David Johnston

1948: In the wake of World War II Dwight D. Eisenhower is elected President. Many of the war's superheroes have been lost in action or retired from action now that the war is over and there are few extra-normal threats. 1952: Eisenhower is re-elected. In his second term the Korean War is fought. Ben Grimm is a fighter pilot in that war. A few new heroes like the 3-D Man and the Human Robot appear, but their public careers are short thanks to the machinations of the Skrulls who arrive on Earth at this time. 1956: John F. Kennedy elected President but is assassinated three years into his term. As a result of his push to overtake the Russians in space, Reed Richards recieves the funding for his ill fated space mission. The Fantastic Four begin their career in 1957. The Skrulls try to eliminate them as well, but fail repeatedly. Technology advances with amazing speed thanks to the inventions of Reed Richards and lesser super geniuses. 1960: Richard Nixon elected thanks to an ingenious scheme to suggest that LBJ was somehow involved in Kennedy's assassination. Shortly afterwards he reinstitutes the draft in order to fight a war in Vietnam. Tony Stark is captured by North Vietnamese and creates the Iron Man armour, using it to escape. Almost immediately after his return, Stark becomes a founding member of the Avengers. Parker is bit by his radioactive spider. In 1961, the X-Men make their public debut and the original Captain America is brought back from the dead. 1965: Scandals force Nixon to resign in his second term, to be replaced by his newly appointed V.P., Ronald Reagan. Peter Parker is now a college student. In 1964, the new X-Men, recruited from all over the world make their debut. 1968: Reagan is elected to his second term. Gwen Stacey dies. Franklin Richards is born. The New Warriours form. By 1971, Parker has married model Mary Jane Watson. 1973: 9/11 happens. The Avengers take tremendous heat for failing to save the day and disband only to reform shortly thereafter. Reagan's V.P. and successor, George Bush launches invasions into Afghanistan and Iraq. The government decides to clamp down on "superheroes". 1976: The modern day. By this point the Fantastic Four and Tony Stark are in their late forties, and Spider-Man is about 35. This world have everything ours has in terms of technology, having advanced roughly twice as fast as ours has since World War II.

Re: Astrogator's Handbook http://www.atlasoftheuniverse.com/ Is interesting because it is so easy to visualise.

Re: Alignment Issues You're mixing your terms now, and you weren't before. Conformity is not the same as perfection; If it was, then the words "perfectly conformist" would be redundant. being Lawful every day in every way is the conformity I do not understand those words. n which case it's meaningless as a distinction, or it is a reference to perfection, which has nothing to do with intent (where the conformity is measured), only success - or failure. Weren't you arguing just a short while ago that alignment does look at intent and not just actions? Yes. And I still think that to be the case. Alignment is which side you prefer. If you prefer your life, world and society to be as stable, predictable and consistent as possible then you are Lawfully aligned. But sometimes you have to compromise your preferences when the alternative is death, or worse, a society which is unstable and unpredictable. That being the case, you might find yourself introducing the occasional innovation in your methods when the old ones are failing because the critical caveat is as possible.

Re: Alternate Earth 20: Paradise Island Lost Wizard's full name would now be "The Wicked Wizard", a disgruntled punk furious that someone else stole his first invention and patented it and nobody would believe him because he's just a boy. Riptide would be a transvestite, posing as a girl in the secret identity that this version of him would have that the original didn't. Because, he was just that pretty. Hellfire would now be named Vesta and otherwise be virtually identical. Excuse me...Hestia I note incidentally that a matriarchal world doesn't really work if you keep the same sex ratio of hero to heroine. I can hardly imagine a 50s patriarchal world in which 80% if the superhuman combatants were female after all for several reason and it applies in the opposite direction.

Re: Astrogator's Handbook Bumped because this contains useful resources that newcomers should see. But http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nearby_stars is particularly valuable to me for being easily searched and containing many of the stars players will actually recognise.

Re: Re-Imaged Hero(ines) Sorry for the delay. The next character, is in honour of my current weather conditions: Blizzard

Re: Alignment Issues You just defined Law out of existence. Since nothing is perfect, if you are only Lawful when you are perfectly conformist, then you can't be Lawful under any circumstances. No definition exists that is more comprehensive than D&D's? If it was more comprehensive than D&D's current (as opposed to just being different) then it would be so vague as to be meaningless.

Re: Where did all the Great Ones go? World building. Yeah, baby!

Re: Alignment Issues I find it interesting that, although military commanders studied past battles to improve their ability to adapt to new situations on the field, every maneveur and every strategy had to be invented "for the first time" once. In other words, modifications of past ideas could only be taken so far; ultimately, in order to innovate and thus to win, Lawful military organizations had to rely on putting a Chaotic individual in charge of their forces (or, at least, placing them in an advisory position, though this might be less than effective when the leader was afraid of trying new things in desperate situations). Has someone forgotten that there's a middle ground between Law and Chaos? Apart from that of course, while being attached to tradition is (often) a Lawful trait, being Lawfully aligned doesn't mean being Lawful every day in every way. Perfection is not expected. Since we've involved such worlds as Moorcock's and Zelazny's, though, I think we're looking for a somewhat more comprehensive definition of alignment? No such definition exists. Different authors have used those labels to refer to different kinds of opposing forces. In Three Hearts and Three Lions, Law and Chaos really were just different names for good and evil. In Marvel comics, they are opposite but complementing forces who usually work together to keep the universe running and when they fall into conflict the universe suffers. In DC comics (now) they are tyrants versus anarchists, both equally contemptible opponents of the heros. In another series I can't recall the name of, they are just different kinds of magic, one which destroys and one which preserves, but the practitioners of each really get on the other's nerves. It's interesting to note how Champions has treated the four alignments of D&D already. Holy, unholy, chaos and law exist as special effects for your power. _Usually_ someone with unholy powers will be a monster, but there are exceptions, people who rebel against their unholy nature. (Thanks to the Marvel horror heroes boom in the 70s) This is a constant struggle for them to defy their own nature of course. Presumably the same might apply to chaos and law so in theory we might see people with chaos powers struggling to impose discipline on themselves and order on the world or people with law powers who struggle to stay sloppy and disorganised. For some reason my mind seems to balk at the idea of people with holy powers deliberately turning to evil and still remaining holy and we don't see any examples of it in the source material. However of course most people don't have such a special effect, or for that matter any supernatural powers on which to have a special effect and hence are unaligned no matter what their personality is. We can see an example of Law (Champions style) in Horror Hero in the "Lord of Law" who, posing as an elderly woman, is secretly abducting heros and villains, stealing their powers and memories and transforming them into children because she just doesn't like how improbable and plagued by unlikely coincidence superheroes and supervillains are and how disruptive their activities are.

Re: Alignment Issues Quote: Y'know, I already gave my definitions of Chaotic. Yes, you did. Silly me, I forgot how we got started on this subject in the first place. I guess that really is the main source of out disagreement: To me, the values of freedom and egalitarianism have nothing to do with the Law/Chaos axis, and having a low boredom threshold is a personality trait having nothing to do with alignment. But weren't you having trouble figuring out what did have something to do with the law/chaos axis? r. Actually, not a lot more in a Chaotic society. For a minarchist, government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else, and that's closest to the position of a Chaotic Good character. What about disputes between individuals? What about them? They weren't generally settled by the war leader, but by the eldest person, or a council of the elderly, or the religious leader. Community-wide calamities? One of the advantages of not having a highly organised logistical framework is that while you can't support as large a population, when calamity happens, it's much easier to rebuild. Investigation of crime? In close-knit communities where everyone knows everyone well, finding out who did what isn't very difficult. Defense of the accused? etc. The accused can speak up for himself. That's not to say that a Chaotic structure will necessarily handle every problem well. It won't. Sometimes that means that people who are Chaotically inclined will make compromises with reality, particularly when survival is at stake. But a lot of the things a Lawful person would see as necessary to run a society properly, a Chaotic person would regard as superfluous Quote: They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people. A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom. Or not. Depends on the laws. I've never heard of any lawful society that didn't. What I meant was, that there were plenty of laws that positively mandated a lack of respect. Quote: It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness. What that means is, you are as free to decide that Chaos is wrong as you are to decide that Evil (or Good) is wrong. OK. I don't see what that has to do with anything we were talking about. I certainly haven't made any such decision. Isn't this discussion about how to adjudicate an alignment system modelled on that of D&D? Quote: I didn't say they were. If, as you claim, the Gauls had more freedom (assuming we mean the same thing by that term), then at least in that one respect, the Gauls were more Good than the Romans. No, they weren't. They were just less organised. They didn't have more freedom because of their benevolent concern for their fellow man. They had more freedom because they would refuse to accept the degree of regulation for themselves that the Romans positively admired. I guess we really do have different definitions of "freedom" as well. I'm not an expert on the Gauls, so I'm taking your word for it. You said they had more freedom than the Romans. By that, did you simply mean they were less organized? To me, those aren't the same thing. No I mean they were less restricted because they were less organised. Quote: To me, alignments are about actions, not emotions. To the game, alignments are about attitudes, not actions. To *your* game, perhaps. Actually I was speaking of D&D. However if alignment doesn't represent something about the character above and beyond what they happen to be doing at a particular moment, then of course alignment doesn't really matter. Quote: Paladins and chaotic evil marauders both kill. The LG Paladin may actually rack up a faster death toll than the CE guy but he remains LG as long as he's killing for the right reasons. While actions may make it clear that your attitude is not in fact consistent with your supposed alignment, it is in fact your attitude, and not your actions that alignment measures. The "purity of your soul" or lack of same, so to speak. "Killing" is not a complete enough description of these actions. One kills innocent people, decreasing the amount of goodness in the world. One kills evil people, decreasing the amount of evil in the world. Attitude isn't what matters. If attitude doesn't matter, on basis can you characterise anyone as "evil" if they aren't doing anything bad at this moment? To use a classic (and admittedly obvious) example, Hitler had a "good" attitude. No, he really didn't. Hitler was driven by hatred and envy and didn't care who he hurt to get what he wanted. Quote: They can't hate it that much if they do it on a regular basis. That strikes me as a rather bizarre statement. I hate going to the dentist, but I still go on a regular basis. So obviously you don't hate it that much. You consider it worth doing even if it is unpleasant while you are doing it. What I was talking about was someone who, say, faced with filling out a form in order to be allowed to drive a car, would instead crumple up the form, toss it away and drive anyway. Quote: All he's doing is stealing. A Chaotic Evil Robin Hood would probably be murdering the men and raping the women. So you don't consider stealing to be an evil act? No, not really. It's not a very nice thing to do, but evil as I see it, is a good deal more than just "not very nice". More importantly in this context, however, is that it doesn't (generally) match the criteria for the Evil alignment. Quote: More like politics. Would you characterise either Republicans or Democrats as really evil? You might if you were a really rabid partisan (just as Lawful person would so characterise a Chaotic or vice versa), but they aren't. That doesn't mean the differences between them don't matter. I'm not arguing, I'm just asking. As I said, I haven't read either Moorcock or Amber. So what actually is the difference, in those works, between Law and Chaos? In Moorcock's Elric, Law were a bunch of rigid and humourless stiffs who opposed change and wanted to establish a permanent status quo from which would ever change. Chaos were self indulgent sybarites who lived for pleasure, power and novelty. I could of course phrase both of those definitions much more kindly, but since the Elric series is very cynical, I don't see a reason to. In Zelazny's Amber they were fighting over the fundamental laws of the universe. "Pattern" wanted reality to be stable and immutable. "Chaos" wanted reality to be exciting and mutable. You haven't yet given any examples of what those differences are other than it seems Chaotic folks prefer to live in small close-kint societies By and large that's the pattern I'd expect a stable Chaotic Good society to take but Chaotics who weren't so good could just as easily form a gigantic marauding barbarian horde. And of course a Chaotic of any persuasion could and would live in a predominantly Lawful society. He could be a criminal, a revolutionary, an agitator for greater civil liberties, or he could just be someone who lived on the fringes of socity not bothering to participate. The "small close-knit community" I mentioned was just a way to make a Chaotic society work without being oppressive. Quote: Having a side IS alignment. That's what the word means. No it doesn't. "Yankee fan" and "Dodgers fan" are not alignments, yet people definitely take sides. Yes and no. In the game sense, they are not alignments because there are no "Detect Yankee fan" spells and no magic bats that burn the hands of Dodgers fans, unless you are playing a very bizarre game. But if there were, then those would be alignments. Quote: So the world becomes less comfortable and less survivable if "Chaos" wins. For you, probably. Oh, so I was meant to take your comment personally? No, really I mean humanity in general. You, me, people like us. What I want to know is: what happens if the Chaos side wins, in absolute terms, regardless of what you assume I personally think about it. In that particular fictional universe, what would happen is that natural laws would become more like suggestions. Gravity might reverse itself in places, life forms would turn into other stranger things, lead might turn to gold or vice versa, the same walk over the same route at the same speed might take varying times. This could happen spontaneously, or, if you had a strong enough will, you might be able to make it happen for you under your control. (Ie. you would be able to do "magic"). How extreme this effect gets depends on how much extra influence Chaos gets. And likewise, what happens if the lawful side wins. Simply put, everything behaves more consistently. "Magic" stops working. Quote: Only as long as you ignore that the Amberites winning makes life less comfortable and more dangerous for other kinds of creatures, more chaotic creatures than you. And who knows, maybe you will learn self-mutation if your universe becomes more chaotic. That's one of the things the Chaos side offers you if they win. It's just that you might die learning how. Well, maybe that's one slight hint. What is "self-mutation"? Shapeshifting. What about the Amberites winning makes the world more dangerous for the chaotics? They'd lose their powers and might end up trapped in a form that was no longer viable.

Re: Alignment Issues Ah...not so much. Melnibone called itself an empire and at one time it supposedly was, but by Elric's time it was a single mostly depopulated city surrounded by wilderness and ruled by an upperclass of whimsical and tyrannical slavemasters. There's no hint of any actual laws, although they do have some rather intricate manners. The only other Melnibonean city we are told of has already wiped itself out in civil war. The Stormbringer RPG claims that turning to a closer relationship to Chaos for greater power was both a symptom and a cause of the Empire's decline. I can't really remember too much about the administration of Granbretan, but then I'm not sure they have anything to do with Chaos anyway. They're just rotten. That series was the closest Moorcock ever got to a fight between good guys and bad guys. Note by the way, that the Stormbringer RPG assumes that Law like technology better and Chaos likes "magic" better, magic in this case mostly consisting of summoning "demons" to do your will. By their standards Granbretan would have probably swung Law-wards.

Re: Alignment Issues Darth Vader would kill someone for being rude to or disappointing him. You don't get much more selfish than that. Yes, he loved his wife, (and strangled her). Yes, he loved his son (and cut his hand off). But he was still filled with hatred enough to drive him to commit multiple massacres of defenseless victims. That his ambition wasn't personal isn't enough to make him Good. Evil also includes swarms of fanatical followers who will commit any atrocity on behalf of their leader/cause. Perhaps not, but a lawful society does EXPECT and encourage respect where it is deemed “appropriate” and it CAN force you to at least ACT respectfully. So can a Chaotic society. Disrespect the tribal elders and see what happens. The difference is that the Lawful society probably would have decided in advance what the punishment is, and the Chaotic society might be more likely to decide on the punishment on the spot. Careful - but for that "probably", you're falling into the habit of doing exactly what Phil did, stereotyping alignments without regard to their personal interest. But it would be in his personal interest. Robin Hood is the leader of a group of bandits. A Chaotic Evil version of the Merry Men needs the raping to stay merry. And as for the murders, it's a heck of a lot easier to be a robber if you aren't careful to minimise casualties.

Re: How does a world die? Not really a Champions issue unless you're talking about how supervillains will destroy them.

Re: Alignment Issues I fully accept Robyn's revision to my statement: "Without laws, you only keep what you can protect by physical force." But it isn't true. Assuming that you have a society of Good people...like say, Elves. That's not to say that these people are all Good, but the people who aren't Good are an exception to the rule. Try to take someone else's stuff by force or stealth, and the other members of the tribe will stop you if they find out. Because they're Good, and they look out for each other. They'll take you before the council of elders, let's say, or maybe an individual who is respected enough to get the role of judging disputes, or aor they'll just vote as a tribe on how to resolve the dispute. They don't need a formulated set of rules to do this because by and large they are good, neighbourly people who know each other well and can deal with the problem flexibly and individually. They can decide each case individually. This can and does work ...provided of course that your society is small and close-knit enough that everyone knows everyone else as an individual. It doesn't work so well in a large city which is exactly why the first codified systems of justice coincide with the rise of the first cities large enough that most of the people were strangers to each other and the populations were large enough that even a small proportion of misbehavers would turn into a large number of misbehavers. Is that better? It also explains why Chaos and Chaos fight, and why Law and Law do not fight. Unless they do, which they will when their respective organisations come into conflict. It's less likely but not impossible. If we're truly talking about Law/Chaos as a separate axis from Good/Evil, there is nothing inherent in Law that says a person can't change his place in society. That would be a matter of goodness. No it isn't. "Good" by the D&D definition will tell you not to take advantage of your higher position on the totem pole to cause pain and suffering. But it doesn't say that your position is up for grabs to someone smarter or more popular. And the chaotic point of view also tends to be, "Any boy can kill the king, steal from the king, or anyone else" ...if he gets away with it. But he probably won't be able to get away with it as long as the king is respected. Please tell us: what are your definitions of Lawful and Chaotic? Here too, I think we are using different definitions. Y'know, I already gave my definitions of Chaotic. Freedom, egalitarianism, a willingness to make up the rules as you go along and to abandon traditions no longer seem to serve a practical purpose, a refusal to respect the position when you don't respect the man, a love of change for change's sake, and a low boredom threshold. Those are Chaotic values. Lawful is of course the reverse. Or rather someone who by and large demonstrates the reverse of those kind of traits is Lawful. But physical might has nothing to do with competence in other areas of leadership. There's a lot more to government than war. Actually, not a lot more in a Chaotic society. For a minarchist, government is there to protect the people from violence, death and the loss of freedom and nothing else, and that's closest to the position of a Chaotic Good character. They could, but it wouldn't be a function of their chaoticness. It wouldn't be a function of lawfulness either. But that's what means the generalisation that only the tough guys would have power is wrong. They might just as easily not have any such respect for those people. A lawful society on the other hand, establishes what respect is due to whom. Or not. Depends on the laws. Quote: It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness. I don't know what you mean by this. What that means is, you are as free to decide that Chaos is wrong as you are to decide that Evil (or Good) is wrong. Quote: But as I said Chaotic societies still have laws. Just not so many. So then what is it that makes them Chaotic? What makes the left wing the left wing, and the right wing the right wing? It's not perfect adherence to their tendencies, because almost nobody has that and those who do are total madmen. Chaotics prefer to get by with less organisation than Lawfuls, and see the degree of regulation that their Lawful counterparts would enact to be "oppressive" or "stifling" or even "tyrannical". Again definitions would help. I've given mine in my previous post. Quote: The Gauls weren't all that Good either. I didn't say they were. If, as you claim, the Gauls had more freedom (assuming we mean the same thing by that term), then at least in that one respect, the Gauls were more Good than the Romans. No, they weren't. They were just less organised. They didn't have more freedom because of their benevolent concern for their fellow man. They had more freedom because they would refuse to accept the degree of regulation for themselves that the Romans positively admired. At least until the Romans kicked their tails and made them swallow their medicine,. Again, I'm going to need some clarification about your definitions. To me, alignments are about actions, not emotions. To the game, alignments are about attitudes, not actions. Paladins and chaotic evil marauders both kill. The LG Paladin may actually rack up a faster death toll than the CE guy but he remains LG as long as he's killing for the right reasons. While actions may make it clear that your attitude is not in fact consistent with your supposed alignment, it is in fact your attitude, and not your actions that alignment measures. The "purity of your soul" or lack of same, so to speak. I'd say there are plenty of people who hate to stand in line and do paperwork and are still Lawful. They can't hate it that much if they do it on a regular basis. And of course if you have one unLawful trait and many Lawful traits, the result character will still by and large be Lawful. Quote: Because he's Chaotic Good. If he was Chaotic Neutral he'd steal just because he wanted the money and didn't respect authority. I'd say that would make him Chaotic Evil. All he's doing is stealing. A Chaotic Evil Robin Hood would probably be murdering the men and raping the women. Quote: You can't imagine the Sheriff not having any evil purposes but just doing his job as it was assigned to him by his boss? Sure, I can. I can imagine lots of things. Doesn't make his purposes any less evil. How is capturing a thief evil? (In re Moorcock) It sounds like a completely arbitrary distiction. Like a sporting event. More like politics. Would you characterise either Republicans or Democrats as really evil? You might if you were a really rabid partisan (just as Lawful person would so characterise a Chaotic or vice versa), but they aren't. That doesn't mean the differences between them don't matter. Both sides cheer on their team, but it has nothing to do with "alignment." Having a side IS alignment. That's what the word means. (in re Amber) So the world becomes less comfortable and less survivable if "Chaos" wins. For you, probably. That sounds more like Evil, to me. Only as long as you ignore that the Amberites winning makes life less comfortable and more dangerous for other kinds of creatures, more chaotic creatures than you. And who knows, maybe you will learn self-mutation if your universe becomes more chaotic. That's one of the things the Chaos side offers you if they win. It's just that you might die learning how. And you also seem to be saying that either side's quality of life improves if they win, so again, it's totally arbitrary. No more than Liberal versus Conservative. It all depends on the kind of world you want to live in.

Re: Normal-proofing your Bricks? Well the first thing to remember is that Marvel martial artists generally suck. They really aren't built on the same number of points as the Hulk so it's no wonder that DD can't hurt the big guy. He simply isn't playing in the same weight-class. Amping the Hulk's PD up to 45 is in fact the right answer. He's their world class archetypical brick. Daredevil is a Dark Champions character skulking in an alley and fighting guys who dress like clowns or try to to get the upper hand by waving a bullfighter's cape around. Daredevil has trouble with Wilson Fisk, much less the Hulk. Want a Hulk-Class martial artist? Look at Karnak of the Inhumans. Maybe Moondragon.

Re: WWYCD: Famous Guy II She was working on the drug smuggling case and no superhumans seem to have been involved with it. Just garden variety lowlives taking advantage of the fact that Paragon is the only powerful superhero in town and his scrupulous observance of people's civil rights which means that if there's no warrant and nobody actually in immediate danger, Paragon stays out of private property. The only reason why he busted this shipment was to rescue the reporter...as usual. Paragon fights some of the strongest villains in the world, but none have been observed in town in the last few weeks. That's why Doctor Prometheus is the police's prime suspect. There are no other superstrong heroes in town, just a couple of street-level martial artist types. Attempts to interview Paragon meet with initial frustration. He appears to be throwing himself into his work, intervening in a lot of things that normally were apparently too minor or remote to attract his attention, even domestic disputes. Attempts to contact the reporter's husband are equally frustrating. He doesn't seem to be answering his phone.

Re: Super Origins The problem with freak accidents is that when they happen again and again they stop looking so freakish.

After your (probably) unpleasant encounter with the Dark Knight of a rather gothic city, you visit the city of Tomorrow, a city where it seems to be all skyscrapers and no suburbs. Don't ask me how that works. The trail you've been pursuing leads you to Doctor Prometheus, an angry scientist who is most known for being the discoverer of a strange substance with some very bizarre properties notable among them the ability to screw up the powers of what is otherwise at least a contender to be the most powerful hero on Earth. This guy is totally over the top, so much so that he spends more of his time stopping major catastrophes than he does fighting crime. Between the asteroid he deflected, the earthquakes he's stopped, the tornados he's quelled, and the tsunamis he's disrupted, he's surely saved millions of lives quite apart from the supervillains who threatened the entire planet and were foiled by his heroics and the alien invaders he drove off before they could even land. He is enormously respected and the idol of billions. Apparently, Doctor Prometheus just having gotten out of jail, he's back to his old tricks and his crime in Gothic City was in aid of reconstructing a second version of his most powerful robotic minion Metal-X, one that had actually defeated Paragon on at least one occasion, powered as it is by that funky mineral that messes up the big guy. Unless you are the envious type, you are probably glad that you got the chance to nip a dangerous plot against perhaps the world's foremost hero in the bud. That is until... You learn that a daring reporter reputed to be Paragon's "girlfriend" has been killed. Based on the physical evidence, the killer was someone who possessed superhuman strength. The top suspect is Doctor Prometheus via one of his robots since everyone expected him to throw down with Paragon again, and Doc regularly kidnapped Paragon's now-aging girlfriend to use as bait in the Silver Age old days. However he never actually harmed her, only threatened her in the old days, so the media is speculating that his recent long jail stint soured the old man's disposition, or perhaps he's just gotten sloppy and accidentally killed the spunky reporter. However, based on what you know, the old man couldn't have done it. His robot wasn't ready yet and he was busy contracting jobs to steal the parts for it. He was certainly planning nefariousness (and actually committing it elsewhere) but you are his only alibi. The lab blew up during the fight and the robot was demolished so what you observed can't be confirmed by anyone else. Naturally like any self-respecting super-hero you investigate for the real culprit. You learn these facts: She died on the docks while working. She was killed by someone with superhuman strength who could fly (both abilities a completed Metal-X would have had) Her next door neighbor to her apartment heard several loud arguments with her strangely youthful-seeming husband, which sounded like they included great physical violence. Despite this neither of them ever looked like they had suffered any injury. The police had been called but found no signs of abuse to anything except the walls one of which had apparently had a sledge-hammer applied to it. Paragon stopped a drug shipment on the docks and rescued her from the criminals (again) shortly before her estimated time of death. He says he dropped her off and flew home, where-ever that is. Paragon maintains a secret identity. What do you do?

Re: Character: Kar-Mit I bet myself going in that this would turn out to be an anthropomorphic frog.

Re: Re-Imaged Hero(ines) Starshine Liebowitz's parents were 70's hippies left behind by the disco era when she was born. Hence, in part, the name. Starshine's mother didn't know she was pregnant when she tried the designer drug briefly marketed to the street as Revelation, but it left the developing embryo permanently changed. Starshine was born both albino and powerfully telepathic, able to read and eventually attack and control minds. Her aversion to sunlight, greater than usual even for an albino, left her unable to attend school, raised in isolation by brain-fried parents. As a teenager she was abducted by an organisation looking to exploit her abilities, but they couldn't control her. She summoned heroes to rescue her even through the psi shield they used on her. For a while she was a member of the team that came to her aid, Strikeforce Omega, but they eventually realised that she had been tampering with their mind repeatedly, editing their memories to try to help them. She altered their memories one more time to make them think she'd died in action. Now she wanders at night, finding minds in pain and removing the pain by altering or simply removing the memories that cause the pain.

Re: Alignment Issues Quote: Originally Posted by David Johnston A chaotic person would tell you that laws only ensure inequality... Well, such a person would be wrong. Without laws, you only get what you can take by physical force. It's exactly that kind of response that explains why Law and Chaos fight. Quote: particularly since we are talking about fantasy environments where the laws aren't exactly designed to keep everyone on a level playing field. True. But that's a lack of Goodness, not a lack of Chaoticness. The lower classes/castes/etc. wouldn't be any better off in a society that was the same place on the Good/Evil axis but with fewer laws. That depends on the laws in question now doesn't it? If it's the law saying that a serf can't leave his plot of land, then are they really going to be better off keeping it? The lawful point of view tends to be "Know your place in society and work to fill it". The chaotic point of view tends to be, "Any boy can be King"...if he's tough enough. Quote: A chaotic utopian vision would be one where people exist in a more or less tribal organisation, where leadership roles are purely the result of demonstrated competence and if someones a screwup, it doesn't matter how elevated their birth, or how long their time in service is. And toward the good side of the spectrum there would probably be quite a bit of townhall democracy when major decisions need to be made and there's time to natter about them. Yep. That's a utopian vision, all right. A real chaotic society would be a tribal organization where leadership roles are purely the result of physical might, Physical might IS competence (in war) and that's important. But that doesn't mean a chaotic society would not have a place of respect for their shaman or their bard, or the guy who is simply their oldest member. and last only as long as that might can be maintained, regardless of screwups of policy. A wise and good leader in such a society will likely listen to his townhall to some extent and realize that laws are needed for fairness and egalitarianism and gradually increase Lawfulness. It's up to the GM to decide how adjudicate his own biases towards Good or Lawfulness. But as I said Chaotic societies still have laws. Just not so many. Quote: Spoken like a Lawful person, but it isn't true. Rome was not a freer or more equal society than the more Gauls who fought them for all that Rome had more law. That's a result of a deficiency of Goodness on Rome's part, not of Law. The Gauls weren't all that Good either. Quote: Also it's worth remembering that Chaotic societies still have laws. And to the extent they do, they are less Chaotic. Perfection is not expected. Quote: If you're the kind of person who hates standing in line and filling out forms and naps in class, then you probably aren't Lawful. By that definition, almost nobody in the world is Lawful. Really? I stayed awake in class and I have stood in lines and filled out forms willingly. Am I so rare? Understand that when I say "hate" I do not mean "does not love". I mean "hate". As in "enrages you". A classic example of Chaotic Good vs Lawful Evil would be the story of Robin Hood. But even here, Robin isn't specifically trying to be chaotic. He goes against the law because it's currently being used for evil. It's the evil that he objects to, not the lawfulness. Because he's Chaotic Good. If he was Chaotic Neutral he'd steal just because he wanted the money and didn't respect authority. Note that the earliest versions of Robin DID steal just because he didn't respect authority and wanted the money. But a Lawful person wouldn't generally stake out a piece of turf and then just start robbing people as a response to an evil administration. Consider the Camber series by Katherine Kurtz for how Lawful Good types respond to an Evil King. Do they start a series of robberies and random guerilla attacks against the Evil guys? Not hardly. They look for a survivor from the previous dynasty who might be considered more legitimate and then they pull off a coup d'etat which is as bloodless as possible to install a new and better King. It's a difference in philosophy, and one that can create real conflicts when a hypothetical Ivanhoe runs into a hypothetical Robin Hood. The Sheriff of Nottingham fights against him, not because he's breaking the law, but because his actions thwart his evil purposes. You can't imagine the Sheriff not having any evil purposes but just doing his job as it was assigned to him by his boss? Quote: Not in Moorcock of course. His Lawful deities aren't particularly good. Not in Zelazny's Amber series. The conflict between Amber and Chaos is not one between good and evil. Neither side is particularly good. It's just that one of them wants stability and the other wants flexibility. I'll take your word for it. I haven't read either. Who follows the Lawful gods in Moorcock, and why? Mostly people under attack by people backed by the Chaotic gods. Are there any good guys in Moorcock? Sometimes, but their goodness or evil has little bearing on how they relate to magic because there are no supernatural entities of "good" or "evil". If either Law or Chaos wins in a given universe, everyone (mortal) dies as the natural laws of said universe collapse. The closest they get to gods of good are the beings of Balance, but they are only "good" in the sense that they work to prevent that outcome. They're basically cold and pragmatic beings. What do they do? If neither side in Amber is good, why do they want stability/flexibility respectively? What's the point? The point is to increase their sides power and their personal comfort. That does NOT mean that you wouldn't take a side in their battles because if the Courts of Chaos were to win in your universe it would change in ways that you would find extremely uncomfortable, not mention hard to survive, unless you picked up mastery of self-mutation.

Re: The downsides of the Iron Age Actually that's one of the problems I have with Iron Age reality. Portraying the entire world as so utterly wicked just makes me feel down.

Re: Science Skill for Spidey He has at least some knowedge of physics. He is also of course an electrical engineer. Note that his specific chemical speciality was biochemistry for cooking up all those failed cures for people with superpowers.

Re: Alignment Issues Quote: Originally Posted by David Johnston You're right. Better words would be: Freedom, egalitarianism, a willingness to make up the rules as you go along and to abandon traditions no longer seem to serve a practical purpose, a refusal to respect the position when you don't respect the man, a love of change for change's sake, and a low boredom threshold. Those are Chaotic values. Excellent! This actually means something real. I have a few minor disagreements about individual points here, but the basic idea I have no problem with. The specific points I disagree on: Egalitarianism - seems to me this could just as easily be on the Lawful side. Without laws, how do you ensure equality? A chaotic person would tell you that laws only ensure inequality...particularly since we are talking about fantasy environments where the laws aren't exactly designed to keep everyone on a level playing field. The idea of "using laws to ensure equality" is fundamentally a neutral, one, a compromise between the two ideals. A chaotic utopian vision would be one where people exist in a more or less tribal organisation, where leadership roles are purely the result of demonstrated competence and if someones a screwup, it doesn't matter how elevated their birth, or how long their time in service is. And toward the good side of the spectrum there would probably be quite a bit of townhall democracy when major decisions need to be made and there's time to natter about them. Freedom - in many senses Law provides far more freedom than lack of same. Certainly in a practical sense, law-based societies have always been more free than those not based in law. Spoken like a Lawful person, but it isn't true. Rome was not a freer or more equal society than the more Gauls who fought them for all that Rome had more law. Also it's worth remembering that Chaotic societies still have laws. They just prefer to get by with fewer and interpret them more flexibly. Note of course that Chaotic Evil societies only have freedom for the powerful (because Evil involves lack of respect for the life and dignity of others), but they have a lot more of it. Low boredom threshold - this is more of a personality trait than an alignment characteristic, IMO. Alignment characteristics ARE personality traits. Evil and Good alignments are evaluations of the kind of personality you have. If you're the kind of person who hates standing in line and filling out forms and naps in class, then you probably aren't Lawful. The next question (which was a point I had made earlier, and which Lucius touched on) is how does the Law/Chaos axis, in terms of it's impact and relevence, compare to the Good/Evil axis? Usually Law versus Chaos is a secondary consideration when Good and Evil are on the field. But since there are campaigns where the GM doesn't want to get locked into good guys versus bad guys, but wants a more shades of grey type of deal. So, easily done, just have most of your characters (and your divinities) be on the range between chaotic neutral and lawful neutral, and make Detect Law and Detect Chaos available spells, but not Detect Good and Detect Evil. My claim is that it's not even close. In works of fiction (fantasy fiction especially), as well as in the real world, the Good/Evil distinction is of vastly greater importance. Not in Moorcock of course. His Lawful deities aren't particularly good. Not in Zelazny's Amber series. The conflict between Amber and Chaos is not one between good and evil. Neither side is particularly good. It's just that one of them wants stability and the other wants flexibility.

Re: Super Origins