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Tarek

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Posts posted by Tarek

  1. Re: I need you advice? Assistance, Help?

     

    It's time to sit down with your players and figure out if any of them want to play a game where there are investigations, or whether they just want to be thrown into the action and then deal with whatever comes as it comes.

     

    Some players just *hate* investigating anything.

     

    Another way to cure this tendency in your players is to give them the kind of game they want... but then throw in curveballs and complications that they could have avoided if only they'd bothered to investigate deeper than the surface.

     

    Say, apparently foiling a massive bank robbery, but the replacement security guards are the real thieves... and they could have found out beforehand if only they'd bothered to follow up on a semi-obvious clue.

     

    The subsequent press conference and/or police investigation should be a very interesting one for the heros... in the same sense as the old Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times."

  2. Re: Classic WWYCD: Socks To Be You...

     

    Blue Star:

    Would look for the extradimensional wormhole that leads to a dryer. Preferably one in a laundromat, to minimize the oddity of having a superhero crawl out of a dryer.

     

    He would also wonder why Foxbat was masquerading as Doctor Destroyer...

  3. Re: What is Munchkin?

     

    Hmm... so far, the Munchkin card game has made fun of:

     

    Dungeons and Dragons

    Kung-Fu Movies

    Superheros

    Science Fiction movies

    Vampire: The Masquerade (and sequelae)

     

    I wonder what genre they'll skewer next? :)

  4. Re: WWYCD: "I, For One, Welcome Our New Insect Overlords"

     

    I would call up Space Ghost and ask him to come and pick Zorak and the rest of his insect buddies....

     

    As for Blue Star, well, there's a reason that the Galactic Rangers exist, and it's exactly for stuff like this.

     

    Insect Overlords wouldn't be allowed to take over the Earth; they'll have to settle for trade treaties. Assuming that the species isn't on the "Enemies of All Life" list, that is.

  5. Re: A Fun and Creepy Thought

     

    "Indiana Jones and the Doomed Planet". That plot has shown up more than a few times in the past decade or so, in SF novels from a wide variety of authors.

     

    I've also seen it on TV. Babylon 5: Crusade, episode 9, "Racing the Night."

     

    In a way, it's also one of the major events of the main Babylon 5 series... only the 'dead' civilization wasn't.

  6. Re: Limitation Value: Instrument Only Flight

     

    Practically speaking, there probably wouldnt' be any effect on the vehicle's point value.

    It would probably require a new Transport Familiarity Adder for the pilot/driver: Instrument Rated. Without that TF:Instrument Rated, the character would take the penalties for being unfamiliar.

  7. Re: Planetary Influences

     

    Planetary.

     

    It has a very interesting take on Marvel's Fantastic Four, and the entire series struck me as being written by the only intelligent people working for that comics company.

     

    Seriously. There's a depth of thought there that's completely missing from the rest of the titles set in the same universe, such as The Authority, which is a basic adolescent power fantasy.

     

    I particularily like the way the writer weaves a "secret history" of the planet under what appear to be the day to day activities of the normal world. In Planetary, most of the time you get the feeling that most people have heard about superheros, but have never met one personally. There are mysteries that haven't been solved.

     

    "Kaiju Island", where all the giant monsters are dead and have been for years... except that one flies over at the very end of the comic. "The Gun Club", with Jules Verne as one of the astronauts. Little things like that.

  8. Re: Korgoth of Barbaria

     

    It was a pilot episode.

     

    The program guide on my cable company had it labeled as "Pilot" where the episode name usually is shown.

     

    It's in the Adult Swim block of Cartoon Network, so really late at night. And I have no idea whether they're repeating the pilot or not.

     

    Thundarr the Barbarian in the style of Conan, as envisioned by the Venture Brothers. That sounds about right.

  9. Re: Gotta hand it to you

     

    Stretching 1", Megascale, Does Not Cross Intervening Space, Limited Body Part (Arms), OAF Detached Arm (breakable).

     

    You'll probably also need 0 end, Persistant for the Stretching, but I see that as possibly being optional. Or buy a small END reserve with no Recharge solely to power the Stretching; when the END reserve runs out, the arm stops moving.

  10. Re: How to build a Density-altering ATTACK?

     

    Why not a STR drain? The effect is that they become so dense that their muscles can't move them.

     

    Otherwise, it's Density Increase, Usable on Others:usable as attack (+1), no STR Increase (+1/2). The 'no STR Increase' Limitation becomes an Advantage in this case. You'll have to buy Ranged (+1/2) if you want to use it at range.

    Alternately, you could drop the "no STR increase" modifier and add a Linked Drain: STR.

     

    You will also need to identify some common way to defend against it; Density Increase and Desolidification come to mind as ways to "cancel" the power. Also, breaking Line of Sight to the target would cancel the power as well.

     

    Yes, it's expensive.

  11. Re: WWYCD: Whoa! Ninjas!

     

    Part the Third:

     

    Through investigation, hanging out with Ninjas, mind control, or some other means, you have finally tracked the Master Ninja down to his lair, a closed for the season amusement park outside of Campaign City, now filled with cunning traps (well, traps) and deadly Ninjas (well, Ninjas).

     

    Confronting the Master Ninja, you find he’s a full metahuman, with a range of bizarre abilities. He seems able to call on an unlimited supply of Ninjas, is an extremely competent martial artist with low level superhuman speed and strength, and has a range of traditional Ninja tricks, from vanishing at will to special attacks and defenses. His mind is well protected. Any character in your team with more than 15 points in Martial Maneuvers and related skills will be subjected at least once during the fight to 15d6 Mind Control, and ordered first to protect the Master Ninja and then to attack his team mates.

     

    You also find that the Master Ninja himself is a juvenile, not too bright, and apparently insane.

     

    How does the fight go?

     

    After the fight ends, whether the Master Ninja escapes or is captured, some but not all of the Ninjas vanish. What do you do with the Ninjas that don’t seem to be from this time or this Earth?

     

    Blue Star, being part of a team that includes a pretty powerful mentalist, would move to arrest said "Master Ninja". Also, since all of the team has been learning Martial Arts from a Martial Arts Master, I'm pretty sure most of the team would be subjected at least once to that 15d6 mind control. Fortunately, the Mentalist has some strong mental defenses and the ability to dispel mind control.

     

    Meanwhile, the player would be making "Tick" jokes and wondering out loud where the giant candy corn artifact is...

  12. Re: The Champion Protocols (ie how to take down your character)

     

    I believe that the reason that Batman used Red Kryptonite, siezure-inducing posions, aquaphobia, etc. was because Batman wasn't looking for lethal solutions, but rather reversible and temporary takedowns in case a strong mentalist managed to take over the minds of the JLA.

     

    Iron Age plans in a Silver Age universe.

     

    However, this begs the question of "why hasn't Batman devised and used plans to take out Darkseid, Joker, Ras al-Ghul, etc. in the same way?"

     

    Makes sense to me that Batman would have laid plans like that, BUT it does not make sense to me that Ras would have somehow mysteriously acquired these things without Batman knowing ahead of time. After all, all that stuff was stolen from the Batcave, and you'd think that Batman would check up on these things on a regular basis, say, every six hours or so. Since he thought up these things in the first place, he would have been well aware of what would happen if they were misused...

     

     

    Anyway, back to the point:

     

    Blue Star is really easy to take down, if you can get him to drink alcohol. x2 Stun, Vulnerable or Suceptible, I forget which... Of course, you'd have to trick him into it, since he's well aware of his inability to metabolize alcohol properly.

  13. Re: New Bujold novel

     

    If I recall correctly, the rapid aging was the major problem with Taura's biology, but it wasn't the only one.

     

    Also, some people lose melanin from their skin as they age; it's only natural to assume that Taura is one of those people.

  14. Re: WWYCD: Snakes on the Plane!

     

    Also' date=' I'm pretty sure depressurizing the plane would cause it to crash.[/quote']

     

    An airliner flying to Hawai'i in the mid-80's lost about a sixth of the passenger cabin's hull at 15,000? feet.

     

    The only casualty was a flight attendant who wasn't seated and got blown out of the gaping hole in the side of the craft.

     

    The flight landed safely. So, no, just depressurizing would not cause the airliner to crash.

  15. Re: adding a random factor to the game

     

    Let me show you where the problem lies.

     

    Character concept drives character creation, including attributes.

     

    Character concept (brilliant college student who becomes a mentalist) calls for high INT and EGO attributes.

    Random roll at the end of the process leads to low rolls (5, 6) for INT and EGO. Even with the +5 from having recognized the potential problem ahead of time, the character ends up with INT 10 and EGO 11.

     

    Character concept no longer works.

     

    Do you see the problem yet?

     

    The other problem is that the stats will either cluster around 10 (for those who haven't bought anything) or 15 (for those who did buy the maximum allowed attributes) with little variance.

     

    Hero System and Champions has a very strong min/max component to it. This makes it easy to model specific characters and character concepts, but it can also lead to abuses.

     

    Why not just impose "Normal characteristic maxima" as a disadvantage everyone gets, worth 0 points, for your campaign? That would get you the effect you want without the irritation of dealing with random rolls for characteristics.

  16. Re: adding a random factor to the game

     

    I wouldn't put it at the end of the character creation process. That's the kind of thing where your hard work in coming up with a character and skill template ends up being blown apart because of a poor roll in a key attribute on which the character depends.

     

    Also, this results in some characters having more "points" spent than others, which is also mildly imbalancing, particularily when you get to the lower end (Heroic, Competent Normal, etc).

     

    Do so at the beginning of the process, and make sure the characters pay the points for the attributes they rolled before they buy skills, etc.

  17. Re: WWYCD: The Darkest Hour

     

    The "early years" Blue Star wouldn't change all that much, apart from complimenting women more often.

     

    Culturally, he comes from an alien society which is very "utopian"; Greed and Lechery have no meaning for him. And that "Total Commitment" to the Galactic Rangers means he's a nice guy in all situations.

     

    The "later years" Blue Star is still much the same, but that mentalist isn't going to be teleporting anywhere any time soon... and by this time Blue Star is pretty good at psych warfare. Stranding the guy on the moon, or leaving him free-floating in space for a few hours, wouldn't be beyond him.

     

    It's really a bad idea, even if you *think* you're going to be safe, to remove the inhibitions on any superhero, so "Mr. Teen Angst" is going to get a pretty good dose of payback, one way or another, before being incarcerated.

     

    The toughest job Blue Star will have, actually, is preventing the Speedster, the Brick and the Mentalist from using "Mr. Teen Angst" as a drum...

  18. Re: THE ULTIMATE MENTALIST -- What Do *You* Want To See?

     

    Cyberspace and "Information Warfare" as Mentalist powers.

     

    If you've ever seen the "Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex" you'll understand.

     

    Basically, Hackers are Mentalists in that TV series, using all sorts of Mentalist tricks. Then there's also their form of "Astral Space" which is the 'net.

     

    I'd like to see some of this fleshed out a bit.

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