Amorkca

I used tweaked versions of Deathstroke as a primary villain group for a few of my 4e and later 5e Champions campaigns. My version was grittier / more hard core than the published version, but they were great villains that the players loved to hate.
 
 
 
In the early 90's a group of supers from across the American south started working together from time to time, and in 1993 a formal team was founded drawn from a network of allies and friends. Taking the name Justice Incorporated, with the logo "When you want Justice not Law, call 1-888-JUSTICE".  
 
The new team quickly established itself as not messing around, fighting several engagements with supervillains and criminal syndicates, most notably including encounters with Agents of Deathstroke (an organization of primarily high-tech mercenaries led by a ring of five supers level badguys, Broken Arrow, Swan Song, Old Sparky, Killshot, and Hypothermic) which would prove to be a reoccurring nemesis for the group.
 
http://www.killershrike.com/SouthernJustice/Team_Background.aspx

August 12, 2003, Mechazone (Camp Pendleton), California...01:25 AM PST.
 
Pete had sent Turbofist to run around the outside of the compound and reconnoiter what was on the two sides not visible from where they stood. The young mutant had vibrated his molecules in a visibly blurry display of power and shot off with an audible loud buzzing whine similar to the noise made by high end racing bikes to do a broad lap, returning nine seconds later to report that there was a loading dock on the side of the building beyond the palettes of stacked storage lockers that were partially visible from this side, with a large garage-style roller door that was closed, and that the far side compound wall and the back of the building itself were just blank concrete.
 
"So...should we wait for back up or should we go down there and check it out ourselves?", Turbofist asked.
 
"Good question. Let me think about it.", Pete replied. And give it a good think he did, in his usual thorough way.
 
On the one hand, his armor suit was impaired and he might be more of a liability than an asset if hostiles were encountered. He could send Turbofist in alone, but as likeable as the youthful hero may be, his maturity and decision making might not be up to the task. He could use comms to call Hype back and send him in, but there was no telling how that would turn out given Hype's volatility and incredible destructive tendencies. He could call Fade over from his lurking over yonder, and send him to teleport into the building, but again Pete was unsure if the ninja-like borderline vigilante would just start assassinating people. Pete's assessments might not be fair to his fellow heroes, but their temperaments and reliability were known unknowns. Finally, if Sybyl really was present, she may or may not recognize Hype, Fade, or Turbofist, and hostilities might ensue.
 
On the other hand, if Sybyl really was present she would definitely recognize him as Makeshift as they'd both fought one another and worked together previously, and thus maybe they could have a conversation without things getting ugly. If he did go down there himself in his busted armor and the situation went to shit, Turbofist was pretty handy in a fight and should be able to buy time, allowing Pete to fall back and take cover behind the shipping containers. Fade would presumably be on top of them in a second or two. Hype could be called back and at his top end speed would also be present posthaste. Also, the longer they waited around the more likely they were to be overrun by killer robots that they had to assume would eventually converge on their location once it was noticed that the bots destroyed earlier were no longer checking in...that might already be happening now.
 
Therefore the least worst option with fewest unknowns seemed to be for him to go down into the compound with Turbofist. Pete rolled that around a couple of times looking for flaws in his logic, but it seemed viable.
 
Turbofist was starting to get visibly antsy by the time Pete spoke again. "Ok, I think me and you should proceed down and hop the vehicle gate, and make our way to the loading dock you told me about around the side. My armor wont fit properly through the barricades around the front door, but we should be able to get the rolling door for the loading dock up. If we encounter resistance, we'll fall back to the big shipping containers, take cover and wait for Hype and Fade to rally on our position...you'll run interference in the meantime. Legit?"
 
"Yeah! Sounds great! Let's do it!", Turbofist exclaimed without contemplation, instantly enthusiastic and reminding Pete of just how young the young speedster really was.
 
Makeshift indicated they should proceed, Turbofist powered up, and the two headed down the gently inclined path to the slatted metal barrier of the vehicle gate below them. Turbofist simply vibrated his molecules to phase through it, passing harmlessly to the other side with only a high pitched vibratory whine to mark his passage. Makeshift hopped over it with a quick rocket assisted jump, landing on the packed gravel of the compound's yard with a stony crunch. 
 
They paused for a moment, trying to notice if they'd been noticed, but nothing seemed to be changed so they proceeded past the parked military vehicles on the one side and the massive shipping containers on the other, then around to the side past the stacked storage boxes...to find the rolling garage door on the loading dock open and a figure familiar to Pete standing just inside of it waiting for them.

The KA is to provide a mechanical reason for characters (well, players of characters) that would be immune to the EDM to take the attack seriously. Many (if not all) of the PCs would have Combat Luck. If the KA wasn't there, the, "Killing Curse" would be a joke.
 
The palindromedary tagline is to authenticate that a post is by Lucius Alexander.

August 12, 2003, north of Simi Valley, California...01:22 AM PST.
 
They had made good time; Simi Valley was just over the next rise.
 
War-Man was cruising above and to the left of Wrath's flying car, which carried Rook and the MOD...and of course Wrath himself as the pilot. No one else was allowed to drive-slash-pilot "Matilda". Wrath had been forcibly retired from PRIMUS a couple of years ago due to personality conflicts with various "candy-ass bureaucrats", to use Wrath's preferred nomenclature, and while he had retained his cybereye and a retirement pistol that his R&D pals had told the brass was a "replica" but which was in fact functional, he'd had to give up a lot of very shiny supergear and toys.
 
Chief among the things he'd had to give up, in his own estimation, was access to the famous PRIMUS flying cars, which apparently he had formed some kind of deep seated personal relationship with. It was not improbable that the only thing on the planet John Wrath, crusty former "Growling Recondo", CIA Agent, and PRIMUS Silver Avenger, actually loved was the pure joy of flying around in a flying car. He complained bitterly of the lack of his flying car often. When deep in his cups (and it took a lot of alcohol to actually get him drunk thanks to his cyberline enhanced physiology, so we're talking DEEP into his cups), he'd sometimes wax downright poetical on the subject of flying cars in general and his flying car specifically. People who knew him well, which was basically just a few of his fellow Millennial Men as no one else was in a particular hurry to spend any more time around him than necessary, had learned to never, ever...ever mention or allude to flying cars within his hearing for fear of setting him off on either an angry tirade against the perfidy of the PRIMUS brass that had pushed him out, or a rambling anecdote or war story featuring his flying car prominently.
 
As a side effect of the disastrous Mechanon-related turn of events, the all hands on deck cooperation between heroes and PRIMUS, the political pressure PRIMUS higher ups were under to get results, and the fact that Wrath's old pal Albert Reyez, R&D wizard and the closest thing PRIMUS had to "Q" from a Bond movie was in charge of the forward deployed PRIMUS gear pool...Wrath had been more or less unofficially welcomed back with open arms. He was still "retired", but he was no longer persona non grata and had been reequipped on the down low. And a surprise...Albert had "misplaced" Wrath's favorite flying car when Wrath was pushed out, and then in a totally deniable bit of administrative legerdemain it ended up being decommissioned in the PRIMUS inventory database. A few months ago it had been offloaded in a cargo container in front of the ranch house on the outskirts of Bakersfield that the MillMen had made their temporary home, with a fresh non-PRIMUS paint job of matte black, keys inside on a big custom machined keyfob imprinted with WRATH in G.I. stencil font.
 
Alliage claimed she saw Wrath actually crack a grin when he first took to the skies again behind the wheel of "Matilda". But no one believed her, the very idea of John Wrath doing anything other than scowling being incomprehensible.
 
Alliage herself was below and to the left of the flying car, crouched on a shiny flattened disk of metal which was carrying her through the air like an aluminum magic carpet. She was trying something new-ish. One of her metallic orbs, which she used to focus her bizarre alchemical powers, was spinning in an enormous elliptical orbit encompassing herself, Matilda, and War-Man. Despite the high speed they were all moving at through the air and wind shear, the orb was able to keep pace without effort. Magic is handy like that at times.
 
But that wasn't the new trick. 
 
Alliage was trying to comprehensively shield herself and her allies from scrying of any sort. She had learned the rudiments of such an effect from Legend, the Beacon in the Darkness, last year as he was concerned that the sinister Chantal who had once tried to prepare Alliage to become the ultimate host for her evil consciousness might once again become a threat. And if not Chantal, then some other mystical malefactor would doubtlessly attempt something similar. Legend had insisted on certain precautions being taken, including training in what Alliage persisted in calling "defense against the dark arts", even though she knew it secretly irritated her mentor and possible love interest.
 
Alliage had practiced the anti-scrying magic a few times, but had never tried to use it for real when it mattered. So why now? Her thinking was that seeing people moving through possible futures was not all that different from scrying or prophesying, which are activities that magic knows a thing or two about interfering with. She had learned to trust her instincts; Alliage's intuition often served her (and her allies) well. Thus, whether it would do any good or not, she was concentrating as hard as she could on hiding her little pocket of the universe from detection by such means.

Try putting a normal person through combat then have them use a swingline or glider wings.
 
I can guarantee that having outstanding athletic ability has something to do with using either.

HERO Designer is a GMs dream.  You can construct characters for your players very quickly and build out your other NPCs at a greatly enhanced pace.

A GM doesn't have to follow the books.  If invisibility makes everyone invisible in the party as long as they stick within a 10m radius of the caster, then everyone and everything would be invisible. You guys tend to overthink things way to much.

Several PCs in my Champions game have Mental Paralysis or a variation thereof (one is a mental maze that works vs. INT instead of STR or EGO).  Yes, it can be an instant shutdown power, although a few select villains have had a few powers that made it less of a problem.  And most villain teams have a mentalist who can generally blow through a Mental Entangle with a single Mental Blast.
 
My current favorite "Mental Entangle Defense" power is:  Neural Freedom Shield:  Drain BODY 1½d6, AoE (Personal Surface; +¼), ACV (OMCV vs. DMCV; +¼), AVAD (Mental Defense; +0), Constant (+½), AP (+¼), Fully Invisible (+1), 0 END (+½); No Range (-½), Mental Contact Only (-½), Only vs. Mental Entangles (-½).  56 AP, 22 RP.
 
An average roll of 5 BODY, minus the (likely halved) MD on the entangle, leaves 3-4 BODY, which only Drains 2 since BODY is a defense power, but that may be enough to take it down.  And since it's a damage shield, it doesn't take the character's action to do its job.  You can imagine the players' surprise when the villain apparently shrugged off the mental paralysis like it wasn't even there.
 

So I can't resist...
 
Do his enemies call him Duckie?

I almost put something in my notes, but I figured people would get it without a nudge. 
 
One of my favorite superhero shows growing up. 

Things that get too genre specific make my hackles rise. Games aren’t comics and vice versa. Players have a lot of experience, and often learn from their mistakes. 
 
Way before Dark Champions, costumes in many local games slid into Kevlar and Army Surplus XD
 
as to the first question,  What ever happened to the 200 point villain, essentially a talented normal with one or two blockbuster powers and a little intelligence?  A good one hit wonder can screw up the Heroes best plans on occasion. 

While it could be quite interesting for some players to have the better part of a gaming session devoted to making opposed rolls for Gambling (Poker) mixed in with shooting dialogue back and forth, most players like the hitting/shooting thing.
 
What can sometimes liven things up is for villains to occasionally exceed their normal power level, or for heroes to be reduced in power because of some villain's scheme and have to deal with foes they would normally laugh at.

I have added an index in the first post and some HDC files.

I like your work, and encourage you to keep going.

Oo! Oo! Is that the next book we work on?!

Hammer tech?

OCD vs OCR

Has anyone done Conversions of the San Angelo sourcebook?

Hope they arrive soon!
 
I've noticed some discrepancies that you may find confusing with the cards and incorporating them with HD.
 
The Character cards (Strong/Dexterous/Determined, etc.) have been created with Characteristic Maxima so the totals for the characteristics are off from if you manually create the cards yourself.  Easy to fix if you want, but just an observation.
 
I've used them to start a new game, was originally just a lark build to see how the cards worked out randomly.  The players are enjoying these characters more than the game we were playing previously.

That's a cool idea.  

Okay; I'm awake!  
 
 
Yeah, sounds strange, but let me explain:
 
I was four days (Sunday and three work days) laid out with the flu.  Should have laid out one more, but I was going stir crazy.  Went back to work knowing better, but I wanted to get out, and of course, there's that whole "work or go hungry" thing working against laying out in the first place.   My typical workday is thirteen hours; sometimes it's a bit short, sometimes it's a bit long.  Yesterday's was, mercifully, a couple of _hours_ short, allowing me a few minutes to catch my breath.    I checked in here, but I had to get ready for the youth group game: an extended session (that turned into a nearly all-nighter) that saw the exciting climax and conclusion of their campaign.  It was a huge success, and there was celebration afterward (pre-ordered of course; this town is too small for an all-night anything except Sprawl-Mart).
 
So I got precious little rest, and needed even more than usual.  Tried to post this last night, when I got in, but I got sidetracked on the board and ended up I dont' even know where and woke up in  in this chair, computer glowing, sun coming up....    decided I should take a little nap......
 
Okay; I'm awake!  
 
 
As promised, there was a bit of house rule I was going to post here, in spite of posting it elsewhere already.  Still:
 
PRE Attacks are defended against by EGO.  It makes more sense to me.  Presence is your force of personality.  As long as I'm discussing what makes sense to me, the fact that the rules interpret this as always being a fear-based reaction baffles me.  "Strength of Personality" does not automatically imply "scary."  It just doesn't.  I would like to cite Terry Hogan as a great example, but all my evidence is anecdotal.  The gist, however, is that everyone who knew the guy, even in high school, comment on being bowled over or plowed under by his personality, but he wasn't aggressive, threatening, or anything else.  He was, evidently, extremely outgoing  and very likable.  He wasn't known to dislike anyone.  He was a bit of a boor, apparently, since it seems that the thing he liked to talk about most was Terry Hogan.  (I believe he's still famous for that, actually).
 
But still: a big, strong personality that is decidedly not fear-based.
 
Look at Sam Elliott--
 
actually, no; don't.  I don't want to drag this out.   I need to make my points and move on, because I have been spending entirely too much time here, and it's not like I've got the time to actually do what I've been doing more and more and more of, and that's hanging out here.  It's cutting too much into my sleep, and my health and faculties are starting to suffer for it.  So just pretend I mentioned something about Sam Elliott having a powerful commanding presence in spite of not actually being able to back it up (which, even this far after his prime, Terry Hogan could probably still do) with a butt whuppin'.
 
This judgement has allowed my players a good bit of freedom, as the don't feel they have to play one of the various denizens of Gotham or a hulking animalistic brick to justify a high PRE score: it's not a measure of scariness; it's a measure of, as the rules state, "force of personality."
 
But the idea that your force of personality was the defense against some else's force of personality never sat any better with me than did "your scariness is your defense against someone else's scariness."  So what is it?  I did some thinking and some light research-- then some accidental research that really drove it home for me.  
 
oh yes: the accidental research:
 
Way back in the mid-eighties, there were a number of things going--  Sorry.  Short version.  Donny T was missing a beat down.  I had found it for him, and had been wanting to deliver it for some time.  One summer night, coming home from a date that ended up with my girlfriend and I mad at each other, I passed Donny T's truck broken down under the light at the SUNOCO station, and lo-and-behold guess who's legs were sticking out from under it?  I fishtailed the bike around, bolted it over the curb, dropped the stand, and started yelling and cussing before I had managed to get my helmet off.  The feet stirred and a hand came out from under the truck and I grabbed Donny T by the ankles and _snatched_ him the rest of the way out from under that truck and it       wasn't Donny T at all.  Not even a little bit.
 
Turns out Donny had sold that truck to another guy, and that guy was not even a little bit, either.  He started screaming and hollering, and at that point I had two options: backpedal and try to explain the situation or bulldog on through and hope he flinched.  Given that he had _at least_ five inches and eighty pounds on me, I didn't figure he was going to flinch, and I wasn't smart enough to try the other option.  So I did the dumbest, most typical thing a young, healthy man with a score to settle could do: I kept being threatening.  We escalated things between us for at least a minute or two.  But that's getting too long, too.
 
So while I was getting my ass kicked (thoroughly, I might add), I had an epiphany.  I realized that I had known from the moment I dragged this complete (and very large) stranger out from under "his" truck and got a solid look at him pretty much how this would up, should we come to blows.  I was no small fella, and (from this point in my life, I am not terribly proud to say) no stranger to a fight.  But this guy outclassed me physically, and I had no idea of his skill.  His looks told me immediately that we lived a similar lifestyle, and that he, too, had likely had some practice dusting his knuckles.  He was a couple of years older than me: not enough to slow him down at all, but enough to give him more opportunity to have fought and learned from it.  He also had a focused look and manner about him (which could have been a simple response to my own posturing) that suggested he was more likely to resort to violence anyway, which led me to make the decision to not back down in the first place).  But the entire time-- from that instant I realized I had little hope of winning this fight to the moment I had this epiphany, I had absolutely not been afraid of him.  Knowing that I was likely going get a solid ass-kicking (and I did, and it was very solid) had not deterred or even concerned me.  I could still very cleanly see what he was doing and try to move or retaliate.  My head was clear.  I was able to quite completely notice that he was both faster than me and more physically powerful than me.  I could understand mid-fight-- not replaying it later, but as it was happening-- that he had already learned every left was a feint and he was comfortable stepping in to them to get around the right that he knew was coming even before I could make myself not throw it.
 
Now that's not to say I didn't touch him.  I bopped him here and there, and his middle was softer than mine.  His gourd, however, was was more extreme to my range than mine was to his.  And of course, I already mentioned he was faster.....
 
So two minutes later, it's all over.   He's standing by the truck, moving a bit, getting warmer and looser, and I'm getting up off the ground.  "We gonna do this again?" he bellows in that gigantic taunt with which we are all so familiar.  "If we have to." I posture back at.  Much flatter than his.  I am trying to convey that I'm not interested in it, but I'm perfectly willing.
 
He postures another minute or so, I drop my defensive stance and posture back, and ask "Well?  You gonna dance alone all night?"
 
The he just laughs, we look at each other, laugh some more, and talk a few minutes.  He makes fixing his truck noises; I make getting home noises.  I started back to the bike and he yelled "you gonna try that crap again?"
 
I looked back at him.  "You let those fists get out of line again, and I'll do my best to beat them till they bruise."  He's got a bloody nostril and a black eye.  I've got two of each.  And a cut lip.  He was standing when I fell for a feint and took a straight-out sucker punch that turned me enough to trip over my own feet.  He wins.  I get on the bike and go home, he crawls back under the truck.
 
 
It was about two months later when I realized what I had learned. 1) Presence isn't about looking scary.  I was big and ugly; he was bigger-- much bigger-- and while not ugly, definitely harder-looking.  Everything in me told me I _should_ be scared of this guy, but something kept me from doing it.  Neither of us would qualify as being especially scary-looking, but he admitted to-- well I won't quote it, but being extremely scared when a guy rolled up, squealed to a stop, leapt off the bike screaming bloody murder, and was doubly-so when I grabbed him and dragged him out of the truck.  I admitted that I had a hard re-think when he just wouldn't stop standing up.  I even told him that I knew I was going to get beaten pretty badly, but for whatever reason, I hadn't been scared.  He told me that once the fight started, he wasn't scared, either: he just fell into habit.  Turns out he was a solider from the local base, so yeah-- _way_ better training that I had _ever_ had, which was none at all.  All my "practice" came from actual fights. Learning-on-the-fly, as it were, isn't nearly as efficient as a good instructor, and the military specializes in that sort of thing, from the physical to the mental.  Just like he said: once he had analyzed the situation, he just fell into habit.  I had known I was out-classed, but hadn't really appreciated just how much until we talked those few minutes.
 
I was setting up a new campaign, preparing for the end of the current one, when I made this connection.  PRE vs PRE wasn't what kept me from being scared.  It wasn't what caused my opponent (whose name I never asked.  It didn't seem appropriate)  to stop being scared when the fists started flying.  I mean, it was sort of "presence," but it was "presence of mind" more than it was force of personality.  Force of personality-- that's the zeal with which you act, the confidence and certainly that you project, even the efforts you make to sell that image of yourself.  But when someone does it to you, it's not a skill-versus-skill sort of thing: you can't "unposture" your opponent.  It is your determination to stand your ground, your willpower that forces you to ignore all the flash and gumption rolling at you, and see this thing through to the end, regardless of the outcome.
 
And that campaign was the beginning of the House Rule that PRE Attacks are defended against by EGO.  Now we _do_ have "Presence Defense (FD)" as a Characteristic, and it is modeled price-wise on PRE: only for defending against PRE Attacks, but that's because we already had that in play.  We have never interpreted it as "PRE: only for defending against PRE Attacks;" we only priced it by that model.  We have always interpreted it as the ability to see posturing for what it is; the ability to see how much of the bravado is genuine, and how much is for show-- the ability to see that maybe, just maybe, he's not as confident as he'd like you to think. 
 
Now to be fair, from the point of that entire realization, I had always meant to go back and remodel the cost as EGO: yadda yadda, but I never did.  Partly because we already had an EGO-Defense (MD) characteristic modeled that very same way, partly because no one ever really bought a whole lot of FD (remember that our older editions used Characteristic X "so much" as opposed to Characteristics + "so much," meaning that a little went a long way, and partly because moving from PRE vs PRE to PRE vs EGO was just enough of a difficult sell to the players that I didn't want to rattle things up any further.
 
 
So, if you're young and full of vinegar, and are looking for just the right experience to get your creative juices flowing, I highly recommend not getting yourself beat up because your temper is short and your mouth is quick.  There are better ways.  Perhaps none that stick with you as well, but still: there are better ways.
 
 
 
 

Break time in the youth group game; I've got about fifteen minutes to check in:
 
Brian, take the time you need.  I myself was out of work the first three days this week: contracted flu over the weekend.  I also see your autocorrect does the same thing to Amorkca's name that mine does. . 
 
Amorkca, you've been pulling all of our weight; I am both ashamed and very grateful.  I hope this weekend to get the list in the first post updated, and delete out those things which I have addressed. Brian's will be a little trickier, because of the way he is doing it, but I _will_ get it done.
 
Gotta run; I want to check a couple threads before "potty break" is over.
 
Bonus:  We are at the "Exciting Conclusion" point of our short campaign, and everyone is riveted so far.  We just _may_ get a couple of new RPG fans out of all this.  
 
 

She's a stealer not a fighter
 
 
 
So you want a super cat burglar. here you go. She's who you bring out when you want a reason that the HQ is missing that special piece of equipment or that trophy or that memorial. Now it is a chase to find her and catch her before she sells it, or before it does something she's not ready for. 

Power wise, she's really street level in power. This fits for her back ground and power sets. Even in a team, she would not be front line, but causing problem in the background, or going for the prize while the heroes are busy.

Personality wise, she's got a chip on her shoulder. Mother kept hammering her lack of value except for her looks. She's been trying to prove her worth ever since.

This thread reminded me of an adventure I ran once in my Champions campaign.  Through some method I don't recall, all of the PCs temporarily lost their superpowers.  At the same time, ARGENT kidnapped one of the PC's DNPCs and squirreled him off to Sealand.  (For those not familiar, it's a former WWII gun fort off the coast of England - outside the territorial limit at the time -- that got taken over and declared a sovereign nation I think back in the 1960s.   In my campaign, I decided it had been taken over by ARGENT in the 1990s and built up a bit more.)  So the PCs had to sneak in and rescue the DNPC, all without powers. 
 
I allowed them to bring any normal stuff they wanted, as long as they wrote it down beforehand and it wasn't too heavy/bulky.  I still remember when they were being chased up an enclosed circular stairway by ARGENT guards, and one of the players said, "I dump my bag of marbles down the stairs."  I laughed and said, "Yeah, sure would be nice to have a bunch of marbles right now."  And he pointed to the middle of his list.  I'll be damned if he didn't have "Bag of marbles" in the middle, right after "duct tape" and before "super glue (6 tubes)".  And yes, all of that super glue got used, too.
 
The free equipment use pretty much made that adventure awesome.

Schroedinger's edition?  The Heisenberg Edition Uncertainty Principle?  Frankenstein Hero?
 
I dub it "Schroedenbergenstein's Edition"