bigdamnhero

LL keeps saying most everything I wanted to say (but better) so mostly just put me down as "What he said."

Re Cap: I thought his identity was known during the war days? I know that's true in the MCU, as he's filmed in his Army uniform and introduced by name at the awards ceremony he blows off. And given that he had no living family, no personal life outside the war, and all his friends were fighting alongside him, he (and the Army) had no reason to keep his identity secret. And certainly once he's believed dead and they're making museum exhibits about him, trying to "reclaim' an SID would make zero sense.

As for the other Avengers: Thor is a full time god, which is way more interesting than Dr. Don Blake ever was. Clint & Natasha are super-cops, whose identities are already public; Nat has no family, and Clint's is already well-hidden. As for Banner, I'm sure he'd *love* to keep his identity secret, but Gen. Ross had no reason to respect that. (I can't remember when Hulk's SID was outed in the comics, but IIRC it was pretty early on?)

So I agree in general that I'd prefer to see a couple more SIDS for balance. But I don't think it made sense for any of the Big 6.

You're not wrong about wanting to show the actors' faces. But as you pointed out, they do that whether they have an SID or not.

Interesting question, and one I hadn't considered before! My first reaction was that in game terms no they're not typically treated as undead because they're not created by foul necromancy, they're not inherently evil, they can't be "turned" by clerics, etc. But I'm not sure any of those points would be relevant in an in-universe courtroom!

It would definitely be an interesting and precedent-setting legal case. I would love to see it played out, with the PCs testifying on the creatures' behalf and trying to make arguments for (or against) their case. Especially if one of the PCs happens to be a lawyer in his SID! Regardless of what the "correct" answer is, the court's decision would likely come down to which side presents a better argument. (Subject to appeal, natch, but I wouldn't drag that out in game.) The creatures & their attorneys would have to provide evidence that they are much more like "genetic constructs based on human stock" and not what the law traditionally regards as zombies.

It could also be interesting if the villain wizard tries to claim them as his invention, therefore his property. Lots of sci-fi shows have addressed the question of when does a "creation" become a legal person rather than property. (See Orphan Black, Humans, even ST TNG.) But I don't how the fact they were created by magic instead of science would change the question? IIRC it seems like law in the CU treats magic and science as more-or-less interchangeable?

The other issue is identity. A key concern cited for exempting the undead from civil rights is the issue of the deceased's property -- if rights are equal, who has a claim to inheritance, the lawful heirs or the "returned" original owner? If these constructs are new personalities, not a reincarnation of the psyches of any of their body-part donors, then there's no inheritance debate. It's like an organ transplant recipient, who has no claim on his organ donor's possessions, even though part of the donor lives on in them.

Good point. Morally, I could argue that the question of basic human rights should not be dependent on questions like inheritance. But in practical terms, I agree the absence of a claim of inheritance simplifies the case significantly.

I also imagine that the exclusion of Undead was intended to deal with the ramifications of events like the "Bloodmoon" incident of 2009 (Where Tekofanes reanimated the corpses of numerous superheroes and turned normals into werewolves).

I'm fairly certain the undead exclusion was in 5ed CU, which predated Bloodmoon by several years. But I don't have that book with me. [/nitpick]

Tony Stark is a billionaire with a head full of tech and national defense secrets, his face recognized around the world. He could hardly have a bigger bullseye on his back just because he wears a metal suit.

Plus, Tony is a narcissistic attention-whore who thought he was invincible before he became a superhero, and has a history of not thinking through the consequences of his actions. I always thought him maintaining an SID (even from the other Avengers!) made little sense in the comics, and I cheered at "I am Iron Man."

But for much of the past in comics, heroes with secret IDs often appeared obsessive over them, closely guarding them from friends, family, even their superhero team mates.

That's a great point too. Keeping your SID a secret from your enemies & the public is one thing; but the obsession with keeping your HID a secret from your friends & loved ones was often overplayed, frequently putting their DNPCs at more risk. A non-comics example is Buffy keeping everything hidden from her Mom, thus keeping Joyce ignorant of the existence of vampire or how to protect herself from them; made no sense except as a dramatic conceit.

IMO it's more reasonable to find a middle ground.

Agreed. Tho personally I do think they've leaned a little too far in the other direction; I think at this point the only heroes with SIDs are Spidey and Daredevil? (Incidentally I thought Defenders handled that contrast well.) So I wouldn't mind a couple more "traditional" SID heroes.

Cap's costume in Winter Soldier is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. It is needlessly dark and completely mundane in its design. Take away the silver star and stripes and he looks like any number of paramilitary mooks you've seen in espionage thrillers since the first Bourne movie came out. There's nothing about it that reads "superhero".

You're not wrong, but I think you're missing the point. That "stealth suit" was made deliberately dark to sharpen the contrast when he switched back to the brighter WWII costume at the end, symbolizing Cap coming out of the shadows of being a SHIELD operative and becoming a superhero again. Marvel is agreeing with you here.

Well for the guys in charge of Marvel, several of them have stated they didn't like old comics and hated the old Superhero patterns.  Its a deliberate move away from the tropes we grew up with of secret IDs etc.

I could be wrong, but I think most of that came from Quesada, who is (thankfully) no longer calling the shots. I've certainly never heard/read Feige saying anything along those lines?

You're right about Marvel downplaying the SID trope, tho. I think they feel it's been done to death, and they want to distinguish themselves not only from the past, but also from DC where SIDs are a more central part of the major characters. So far the only MCU character I wish they had gone the SID route with was Ant-Man, because Scott had a compelling reason for one.

I think I posted something from Caravan Palace awhile back. But this video has dancing robots. You're welcome.

The dark costume = serious is probably a remnant of "The Batman Effect".

Reinforced by "The X-Men Effect."

to be honest the superhero costume palette is relatively far down on my list of criticisms compared to bad writing or Batman branding bad guys.

Amen. Maybe I should be posting this in the "Destroy Your Geek Cred" thread, but I really couldn't care less how faithful their outfits are. Just give me a good movie.

Also, I think we fans don't tend to realize just how freakin' goofy many classic comic book costumes look to people who haven't grown up with them.

Muting Superman was a mistake, though.

Agreed. Tho it did match his personality and the overall tone of the movies. Unfortunately.

Journey to the West: This is probably the best film attached to Steven Chow since Kung Fu Hustle. It's the story of of a buddhist monk who wants to be a demon hunter. Problem is that his methods are a bit too pacifist for the public at large. When a pig demon starts causing havoc, the monk goes on a quest to find the legendary Monkey King to help. The SPFX in this are pretty good and the leads are engaging enough to make the 140 minute run time go by fast. Recommended.

Just watched it. Merciful Buddha, I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard! Also, Shu Qi is my new crush. Great recommendation!

I seriously doubt the choice to go dark with the costume had anything whatever to do with Hope's personality in the comics.

No, but it's consistent with her personality in the Ant-Man movie. This is not Janet "6 Costume Changes A Month" Van Dyne.

Presented sans context:

"I know all the best nuns. You can trust me; I'm a priest."

They said the same thing about Arnie during most of his career. Roles like Conan and the T-800 were seen as perfect vehicles for him because they had relatively little dialog and primarily worked off his physical presence instead.

Sure. But then Arnold went and took a bunch of acting lessons - at a time when he was the highest paid star in Hollywood, mind you - specifically so he could bust out of roles like that.

It's definitely easier to get a decent actor in shape than teach a decent bodybuilder to act.

Exactly. And sure, there are some wrestlers who can act, but hiring someone because of their pecks is the recipe that gave us so much awful 80s cheese.

The characterisation they went with for Drax helps cover any gaps... but yeah, the next Dwayne Johnson he's not (who is probably the best of the lot - and his acting is also only adequate.  He's just so damned charming that he can sell any performance. 

I've never seen Bautista in anything else, but yeah I think his success as Drax had more to do with the part being perfect for him than in any innate acting talent.

I for one am thrilled that Hollywood has outgrown their 80's habit of casting bodybuilders and wrestlers in superhero movies because they "looked the part," whether or not they could actually act.

Despite one of my pet peeves (ebil gubber-ment) ...

I'm with you on being tired of that one. But you couldn't really do an 80s homage without it.

I guess it made enough to get a sequel, oddly enough.

They all do; that's part of the problem. Their movies get critically panned (except WW) and us fanboys bitch about them online, and they don't make quite as much money as they'd hoped...but they still pull in an average of $775M. So while it may seem obvious to us that they need to change their focus, it may not be as obvious to the people who sign the checks.

Wild Target. I can't remember who recommended this to me, but it turned out to be surprisingly funny. Bill Nighy is a hitman hired to kill con artist Emily Blunt, but falls for her instead. Think Grosse Point Blank meets A Fish Called Wanda. The trailer doesn't quite do it justice, but here goes:

PCs who insist on wearing their armor everywhere is kind of a personal pet peeve of mine. Not just because it's so blatantly ahistorical, but because it turns every encounter into a potential slug fest. Fortunately I have players who are mainly interested in telling a good story, even if that means occasionally being at a disadvantage, and trust me to do the same.

So sure, if the players want to walk around town fully armored, they can do that. But NPCs will not react as if that's normal; they will treat it as the aggressive in-your-face looking-for-trouble move it is, and that will color all your interactions. You can sometimes play the "I'm so-and-so's bodyguard" card, but again people will tend to react to you as a hired thug rather than a person of importance.

It also depends on the norms of the particular city/region. In the borderlands, wearing armor might be more normal, whereas in more civilized cities it might be less common, or banned outright.

Besides, it also means the characters that paid for their IIF magical defenses got something for their points/gold.

As for weapons, I generally assume that wearing a sword around town is usually ok. But if you're bristling with a dozen different weapons like some dungeon crawlers are wont to do, you're going to get some odd reactions.

Again, it all comes down to trust that the GM isn't going to take advantage of the situation to try and screw them over.

I only recently discovered Imelda May. If you like good rockabilly, check this out:

Its also said in the stories that he doesn't learn anything that doesn't help solve crime and apparently did not know that the earth goes round the sun or who was the prime minister. So he is something or a Min/Maxer.

True, tho Doyle was notoriously inconsistent with that. In one story Holmes would claim to know nothing about politics, but then two stories later he'll go on about the details of court politics in Bohemia or wherever.

This is true, although that may have just been him winding people up.  High functioning sociopath.  Got to keep yourself amused somehow. 

One of the many things I loved about the Cumberbatch version of Sherlock was they straight-up admit that a good percentage of the things Homes says are complete BS; the fun part is trying to figure out which bits!

They were bashing it before anything even aired. 

Well yeah, that's kindof their job; they get to see things before they air and then write about if they liked it or not. I've only read a handful of reviews, but all of them had clearly seen at least the first few episodes, not just the pilot.

I was hoping for something that wasn't just a clone of pretty much all the scifi in the last 5 to 10 years and I got that.

I get that, and I admit I'm burned out on Grim Conspiracies too. But instead we got a clone of scifi from 1990, and I'm not sure that's much of an improvement.

It is heavily influenced by Trek and that isn't a problem.  Many other shows are influenced by Star Wars, Road Warrior or even Terminator and that didn't make them bad.

Sure, but most of those at least attempt to do something original, rather that straight-up remaking an old show with the serial numbers filed off. I'm glad some of you are enjoying it - and with MacFarlane's name on it, at least it's less likely to get cancelled before it can find its feet. Like I said, I'll watch a few more and see if it gets better, but so far I'm underwhelmed.

OK, this Indiewire review is a tad harsh, but I did like this observation:

After watching the actual show, its intentions became clear: Seth wanted to cosplay being captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise. And Fox let him do it.

‘The Orville’ Review: Seth MacFarlane’s ‘Star Trek’ Rip-Off is Creatively, Morally, and Ethically Bankrupt

I mentioned this in another thread, but thought I'd put it here for all to see.

For those of you who loved the Rifts setting but couldn't stand the wildly-unbalanced mechanics, Hero alum Sean Fannon has republished Rifts for the Savage Worlds system. Wired has a good review:

https://www.wired.com/2017/05/geeks-guide-rifts/

I haven't picked up the book(s) myself yet (lack of funds), but I got to play a game at a convention a few months ago and it was a hoot. And I've heard several people say it captures the feel of the original Rifts but with a smooth, playable system.

Wolverine = Blade Magnet

IIRC they tried to justify that in one comic by saying part of why Wolvie is so deadly is he doesn't bother wasting any energy on defense so he's all-offense-all-the-time. But still, yeah.

Similarly, any show where a character has resurrection, it's guaranteed they'll be the only one to get killed on a regular basis. The "I have one Hit Point" Cheerleader from Heroes was bad enough (at least she looked tiny & fragile), but how many times did Jack Harkness get killed in Torchwood & Dr. Who? Like that one time they dropped a building on the whole team and everyone else walked away with minor scrapes, but big tough Jack gets straight-up killed.

Re: The Tick - I haven't seen it yet, but based on everyone I've talked to it seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it kinda show, with existing fans and newcomers on both sides.

The character sheet is the opening bid that is negotiated before and during play. The things that fit the GM's campaign stay, the other stuff is retconned out and replaced by more game-appropriate content. No GM can foresee where their campaign is going to end up and can similarly make no promise that things on the character sheet will get any "screen" time.

Absolutely. Complications in particular can change a lot during course of play, either because the GM couldn't really work them in (as in your example), or because they get surpassed in game. Maybe the PC wipes out the crime family that was Hunting him. Or overcomes his mistrust of elves due to his friendship with Legolamb. I rarely have characters "buy off" Comps per se; typically they'll swap them out for new ones.

Quite frankly, I leave it usually with the players to say something because I can't keep track of all skills, limitations, foci, backgrounds, etc., all the time, in addition to real life. Once in awhile though, I look at character sheets to refresh myself.

For some campaigns I'll keep a list of all the PCs' Complications, with notes as to when was the last time they came into play, just to remind me when I'm under-using some or over-using others.

I'm going to disagree on some of this.  Sometimes I give a character a special defense specifically because I don't want those attacks to come up.  You hate being Mind Controlled, so you put 20 points of Mental Defense on your character sheet.  You GM shouldn't look at that and think "Oh boy, now I can finally pull out Menton!"

Fair point. Tho I would take that 20 MD as "I should throw some mental attacks at this guy, so he can watch them fail." Regardless, everyone saying "have a conversation" is spot on.

I agree that's a good way of looking at it. You don't want to take the "contract" idea too literally of course, but it's a great way of explaining it to the character: "Tell me how you see this coming up in game?" "How bad are you going to cry when the villain disarms you of your OAF? Cuz that's gonna happen at some point."

My players love to put weird $#!% on their character sheets, I think just to see how I'll work them in. So far this campaign (a low fantasy game) I've managed to work in SS Anatomy, SS Astronomy, LS Aramaic, AK Wales, SS Geometry, PS Herbalist, PS Pilgrim, PS Merchant Sailor, and even KS Legends of the Sidhe (who I hadn't planned on including in the game at all until the player put it on their sheet). One of the highlights of the last campaign, was when the team brick incorporated her PS Dancing into a combat and started slam dancing: with a semi!

I also agree things that are unlikely to come up often (or at all) in game should be given for a discount, or even for free. I once had a player who really wanted KS: Beatles Lyrics at 18-. (And it totally fit his character concept.) I think I charged him 1 point for it, and it came up once or twice, mainly for roleplaying purposes.