archer

In the aftermath of the Gulf War, GHWB lifted the no-fly zone in Iraq just long enough for Saddam to send in helicopter to slaughter the civilian uprising in Baghdad which was threatening to topple him from power. As soon as the helicopters did their job, GHWB reinstated the no-fly zone. So I'd rank GHWB somewhere below Nixon in my list of "best GOP presidents".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superconducting_Super_Collider The Superconducting Super Collider, if it had ever been finished, would have been roughly 3 times the power of the Large Hadron Collider. The original SSC plans were for a 54 mile long underground ring particle accelerator. Only 17 shafts to the surface and 14 miles of the tunneling were ever excavated before the project was shut down for lack of funds...supposedly. But that sounds more like the cover story of a clever scientific villainy group to me.

I probably average 2 or 3 (if you don't count in my gadgeteers who are festooned with foci). I usually use them for minor powers like enhanced vision, radio, minor gadgets on a utility belt, etc. basically things which are useful and would make sense for an experienced hero to get to make his life easier but not cross over into the realm of "hey this makes me a superhero!" if some kid got his hands on them. I rarely have any major powers bought through an OAF.

At the time, I thought Storm really stepped in it because she didn't consider that Wolverine might have been running a very effective bluff which would have outed Mystique when Nightcrawler was too preoccupied to think of that solution on his own.

Having trouble organizing my thoughts so this might be a bit disjointed. 1) Sounds like to me that the villain group would have the motive to contact a crusading reporter and show him the proof. Allow the reporter to bring a cameraman and his own doctor to verify that it's a dead human body and not a fake. Personally if something like that happened, I think local and national news would be all over it. The "hero" would get invitations to talk shows all over the country to appear and defend his actions. If he shows up, he gets savaged for his indefensible actions. If he refuses to show up, the host will point out his cowardice in refusing to appear then savage his indefensible actions. Racially-motivated hate groups would be praising the hero's actions. Civil rights groups would be calling him a human weapon and be demanding that the government do something about superpowered murderers running around slaughtering people while pretending to be heroes. Children should be running up to him on the streets (in front of cameras) saying when they grow up that they want to kill bad guys just like he does. Public appearances which have been scheduled for the team would probably be cancelled. If the team has a fan club, it might disband or at least publicly disavow the killing. If the team has donated money to a charity, the money might be publicly returned with maximum publicity. New invitations to speak at Purity League events would be extended. 2) Aside from that, have the police pick up the "hero" for questioning. They can hold him for a certain amount of time without pressing charges (usually something like 72 hours). If the guy insists the police release him or charge him, charge him with assault and battery, then bring in the whole team for questioning. If the "hero" resists or avoids the local police picking him up in the first place, have a well-known out of town superteam show up to back up the PRIMUS team which comes after him. 3) As for the player's attitude, I freely admit that I don't worry about how much BODY damage I do in the first attack against a tough villain I'm familiar with. But I also don't usually play characters who have killing attacks and I certainly wouldn't be using them full power on a character who is clearly close to death already unless there are zero alternatives. 4) As for how to address this out-of-game, if it were my game, I'd explain to the players whose characters have a "Strong Code vs Killing" that part of that limitation, in my opinion, is to not be standing idly by while you know someone nearby is being intentionally killed by your teammate. If the limitation isn't fully limiting the character, it's not worth the full amount of points so they owe me, the GM, some points back...or they need to correct their behavior in-game. 5) The player who is the problem isn't taking subtle hints so don't be subtle. Tell him that behavior isn't acceptable as part of your game. Go ahead and play through the consequences of his actions in-game. If he appears to be straightening up, fine. If he appears to be unrepentant, toss his character in jail forever or have the character be killed by a vigilante hero...and be clear up-front when talking to the player that those are possible options you have considered to deal with the situation but you'd prefer he not take it that far. 6) Clearly the large HKA is part of the problem. Offer to work out an in-game solution to get rid of the offending power and replace it with something else. The villain team seems to be staffed with scientists so perhaps they capture and experiment on the hero with some expected or unexpected results. 7) No experienced character except psychopaths should be flippant about someone dropping off of a 5 story building. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930020462.pdf Page 36 of this NASA document shows you leave the "zone of marginal survival" and enter the "fatal zone" at a speed of about 17 meters per second, which corresponds to dropping from a height of roughly 12 meters This site shows a typical story for a residential building as being 3.1 meters. I would expect a "mansion" to have higher ceilings but we can go from what's typical. http://www.ctbuh.org/HighRiseInfo/TallestDatabase/Criteria/HeightCalculator/tabid/1007/language/en-GB/Default.aspx 5 stories times 3.1 meters each would show the drop height for the victims as 15.5 meters while NASA says the drop is expected to be fatal after 12. (I seem to have accidentally erased a paragraph somewhere in #7...something about having the player make an intelligence roll and if he blows it badly, tell him that his character thinks the idea of letting the people drop because they'll survive is a perfectly wonderful idea.)

Baby Formula: M + F = B

I'm not very artistic so I'm always happy to see what others can do when it comes to campaign maps. https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/homebrew-dungeons-and-dragons-maps

What kind of build did you end up with for the scarecrow character?

I was thinking that the machines might pick a name which was a homage to their alien creators. And that being literal-minded, their name would be "The Homage". And that they'd be more than a little puzzled that everyone didn't "get it" right away.

The premise of the character is that he learned to cope, not that he's spent his money on special gear to compensate for his handicap. If he wants to sink his time and money into finding someone to design special gear like sacks with an eyehook so that they can be dangled from his armor without tearing and pay for the sacks, I've got no problem with that. But then he's going to have to find an armorer, who can design and build a special suit of armor then pay for that. Then he's going to have to find a cobbler to design and build special boots. And every time he changes cities and gets some of his equipment damaged, he'll have to do the same thing all over again. And of course your torch idea is stupid because he couldn't move the torch up and down without raising and lowering his whole body. And heaven help him if the ceilings are low or flammable. I very much did not appreciate this statement (and that's the understatement of the century), mainly because I was specifically talking about one of my players rather than a handicapped person. The forum rules do not allow me to express myself in the manner which your statement has earned.

That would depend on the player's background to some extent. A lot of people get tech training in the military, others work for DARPA. Maybe appropriate for a complete civilian but perhaps not for some player's backgrounds. I would only use those modifiers if the tech development there is substantially different than it is on the campaign version of earth. You could have the High Evolutionary's Counter-Earth or Alternate Evil Spock Mirror Universe Earth and the tech development path be not much different.

As for discouraging players from casting it all the time, you could make it a ritual. Take for example 1) At least five people must be chanting the spell for the duration of the spell. People can drop in and out of the ritual for breaks but at least five must be actively involved at all times. 2) Extra time: 5 years If the player wants to analyze the spell to figure out how to cast it, let him make a magic roll. Whether he succeeds in the roll or not, tell him that 34 people were involved in casting it and it took five years to complete the ritual. If he makes the roll, tell him that only five people have to be actively casting it and that they can drop in and out of the ritual as it continues after they let a replacement step in. If the player doesn't think to analyze the spell but wants to work on it later, let him spend a couple of weeks working on it then tell him that the only way he could figure out how to make it happen would involve at least five people casting it, concentrating at half DCV, for five years or more.

Is the player fully committed to being completely without an arm or would he be content just being without a forearm? I've got a relative who is missing the function in his one hand and forearm and it barely slows him. But he's able to use what he does have on that side to hold items against his body and to give him leverage when needed. If one of my players wanted to go completely without any arm and wants to claim that his character has learned to deal with it without suffering hindrance, I'd have him describe to me 1) how his character opens then closes a jar of pickles and 2) how his character picks up, opens, takes a drink from a waterskin, then closes it firmly enough that it doesn't leak and 3) how his character swings on a rope and grabs on to the ledge on the other side of the crevasse. Then after he fumbles around for a bit trying to think of answers, I'll tell him as GM that I'm going to treat the character's handicap fairly realistically whether he takes any points for the physical handicap or not. I look at it like this: when I'm designing an adventure, I'm going to know a handicapped character is in the group. I don't feel bad at all about putting in all the normal physical challenges which every character would usually face on an adventure if the handicapped character has been compensated by getting points for his handicap. But I'm not willing to feel bad. Nor am I going to write my adventures to avoid his handicap from being a handicap, nor am I willing to handwave away the fact that a one armed person cannot rapidly accomplish some tasks in a world which is not shaped to be friendly to handicapped people. can't carry a torch and a weapon can't carry a bag of loot and a weapon can't get his backpack off, open it and dig through it as quickly other people would have trouble tying his laces whether on his shoes or his pants (which I'd be completely unable to resist exploiting for comedic purposes)

A combination of federal regulations and state laws from what I remember of his blog but it's been a couple of years since I read what he had to say about it. Sounds like from the article that the Bureau of Land Management is wanting to continue the federal change away from the decades-long "leave everything completely alone and let whatever happens, happen" policies, a change which started in a small way during the Obama administration, and go more toward "minimize the fire danger while having the least possible human impact on the living forests". Federal mismanagement of land is a big concern in most western states and significantly affects the political landscape there. Trust Trump tweet in such a way as to spin a rational policy initiative into something which sounds completely demented but which at the same time appeals to his political base. However, that's what you get when you let him close to his phone. Either that or an irrational policy tweeted in such a way as to sound completely demented.

It's amazing how much one person who I never met so completely altered my personal world. Thanks for all you did, Stan. We'll try to keep the world of imagination alive in your absence.

Thank you but I'll decline the honor. I'm in the middle of 18 different things these last few days and my mind is a blank.

http://www.capradio.org/articles/2018/07/09/feds-want-to-remove-millions-of-dead-and-dying-trees-from-californias-forests/ "The federal Bureau of Land Management wants to remove dead and dying trees from 35 California counties, from Siskiyou to Santa Barbara... BLM says there are 127 million dead and dying trees in California forests. Agencies working through California's Tree Mortality Task Force have removed 1.2 million since February 2015." One of my favorite authors lived in the hills above Hollywood and his property was in constant fire danger. He talked about the problem at length multiple times on his blog, pointing out that both property owners and the local authorities were prevented by laws from going in and removing the standing and fallen dead wood which creates the environment that fuels the wild fires.

I think I'm leaning in your direction in this discussion. If I'm awarded XP, I want to spend it on my character the way that I see fit and I want the other players in the campaign to be able to do so as well. Sure there are campaign limits, but augmenting existing combat abilities,(such as being able to throw a punch) should not be controversial when it is below that limit. When my character wants to learn some simple martial arts because he isn't being effective in hand-to-hand combat or is regularly being curb-stomped by bad guys, that's not an outlandish proposition which is going to take a lifetime to learn. Take a look at this local women's self defense site then this article talking about those classes https://www.impactbayarea.org/public_classes https://blackbeltmag.com/techniques/self-defense/the-art-of-teaching-womens-self-defense-less-is-best They teach Escape, Grab, disable, eye gouge, basic throws and either +DC or increased Hand Attack to people with absolutely zero combat experience in just a cheap 24 hour course. So I think it's entirely reasonable in a campaign if a hero, who's been in a large number of combat situations, wants to drop some amount of cash and dedicate three weeks of his life to it during his down time that he could learn actually learn 10 points in martial arts maneuvers from a real expert.

Justice Ginsburg released from hospital after breaking three ribs in a fall. https://www.yahoo.com/news/supreme-court-justice-ginsburg-working-fall-101653457.html

Send this man to Wall Street! They always seem to have an excess of bears in the market.

Rip gave them the time travel technology so no R&D costs, just construction, upkeep, and personnel. And I can guarantee that if the country or planet were to be on the verge of being destroyed that the government would send in their own operatives to take over the Bureau, intending to using time travel to fix the problem regardless of what would happen to the timeline. Either that or they were intending on immediately "defunding the Time Bureau" as a way to put control of the technology into the hands of people who wouldn't use it ethically and were only stopped from doing that because they became aware of the continuing large-scale magical crisis which needs to be handled by the expendables of the Time Bureau staff.

You immediately sell it to the Russians for reuse as a weapon?

I wouldn't really mind the Vision being a major part of it. But even the toned-down MCU version of the Vision is going to vastly overpower almost everyone the couple are likely to meet. I think a solo series for the Scarlet Witch would work better with her being more "I'm out on my own learning on the down-low but keep falling into these situations" and I just don't see how you could fit a large red android into a low visibility life on a weekly series. They've pretty much set up that "the public hates Wanda plus she's on the run from almost every government in the world". Even if they handwave away the government problems, she'd have problems with normal people. And she can't stay in secluded in Avenger's HQ without there being some explanation of why Avengers aren't there.

Agents of SHIELD Is More Popular Than Any Marvel Netflix Show https://screenrant.com/agents-shield-marvel-netflix-tv-shows-more-popular/ "They rank Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. in the top 0.03 percent of in-demand TV shows worldwide, a category Parrot classify as "Amazing." To give a sense of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s popularity, in the US shows with similar demand include Better Call Saul, Criminal Minds, and Vikings; demand for S.H.I.E.L.D. is higher than the likes of The Originals, Supergirl, Arrow, and Fear The Walking Dead. "

I think the Scarlet Witch series has more upside for storytelling. In the MCU, she seems mainly to be a telekinetic and a minor character regardless of the fact that she shows up in major movies. But in a series, they could explore her grief over her brother's death, figuring out her powers to make them more similar to the comics, getting training in actual mysticism, actually getting a superhero name which people use rather than just being "Wanda".