rjcurrie

Re: What Marvel/DC storyline have you ripped off...err been inspired by? I've borrowed a number of little things here and there -- some intentionally and some unintentionally, but very little in the way of whole story lines. However, one of my favorite collection of intentional rip-offs is the origin of Rick Davies the Resilient Rubber-Man. It takes elements from Miracleman (the virtual reality training of created heroes), Captain Atom (a fake public origin to cover up the real one), Captain America (the creator of the process that created Rick was killed in a villain attack on the project), and Helix, the villain group from Infinity, Inc. (a group of villains who are a family) with a nod to the Fantastic Four. In this case, Rick Davies was the prototype for the Project Victory super soldier program created by Dr. Johann Staebler, which would bond nanites to the subject's genetic structure to create superpowers. When he was created, the virtual reality training tubes had not yet been finished so he did not undergo that process. When the rest of the subjects were created, they were put in the virtual reality trainers which also reinforced the ideas of "team as family" and "Rick as leader". Unfortunately, while, they were undergoing this process, EUREKA (European Underground Research Establishment for Knowledge Advancement) attacked, killed Dr. Staebler, and kidnapped the subjects still in the virtual reality training tubes. The psychological programming aspect of the virtual reality training was altered to instead turn them into the villain team Victory. They still thought of Rick as family and would try several times to bring him back to the family. To keep the project a secret, Rick was given a public origin of "falling into a vat of experimental rubber". And finally, Rick, a scientist himself with some knowledge of Dr. Staebler's process has been able to reproduce it enough to create flexible and resilient costumes for heroes like himself. He has often called the material used to make these costumes "staebler molecules" in honor of the doctor.

Re: Anyone know what happened to JLU? I apologize. That may have been a bit too harsh, but I just get irked by people who seem to get overly attached to things like TV shows or RPG characters. Enjoy them while they're there. When they're gone, move on. After all, does having your favorite TV show cancelled or your favorite RPG character die really matter all that much or have that much affect on your life?

Re: Are HERO gamers more wedded to more "realistic" game physics? Personally, I think that Hero gamers, like all gamers, just like to complain.

Re: Anyone know what happened to JLU?

Re: Anyone know what happened to JLU? The show's over. Move on. If you want to enjoy the episodes again, buy the DVDs.

Re: Character: Lance Dulak, Private Eye I like the name -- I saw it and wondered how you were going to turn Sir Lancelot into a pulp detective. Personally, I think that it's just something that no one ever questions.

Re: Character name help!!! Dr. Thomas Kelly Power aka Dr. T.K. Power aka Doc Power aka T.K. aka T.K. Power aka Doc T.K.

Re: Another character idea, I need help for. Combining this with a couple of other ideas, I came up with the following: Comic book fan Jake Armstrong awoke one morning to find that he had superpowers. Setting out to be a true Golden/Silver Age hero much like those of his favorite comic book writer Roy Thomas, he donned a flashy spandex costume and took to the streets as Mr. Wonderful. Unfortunately, being a superhero was not as easy as in the comics. After wrecklessly barging into a hostage situation that left 3 hostages and a fellow superhero dead, he discovered that real world superheroing was much more akin to a Garth Ennis comic. With Mr. Wonderful (and Jake himself since he hadn't done as much as he should to protect his secret identity) wanted for manslaughter, Jake hung up the flashy cape and tights in favor of a trench coat, fedora, and full face mask. Adopting the superhero name Rennis (as an anagram for "sinner") and the new civilian identity Roy Ennis (not only did its Batmanesque style appeal to the comic book fan in him, but it would also serve to remind him of the two sides of the superhero coin), he set out to attone for his mistakes.

Re: How do I create the following? When a character dies, you usually get to design a new character to replace it, so why not simply agree with the GM to let you build a new character that is the old character in a new physical body? You would build the new character with the same mental stats and perhaps a KS: Previous Character's Memories with a roll based on how successful the mind transfer is. That is, if your new character only has flashes of the memories of the previous character, then it might be 8-. If he remembers almost everything, it might be 18- (or higher). Just a thought.

Re: What fundamental thing would you change about the Hero system? All I was doing was commenting on the feeling that there shouldn't be any comments in this thread that defend the current system or mention why the changes wouldn't work. Do I think the Hero System is perfect? Of course not. But to be honest, we spend so much time on these boards talking about things that don't work, that I do indeed worry about the perception that it might give to newcomers. Perhaps I am wrong about that, but given the state of the RPG industry these days, pretty much every game company needs all the customers it can get. I'm not saying that you shouldn't post negative things about the Hero System, but you shouldn't be surprised when people disagree with you. Now, to be honest, defenses of the HERO system in this thread should problem be more in the area of "I think that's something they didn't get wrong and here's why" rather than simply saying "HERO doesn't need changes". Oh, and I believe the matching berets arrive next week.

Re: What fundamental thing would you change about the Hero system?

Re: What do I need to run a good supers game? Champions -- a good overview of the superhero genre. It really has nothing in the way of new rules. Champions Universe -- the overview of the "official" universe used in many Champions products. If you are designing your own world, it can be useful for ideas. UNTIL Super Powers Database -- an excellent collection of pre-built powers for a large collection of special effects. Even if you don't use the powers directly as written, they can inspire ways of building powers that you might not have thought of. One of the most useful books published for 5th Edition. HERO System Combat Handbook -- is just a collection of the 5th Edition combat rules combined with some combat-related rules from various other books. Note that this not include the various martial arts styles from UMA or the rules for building your own martial maneuvers. Ultimate Martial Artist -- a collection of many real world and fictional martial arts styles with a number of new martial maneuvers not found in the main rulebook. It also has rules for creating new martial maneuvers. Technically, this book is out of print, although a few remain in stores (including I think, a few in the online store). It is also available as a PDF. It is not currently scheduled to be reprinted because, while an excellent book, sales of it as a reprint do not warrant keeping it in print. I also highly recomment Villainy Amok which covers a variety of common comic book plots with advice and twists on running such plots.

Hey Folks: I have introduced a villainous mystical group into the world that I use for my convention games. So far, the group is simply called OMEN. My question is what should OMEN stand for or should it not be an acronym at all?

Hey folks: I don't have a lot in the way of art skills so I thought I might call on the collective talents of the HERO games community to help me out. I have a few organizations in the campaign world I use for my convention games that I would like logos for. The organizations are as follows: EAGLES (Elite American Group for Law Enforcement and Security): EAGLES is the US Government organization primarily responsible for dealing with superheroes, supervillains, and super-sized threats. OASIS (Office of American Scientific Investigative Studies): OASIS is more or less the equivalent of a government-run STAR Labs. They tend to be the experts in things like super technology and other super sciences including superbeing genetics. EUREKA (European Undergound Research Establishment for Knowledge Advancement): EUREKA is a consortium of primarily European "mad" scientists who work together primarily to advance each other's goals. Essentially, while each member may pursue their own goals, they share equipment, personnel, and other resources. Brotherhood of Odysseus: The Brotherhood of Odysseus is essentially the equivalent of The Adventurer's Club in my Pulp Hero game. It is a collection of adventurers who get together occasionally to swap stories and share knowledge about the largely unknown parts of the world. OMEN: A mystical organization that is meant as a threat primarily to mystically based characters. As to what OMEN stands for (if anything), see my separate thread on that subject. I would love to see what people could come up with as logos that I can either use as is or modify slightly.

I have made several updates to my supersquadamerica.com web site. In particular, I have updated the SuperSquad America character backgrounds and character sheets to those that will be used for the 2006 convention season. I have also added a site for The Remarkable Wrong-Righters, but that one is still under construction and doesn't have much there yet.

Re: Draining SPD to Zero Hero System Almanacs 1 and 2 were 4th edition supplements. They are superceded by the description of negative characteristics in the 5E and 5ER rulebooks.

Re: NBC's "Heroes" Like any TV series, I will have to see at least one episode and probably more before I judge it. I refuse to make snap judgements about anything like this based on synopses or previews that often aren't even created by the people directly involved with the program.

Re: If You Had To Play a DC Character… Having to pick just one: The Ted Kord Blue Beetle: An inventor/gadgeteer and martial artist with a sense of humor. If played at the time that he still owns Kord Omniversal Research and Development, then there's lots of room for story hooks around not only his personal life but also around his company. However, there are a couple of classic characters that would also be tempting: The Alan Scott Green Lantern: A true hero with a great power who is normally cool and collected but still agonizes over mistakes that he's made. It would also be fun to play the veteran hero who has many tales to tell and adventures to draw lessons from. The Jay Garrick Flash: Another cool and collected veteran who is a mentor to a whole line of speedsters.

Re: If You Had To Play a Marvel Character… Spider-Man: Good powerset and lots of fun noncombat storylines. The Thing: Nice simple powers and it would be fun to whine and moan about being a monster and a freak and then when "it's clobberin' time", go into action. Nightcrawler: Teleportation is cool and playing the swashbuckler (with much more depth underneath) would be a lot of fun. Hawkeye: It can be fun to play the more-or-less normal guy in the crowd of supers.

Re: Character "niche" Doesn't anybody ever focus on things like personality and motivation as factors that make character different?

Re: This Year's Comic Book Covers For My Convention Events Thanks. The character outlines are just Hero Machine charaters all colored black.

Re: This Year's Comic Book Covers For My Convention Events Incidentally, comments are welcome.

As those of you who have played in my SuperSquad America events know, I like to do comic book covers for each year's event. However, since I have limited art ability, I have to either get Kerry Connell to do a new group shot for me or create something with the existing art he has done for me. So, with KublaCon just two weeks away and the debut of SuperSquad America 2006 and my new Remarkable Wrong-Righters event, it was time to do this year's covers Now, I do not yet have any art from Kerry for the two new characters in SuperSquad America or for five of the characters in the Remarkable Wrong-Righters, so I had to make do with what I had. So, here are this year's covers.

Re: "Ravenspeaker" If I remember correctly, Ravenspeaker is Steve's first nation (that is, native Canadian) character who is scheduled to be included in Champions of the North.

Re: Now Taking Preorders For the Champions 25th-Anniversary Special Edition! I'm boring. Since #1 was unavailable, I asked for and got #2.