assault

Re: I want to run a Bad Comics game Acronym: Paranormal Intelligence Network - Human Enhancement and Augmentation Department. Paranormal Intelligence National Headquarters - Executive Action Division. etc. P.I.N.H.E.A.D. agents can be readily constructed from published Champions material. The Champions genre book will provide suitable costumes and some relevant gadgets. VIPER provides suitable training packages (change the names a little to lose the snake theme), as well as heavy weapons that can be used as P.I.N.H.E.A.D.'s Fusion Blast Guns. Hmm... A typical P.I.N.H.E.A.D. agent will be a mutant ninja cyborg with a FBG. You probably wouldn't get that into 350 points, even allowing for their ninja training being provided by the Wannabe clan. You would probably have to go with 450, perhaps with standard superheroic guidelines for DC limits and so on.

Re: I want to run a Bad Comics game Actually, it would be a hoot. As good as running Bad Silver Age games, and for the same reasons. Your campaign would need a snazzy title... How about: "B.A.D.F.I.S.T.: Countdown to Mardi Gras"? Scenario design would be easy. Lots of posing, interspersed with violence. Romantic subplots ("Sex") would be common, but would be affected by the side-effects of steroid abuse.

Re: Request for plot ideas for an Anarchist villain team.

Re: Request for plot ideas for an Anarchist villain team. You could always make them anarchists, rather than lunatics.

Re: Nudity and Sex in comics books Frankly, it sounds like they are so desperately out of ideas that the whole thing should be cancelled... I mean, presumably this stuff sells, and it might even be new to people who haven't been reading comics for eons, but it's just so unbelievably cliched... Pre-Crisis Superman was more original than this. And more consistent in characterisation. And more fun.

Re: "So, Thor hits Superman with Mjolnir..." I'm not sure Superman actually has Power Defence. He seems to suck against all drainers, not just magical ones. The Parasite is the classic example. He might have some Power Defence if it's required to defend against environmental hazards, but he doesn't seem to have a form of it usable in combat. Edit: Most of the "normal" weapons built using Drain or Transform seem to involve limitations like "must hit non-armoured hit location" and so on, which would stop them from working against Superman, as long as "non-armoured" is actually read as "has no resistant defences". Presumably most gas effects would be stopped by appropriate Life Support. OK, so he might have a _little_ bit of Power Defence. Just not lots.

Re: The Brat Pack

Re: Hitler in a jar

Re: The Brat Pack It's actually worth reading, although Maximortal isn't, IMHO. Very nasty, and deliberately so. It shows Iron Age "heroes" as what they really are.

Re: [4color] Why do you dislike the Iron Age style? (No flames, ok?) (Flammable response reluctantly deleted.) Despite all the stuff I didn't write, I dislike "people suck" arguments as well. These arguments are stupid, elitist, and inaccurate. Politically, incidentally, they are deeply conservative, since obviously these stupid people are incapable of running their own lives, and need to be supervised by their betters. This is a variant on the kinds of argument used by authoritarian governments to justify their existence. So people who think people suck, suck.

Re: Romantic Villians One of the most sympathetic villains in editions previous to the current one didn't make it through: Shamrock. He would be a character that could be worked up as a potential romantic interest without much difficulty. He's a Believer in a Cause, who is a "villain" because of his actions in support of that cause. You might be able to find some others if you dug deep enough. Of course, not being female, my judgement of what is attractive is rather limited. Not everyone would be able to get over negative opinions of Shamrock's cause, either, so you might need some other alternatives too. I can't think of any examples from the source material, but I will repeat my suggestion of checking older edition material. Swashbuckling rogues and "heroes on the other side" are probably usually the best. "I don't want to do this but I have no choice" might work, but these characters may come off as slightly weak personalities. Of course, a heroic death, of whatever duration, will redeem them. Ah! Actually, you might want to look at various "reformed villain" characters in the source material. Marvel in particular has a fair few such characters. Some had a fair bit of history before they changed sides.

Re: Avenger/Justice League in the "real" world Well, you are right that governments would seek to establish their own teams. But... that would be one of the loopholes that a non-government team could seek to exploit. They would make a deal: "we will make ourselves available to defend your country when required, as long as you don't interfere with us the rest of the time." In effect, they become reservists in that country's military, subject to call-up in an emergency, but carrying on their civilian lives the rest of the time. This would, of course, place them in direct opposition to the Wanderer-style world conquerors. Obviously they would only be authorised to operate in certain countries. Crossing borders would be a bit tricky, but it could be manageable. Sometimes they might cross borders without permission... It is quite likely that there will be rival groups of this kind, working with and for different allies/patrons, and it's probable that they would end up in conflict sooner or later, unless they established some kind of arrangement.

Re: The Golden Age Recruitment Drive My favourite high tech Golden Age character is Air Wave. His main piece of high tech equipment was - a mobile phone. He could also roller skate along phone lines. And owned a parrot. That's what it took to be a superhero in the Golden Age. ... Oh, yeah... He had a pretty decent punch, and a bunch of useful skills, too. He would have actually been useful to have around.

Re: Avenger/Justice League in the "real" world

Re: Avenger/Justice League in the "real" world

Re: Avenger/Justice League in the "real" world The major problem would be that the supers would most probably reflect the orthodox political views of their societies, and, worse, would be inclined to act on them. For that reason, it would be preferable for there to be some reason why the supers don't do this. Otherwise you would have superhuman wars, or else you have a bunch of superhuman Donald Rumsfelds running around. Or you have a war, and the winners remake the world in their own sick and twisted image. There definitely needs to be something preventing this.

Re: Need ideas for a revised CU timeline Very few people have read it, these days. But a lot of people have seen the movie, which is a classic!

Re: Need ideas for a revised CU timeline

Re: The Ages of Comics. Threw a Glass Dorkly

Re: The Ages of Comics. Threw a Glass Dorkly

Re: World In Crisis..Idea help please Why would he need a reason? It's his world, after all. I don't see why "Must Protect Innocents" would be discouraged in an Iron Age game.

Re: Starting points for rookies in established campaign My take would be that it would depend on the magnitude of the discrepancy in points. You see, I tend to encourage characters to take lots of skills, and to broaden out their power sets, rather than to simply power up. That means that a character with up to, say, a couple of hundred points more than their starting value isn't _necessarily_ going to be all that much more formidable a combatant than a starting character. There will be a difference, but the starting character isn't going to be useless in combat. More importantly, perhaps, the starting character will hopefully be of value out of combat as well... There is a point where all this breaks down, of course, and it doesn't make much sense going back to square one, but I've never played a game that lasted that long.

Re: Crisis of Infinite Boredom Assault would, of course, go to the pub and find people to talk to. If he was feeling conscientious, he would go to an underworld pub, and take advantage of his ridiculously high perception rolls. Or he'd watch TV, read a book(!) or even go shopping... The pub (brawl) option would probably be the one he would use in play.

Re: In need of a good origin story

Re: In need of a good origin story It's a good story. My only reservation is that Zack comes across as a bit of an idiot. I prefer my own PCs to be more sympathetic. But that's an irrelevant matter of taste. You've certainly established a striking image - it's easy to imagine the artwork. Well done.