BoloOfEarth

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

Buster Knowlton was addicted to gambling, and his luck (whether at betting on horses, card games, casinos, etc.) would swing wildly from incredibly good to incredibly bad and back again constantly. It was during a particularly persistent bad-luck time that Buster walked out of his house and was hit by a meteorite. He was killed instantly, but to his surprise he didn't go on to the afterlife. He was a ghost, doomed to wander the world. (He isn't sure why this is so -- Buster doesn't feel he has any particularly important "unfinished business" but he suspects that some mystery element in the meteorite is responsible for trapping him between worlds.)

He was rather put-off by this turn of events, until he learned that his ghostly touch seemed to alter probabilites. He could touch a deck of poker cards and one player would start getting impossibly good hands (as in, all 4 aces six times in a row). Passing his hands over a brand new car could cause it to throw a tie rod. He began to experiment and had fun with his newfound ability, though he can't always control whether his target gets good or bad luck.

Eventually, Buster started to get bored. Most other ghosts he met were either dreadfully dull or disturbingly scary, and being unable to speak to the living (in most cases) made him feel quite alone. He was wandering the city one day when he ran across the Mortician, and was shocked to learn that the man could actually see and hear him. Mortician invited Buster back to meet some of his friends, and in a way has adopted the wandering spirit.

Buster joined the Walking Dead after discovering that the other undead members of the team could also see and hear him. Taking the name Ghost Buster, he serves as the team's recon person as well as their wild card in battle. (This has become amusingly literal -- Buster has discovered how to manifest a deck of ghostly playing cards, and can fling them at nearby targets, altering the probability of whatever they hit.)

Re: Journey to the Center of the Earth! A new Michael Satran product!

After a day of agonizing food poisoning' date=' during which I got nothing done, I am up to P on Plot Seeds.[/quote']

 

Mike, sorry to hear about the food poisoning. I hope you're feeling better.

 

But why would you want to P on the Plot Seeds? That's not very nice!

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

I'm going for the character I think the heroes will most enjoy attacking...

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One of the posters was of the latest installment in the Twilight series. When the smoke cleared from the battle between Dr. Oddity and Montos, a young man was standing in the theater lobby, looking confused. "Where is my Bella?" he asked.

One of the teenage girls, trapped in the lobby and unable to escape during the battle, swooned and then rushed forward. She had, after all, dressed the part for her absolutely-OMG-favorite-of-all-time movie. "It's me, Edward! I'm Bella!!!"

At first, the sparkling vampire lad was fooled and took her into his arms. But after he looked at her face closer, he threw her aside (breaking many of her bones when she struck the wall) and shouted, "No! You have actual facial expressions! You cannot be Bella!"

Since his appearance, he tried to be known by his actual name, but unfortunately for him Frank N Furter mind-controlling some reporters to call him Sparkles instead, and the name stuck.

He has all the powers of the fictional Edward Cullen -- superhuman strength and speed, telepathy, etc. -- and is only with the Images so he can better search for his Bella. Thus far, Ms. Stewart has managed to avoid Sparkles.

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

NT: Reasons to have monkey bars on the ceilings and walls of your workplace.

Well, the monkeys need someplace to have a drink and relax....

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

NT: Likely sponsors for asteroid airbursts.

Pop-Rocks, naturally!

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

Arnold Pointer went to high school with Tom Garret, but they travelled in completely different social circles. Arnold was on the chess team and headed up the school's National Honor Society chapter, while Garret was a star player on the school's football and wrestling teams. As you might guess, Arnold was frequently the target of bullies, of whom Garret was one. (Garret never saw himself as a bully; he says he's just pulling pranks and having fun -- it's not his fault if some geek gets his nose bent out of shape.)

After they graduated, Arnold was dismayed to learn they would be attending the same college (with Garret gaining entry thanks to a football scholarship). Thankfully, the campus was big enough that they didn't run into each other very often, so they got through their freshman year without incident.

In their second year, however, Garret (after a night of drinking) discovered his incredible strength and thought it would be fun to pick up the science building and move it across campus. Unfortunately, Arnold was inside working on a chemistry experiment at the time. Moving the building caused the chemicals to spill all over Arnold, triggering a transformation. Suddenly, he found himself able to turn himself into any element or chemical compound. At first, he thought this was incredibly useful -- his titanium form is incredibly hard to hurt, for instance; his acidic forms eat through things, and he can turn into a highly flammable gas and explode, reforming moments later without harm to himself. But to his dismay, he also found that he now perpetually smells like rotten eggs (sulfur) in his human form, pretty much ensuring he'd never get a date with a girl.

When Garret took the name Toga and joined Fraternity Row, Arnold decided to use his own powers to oppose Toga directly. Arnold's bad luck streak continued, however, when a reporter heard Garret refer to Arnold as Poindexter (Arnold's nickname throughout high school). The name has stuck ever since, like his rotten egg smell, and serves as one more reason for Arnold to hate Garret.

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

New Topic: Who's really responsible for that explosion over Russia this morning?

President Obama -- at least, according to Fox News and Rush Limbaugh.

Re: "Neat" Pictures

Einstein looks Bohred.

I imagine they were listening to some Nine Inch Niels.

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

They say for every person with a useful superpower, there's a dozen whose powers are... well, let's just say less useful. Jack Blutarksy is one of that dozen.

Jack had helped his pal Boyd Bates carry some funky machinery down to the maintenance tunnel, but while Boyd was making final calibrations, Jack got bored and wandered off. (There's gotta be a snack machine around here somewhere, he thought.) After a while, Boyd assumed Jack had left the tunnel and gone back to the frat house, but Jack had actually gotten lost. He'd just found his way back to the machinery when Boyd threw the switch. Boyd disappeared (having teleported back to the frat house) and Jack was caught in the periphery of the machinery's explosion.

Coughing and waving away the smoke, Jack climbed out of the tunnel in time to see bras and panties dropping from the sky. With a chuckle, he settled down on the grass to watch the show as women screamed and ran hither and yon. Y'know what would make this perfect, he thought, would be some beer and a sandwich. No sooner had he envisioned that when a half-eaten ham-and-cheese sandwich and a glass of beer appeared in midair about four feet away from him.

It took him a bit of experimentation to get some control of his newfound ability to "call" food to his vicinity, and even longer just playing around with it (in the process emptying out a third of a nearby dorm cafeteria's prepared lunches). Soon he could not only call any food or drink to himself at will, but if he wanted he could make it appear with some velocity added. His first (and second, and third) use of this was to spray beer at some of the now-braless women running around, causing an impromptu, unwilling wet t-shirt contest. And when the campus police showed up, he added enough velocity to the beer to simulate a fire hose. Throw a little vanilla pudding under their feet, hit 'em with the beer spray, and they were slip-sliding all over the place. What fun!

It didn't take long before Jack joined Fraternity Row as Food Fight, the messiest villain in town. He knows he's nowhere near the most powerful person around, but he's certainly having fun while he can.

Re: Create a Hero Theme Team!

Many hero teams have a member that tends to rub the other members the wrong way. For the Constellations, that member would be Cassiopeia.

This beautiful woman is the team's mentalist, able to read thoughts and project rather intricate mental images. For a mentalist, her suite of powers is somewhat limited (no actual mind controls or mental blasts, for instance) but she is able to use those she does have to great effect. For instance, she can tap multiple foes' unprotected minds and warn teammates of the source and timing of incoming attacks (allowing them to better dodge the attacks). She can also mask her teammates from view, unless the observer is either unseen by her or has significant mental defenses. And her favorite "attack" is to read the subconscious desires of a male foe and project a mental illusion of his perfect mate, often getting that foe to stop fighting and chase after this "vision of beauty."

The downside is, like her Greek namesake, Cassiopeia is quite arrogant and vain. She loves to be the center of attention, so she frequently acts as spokesperson for the team (whether the others like it or not). (The press loves this because she is incredibly photogenic.) If her powers weren't so useful for them, the other members of the Constellations would have probably kicked her out by now.

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

Always chasing on the heels of Multiplicity is Detective Brown, a PI who claims to be after the reward money for capturing the villains. He is armed with the discarded or older-model foci of various heroes. (Strangely, all of it seems to be made from the same type of plastic, and none of it will work for anybody but him.) He also isn't known for staying on the right side of legality in his pursuit of Multiplicity (stealing evidence, threatening witnesses, endangering innocents, etc.), so he's actually wanted by the police.

- - - - - - - - - - -

New Team: Fraternity Row

This group of five super-powered frat boys are infamous for their rowdy antics throughout their college town. That their actions cause injuries and property damage is not their concern.

Note: if somebody wants to include a super-powered sorority girl as their frat's "little sister," that's fine, but there should still be five guys.

Re: Are starship deckplans with a 1 inch grid usable?

I'm still a HERO newbie but I think the write ups look great! Thank you for sharing.

 

I asked the original question about gridded maps when I was considering the feasibility of making real posters out of some of the ships. I did a Kickstarter campaign for a poster of the Clydesdale class gunboat (from the Jo Lynn issue of Future Armada) and it went really well. I'm currently running my second campaign (a poster of the Grendel-class free trader from the Midnight Rose issue) and am looking forward to doing more. Knowing that the ships are getting used out there in real campaigns really inspires me to keep at it.

Yep, I participated in the Clydesdale Kickstarter (great turn-around time, by the way!) and am in the Grendel one as well. If I could nominate one for a future poster, I'd suggest the Gryphon (which worked great for my players' ship). Other ones that would work well as PC crafts are the Exeter tramp freighter and the Venture free trader. I haven't had a chance to use the Clydesdale poster in-game, but I know it would be faster to use than piecing together the map sections.

Fair warning: my writeups are geared for a Champions (superheroes) game, so I tried to balance ships' defenses and weapon damage with that of the heroes in my game. So I probably have both the ships' defenses and the weapons' damage a bit lower than they should be for a Star Hero game, but in my game the writeups I did worked perfectly. I even ran a few ship-to-ship combats to test how they would run, and I think they came out pretty well.

Most of your ships put in an appearance at some point (even if distantly). The ones that got the most use for me, most notably including map use, were:

Gryphon (player characters' stolen ship)

Vanguard Station (as an alien listening post boarded by the heroes twice)

Argos III Space Port (served perfectly as the UNTIL space station)

Orion Strike Carrier (alien command ship boarded by the heroes in a key battle)

Morningstar Corvette (two different ships boarded in two separate incidents)

Remora Boarding Craft (three of these were used to great effect to breach the walls of the Stronghold super-prison in an attempted prison break, and the heroes got aboard two of them)

Mercury prototype (as a separate alien race's vehicle stolen by the PCs enemies, that the PCs liberated to gain allies)

So yeah, I got my money's worth. Many thanks!

Re: Create a Hero Theme Team!

It just goes to show, you shouldn't make assumptions.

The Rune Mage heard on the radio about some sort of panic taking place downtown, so he teleported to a nearby street. He was shocked to see a slow-moving wave of... something... advancing down the street, and every man, woman, and child it touched was turning into crystalline statues. He naturally assumed it was the work of his frequent foe, the archmage Petrificus, so the Rune Mage sprang into action. He had previously created a spell that protected himself from Petrificus' magic, so he teleported in front of the wave. After activating his anti-Petrificus runes, he cast a spell to compel what he thought was a wave of magical energy to center on himself, thinking himself safe from its effects.

Too bad Petrificus had nothing at all to do with it.

No, it was actually a wave of nano-machines escaped from a research lab, and thus Rune Mage's protective spells were almost useless. The nannites were supposed to convert carbon from garbage and other waste into a diamond-hard crystalline form that could be used in construction, but they were going to town on any carbon they could find. Including carbon-based life forms, like humans.

To the Rune Mage's credit, he did save hundreds of innocents by making the nannites converge around him, at the apparent cost of his life. Once the nannites were deactivated, the crystalline statue that was once his body was locked in a lab for study. It took over a week before somebody thought to put a stethescope to the chest... and they heard a slow heartbeat inside.

Shaw heard of the incident and collected two of the best scientific minds to work with two experts in magic. They surmised that the Rune Mage's protective spells had kept him from being completely affected -- they were supplying his internal organs with air -- but it wouldn't be long before the man inside would die from lack of nutrients. Working together, the scientists and mystics managed to reprogram the nannites to reverse much of the transformation, but the Rune Mage's protective spell kept this from being 100% complete. The mystics were able to suppress the protective spell at the joints so that Rune Priest would be able to move his limbs (albeit not very gracefully).

Most of the former Rune Mage is now covered with a permanent layer of diamond-hard crystal, giving him quite a lot of protection. His reduced dexterity has left him unable to draw more intricate runes and thus he can't cast some of his more complex spells, but he still has a decent amount of magic in his repertoire. He now calls himself the Diamond Mage and joined the Abnormals in appreciation for Shaw saving his life.

Re: Journey to the Center of the Earth! A new Michael Satran product!

Wow. You work fast.

That's what she said...

(Sorry, couldn't resist.)

Re: "Neat" Pictures

He's bear-ly hanging on!

(Okay, I'll take myself out back and have myself beaten severely for that.

Re: A Thread for Random Videos

...broke' date=' stupid and high is no way to go through life, girl.[/quote']

 

Thank you, Dean Wormer.

Re: Are starship deckplans with a 1 inch grid usable?

First off, I just discovered this thread. So my apologies for the lateness of my post.

Second, I've bought all of the Future Armada deck plans, and used many of them quite successfully in a past (5th edition) Champions campaign. Attached is a PDF of the writeups I created for a decent handful of the ships, as well as CHE and nuclear missiles and decoy drones. (I handled missiles and drones as "Summoned" things, each with a separate character writeup.)

Please note that in my campaign, the alien invaders using these ships were a caste system, with the ruling caste being mentalists, so they made key systems (mainly engines) on their more powerful ships require a mentalist's presence onboard (to hinder potential rebellion by the lower caste). This Disadvantage can be easily dropped, as it was just in there for campaign world flavor more than anything else. (And it gave the PC mentalist a purpose on the ship, as the ship effectively recognized him as Captain.)

Also, on missiles and drones, I required a Susceptibility (3d6) if successfully Deflected by Point Defense Systems, to cover the missile getting destroyed by PD lasers.

For larger ship's shields, I had front, right, left, and rear (for smaller ships, just front and rear shields), considering top and bottom shields as the old "if a Force Wall is a complete circle, the top and bottom are covered." So I portioned out top and bottom shield damage to those areas, either randomly or based on the direction the shot was coming from.

On the Remora, I tried something semi-original (it's an idea I borrowed from Champsguy, who used to post on these boards). The Armor Plating was done as +15 DCV, Ablative, with the special effect that attacks aren't literally missing so much as getting deflected away. This meant the ship effectively could take a pounding from most weapons, but a highly accurate shot could hit areas not protected by the plating.

Also, I required a ship carrying smaller ships (including escape pods) to pay 5 points per doubling of ships carried, to represent landing bays, etc.

Not sure how closely they fit to the stats from Ryan's writeups, but they should generally be pretty close.

Anyway, here they are. Hope they're useful to somebody.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]45672[/ATTACH]

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

New Topic: Creative ways to tell your current boss that you're starting a much better job tomorrow.

(Singing)

My new job will start... tomorrow!

Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow, I'll be gone!

Just thinking about... tomorrow!

Clears away the heartache and the sorrow!

I'll have fun!

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I'm outta here, tomorrow!

It's only a day away!

(the curly red wig and the little dog might be pushing it a bit, though)

Re: Journey to the Center of the Earth! A new Michael Satran product!

So... a journey to the center of the earth is... rising on the horizon?

(Sorry, Mike, I couldn't resist.)

Hmmm... something to add to it? How about a description of a military force geared toward fighting the underground threat. (Y'know, someone the heroes can interact with, for good or bad.)

Major George "Gopher" Grandy: "Yeah, they said planning for 'attacks from mole people' was a waste of time and money, but the US military prides itself on considering all possible threats. So that's what me and my boys are for. (puffs on cigar) Well, now that Oligarch is pulling $!#&! from underground, I'll bet people are glad the Underearth Expeditionary Force is prepped and ready to kick Oligarch's subterranean @%#!"

(Full disclosure -- I ran a Subterran adventure arc in a past Champions campaign, and the heroes had to deal with a general who thought the US military was perfectly capable of dealing with attacks from underground without help from a bunch of loose-cannon "capes." It added some great color to the game, as well as some extra challenges -- and some timely assistance -- for the heroes.)

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

NT: Ineffective power sources for your low-bid giant robot.

Hamster wheel. But if you get the Deluxe model, it has *two* hamsters!

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

Vitamins to improve his vision. He needs it to be ready when Anya shows up from Sunnydale looking for blood.

 

NT: Subtle signs your piloted giant robot was built by the lowest bidder.

The robot covers the entire floor of a huge room -- but it's only 6" tall.

Oh, that's not what you meant by "lowest" bidder. My bad.

NT: Dumbest ideas to come out of Stark Industries since the Cardboard Giant Robot.

Re: Create a Hero Theme Team!

Sherry Baker's psionic powers manifested in full power during her high school graduation ceremony, and without mental shields or any psionic buffers her mind was instantly assaulted with the thoughts and memories of everyone around her. As if that wasn't bad enough, she discovered that her slightest whim was transmitted as an unbreakable mental compulsion to others. Even her daydreams manifested as mental illusions to anybody nearby. She fled the city, eventually holing up in a cabin in the Appalacian mountains, as far as she could get from other people (though she found that she was still picking up thoughts from animals nearby).

She was visited one day by Timothy Shaw, who offered her a chance to return to society. He had contacted scientists who said they could modify one of Stronghold Prison's psionic suppression headbands for Sherry. The plan was to suppress her powers entirely, but they were too powerful for the headband to completely cancel them out. (One scientist quipped that her mental powers were "in overdrive.") However, the headband did bring them down to a manageable level for Sherry. In appreciation she offered to join the Abnormals, taking the name Overdrive.

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

Tock-Tick thinks he is one of Monty's ancestors from the past (specifically, the mid-1800s) and believes himself travelling through time against his will (which explains his absences). Unwittingly using Monty's reality-altering powers, he is able to teleport himself and others (thinking he is doing so via altering the target's placement in time).

Re: "Neat" Pictures

Lightning Storm in Athens

 

Guy needs to be holding a sword up in the air.

Or a hammer. "Zeus! I would have words with thee!"

Re: Create a Villain Theme Team!

“This is Jimmy Dugan, following American Protector’s trail as he continues attacking various supervillains. I’m not sure if he’s seeking justice or vengeance, to tell you the truth. Thus far, he has hospitalized Loopy Lou, the Acrobat, Sonic Sara, and Max Millions. Hodag is still missing after his run-in with Protector, and we have reports that a man-sized ‘missile’ which may have actually been Protector, was responsible for Scarlet Hawk’s death outside Salt Lake City. However, we have no confirmation that American Protector is definitively responsible for that death.

“I’m reporting now from Reno, Nevada, where Laddie Luck, the Scottish probability-altering supervillain, is attempting to elude American Protector after robbing Harrah’s Casino. While Laddie’s luck powers have kept Protector from grabbing the villain or landing a solid blow, he has managed to force Laddie to drop the stolen money in his haste to escape.

“Wait… I’m not sure why, but Protector has just ripped out the massive sign in front of a restaurant… oh! He’s going to use it like a giant flyswatter! But wait… apart from his luck powers, Laddie is a normal person. There’s no way he can survive… Oooooo. Oh, God, I think I’m going to be sick. Oooooo. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope the WSN censors stopped the video feed and you didn’t see that. The blood… I don’t think even Laddie Luck’s powers could have helped him survive that. Oh, no, Protector’s not stopping, he’s hitting the body again, and again, with the sign! Good Lord, it’s horrible, you can’t even tell it’s a body any more…”

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(I'm not counting Max Millions as one of the contributions, since all was given for him was a name. So the person to post the final victim in San Francisco can name the next team.)