Dr. Anomaly

Yup, Sylvester McCoy made it across to here. I didn't like his Doctor much at first (and Ace really annoys me) but I grew to like him, and there were some very neat storys that took place during his tenure as the Doctor.

I've done a LOT of alternate-timeline scenarios, but I've also been GMing Champions for almost 15 years. (It sure doesn't seem like that long!) Let's see... I've done a "dark world" adventure where the heroes linked up with the "villains" of that world (actually underground freedom fighters opposing a totalitarian regime and its 'super hero' enforcers). You should have seen the looks on the player's faces when their PCs met that world's supergenius leader of the rebels, that world's last, best hope...the noble Foxbat! (and then later on they met Professor Preserver, an ancient scientest permanently grafted into a suit of life-support armor [ie Dr. Destroyer as a good guy]) Oh, yeah, the Grond they ran in to had an INT of 23, by the way... I've done a "Fuzzy Animal" world scenario for the Legion of Super-Heroes game I run. Hidden Dragon (the PC), a martial artist with invisibility and a few other useful powers, got tossed into a world where there was no such creature as humans, and her counterpart really was a dragon. The Legion in that world included members like Brainy-Quack 5, Mon-Eel, Shadow Lassie, Sun Bear, Colossal Boar, Phantom Gull, and so on. I played it serious, not for laughs. The major threat during that scenario was when Earth was invaded by Pulsecat Stargrave and the Duck Circle. For that same Legion game, I'm in the process of running a scenario in a gender-reversed universe. It's not an exact mirror, either...some of the personalities are a bit different, for example. Right now the Legion is on the way to confront Mordra the Merciless on the Cemetary Asteroid Shanghalla, and they've already run into the dead risen from their graves to serve Mordra...and there are quite a few dead Legionnaires buried there... I did a scenario in "Horror World", from Champions in 3-D. I don't like horror, myself, but some of my players do, and I got some nice compliments from my handling of that one. I've done one where the PC found themselves in a world where all the characters from DC, Marvel, and Champions were all in existence. I've done others, too, but for the moment those are the major ones I remember.]

These days, sure. But you can take a Limitation on it to make it all-or-nothing. Since this build will still be pretty expensive (though a lot cheaper than going the other route) I just trying to point out, "in passing" as it were, that taking that Limitation wouldn't be a good way to save points. More sort of a reminder: "Make sure to leave it Cumulative."

Thank you, thank you! A doctor should know diseases, right?

Then don't do it that way. Buy it as a Cumulative Major Transform, Continuous (so even 1d6 will eventually do it), 0 END, and probably take Gradual Effect (so it doesn't do its work in under 5 minutes...let it take several days to build up enough to cause the cloning). Give it Invisible Power Effects and Sticky, and people won't even know they've been infected and are transmitting the disease. What's it transform them into? It transforms them into: Exact copy of themselves, but with the following additions: LS: Immune To Clone Virus (2 pts) Duplication (exact copy of the person as they are now, but without the Duplication power), No Concious Control, 1 Charge Never Recovers, Cannot Recombine. Once the disease reaches this stage, they manifest the effects by splitting off the Duplicate, which due to the limitations, can never recombine. Viola! A permanent clone, and done MUCH more cheaply than trying to buy Duplication, UAA, Sticky, etc.

You're right, that's a very good solution to the my problem. Zornwil, I hadn't checked Steve's article because, even though I have paid for and downloaded every issue of Digital Hero so far, I couldn't find where I'd put them. I know I'd burned off a copy just in case, but I also thought I'd left them on my hard drive. As it happens, I couldn't find either one. It wasn't until a short time ago that the thickheaded yours truly remembered that having paid for them *once*, you can download them over and over and over... ...so I now have new copies on my drive, safely ensconced in my folder wherein reside all things HERO, in their own clearly labeled "Digital Hero" folder. And yes, as you'd expect, Steve's article is a good one!

Preeeeesenting... The Living Target Val Char Cost 20 STR 10 18 DEX 24 50 CON 20 80 BODY 140 15 INT 5 25 EGO 30 20 PRE 10 18 COM 4 5 PD 1 5 ED 1 4 SPD 12 8 REC 0 40 END 0 90 STUN -10 6" RUN02" SWIM04" LEAP0Characteristics Cost: 247 Cost Power END 24 I Can Take It If You Can Dish It Out: +30 CON; Only To Avoid Being Stunned (-1), No Figured Characteristics (-1/2) 25 I Ain't Got Time To Bleed: Healing 1d6, Can Heal Limbs, Resurrection, Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), Persistent (+1/2); Extra Time (1 Turn (Post-Segment 12), -1 1/4), Self Only (-1/2) 29 Neither Rain Nor Snow Nor Deadly Radiation...: LS (Immunity All terrestrial diseases and biowarfare agents; Immunity All terrestrial poisons and chemical warfare agents; Safe in High Pressure; Safe in High Radiation; Safe in Intense Cold; Safe in Intense Heat; Safe in Low Pressure/Vacuum) Powers Cost: 78 Cost Martial Arts Maneuver Boxing 4 1) Martial Strike: 1/2 Phase, +0 OCV, +2 DCV, 6d6 Strike 5 2) Defensive Strike: 1/2 Phase, +1 OCV, +3 DCV, 4d6 Strike 5 3) Defensive Block: 1/2 Phase, +1 OCV, +3 DCV, Block, Abort 4 4) Martial Block: 1/2 Phase, +2 OCV, +2 DCV, Block, Abort 4 5) Counterstrike: 1/2 Phase, +2 OCV, +2 DCV, 6d6 Strike, Must Follow Block 4 6) Martial Dodge: 1/2 Phase, -- OCV, +5 DCV, Dodge, Affects All Attacks, Abort Martial Arts Cost: 26 Cost Skill 3 Acrobatics 13- 3 Acting 13- 3 Climbing 13- 3 Combat Driving 13- 9 Contortionist 16- 3 Demolitions 12- 3 Forensic Medicine 12- 7 Interrogation 15- 3 KS: Boxing 12- 7 Power (Body Stunts) 16- 5 PS: Stuntman 16- 3 Streetwise 13- 5 Teamwork 14- 20 +10 with Dive For Cover Skills Cost: 77 Cost Talent 4 Double Jointed 14 Fearless 3 Simulate Death Talents Cost: 21 Total Character Cost: 449 Val Disadvantages 10 Soc: Public Identity: Jason Livingston, Crazy Stunt Man (Occasionally, Major) 15 Rep: Crazy Death-Seeking Stuntman/Hero, 14- 20 Psych: Thrillseeker (Very Common, Strong) 10 Psych: Actually enjoys pain (Common, Moderate) 20 Psych: Must Take The Hit For Innocent Bystander Or Team Mate (Common, Total) 15 Enraged: If deliberately prevented from taking the hit for an innocent, who is injured as a result (Uncommon), go 14-, recover 14- 15 Hunted: A variety of random maniacs who keep trying to find out if he's truly unkillable or not 11- (Less Pow, PC has a Public ID or is otherwise very easy to find, Harshly Punish) 25 Hunted: Telios 8- (Mo Pow, NCI, PC has a Public ID or is otherwise very easy to find, Harshly Punish) 20 DNPC: Ginger St. George, Actress/Girlfriend 11- (Incompetent) Disadvantage Points: 150 Base Points: 200 Experience Required: 99 Total Experience Available: 100 Experience Unspent: 1 History: Jason learned early on in life that while he could be hurt just like anyone else, it never lasted very long, and pain never seemed to bother him as much as it did other people. This lead to an early attempt at a boxing career, but he found it just didn't supply enough thrill for his tastes. The work of a stunt man, though, did. Jason excelled at every facet of the stuntman's craft, though many of his fellows muttered that the only reason Jason was so "good" and "fast" when setting up the pyrotechnics was that he was not afraid of the consequences if he made a mistake. Jason didn't care; he was happy in his own little niche, making actors look like heroes on the silver screen. That all changed the day he got to know Ginger St. George better. Jason was working on the set of The Deadliest Game when the unthinkable happened: someone made a mistake and loaded one of the macine guns with real bullets! Jason realized what was happening as soon as he saw two lines of dust puffing up...the one from the small charges buried in the ground to simulate the gunfire, and the line from the real bullets hitting the ground! Ginger was playing the part of the female co-star, who was supposed to be menaced by the gunfire; no one had expected that she would be in real danger. Jason threw himself in the way, taking a half-dozen rounds in the chest and stomach. Ginger screamed as he collapsed at her feet, covered in blood, and of course the production was immediately halted. As usual, though, Jason was not seriously hurt. The investigation never did turn up who as at fault for the misloaded gun, but two other things did come of it: Ginger's undying love for Jason, and Jason's discovery of a new thrill, the best one of all: putting his life on the line in defense of others! Tactics: Jason's main tactic consists of throwing himself between an agressor and their target, taking the blow himself. Anything he can do to spoil the goal of an opponent is fine with Jason, and if it gets him hurt, all the better. Jason enjoys getting down quickly from the top of a building by stepping off the edge and falling to the pavement, for example, or throwing himself on top of a live explosive round. He's always the first to offer to defuse an explosive device or disarm a trap; after all, if he makes a mistake, the only one getting hurt will be him...and the consequences never last for long. Skills: In addition to the skills he learned in the stunt man trade, Jason is also pretty good at contorting his body in all kinds of outlandish ways, making it relatively simple for him to slip out of bonds or squeeze through openings that should be too small for him. This isn't due to real skill, however, but a willingness to violently dislocate joints or scrape off parts that stick out too far...after all, he'll get better, and quickly. Jason also has a passing interest in forensic medicine; some of his friends believe this is a morbid curiosity that comes from having seen his own insides so often... Interrogation, while not something Jason has had to resort to all that often since becoming a super-hero, is something that he's quite good at as well. He has a habit of showing gruesome implements to the person he's interrogating, then demonstrating their effects on his own body. With a vivid example in front of them, most everyone starts talking right away. They have no idea that even though he enjoys pain, Jason will do anything to keep someone else from being hurt, and would never actually use those implements on anyone else! Notes: Jason gets frequent letter bombs or surprise assassination attempts by nutcases who are determined to prove that he's not actually unkillable. While generally only annoying, sometimes these idiots can threaten other people in the vicinity with their methods, and that puts blood in Jason's eye faster than just about anything else. Telios has also been heard to remark that he'd like to study Jason more "closely"; rumor has it that Telios has obtained a number of samples of Jason's genetic material (he leaves it strewn everywhere, just by the nature of his approach to the super-hero trade) but that the samples either broke down abnormally fast, or they gave no clue what so ever to the nature of Jason's abilities. Jason says he doesn't take the rumors about Telios seriously, but who knows for sure? Ginger is a stunningly good-looking woman, and completely and absolutely devoted to Jason. Her heart is definitely in the right place, and she is a genuinely good woman. Unfortuantely, her acting ability is sub-par at best (it's a Familiarity) and the fact that she refuses to play the "Hollywood Bedroom Game" has probably doomed her to only minor parts. She doesn't mind, though, as long as she has Jason. She knows that while Jason's very fond of her, he's not in love with her yet, but she'll wait; she's confident that, given time, he'll come to love her as much as she loves him.

Hermit, I was just thinking the same thing. Something like this: STR 20 DEX 18 CON 20 BOD 90 INT 15 EGO 25 PRE 20 PD/ED 5/5 SPD 4 REC 8 END 50 STUN 100 +30 CON, Only To Avoid Being Stunned (-1) Regeneration (with Ressurection adder, just in case) +10 levels with Dive For Cover (used to dive *into* the line of fire) NO Resistant Defenses A sort "basic" Martial Arts package, like Boxing Basic schtick? You can hit him, and nearly always hurt him, but you CAN'T kill him, so he specializes in throwing himself in the way of Killing Attacks and such aimed at other people. The 'boxing' is how he deals with thugs, minions, and so on. The high EGO is because he deals with the pain of being hit and hurt...a LOT. The high PRE is because he *knows* he can take it...but can *you*? If it weren't for the fact that it's already been taken, I'd be tempted to call him "The Human Target"...

The villain my players most hated to see wasn't the most powerful, not by a long shot. They'd handled far more powerful than him. He wasn't the most brutal, vicious, or most likely to kill large amounts of innocent bystanders on a whim. No, it was simply that he talked, non-stop, in a snivling, self-serving, nasal whine. The most hated recurring villain I've ever run is... [drumroll, please] ...Occulon! Yes, that's right...not Dr. Destroyer, not Terror, Inc., not Eurostar or Firewing, but Occulon! It was amazingly easy to keep up a non-stop flow of whiney diatribe during the combat...and you'd be AMAZED at the way these guys pushed attacks to UNLOAD on him with everything they had, just to get him to SHUT UP!

Hey, Ghost Who Walks? Didn't I read that scenario in a book? One filled with singularly unsympathetic characters, as I recall...Charon's Ark, by Rick Gauger... In any case, for an alternate look at what life on a low-temp iceball like Pluto could be like, check out Camelot 30K by Robert L. Forward, one of the best "what would real-world life in this extreme environment be like" authors of all time. In it, the aliens are small ant-like creatures who keep warm by having a small ball of radioactive material inside themselves, staying warm by radioactive decay. That means that human temps are not nearly so much of a problem for them, because while their outer form is adapted to dealing with the extreme cold, their internal processes are much closer to OUR kind of temp than you'd expect. They weren't on Pluto, but on an object in the Oort cloud, so temp and composition would be similar to that of Pluto.

Hmmm...as a matter of fact, I love Chalker's works. I even had the opportunity to sit up all night in his hotel room a few years ago with some friends, talking with him about his books, characters, the publishing industry, and the Mafia. Interesting stuff! Sponge would indeed be a very nasty thing...and I could see Telios doing that, but just to a few important people, you understand... I also remember Bloodhype, Treb, but its' been so many years since I read the Flinx books that I don't even remember what the ultimate source of the drug was. The Flinx books I remember best were The Tar-Ayim Krang and Orphan Star. Remind me, please?

And here I was convinced I was the only sentient on the planet that remembered Magnus! Oh, wait...do you mean the original run, or the later...uhm...Valiant?...run? I've never read the Valiants, only the original run. Ah, the memories... One group nobody has mentioned yet: The Legion of Super-Heroes! And what about the original Metal Men?

If you look back at my original post, I said that I wanted it to NOT work on someone with LS: Vacuum/High Pressure, since that would indicate a sealed environment...or skin so tough a chemical probably wouldn't be absorbed through it anyway. Edit: Okay, so BNakagawa edited his post while I was posting my relpy...but my reply still stands. Things like automatons often have that kind of environmental protection anyway, or don't have a CON score, which would defeat it if it were based on CON...or don't have an EGO, which would defeat it if it were some combination of Mental Illusions.

I really like these...I may well snitch some of them for my own use, since I'm playing a sorceror-scientist in a Champions game, but I've got a pretty small magic pool, so low-cost stuff is always appreciated. I may post some of my own low-cost stuff, though most of that comes from the gadget pool, not the magic pool. Little everyday magics that anyone can learn, and soldiers often know a few... Hmmm...anyone else remember the Cenotaph Road series by Robert Vardeman from about 20 years ago? The hero in that series is a soldier, who has a few minor magics...wound closure, fire starting, etc. By the end of the series he's a world-cracking mage, partly because once the cross-world adventures start happening, he's constantly having to use these minor little magics in ingenious, improvised ways they were never meant for...and he slowly develops them into stronger, more versatile spells as he goes.

I'm GM for a Dr. Who-universe solo game; the PC calls herself "The Valyard" -- basically, Chief Prosecutor of the Time Lord legal system. I'll see if I can get her to post on this thread about her character. If anyone's interested, I can post the character sheet for her, her TARDIS, and for her Companion.

Here's a link to some write-ups I've been working on for various Legion of Super-Hero characters. Just change the names and don't use the included pictures, and viola! Though I admit that some of them, like Bouncing Boy, would probably be rather distinctive...if you need the HeroDesigner files for them, let me know and I can email them to you. I'll see about posting my PC, but the way he's written up (some campaign-specific "freebies" that every PC gets, etc.) would probably take some explaining.

Dr. Anomaly: Yes, absolutely, though he could (and would) give more money-wise than the charity event would probably bring in...he'd donate quietly, but still agree to the auction/date simply because it would be good publicity for the cause. As for the date itself...he's aware he would be far from an ideal date (tends to talk in very technical terms or mystic ambiguities) but he'd do his best to live up to his obligation. His alter ego, Dr. Solomon Kinkaid, would be much more suited to handling the social aspects, but (1) it's a date with Dr. Anomaly, and he has a secret identity to protect and (2) Dr. Kinkaid spends a lot of time avoiding "dates" and other potential romantic entanglements, as he's a very wealthy inventor/corporate head who is also still single and therefore seen as a very good catch, even if he is a bit of a flaky New-Ager who likes to sit in an open-sided pyramid during company board meetings to "help focus his inner energies to the best effect."

Okay, I'm appealing to the artists on this board for a bit of help. One of my players found a picture on-line that she really likes for her current character, but with one problem...the hair's the wrong color. Normally this wouldn't be a problem for me, it'd be easy to fix...but the picture as it is now is a blond, and the color of hair it needs is that black/blue like Superboy has, and I've been utterly unable to get a satisfactory result. I will not post the picture here because the picture does not belong to me nor was it done by me, and I'll not post an artist's work on a public board without permission, but if anyone might be able to help me with the hair-color change, perhaps we can set things up via email. Help?

The time dialation effect happens to the crew. In other words, suppose it takes 10 years to reach someplace with a near-lightspeed velocity. To the rest of the universe, it takes the ship 10 years to get there...for the crew, if they're moving close to c, then it will take less than 10 years; how much less depends on their inverse tau factor, which doesn't begin to climb drastically until you pass .96c, which is darn hard to do.

Well, since it's a chemical, I figured that the first thing people would do is try some kind of solvent...and alcohol is one that comes readily to hand. Further, it doesn't have to be rubbing alcohol...any kind of sufficiently strong alcohol will do the trick (i.e. not beer or wine, but any liquor, spirit, etc.). In a city, you're seldom more than a block away from a restaraunt, liquor store, gas station, or whatever...all of which are easy places to get alcohol. Still, perhaps doing "Susceptible: Water" would be better, letting ordinary water wash it off. I suppose I should probably have it get weaker over time on its own, as the drug begins to wear off. Perhaps giving it an Ablative based on time? I.E. each post-12 it goes one lower on the Ablative chart; if it ever fails an Activation check, then the drug is assumed to have "worn off" and the person is automatically freed?

I'm having a bit of trouble with an effect I'm trying to model, so I'm appealing to Herodom assembled for help. What I'm trying to do is create a paralyzing drug; I'm trying to do this with Entangle, and I'd like to say vs. CON instead of STR for the breakout, but there doesn't seem to be an option like that. The closest I've been able to come so far is BOECV, Normal Range Applies (+3/4), Entangle Takes No Damage From Physical Attacks (+1/4), Works vs. EGO not STR (+1/4), Susceptible to Alcohol (washes off the chemical) (-1) Cannot Form Barriers (-1/4). There are several problems with this; first, it's vs. EGO, not CON. Second, ideally, having LS: Vacuum/High Pressure would prevent the Entangle from working (can't get to exposed skin) but I don't want to have to buy NND just for that *Limitation*. Third, *EGO* attacks could blast the "chemical" paralysis away. Any notion on how I could model this, without resorting to a *lot* of custom Advantages and Limitations?

Another possibility for low-rubber propulsion would be using kernels (Kerr-Newman black holes) as your power/propulsion source. Well, it's low-rubber if you concede the possibility of substellar-mass singularities... It's possible to store energy in, or extract energy from, the ergosphere of a black hole using rapidly-moving charged particles or magnetic fields. Depending on the exact physical parameters of the black hole in question, as much as 49% of its mass may be available for extraction...that is, in an extreme case, up to 49% of the mass of a black hole may be in rotational energy (mass-equivalence) as opposed to 'actual' mass. Given that even a microscopic black hole would weigh in the hundreds of millions of tons, think about the possibilities of being able to extract up to 49% of that mass as usuable energy during a voyage...that is a humungous amount of available energy, even by the standards of subluminal interstellar travel. It's almost half as good as a matter/antimatter reaction in efficiency, but you don't have to worry about containing the antimatter...the black hole's gravity makes it self-containing. Also, with a matter-antimatter drive, you'd either have to carry enough antimatter along for both legs of the round trip, or somehow manufacture more at your destination. With a kernel, you can "refuel" it at your destination star by using ordinary fusion reactors (with fuel harvested from local sources, like ice comets or gas giant atmospheres) to "recharge" it (spin up the rotation again), or even use solar power to do the same thing. That's a lot simpler (at least in theory) than containing or manufacturing antimatter. For a better idea (in fiction) of the near-real possibilities of using kernels for power/propulsion, check out The McAndrew Chronicles by Charles Sheffield. The stuff with kernels is in the first couple of stories...the later stories deal heavily with very high acceleration drives powered by zero-point (vacuum fluctuation) energy, which are probably far too "rubber" for your taste.

Steve, I've got a couple of unrelated questions for you. (If in the future you'd prefer a seperate thread for each, please say so. ) 1) Suppose a character has a 75 STR and has paid for Armor Piercing on 50 of that 75 STR. In what order/how do you apply damage done by a punch to a target's defenses? 2) A character of mine has an invisible extra pair of arms...think Gil Hamilton of ARM (Larry Niven) except these are actual arms, not just short-range TK. Originally I bought this as +1 Fully Invisible and +1/4 Inherent, meaning it would probably look like TK to someone seeing things "float" around near him, but it actually is an extra set of arms. Last night, when I went to update my character sheet in Hero Designer, I discovered the current version won't let me apply Invisible Power Effects to Extra Limbs because it says that since Extra Limbs does not cost END, the power is therefore Invisible already and that Invisible Power Effects is not a valid Advantage. Is this right? You can't buy Invisible Power Effects on something that doesn't cost END? If so, how on Earth do I represent my "invisible extra set of arms"? I'm not interested in buying Invisible Inherent No Range TK...I just want that extra set of arms bought with Extra Limbs to be invisible! Help? I know you might say #2 isn't strictly a rules question but more of a "how do I build this" question, but what I'm really asking is...isn't it okay to apply Invisible Power Effects to powers that don't cost END?

When I first saw this thread, I thought "badger3k is offering us clones of the HERO Board's own Treb! COOL!" Really...that is the first thing that went through my head when I saw it...

I've been gaming for a looooooong time, but better than 90% of the time I GM instead of playing, so most of my 'weird' characters have come from things I played at conventions. I have played a spell in the mind of a mage that was dying. The entire module took place in the few fractions of a second between when the death blow was struck and when he died. I was playing a Magic Missile spell. I don't remember his name, but I do recall he had a French accent. I have played in a game where each other player played the sort of 'incarnation' of one of the Seven Deadly Sins in the mind of a rather wacked-out teenage boy. Lucky me, I was the eighth player and got to play the Conscience. It was a blast, though! I have played a magically animated origami crane who, along with five other animated origami figures, went on a quest to save the dying monk who had made him. We were still our origianal sizes (about 2") and still made of paper. Fun stuff! I play a human/tiger shapechanger in a very primitive tribal setting. Since he's a tiger, everyone expects him to be a great warrior. Surprise! His strengh and dexterity are so sub-standard that he's easier to hit than an unarmored person! He's got a great force of will and presence, though. His main form of 'attack' is intimidation/presence, getting others to back down. Sort of Ghandi as a tiger, but with a bit of 'attitude' when the situation calls for it. I'll probably think of more later...