Matt Frisbee

This is a campaign I'm starting to develop -- hope you enjoy the fiction. Armageddon 1946 Introduction Fear has been my unwelcome companion for nearly seven hours. I can feel sweat trickling down my sides under my blood-stained wool-lined bomber crew jacket as I gasp for breath. My body is shaking from exertion fueled by the raw, bile-tinged fear that has driven me through this ancient arboreal maze they call the Black Forest. Am I the lucky one to have survived the flak burst that sent my B-17 pin wheeling into the German countryside? Or does fate have a much more sinister end in store for me? I whimper between breaths as my mind races through the possibilities. The most likely of these is capture by the Nazis, followed by days of torture and interrogation, then a horrific death in one of the dark rituals they use to sustain their beloved but completely insane Fuehrer. Nightmare tales of those rituals have leaked out of Poland – part the Nazis’ Final Solution in their continued genocide of European Jews – mass blood sacrifices of men, women and children to barely human creatures and rites to pagan gods of Germanic legend. What used to be playful stories around the summer campfires of my youth are morbid realities now. The world got its first hint that something was wrong when the German dead rose to fight again in North Africa and literally had to be blown to pieces by terrified British troops. Island-hopping American forces got their own taste of the supernatural when Japanese soldiers were reinforced by supernatural spirits – Kami – that could not be stopped by any of their conventional weapons. For over a year, the Axis powers overwhelmed their enemies, coming to the brink of forcing their surrender. But the Allies found ways to fight back. England’s Celtic Druids now hold the minions of Germany’s Teutonic magic at bay. America found new and powerful magical allies among its Indian nations, the Inuit and Hawaiians. In Russia, Comrade Stalin found a kindred spirit of sorts in Baba Yaga, whose command of the spirit world has held the advances of the Third Reich at bay. Surprisingly, Australia has risen to prominence among the Allies with their aborigine shamans’ ability to perceive and manipulate primal magical forces… The sudden sound of a feral hound’s baying freezes my heart. As powerful as the Allies are, they are no help to me here. I am alone and have no hope of rescue or salvation now. I see humanoid figures approaching – giant misshapen forms shambling among the trees. I see one of the figures stop to sound a great horn of bone. The note is filled with malice and foreboding that steals all hope of flight. The figure turns toward me with a grin and shouts something in a guttural language. Its head sports a full rack of antlers as the eyes glow like half-dead coals in a fireplace. The giant shakes a spear with a jagged point at me and begins to advance. I can hear the hounds that have pursued me running through the brush. I load my service pistol with a clip of argent-core rounds, and draw a bead on the first slavering hound to reach me. The round nearly takes its head off, but the others are on me before I can fire again – shredding my jacket with their fangs. I kick and roll to get clear, losing the pistol in the process, only to find myself on the business end of their master’s spear. With a howl of triumph, he raises the spear to finish me, but the thrust is never made. The sharp reports of bowstrings on leather bracers and the meaty impacts of arrowheads in flesh mingle with the enraged and desperate cries of pain from the hounds. The huntsman becomes the hunted and flees into the screen of trees for protection from the onslaught. Someone – a middle-aged man – screams something in Hebrew at the huntsman’s back, and then pauses to silence the whimpering of one of the hounds with a blow from a hatchet. I rise slowly as the man turns to face me. His weathered face breaks into tired smile. “I see the Master of the Wild Hunt has welcomed you to Germany,” he says without preamble. There are four others with him, each sporting a longbow and a quiver of arrows. “I presume you’re American?” he asks. I nod. “Is that standard weaponry in the Jewish Resistance?” I ask, indicating the bows. “We use what works,” a young man with a scarred face among the others says to me, “Bullets don’t even make the Huntsman flinch, but he has felt the sting of sacred arrows before.” “No offense,” I reply. “No time for talk now,” says the middle-aged man, “The Gestapo has patrols out, searching for downed airmen like you. Even the terror of the huntsman’s horn will not keep them away forever. We must run.” And with that, the rest broke away at a trot and I was hard-pressed to keep up with them, even after only pausing long enough to retrieve my pistol. While my weapon might be useless against the Huntsman, it would certainly be of some use against the human monsters that wore black uniforms…

Re: Western Hero Book Kenzer & Company are releasing a "Shattered Frontier" version of the Old West called Aces & Eights. This will probably be in the vein of Hackmaster with overly complex rules concerning gunfights, plus more potential enemies besides indians as the Confederate States of America, Mexico, Spain and several other countries vie for control of the lands west of the Mississippi river. Advertised price was $49.99 and stresses over 400 pages of material. I, personally, will have to look it over before I give it a try, but whatever floats your boat. Matt "Remembers-1st-Edition-AD&D-books-were-$12-back-in-the-early-80's" Frisbee

Re: Answers & Questions

Re: Apocalypse Hero A few bits of source material that seem to have slipped through the cracks: The Deathlands series of books (and a low budget movie on the Sci-Fi Channel) details the exploits of a mercenary type in the shattered wasteland of a world gone about 100 years post-nuclear (I think). There are some mutants and such in the books, along with lost technology, warlords, etc. The first of the Bolo series of stories takes place a few decades after a nuclear war. The major character was a test subject for a cryosuspension system at a missile or military base. The Marvel comics character Deathlok was a cyborg survivor of some sort of cataclysmic war (at least in the comics I've thumbed through in the past). For a slightly childish take on the apocalypse, try the Saturday morning live action series Ark II in which a group of young scientists helps the scattered groups of humanity begin to rebuild after earth suffers a ecological holocaust due to pollution. Along the same lines, don't forget Planet of the Apes movies, since a few of them are (presumably) some 1500 to 2000 years post nuclear war. (As a side note, I have secretly wanted to do a slightly expanded version of this for a campaign for a long time, though most of my current group of gamers can't stomach the kitch...) And, not to be too much of a gadfly, The World of Greyhawk might technically qualify as a post-apocalyptic setting, since a great (non-technological) society has fallen in ruins in the past, and the current inhabitants live on the bones of the former society. Matt "Damned-dirty-apes-fan" Frisbee

Re: Top 10 Action Hero One-Liners "Don't run!" *BLAM* *BLAM* "Don't run!" -- Loki, Dogma

Re: Best ever Reason to NOT be a superVillian!! "Crush your enemies, "See them driven before you, "And hear the lamentations of the women." What, you're serious about that?

Re: Top 10 Action Hero One-Liners MATT FRISBEE'S TOP FIVE TAGLINES FROM THE MOVIES: 5) "EAT THIS!" -- Hicks (Aliens) 4) "You're terminated, *BLEEP*-er." -- Sarah Conners (The Terminator) 3) "Consider this a divorce." -- Doug Quaid (Total Recall) 2) "I'm going to get medieval on your a**!" -- Marcellus Wallace (Pulp Fiction) AND THE NUMBER ONE TAGLINE IS: 1) "Get away from her YOU BITCH!" -- Ripley (Aliens) Matt "Tagline-not-included" Frisbee

Re: Best ever reason to NOT be a superhero... MATT FRISBEE'S TOP FIVE REASONS TO NOT BE A SUPERHERO: 5) Because supervillains always go for the groin shot, 4) Because I flunked the sewing section of Home Economics, 3) Because I just can't make a snap decision, even if the world hangs in the balance, 2) My cursive is really sloppy, and I don't want to disappoint autograph seekers, and -- 1) Because being a superhero would cut into my gaming time! Matt "Throwing-dice-now-try-later" Frisbee

Re: Superhuman women and normal women In my particular dimension, superheroes don't have much influence on society at large, other than by their actions. Supers have been around since the late 1920's, but there are only about six thousand of them worldwide. People do want to be superheroes, but it is taught from an early age in public schools that superheroes and villains are not normal people. Thus, normal expectations for things like body image are maintained. Since my particular multiverse is the four-color idealistic sort (at least for superheroes) ordinary people may admire and even obsess about superheroes, and children may pretend to be their caped idols, there is no direct correlation between the world of supers and world of norms. Of course, in my world, the heroes don't wear spandex, either -- they are a little more functionally oriented, especially since they get a lot of their gear from the federal governments. Matt "You-can't-tell-me-Victoria's-Secret-models-are-real-humans" Frisbee

Re: Rejected Superhero Names I had a campaign with some goof-ball heroes. Among them: Piledriver -- a brick with incredible move-thru powers. No problems with the name until he missed one move-thru in the railyards and cracked open a tanker car full of liquified manure... Phallon -- I don't think I need to go into details about the round of giggles that started when our resident "player who takes the game way too seriously" proudly stated his character's name for the group. I made some crack about him taking matters "in hand" and he stormed out of the room, our hysterical laughter nipping at his heels... Rebound -- everyone's favorite shapechanger with the ability to bounce ran afoul of my sledgehammer wit after coming off second best to a fire-based villain. Quote -- "You should change his name to Vulcanized rubber now." From another player -- "Does that mean he can do it only every seven years?" Kudos all, Matt Frisbee

Re: I eat my Cheerios stealthfully! Yep, probability does not dictate the result of a single dice roll. "Dice" by Matt Frisbee My dice are my enemy, My dice are my friend; They determined the beginning, And they always spell the end. Tumbling and rolling, Pips blurring as they fall; Clattering and slowing, With faces seen by all. The spots stare at me blankly, Like the soulless eyes of fate; Exhaltation or damnation, There is no longer a debate. Though this throw is ended, With results so plain to see; I hold them tight within my palm, Longing to set them free. Matt "Roll-them-bones" Frisbee

Re: Traveller Hero Update Unfortunately, I have to agree, especially after giving the playtesting rules the once over. Even though I have MegaTraveller .pdf's on disc, it will be a cold day in Hades before I ever get a group to suffer through that system, but I've got a group that loves the simplicity of the original LBB's. I guess that makes me one of the "grognards" but I am still quite interested in Traveller Hero. GURPS Traveller did give me some interesting ideas to drop on my players in the last campaign. Hopefully, Traveller Hero will do the same. (Nope, I don't have original concepts in my games -- I just steal what I like from everyone else.) Matt "Grognard-pride" Frisbee

Re: WWYCS: "Why Shouldn't I Kill Him?" Why not kill him now? Because I'm not going to stand by and let you kill him, regardless of your reasoning, and I'm sure the scum will get a laugh out of the idea that a hero had to save his life from another so called hero. The moment we as heroes take the law into our own hands is the moment we lose the trust and confidence of the people and organizations we are trying to protect. When our actions indicate that we have placed ourselves above the law, most people assume that we have placed our goals and motivations above their rights. Justice must be justice for all with due process and the all the rights and procedures that the legal system entails. Sure, mistakes are made and the victims and survivors sometimes feel that they have been treated less fairly than the criminals that victimize them. But in the long run, for the vast majority of cases, the law and legal system is both fair and adequate to the task. What you are proposing is vengeance, not justice, and if you step over that line while I'm around, I will lay down my life in an attempt to stop you from carrying it out -- not because I care about this scumbag, who obviously has some sort of punishment coming, but because I care about the image we as superheroes have to the public and what we represent to them. I will not allow you to cross this line. So you either back off and let the law handle it, or get ready to kill me as well as him. He may not deserve it, but it's not a matter of earning human rights, after all -- he's entitled to his regardless. It's a matter of what's right, and taking life when not absolutely necessary and unavoidable is not right. I've made my decision, so now it's up to you. So what's it going to be? The vigilante route with two dead bodies, or the heroic route where you let justice be done? (Short and sweet -- this sort of moral dilema doesn't crop up in my campaigns because I require heroes to be heroes in my universe.) Matt "Upholding-the-four-color-paradigms" Frisbee

Re: Traveller Hero Update I wonder if Traveller Hero will be released at about the same time as Traveller Fifth Edition? Promotional goods for that product keep saying June 2007 for its release, so maybe a conjuctional release? Matt "Just-Curious" Frisbee

Re: The Core Suns Thanks for the correction! But, of course, all of this is relative since the whole tapestry of space is in constant motion. The Traveller geek in me wonders what the local group would be like around 5600-5700 AD (which is the time of the Classic Traveller setting). Anyone? Matt "Just-curious" Frisbee

Re: The Core Suns I am presuming the coordinates are written in X, Y, Z format, of course. Just out of curiosity, can we assume that X is in line with Sol and the center of the galaxy, making Y perpendicular to that on the plane of Sol's ecliptic and Z being perpendicular to Sol's ecliptic? (If that makes any sense at all?) By the way, thanks for the information. Matt "The-Stickler-GM" Frisbee

Re: ONE power: what do you do with it? Admittedly, when this idea came up in another thread, I immediately said "Flight -- because it's so damn cool." However, after watching a few episodes of Heroes you can sign me up for Hiro's power. Worldwide teleportation is pretty cool, too. Matt "Passport?-I-don't-need-no-stinkin'-passport!" Frisbee

Re: matchmaker for masks? I wound up with Psylocke (but only at 59.7%), then Ariana and X-23. Considering I liked Betsy Braddock even before they started drawing her like a supermodel, I was actually quite happy with the result. Matt "I'm-just-a-harmless-class-of-pervert" Frisbee

Re: Answers & Questions Q: Did you hear the one about the rabbi walked into a bar with a sore tailbone? A: Racka-sacka-nacky-OOPS!

Re: Pimp My Stardrive! Okay, here's a rough draft of the basics. Sorry if it reads like stereo instructions. The Pimped Stardrive System (courtesy of thread contributors, but especially Spence): System Classification: Stardiver Basic Theory The gravitation and magnetism of a star combine to produce areas of stressed normal space around it. This stressed area of space is called the Interphase Zone. Under ideal conditions, high velocity objects can cross the dimensional barrier and be thrown temporarily into hyperspace when within the volume of an Interphase Zone. Such objects are usually destroyed upon contact with the hyperspace medium, since hyperspace is a parallel universe that is only 1/10,000th the size of normal space. However, spacecraft fitted with a hyperspace shunt can access hyperspace by emitting an intense pulse of magnetic energy at the precise moment the ship reaches an Interphase Zone, transitioning it to hyperspace. As a ship transitions, the pulse of magnetic energy it created converts into a compression wave that enfolds the ship with a small bubble of normal space, much like a super-cavitating marine projectile is enclosed in a small bubble of air or vacuum. This compression bubble protects the ship from the hyperspace medium which would otherwise destroy the ship due to friction. Due to this friction, the compression bubble does have a finite lifespan, eventually decaying to a point where the ship reverts back to normal space. Stars of 0.8 solar masses or more can create Interphase Zones, though more massive stars combined with more powerful hyperspace shunts are capable of transitioning ships for longer periods of time (and thus greater normal space distances). The ship in hyperspace cannot affect its ballistic trajectory (most ships cut their engines just before transition), and must coast during the journey until transitioning back to normal space. Because of this, the entry vector relative to the stellar mass and intended destination (as adjusted by the additional dimensions of hyperspace) as well as the energy discharged into the shunt determine where the ship emerges into normal space. Even small deviations of any variable in the transition can translate into very large changes, especially with longer transits. As a rough guide to potential transit distance in parsecs, multiply the stellar mass of the star, by the class of the hyperspace shunt carried by the ship, and the maximum speed the ship can reasonably attain on the approach in tenths of AU per hour. Thus, a ship approaching a star of 1.4 stellar masses with a class 2 hyperspace shunt at a speed of 0.13 AU per hour, could achieve a maximum transit of (1.4 x 2 x 1.3 =) 3.64 pc or about 11.9 light years. Most civilian ships would limit their transits to approximately one half of their potential maximum, since such transits enable their navigators more confidence in their transit plotting calculations. While they may be found in many locations around a star, the most typically used transit points are found along the axis of a star's rotation. The best point to use is the one closest to the star, which is found a number of AU from the star's center equal to one-quarter of its mass in solar masses. Thus, the star used in the example's best point would be (1.4 x 0.25 =) 0.35 AU from its center. Other points can be found at half the best point distance around the star, but due to the dangers of intense light, heat and radiation, most ships avoid these points except in absolute desperation (GM fiat). More to come -- but input appreciated! Matt "The-deranged-GM" Frisbee

Re: Pimp My Stardrive! Fixed routes are nice but too predictable for my liking -- that's probably why I never ran a system that included stargates and such. Continuing my previous post, here are some other tweaks to your "rules." 3) I would trade out the letter hypershunts for a Class system that were rated in powers of two for maximum supra luminque distance. (Class I [2 to the power of 1 = 2 light years; Class II [2 to the power of 2 = 4 light years]; and so on. 4) I would tie the distance bands to some formula based on stellar mass -- thus white dwarfs and cooler stars would be highly desireable departure points. The chokepoints thing of your fixed star routes still works since ships need the mass of the star to accomplish the transition to hyperspace. Other than these issues, I think your post for "rules" is extremely good! I'll probably be stealing it in the near future. Matt "All-gaming-usable-material-will-be-assimilated" Frisbee

Re: Pimp My Stardrive! Hello Spence, I like the write up enough to run with it, though I would tweak a couple of points for my personal flavor. 1) While the idea of popping back into normal space around a star makes for a good bookend to the voyage, I like the idea that a ship could literally revert to normal space anywhere including the cold, unforgiving depths of interstellar space. That way, explorer (or enemy) ships could have the option of dropping out at a distance as they move toward the stellar primary. 2) I've never been a fan of instantaneous transits (sorry). I like having the transit taking some time as a function of the ship's drive power or velocity. I'll finish this later -- thunderstorms moving into my area. Matt "Duck-and-cover" Frisbee

Re: Pimp My Stardrive! Spence, you have been repped. The more I think about it, the more I like it. However, try this last twist on for size: What if it was a variation of the infamous Star Trek "slingshot" effect, but instead of time dialation, it was space dialation? The ship slingshoots into hyperspace through the transitional "window" and the combined effect of spatial compression and ship's velocity throw it through hyperspace in an arc of sorts (whatever the heck that might be like in more than three-dimensional space) that transitions the ship back to normal space as the compression effect fades. Good news: you don't need to shunt back to normal space. Bad news: you have to plot your hyperspace courses and entry trajectories very precisely. More Bad News: if your enemies know your normal space trajectory before entry into hyperspace and can suss your ship's mass, their astrogator can make a pretty good guess as to where your ship was going. How's that? Matt "Glad-there-are-other-science-fiction-geeks-around" Frisbee

Re: Pimp My Stardrive!

Re: Pimp My Stardrive! I'm thinking that it will be a variable that depends on how "good the numbers feel" to the navigator. There will be optimum entries (based on angle, velocity and mass of the protostar) for other systems. The entry points are probably affected by the gravitational force of nearby planetary bodies (since most protostars have large moons). Admittedly, I'm probably making this more complicated than it needs to be, but it's an idea I've been mulling over for some time, now. Technically, the entry points cannot be detected unless a vessel is making a hyperspace translation. I imagine the math for an entry point is something like quantum physics, where an entry point can be predicted to a certain probability but cannot be proven to actually be there. I'm thinking these points work both ways but aren't connected like a network. I was thinking along the inverse, where smaller ships are actually easier to translate to hyperspace than larger ones. The big ones are still around, but the energy requirements of the big ones limit how big these ships can be (with current technology). Thanks for the questions, though, since it helps me clarify the concepts I've been thinking about. Matt "Thinking-about-it" Frisbee