The Monster

Re: Some Sf weapon ideas... Seems like a pretty complicated way to do something that's already been done for decades. You could accomplish the same thing with a crate of ordinary grenades and a crate of cheap shotguns, pistols and/or SMGs. You could even make the firearms cheap, like poor imitations of the "grease gun" of WW2, maybe even with sealed components so you can't accidentally pop the clip out (or reload it...). To my mind, the primary use of the devices you describe would be for booby traps, not for firearms. A multi-shot, unbreakable, self-firing gun could cause major panic in a crowd or ambush.

Re: Character "niche" From your description, I think the GM is being a little odd: but then, he sets the ground rules. On the other hand, it's hard to think that there are many niches (by that definition) that are better suited for a "martial-arts campaign" than DEX -- I mean, okay, there's STR, but really, nothing else is really good for a martial artist. A max 15 CON is a waste of points against a martial-arts boosted STR 15; and INT or EGO 15 is obviously not a martial artist's natural specialty. So the GM, as you describe it, is setting up a catch-22: one guy gets to specialize in DEX, and probably be the best martial artist, and everybody else gets to stand and watch him fight. To be diplomatic, it might be worth exploring just what the GM is really looking for when he says heroes should have different "niches" - because, among other things, two characters with DEX can indeed be very different in function. Maybe he can suggest specific skillsets or something.

Re: What I learn playing a GM. Don't drive 'em down the road, lead 'em by the nose.

Re: Invisable : Features Depends on what exactly you want people to see... Images, in a highly limited form, can be used to alter or conceal features (The Question from Justice League Unlimited comes to mind), though Shapeshift will work in a different way (changing the actual features rather than just the appearance; important for nonstandard senses). You can even buy Disguise skill adds and call it a superpower. Mental Illusionmight do what you suggest, but I think it would be so modified it would hardly be worth the work, and probably still too expensive. It really depends on the special effects and specific result you want.

Re: What I learn playing a GM. The NPCS should never upstage the PCs. While some NPCs should be dramatic and take center stage (e.g., major villains), they should never take over the scene. I've been in more than one session where a GM has a favored NPC who, when s/he shows up, the players are supposed to just sit back in awe as s/he wipes out the bad guy(s) with 733t p0wRz. It really sucks, even if the rest of the session is fine.

Re: What I learn playing a GM. "Everyone has an invisible sign saying 'Make me feel important.'" Don't leave anyone out - make sure that there's something significant their character can contribute to the game. If your climactic fight is a bunch of robots, see what you can do to prepare something the mentalist can do even if she doesn't have "affects mechanical minds." The player may not take the chance, but there has to be the opportunity to not feel useless.

Re: Victorian Women's Art of Self Defense And don't forget the huge COncealment modifiers for hiding weapons under those skirts... "Dear me, where ever did you get that trench mortar?"

Re: Amaze the Natives Kit Or, more likely, a Whack-the-Snotty-Tourist-and-Take-His-Kewl-Stuff Kit. Assemble many pointed sticks...

Re: Help with Magic System Magic Items This brought to mind an old idea my friend in high scholl and I had, where wizards marked their rank on their staff: each rank had a distinct stone or metal which would be infused into a ring around their staff. So two wizards could tell at a glance (if they didn't keep them hidden) how powerful/knowledgeable each was, and the staff of a higher wizard would be more ornate.

Re: "Sleeper" Genres If/when they publish Victorian Hero, I will buy it. I'd have to be really poor to not buy Renaissence Hero as well. A friend of mine is doing yeoman work on "funny animal" hero; he's got stats and martial arts for many different species.

Re: Infiltrate the facility Perhaps a rival gang of pirates has set up the players? They got word of the target, arranged for the players to be hired for the job (or hired them themselves), then tipped off the lab that an attack was coming. Then they hang around, and when the fight gets really intense, the rival gang waltzes in the back way (the one they didn't tell the players about) and makes off with the goods. At least that's their plan... Another option: there's an inside man, who's willing to help but insists that the players take him along when they leave. Maybe he's got his whole family hiding in the closet, so that they can be brought out of the clutches of the "evil" lab agency. Of course, he's the one who designed the thing, and in its current damaged/unassembled state, it will never work. Of course, he could be a plant, too, and act as a beacon for security forces. There may not be a weapon - it's a false lead, maybe planted by the "target" to incriminate Draconis as a legal and/or PR ploy. ...or have I GMed too much Shadowrun?

Re: I just thought of an extremely scary relationship. "Would you at least take the garbage out? All you do any more since they took away Minas Morgul is sit around the house, watch TV, and eat all my Turkish Delight......"

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... (from me when I noticed my wife's Deadlands preacher has 4d10 Strength, while my Mad Scientist only has 3d6): "Who is this, Popeye the Preacher Man!?"

Re: Whoot! Victorian Hero Loot! Victorian Hero was on my "I will buy this when it comes out" list from the moment I heard it might actually be written - and after seeing Pulp Hero (which was also on that same list), it will stay there until delivered. (Btw, that list is my highest, even above my "I will buy this as soon as I can afford it" list, or my "I really want this" list, which include most other Hero stuff in genres I actually run.) I do own a full set of 1920 encyclopedias; they are fun to read, sometimes a hoot. For example, there's no entry for "airplane" or even "aeroplane" - it's under "flying machine."

Re: Raiding the Icebox Makes one wonder what plans are stashed in the Pentagon relating to potential alien invasion... "They have hand-held lasers and their vehicles are not antigrav? Excellent! Then it's Plan Chartreuse. Prepare copies for distribution and immediate execution."

Re: Zeppelin versus Pterodactyls I could cry that this picture was never made. My spine tingles just seeing the poster. I did run a dino-versus-zeppelin fight in my archangel campaign. Unfortunately, it was in clear skies, and the PCs saw 'em coming - and opened up with the several MGs mounted on the ship. Pteros (actually tribesman-mounted riding quetzalcoatlus) just don't have enough BODY or armor to stand up to a stream of hi-power rounds. There wasn't even time for the fighters to swing into action. Next time, it'll be a surprise attack, at night and/or in cloud cover.

Re: Pulp Era Board Games Yep, Tikal is a good game, and in the exploring-ancient-ruins mold. Arkham Horror is pulpy, at least in the original. The re-release is totally redesigned, so I don't know how it plays. Friends who got it say it's more complicated and darker in tone. I don't know if it's still in print, but Mayfair's Family Business is a very quick & easy game of gang war, where each gang is historical, and mostly from the pulp era - and each gang is made up of nine historically-named mobsters from that gang (okay, one "gang" is "Bank Robbers," with folks like Ma Barker and Dillinger, but the others are straight up).

Re: Summoning a creature with variable stats Or just Summon one specific being, but the "imaginary friend" has Multiform...

Re: THRILLING PLACES -- What Do *You* Want To See? No one's mentioned a seedy waterfront bar yet! I've staged a couple sessions in seedy waterfront bars around the world (it was little embarassing the time my wife pointed out that this was the *second* Monkey's Head Bar they'd run into in the Far East - maybe it was a franchise?). You could even draw up a generic location map and have a range of modifiers to use it for New York, Hong Kong, Cairo, London, etc.... For that matter, a laid-out harbor warehouse district, with both operating and "deserted" warehouses and other appropriate businesses, streets, alleys, and so on. Another possible generic with regional modifiers. A bank, with details on just what kind of safes, security, alarms, etc. would be appropriate for the period. A secret submarine base (a la Raiders of the Lost Ark).

Re: SciFi Colonists You don't want people who breed - you want people who produce If you focus on breeding, you end up with a population boom that you may not have the resources to support; presumably, we can pack along a good supply of machinery and machine-producing machinery, so farming won't be so much a matter of manual labor. Same with knowledge - computer geeks, at least a few of them, will be invaluable to maintain and expand the system you take (Apple, Windows, or Linux?) and keep the machines running.

Re: I need your help with my Pulps Adventure Cruella DeVille?!?

Re: Character Name Help Half-Nisei with a European mother, if Dad served in WW2, means that Dad was almost certainly in the 442d(?not sure about the number?) regiment, which was one of the most highly-decorated units in the US Army. This heritage of heroism bodes well for the character. As far as names, why not "American Dragon" (okay, so it's currently a kid's cartoon on cable...)

Re: How's *this* for a new setting. One of the interesting things about Narina is that, while there are certainly sides, the sides are *not* always as clear to the characters as we might think. In The Last Battle, Aslan points out that, even though the Calormenes worship the rather nasty Tash, it is possible to be a good guy and worship Tash - if you are trying to do all the good things that you know are good in stpite of the nastiness all around you. Also, several characters - Edmund and Eustace are the primary examples, of course, but others as well - end up switching sides on a temporary or permanent basis, or cavil for an awfully long time about choosing sides, some more than once. BTW, there is a friend of mine who's been working on and off for years on a systematic "funny animals" Hero module, which has struck me that it would work very well for making Narnian talking animal characters. And more BTW: Tolkein and Lewis were nto very enamored of each other's work in this arena. Lewis thought the LotR stuff was way too long and detailed (especially during the way-too-many Inkling sessions where Tolkein would read his new stuff), and Tolkein thought Narnia was just way too allegorical to be a really good story. At least that's how I've heard it.

Re: Personality Archetypes The Seeker - whether after some philosophical ideal, some bit(s) of arcane knowledge, or personal redemption, the person who really isn't into heroism and adventure for its own sake but travels restlessly looking for something s/he knows she'll probably never find. The Fugitive - rightly or wrongly accused of one or more crimes, on the run from those who hunt him The Healer - follows the heroes around patching up the mess they alway seem to end up in the middle of

Re: Symbiotes in a Fantasy Setting - Multipower? From your description, including the things having their own sense of survival and such, don't make it a Focus, or even a power at all - make it a Follower! Then it is its own full character sheet, with seperate stats for everything, just like, say, a hunting dog or something. And just like some hunting dogs, it has its own set of disads, which may include a certain preference for self over the welfare of its "master," or some kind of more harmful tendency (e.g., for an attack dog, a Berserk psychlim would be quite approriate). Then the host of your coral critter just pays one-fifth the value of the critter. Easier on him accounting-wise, and easier for everyone to seperate out just what the source of the various powers are. For the armor effect, you could simply declare that the critter covers locations x thru y if you're using hit location rules, or that any hit has a 14- less chance of hitting the coral instead. Hmm - you could use a twisting of the Knockback rules also: when the coral is hit, make a Knockback check. The host takes damage as if the coral had just been knocked back into him (from zero distance, of course). This alone could be enough of an armoring effect that you wouldn't have to worry about the critter actually adding any armor directly to the host!