Duke Bushido

I have no idea where you are, but from my house, I only have to drive an hour or so to find a comic book. I have to drive two-and-a-half hours to find a Barnes and Noble. :/ Of the two, I'd rather find the book store, but such is life. And put the Captain Marvel name _back where it belongs!_

Interesting discussion, guys; thanks. Clearly what we need is a new, expanded rules edition. Kidding, of course, but thanks for one of the more interesting discussion of late.

Life-long gear head and wrench bender here (it's lucrative, given everyone else on the frelling planet decided to dick around with computers all day ). First and foremost, I like both eepjr24's option and the "dispel the perk" option the best. So "why?" is next, right? Because what you are describing is butt-bendingly annoying to do with an RPG. RPGs, at their very best, simulate people and the actions of people. We all love HERO, and we all want to keep touting the universality of it, but it breaks all to bits when you try to simulate an actual real-world phenomenon. That's because it's not built to do it: it's built to simulate people. "Well then how would you do this with people?" I hear dozens of voices simultaneously not asking. Perhaps even thousands! With people, it's pretty straight-forward: do a high-level NND and STUN damage them to unconsciousness. Do a Mind Control. Do a Drain: INT. None of those will work with cars. They work for people because they exploit a very basic, universally-accepted aspect of people: they can be knocked out; they can be intellectually nullified in some way ( slow-roasted pork shoulder works for me ). Neither of those translates well to cars. It's weird how complicated the builds have to be to affect cars built by the game rules, when what you want to do is so _ridiculously easy_ to do to a real car (especially a Chrysler! Man, the damage you can wreak with a half-charged 20v battery in one of those things). The solution to your problem, though, is remarkably easy, and extremely simple-- so simple that us HERO fans tend to miss it all together, because there's nothing we like more than seeing just how many modifiers we can stack into a single build. The problem is that we're looking at it the wrong way: we're looking for a power that affects what we already have in game-terms. The solution goes back to a really _great_ discussion we had a while back. I've been searching for it for a bit, and came up dry (with any luck, LL will pass by: his search-fu is... well, it's just mystical, it is. And most of all, I wish I could remember who first floated the suggestion, because he deserves to be slapped with the credit stick a few more times. The solution isn't in the power build that affects the car. The solution is in the way you build the car. The original discussion, if I remember correctly, was about vampires or some such "unholy thing" taking damage because they were on consecrated ground. (Don't quote me, but I seem to recall that was the gist of it). There was, of course, considerable discussion of just how to build "Holy Ground" and what sort of attacks (and modifiers- _never_ forget them! Mandatory! MANDATORY! ) would provide the desired results and how much they cost and then how much was the cost for the ability to consecrate ground, and was a T-form or a Change Environment that lasted for a thousand years and what undid it and since it was a power a vampire could buy "Dispel" or "Suppress" and rub his groin all over Saint Sampson's holy tombstone----- Anyway, it was a fun conversation. The best part, though, was the simplicity of what I thought was the absolute _best_ answer. Do _not_ credit me for this (unless you hate it. If you hate it, by all means blame me and leave the creative genius who came up with alone so that he can do more great things), but the answer was this simple: There is no attack inherent in Holy Ground. There is no power to make Holy Ground-- and priest gives a blessing: boom! Holy Ground. There is a default Disadvantage / Complication ("Disadplication," for simplicity's sake ) inherent to the unholy monster: Vulnerable to Holy Ground: Xd6 per T, where T is the amount of time that passes before the beastie suffers damage yet again. You've got the same thing going on with cars and electricity-- I mean the _exact_ same thing. Any car that does not have a points-and-condensor ignition (for what it's worth, the last non-motorcycle one on the road was the original "Chevy Luv" pick-up, built and imported by Isuzu. The original body style. By the time the actually became a tiny bit stylish, they weren't using points and condensers anymore. By the mid-eighties, everything had at least a control box, even before full-fledge computers) and is not a compression-fired diesel (all "big truck" diesels, and pick-up truck diesels beginning with the Cummins era of pick-up trucks) have this Disadplication: vulnerable to electrical surges. You then, as GM, decide that rather than assigning a "damage" effect, you assign the debilitation: engine stops running. As for points-and-condensor engines: It's _possible_ to drop one with a large electrical surge, but it's really, really unlikely. Generally an "overage" of power in the ignition system is shunted to ground and nothing happens. If you get really, _really_ luck, you can arc the points enough to stop them from moving or blow the condenser (essentially a capacitor). newer compression-fired diesels (big trucks since the seventies; pick-ups since the Cummins era (say early 90s: close enough for a game) don't have an ignition system. All those electrical gadgets and gee-jaws are entirely for passenger comfort. You lose the alternator, the gauges, the lights, all that-- but the engine keeps running-- unless your truck happens to have an electric fuel pump, in which case fuel flow stops, and so does the truck. Older compression-fired trucks big trucks tended to have mechanical fuel pumps; turning off the key actually moved a solenoid that closed off fuel flow (ever notice how when they shut down they always seemed to just starve out instead of turn off? It was also the reason drivers tended to leave them running: any loss of fuel pressure behind that solenoid-controlled valve meant running the risk of loosing fuel prime every time you shut the truck off. ). The worst thing that's going to happen to a vehicle of this type if you attempt to overload the electrics is the loss of all the instrumentation, lights, and creature comforts, with the added possibility that if you fry the ignition switch or the relay controlling the solenoid, you might not be able to turn the truck _off_ until it's out of fuel. But man do I digress. The ultimate upshot of this is that, while the vehicle rules as-is don't account for it, modern vehicles have a Disadplication which game characters can take advantplication of: Vulnerable to electric overload in the ignition system. Now go build a spear with a large capacitor, because at this point it's just a special effect. Duke

And with equal respect-and promptly dropping the matter, as we both obviously have strong and differing opinions on appropriate measures in such cases-- I offer that letting him "live with the horrors of his soul" or what-have-you offers nothing but the chance for society--or a satiated victim-- to come to the realization that they, ultimately, may be no better that the person who's torment brings them satisfaction.

I have considered it. So you know where I am coming drom: outside of fiction, I don't believe in the "two wrongs make a right" thing. A short and torturous life inflicted in your assailant. I find it even worse when it is in keeping with the wishes of the victim. Don't get me wrong: I _understand_ feeling that way. However, I can't call it healing or closure; I can only call it being given the legal right to prove you are just as evil. Dead, though--dead is great. No more victims; no chance of revictimizing the old victims. No media, no interviews playing for six months and then again for a "five years later" segment--no trace left amongst the living. This is ideal. Bad analogy, but akin to the Bin Laden burial at sea: no grave site to vandalize or martyr, etc: just gone. Yeah: I know most other places aren't big on the death penalty. But in terms of done, just flat out _done_, dead and forgotten is my personal favorite.

Yeah, I get that, too, LL. It's simply that at the end of all that-- well, he's still alive. He's still "free," in a sense, that he will be protected, fed, and taken care of for the rest of his life, without undue need to stress over his own needs. Guys like this-- I find that unconscionable. Dead. Dead is perfect. Dead is ideal. Dead, and damed fast. By his own hand? Well that's just gravy. I like gravy.

Thanks, but honestly-- it was just the idea that I missed something in books that I use to this day that had me curious. (and not in Champs II; just finished a cover-to-cover on that.) And I'm curious to see if there was a write-up of that particular power: was it a detect? Or something else? You know how it goes.

I get that part-- what was killing me was the people -- victims and associates, primarily, and a few investigators and prosecutors-- lamenting the singular fact that by killing himself he somehow "got away with it." Not those words, exactly (though some not far off, strangely enough), but c'mon! Watch him get a jail sentence as opposed to being so miserable with himself that he took his own life? _way_ better in terms of justice regarding his crimes personally, or at least that's how it feels to me. Though regarding the comment above: I can't blame Hillary for this one, as she didn't stand to make anything from it.

Thanks! Though if it's Perrin, it might be in the old SuperWorld stuff, too. I'll find a few minutes to browse around this week. Thanks again!

I thought I had all the early ed stuff. Can you point out where, so I can take a look? Thanks!

Maybe there's something wrong with me-- I don't bleed for some great higher ethos or something. All these people screaming "He took his own life and now he has evaded justice and I can never get closure because I can't watch him get sentenced to prison." Dude's _dead_. And better yet, apparently by his own hand. It doesn't _get_ better than that! It's like a self-flushing toilet, ya know? What the hell do want? Him to live another forty years? Good God, Man...

I don't disagree. Honestly, I've never made a secret that I'm not and never have been a comic book guy. I peep a few here and there as players leave them laying around, and I can honestly say it's been twenty years since I saw something interesting. The bulk of it seems to be soap operas and spandex.

I don't know, Man.... you take that blue away, and you really lose a lot of the "pop" to the costume..... How about Lace? or Silk? or Silk Lace? Nope. Ya got me....

You have unilateral, unconditional, enduring, and endless permission to quote Tom Lehrer.

Which suggests that the Britsare some kind os sick and twisted, given the chance to be creative. (and that they totally understand how to go from "cool" to "coolest")

Thanks, Sentry. I'd been wondering about that since I first read about your ap.

From today's youth group: Kinetica: Oh, crap! It's the mayor! Feral: RUN!! (entire party beats feat out the fire exit) (No; explanation makes it no less bizarre )

Does the current / will the new version offer a way to read sheets without HD?

Couple of things I just wanted to say. First, I stopped in to say that, while it took many decades, I finally came to realize that two primary differences between "decent music" and "utter cap" are repetition and volume. Without either of those in excess, it seems most music becomes bearable. The entire music industry, perversely, is the reason that we absolutely hate all the songs they want us to love. Music is not marriage! The Stockholm Syndrome does _not_ apply! At least, I _was_ going to say exactly that. I was going to say exactly that as I waded through every sample given on this thread, right up until I clicked that little tiny picture above. That changed my mind. I've never heard that song before, and I don't generally keep my computer's volume particularly loud. In spite of that, that song is quite possibly once of the worst things I've ever exposed myself to. I have no idea how it got on the charts at all. :/ And Scott: I think the only reason this soulless piece of tripe ever got aired was the slight risque factor for the era. I just wanted to mention that 1) I never liked it, and 2) I listened to it a lot _specifically_ for the vocals of the young black woman: her voice is _tremendous_, and I kept hoping she'd dump the rest of these zombies and go do something great with her talent. However, having musical tastes that range from "nonexistent" to "eccentric," I couldn't tell you if it ever actually happened or not.

I dispute your last comment, Sir! Starting from the mid-eighties, really, short barreled shotguns have been one of the staples of the Rule of Cool. Damn, look at video games even as late as Doom, Duke Nukem (Time to Kill being a wonderful example), and Tomb Raider where you could-- for reasons that deny all understanding of ballistics-- deliver more damage with a shotgun shell than you could with just about any other gun in the game. There were auto fire weapons that didn't deliver damage like those things. Why? Because short-barelled shotguns were _cool_!

Chainswords, Dude. Chainswords. I have no idea where they came from-- I first discovered them in a Halloween store a few years ago, but for sheer coolness and "I want to cause you as much close-up, look-each-other-in-the-eyes-while-you-die physical agony as is humanly possible--- well then I have to say the chainsword is the way to go. And we're still waiting!

I liked Spinster a lot, but I'll toss out "Spinnerette" as well. Or maybe "Judy." Judy's a good name.

And all the Japanese cartoons that inspired them. There is was a cool factor there until the prequels just passed the things around like candy. Got tired of seeing them, honestly. No matter how you tear that thing apart, analyze it, or study and create some kind of methodology for it's use, that thing is stupid from start to finish. The only way to use it with minimal risk to yourself and the guys on either side of you is as a very short, very limited-options staff, and a very short, very limited option staff would be better at it. I'll come back to that, but first I'd like to say that the Traveller justification works well enough, honestly. When firearms are illegal from top to bottom in all places-- well, let's face it: people are still going to want to kill each other. It's in our nature. Swords work better than sticks. So you never know: social pressure might actually result in them coming back. Even today, there are just as many places selling (seriously low-quality artistic junk) swords as there are guns, at least in the US. Addressed already: the Traveller justification may not be absolutely perfect, but it is reasonable enough to accept as plausible in a game setting. What else do you _need_?! And airlines and conduits and all those other things-- the Traveller justification. However, if you're fighting inside a Traveller-esque ship, you'd better be using them for stabbing only, as swinging them in those tight corridors causes the same "cutting things" problems, compounded by the presence of your teammates swinging swords in narrow corridors. And that's a great place to start with "why." If we're going the Traveller / space opera route, we have more than one culture. We have more than the cultures of one planet. Given potentially a thousand new cultures, or a thousand-thousand new cultures, it's entirely possible that some of those cultures, for whatever reason, find swords to be the most practical personal weapon. Even today, should I live in Canada or England, I-- as a tourist-- would likely have a way easier time finding a big knife than I would have finding a hand gun. The catch, of course, is that the pigsticker is a bit harder to conceal--- which in _itself_-- the fact that you _know_ if buddy-cross-the-table is packing a sword or not-- may be one of the very reasons that some sci-fi cultures find swords to be more socially-acceptable weapons. Who can say? But keep running with space-opera settings: traveling to untold worlds, a hundred tech levels from "Wheels?! That's one _hell_ of an idea!" to stone hatchets to compound bows to pistols to pocket missiles to nuclear-weapons concealed in prosthetic eyes to who knows what?! So I stop at Aldebaran Station and load up: I refill my sand casters and missile launchers, maybe trade off some cargo space for a small power plant so I can add that last beam weapon I've been dreaming of.... I get my slug and pellet throwers serviced (last mission saw a _lot_ of action! You can _hear_ the barrel slop on that automatic! ), and I get two crates of ammo for each of them. I grab a couple of flash and stun grenades, just in case the natives are hostile where I'm going, fill the galley, and off I go, my crew and I ready for adventure. We get halfway to our destination, prepare for another jump, foof-- misjump. Lucky us, we can detect a habitable tech 1 planet at extreme range and head for it. Navigator says the comp and some of the hardware needs work. Looks like we'll be camping for four months or so, given we're going to have to cannibalize a few things and make a few others. Turns out the natives _are_ hostile, and more than one hunting trip has resulted in attack. By the end of the third month, we're pretty low on deadly noisemakers. The natives, iron age bastards that they are, seem to have one distinct advantage over us with their swords: the don't have to reload. Sure, they're sucking hind teat on offensive ranged capability, but they've got the area knowledge; they've got the skills-- the tend to get pretty damned close before we even see them! We fire eight shots and we're out; stop to reload. They keep swinging those swords.... So we've got that in favor of swords, at least as a back-up weapon (which honestly, even in Traveller, other than duels, back up weapons is all I ever really saw a sword being used for, even for NPCs. Everyone had a gun, but they all had a sword of some sort for on-board work and in case that gun failed. Guns are inherently more complicated than swords, after all. Or suppose we leave the Imperium entirely. I've been two seven worlds and can't find a damned thing that will work with my Browning or my Dan Wesson. That kind of sucks, because I really _like_ that Dan Wesson! So I've spent money on new slug throwers and new ammunition on every planet, only to find I have to do it all over again if I don't scrape up the funds to start buying it by the metric ton! My steward, though, has come to realize that regardless of how they build their guns, all these different people still bleed a _lot_ when you chop them with something. I have more, but I don't have the time, so I hope some of this might get your "why we need swords" juices flowing. Now backing way up to Connery's Outland, or whatever it was called--- well these problems don't apply. It's sci-fi, but we didn't leave the planet(ish), so why bother?

My supers universe is filled with these: Characters (NPCs) with a power or two who are _not_ "super heroes" or "super villains," but just people. Honestly, I _had_ to do it. I mean, i introduced it as a minor, once-in-a-while background gag, just to test the waters, but I was surprised at the reaction of the players: it just made so much sense to them! I was shocked. Like me, they figured for every one guy who got ten different powers, there were probably three or four who got one or two powers. For every person who go some awesome movement or combat or clairvoyance power, there were likely a few who got "see in the dark, period." I have no idea whatsoever how to write them up in 6e in a way that won't result in nine different discussions about what I did right or wrong, so let me just give you the basic idea of two of the still-present (and strangely popular) of these characters: Steven "The Step" Stephenson (real name Jordan Piper) has the singular ability to survive a fall from any height. That's it. Even if he lands at terminal velocity and falls flat onto a field of high-density concrete, he'll be fine. This does _not_ mean he can survive being hit by a car doing 50. His amazing invulnerability only applies to falls. He currently supports himself as a highly-demanded stuntman in the movie industry. Danica Manning (real name Danica Manning): Duplication. She has become so used to being twelve people that it's rare to find her fully combined. Currently, she supports herself as six lab assistants (mostly in the "super science" type fields), attends college where she is currently working on four different degrees (three duplicates) to go with the ones she already has. She is also dating a couple of guys, and is living a life of absolute leisure, doing whatever strikes her fancy. When she needs to rest, the more worried, frazzled, or tired duplicates will merge for a few days with the "permanent vacation" duplicate, re-align themselves psychically, intellectually, and spiritually, and then go back to work. Though sometimes it's not always the same one going back to the same place (nor does it really matter, so long as she has recently combined with the appropriate one). This neat trick has given her an undeserved reputation for infinite patience. She respects those with powers who decide to put on costumes and put their lives on the line, but in equal measure she finds the entire idea unbelievably stupid. As she is does not age unless all of her is combined into one form, she expects to enjoy a long working life (with eleven retirement plans! ), she's pretty confident that she's working toward a very, _very_ comfortable "middle age" that she plans to extend for as long as possible. She's slightly sarcastic, (very slightly), almost monotone when at work, and -- well, she's not exactly anti-social; it's just that sometimes she is more company than she cares to have. She can be bribed with a small sack of chocolate-covered mayonnaise balls from Truck's Tacos. There are many, _many_ more, but for some reason, with every supers group I run, those two keep coming up as fan favorites.

We're likely within a decade or so. These are both "late life" kids: I'm fifty-nine. And after the 6th grade orientation I had to attend for my son's new school-- which could be better boiled down to "how to helicopter even more closely via social media and smart phone, I think I may also be the last of the "free range" children....