Clonus

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

Well, I disagree. If his attitude was changed completely, so that his friends were his enemies and vice versa, I could see your point, but given that this would only affect people capable of fear, and that it would have to be preceeded by a +20 Presence attack, which would make anyone scared anyway, it is only really just keeping them scared longer. I seriously don't see how it can be argued that this is more than minor.

 

Oh I agree. It isn't more than minor. But it isn't cosmetic. It isn't just changing the way things look or seem.

Re: Help me make Awesome Presence

And how exactly would that be more than cosmetic? I'm sure if the attack only gave someone a pimple' date=' that would be considerred cosmetic, but physically this is even less of a change than that, since this is not a physical change. It only makes them scared. [/quote']

 

Only? Turning a superhero into a coward isn't an "only". That's a very fundamental change. That it isn't visible to the naked eye doesn't make it trivial. Just the opposite.

Re: What Age?

It's hard to answer since I'm not keeping track of what's Gold' date=' Silver, etc. If someone wants to update me on what's what, I can post again.[/quote']

 

Gold: Gold represents the era starting with the introduction of Superman and Batman up until the introduction of the Barry Allen Flash. Benchmarks include:

 

Characters, hero and villain, can kill, but mostly indirectly in the case of heroes. You don't see heroes breaking the necks of enemy sentries, but you do see them blowing up Japanese dams or causing some criminal's plane to crash, No particular effort is made to save the lives of bad guys and certain heroes are remorseless and implacable killers.

 

Capes aren't universal but are widespread fashion.

 

Teenage sidekicks who are shorter, less capable versions of their patron are even more common than capes.

 

No particular training or powers are considered necessary to a superhero. As a result there are a large number of characters who are going into combat armed with nothing but a mask and an attitude, and a mob of mundane thugs are often a serious threat even to some characters who have powers.

 

Titles and colours are common in superhero names: Characters are named "Doctor" or "Captain", or "Mister", or the "Red", "Green" or "Blue" something. When you aren't named like that odds are good that your name ends in "Man", or "Lady" or "Girl". Or you're a sidekick in which case your name tends to be something nonthreatening and meaningless.

 

 

Nazis are common opponents. So are bald scientists. (Historically Japanese were also common opponents in the real Golden Age, but in nostalgia stories hearkening back to the GA the Japanese have largely been sidelined in favour of the more romantic Nazis.). Actual superpowered opponents, as opposed to bald scientists with a robot or a death ray, while not unknown, were less common than in later eras. Aliens from other parts of the solar system are also frequent opponents.

 

Common origins include: Accidental chemical exposure, visiting or being raised in a secret society which can train you to have powers, stumbling across a magical relic, consumption of a drug or serum which usually only requires one dose, designing a special weapon that can be held in one hand, just getting angry and putting on a costume.

 

Silver Age: The Silver Age began with the introduction of Barry Allen in 1956. (Seriously. In the next letter column there was a fan who wrote that if the World War II era was the golden age of comics, then the new Flash was the start of a silver age.). The Silver Age ends with the disintigration ofthe Comics Code.

 

Heroes may no longer try to kill "living" beings. Villains may try, but their attempts are doomed to be foiled at every turn. This restriction does not apply to any kind of machine no matter how self-willed it may be. Mind control is used quite casually and thoughtlessly even by supposed good guys.

 

At this point, the idea that super-powered heroes might be regarded with fear and mistrust by the general public is introduced. The teenaged side-kick goes out of style to be replaced with a larger number of teams of teenagers or teenage solo heroes. Supervillains become much more common as opponents, and mundane opponents become no more than nuisances and distractions used by their supervillainous leaders to take the hero offguard. Supervillains, while powered, are rarely an equal match for the heroes, so they need the advantage of surprise

 

The government is trustworthy. The Communists are wicked. And where-ever you turn, there are apes posing a threat to the public or you personally.

 

The most powerful characters are _extremely_ powerful, capable of moving, destroying and creating planets. Interstellar travel is routine for many characters.

 

Common origins include: Being an alien. Stumbling across alien technology. Building a circuitry-laden suit. Accidental exposure to radiation. Note that characters from the Golden Age persisted into the Silver Age or were brought back during it.

 

The Bronze Age: The Bronze Age begins with the collapse of the Comics Code (Which started almost immediately before the introduction of Barry Allen). Villains are now more successful in their efforts to kill people. Government is less trustworthy. Communists are less evil. Killer vigilantes begin to emerge as anti-heroes. Some heroes fall victim to drug abuse, or engage in sex. The most powerful characters are cut down to size or and many characters run into more opponents who can face them as equals. '

 

The personhood of thinking machines is more recognised and the morality of using mind control for convenience's sake is more questioned.

 

The Bronze Age also sees the introduction of massive company-wide crossovers.

 

Common origins include: Being magically cursed. Genetic engineering. Being mechanically built or getting cybernetic implants. Deliberate exposure to radiation. Recieving training in oriental martial arts (which are now regarded as superior to western hand to hand forms)

 

Iron Age: The Iron Age began with with characters like Wolverine and Punisher getting their own comics and the Watchmen series.

 

Multiple examples of killer anti-heroes become leads rather than guest stars or supporting characters and even characters who aren't generally killers become more inclined to make exceptions. The bickering of the previous era's superteams is replaced by outright paranoia as their own members become a far greater threat to each other than the "supervillains". Governments are reliably evil. Power levels increase from the Bronze Age but become less reliable. Characters are more likely to find their power failing, changing unpredictably or turning on them.

 

Common origins include: Getting your hands on really big guns, knowing magic, being exposed to overlaps from other universes and nanotechnology.

Re: What's in a Name

OK

First Wave: Out to 20 light years. Planets initially discovered by Starwisp probes are colonised by fusion rockets launched by Earth's nation. Names are from Earth mythology.

Second Wave: Out to 40 light years by reactionless drive. Names reflect the ideologies and religions of the "colonists" who are sent out by the Pax as a means of getting rid of their opponents.

Third Wave: Slow hyperdrive means that worlds that aren't habitable are now being colonised by corporations to act as trade links and mining colonies. They tend to end up being named disparagingly by the actual colonists.

Fourth Wave: Fast Hyperdrive takes colonisation beyond the 40 light year sphere.

Re: WHY is combat so slow and what have you done about it?

single sheet. For D&D' date=' once again from my experience, it is virtually impossible to play out a combat without referring to at least two or three charts meaning at least two books PH and DMG.[/quote']

 

In the D&D games I've played everyone instantly was down and dieing after the first or second hit, so yeah, combat went a heck of a lot faster than an in any Champions game I've played.

Re: Superhero Legal Disclaimers

Interrupting soliliquys is against the rules. Hence this legal disclaimer:

For Love and Justice, the pretty sailor suited soldier Sailor Moon! In the name of the moon I will punish you!

Re: Designing Interstellar Cultures

The one thing that really bothers me about "Empires" on TV Sci-Fi (and some novels and games, to be fair) is their cultural homogeneity.

 

We can't manage that kind of unifying culture in little countries of a couple million people.

Oh sure we can...bearing in mind that we don't get an indepth look at yer Klingons and Romulans all that much. For example there was a TNG episode where one of the Klingon worlds was rebelling, but we never even met the rebels and found out just what their beef was. Later on I saw a world of pacifist Klingon-Romulan hybrids. Don't get much more different from the supposedly homogenous Klingon culture than that. But in part it's like looking a face of another race. You have to spend a lot of time looking at the faces of a visually distinct ethnic grouping before you stop thinking how different they look from your lot, and start thinking how they look different from each other.

But apart from that, another consideration is that actual cultural differentiation requires communication barriers. Establish your colony on Mars but give them 24 hour access to all those Earth TV channels, and they will not be a terribly distinct society from the Earth society that founded them. They'll talk pretty much the same, and they'll imbibe the same attitudes about life and right and wrong.

Re: Superhero Legal Disclaimers

 

Something like "I am required by law to inform you that I am a metahuman. If you wish to surrender, you will be remanded into police custody..."

 

It needs to be short enough that someone could conceivably monologue it early in a fight.

 

Or you can save time by dressing in primary colours with a cape. If that doesn't say "I'm a metahuman" I don't know what will. In fact, that makes a pretty good justification for heroes to get into costume before swinging into action even when they have no secret identity. If the law requires them to identify themselves to perpetrators, police and bystanders, then wearing a distinctive suit of clothing that nobody sane would wear if they didn't have powers, that might be just the ticket.

In which case the verbal disclaimer would only be necessary for people who happen to be in civvies. In which case the boilerplate might be something like "This is a citizen's arrest. I have metahuman powers and I will use them in my defense if you resist."

Re: Astrophysics question

Thanks. How can we tell? Theoretically' date=' would an object made of AM "look" any differently from one made of "normal" matter"?[/quote']

 

It would look a bit different because of all the antimatter explosions as it came in contact with the interstellar medium for our galaxy which we know to be matter because we aren't experiencing such explosions. Also we've sampled it. It's possible of course that other galaxies are all made out of antimatter...but not likely since there would be no way to separate the matter from the antimatter in the first few seconds after the big bang.

Re: What's in a Name

Yes' date=' what about the namers with senses of humor?[/quote']

 

That would only happen if the naming is being done by lone guys or partnerships in tiny scout-ships. Committees and associations have no sense of humour.

 

Actually, astronomers tend to be boring and use numbers. Deathless things like HD209458b.

 

Yes and no. That's what they do with objects they don't find particularly interesting or that they aren't entirely sure actually exist. But they are still naming objects like Eris and Sedna because of their size and proximity, and should they discover life-bearing planets in space, they will certainly want to name them.

Re: WWYCD: The Life Pod

Riptide: She's teh hawtness, isn't she? How is not defrosting her even an option?

Wizard: Figure out just how long the stasis pod has before it runs out of power anyway.

Hellfire: We're in the business of helping people, aren't we?

Re: Isis and Solara

On the whole I find NPC opponents more useful than NPC heroes.

Re: New President -

But he's a demon from hell. Jokes about New Jersey aside' date=' he's not a US citizen.[/quote']

 

Etrigan could be grandfathered in, having lived in the United States since before it existed as a nation.

Re: Grandiose Schemes

Use the Gay Bomb, http://cbs5.com/local/local_story_159222541.html on a major population center.

Re: Points Equality

The point of having a point budget is not to make all the characters equal. After all, you can give me an infinite number of points and I can still use them to create Xander if I feel so inclined. You can always create a less-powerful or effective character. The reason for a point budget is to define, more or less, an upper limit to how powerful and versatile the characters can be at the start of the game. It lends structure to the character design process.

Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it...

 

I was, however irked by one small thing about the ending.

 

 

The reason the ursurper took over and the people let him is because there's no way in the system to replace a bad ruler (such as the previous rightful queen) short of assassination or civil war. The system is never fixed to deal with this problem--instead the ending implies that the problem of a bad ruler just didn't come up again for a few centuries.

I'm not sure I see the problem. Situations like that crop up all through history

Re: What would your character Dream: The Hero who has everything

Hellfire would dream of being married to the Canadian Shield. However this would fall apart as she'd find herself inexplicably attracted to her real husband.

The Wizard of Oz Incorporated would dream of being world-famous as the inventor who catapulted the whole world into a future of flying cars, robots and space colonisation. But then the robots rebel...

Riptide would dream of a world in which his mother was still alive and he had never become a superhero, instead pursuing his pop music career.

Re: Humans are "Special"

Another question would be' date=' why would aliens have special abilities except for higher tech? [/quote']

 

Because it's a superhero universe... While it is true that the Champions universe ended up depowering its aliens except for a few that went into seclusion, I assume that's because of the decision to put the science fiction games in the future of the superhero universe. But there's a reason why I posted this in the Champions area instead of the Star Hero. On Ben 10 all aliens appear to have powers because that's what his gimmick is dependant on. In DC while not all "aliens" have powers, an awful lot of them do, maybe more than don't.

Ever watch Ben 10? Notice how pathetic humans seem to be? Everyone else seems to have these superkeen powers. Are we just the lameoids of the universe or what? Suppose you were setting up the Galaxy Legion, a team which takes the most formidable individuals from each of a bunch of species like that. What would you set off as the human specialty, the thing we do that they can't?

Re: Democratic Republics in Fantasy Worlds?

Of course, any number of higher-capital-cost modes of war can lead to the emergence of a class of military technicians. That is why today we are ruled by a dictatorship of the air, and pilots are our gods.

.)

Not as long as we can simply refrain from refueling them.

Re: What would a supers setting look like 35 years from the present?

Thanks for the suggestions, guys! I'm looking at a Batman Beyond-ish setting for the most part, with Cyberpunk tropes becoming more and more common. I probably won't go for the dystopian route since it's still meant to be a relatively lighthearted campaign.

 

I've been thinking about it and it seems that the future would be all about a cashless society. What kind of crimes do you think would be the "norm" in a future setting? Given that the local law enforcement (and criminals) will have access to some gadgets that only the gadgeteers of the former era used to have as standard issue.

Cash is something that if lost, will inevitably be reinvented. People need something to pay hookers with that won't show up on a credit check. I'm betting on "souvenir" gold and silver coins and prepaid gift and phone cards. One obvious development would be an increasing tendency among the criminally inclined to go to black market body shops for the implantation of a competitive edge. Being a cyborg might end up being socially stigmatised. Android servants in a comic book future might be affordable for businesses and the upper-middle class. Actually I highly recommend raiding J.D. Robb books if your players don't read them.

Re: What would a supers setting look like 35 years from the present?

Floating cars obviously. Nothing says "future" more than floating cars, no matter when you start from. You might also want some kind of space colony. Those are the classic science fiction 30 years later benchmarks (neither of which are likely that soon in reality). You could have a society that has lost patience with superheroics and instead relies on special police squads that are sufficient during a relative supervillainous lull.

Re: How to get swords on your starship

THANKS, I feel much better now. I guess I need to find a copy.

Find Galactic Empires and you'll see the original short story that was much better untainted by the author's second thoughts.

So you're mapping your universe and you want to name your inhabited planets and systems? Well what kind of name you end up with is going to tend to be determined by who gets to name it:

Astronomers: Astronomers have a tradition of going with mythologies. So names like Odin, Hecate, Isis, Fenris, Kuan Yin or Anansi.

Colonising Governments: Governments are likely to go with naming planets after things they already control to send the message they control the new colony as well, leading to names like New London, Nuevo America, Texas or Nihon no Tenshi. They may instead have a tendency to name worlds after past or present officials or other persons they wish to honor, so Hammerskjold, Lincoln, Rice, Van Devoort.

Private Enterprise: Likely to go with names that will attract customers like Paradise, Greenfield, New Earth, Opportunity, Cornucopia, Hope.

Explorer and Early Settlers: Likely to name the planet after what they notice early on so names like Plateau, Purplewood, Dragonhome, Tempest, Montana.

Re: Democratic Republics in Fantasy Worlds?

I have plenty to say, but it's all an exercise in calling you a historically illiterate idiot.

 

Very few democracies have ever been established without violence. Not Athens, not the US...

Yes but that has very little to do with what I said. The British colonies in America had elected legislatures before they had their revolution and afterward democracy was established not by the sword but by tedious talkfests. 9 times out of ten when a dictatorial government is overthrown by force, what replaces it is something no more democratic. More than half the time, the result is something more oppressive.