Longshot

Re: Aliens, as in ... well, "Aliens"

Re: Various New Characters If you right-click inside the frame (not on a picture), the pop-up context menu has "back" as an option. Cool!

Re: Various New Characters That is the coolest way I have ever seen to post characters!!!! I can't decide which I think is better -- the links pulling the sheets up or just having the sheets in the post. Both are cool, kind of like deciding who's faster -- the Flash or Superman. That is awesome, KS!

Re: Flamethrower tricks What sort of incantations were you think of as necessary for the power? For me, the only thing that comes to mind is holding on for dear life while saying over and over "ohgod ohgod ohgod ohgod". Did you mean gestures? Some other power ideas: Burning Barrier: killing attack, AOE line, continuous, persistent -- represents a line of fire burning from phase to phase (very expensive, though) Intimidating Flames: +4D6 PRE, only to cause fear -- uses the flamethrower to encircle the target(s) of the attack with flames, or generally just shooting flames at the ground around the target. Wouldn't cause any actual damage, just a whole lot of impressiveness. Smoke: Darkness, 3" -- by adjusting the mixture of the fuel, a very weak but high smoke producing fire could be produced. Another option would be have this power take the limitation Must Follow Flame Attack And Only Manifests In Area Targeted By Flame Attack (-3/4) which would represent smoke resulting from stuff burning in a flame attack, but only if the flamethrower mixture was done just right (i.e. only when you wanted it to happen). Finally, you buy the smoke power with an OIF: Flammable Objects Which Produce Smoke When Burning, meaning you could only use the power if there was something in that area to accommodate the power. Quick Spark: Flash -- a very fast flame burst could temporarily blind/dazzle someone. This could be very effect against someone with IR vision. Blinding Flames : Darkness (again) -- Extending the idea of using fire as a Flash Attack, bright enough flames could also act as a form of Darkness. To represent the licking, undulating nature of flames and the way the heat distorts the air, the Darkness could be bought with a sort of Activation Roll from Phase to Phase to determine if the are fully obscuring vision on a particular phase. Melt: Drain Vs. PD and Drain Vs. PD Armor -- a variation of Brittlize, a Cold power from the USPD, the character can apply the heat from his flames in such a way as to render an object easier to bend and break. Just a few ideas. I hope you find them useful. Longshot

Re: New Campaign could use some feedback I don’t know if you’ve already fleshed out your “Antagonist Empires†yet, but here is a suggestion, for what its worth. The Puppeteers (with apologies to Larry Niven) The members of the ruling race/class of this empire embody selfishness and fearfulness. When encountering other species, they either subjugate them or bomb them into oblivion. After subjugating them, if the Puppeteers find that the species in question has nothing useful to offer, they bomb them into oblivion anyway just to make sure the species can’t become a threat at a later time. After subjugation, a species is confined to a limited area of space within the Puppeteer Empire, and used as slave labor or some other purpose benefiting the Puppeteers. This confinement could be as simple as a sensor net relaying a breach of the confined space area or a sophisticated planetary energy field which only the Puppeteers can breach. Puppeteer technology is highly automated due to their a) selfish laziness and lack of trust in others (if you don’t trust other species, why let them on your ship, let alone give one of them a gun!). Automated systems, robot laborers and sophisticated computers are all common elements in their civilization. A single Puppeteer might command an entire carrier-sized spacecraft, and perhaps a dozen or so might control an entire battle fleet. Unmanned drone ships make up the bulk of their fleets. Its theorized that all of their ships are unmanned and the Puppeteers actually control their fleets from nearby cloaked ships. Their ship design philosophy puts a premium of defensive capabilities (to keep themselves safe) and offensive capability (also to keep themselves safe and to make others do what they want). The ships they actually do man have luxurious interiors for the parts of the ship they inhabit. They view all other species with extreme contempt. Any armed spaceship not controlled by another Puppeteer is viewed as a threat to be destroyed on site, if possible. On a more personal level, the Puppeteer’s disdain personal contact with other living beings and don’t even really trust each other. They communicate with each other remotely and will only actually meet face to face for purposes of breeding. They hide even their appearance from other species and only they know what they really look like. Story Seeds These start with the assumption that the Puppeteer Empire is unknown at the start of the campaign. Breaking and Entering While on an exploration mission on the edges of Dragon Space, the PC’s encounter a system encapsulated by a highly sophisticated sensor network. Their ship’s sensors indicate that one or more of the planets have some advanced tech, but there is no response to hails. Breaking the sensor net and approaching one of the planets, the PC’s are greeted with desperate terror from the planet’s inhabitants, who say “Fools! You have brought THEM down upon us!†as a large, menacing, and previously unseen ship enters the system. Deal With The Devil The Atrophi, and alien species, has access to a medical technology the Galactic Council desperately needs (cure for space plague, aging, the common cold, what have you). They are only willing to share it in exchange for membership on the Galactic Council and a large quantity of diaveek, a rare mineral only known to be found on a planet within the Puppeteer Empire. Can the PC’s find a way to get the mineral from under the noses of the Puppeteer? Or perhaps they can find a way to negotiate some sort of trade with them… Inevitability The Puppeteer’s reliance on their technology has gotten them into trouble. A rogue A.I. virus is spreading through their civilization. At first the A.I. made it look like a faction of puppeteers was instigating a civil war, but in reality it was beginning to take over. Now the surviving Puppeteers have found out what’s going on and cannot stop it without (shudder) help others. Their subjugated species have nothing which can help (and might have actually engineered the A.I. virus). And if the A.I. succeeds in conquering the Puppeteers, who is to say it will stop with them…

Re: Twins This is a great concept! It also somewhat reminds me of something they did on the Big Brother reality series this summer. (My wife made me watch it, I swear!). If you have never seen the show, they take a group of complete strangers, have them live in a house together with no outside visits or contact. Each week, the group votes out one of the folks in the house. They film 24/7 of the goings on in the house, then edit it to three 1 hour shows per week. Anyway, this summer, they had identical twins in the house, but only one was actually in the house at any given time. The other was kept in seclusion “elsewhere†(my guess: pocket dimension). Every few days the twins would “switch places†with one going into the house, the other going into seclusion. During the switch, they had about 5 or 10 minutes to catch the other twin up on the goings on in the house. This was done out of sight from everyone else, so no one would easily catch on. If the twins could keep from getting voted out and keep anyone from catching on that something funny was going on for a period of six weeks, then they could both enter the house to “play the game†at the same time. They did actually manage to pull it off, although several of the other players said they thought “something was going onâ€, but didn’t mention it to anyone. One of the twins even had a mole on cheek that the other did not have. It was actually pretty interesting to watch.

Re: Rattles If you wanted a really expensive way to do it: Drain INT, AOE Explosion, only to reduce PER rolls, OAF: Rattle Grenade, 6 Charges. : ) Seriously, this is one of the things I love about this game system -- most things have at least 2 or more ways of being written up!

Re: Rattles Actually, I think the power you're looking for is Images, affecting the Hearing group and with a Set Effect: "Create Rattle Noise" (-1). The level Images is purchased at can either be subtracted from (making it harder to notice) or added to (making it easier to notice) the perceiver's PER roll. In this case, of course, you would want the modifier to be added to the roll, making it easier to notice the “Rattle Grenade’s†rattle. Another way to do it would be to purchase some Stealth Skill Levels with an OAF of the “Rattle Grenadeâ€. She would only the extra Stealth Levels in situations where the rattle grenades could be used and if she had some grenades with her.

Re: Further thoughts about the UES Centauri and the AW space combat environment I'm not that familiar with the AW setting, but I do have Star Hero. Just curious, but in the scenario you described how close would the 2 sides be when they started shooting at each other?

Re: hanging PCs together After having thought about this for quite a bit, I think the best way would be to let the players sort it out themselves. Since you know what the initial encounter/adventure for the game will be, have the first player making a character determine what their rational for being at that particular place at that time would be. Tell the next player "Okay, how do you know PC #1 and why are you with him?" Its best to do this as part of character creation so they could work that idea in with their concept. PC #2 says "PC #1 saved my life, so I owe him big time. I follow him around and look after him like a wookie life debt." etc. Player #2, building on this concept decides that his character follows a strict code of honor. This gives the players move investment in their characters (I *chose* to be here) and takes some of the burden off of you having to figure it out for them. Just my opinion, though. : )

Re: Random powers (falling, barriers) A very good point. I had forgotten about the Indirect advantage being necessary. However, and this is a matter of personal taste, but I think the Entangle would be the more elegant of the solutions, closer to the overall desired effect, and possibly cheaper.

Re: Random powers (falling, barriers) If that's what you're interested in, then you could try something like: An AOE Entangle, only to form barriers, with a higher Body and lower DEF. Or Instead of 1 Force Wall with 5 DEF, buy 3 Force Walls with 2 DEF each. It would provide about the same overall protection, but just about anybody could get through it eventually. I’m not sure about the legality of such a construct, but I would allow it. Just throwing out the suggestions…

Re: Random powers (falling, barriers) Rapier is correct that you can't use TK on yourself. However, the above solution using Teleport would work. Plus, it is simple, elegant, cheap, and, in a word, Brilliant!

Re: Trolling for suggestions, 1982-style. Gads! Are you saying that Timothy Dalton was better liked than Rodger Moore?!?

Re: Trolling for suggestions, 1982-style.