Tjack

First, Hello and welcome. Next through no fault of your own, with your very first post you’ve stepped into a bear trap of controversy about getting the “company” to be more active about ways to bring in new players. If you receive posts that seem testy or maybe just no posts at all because no one wants to start this all up again, don’t feel it reflecting in any way on you or the normal behavior of the folks here. You just accidentally mashed down on a hot button.

Neither, it was an early YouTube video. I admit it when I’m an idiot. See my post “Veteran of the Fannish Wars”.

This is not really a joke, because it actually happened, but it’s the funniest thing I’ve ever seen. Some poor bastid decides to go bungee jumping and have a friend record it. So they go early in the morning and this shmuck is the first one of the day. And I guess somebody must have moved or lowered the crane during the night....not much, just a few feet. So Dum-Dum jumps off. (The fact that he jumped off a perfectly good crane is why I call him Dum-Dum) and everything goes to plan...at first. You can tell he’s thinking, “This is fantastic!” “Oh good the bungee is slowing me down now!” ”The ground is getting awfully close!” The bungee extends all the way to the ground enough to let this guy slap into the ground with his chest and face before bouncing back up. ”OH DEAR GOD THAT HURT!!” “But I’m alive!” “I’m gonna sue the s#1t outta somebody, but I’m alive! As this is happening the bungee has retracted all the way back...and gravity takes over again. ”All right I’m ok and their going to get me loose now....oh no.” BAM! This happens FIVE TIMES. All you can hear on the soundtrack is the crowd screaming and the buddy laughing his ass off.

No. Do you wanna know what’s a great sword? It’s a bayonet attached to a Vulcan mini gun. A couple thousand rounds going down range, that’s a great sword. Anything less is just a sharp stick.

I still do some of these.

Huh, it’s kind of a cross between Mad Max and The Boys. Neat. Doc Savage, one of my favorite pulp characters used to capture criminals and give them brain surgery at his Crime College to eliminate their memories and criminal tendencies and when they recovered enough they were taught a useful trade and released into society. If there’s a difference between this and a lobotomy, I can’t see it. The writer, Lester Dent was working from the best of intentions of his era, but to a modern audience it can be a little chilling. Is Doc still a hero or is he somebody who needs to be stopped?

That’s a job for a short sword.

The first time I looked at this I thought the nun on the right was giving me the finger. I spent too long in Catholic school.

Actually, in the three examples I cited (Squadron Supreme, Authority and the Justice Lords) they just kind of took over and told the various world Governments to go pound sand. That’s why I said that PC’s needed to be at a pretty high level if that’s the game you want. Other than that I pretty much agree with you.

I wrote Planetary, but I meant Authority. Oops! Thanks csyphrett.

Nothing against you, but I’ve heard this proactive vs. reactive argument before. Let’s remember the Police and Fire Department are also “reactive” by this definition. There are examples of Supers being more proactive about the world and its problems. Squadron Supreme, Authority and also the Justice Lords from Justice League animated series. If that’s the game you’re looking for than that’s great. And it could be a lot of fun. But without very powerful characters I don’t think you can pull it off. This is not to say that your PLAYERS shouldn’t be more active in the game. Encourage them to come to you with plot threads they’d like to follow up on or Searches for/Hunted by’s they want to see more of. Maybe try out some “blue booking” (writing in story form or simple listing what their character does) for an investigation on their own. This not only takes some of the creative load off you but also gets the other people in the game more involved and thinking about what their character wants out of life. And if they still want to take over the world, then have at it. They couldn’t do it any worse.

Well fine then, I’ve thought for a long time that Cowboy Bebop would make a fine basis for a game. If I was going to mash it with anything though it would be Firefly. It would be pretty cool seeing both crews chasing after a bounty or both are hired to transport a much needed medicine through pirate territory with a huge bonus to the first one there.

It’s good to know that the Masked Rider of the plains is still drawing in new fans still. I was riffing on the origin provided from the original radio show of the 1930’s. In that, rookie Texas Ranger John Reid, his older brother and a troop of Rangers were betrayed and bushwhacked by the Butch Cavendish gang. Killing everyone else and leaving John for dead, he was found by his boyhood friend Tonto and returned to health. As Tonto said “ All others are dead, you lone Ranger now.” Reid makes a mask from his brothers leather vest using the two bullet holes for eyeholes, and decides to seek justice in a way that he can never be found and betrayed again. (cue William Tell Overture) Tonto joins him on his quest and together the tame the wild stallion Silver, discover the mine that provides the pure metal for his bullets and begin the greatest legend of the west. If you haven’t seen it yet go to YouTube and look up the Lone Ranger’s creed. It should be recited by schoolchildren every morning and issued to every superhero along with their mask & cape.

The Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) while exiled on Earth’s 1960’s worked for the United Nations Intelligence Network in London as a Scientific Advisor named John Smith. During a case trying to stop the Master from using some alien technology to take over the world British Intelligence orders an operative to take over the case. International Man of Mystery...Austin Powers! I could have made it easy, but where’s the fun in that?

Didn’t you know the secret truth?!? The Lone Ranger is really a daywalker who’s family was killed by the vampire king Butch Cavendish who was an emigrated Englishman turned by Dracula. The Ranger and Tonto who is a powerful Medicine man roam the southwest searching for creatures of the night. The Ranger wears a full face mask to hide his fangs and strange glowing eyes.

That’s a story Garry Marshall told. If Mork is a character you’ll be interested in playing someday, or just think would be good in a campaign you ran then tell us why. I don’t mean to pick on you, but people are just shouting out the names of TV shows rather than what they think about those shows or characters and how they’d fit in a game. Yeah, that’ll do it. It’s a good rule for keeping things accurate, but it does slow things down to a crawl sometimes. Action heroes seem to never get hit except in the upper arm or leg and it never seems to slow them down any.

What era were you playing in? I find that carefree spy stories don’t really work after the late ‘70’s. But why would he? Give me a scenario. Tell me a story.

Sounds great! How would you write him up? Wasn’t he an expert on different cultures or something? I could look it up but let’s see how you all would do the research and make these characters happen!

The entire Orkan race are total pacifists. The whole planet won the intergalactic title for Hide & Go Seek. It kind of leaves not much for him to do in combat scenes. But as an NPC...?

Hello and welcome to the both of you! If nobody actually said it before this.

Who else would you put in there? I vaguely despise Automan, but Man from Atlantis and my personal all time favorite Ralph Hinkley The Greatest American Hero would work. As a matter of fact my very first Champions character was Bill Maxwell getting the suit after Ralph retired and the “Green Guys” rejuvenated him. I blended his backstory to include his using the cover name of Kelly Robinson during the late ‘60’s.

Do you mean “Legend” a short lived UPN series where RDA played a cowboy named Ernest Pratt who was payed to pretend to be dime novel hero Nicodemus Legend and he had a crazy European inventor sidekick played by John DeLancie? That would fit the aforementioned Western Hero campaign or are you suggesting an ‘80’s campaign of its own? With Michael Knight, KITT and the Misfits of Science.

It’s really about turning TV shows and their characters into a Hero Games playable game. If somebody wants to discuss the show Heroes or Bruce Lee’s version of Kato I don’t want to be the one to stop them.

Old west amnesiac with agent skills and a vague memory about Lincoln’s assassins played by Robert Urich, right?

A Swinging ‘60’s Spy game would be another good one using the Danger International rule book. You could include members of the Impossible Missions Force and Alexander Scott & Kelly Robinson from I-Spy. I wouldn’t play him but some twisted soul might even want to run Maxwell Smart.