Supreme

Re: This is Too Cool, and I Must Tell You About It Yes, thank you. That is a good point. In every case of infidelity the is always a terrible price to pay, usually by the offspring. Immortals are above such things. And in this case the PC is herself immortal (actually paid points for it an everything). Of course I'm taking liberties. My game. My liberties.

Re: This is Too Cool, and I Must Tell You About It Yes, but that's Aphrodite mating with a fellow deity, which I am saying is significantly less of an insult.

Re: Greatest American Hero type character???? No, and I'll tell you why in a few sentences. First, the how. There are various ways of accomplishing this. The first thing that comes to my mind is to apply negative levels to everything. You could also try side effects explained as mis-fires. Though playing such a character is different, and somewhat interesting, the novelty wears off quick. The big problem with the character is that they can't do anything. If you only successfully hit your target every tenth time, it becomes a real pain in the tuckus. Part of the point of being in an RPG is that you have an effect on the world your character inhabits. Taking on all kinds of I-can't-use-my-powers-right disadvantages and what-not limits that severly. I suppose it might work if you were more powerful than the other players by a wide margin, and you spent your EPs taking away the negative levels. Still, that'd take a REALLY patient player.

Re: Status of My Mixed Power-Level Campaign

Re: Need (More) Help With Marvel Age Game Trouble with the nanobots is that they are not period appropriate. I'm concerning myself more with flavor than good science. The other problem is that the aliens whose ship crashed on Earth, are not part of an invasion or subversion. They showed up 10,000 YA to study a planet undergoing and ice-age and their unmanned ship crashed. Now I know that I am already diverting from vampire lore significantly (though I wasn't aware that Stoker diverted that much himself, I'd thought he'd done a lot of research through 50+ trips to the Carpathians). I'm picking and choosing the parts of the lore that suit the game. When it comes to vampires, I feel that the inhibition against entering uninvited made the most sense because that forces them to stalk people on the streets at night (especially in modern times when people don't have blessed homes, or crosses on the door, or garlic hanging in the windows). If I can't really make it work with a "good" explanation, I'll probably just kick it loose. What I really need is something that makes it impossible for them to invade a persons home, but not impossible for them to invade a PC's lab, which I plan for them to do later. I can't wait for that. I'm going to reveal to him that there appears to be some sort of chemical in vampire blood which responds to some form of background radiation. When he attempts to scan for that chemical I'll say, "Well, you've got the scanner going, but... this can't be right. If these readings were right then there'd be at least a dozen of those things in the building with you right now..." Sort of a "the call is coming from inside the house!" kind of thing.

A bunch of you expressed interest in staying appraised of my "Marvel Age" mixed power-level game so... For those of you unfamiliar, I am embarking on an experimental campaign whereby I offered my players a choice. Play a 200 pt character with little combat effectiveness, but all the science and detective skills useful for advancing plots and solving mysteries they want (within the limits). Play a 500 pt character who is a combat monster, but isn't good for much else. Play a 300 pt character who is in-between the two (non-combat abilities are generally good for finding clues -- like enhanced senses -- but still lacking the skills to advance from there) So far... We had one session which was mostly finishing everyone's characters. One of our players dropped out before the first session because he's moving to another city. So I have three players, one for each category. We played for one hour. The 200 pt character investigated a mystery associated with his origin, and the others got their characters, to the campaign city (one comes from Antarctica, the other from another dimension). The real test will come next session, at the end of the month, the extra-dimensional character brought a giant beastie thing with her (she doesn't have EDM, she was brought here by accident). The giant beastie is TOUGH, so only the 500 pt character will be able to last long going toe to toe. Hopefully the 300 pt character can last long enough to protect the 200 pt character while he figures out the beastie's weakness. Of course the trouble is that the 300 pt character doesn't speak English yet. Should be interesting.

Re: Need (More) Help With Marvel Age Game I thought of that, but my main reservation there is that they'll never be able fight indoors. Also, they'll never be able to go to sleep indoors. Tempting. I'll have to leave a brain circuit open for that. Of course when it comes to science, I'm the "it" guy of the group. Still they might come up with something good.

Re: This is Too Cool, and I Must Tell You About It

Re: This is Too Cool, and I Must Tell You About It Actually, it wasn't WS's idea, it was another player. But that wouldn't stop her from chiming in. And we saw Troy... WS loved it so much that she'd accept, "but it was in 'Troy'" without further argument. Still, I have been reading about the Gods and Goddesses since I was a kid. Unfortunately, my sources haven't been as advanced as hers, but still I have a lot of strong ideas about what each of the gods represent (my current theory is that Hermes is all about virility, but that's another thread) and I'll just have to make it clear that in my game world it's my interpretation. I'm also free to say that some myths happened and some didn't and some just happened differently than Robert Graves thinks.

Re: This is Too Cool, and I Must Tell You About It I read about Aeneas, but because he is supposed to be the ancestor of Italy, I assumed that it was a Roman myth about Venus confused for a Greek one about Aphrodite. Anyway, I figured that at some point someone in the game, like the Wife Supreme who used to be a Classics major, would bring up some obscure story about Aphrodite sleeping with a mortal. For that I would just say that "concessions were made" and leave it at that.

Re: Need (More) Help With Marvel Age Game Interesting suggestions. However, I'm trying to avoid the idea that normal people generate significant amounts of psychic energy. Also, most houses aren't blessed, especially in modern times (the game is set in 1961).

Re: This is Too Cool, and I Must Tell You About It Generally, I don't contradict central established elements of a PC's origin. I think it's more respectful that way. I will build on their origins though.

Cometeer! Ice Queen! Don't read what follows! I just came up with the coolest subplot for my upcoming game and I have to Brag Supreme... One of my players is creating a character who is the offspring of Aphrodite and a mere human male. Cool. I start thinking of how to work up a sub-plot for her character... Aphrodite... married to Hephaestus. Beauty and Industry. Although Aphrodite's Roman counterpart dallied with mortals, Aphrodite herself did not. She only dallied with gods like Ares. OK... So, this would be too much of an insult to Hephaestus for him to bear. So, he will send his minions to Earth to retrieve this cuckoo, dead or alive, and bring her before the Olympian Court (Hephaestus can bring her shade before the court, so this is a full-on Hunted) as evidence of Aphrodite's infidelity. But it doesn't stop there. The PC will be told about this through Hermes. He's a nice guy, for a scoundrel, as well as a messenger. Of course he's also the god of deception, so what's he holding back? She has an option. If she let's Aphrodite "disavow" her parentage, then when the PC is brought before the Olympian Court, there will be no evidence of Aphrodite's infidelity. The drawback? The PC will permanently lose her powers. Hermes doesn't want this to happen because there's a big bad villain who will wipe out civilization, and his chances of succeeding, if this PC loses her powers, greatly increase. It gets worse. If Hephaestus succeeds, then Hephaestus and Aphrodite will "divorce." What happens when beauty and industry separate? No more art. The player is an artist. I'm loving this.

Cometeer, do not read! OK, so many of you already know that for my upcoming Marvel Age game my main villain is a Dr. Doom/Kang type named "Dr. Omenus." Omenus uses salvaged alien technology to re-create monsters of European mythos, particularly vampires. The deal is that Omenus found a buried UFO that leaks this glowing green liquid (Omenite) that turns people into monsters. This liquid picks up energy from crystals scattered on the moon (there were two ships, one crashed on the Moon). When the Moon is overhead the Omenite crystals pick up light from the Sun and relfect it on some funky frequency (this is a Marvel Age game so I'm not trying to make the science super-convincing) which activates the Omenite in the creatures (werewolves transform, vampires rise, golems awaken). For vampires, the presense of normal solar energy shuts down their consciousness and they become dead (again). Take it away, and they rise again, though the less moon light there is the more blood they'll need to keep going. Silver breaks down Omenite. Garlic thins the blood and causes the Omenite to separate. In vamps, Omenite collects in two particular places: the heart and the brain. Pierce the heart or sever the head and they die (permanently). If they look upon a symbol which, in life, they strongly associated with reverence, it causes feedback in that part of their brain and they experience severe pain and disorientation. Now... why should they be unable to enter people's houses without being invited?

Re: Power Skill...How Do You Use It?

Re: Power Skill...How Do You Use It? I generally think that the more you want to defy physics, the more you have to pay. Thus, if you want to do as the Human Torch has done and use your heat or fire powers to stop a bunch of people from falling to their deaths by causing the air beneath them to expand and rise, your choices are as follows: Pay no points: they die. You may buffet them about on their way down and cook off most of their skin, but they're still dead. The best you will accomplish is confusing the heck out of the coroner. Pay 3 points for the power skill: they don't necessarily die, but they're going to take some heat damage. Pay XX points for TK, AE, special effect: creating rising jets of heated air: do whatever you want within in the limits of the power as purchased.

Re: Power Trick For Heat Vision

Re: Variable Power Levels for Heroes I'm not much of a fan of leeway. I was thinking more about villains that the lower powered characters can do research on and learn crucial weaknesses of -- which the 500 and 300 pointers need to know about. Also villains with accessible foci, and plenty of innocents to get clear.

Re: Variable Power Levels for Heroes I plan to. I think the biggest challenge will be keeping everyone entertained during combat.

Re: Variable Power Levels for Heroes I'm just now gearing for running (in about a month) a "Marvel Age" game in the style of early Avengers or FF. The Parameters Supreme I have the players were thus: Choose one of the following for your PC: Be a 500 point character who has little ability to do anything in non-combat situations, but is utterly devastating in combat. Be a 300 point character who has a decent amount of combat ability, and has some powers that can be applied in non-combat situations (i.e., enhanced senses that can find clues), but no real detective or science skills. Be a 200 point characters, who can barely survive combat, but who has all the detectice/science skills you could want. 200-pointers are expected to have few, if any, powers and are generally expected to be one-trick ponies (i.e., can turn invisible, shrink, or have a gadget pool). I'm requiring that each slot be filled by at least one PC. I have four players, so I'm expecting two of one type. I plan to have all of my players sit down for at least one full session and talk about their characters to work out most of the specs, and make sure that no one's idea will get in the way. Also, all PCs will only have to take 100 points in disads. I just don't want to have to keep track of all that. My thinking is that when they need to advance the plot (figure out where the bad guys are hiding, solve the Sphinx' riddle, determine the master villain's weakness, etc.) then they can't do so without the help of the 200-pointer. When combat comes along, it's the 500-pointer's show -- and what a show that will be! The 300-pointers are supporting cast. I'm also going to make sure that each PC gets plenty of personal life role-play. So far I've heard these ideas: The Wife Supreme will be playing a 500 point brick (her first brick, you should have seen her eyes pop-out when she saw her figured stats) who is an alien primitive named "Kir." Eight feet tall, blue skin, no idea what technology is. Fun. The Cometeer (as he posts here) will be playing "Dr. Claw." A scientist gadgeteer who got caught in a botched experiment which permanently turned his right hand into a claw. His costume looks like it came straight from Jack Kirby's drawing table (the Cometeer is quite a gifted artist). More fun. The Cometeer's S.O. will probably be playing a character known as the "Ice Queen." Wang Chun. Our fourth player is new so he's probably going to need a bit of help to get his ideas off the ground. Wish me luck.

Re: Help with detective/PI skills In my Opinion Supreme, the must underestimated detective skill of all is... Accounting. Seriously, all those other skills (except maybe Bureaucratics as S7Michelle mentioned) will not help you recognize when someone is clearly keeping a set of double books, and thus figure out where the money is really going, and what it is really buying.

Re: Evil Businessmen. Joseph Coors.

Re: Aliens in your Universe A friend of mine always had one rule about aliens, that I have shamelessly stolen for all of my campaigns. The rule is that no alien species has more inherent greater-than-human abilities. Thus, if you want to make someone who is an alien possessing super-powers, they have to be just as extraordinary back home as they are here. Generally, any powered aliens anyone encounters in my campaigns are so powered by their technology. Solves more than a few conceptual problems.

Re: "Primitive" Disads Hmm... That sounds workable. So, maybe something like: Physical Limitation: thinks all technology is magical, slightly limiting, infrequent

Re: The Master List of Limitations