Theron

Re: Movies Robin of Sherwood would probably work better in Hero. IMHO, you can do quite a respectable take on "Pirates of the Caribbean" if you use Green Ronin's Skull & Bones sourcebook. Honestly, you can do a lot of those films justice using the d20 system, unless by "D&D" you mean out of the box, as is, use all the rules, with no tinkering.

Re: Champions Worldwide (Fuzion) It was never published. I don't know what the official storyline was going to be, but I did have some notes from my Champions: The Animated Series game. If I can find them, I'll let you know.

Re: FH minor errata update Well that explains the cardboard cutout I met at Origins last year. Darren just kept mumbling something about a hangover and changing the subject.

Re: Tactical Challenge: Eurostar You've told me their capabilities, what are mine? I'm going to need, at the very least, a Holocaust Cloak, sixteen gallons of redwood paint, and a chronal manipulator...

Re: Hero HERO I was rather surprised to recently learn how far back some of the more (to my mind) over-the-top elements of wuxia film actually go. Among the earliest works of Chinese cinema (back in the silent days) there are a number of wuxia films that include flying people and, in one, flying swords which were actually painted onto the film negatives frame by frame to animate them. I'd always assumed "wire-fu" had been a progression towards finding more visually interesting and extreme effects, but it actually was a safer method of doing many flying stunts that had been part and parcel of the films for ages (for instance, to have a guy leap two stories up, they had him film a jump up at the foot of a bulding. Then they edited in a reverse sequence of film of him jumping off the same building backwards. Wire work is actually much easier on the stuntmen and the actors.

Re: Ultimate Wendy, Marvin and Wonderdog I could've sworn one of them was Perry White's niece or nephew, but I'm not going to burn any brain cells trying to look for the info.

Re: Ultimate Wendy, Marvin and Wonderdog For those keeping score, Marvin showed up in "Kingdom Come". He was the surly drunk in the underground bar who dissed Supes.

Re: Don't have it yet I picked one up at the FLGS in Houston at lunch. Pretty spiffy looking.

Re: What Gold/Silver/Iron Age story or series do you love? Golden Age - A Gardner Fox JSA story where Solomon Grundy is once again on a rampage. The JSA splits up to track down clues in the path of destruction and terror he's wrought. A reprint of it was the first JSA story I ever read. Anything involving the Marvel Family. Anything involving Superman Silver Age - Green Lantern. Gil Kane's artwork defines "Silver Age" for me. The Galactus Trilogy. The Julie Schwartz run on Batman before the camp effect of the TV series began to influence the book. Jim Shooter's run on Superboy and the Legion of Super Heroes, which might be Bronze Age by date, but was pure silver in terms of tone and feel. Bronze Age - Lordamercy, lots of stuff. The Steve Englehart/Marshall Rogers run on Batman, Paul Levitz's stints on LSH. X-Men. New Teen Titans (The Judas Contract, Who Is Donna Troy?). The Shooter/Perez run on Avengers. Walt Simonson's Thor. Alan Moore's Superman stories (For The Man Who Has Everything, The Last Superman Story), Justice League International (Bwahahahahaha!), Byrne's relaunch of Superman. The Crisis, even if I think it was a bad idea in retrospect. Iron Age - Watchmen, Stormwatch, New X-Men, Ultimate X-Men, The Ultimates

Re: Looking at the Iron/Silver Age threads (not a flame) I am a complete and utter middle-grounder. I am a superhero geek and that means sitting in a big tent, insofar as I'm concerned. I find myself defending Iron Age stuff a good deal because you don't see fans of the Authority insisting that the Big Red Cheese or the Big Blue Boy Scout, or even Mr. Pointy Ears aren't superheroes. But I enjoy it all, on its own terms. I can geek out over the obvious (to me) sexual overtones in the Golden Age story where the Red Torpedo pilots his sub into the underwater cave of Queen Klytorra (I am not making this up). I still have and treasure the Giant-Size Fantastic Four collection I found at a grocery store when I was 11, reprinting a bunch of their early stuff, including the Galactus Trilogy. I still have a beat to hell DC reprint book I found in my middle school band hall that introduced me to these guys called the JSA. I got chills when I met Gil Kane, Jack Kirby, and Jerry Siegel. The early 80s X-Men, New Teen Titans, and the Giffen/Levitz LSH were my first comic book loves. My jaw dropped when The Elementals actually killed people who were trying to kill them. Watchmen made me think about what superheroes would mean in a larger context. Stormwatch and The Authority raised even more questions. Supreme, Marvels, and Astro City reminded me of what they were all about when you boil them down -- entertainment. I loves my superheroes, on their own merits, within their own genres. I'll leave the nitpicking to others.

Re: hero vs rolemaster

Re: Your Dream Ultimate Shang-Chi

Re: DnD's Spiked Chain

Re: DnD's Spiked Chain Picture a long chain with a bunch of blades on each end. In D&D terms it's got extra reach (so you can attack without getting hit back) and does pretty hellacious damage right out of the box (it gets even nastier with proficiencies and the like). In the hands of a berserk barbarian type, it's rather terrifying. Realistically, the weapon would probably present more of a danger to the wielder than his enemies, but it's D&D.

Re: Turakian Age Review posted to Enworld Whatever, dude.

Re: Ultimate Wonder Twins Some years ago, Wizard ran a phony promo piece in an April Fools issue talking about Alex Ross's new deluxe product, "Form Of Water". I seem to recall that Gleek got rabies.

Re: hero vs rolemaster As I mentioned earlier, I think The Riddle of Steel comes closest. The problem is that the realism it reflects flies in the face of the expectations of most gamers and fans of the fantasy genre. It's not the sort of game where your hero can wade through a mob of orcs with impunity. In fact, two vs. one pretty well constitutes overwhelming odds, depending on the terrain (I've faced four opponents by myself with a practice rapier, and while victory is possible, you spend a LOT more time moving trying to keep from being hit than you do fighting). TROS does fall down a bit when introducing non-humanoid opponents. There's only so much that realism can accomplish when you introduce dragons and the like. But it's an interesting little game with some very intriguing mechanics to it (particularly the Spiritual Attribute rules). Combat is very much a game within a game, and a canny player can use his understanding of how it works to his character's advantage. But ultimately, the quest for realism is a bit of a fool's errand. When the average gamer talks about realism, he's discussing wound effects and damage mechanics, but generally speaking, not the implications derived from the same. IMHO, YMMV, ONGITSORIOTTOPR, etc.

Re: Ultimate Champions: How would you do it? Fair enough. I've had more than my share of cranky the past few days.

Re: Ultimate Champions: How would you do it?

Re: Turakian Age Review posted to Enworld YMMV and all that.

Re: Ultimate Champions: How would you do it?

Re: Turakian Age Review posted to Enworld One minor thing, Arcady: It could have done with an editing pass or an extra pair of eyes looking it over. You consistently use "fair" when you mean "fare". But I'm anal retentive that way.

Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Beggars In Spain, by Nancy Kress. I'm glad I read it. I'm not sure I liked it. I thought the villain of the piece was rather cardboard, but the protagonist wasn't that much better herself. Still, it presented some interesting notions and carried them through to logical conclusions without flinching, which was nice.

Re: Turakian Age Review posted to Enworld It was a very informative review. Fair and no negative slant that I could perceive. What you did was simply confirm what I'd already gathered from thumbing through the book at the store. It's a very generic "gaming fantasy" setting. Nothing wrong with that. It's just not my thing. By and large I either like low-fantasy stuff (like Harnworld, Howard's Hyboria, Kay's "alterna-histories", or Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire") or stuff that's out on the other end of the reality spectrum like Talislanta, Exalted, or the "D&D turned up to 11" approach of Eberron. From all I can see, TA is a great product, just not what I dig in terms of fantasy gaming.

Re: Turakian Age Review posted to Enworld Good review. It showed me quite thoroughly that the TA isn't my cup of tea, but I can appreciate the work that went into it.