Sundog

The obvious one to me is the Cutlass. It was actually designed for close combat on shipboard, can chop almost as well as an axe, but still capable of thrusting, while being short enough for use in tight compartments.

Citymaster joined out of a sense of obligation. He'd been part of Street Force back in the 80's, a group of low-level heroes protecting their neighbourhoods and getting together for major problems like Viper. He was the juniormost member, and had been well instructed by his elders, like Harlem Warrior and High Rise. So far as he knows, he's the only member still active. William Washington has progressed a fair bit in his technological understanding since then, and the Citymaster armour is no longer considered low-level. It's still a bit less well armoured than many other suits, but makes up for it in speed and evasive capability - it's very much the opposite of the lumbering power suit. With tear-gas projectors, net guns and stun bomb launchers, he's well positioned to take on agents and mooks, but needs to get up close and personal with his shock gauntlets for real supervillains. William is seeking to pass on to a new generation the lessons that were taught to him by his mentors, as well as continue to protect the city he loves as long as he can.

Colin Biggs is '50s Hero. He's square-jawed, fit and muscular, will never back down from a fight and has a right cross that can level small trees. He's also a bit dim, slow on the uptake, bad at personal relationships and often unthinkingly sexist and/or racist. He's also absolutely and totally convinced he's in the right, always. The Ingenue can twist him around her little finger, but he's actually kind of intimidated by Final Girl. Of course, that won't stop him diving in and fighting beside her - his fragile ego could never take being shown up by one of the "fairer sex". '50s Hero is basically a brick, but a skilled one (a leading man in the 1950's could have been expected to have military experience).

Shelby Court loves his toys. Action figures, model planes, die-cast cars, he adores them all, and he plays with them all the time. To the point where he's become very good at maintaining and repairing them. Sadly, there's little money in that, and he needs more cash to get more toys. Until he realised he could use the one to get the other. He made some fairly basic robots. He could make ones that were strong, and fast, ones that flew or rocketed by. But he was no mad scientist, and he had no idea about artificial intelligence. So, instead, he'd set a pre-set series of instructions, let the robot do them, then send another set of instructions from his control board. If he kept it a reasonable number - five or six instructions in a row - he could let that robot do it's thing while he sent instructions to another one. And another. And another. So Shelby can usually be found surrounded by a swarm of robots, some pulling the heist as ordered, some doing seemingly totally random stuff, some sitting and awaiting their next string of instructions. Huh, wasn't this like that old board game his brother had, with the cute miniatures? Oh yeah, it was! So Shelby Court became Roborally.

Skydancer Laurie Perrin was a late blooming mutant with the power of flight. She's very fast, very manouverable and has reaction speeds in the nanosecond range. Laurie was part of the "young and beautiful" crowd, pretty much still is. She has a tendency not to take things as seriously as her team mates, though she isn't as shallow as many think her to be. She doesn't have time for long-winded lectures from her "elders" on the team, she got enough of that from her parents - and didn't listen to them either. But if someone wants to sit down and discuss an issue with her, she's all ears. Skydancer is strong and fit, but her only actual power is her flight. That doesn't stop her doing multiple move-by attacks on agents or grabbing a supervillain and propelling him into the side of a building.

Bacca-Rat A small, ratlike humanoid with a deck of cards. Besides being able to climb and slip into small spaces, he can toss pairs of cards at targets, either to damage the target or to have various special effects. The effects, however, are quire random, and based on the card values, and can do such things as entangle, encase in a circular force wall, or his most powerful ability, mind control. Likewise, the amount of damage inflicted varies wildly, and apparently out of Bacca-Rat's control. A recent rumour is that Bacca-Rat was a gambler who offended the gods of chance by cheating. 'Rat isn't saying - partially because he apparently can't talk.

The Boot Giorgio Theopolus was always a nasty, unpleasant man. When he accidentally fell into the Land of Myth that didn't change. When he came back out, he was sporting a nasty facial scar covering his left cheek, and a pair of solid iron, spiked boots, as well as a scrap of red cloth he uses as a mask. The boots enhance his strength, especially for kicking, and he's taken to dipping the cloth in the blood of his enemies.

Actually, I have one for Union. (I honestly hadn't opened this thread for awhile and hadn't seen the team before today.) Darkraven is the team's investigator and forensics specialist (as befits her "day job" as an ME). She's considered less "street" than Street Hawk, both because of her more clinical approach and because she does actually have obvious powers (including low level flight). It was she who examined The Dark Prince's remains, and while she was unable to determine the cause of the detonation or the explosive used, she realised she had seen something similar, years ago, when an entire room full of gangsters were vaporised...gangsters that Street Hawk had been trying to take down for months. Plus, everyone had heard Street Hawk threaten to go "gloves off" to the Prince before - they hadn't thought much of it, it was part of Street Hawk's modus operandi, but with 20/20 hindsight...

Vicki the Impaler Air support and ranged specialist for the team, Vicki uses a set of jet boots to get around and a pair of arm mounted harpoon guns to inflict pain and mayhem. She has a variety of harpoons, but her preferred one is barbed so as to slowly work it's way deeper into the victim. Vicki (her real name is Sarah, she isn't stupid) is nasty and unpleasant person, and quite enjoys killing people.

Godnus the busy, hoarder of chicken wings and mobile phones.

Makeup Yvonne Fairchild has worked at many tasks in her 80 or so years. Barmaid, dancer-for-hire, waitress, numbers runner, thief, streetwalker when she was down and out...which was more often then she'd like to remember. Her latest one has been as a cosmetics specialist and beautician in a mid-scale beauty salon. She's still working because she has never managed to put together any sort of savings, and Social Security ran out years ago. But of late she's been using her makeup skills a lot on herself...because without them she doesn't look like an eighty year old anymore. In fact, she looks like she did when she was 30...well, actually, better, since Yvonne was never much of a looker. And the beautician job isn't being done for the meagre pay, but to find victims. When she finds someone willing to chat, who has some money, who is single or otherwise living alone, that's when she strikes. She uses her ability to teleport through mirrors to go straight from her rooms to the victim's place, her knowledge of makeup to make herself unrecognizable, her newfound strength and vitality to capture the woman (or man - men don't come as often to the salon, but she isn't picky). She makes them tell her where all the money is, all the valuables, and then she paints their face - with acidic, poisonous makeup of her own devising. They come out of it beautiful to look at, but underneath, their faces are melting... None of her victims have survived so far, and the Police have instituted a task force to find the "Makeup Killer". But who would suspect a little old lady? On the team side, she acts as a scout and infiltrator. She's actually quite capable of combat, but she dislikes it. The others know she's someone in the building, but not that it is little granny Yvonne from the fourth floor.

Exactly. Giving them official representation to Parliament.

Representation referendum in Australia is defeated: https://www.9news.com.au/national/voice-to-parliament-referendum-live-updates-2023-latest-news-headlines/1c357953-0f64-4892-9dca-a2930fefa394

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schismatrix

It was that show that introduced me to her music. I now have all of her solo work and a bunch of Clannad albums. Definitely the best version of Robin Hood ever. Even better than the Errol Flynn/Basil Rathbone 1938 movie.

Thankfully, very true. That appears to have been the case with the Nepalese Gurkha people - there's plenty of evidence of them being a fearsome raider culture in the past, but by the time the British came on the scene they were mostly trading and agricultural.

You can also have the problem of the classic hill tribe. This is the group of people who live in the not very productive or fertile hills/mountains/badlands above and near the fertile and productive valleys/plains occupied by a different tribe or people. Perhaps they were driven out of the fertile lands by the current occupants, or maybe they came here from other places, or perhaps tech has changed things and allowed the people in the infertile realm to access the fertile one. The classic way they get past the infertility of their land is to take what they want/need by raiding the people in the fertile area. Over time, they come to view their capacity to raid the fertile regions as a divine gift or right, and they get very good at it. Of course, the people of the fertile valleys have a rather different view. To them, the hill people are the purest evil. It's a pattern that has repeated dozens of times across the world. It usually ends either when the fertile valley people get together and burn out the hill tribes (though most attempts to do so fail) or there is the rise of gunpowder. The fertile valley folk have the tech edge, and that changes everything. We actually see the remains of that situation in the northern middle east today. The Kurdish people are the classic hill tribe, and the people around them - the Turks, the Arabs, whole peoples of that region, have long memories of Kurdish raiders. It's one of the unspoken reasons hy none of them want the Kurds to have their own nation.

I think you'd have the situation be on a case-by-case basis. Most planets, the two biologies would be too dissimilar for a virus to jump hosts. But on the occasional just too similar planet... You'd probably be in greater danger on a terraformed world, where all the life is from your own biome.

It is indeed. More importantly, it's a nation which is embracing higher technology, and building the infrastructure to be strong and self-sufficient while being a full participant in the global community. Which I suspect is one reason China is so driving to be the regional power in the area and a potential superpower - India is actually better positioned to do so on a slightly longer timescale. China wants to be in a position to neutralize Indian ambitions - but that is driving it into conflict with the west.

Bye-bye Chucky.