transmetahuman

Re: Evil Corporation: Magewerks

Re: Evil Corporation: Magewerks Nice! I like the imagination-and-whimsy face of the corporation, and the idea of a not-so-evil Evil Corporation. The first thing that came to mind is the name, and how PCs would jump on it. I'm guessing that the world at large is one of those "doesn't believe in magic, rationalizes all magical supers as having a different power source, and the magical types prefer it that way" places? What about the people in R&D? I guess what I'm saying is, how easy will it be to keep the secret that there's magic involved in the tech with all the clues that a typical supers world (and the name) provide?

Re: Wold Newton Scenario: Fonzie and Batman

Re: Wild Card's Hero

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group...

Re: The Brat Pack My God. Think of the people who actually started on comics with something like this. If "started" would be the right word.

Re: Not the Dark Age -- the Dork Age! There was a power mimic on one of the New Mutants teams that was like this. Fun, fun.

Re: Plainclothes Champions (Disclaimer: Haven't read the book in question) That covers virtually every contemporary-setting game that is likely to use HERO except the traditional supers game. Almost every game premise I've come up with would qualify - the hidden extended family with single powers, the Buffyesque supernatural game, the died-and-came-back-as-archetypes/godlings game, the Wild Cards variant game... Probably the first thing to decide is whether the public at large know about the people with powers, whether you want to game the social upheaval when they do find out, or, if not, what incentives you can give your players (and NPCs) to keep their power use discreet. The other big one is coming up with a reason for the PCs to stick together, since there isn't the built-in tradition of superpowered crimefighting teams. What goal do they all share, and what kinds of conflicts will that bring? It could be as simple as "escape from the men in black that want to find out how we tick". Oh, also - usually these kinds of settings have one basic reason behind all the powers. The Wild Card virus, the family bloodline, mutation, the magic returns, alteration by benevolent kidnappers from the future, brain tumors let you manipulate "quantum"... Come up with one that gives a lot of wiggle room, but gives some structure (goldfish might/can't get powers, powers do/don't manifest in the womb, powers are/aren't contagious, etc.) - or come up with some reason that all these different sources of power just happen to become evident now, and haven't already changed society. I guess the underlying assumption I'm making is that a "Plainclothes Champions" game is intended to be more plausible than standard comic book universes.

Re: [Review] The Ultimate Energy Projector I'm very sorry to say this, but I was very disappointed with this book. It's probably the most regretted games-related purchase I've ever made. Sooooo much space is taken up by repetitive boilerplate like this stuff: "(SFX type 1) (SFX type 2) has no special interaction with (SFX type 1); it neither gains nor loses against this special effect. (SFX type 3) (SFX type 3) has no special interaction with (SFX type 1); it neither gains nor loses against this special effect." On and on for pages. It would have been simple to just list the pairs that do have interesting interactions - and avoid the appearance that the author was just padding a very thin book. At least separate out the elements/energies that, since they only exist in fiction, don't really have special interactions with much of anything. The suffocation rules were pretty disappointing, too; overly complex, clunky, and clearly too expensive. Yes, you can build a spoon out of HERO Powers; that doesn't mean it's worth 35 points. Like the Time Stop power I remember Steve once wrote up, it reads more like an argument for "why the GM shouldn't let anyone take it" than an attempt to make a useful rule. I understand why so many of the items in the book refer the reader to other HERO books for explanations, and that aspect didn't really bother me much - but it does add to the sense of getting ripped off when put in the context of the rest of the book. I'm starting to think Steve's writing style is too dry and mechanical for my tastes, too. Precise, but not always easy to grasp - much like a legal document. Actually, yeah, this reminded me a little of the 401 (K) documentation that I was reading this morning. There are some good nuggets in there, but I think this is gonna be the first game book I ever put up on ebay. Sorry to be so harsh.

Re: Am I the only one who ever noticed... I'm more flabbergasted that there are TVs in Atlantis and Paradise Island... manufactured to resemble sea-fronds and stone columns, respectively. But, yeah, the dialogue there is pretty jarring. Not because it's slang, or even old alang, but because thse two characters never talk that way otherwise.

Re: What were the best Marvel titles of the 70's? You're not alone. I've also wondered whether the ability to come in, utterly ignore the stories before yours so you can add your own flavor of pee to the mix... Ahem*. I mean, whether the lack of any continuity in the overall feeling for the characters has contributed to the downfall in quality. Weak editors share some of the blame for this, but maybe writers who felt more personal commitment for the stories they write would be a good thing. Ain't gonna happen, though. *Sorry. Just finished reading the FF TPB for Civil War, from my local library. Can't seem to get that taste out of my mouth.

Re: Hero's List Well, yes and no. The way super-villains are usually depicted, this is exactly what I meant. But I loved Tarnished Angel (didn't remember the minor gay character though) and Steeljack; it's probably my all-time favorite Astro City story. I'm not surprised it had exactly the kind of sympathetic depiction of a gay super-villain I was talking about.

Re: Jumper I didn't realize 'til I poked around yesterday that Jumper (the novel) has two sequels: Reflex and Jumper: Griffin's Story. Looks like the latter explains the second jumper character in the movie.

Re: Jumper Hadn't noticed the semi. In the book he could only 'port with whatever he could lift off the ground - if only for a fraction of a second. Agreed about most superhero movies sucking - and about the fact that I'm usually willing to give them a try anyway. Despite what I said above, this will probably be more of a sci-fi movie than a superhero movie, though. In the book, he's sympathetic and at times heroic, but he doesn't exactly put on spandex to fight crime.

Re: Jumper Oh, WOW! I haven't seen a trailer that made me this excited in ages! Clearly strongly based on the novel of the same name (the added second jumper character is the only significant change I can see), which is good because I loved the novel. Hermit: if it's as much like the book as I think, the protagonist does get in some super-heroing, though costumeless. And super-villainy, come to think of it. Definite must-see for me. Thanks for the heads up! Edit: here's a link to the book on Amazon: Jumper by Steven Gould

Re: Mad, Beautiful Ideas That sounds like a cute idea for a convention one-shot, with the PCs as the kittens. Kind of a nuclear Watership Down...

Re: Hero's List Speaking as a gay guy myself, I have to agree with most of the posters here - though reading that list all the way through was starting to get to me in aggregate. Gays didn't really start appearing in comics until we were pretty much into the Iron Age, when truly horrific things started happening to everyone, and depictions of corrupt "heroes" were popular. I missed most of the storylines he lists (not entirely unrelated to the last sentence), so I don't know the context a lot of this stuff happened in. Didn't even know a lot of these characters were gay! But bad stuff happens to all supers. I agree with OddHat's take on the Watchmen, and I thought the guys in Young Avengers were done well. Northstar was always pretty much a jerk; I'd tend to believe his character was unpopular because of that more than because of his mostly closeted (as far as I read) sexuality. The astrally projecting gay guy killed by Wolvesbane was totally an accident, IIRC, and had nothing to do with him being gay. There's contention online that Zach on NBC's Heroes was nixed because the actor (or possibly his agent) didn't want to play a gay character - possibly because of another role the actor was hoping to get. It might or might not have had anything to do with the show's creators or higher-ups, and it might just have been that the actor couldn't do both roles at once, and took the more lucrative one. There's a thread about it over on NGD somewhere. I wouldn't expect to see many positive portrayals of homosexuality in villains because, well, they're the villains (though it could be done, and might be neat to see). I'd never even heard of Freedom Ring, but with a name like that, I suspect the character wasn't popular because no one really likes characters who blatantly only exist to promote an agenda, however palatable the agenda. Wouldn't you be leery about a hero named Black Pride? Or the heroic, self-sacrificing exploits of Diversity Man? No one likes being preached to. Okay, point is, I think the author of the list is reaching too hard. He's definitely describing some of that stuff from a skewed perspective based on what I've read, which makes me suspicious of the stuff that I haven't read. On the other hand, some of the list is disturbing - the Bruce Banner in the YMCA thing, for instance, and the sheer number of weak or comedic examples. I don't doubt that some creators are grinding some pretty ugly axes, and some are apparently just laughably misinformed (Electro needed to find a shapeshifting prostitute? Has he been to NYC?). If someone were to argue that character deaths are proportionate with character popularity, and that openly gay characters tend not to be as popular, I wouldn't really disagree. But I don't see any conspiracy in it at this point. I've got pretty much the same attitude about the Women in Refrigerators list, actually. Disturbing in aggregate, but I'd like to see someone do a similar list for straight white males some day. As another poster said, things are changing. I've lived long enough to appreciate just how much has changed for the better, faster than I ever would have believed. Support it. If you're not a comics writer, support it with your dollar, and maybe write some letters when you see something you dislike, and remember to write supportive letters when you see something you do like. Edit: I'd normally be interested in his book Hero - I'm always up for novels about superheroes, and the gay protagonist would just be icing on the cake. But that list doesn't inspire confidence in the writer.

Re: STRONGHOLD -- What Do You Want To See? It's a CU-specific book, so a few years from now when everyone loses their powers so they can become cyberpunks, I doubt Stronghold will be maintained. I'm resigned to the near-certainty that the stuff I'd most want to see will be excluded for much the same reason - it's a CU book, and the CU does have technology that can deal with powers. But I'd really love some exploration (maybe from the earliest days of Stronghold?) of what happens to the criminal justice system when the state of the art can't guarantee imprisonment. It's just always bugged me that the same force field enhancement will work against the vibrating speedster, the girl who can turn herself into a stream of neutrinos, and the mystic who transforms into ectoplasm. I like SFX-driven countermeasures better than game mechanical ones - and most of my campaign world ideas don't include super-tech anyway. But like I said, I don't expect to see anything about this in a book set in the CU. Even I don't think it would be appropriate (except maybe in a historical sidebar, wish wish). So, back to more constructive suggestions! Sorry for the tangent. How about some overview of the process by which the techs determine which powers they need to plan for? Is it all just based on a bio-scan plus collecting anecdotal lists of what the villain has been observed to do in the past? What kinds of things will a full examination tell them, and what ace-in-the-hole powers might slip by? What do they do with criminals whose powers they haven't figured out how to neutralize, and who have the right life support that hot sleep isn't an option? Also, what about super-powered arrestees who haven't yet been convicted? Do they go to Stronghold to await trial? Are they put in with the regular population?

Re: Some help with a foe for a wind manipulator please Yeah, air loves a vacuum, it always dives right into the party. But it was funnier without us picking at it.

Re: Your Character/Game Equation I always thought of the contemptuous-of-humans, aquatic Captain Trips alter-ego from the Wild Cards books when you've written about him. No connection? Or did you just figure it was too obscure a reference to use in the equation?

Re: writers block Squish two things together that were never squished together before. Add more to taste. Aspects of other characters, bits from stories/movies/etc... even just random words from the dictionary. Then try to imagine what, say, "lentils", "plagiarism", "Orion", and the last scene from Revenge of the Jedi have to do with this character. Speaking of which, does anyone know where to find a really big list of words that can all be used to describe people? Not a dictionary or thesaurus; a list that's already filtered. I must have planned to make one a dozen times, and wished for one a hundred times, but the project is a little daunting (meaning "sounds like it'd be a lot of not-very-interesting dogwork").

Re: Your Character/Game Equation Steve Urkel? Plus Booster Gold? Sweet Jesus. And your fellow players haven't killed you* yet? *You, not the PC...

Re: Universal Translator and Cyphers It would depend on the SFX... and there aren't a lot of SFX for a truly universal translator ability, that works on written stuff, that make sense. Akashic access or picking up psychic vibes left by the writer might let you decipher or even decode. "Super pattern recognition" probably should; after all that's how they break ciphers in real life. A limited UT "Only for languages in this vast database" obviously wouldn't. A spell of translation might go either way. I'm having a hard time reaching for other SFX; it's always been a tough one.

Re: Heroes The build-the-nuke-effect posts reminded me that I'm wondering how the U.S. military people who are monitoring radar for missiles (or just air traffic control people) are going to react to Peter and Nathan's not-particularly-inconspicuous kaboom. I'm sorta hoping the writers don't address the issue, actually (unusual though it is for me to root for plot-driven implausibilities and inconsistencies). I'd like to put off as long as possible the point where the whole deal about people with powers goes public. I can't see it going any way other than paranoia and/or celebrity status, almost certainly more the former, and I'm really, really tired of that stuff. Don't need another 4400, please.

Re: I have created a Regulation Act Telepathy? Clairsentience? Precognition?