BoloOfEarth

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

Re: Help with a magical contract Okay, here's the current contract (changed due to everybody's fine suggestions): The undersigned members of S-Squad do hereby swear a sacred oath to refrain from revealing anything about any and all members of the Alexandrian Order to anybody other than each other or members of the Alexandrian Order. This restriction applies both to the words and deeds of the undersigned, as well as their actions and inactions. Furthermore, the undersigned members of S-Squad agree to allow members of the Alexandrian Order to keep all magical artifacts, devices, items, and/or materials used to find and/or produce a cure for the Curse of the Basilisk. The undersigned members of S-Squad do also swear a sacred oath to refrain from revealing the existence or details of this pact to anyone other than themselves or members of the Alexandrian Order. Again, this restriction applies both to the undersigned's words and deeds, as well as their actions and inactions. [space for heroes to sign] In exchange the undersigned members of the Alexandrian Order will provide all magical and mundane assistance needed to cure the Curse of the Basilisk, provided such assistance does not directly harm any member or follower of the Order nor result in their incarceration. [space for villains to sign] All restrictions enforced by this magical contract shall automatically cease sixty (60) days after signing, or should both copies of this pact be destroyed.

Re: Help with a magical contract I'd like a second way for the contract to be broken, otherwise I can bet the players won't even consider signing it. I now think I'll keep it Fragile, but have two copies (one for the heroes, one for the villains), and specify in it that the pact is broken if *both* copies are destroyed. IOW, either both sides need to agree to break the agreement, or one side needs to get their hands on the other side's copy. The "curse" doesn't spread, however. It's a Transform attack that two of the player character heroes get hit with, along with a solo hero that the PC heroes often go to for mystic help. (IRL, two of my players will be out of town when I next run, so I'm making an in-game reason why their characters are unavailable.) I'm assuming the other heroes will capture the Basilisk Staff, but none of them know squat about magic, and their healer's powers won't undo the Transform. Of course, the heroes *could* use the captured staff to turn other people to stone just to keep the Order busy curing them. ("Okay, here's the staff. Now fix Styx and Synergy. Oh, and when you get done with them, there's a few hundred people, spread across the country, that we kinda turned to stone, just testing out the staff, y'know? I figure it should take you two months to travel around and cure all of them. Happy trails!") That's hardly heroic, though I must admit it would be amusing.

Re: Strange Hero Concepts: Discuss Your Own! JD: A formerly normal-human bounty hunter, his body was destroyed but his brain saved and put into a jar, mounted atop a robot body. He could detach from this body, which could fight independent of him. Metar: Alien nano-swarm. Subliminal: Team mentalist and the sixth member of S-Squad. Actually, Subliminal doesn't exist. He's a figment of the PC heroes' imagination, invented to make foes *worry* about a never-seen mentalist. They drop his name every now and then, in battles or during interviews, just to keep everybody guessing. If one of the heroes is asked directly about Subliminal, that hero gazes at nothing with a blank expression and say in a dull, hypnotized-type voice, "Subliminal? I have no idea who you're talking about."

Re: Help with a magical contract Well, I could remove "Fragile" from the OAF. Since it's about a 90-point power, that would give it 18 DEF, making it much more difficult to destroy. As to the second part, yeah, I meant it as "among themselves," though "each other" would probably be clearer. If Squeeze and Sentinel both sign the contract, they can discuss it without a problem. Thanks for catching that.

Re: Istvatha V'han - why can't she conquer Earth? Why can't Istvatha V'han conquer Earth? Well, y'see, Foxbat built this toll booth, and V'han had to send back to her home dimension for a s***load of dimes.

Re: Help with a magical contract By the way, thank you for the great feedback and suggestions. I've already repped Hugh and Pinecone, and tried to rep LL (but apparently I already did so too recently). I'll rework the contract and re-post it tomorrow. I also had a thought about the Power for the contract itself, since heroes' Mental Defense would be problematic for a small Mind Control. How about a 3d6 Mind Control, NND (Defense is signing against your will or signing a name other than one by which you're known), Cumulative (4x Max = 72 points), Continuous, Uncontrolled, 0 END, Trigger (signing contract; automatically resets), Difficult to Dispel; OAF Fragile, Effect ceases if contract is torn in two or otherwise destroyed.

Re: Help with a magical contract Hmmm... I should change the word "needed" to "used" or something similar, since Codex would suspect a non-magical approach may exist, and he would definately want to close that loophole. And if the heroes don't *ask* about some way other than using the staff, well, he can't be blamed... Keep in mind that this is all pre-planning for next week; I have no idea if the heroes will even entertain the idea of a deal with the Order. But regardless I'd like to have the contract ready for them to sign (and like you said, I think there's some great roleplaying opportunities in this scenario).

Re: Help with a magical contract Good call on that. I'll change it to that, but with "... harm any member of the Order or cause such member(s) to face likely incarceration." One could argue that being locked up isn't necessarily harmful, and he doesn't want to be forced to, say, break into Stronghold to steal something in their evidence vault. Codex is willing to take that chance; he is rather greedy about acquiring magical items and artifacts. (Even villains have to deal with Psych Lims.) If he makes it too one-sided, the heroes won't sign it and then hand over the staff, so he doesn't mind them thinking, "It's okay, we'll just get it back later."

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat Rename all the players to match the Abbott & Costello "Who's on First" routine. NT: Who really is on first?

Re: Help with a magical contract The heroes will be signing their Super names; I've decided that it actually only prohibits them from revealing info while they're in their hero IDs. In secret ID, they can call PRIMUS and reveal anything they want without breaking the contract. Absolutely. The affliction can be removed using the staff, but there's also a way it can be removed using non-magical materials. If the heroes figure that out, they don't have to give the staff to the Order after all. Interesting and devious idea. I'm not sure how I'd implement it; the heroes don't know that type of details about the villains; but I like the idea. As to the first point, Codex actually has no problem with helping the heroes (he has a Code against Killing), so he's not going to try and weasel out of his side of the bargain. On the second point, Codex will send a teammate away with the contract before starting to help the heroes. But if the heroes can find it, yep, they can tear it up easily. Time or dimensional travel shouldn't come into play at all. As to the beat-down, that was intentional from a GM standpoint, and sloppy thinking on Codex's part. But while nothing precludes the heroes beating up members of the Order (or vice versa), the heroes should still be prohibited from calling PRIMUS or the police afterwards, at least until 60 days have passed. Of course, that could be interesting. (Pound, blast, thump) "Sorry we have to keep beating on you, but since we can't turn you over to PRIMUS for another 56 days..." (pound, blast, thump) "... well, we can't have you running around loose..." (pound, blast, thump)

In a little over a week, I plan to set up a situation in my Champions game where the heroes might end up turning to a villain group (the Alexandrian Order) for help curing two of their teammates from a magical affliction. In the process, the heroes will likely discover some information about certain Order members that the Order doesn't want out just yet. To this end, I plan to present the heroes with a contract for them to sign. Signing it will magically bind them to abide by the terms of the contract. I don't mind if the contract has a loophole or two that the heroes might exploit (actually, I'd prefer at least one), but nothing too obvious. The leader of the Alexandrian Order, Codex, is not a lawyer but is pretty intelligent (20 INT). He wants the magical staff that was used to afflict the unfortunate heroes, and which the heroes will likely have in their possession. Codex also suspects the staff will be needed to reverse the affliction. Thus far, I've come up with the following for the contract: The undersigned do hereby swear a sacred oath to refrain from revealing anything about any and all members of the Alexandrian Order to anybody other than themselves or members of the Alexandrian Order. This restriction applies both to the words and deeds of the undersigned, as well as their actions and inactions. Furthermore, the undersigned agree to allow members of the Alexandrian Order to keep all magical artifacts, devices, items, and/or materials needed to find and/or produce a cure for the Curse of the Basilisk. The undersigned do also swear a sacred oath to refrain from revealing the existence or details of this pact to anyone other than themselves or members of the Alexandrian Order. Again, this restriction applies both to the undersigned's words and deeds, as well as their actions and inactions. [space for heroes to sign] In exchange, the undersigned members of the Alexandrian Order will provide all reasonable magical and mundane assistance in removing the Curse of the Basilisk from any and all affected individuals. [space for villains to sign] All restrictions enforced by this magical contract shall automatically cease after a period of sixty (60) days from signing has passed. Just in case, I'd also like some help in designing the Power of the magical pact. I'm thinking a 4d6 Mind Control, Cumulative (4x maximum = 96 points), Continuous, Uncontrolled, Trigger (signing contract), 0 END; OAF Fragile (the contract itself), Target must sign of own free will (-1?), Effect ceases if contract is torn in two or otherwise destroyed (-??)

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat A rousing game of d20. (Before people shout "kill the heretic!", it's just to remind ourselves how great the HERO system really is.) NT: Things that make an NGD board member a heretic (other than pointing out that Gillian Anderson only looks "kinda nice").

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat Collecting pictures of Gillian Anderson.

Re: "Neat" Pictures

Re: Jokes Officials at the FBI, the CIA, and the LAPD were arguing over which of them had the most successful people working for them. Finally, they decided to submit their best and brightest to a test: a rabbit would be released into the woods, and whichever one found the rabbit in the shortest time would be declared the winner. The CIA team immediately diverted a satellite to take detailed infrared and low-light pictures of the forest, then set up listening devices throughout the woods. After a week's fruitless results, they decided that the rabbit must have moved to a neighboring forest where it was living under an assumed name. The FBI team tapped every phone in the forest (which didn't take long) and set up an informant network among the woodland creatures. After two weeks, they came to the conclusion that the rabbit had been killed by the Bunny Mafia. Finally, a pair of LAPD officers went into the woods. Two hours later, they came out dragging a handcuffed, bleeding, and badly-bruised grizzly bear who was shouting, "Enough already! I'm a rabbit! I'm a rabbit!"

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat X-ray vision... until you consider just how many people in America are obese.

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat Far, far away from my friend throughout "Bean Burrito Saturday"

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat Funny, I was about to suggest either "Poisoning Pigeons in the Park" or "I Hold Your Hand in Mine", both also by Tom Lehrer. Instead, I suggest the tender love ballad, "Skullcrusher Mountain" by Jonathan Coulton

Re: When the good cosmic being motiffs are taken Joshua was in a fix. His wife had run out of breadcrumbs and salt while preparing a big dinner, but all of the grocery stores in the area had closed early. What's a guy to do?! Suddenly, he spotted it, a Stop-and-Buy still open on the corner. As he pulled in and ran into the convenience store, he failed to notice the small old man walking past. The wizened old man looked up and smiled. "Another life bettered, thanks to me, Pak-Seex, the God of Convenience Stores!"

Re: Heroes and their compassion My first year at GenCon, I played in a game -- I think named China Doll -- run by Kerry Connell. (Mike / Balabanto, I think you were in that same game with me.) IMO, it was the best game I'd ever played in. The female antagonist (can't really call her a villain) was terrorizing her former business partner in a modeling firm, seriously damaging his business and obviously building up to eventually killing him. The GM did such a great job revealing bits and pieces about the woman's past and the mental distress Mr. Scumbag had done to her (as well as to other models) that, had she had a change of heart and turned herself in to the police, I think we would have kept investigating just to figure out what was really going on. Anyway, when it came time for the big showdown with her and some hired gun-toting thugs, I don't think any shots were fired. She managed to grab Mr. Scumbag and stick her gun to his head, but instead of trying to disarm her or distract her or somehow get the hostage away from her, we simply talked to her. The compassion that all of the heroes (and the players) showed to her managed to get her to put the gun down and let him go. As some of the players made impassioned pleas, I had goosebumps. As I said, it was the best game I'd ever played in.

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat to be fair and balanced: "Have Gun, Will Shoot Ourselves in the Foot" -- any Democratic party candidate. NT: Foxbat's winning campaign slogan

Re: NGD Scenes from a Hat

Re: Paralysis Ray: Would you allow this? Oh, and I'd strongly consider adding some sort of Limitation "Power DEF adds to EGO for breaking free" (rather than Mental DEF adding to EGO like straight mental entangles might have).

Re: Paralysis Ray: Would you allow this? Couldn't you just drop the BOECV instead of adding the Mental Powers Based on CON? That said, I'd allow it, though at 3d6 with 2 DEF instead of 2d6 with 3 DEF. If there's no reasonable way for it to be removed, anyone with 10 EGO would be stuck forever in a 3 DEF mental entangle (barring the presence of a mentalist). At least with 2 DEF, someone could feasibly push their EGO and get out within a turn or two.