Supreme

Those are pretty basic, though different sects will generally feel that some of those are more important than others. Virtually all muslims feel that idolatry is hands-down the worst crime possible. True, all Jews and Christians feel that idolatry is bad, but some might feel that murder or something else is worse. These are not matters of official dogma, of course. They're just cultural differences. Many muslims, for instance, seem to think that adultery is bad enough to warrant capital punishment. That should be up to the GM. The more points that they take, the more often it should come up. What if the PC is up against a villain that's immune to his powers, but an old pagan magic sword is known to be deadly to the villain? Sin isn't just about what harmful to others, its about what's easy. One little Suggestion Supreme: Try this out as a susceptibility that drains your powers (3D6 per phase or turn...).

My proudest moment as a player was when my Silver Age Champion knew that a death ray was going to be shot at the UN. He knew what angle it was going to come from, but not the point of origin. So, while everyone else is fanning out to try and find the point of origin, Champion parked himself directly in the path of the death ray. We found the delivery system (a group of reflective kites), but not before Champion took 7D6 AP killing to the chest. He managed to say "Leaping 'Lectrons" before succumbing to unconsciousness. People started to chuckle at my character's pain (I was playing it up for yucks) until the GM pointed out that my character took 7D6 AP killing to the chest... and lived. My Golden Age Champion does this for his team-mates all the time (as the only brick in the group he feels it's his responsibility when he sees the Scarab Sorceress about to take 12D6 against her 19 ED), but the GM never used any death-rays so it's not so dramatic.

I've decided that I play too many bricks, and that the next character should be an uber-martial-artist. I want this character to be completely human: no super-human abilities at all. That's not to say that I won't take any talents. So, I'd like a couple of suggestions along these lines. First, what talents do people recommend? I haven't played a lot of martial artists. Which talents aren't worth it, which ones shouldn't be done without? Second, I want to come up with a good name. Now, rather than suggesting a name, can anyone suggest any good web sites or books with information on Chinese cultural symbolism? I don't want to name a character "Jade Monkey" unless I know the significance of Jade and monkies in Chinese culture. Thanks Supreme!

They don't all have to be aliens. Some teenaged athletes have fairly amazing abilities. Then there's always things like psychics, or people altered by alien technology. Perhaps one of the kids' parents are secretly participating in a government program, and are putting recombinant DNA thingies in their food.

I too read and adore "Avengers Forever." This is simply one of the best limited-run series I've ever read. BTW, I believe the first super-hero to face an adversarial future version of himself was marvel's Adam Warlock who faced the Magus. It's a great concept. I ran a silver age version of my favorite brick character, Champion. We were all allowed to write little inconsequencial side-stories on our characters for extra EPs. I wrote one about Champion experimenting with the cosmic radiation that gave him his powers to try and boost them. Something went wrong and he was catapulted into a future where his experiments to increase his powers went horribly right. He became the corrupt overlord of the Earth, Lord Champion. The good Champion defeated the bad Champion in a climactic battle that caused a space-time disruption which hurled the good Champion back in time to 1959, where he decided not to pursue the experiments after all. After I was forced to leave the game because of schedule conflicts, another GM ran a Champs campaign set a few years later wherein the characters had to face Lord Champion. It was cool, as the GM consulted with me about all kinds of things including what the good Champion would be doing in retirement.

Re: what if This reminds me of one of the most profound statements about the point of view of children that I ever saw in a film. The film was "Stand by Me" and one of the kids answers the question asked off camera, "Who would win in a fight between Superman and Mighty Mouse?" The kid's answer is, "Superman! He's a real person and Mighty Mouse is just a cartoon." My money's on the mouse, btw. WB animation has Hanna Barbera beat each and every day of the week -- and twice on Sundays.

(Bow Supreme) Thank you. I'm not always a fan of angst, but I thought that wasn't too bad. Interestingly, I was thinking about it as I wrote. Totally off the Cuff Supreme.

We got into a discussion over at the "Send in the Bricks" thread about micro-bricks. That's bricks with shrinking who retain their mass (three levels of DI/level of Shrinking). So I cooked up "Microman". Yeah, I know. I'm addicted to silver age cheese. Hey, I just like it when it's been aged for about 50 years (okay, 49...). I'll probably work up a sketch this weekend and post here. Let me know what you think. I recommend saving it to a txt file rather than viewing it directly from your browser. I just tried that and IE won't support the carriage returns.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: "Angel" the RPG True. Though they do sneak around in the dark, have fangs, and drink human blood. Of course almost every culture has some kind of blood-sucking, shadow-walking creature in their folklore. Europe just happens to have one that's a reanimated corpse.

You and me both. First "The Tick" and now "Firefly". Have they NO sense of good programs - or how to promote them?

Re: Re: Re: Re: "Angel" the RPG Yes. More specifically an addiction. I get very strict when it comes to the treatment of concepts like "evolution" and "species". The defining characteristic of a species is the ability to procreate with fertile offspring. Outside of Southeastern Asia (i.e., China, Japan, Korea, etc.) vampire folklore never really shows vampires reproducing. Even Anne Rice went so far as to expressly state in "The Vampire Lestat" that vampires are unable to procreate (she even implies that the males are impotent).

Well aware already, but thanks. This is actually still in discussion over at Mutant Enemy (the folks who make the show). They've also been talking about a "Dawn the Vampire Slayer" show too. Of course all of this is going to be thrown into a bit of disarray now that "Firefly" has been cancelled.

An excellent point. Though to be fair it would be Detect: science fact, sense, discriminatory, analyze, etc. It would be more limited than that. I guess the only really good way to do this would be to buy the usual skill enhancers and all the skills I can stand.

Re: Real World becomes more like Comics Oh that's just weeeiiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrrd... Of course if this were to progress like it did in the comics, then it would turn out that all those who used the formula would slowly turn evil. The underlying assumption is that you're supposed to earn your advancement, not swallow a pill. I'm guessing that in about 10-15 years the results of this study will be available over the counter as a diet pill, or at least available by perscription from a doctor as a geriatric treatment.

In the campaign I'm currently running, all the PCs are too young to serve. If they weren't I would probably ignore it, unless the players all told me they wanted to shift to a Persian Gulf campaign. In general, I have a hard time buying governments enlisting free-lance super-hero help. I tend to think that the government would view super-heroes as very powerful, but very loose cannons. They're always disobeying orders, having moral epiphanies, discovering that their deadliest enemy is actually their old flame from college, etc.

I've wanted to play in a game like this since I first saw "Night of the Living Dead" in the early 80s. Dang.

Re: Re: "Angel" the RPG Aww, you're just buttering me up so I'll help you write all the background material. Seriously, doing vampires these days is hard work, especially if you care about doing something original. Vampires are the most over-used piece of folklore in pop-culture today. And so much of it these days are either urban vampire gangs (the Blade movies) or self-indulgent rave clubbers (Rice's Vampire Chronicles). I'd like to see vampires that are dirty, grubby, and of limited mental faculties. On "Buffy" it's been established that vampires, like most demons have a hard time evolving over time. That is to say that they have a hard time picking up new skills and adapting to the modern world. I thought of a vampire idea a while back where the vamps are unable to develop long-term conditioning. They can remember where they've been and who they've interacted with, but they are utterly unable to learn new skills. Thus each successive generation of vampires is called upon to take care of the elder vampires (try explaining a internet chatroom to a 5th century vampire). Ultimately, all vampires become "kept". They live out their existences in hidden bases getting fed by younger vampires who are still able to function. Of course you'd need some reason why the younger vampires bother (like feeding from older vamps makes them stronger).

You're Welcome Supreme. And thanks. I read that and felt Disappointment Supreme. I felt it was FULL of cliches and a central character who was so self-indulgent and obnoxious I wanted to jump into the comic and beat him senseless myself. Maybe if I reconfigure Optilux's ray gun...

Anyone ever been tempted to play out a retcon? Do a Crisis on Infinite Earths game?

The Blade movies have increased your faith???

A friend of mine actually strictly enforces a rule that every session is one "issue" of the comic book that the PCs are playing out. This means that he has to resolve each and every session's plot in that session. He also likes to makes sure that there are "Christmas" and "Halloween" issues. It takes all kinds.

Has anyone ever tried to run a campaign where all the PCs were required to be bricks, or all martial artists, or all mentalists, etc.?

I wouldn't bet on Columbus being the final director. That film is still in its early embryonic stages. They have no script (that they want to shoot), no cast, and the director is going to be tied up with Harry Potter for years to come with filming complications piling up daily. BTW, the studio wants to do a comedic FF. This is going to suck harder than a black hole in the Negative Zone.

Regardless, the existence of ECs, other frameworks, and power limitations does not "devalue" characters who pay full costs for the same powers, in my Humble Opinion Supreme.

Check out my "Paranormal-Teen HERO" thread in this area.