BoloOfEarth

Apparently, an asteroid 2.3 times the size of a dinosaur is heading for Earth. These new measurement systems have me confused. How many giraffes is that?

Well, not any more.

Thereby proving my theory that Facebook is run by face-hugging acid-blooded aliens.

This joke reminded me of the Chicken Cannon story.

I'm reminded of the story I read online about somebody trying to prove or disproved the story about the car with the JATO (Jet-Assisted Take-Off) rocket strapped to it, being found embedded in the side of a cliff. He said he contacted somebody in the DOD to ask about the feasibility, and was later sent about 20 pages of formulae, charts, and diagrams ultimately showing that it was impossible. The writer commented how it must have taken hours for the DOD guy to research everything, make the computations, compile the data and tables, etc. adding "this is your tax dollars at work."

Not quite sure I follow the logic fully. I can semi-understand (though don't endorse the argument) that the requirement to pay child support may make some men pressure woman to have abortions. However, if men *aren't* required to pay child support for the children for whom they were sperm donors, then wouldn't that be more of an impetus for women to *want* to have an abortion, rather than having a high likelihood of living in poverty?

Dudes, are you two competing to see who can retell the same joke more times? 🤣

I also agree strongly. When my players use Interaction Skills, I ask them to give me the gist of what they're trying to say or do, and then use that to perhaps modify the roll. Sure, we all have a laugh if the player says something ridiculous (a personal favorite was a Presence Attack: "Stop, Evil Do-Gooder!"), but the player mis-speaking doesn't mean the character did, unless they flub the roll. Regarding the puzzle / riddle thing, I admit to being guilty of using them on occasion, and try to remember to have them make a roll on an appropriate skill if the players are having trouble with it. Although I'll point out that there is something to be said for the pleasure the player gets in figuring out the puzzle / riddle themselves. I'd say to give them a chance to figure it out for themselves first, before throwing in the skill roll and hints / details / etc.

For skills with Skill Enhancers, I don't think you need to spend 2 points on each of them. One point on a skill with an appropriate Skill Enhancer would give you an 11- roll in that skill, and that's no longer a Familiarity. So you could have a base 11- in each skill, and then apply the Skill Levels in all Non-Combat Skills to increase the roll. Also, FYI, according to 6E1:56, you can buy a Proficiency in a Characteristic-based Skill, giving a 10-, to which you can then apply Skill Levels. So that may be something you can use for skills that don't apply to Skill Enhancers.

Try Extra-Dimensional Knockback. "I'll hit you so hard, I'll knock you into next week!"

You can always go the route of the Middleman. "Oh, phooey." "Dag-diggity!" "Jeepers!" "Not a gosh darn chance in Heck." "Gob smack it!" "Dag nabbit!" "What the monkey?" "Sands of Zanzibar!" "Jumping bananas, we're in Dutch." "Sweet mother of Preston Tucker!" "Hot flaming pork buns!" "Sweet Molly Brown!" "My Little Pony!"

The quote came from her victory speech. And according to the article: "The victory came just hours following the deadly massacre at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas."

Many thanks, everybody, for lots of great ideas, as well as things to think about overall. FYI, I altered some of the villains' backgrounds and origin stories to fit the whole Paranormal Flux thing, as well as modifying some of their powers somewhat (particularly the 3rd edition characters to bring them up to 6th edition, plus some tweaks to make some of them a bit more useful or rounding them out a bit). So if I mention something that doesn't match the original character 100%, that's why. Regarding Southern California, I don't want to have too much going on down there that might involve the players' hero team (the Golden Gate Guardians, by the way), since LA has their own NPC hero team (Angel Force), with whom the PC heroes have made an effort to have a pretty good working relationship. But I can always have goings-on down there appear in the news, with things eventually tying into something going on in the San Francisco area. Since the Guardians have recently gotten official sanctioning from the city of San Francisco, that alone could make them "tools" and targets in the eyes of the Dissidents. And Rainbow Warrior being on the Board of Supervisors give her extra "stooge" status. I've had the heroes accompany a prisoner transfer from the High Desert State Prison in upstate California down to Alcatraz Prison (it's being turned into a super-prison, and the refurbishment is partially complete). If the Dissidents attack legal weapon shipments, the government might ask the Guardians to accompany a future weapons shipment, particularly if it's bound for another country and sailing out of San Fran. I didn't think about the Dissidents wanting to recruit any of the heroes but that's a good idea. (In a past campaign, VIPER tried to recruit one of the PC heroes. That was a blast to run.) And with Echo around, the Dissidents can figure out if the hero tries to play along just to set up an ambush. Could be quite interesting... I like the idea of the Dissidents going after a San Fran-based biotech firm - they have Dragonfly (who was transformed by a lab accident and hates being a 'freak'), Flower (who is convinced she got her powers from a covered-up leak at a nuclear reactor when a different supervillain team stole some fuel rods. There wasn't a leak, but good luck convincing her of that. It's all a cover-up!) and Titaness (who lost a lot of friends due to a company dumping toxic waste near their commune). Maybe target that company, kidnap some scientists and steal equipment / chemicals / other supplies to try and restore Dragonfly and Flower to normal. (Not sure whether Titaness would want to give up their powers, though.) If the heroes learn about the toxic waste dumping, that even ties into Sundog's idea of adding some mental conflict for the heroes. For the future, I like DT's idea of mining NCIS for ideas. It's been a while since I watched the original NCIS, and didn't really follow either NCIS-LA or New Orleans, but I can do some research online. From what I recall of the original I should be able to find an idea or two to steal borrow with appropriate alterations. As to someone manipulating the Dissidents, I do have some demons who are trying to make life difficult for Angel, and already manipulated another metahuman group (Divine Right, a group of fortunetelling supes, not quite villains but not quite heroes either) into facing off against the Guardians. Tricking the Dissidents into doing the same sounds like it would be up their alley. Again, thanks, everybody, for some great ideas.

In case it helps, the hero player characters in my campaign are: Angel - female actual angel with wings and martial arts skills, also Streetwise (and a bit of Wealth, for some strange reason) Escudar - male Hispanic martial artist with Code vs. Killing and gets enraged at people harming the weak and innocent; sneaky but no real streetwise or investigative skills yet Flux - female interior designer with vibration powers (blasts, flight, vibration-based radar, has Conversation skill Jack Frost - the "Face" of the group, a male attention hound with cold/ice powers and major musical talents Rainbow Warrior - non-gendered public ID (is on the Board of Supervisors for the city) with light powers (blasts, teleport, invisibility, holograms), has Bureaucratics, Conversaton, Persuasion, and Streetwise skills Techtronic - male technopath with cyberkinesis / electrokinetic powers (taser-style Entangle, machine psionics, camera vision), has Electronics and hacking-type skills Thumper - male brick able to manipulate his own size and density (so, growth and shrinking, density increase, desolid), very wealthy with minor noncombat skills (Conversation, Stealth) but not much in the investigative field They have an "office manager" (Wally Burke) who has the metahuman talent that he can frequently (but not always) hear local police band transmissions - from about 15 minutes in the future. So the team often gets a heads-up when things are going on, with enough notice to hopefully arrive in time to save the day.

I've decided to introduce the Dissidents to my Champions campaign, set in San Francisco. The premise of my game world is that it was very similar to our own world until about 3 years ago when an event (called the Paranormal Flux) caused a number of people to get superpowers. A small number (say, a fraction of 1%) got full suites of powers, while significantly more (say, 5%) got minor powers (5 STR TK) or only one useful power (like, say, 30 STR or x-ray vision). So now the world is turning more and more into a comic book-style world, with megalomaniacal superhumans trying to carry off plots that are "sheer elegance in their simplicity" (which is often utter BS). The Dissidents were a supervillain team from 4th edition, introduced in the Champions Universe and made up of characters from 1st through 4th edition. For those who aren't familiar with them: Lady Blue (from Classic Enemies) - team co-leader, female; magnetic/force field powers from a self-designed battlesuit make her a flying brick with an energy blast, has Code vs. Killing and a concern for the poor and homeless Cold Warrior (from Classic Organizations) - team co-leader, male; cold / ice powers from self-designed battle armor; Russian expatriate; Protects innocents and Hatred of war/military Titaness (from 3E Enemies: Villainy Unbound) - female growth brick with limited-use electrical attacks; determined to destroy society Dragonfly (from 4E Corebook / BBB) - male scientist transformed into bug-man; has flight and bioelectric sting; metes out "justice" and hates his bug-like appearance Mongoose (from Classic Enemies) - male martial artist, fun-loving swashbuckling showoff Rainbow Archer (from Classic Enemies) - female speedster archer with trick arrows; has Code vs. Killing and Overconfidence, robs from the rich and gives to the poor... and herself Bluejay (from 4E Corebook / BBB) - female with flying battlesuit and sonic powers; has Code vs. Killing and won't endanger innocents; since my world's VIPER-analogue is only just starting out, I removed them from her background and just made her Greedy. Flower (from 3E Enemies: Villainy Unbound) - female hippie able to transform into a ball of energy that can fly around bashing targets has Code vs. Killing and an urge to correct every wrong, sees all issues in black and white Echo (from 3E Enemies: Villainy Unbound) - female former Russian spy with mental powers based on making the target remember past info or relive past events; mirrors traits/desires of those whose minds she's read To quote from 4th edition CU: "The Dissidents have begun working together to attack what they see as the real enemies of the world - the military/industrial complex and major business conglomerates. They often clash regarding methods (some are definitively more blood-thirsty and/or careless than others), but all in all, they get along." I'm seeing them as an overly-aggressive socially-conscious group, and already introduced them in the news, having attacked a Northrup Grumman facility where they're building replacements for the Minuteman III ICBMs. While I could easily go the environmentalist / eco-terrorism route with the Dissidents, I'd rather avoid that as I already have two other supervillain teams that run along those lines. Other than attacking defense contractors, any idea what other plots I could use the Dissidents for? I'm trying to think of some multi-part plot but am drawing a blank on anything I haven't done before. I thought of the Dissidents kidnapping a company's CEO / executives / major stockholders and demanding the company redistribute some wealth to the poor / divest itself of factories in poorer countries who employ children / cease creating dangerous or addictive Product X. However, the wealth of Code vs. Killings above means they can't exactly threaten to kill their hostages, so what could they threaten them with? Has anyone used the Dissidents or these characters in the past? If so, what sort of things have you done with them? I'm open to any ideas people might have.

A Megascale Presence Attack?! I must have missed that one.

(sigh) Giraffes are a measure of height or length. T-Rexes are a measure of weight. Asking how to convert from T-Rexes to giraffes is like asking how to convert from ducks to windmills.

Is that the one he wore on the sound stage where they filmed the lunar landing? (just kidding - don't want Buzz to show up and punch me)

My daughter pointed out that Netflix is carrying the first two seasons of Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide. We had watched many an episode together when she was just a kid, so I binge watched it for nostalgia. I enjoyed it a lot. Loved Gordy, the janitor -- I also had enjoyed seeing that actor in both Veronica Mars and iZombie.

Yep. Our republic might as well die by political violence as well.

"Purrfect for Jewish Cats!"

At times, I do wonder whether I'm still alive, or if I actually died at some point relatively recently and am "living" in my slowly fading imagination and memory. Other than that, I'm of a mind with Ragitsu. If I'm a construct created by someone else, then either they're not very ambitious / imaginative or I was created as part of some class team project where the team members are pretty much half-assing it.

Don't tempt the GOP. I'm sure they'd love to show us.

Once, there was a lumberjack who wandered into a magical forest. As he swung his axe, the tree said “don’t cut me down, I’m a talking tree!” The lumberjack replied, “and you will dialogue.”

Evil Does Eventually Die: a scathing obituary.