RDU Neil

Easy? I didn't say easy. No f*cking way has it been easy. Fun, though.

Re: I am SOOOOOO jealous! The secret to a long campaign is that it is a "meta-campaign." The Red Dragon Universe is like the Marvel or DC Universe (only much better ) There are hundreds of characters and dozens of "comics" that tell different stories in different parts of the world. Players don't play the same PC every game session, every week. Storn joined RDU in 1992, w'Vector. Vector has semi-retired twice, been lost in time, etc. During those absences, Storn played other characters in different sub-campaigns... but eventually, the V man showed up again. Storn has probably 20 PCs over the last 11 years... some only played once or twice. A couple quite deceased. Down time for characters is essential. Unlike comics that HAVE to have an adventure once a month to sell an issue... it is more realistic to have PCs who have weeks, months... even years go by without a significant "adventure worthy" event happen. During these down times, ideas percolate, and a stale character gains new freshness. They come back older, with a wife and kid and a new outlook on the hero business or whatever. This kind of meta-campaign allows a freshness of game style, too. With a superhero world, it is very easy to have almost any "genre" show up. We have a lot of "wild martial arts" or "gritty guns and crime" or "mystic otherworldliness" type games... all happening within the same world as the very political and high level metahuman affairs that Vector deals with. Characters that are nothing more than well trained agents exist in the same world as Omega class earth breakers. They likely never meet... but it gives the players a sense of a larger context... a more complete existence... an definitely adds to the longevity of the overall campaign.

Re: Re: Character driven... Yeah, but Vector's dad still has the best NPC quote I've ever had, IMO. "Son... in my day, the guy with a skull mask who said he talked to dead people was the BAD guy." Ultra Man to Geist (new PC also played by Storn) not long before Geist killed 20,000 people.

Character driven... My "old guard" come mostly from PC driven origin stories or plot lines. I'll adapt the occasional NPC from a supplement (Hyperion from Sanctuary, Taurus from Zodiac and Sunburst from Classic Enemies) that become very important... but the real "old guard hero" types usually come up because of relationships to current PCs. Ultraman & Lady White: Two of the most prominent American heroes in the '60s and '70s were created as the parents of long time PC Vector. Phantomhawk: When created as a current PC, liked the idea of being a descendent of the original... so I introduced two past Phantomhawks... one a WWII mystery man, and the other a secret agent during the '60s. Crusader: The original from 1st Edition Champions... I kept him as '70s and early 80's vigilante who grew old, retired, and passed on the mantle to an up and coming PC who had a similar origin story... updated power set just like the original Crusader... but none of it done intentionally by the player. When Crusader offered the mantle to the PC, he was overcome with the sense of history are really got into a whole new level of role playing with his PC, formerly called Intercept. Sentinels of Justice: The greatest part about having a campaign that has run for 16 years, is that original PCs have BECOME the old guard. The original team of heroes created back in 1987 is no longer played, but has become the NPC group that sets the standard in America (the Champions disappeared years ago). On a similar note: Just recently, a player wanted a new character, and the discussion led to an old NPC that was created back in 1987. At the time, Bobby Stone was 7 years old and found a magic Godstone that gave him powers. It's now 16 years later, and Robert Stone (with a few significant NPC adventures) has just graduated college, a full fledged adult looking to use his powers to their fullest. That an NPC has gone from child to grown up during the course of the campaign has really brought home a depth to the campaign that is everything I've always wanted the gaming experience to be.

Re: PBEM game? Really jonesin' for a game, eh my friend? Sorry we missed you last weekend. How was your trip? Neil

Adding to what Storn said, I've always operated on the 1/million ranking someone mentioned above. That puts 6,000 true metahumans on the planet. This does NOT include guys with high tech equipment, magic users, or martial arts adepts, etc. Equipment or training that can put someone at the power level of a Delta level metahuman or higher does not make them count as one of the six thousand. So there are a LOT of paranormals in my world... though some may have sub-Delta powersets which means they aren't really combat effective, but as Storn says, more are growing every day, as tech and such actually begin to create more transformed humans. Heck, this is also not covering magical creatures like dragons or unicorns, which have returned in parts of the world. Over all, the paranormal factor of my world is going exponetially off the charts... and this is a major theme to the campaign. What will happen to the world? Will there be any place for normals? What happens when metahumans begin running countries and making policy? Oh yeah... and then there is "the Key" A young woman whose power set is to "activate" latent metahumans. If the normal activation hovers around 1 in a million, she can bypass this and then... who knows how many we might have.

>>>Dear Vice President Cheney, Thank you for letting me leave alive. Yours truly, Dr. Lucas Warren<<< The scary part is, this quote is actually game relevent!

ooops dual post

Liaden, Thanks for the info. I had the Zodiac be major players in my campaign for years, but not necessarily as threats. Taurus, based on his origins and wisdom, is not interested in world domination, as much as guiding the world to a better place. Some of the Zodiac members were mistakes, and bad apples, and eventually the Zodiac fell apart, with the really villainous ones going off, as the rest became allies and mentors to heroes. The living spacestation I had turn out to be one half of a massively powerful Progenitor tech simply called "Ship" with Dr. Destroyer with the other half. After ten years of my campaign, the big final battle with Dr. D was to stop him from combining the two artifacts into one, under his control. Dr. D was stopped and killed... "uh... correction... he died of natural causes" and the ships did combine and was dubbed Aria, because her mental contact with Locke, a major psionic PC, sounded like music to him. She turned out to be highly benificent, and turned herself into a massive "uplift embassy" floating in the middle of the Atlantic. It was at this point that the few remaining Zodiac... Taurus, Virgo, a cloned Sagittarius and Scorpio... moved to their Lunar Base "Genesis Cave" type area. Big Guy, the PC who helped reform Libra, retired after nearly being killed by Dr. D, and became the gardener... eventually. These days, this Lunar Cave is becoming a full fledged colony, as the human race begins moving out into the stars. Taurus is seeing some of his dreams fulfilled, as the PCs have taken on some aspects of his "mission."

Light is dawning in my dark mind at last. Thanks, Doc.

Help me out here... what the heck does... ... IIRC... ... stand for? Everyone uses it, but I have no clue.

One of the reason I game is to do the comic stories the way "I" think they should be done. I still remember reading Uncanny X-Men#137 "Death of Phoenix" and #138 "Ellegy" and feeling so moved at the sacrifice that was made... not only by Jean... but by the creators in sacrificing a great character. Later, when Byrne brought Jean back, I was incensed. I quit buying Marvel comics for a long time, and to this day, only buy a few. By destroying the validity of one of the most classic comic tales ever, they ruined my faith in the Marvel Universe. Those quiet or moving or happy or tragic endings MAKE the game... because they are endings. A character's story has been told. The world moves on... new characters are explored... but that tale is now part of myth... and is more powerful for that. No resurrection for Libra as long as I'm alive.

Thank you

LIbra... I used the Zodia extensively, and always translated Libra as the most dangerous one of them all, potentially. I perceived her powers to be molecular transformation... i.e. she could create, change or destroy just about anything she wanted, given time. Over the years, she got more and more powerful, in my game. Very scary. In the end, she was redeemed by a PC hero, and after Zodiac (kind of a gray team in my world) left their space station to colonize the moon, she transformed herself into a miniature sun that brought life to a "Genesis Cave" type colony that they created on the moon. The PC retired to tend this garden, always talking to the sun as he worked, since they had been in love before she transformed herself.

Several good quotes from this weekends big game... "I just pushed a man out of a 40 story window. I didn't do it just to get rid of you!" Speedball to his lady love, who he is warning to leave New York because of a terrorist threat. "Do you realize just how far in the $hitter you are when 'Eric's' character is the Good Cop!" (Rick, while the heroes are questioning a villain, and Eric, who normally plays the "grim servant o' death" type characters is the only voice of reason.) "No... really... who's the mook?" Speedball, upon meeting Nunzio for the first time. "You don't know what's going to happen when it hits you." Me (GM) "Nothing good! It's not a healing spell!" Geoff Great games create great quotes!

I would agree with the "avoid naked advantages" comment. In a MP, just buy powers whose "effect" simulates that of "huge strength tricks." Also, just as a note, I'd suggest being more concerned with damage class limitations, rather than active points. 60 active points in Hand Attack (or HKA) is hugely more abusive than a 10d6 AE Radius EB (whose active points is 100). Sometimes cool powers get cut because the active points are too high, even though the power is not nearly as abusive as other powers bought within the Active Point cap. Limiting Damage Classes is a better way to balance powers. 10d6 AE Hex makes it very easy to hit (only have to hit the hex) but 10d6 will never be an overpowering attack (at least in most campaigns.) However, for the same active points, I could buy a 5d6 HKA, which would be a minium of 6d6K with a 15 STR. Way abusive. Heck... on second thought... just be really careful with Hand Attacks and Hand Killing Attacks and you'll be ok!

"So... how much C-4 can I safely use on my friends?"

>>>And if they're trained, dedicated agents of an organization out to conquer the world and kill lots of people, well, do the math. You only suffer serious consequences at 0 Body (bleeding, severe muscle and bone damage). If they're working for that kind of a cause, a 5 Body injury is getting off cheap.<<< Ah so now we go from "killing is bad and immoral" to "they deserve to have broken bones and potentially disabling injuries." Hey... I agree with you. What I disagree with is the people who make a moralist stance against "killing attacks" or "lethal force" but fail to realize that, in the middle of combat, a bullet or a punch that takes someone out in one shot... they both are potentially just as lethal. To say one is "the high ground" and the other "base and villainous" is just wrong headed.

I'm not saying it's the full force of what Cap "could" do... but I'm saying... a 6d6 attack will not keep a normal down in one punch on average. 5PD for a basically untrained, but been in a few fights, thug. (If a pro-boxer is an 8-10 PD, this makes sense for a street tough.) 21 Stun on average -5, equals 16 stun. Probably a Con Stun... but not unconscious. Unless Cap hits him when he is down... which we never see... the guy gets up in a few seconds... which we also never see. You never see Cap having to punch a thug twice. So, to take out a 20 stun, 5 pd thug in one punch, so that at a minimum he is out for a full turn (which is still recovered and up again in under 30 seconds) Cap has to do 36 stun, minimum. That puts the thug at -11. 10d6 normal is 35 stun on average. So it has to be an above average roll on 10d6 to put a thug down in one shot. That is, on average 5 body damage done. HALF the thugs body in one shot. That is the average of a 9mm bullet. Now, you can put in a rule bending, lets keep Caps hands clean, mook rule... allowing the so called heroes to just take out thugs without even rolling, but that is script writing to maintain the illusion that violence is clean and safe. Violence is not clean and safe. You punch a person hard enough to take them out in one shot... especially if you do it with a superdense metal object... you are severely injuring them, possibly in a life threatening manner. A month in the hospital? Same damage as getting shot. Why is one kind of damage "lethal" and the other "family friendsly?" Stupid writing/genre conventions that have no basis in reality, and in my opinion, severely detract from any kind of dramatic story telling... whether in the comics or an RPG.

Alibear... EXACTLY. I always find it hypocritical that players who would never think of using a 3d6+1 KA on a normal... will no flinch from using a 10d6 normal attack. They call it being heroic, because they didn't use a KA. Well... a 10d6 attack is not as LIKELY to kill a normal... it is a game mechanic justification... not an "in world" concept. That 10d6 blast is still likely to do 7-8 BODY after defenses, which is more than a 9mm bullet will do on average. "But it's not a killing attack" I hear so many people say. (Not my players, thank god.) The fact, though, that Capt. America needs to do 10d6 or more in one attack, to put a normal "out of the fight" for sure. Therefore, Caps attack is a measure of lethal force... we are just saved by the writers from seeing the disabling, bleeding, broken body effects... therefore Cap is kept with "clean hands." I've hated that element of comics since I was a child. I don't role play superheroes. I role play "people with powers." Sometimes the PCs do act in villainous ways... other times they are quite sacrificial. There is no b&w... there is only the very, very gray of CHOICE. Gaming is not comics and movies. It simulates elements of them... but it is it's own medium, a medium defined by character/player CHOICE. Trying to force role playing to conform to some false "genre standard" is limiting, and no kind of game I want to be a part of. Playing off of, or with those genres, fine... but enforcing them by fiat and morality arguments... no way.

A lot of the 100 Agent Smith's battle could come down to maneuvers. Remember... Champions/Hero doesn't have to be about buying complicated powers and advantages all the time. Sweep... Defense Maneuver... Acrobatics... all of these would represent the majority of what Neo pulls off against multiple Agent Smiths... not to mention, a higher SPD so he gets more attacks. Neo and Smith were roughly equal until the end of the first movie. In this one, Smith has new abilities, but Neo is clearly, faster, stronger, tougher and more skilled than any one Smith. Don't over complicate stuff. Most of that fight was in the basic combat rules... the rest is special effects and very common skills and stats.

I agree, Mark. The only characters you'd have to "stat out" would be the Agents in whatever special powers they have. All the others are normals, with more or less skill levels and equipment. It's like running a Danger Internation/Spy campaign... or a cyberhero campaign. Most of the flashy stuff is special effects. Most villains work off of one "gun guy" sheet which you tweak in the game as appropriate. Any "Heroic level" NCM game is easy, because all characters are very similar in stats to each other... only skill sets differ. The Matrix gets hinky, because you introduce superpowers, essentially, but that is no worse than any other supers game... in fact easier, because the powers are limited to wild martial arts, for the most part. Piece o' cake. It's all in the telling, not the stats.

Re: What made the Protectors great All these things are true... and in my opinion, we're doubly true from the only other supplement BETTER than TS&P... The Zodiac Conspiracy. (Well... the art in ZC wasn't as good, but the color made up for that.) A solid group of individuals that have a REASON for working as a team. Very important. While the Protectors were the old guard that helped usher in new (read PC) heroes over the years... and the death of Quasar, saving another PCs loved one, was very moving in my campaign... the Zodiac ended up being my lynchpin group. Their "villains... sort of..." motiffe (or at least I played up that angle quite a bit) lead by an immortal scholar powerhouse character like Taurus was great for driving plots forward and working both for and against the heroes. Kudos to both these supplements for the source material for absolutely great games.

I'm a big fan of heine, too! Uh... I mean... you know... Scott... and... ...uh... Never mind. (Seriously. BRING BACK THE PROTECTORS!) (oh... IN COLOR!)

Kind of a "been there, done that" with the Matrix, concept. I played a lot of "Cyber Hero" though I changed a lot of the overly complex and downright wrong rule interpretations from that supplement. I had a number of 150 or so point NCM characters in the "real world" who were mercs and drivers and fixers, etc. The problem came up when one person wanted to be a hacker, and the others were street runner types. The hacker got left behind, or went off into their "net world" and it was tough to keep the group heading in the same direction. We did do "hacking and jacking in" type scenarios, but it required the GM to be describing two worlds at once... one the "real world" with guards and cops... and the other the "net world" or "matrix" where the hacker was in avatar form, battling through nodes to simulate hacking into systems to let the real world guys enter a building, or something. We did it with a similar idea as to posted above. Anyone could connect to the "net" with simple electrodes, but you were just a "normal" in that mode. Few skills. If you had paid points for a "headjack" then you could have an avatar that had 10 pts for every 1 you spent on the "headjack" (or something like that). Your avatar could be anything, with any powers/skills/etc. except "computer programming" The idea was that your avatar's "powers and skills" were metaphors for the programs you could access. If you battled a dragon in a security node made out to look like a castle, and were able to raise the portcullis... you had bypassed security and unlocked the back door of a corp building in real life... that kind of thing. We did this all based on William Gibson's Neuromancer trilogy... or Stephenson's Snow Crash... long before the Matrix came out. We were, in fact, done with this campaign when the Matrix came out, and only played one more game, inspired by how much we enjoyed the movie. It was fun, and I'd like to return to that kind of game... but it's kind of outdated now (despite the popularity of the Matrix) and I only have time for one game these days, and that's my supers campaign.