DShomshak

New complete fossil from Triassic, a 240 million year old 'dragon'
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-68374520

In the "Millennium Universe" setting for my campaign, I make super-powers and super-tech a new thing so it hasn't had time to change the world economy. People expect it to, though, and know it can because a few supers came back in time from various possible futures in which it did so.
 
Most notably, the time-traveling/precognitive hero Doctor Future recruited the PCs from futures in which one megavillains destroyed the world. Destroying the world is an economic change, yes?
 
The NPC hero Cyberman was accidentally sent back in time from a future in which maimed soldiers were routinely restored and upgraded through bionics. He's responsible for introducing bionic tech to the Millennium Universe. Prosthetics are better than IRL but still very expensive, and actual super-cyborging is only possible for governments and large corporations.
 
Alien tech has even greater potential. When the small starships piloted by the villainous Intruder and the lawman Officer Pax crashed on Earth, smart people realized the most important technology to be reverse-ingineered might be the proton reactors that powered them. Zetrian proton reactors are safe, reliable nuclear reactors that can be made small enough to power, say, a suit ob powered armor or big enough to power a city. However, Zetrian reactors are made using muonic matter, strange matter, and other substances for which it will take decades to build the requisite infrastructure to produce in quantity. Attempts to build proton reactors of mundane materials have had, well, mixed results. (Such as the megavillain Professor Proton.) But it's only a matter of time until proton reactors make fossil fuels as obsolete as horse-drawn buggies... which is why the villain called the Mahdi hijacked a time portal. In his future, the Middle East stuck with oil and gas to the very bitter end and squandered their sovereign wealth funds in wars, leaving the region geopolitically bankrupt and irrelevant. He is determined both the delay the development of proton reactors, and to conquer a new Caliphate that can use its oil wealth to dominate the world.
 
Contact with aliens also lets people know that contemporary economic and environmental problems are solvable because other species have solved them -- though it took clear thinking and good will as well as tech that to humans seems super.
 
"It could, but not yet," gives me maximum dramatic flexibility. Heroes can know they aren't just beating up one bad guy, who's trying to do one bad thing. (Or even trying to force the world into a worse mode.) They can hope that someday, their battles will lead to a better world overall.
 
Dean Shomshak

I built my supplement, Shared Origins: the Dynatron (available through the Hero Store) around this premise. It's a not-uncommon trope in comics that someone invents a way to give themselves super-powers... but somehow, this never spreads very far. The supervillain Red Giant built a power-granting machine, the Dynatron, out of coomercially available tech, some scavenged from junkyards. Other people have successfully used "dynatrons" he built, though no one else seems able to build copies of their own.
 
After a brief and unimpressive career as a super-robber in a team with friends he also empowered, Red Giant realized he could make immensely more money just selling super-powers. If you've got the money, he's got the origin. Though this approach turns out to have problems of its own. As a business, it's still quite smal and hasn't slid over the edge to world-changing. If you want to know more, read the supplement.
 
Dean Shomshak

I built my supplement, Shared Origins: the Dynatron (available through the Hero Store) around this premise. It's a not-uncommon trope in comics that someone invents a way to give themselves super-powers... but somehow, this never spreads very far. The supervillain Red Giant built a power-granting machine, the Dynatron, out of coomercially available tech, some scavenged from junkyards. Other people have successfully used "dynatrons" he built, though no one else seems able to build copies of their own.
 
After a brief and unimpressive career as a super-robber in a team with friends he also empowered, Red Giant realized he could make immensely more money just selling super-powers. If you've got the money, he's got the origin. Though this approach turns out to have problems of its own. As a business, it's still quite smal and hasn't slid over the edge to world-changing. If you want to know more, read the supplement.
 
Dean Shomshak

I ran a magic based game set in the 1920’s.  Even though all the characters were magic based there was enough diversity that the game worked really well.   A lot of the characters were spell casters of some sort but there was also a dragon, a character who was cursed with immortality and a fey who was banished to our world and stuck in the form of a cat.  
 
One of the characters was playing a Dorian Grey type character and was the best Hero and Villain in the game.  He had split himself into good and evil and for the most part kept the evil locked up in a painting.  But occasionally the evil side took over.  He had an accidental change when knocked out.  The most memorable thing he ever did was to summon up a school of Holy Piranha to eat the aquatic ghouls the party had to get past.  
 

As a thought experiment, what might be the effect of superhumans on the economy of the world? I was thinking about this today and thought I’d throw it out for discussion.
 
The main comic book universes tend to try to keep their worlds relatively close to “real life” when it comes to your average person, but what if such restrictions were removed? What if the Champions Universe saw the release of tech breakthroughs by superhuman geniuses that our world can only dream of? Would it warp a campaign beyond the point of fun or believability?
 
Energy production?
Materials production?
Food production?
Medical treatments?
Space and undersea exploration?
Artificial intelligence?
 
And the list goes on and on.
 
 

The Doonesbury strip for February 18th--
 

Well, this is more than I ever thought I'd want to know about the economics of fast food. But thank you, one and all.
 
I am at least persuaded that making drastic changes in just one part of a complex, interconnected business environment is flipping insane.
 
Dean Shomhak

Season 3 of Star Trek: Lower Decks came in at the library. I've only just started watching (not a binger, me) but I'll note the first episode snarkily inverted one of the overused tropes of, well, many dramas with young protagonists: The People in Charge Are Idiots, So The Kids Must Save The Day. Mariner believes this, all the more because everyone tells her to "trust the system." And for once, she's wrong. Whaddaya know, the people running Starfleet turn out *not* to be idiots, they see as clearly as she does that her mother is being framed, and how (the Original Series episode "Courtmartial" had this), and deal with it competently. As they were supposed to.
 
Wow. Now that's satire.
 
Dean Shomshak

Season 3 of Star Trek: Lower Decks came in at the library. I've only just started watching (not a binger, me) but I'll note the first episode snarkily inverted one of the overused tropes of, well, many dramas with young protagonists: The People in Charge Are Idiots, So The Kids Must Save The Day. Mariner believes this, all the more because everyone tells her to "trust the system." And for once, she's wrong. Whaddaya know, the people running Starfleet turn out *not* to be idiots, they see as clearly as she does that her mother is being framed, and how (the Original Series episode "Courtmartial" had this), and deal with it competently. As they were supposed to.
 
Wow. Now that's satire.
 
Dean Shomshak

Season 3 of Star Trek: Lower Decks came in at the library. I've only just started watching (not a binger, me) but I'll note the first episode snarkily inverted one of the overused tropes of, well, many dramas with young protagonists: The People in Charge Are Idiots, So The Kids Must Save The Day. Mariner believes this, all the more because everyone tells her to "trust the system." And for once, she's wrong. Whaddaya know, the people running Starfleet turn out *not* to be idiots, they see as clearly as she does that her mother is being framed, and how (the Original Series episode "Courtmartial" had this), and deal with it competently. As they were supposed to.
 
Wow. Now that's satire.
 
Dean Shomshak

A recent The Daily episode dealt with Biden's supposed senility. The reporter noted that Biden has a very long history of mixing up names and sentences that wander off into unexpected territory. Also addressed the cognitive advantages of old age: less glib, but better judgment. Slower speed, but better aim, so to speak.
 
I am reminded here of the assessment of someone who knows former House Speaker Newt Gingrich well. In ten minutes the man can be relied on to come out with ten startling, original, and superficially brilliant ideas... half of which contradict the other half, and nine out of ten of which turn out to be batsh*t insane once you look at them closely. Really, not someone I would want with his hand on The Big Red Button.
 
As I grow older myself, I place greater value on temperament than cleverness. I trust Biden to at least try to do the right thing, even if I may disagree with him about what the right thing is.
 
Dean Shomshak

I ran one game where Dark Seraph took on another form and created a school for those with magic talents. There he actually taught them magic as he needed a sacrifice for his future plans of 12 actual wizards. One of the characters in my game who had magic talents actually left the team and joined this school and learned magic. And at first she actually defended the school from the other player characters as she was actually learning magic (and spending points for it). But later learned that there was something strange about their teacher and allowed one of the other player characters secretly into the school (which was on another small magically created dimension) to investigate. They of course found the area where the planned sacrifice was going to take place and that Dark Saraph was their instructor. After running around and fighting a bit with the school's secret magical defenses they were able to find an entrance and allow the other members of their team to get into the dimension to prove to the other students what was going on (which was not easy as they definitely were learning real magic) and then with the assistance of the students fight Dark Saraph.

A recent The Daily episode dealt with Biden's supposed senility. The reporter noted that Biden has a very long history of mixing up names and sentences that wander off into unexpected territory. Also addressed the cognitive advantages of old age: less glib, but better judgment. Slower speed, but better aim, so to speak.
 
I am reminded here of the assessment of someone who knows former House Speaker Newt Gingrich well. In ten minutes the man can be relied on to come out with ten startling, original, and superficially brilliant ideas... half of which contradict the other half, and nine out of ten of which turn out to be batsh*t insane once you look at them closely. Really, not someone I would want with his hand on The Big Red Button.
 
As I grow older myself, I place greater value on temperament than cleverness. I trust Biden to at least try to do the right thing, even if I may disagree with him about what the right thing is.
 
Dean Shomshak

A recent The Daily episode dealt with Biden's supposed senility. The reporter noted that Biden has a very long history of mixing up names and sentences that wander off into unexpected territory. Also addressed the cognitive advantages of old age: less glib, but better judgment. Slower speed, but better aim, so to speak.
 
I am reminded here of the assessment of someone who knows former House Speaker Newt Gingrich well. In ten minutes the man can be relied on to come out with ten startling, original, and superficially brilliant ideas... half of which contradict the other half, and nine out of ten of which turn out to be batsh*t insane once you look at them closely. Really, not someone I would want with his hand on The Big Red Button.
 
As I grow older myself, I place greater value on temperament than cleverness. I trust Biden to at least try to do the right thing, even if I may disagree with him about what the right thing is.
 
Dean Shomshak

A recent The Daily episode dealt with Biden's supposed senility. The reporter noted that Biden has a very long history of mixing up names and sentences that wander off into unexpected territory. Also addressed the cognitive advantages of old age: less glib, but better judgment. Slower speed, but better aim, so to speak.
 
I am reminded here of the assessment of someone who knows former House Speaker Newt Gingrich well. In ten minutes the man can be relied on to come out with ten startling, original, and superficially brilliant ideas... half of which contradict the other half, and nine out of ten of which turn out to be batsh*t insane once you look at them closely. Really, not someone I would want with his hand on The Big Red Button.
 
As I grow older myself, I place greater value on temperament than cleverness. I trust Biden to at least try to do the right thing, even if I may disagree with him about what the right thing is.
 
Dean Shomshak

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/2/13/2223296/-My-Thoughts-on-Biden-As-Someone-With-Actual-Cognitive-Dysfunction?detail=emaildkre&pm_source=DKRE&pm_medium=email

I had heard of this, but my idea of the problem was off by an order of magnitude. I had thought that the major issue was special grades of sand for computer chips. Knowing that it's for construction, make the problem much more serious. And it's insidiously mundane, who pays attention to sand trucks? And I can easily see a Bond movie based around this. They didn't really play up the water plot in Quantum of Solace.

From the February 2024 issue of Scientific American: The world uses enormous quantities of sand, construction to silicon chips. This makes illegal sand mining one of the biggest rackets in the world, far exceeding other forms of illegal mining. Since this is Scientific American, much of the concern is about the resulting environmental damage -- but the big money in sand mining can corrupt governments at every level and fund other unsavory activities. Googling "sand mafia" turns up many other articles for further research.
 
Illegal sand mining might be difficult to work into the usual urban vigilante Dark Champions game, but you might fit it into an international espionage game. Imagine a James Bond-style mastermind who uses sand mining to fund his terrorist scheme, coup plot or diabolical weapon. The death trap for captured agents should be obvious.
 
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sand-mafias-are-plundering-the-earth/
 
Dean Shomshak

From the February 2024 issue of Scientific American: The world uses enormous quantities of sand, construction to silicon chips. This makes illegal sand mining one of the biggest rackets in the world, far exceeding other forms of illegal mining. Since this is Scientific American, much of the concern is about the resulting environmental damage -- but the big money in sand mining can corrupt governments at every level and fund other unsavory activities. Googling "sand mafia" turns up many other articles for further research.
 
Illegal sand mining might be difficult to work into the usual urban vigilante Dark Champions game, but you might fit it into an international espionage game. Imagine a James Bond-style mastermind who uses sand mining to fund his terrorist scheme, coup plot or diabolical weapon. The death trap for captured agents should be obvious.
 
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sand-mafias-are-plundering-the-earth/
 
Dean Shomshak

I try to resist clickbait, but this was just too funny when it turned up in my front-page newsfeed.
 
You wanna talk reclaiming historic territories of your great, great empire? Mongolia has a comment or two.
 
Mongolia's former president mocks Putin with a map showing how big the Mongol empire used to be, and how small Russia was (msn.com)
 
Dean Shomshak

From the February 2024 issue of Scientific American: The world uses enormous quantities of sand, construction to silicon chips. This makes illegal sand mining one of the biggest rackets in the world, far exceeding other forms of illegal mining. Since this is Scientific American, much of the concern is about the resulting environmental damage -- but the big money in sand mining can corrupt governments at every level and fund other unsavory activities. Googling "sand mafia" turns up many other articles for further research.
 
Illegal sand mining might be difficult to work into the usual urban vigilante Dark Champions game, but you might fit it into an international espionage game. Imagine a James Bond-style mastermind who uses sand mining to fund his terrorist scheme, coup plot or diabolical weapon. The death trap for captured agents should be obvious.
 
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sand-mafias-are-plundering-the-earth/
 
Dean Shomshak