keithcurtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes That's the one. I was just too lazy to go look it up. Keith "Fetch me another soda while your at it, V." Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes You could be remembering the recent scenes in Thud, where she gets a bit manky in the tunnels. Keith "great scene" Curtis

Re: Comics are getting too steamy...

Re: Comics are getting too steamy... I figured that was a typo for pee-chees. Oh, and without looking at the list, Wendy Pini Trina Robbins Marie Severin Jill Thompson Keith "Not to mention women working in newspaper strips" Curtis

Re: Jetpack for Bicycles Without having read the article, this looks like the "Before" picture from the "Big Coffee Table Book of Don't Do This". Keith "Look Ma, no Haaaaaargh!!!!" Curtis

Re: Enginneered Geisha In my experience, most people have a far longer life span than most machines. Keith "especially complex machines" Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes Talent Situational Awesomeness, 3d6 Aid to characteristic or skill or power required to showcase character and advance plot. May be purchased multiple times. Keith ":)" Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times All this, while technically true, entirely misses the point. Keith "It's not about the realism..." Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes Obviously, we would need benchmarks for what is considered "the best". Lets explore the Primary Characteristics in terms of what character or race epitomizes them STR - Trolls DEX - Vampires? CON - Golems? no, they don't ever get tired. BOD INT - Vetinari EGO - Granny Weatherwax PRE - Carrot COM - Elves? Keith "Any ideas?" Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes I figured that some folks are the epitome of certain characteristics. Carrot would have a 25 PRE, for example, while Granny would have a 25 Ego. Keith "Sorry, 30. She just stared at me." Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times Mister Terrific (TV Series) Mister Terrific (Comics) Keith "learning new stuff" Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times The problem I always had with Mr. Terrific, is how can you Play Fair when you're objectively better than everyone else? Keith "His costume should keep one arm tied behind his back" Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes OK, the final version (barring minor edits) is up. Keith "I hate writing the background stuff" Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes Wizards seem to need to prepare specific spells, though they can store quite a number of them in staffs and such. As stated, their biggest drawback is too much used by the inexperienced draws attention from the Dungeon Dimensions. With witches, it brings on the cackle, gingerbread cottages and oven doors: Black Alys. It's an interesting contrast that the greatest threat to a wizard's misuse of power comes from the outside, while a witch's danger comes from within. Granny certainly goes to enormous lengths to avoid magic-dependance, such as the business with stopping the sword at the Opera House. Keith "I love talking Discworld" Curtis

Re: Character: Sam Vimes He's already so loaded with psych lims, I could keep piling them on all day. That should probably be a personality quirk, since he has used magic in the past (he uses an imp for filing, a broomstick-enhanced cart in Thud!, etc.) His Danger sense should cover that. Beyond that, he's got buckets of things like Deduction, Criminology, etc. That's a good point and should be in there. His Ankh-Morpork City and Culture knowledge combined with high Streetwise should cover that. I'm loathe to add more than necessary to an already admittedly costly character. I think maybe a Public ID might be in order. That would also cover how his enemies know where to find him. Definitely The biggest hurdle I face in writing up some characters is how to handle magic. Beyond a could of general rules, Discworld magic isn't terribly detailed. I'd like to just give characters like Mustrum Ridcully or Granny Weatherwax a general power number indicating the levelof stuff they can do. Maybe a VPP with a few standard limitations? BTW, as said above, the book is "Thud!". Bonk is the name of the Uberwald town in "The Fifth Elephant." Keith "Thanks for the suggestions" Curtis

Re: The Genesis of +5 = 2x power?

Re: Character: Tarzan I'm going to impart a story wherein I received a great leeson from no less a GM than Darren Watts. This was in his Pulp All-Stars game, wherin I played Tarzan. Now Darren's write-up was different in that it did have Swinging, Acrobatics and so forth. As I said above, it's a style judgement call. Now, there's an emergency and the various pulp all-stars have to leave a hotel to get to Central Park in a hurry. I, as Tarzan, leap from the window and proceed to make my way there by running along drain pipes, telephone lines, signs, flagpoles, etc. Darren required no roll on this. One of the players asked, "Can he do that?" to which Darren casually replied with a phrase I shall never forget, and have put down into my GM Ten Commandments: "Dude, he's F---in' Tarzan!" Four simple words (expletive softened), that say so much. There are times to just ignore the rules in any system. He could have had me make various rolls and such. But then there is the possibility of failure in a moment solely dedicated to advancing the story by getting the characters into the action. Additionally, this is the character's schtick. Failure serves no purpose other than to make the hero look unheroic. Just do it. Can he? Of course he can: "Dude, he's F---in' Tarzan!" This become an occasional catch phrase I or my players invoke when we realize we are focussing on the dissecting rules rather than having fun being heroes. Can the hero show off fancy swordplay to impress a bunch of raw recruits? He's got buckets of combat skills and he's a hero. Just before I'm about to ask for some roll, the player says, "Dude, he's F---in' Tarzan!" And then I'm reminded of why we are there. Now if it were a major plot point: Tarzan must swing across a gorge to grab a hand grenade and throw it back into a machine gun nest before the girl is blown to bits, then yeah, use the rules. But for the most part, when your whole purpose is to be a hero: "Dude, he's F---in' Tarzan!" Keith "Thanks, Darren" Curtis

Re: Character: Tarzan

Re: The Genesis of +5 = 2x power? As I said earlier, I don't even know what "twice as intelligent" could possibly mean. Either in real world or game terms. It's just smart and smarter, or dumb and dumber. Equating it to real world benchmarks is a vain attempt, because there are no real world benchmarks for intelligence. Not any that anyone agrees on, anyway. Keith "STR is unique among characteristics" Curtis

Re: Character: Tarzan These are just from the first volume. There are countless other examples. Keith "seems the simplest solution" Curtis

Re: The Genesis of +5 = 2x power? I think the "rule" only existed when describing power, like Strength or Energy Blast. I'm not sure what "twice as intelligent" or "twice as dextrous" would even mean, nor how one could quantifiably measure them in the real world, let alone a game system. Keith "needs several +5 pts. to my bank account" Curtis

Re: Character: Tarzan I agree with Flight, given the description in the book of how he actually travels. Vine swinging is a Hollywood invention. He could probably use Environmental Freedom, since he routinely travels with ease through areas civilized men would find impenetrable. Is the Stretching to represent the lasso? Also, is there a reason he is buying his equipment with points? Finally, should LANG: Ape be LANG: Mangani? Keith "Kreeg-ah!" Curtis

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times I knew posting something from the dregs of my childhood memories without corroborating research would come back and bite me on the behind. Keith "OK, how about Pureheart the Powerful?" Curtis

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

Re: Top 10 List of the Lamest Superheroes of All Times Hey! He was only trying to help... Keith "The X-men need a fifth dimensional imp to lighten things up" Curtis