keithcurtis

Re: Heroes for HERO?

I see Sylar's ability as a large VPP. He only gets to add slots when he does whatever he does with the brains.

Claire should have some Unluck. If she didn't have regeneration, she'd be dead or mangled ten times over. I realize the audience needs to see her ability once in a while to remind them what she can do, but the number of mutilations she goes through is staggering.

Keith "weird juxtaposition of images to have the cutest cast member go through the most horrific effects" Curtis

Re: Order of the Stick

I figure Miko's gotta be pretty rattled. That loss of confidence will count for a lot. Also, if her sword just happens to be a Holy Avenger (she was the top paladin), it's now just a sword. I think the Order can take her.

I don't know about resurrecting Shojo. It happens in the strip, but feels wrong somehow. My guess is that there will be extenuating circumstances (like, no time before Xykon attacks).

Keith "Not sure if there even is a +5 Holy Avenger in edition 3.5" Curtis

Re: Conditional Reputations?

Is never "never killed anyone" necessarily positive? I can think of any number of ways it could be used against him.

"Stand back Heroman, or I'll shoot your girlfriend!"

"Now, now Captain Villain, you and I both know you won't pull that trigger."

"Curses!"

Keith "He's gotta say, 'curses', 'cause he's Golden Age" Curtis

Re: Heroes for HERO?

Good write-up on Claire, but I question the need for a 20 Dex. I would think a 12 or 13 would be more than generous. Nikki is the one with superhuman reflexes.

Keith "Liked her bonus disad" Curtis

Re: Heroes for HERO?

Pls watch the spoilers.

Why?

I don't mean to be a pain, but why would anyone go to a thread that discusses a show if they didn't want to talk about or hear about the show? Heroes is the only show to my knowledge that does this. If you don't want to know about the show in advance, wait until you have seen the episodes before going to a thread that talks about them. If I don't want to know anything about a movie before I have seen it, I don't go to a thread that talks about it. I wait.

It's like walking into a room where everyone is talking about what happened on a show last night, insinuating yourself into the conversation and then insisting that everyone whisper or talk about something else. If you don't want to know, don't look.

I know we have these neat spoiler tags. They are useful in some situations, but it's a pain in the neck to read a thread that is littered with them in every other post.

Susano asked for write-ups. Admittedly, he's on episode three, but he probably is not too worried about spoilers in his own thread if he's asking for write-ups.

Gojira, this was not directed specifically at you. Please don't think I'm picking on you. It's just that I see this all the time in the main Heroes thread and I just can't understand it.

Keith "Am I crazy?" Curtis

Re: Chimpira's Art Dump

Nothing to be afraid of posting there, Chimpira. Haven basically said all the nice things I was going to say. Very nice. The Dynamic linework more than makes up for any perceived lack of dynamic posing. Nice expressions!

Keith "one of my weak points" Curtis

Re: QuestionL Would you consider this unfair or rail roading?

I would have set up the scenario so that there was a reasonable chance for the heroes to have averted the situation in the first place. Presenting it as a fait accompli and then not being willing to be creative with solutions is railroading. It might be the angsty thing your players like, but presenting an unavoidable situation without resolution is not a game. It's improv theater.

Keith "YMMV" Curtis

Re: If Marvel and DC really *do* collapse

I've been feeling for a while that both Marvel and DC need to "reboot." Pretty much since the start of the whole "Identity Crises" and "Civil War" storylines. I think both companies need to bring back artists' date=' writers, and especially editors who actually [i']like [/i]superheroes and superheroics. Then both companies need to take a couple months off, issue some type of apology for the last few years ("We're sorry. We're gonna come back and do it right. We promise never to mess up that bad again."), and relaunch everything.

Won't work. You can't please everyone. Some people like the current mess, and reboots haven't solved anything yet. You'd get just as many people, if not more, complaining that "Character X was ruined in the re-boot".

Keith "Buy what you like and let the market work it out" Curtis

Re: Swallowing a Man Whole

I wasn't against modeling it. I just didn't think it was something a character needed to pay points for. To use the example above, slamming shipping containers down on someone probably is modeled as an entangle, for combat purposes. But the character shouldn't pay for the ability.

Keith "That's the way I'd run it, anyway" Curtis

Re: Swallowing a Man Whole

I suppose you might feel compelled to model this, simply so the characters can react to it, but I don't know if I'd make a creature who happens to be larger than a human pay points for the ability. It just is.Otherwise, why not have ALL characters buy it? A human might be able to swallow a pixie.

Keith "for certain values of pixie" Curtis

Re: Flash Gordon Series News

I feel the same way. At the very least it looked (all things considered) like the old comic strip, which was nice since that, for me anyway, was the strong point of the strip.

 

I have an old Starlog magazine that had a small article about it that showed an unused scene where Ming is communicating with Hitler(!) I can see why they decided to cut that bit, but it would have given the whole thing an interesting twist, if nothing else.

I don't remember communication, but I definitely remember him watching Hitler on a video screen and referring to him as "my friend". If the scene wasn't used on Saturday morning, maybe it was restored when they folded the "best parts" into the two hour primetime TV movie.

Keith "Remembers thinking it was cool that Hawkmen died" Curtis

Re: The new face of Iron Man

Well it can't be the real shield, 'cause it's all busted up an' stuff.

Keith "should be tougher than any armor Stark can make" Curtis

Re: Plucking Out Eyes

Yeah Hit Locations and Disabling, but I'd modify that by genre. In some games, I feel that an eye pop is extreme, for instance, four color supers, or some kinds of High Romance Adventure. I'd never pop out Tarzan's eye, for instance.

In that case, I'd go for a temporary blinding caused by swelling. ("My man's cut, my man's bleedin'!")

I'd reserve true ocular removal for gruesome or gritty stories ("Out, vile jelly!")

On the other hand for a bloody Hong Kong Theater Secret Move, I could see it as a power.

Keith "kudos to quote spotters" Curtis

Re: The new face of Iron Man

I cant reveal how I got it because it may cost me my job (and no, I dont work for Marvel)

Keith "I can't tell you how I know this because it's privileged information" Curtis

Re: If Marvel and DC really *do* collapse

Tpb?

"Trade PaperBack"

A "graphic novel" format that reprints a particular run of a given comic. It's the reason why so many comic stories are planned for 6-8 issue arcs these days. Comics are periodicals and must be replaced month per month and either remaindered or put into inventory. Trade paperbacks can be ordered in smaller quantities, at need, and remain on the shelf until sold. They are "evergreen" products. That is, ones upon which the initial outlay has been made and hopefully recouped, and which can do nothing now but sit on the shelf and wait to be converted into money.

Keith "verbose" Curtis

Re: One Finger Hand Stand

I'm very suspicious.

Keith "But I'm a natural skeptic" Curtis

Re: Flash Gordon Series News

I actually liked the Filmation version better than the campy movie.

Keith "But not Filmation's cheesy second series" Curtis

Re: Sulfur hexafluoride in action

Yes' date=' but it said "Sound does not travel as fast in this medium" which would be an incorrect statement if it's [b']denser[/b] than air.

 

Your voice pitch may lower for the reasons you sighted, but that has nothing to do with how fast sound travels. Sound is a wave function, the denser the medium the faster the wave travels - so you get a fast travelling low pitched voice.

Actually, a very quick perusal of a variety of sites indicates that this is not precisely the truth for gases. For example, monoatomic gases transmit sound faster than molecular gasses (Hydrogen is faster than breathing air, for example). Also, the density of the air has little to do with the speed, unlike most solids. Air under pressure does not conduct sound significantly faster or slower. The temperature and the composition have a lot more to do with it. I admit that most of the math I found was beyond me, but that's what five minutes of research turned up.

Keith "live and learn" Curtis

Re: Discworld HERO

Respect? Or fear?

'Mrs Cake? What's a Mrs Cake?'

'You have ... ghastly Things from the Dungeon Dimensions and things, yes? Terrible hazards of your ungodly profession?' said the Chief Priest.

'Yes.'

'We have someone called Mrs Cake.'

Keith "We need to see more of Chief Priest Ridcully" Curtis

Re: Parasite/Rogue Effect

If it's a villain, it just happens. I'm perfectly fine with plot devices as NPCs. For Heroes, I'd go with a suppress/vpp combination, after exhausting myself trying to convince the player to choose another concept.

Keith "Mister Simple" Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

Just consulted Wikipedia.

Golden Age Aquaman had super strength and communicated with sea life like porpoises by "speaking their language". He was also fully human, the son of a scientist who found the ruins of (presumably) Atlantis, and raised his son underwater. All sorts of scientific secrets were used to give him his abilities.

Silver Age eventually developed telepathy, had normal strength and a half-Atlantean origin.

Keith "Thank you, O Wiki Oracle" Curtis

Re: Discworld HERO

You're just traveling down the other trouser leg of time...

Keith "assuming mutual definition of soda, again" Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

From reading the old Aquaman stories as a kid, and the cartoon, all I remember is breathing underwater, swimming really, really fast, and commanding and talking to sealife.

Most of his stories (like so much silver age - I can't really speak to golden age, since at the time I had no way of knowing what was new and what was a reprint), revolved around creatively solving problems using sea life. He was gimmicky.

Keith "impressions and experience only, no claims are made to scholarly research" Curtis

Re: Discworld HERO

There are tons of witches. From Wikipedia:

1 The Lancre Coven

1.1 Esmeralda Weatherwax

1.2 Gytha Ogg

1.3 Magrat Garlick

1.4 Agnes Nitt

2 Tiffany Aching

3 Other Witches

3.1 Sarah 'Granny' Aching

3.2 Gammer Beavis

3.3 Gwinifer "Old Mother" Blackcap

3.4 Aliss Demurrage

3.5 Old Mother Dismass

3.6 Mrs Letice Earwig

3.7 Hilta Goatfounder

3.8 Erzulie Gogol

3.9 Petulia Gristle

3.10 Ammeline 'Goodie' Hamstring

3.11 Annagramma Hawkin

3.12 Dimmity Hubbub

3.13 Miss Level

3.14 Miss Tick

3.15 Diamanda Tockley

3.16 Eumenides Treason

3.17 Lucy Warbeck

3.18 Alison Weatherwax

4 Fairy godmothers

4.1 Desiderata Hollow

4.2 Lily Weatherwax

Keith "Wikipedia - Source of all pop culture knowledge" Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times

Aquaman gets screwed by unimaginative writers. At the depths he can survive at he should be immensely strong and resilient to damage. In the thin air of the surface world he should move like John Carter on Mars. His senses are hyper-acute' date=' probably enough so that Wolverine would slink away in shame. He was born and raised in a 3-dimensional environment so he should be a phenomenal pilot and tactician. And he is able to project his will onto others. Arthur rocks.[/quote']

 

I've never bought that explanation. Most deep sea creatures are pretty filmy, flimsy things that die long before you can get them to the surface. Make hims stronger, faster, whatever, that's fine. But don't use the "I can survive the bottom of the sea" excuse.

 

Aquaman's retconned super strength and toughness are a by-product of the post-Silver Age, when comic book characters are far, far, far more dependent on fight scenes.

 

Keith "I don't know you, so lets fight for six pages" Curtis