuff like Ivanhoe or the Father Cadfael mysteries. Even movies with wildly inaccurate stories about real people such as Shogun or Braveheart qualify. I'm pretty sure I'm in the minority here, but I can't be the only one who enjoys it.

 

I prefer low fantasy, but what most people call low fantasy I consider high fantasy indeed.

Originally posted by Speedball

Well, others have made many of the important points I would make about the wrath your players have called down upon their heads by switching sides, so I'll just say that I agree with them. Use all those disads to their fullest extent. You don't need to forbid your group from following this course of action. You can just *show* them how dangerous it is to be a traitor.

 

Now, this is all assuming you've done a careful review of al their psych lims and made sure that they're playing the game in character and not--as others have suggested--taking out their campaign issues out on your storyline.

 

Granted, I'm a player rather than a GM, but I would hope that psych lim objections notwithstanding, you allow this. As the GM you help create the world in which the players make decisions. You're not going to agree with those decisions, but as often as possible (maybe after a veiled, or not so veiled warning) GMs should let players control the destiny of their characters. That way the game is more like a partnership rather than one person's view about 'how a story is supposed to go.' I've been lucky enough to play with some *great* GMs over the years who would do just this and, over the long term, it's greatly appreciated and leads to an interesting story.

 

Of course, If I were you, I'd bring on the JLA...the Avengers...and maybe Uatu just for good measure...blow 'em away--but do it with an innocent smile on your face..

 

A little background on me. I am approaching thirty-years of gaming experience, I have played in every genre and in a vast array of systems and I believe conflict is necessary to keep a game going and the more conflict the better. But, I also don't believe that the GM is god nor that the GM is solely responsible for the world or the tone of the game. So, yes give your players hell as villains. But don't do this to be vindictive, do this to keep your game alive. Walking away from a campaign is always the very last resort, because almost any campaign has untapped potential.

Four things come to mind.

 

One. Are the players acting out against you? Have you made them unhappy with the way the world treats them? If so cracking down on them for this will only make things worse. Give them an out, an opportunity to turn this into a sophisticated ruse or to make them victims of a villainous plot. Tailor your game a bit more to their expectations from here on in.

 

Two. Your players, from what I can see, are playing a fairly classic form of comic book villainy; that is they are engaging in pointless acts which are illegal and violent, so if nothing else, you can take advantage of their stupidity. In particular I think the Russian mob boss would be better served using them as a distraction from his real businesses raher than relying upon them and in particular taking full advantage of their aid while giving them nothing in exchange.

 

Three. You want to run a villain campaign? Then you are going to have to find a way to motivate the players. Too much success and there is no point to villainy. After all, it's not reactive like heroism and new challenges do not need to be met. The best way I have found is to make the players very low powered and serving a real master villain who gives them assignements they don't know the significance of, which they can't accomplish on brute power and where losing doesn't end their careers every time. Done right, they could actually become fed up enough with being villains to turn on him and try to be heoes again; which brings me to . . .

 

Four. There is no point in comics where a character can't be rehabilitated and become a hero. Magneto has jumped the fence, Namor has jumped the fence, Thunderbolts, Punisher, Venom et c. In genre it doesn't take that much to turn things around so don't asume you are stuck with either a villain campaign or a dead one. Roll with it and go.

I just don't see any technology penetrating the secret ID of hero/villain of the Captain Marvel style. No one will guess he is really Billy Batson, it won't even be a possibility (and, yes, I know that in the original comic Billy Batson/Capatin Marvel did not have a secret identity and everyone did know, but if he wanted one it wouldn't be hard . . .).

Captain Courage was the first major superhero the world ever knew. He first appeared in he mid 1950s and he has been at the forefront of every serious challenge. But what no one realizes is Courage's powers are based on black sorcery. To renew and create his powers Courage must go on rampages of evil, and adopts the identity of The Monster in order to avoid attention . . .

Originally posted by Blue

Real Science is the enemy of a really good superhero story. From the red sun v. yellow sun effects on kryptonian physiognomy to the super-power inducing effects of cosmic rays (which strangely has not been simulated by any group since the FF).

 

 

Heey, what about the Red Ghost and his super apes, or, many decades later, the U-Foes?

Re: What do you have in your coinpurse?

 

Originally posted by Shaddakim

I'm doing some re-vamp work on my campaign and have a question for everyone:

 

Does the money in your game have specific names for the coins (penny [copper], denarii [silver], noble [gold], bar [platinum]) or do you use the generic version (cp, sp, gp, pp)?

 

I am interested in everyones experience on this. Thank you for your time in advance.

 

Well, usually each authority in my campaigns tends to use only one species when minting coins (silver is preferred) and everyone of them likes to have them be roughly the same value as their competitors, so most tag their size and metal content to the dominant economy, though they might be using a different species for their coins. I try to name two or three of these currencies, but the name of the dominant economy is what is usually used generically.