BigJackBrass

Re: Stats for Captain Britain? Well, there's the rub. I'd love to see how someone else viewed him through the various versions (personally I still have a soft spot for the original Claremont / Trimpe Cap from the weekly series, but that's more to do with the fact that I eagerly waited for the newsagent to deliver that comic every week than any real reflection of its lasting quality ) to compare with the - very rough - notes I've been making as I re-read the stories. He's changed a lot - I still prefer the original costume! - with the forcefield moving from the staff to his person, being dead and getting better and so forth. Anyway, many thanks for the links. The second one does look a bit more reasonable, so it gives me a sort of marker for one part of his career.

My searching skills have found nothing, so can anyone help me to find Champions / HERO stats for the various incarnations of Captain Britain, please? Aside from a Marvel Superheroes write-up in an old magazine ad I've hardly seen any translations of the Captain into game terms and I'd be very interested to see how other people have described him, mechanically speaking.

Re: Play on words magic items/spells You realise that you're only a small step away from Tunnels & Trolls here, don't you? I mention that as someone who has long enjoyed T&T and also has an occasional super-hero magician called Punslinger whose spells all followed this sort of logic. For example: A Mere Trifle: Turns a body of water into a jelly and custard dessert with whipped cream topping. One Good Tern: Forcefully changes a seagull into a Good creature that will no longer try to steal your chips. Needless to say, he's not the most successful magician out there...

Re: Indiana Jones 4 Trailer is now out!!! According to my handy-dandy Pulp HERO Secret Decoder Ring it means... R-13-O-O-A-R !!! So there ya go. Next question

Re: Hudson City as Pulp city? Hudson City also feels like it's been around for a long time and seen its share of Depression-era troubles and low-end pulp activities. I'd love to see a book (or even PDF) covering some of the changes to tie it in with Pulp HERO.

Re: Greatest Superhero Team of all Time!!!

Re: Indiana Jones 4 Trailer is now out!!! The frenzy never went away... we've just been waiting patiently

Re: Greatest Superhero Team of all Time!!! You know, considering some of the official figures we've seen in the past (remember The Thing wearing a rock-patterned suit?) this pack does have a certain charm. I'd be tempted to grab a Sharpie and draw a thong on Hulk, though... It's like something from a Secret Wars version of The Full Monty.

Re: What Are You Listening To Right Now? Way too much Roxy Music.

Re: New to Champions, is BBB good enough? That seems awfully new-fangled and tricky... Wouldn't a good old threat of violence suffice?

Re: Superhero gaming suffering a lack of popularity? The RPGnet thread about this article caught my attention, but I decided not to leap straight in and disagree with the poster. The article does refer to comics rather than games and has some reasonable points to make in places, but as far as supers gaming goes one might well argue that we've never had it so good. The only thing missing are the big comics licences, which aren't necessary when it comes to a healthy section of the gaming community. Not only are there several popular "traditional" superhero RPGs doing quite nicely and a number of others ticking over, there are at least three or four "Indie" or "story-game" systems on the market. Although their sales will be relatively low they suggest a strong interest in the genre. With the quality and number of superhero films increasing (and looking particularly promising this year, although really 2008 is going to be Indiana Jones and Everything Else ) I think it's a genre with plenty of interest and life in it right now. The comics themselves? They might be going through a slightly wobbly patch.

Re: New to Champions, is BBB good enough? Doesn't BBB often refer to "Big Blue Book," the hardcover Champions from the late 1980s? If that's the case then the link Lord Liaden provided will be a big help and Sidekick may be a very helpful purchase, but of course in many respects there's nothing hugely wrong with the older edition, it just grinds a bit when meshed with some of the new stuff. If it's the big black 5th edition book then you're up-to-date and the software will reflect the rules correctly.

Re: What Book Should I Buy Next? Absolutely. A superb piece of work, very handy to give the "Batman"-types more oomph. Personally I'm quite fond of The Mystic World, too.

Re: The Secret History of America. If you want to include some degree of non-imported weirdness then you could do worse than to read Myths and Legends of Our Own Land by Charles M. Skinner. I have a rather lovely two volume edition from a hundred years ago, but more conveniently you can follow that link to a free e-text on Project Gutenberg.

Re: Has anybody played "Spirit of the Century" In fairness they don't market it as a campaign game. Quite the reverse, indeed, as the emphasis is on "pick up" play. The main problem (or at least limiting factor) that I see with the game is the number of Aspects in play increasing to the point where nobody can keep track. Half a dozen players with, what, ten Aspects apiece is going to start straining the GM. Sorcerer suffers from a similar issue, since the GM is effectively running a demon character for every PC as well as any NPCs. With the right number of players, especially those with a good grasp of pulp adventure, it has a lot going for it.

Re: Need help with character Would the character choose a new name for himself or could he be stuck with the sort of "funky" hero names prevalent in the seventies? It might be an interesting quirk to lumber the poor guy with something like that, particularly given the "kung fu" craze of those years, especially if the name meant a lot to the old man but seems woefully out of place today.

Re: Yog-sothoth.com We'll eventually get around to them on the RPGMP3 Community games, but I'm having to break my group in gently Getting some of them to use dice was hard enough!

Re: Yog-sothoth.com Paul of Cthulhu and friends have put together an excellent site there, and it's worth noting that some "big names" from the Call of Cthulhu world frequently post on the forum. Many of the articles and posts are relevant to any game set around that period of history; I've certainly found a few fascinating titbits whilst browsing. One thing that the prospective pulp-era GM might find interesting about the audio games is listening to the sorts of things players know and don't know about the 1920s and 1930s. Useful if you like to be prepared and have the sort of players who demand definitive answers! You can also find some Cthulhu audio games over at RPGMP3.com but not much in the way of relevant written material (There's a superhero game on the new "Community" podcast feed there, but it's Truth & Justice rather than Champions.)

Re: Pulp-Era Futuristic Space City Wow - stick it in a bottle and call it Kandor! Have to be a bloody big bottle, obviously...

Re: Pulp Hero Resources Here's an amusing (and quite informative) mini-game about the Roaring Twenties from Canada's McCord Museum. There's a similar game with a Victorian theme on the same site. More than a little Terry Gilliamesque

Re: Stegosaur at Angkor Wat? Of course one of the problems with things like this is the "Blue Monkey" effect: Tell someone to clear their mind and not think of a blue monkey and of course that's all they can think of, so once someone suggests it's a stegosaurus then that's what keeps leaping out at you. Well perhaps not, since it was an herbivore, but you see what I mean... But this is pulp! It's a stegosaurus and it's probably being chased by something hungry

Thanks to David Crowell for sharing this link on the Terra Incognita mailing list. Does this really show An Ancient Stegosaur Depiction At Angkor Wat? Your pulp adventurers might be very surprised at what they bump into in the jungles of Cambodia!

Re: Pulp Hero Resources Not a problem, I appreciate the last lot you gave By the way, if you like the look of the Lego sets then you'll certainly fancy a go at playing this. Definitely one for my "games to buy" list, but then the Fedora, custom leather jacket and authentic British gasmask bag in my wardrobe do tend to hint at a slight interest in the pulp / Indy scene...

Re: Pulp Hero Resources My Inbox is generally a sorry collection of commercial notices and occasional letters, but once in a while something worth a look arrives... Today it was a newsletter from Lego pointing me towards their new Indiana Jones Lego sets. I hope these get released in the UK (not all of the cool Lego stuff does, alas). Anyway, consider it another source of pulp miniatures

Re: Pulp Hero Resources Not sure if anyone's been paying attention to Pelgrane's See Page XX, a nifty collection of articles for their games which has more recently begun to include pieces about the pulp era (tying in with the upcoming Trail of Cthulhu game they're publishing): http://pelgranepress.com/SeePageXX/december2007.html