Ravor

Re: There's a Hole in the Planet Honestly, it seems to me like the hole would probably just colaspe somewhere behind him but if it didn't then my gut ruling would be that Earth just got two new volcanoes with nasty first eruptions.

Re: How can mutants be discriminated against while other "supers" get a pass? Well, the way I see it, the poster who basically stated that most of the anti-mutant hate stems from the fact that the muties have decided to band together against the norms has it the issue square on its head. Try driving in a liberal area with a Tea Party bumper sticker and time how long it takes before your car gets keyed, on the converse, walk in a conservative area with a Planned Parenthood button and see the types of reactions you get. The modern anti-mutant bigotry has far less to do with racism or sexual discrimation then it does with the way political parties treat each other. As for the reason that non-mutant Supers have it easier, well, quite simply because they didn't decide to band together in a us-vs-them mentality at the first sign of fear from the norms. I would also argue that the various non-mutant supers have been registered and are being watched by the government sans any law, but the shear number of mutants coupled with the fact that most of them would rather slink in the shadows as opposed to stepping out in the open with the notable exception of the terrorists who want their own fracking country (Wonder how many non-mutants get visas to visit or live there?) makes the unoffical status quo impossible. *EDIT* Just look at the reaction in the mutant community the moment one of them wishes to get rid of a handicap such as never being able to touch another living being, ID Politics is a double-edged sword at best and turning on your own when they don't want to toe the party line makes it all the worse.

Ok, I'm still more then alittle at the sheer joyful flexibilty of the Hero system but while playing with the Hero Designer (I'm afraid that the mere thought of building powers "by hand" made my head explode.) a couple of questions have cropped up. One of the characters is perhaps best described as a "Cosmic Energy Power Plant", forever hunted by a race of ghost-like beings with destrubingly similiar powers that need to use her to regain their physical bodies (they currently burn out the souls of humans to exist in the physical realm as gradually rotting shape shifting husks). Now, she has two basic "modes", the first involves allowing her natural power to surge into the real world, giving her basic blaster powers and increased protection. Her supressed mode allows her the ability to blend in with humanity. ( 1 ) How many points if any would a modified version of the lockout limitation be worth if she loses the ability to change her physical form while in "blaster mode" BUT does not revert form. This would be shared by almost all of her blaster powers, in fact, whatever "super stats" she might buy will most likely be bought as powers and linked as only being active when her damage shield is powered up. (The damage shield has no END cost so it isn't too big of a deal.) Her shape shifting ability is fairly powerful, she can't copy people but is typically rather beautiful (makeover), and doesn't really have a "true form" anymore (END cost only to change shapes, persistant), and can only shift into female humanoids, clothing and distictive features not affected. ( 2 ) The ability to "burn out" somebody from the inside out would best be similated by taking the "Indirect" (Source and Path is different each time +1), NND (Resistent ED defined as Force Fields, All-or-nothing +1), and Line-of-Sight (+1/2) ... Best if used with some form of pentrative targeting of course ... ( 3 ) As long as a power doesn't have the "always on" modifier, it can be turned off, does that also apply to super stats as well?

Re: Alternate Sexualities in Champions and Supers settings Is my memory failing me or wasn't the original "Superman" character supposed to be a Nazi villian only to be regected and revamped as the all American hero?

Re: How much damage done "the chair" do? Well to be fair, isn't Supes immune to pretty much everything except Magic and Red Radition?

Re: I made the GM cry.... Details?

Re: Alternate Sexualities in Champions and Supers settings Clark Kent doesn't exist to protect Superman from us, he exists to keep Superman sane and able to relate to us mere mortals. However with that said, despite being born on another planet, Superman never really came across to me as repersenting being an "alien", after all he looks exactly like us and has no memories of Krypton, ect. Hell, other then some meaningless fluff the character would be the same if Papa Kent was biten by a radioactive snake and Mama Kent stumbled into a crater and had her genes twisted by the strange influence of Energy Z. Actual "true aliens" remain just as scary post Superman as then were pre Superman.

Re: What to do with Mars Personally I think I'd do the Mars from the newest version of Doom, a planet of ancient ruins and molding tech that if poked at will tear open the fabric of time/space straight into whatever hellish realm of your choice.

Re: Repercussions of mass-producing comic book technology And of course, you always have the Riech 5 worlds.

Re: Repercussions of mass-producing comic book technology True, but where we disagree is that I don't consider a mere generation or two as being a long time even when those generations are measured as a century or so, remember that human lifespan has already been extended by at least two fold and our mortality rate has been vastly decreased just an eye blink in the past. And as a result of those changes our civilization has voluntarily changed our repoductive habits, no oppressive Big Brother goverment program necessary or wanted. Remember that many of the same predictions people are making on these boards were made in real life just a handful of decades ago, they were wrong then and would be wrong again. Hmm, the public reasction to trans-dimensional transport, well I think it largely depends on whether or not if return trips are possible and how hard it is to make the journey.

Re: I made the GM cry.... Hmm, might not be Golden Age but it seems to me that the "correct" way to deal with the big bad in that case would be to mindwipe the entire group and then alpha-strike the only guy left standing.

Re: Repercussions of mass-producing comic book technology I have to once again disagree, you are assuming that in the long, long term humanity is unable or unwilling to adapt to the new population norms, remember that it really wasn't that long ago where it was considered normal for a family to have five or more children with the expectation of a couple of them surviving to adulthood, I could've swore that I heard somewhere that some of the First World Countries would actually have some small population decline sans immigration (As a disclaimier I've never fact checked that statement myself so YMMV.). The tech being discussed isn't the fountain of youth, at it's core it simply doubles the human lifespan which is something that has happened in the last century, and last time I checked, the dire warnings of the population bomb destroying us all before the year 2000 has simply been wrong. Now to take us back into a more comic book feel, for a moment lets assume that a longer life does turn mankind into a mindless locus swarm that devours the entire universe, well, once we've outgrown Universe 001 then we turn our eye towards Universe 002 and let the invasion begin, I'm sure that a campaign or two could be wrangled out of that concept.

Re: Repercussions of mass-producing comic book technology You know, it seems to me that with the various supertech that has been suggested the "population bomb" caused by smarter/healther/longer lived humans doesn't have to be a bad thing, for starters, Earth has alot more room once the bottom of the Oceans become colonized, and mankind will reach for the stars once we actually outgrow Sol III. "Go west young man." was the motto of the past, the settlers of the future will say things like "Mars or bust!", and "The roads of Tae Ceta are paved with gold."

Re: Alternate Sexualities in Champions and Supers settings I agree wholeheartly IF being 'X' is an issue in the setting then it is worth points, the problem is that the vibe I was getting didn't include that context. As an example it's my opinion that being flamboyantly anything should be worth points in a campaign with serious tones and that keeping a secret is still "merely" keeping a secret whether it is about your sexuality or some other tidbit you are willing to take steps to keep people from discovering and should be worth the same points. Now, on the other hand, if you are playing in a setting where being homosexual means imprisionment and/or death then of course it is worth the same number of points as any other secret that would result in the character's confinement/death.

Re: ...And now the city is mine to control! Muahahahaha!!! Both have been mentioned, but personally I like the combo of Mega Forceshield coupled with Doomsday Weapon set to go off ala John Crichton in Farscape. (Basically if any of his bio readings went beyond norms the nuke would blow, of course in that setting mind rapes was coupled with either crippling heat blasts or brain surgery so our would-be villian has best have some defense against telepaths if he wants to keep his city.)

Re: Alternate Sexualities in Champions and Supers settings Hmm, "outing" one of the blank slate NPCs? A bit of a grey area I suppose, my gut reaction is that I would rather tread carefully so as to not interfer with people's internal vision of them, I imagine that it would be jarring if a character's NPC lover suddenly had his/her sexual preference stated and it didn't match with the campaign. (Sure, I understand Rule Zero and all, but I know it would leave a bad taste in my mouth if it happened to me.) However, given the shear number of NPC writeups over the years I see it as probably being unavoidable in a pratical sense. And yeah, I agree that in some settings being homosexual would be an issue worth points, I just don't believe that it should be in most Supers as I'm of the (possibly incorrect) mindset that once you introduce beings that can fly, breathe fire, and read/control minds the average bigot will have a much bigger and better target than most current real world targets. I think Shadowrun said it best with "Who cares what color of skin your nieghbor has when that THING over there is ten feet tall and has horns?"

Re: Need some ideas for powers in a cyber eye... Seems to me that it might not be unreasonable for the eye to be able to record images, ect and upload them to a computer, perferably an implanted one of course. This way she could quickly skim through documents in the field and then read them in relative safety elsewhere, or with a radio link have someone monitering whatever she is looking at to point out things she might have missed or talk her through some situation she isn't familair with.

Re: I made the GM cry.... megaplayboy have you been evesdropping on me, cause that sounds alot like my group.

Re: Alternate Sexualities in Champions and Supers settings I don't know, on one hand I guess that I wouldn't mind new characters that happened to be gay or bisexual or whatever else but retconning existing characters would royally upset me. The only quible that I really have with the idea is the vibe that I get from a few posts in this thread that suggest that being homosexual should be worth actual points over being hetrosexual in a setting that quite frankly, whatever stigma that might exist in the real world happens off screen if at all.

Re: "Holy Silver Age, Batman!" Thanks.

Re: I made the GM cry.... Gotta love the OP's group, although personally I think I would have awarded the bonus XP but have retconned a little alarm in the villian's head provided that I thought the villian would have been smart enough to think of it. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe in screwing the PCs over but at the same time I understand that sometimes the various NPCs are simply going to be smarter than I am.

Re: "Holy Silver Age, Batman!" Mandate would probably wind up causing far, far more damage then the villians could dream of ever doing. After she learnt her lesson the hard way she'd wait until they had "escaped" and were well away from anything breakable before even trying to do anything.