assault

True. I was mainly thinking of the colonies, where there was a power struggle between Vichyites and Gaullists. An example might be somewhere like Syria, where Vichyite and Gaullist forces came into serious conflict. Images from "Casablanca" come to mind too. French Indochina might been another likely spot for supers. Most wouldn't be official, I suspect, although local officials might wink at their activities. Some might eventually defect to the Gaullists, but others might go the creepy fascist road, like below: Hmm. Maybe. Such a character could have quite an interesting career after the war as a "disgraced flagsuit". Not exactly a supervillain, but a controversial hero of the far right, seeking to be rehabilitated by fighting for France in Algeria, Vietnam and so on... Meanwhile, former Resistance fighters fall out of favour due to their cooperation with Communists! I like it. A lot. Thanks. Alan

I like the White Rose character. Very cool. Consider the idea borrowed and filed. The dart throwers are fine. An alternative might be some kind of crossbow type gadget, but its rate of fire might be a problem. On a more general note: how about some Vichyite "heroes"? After all, the Vichy government was the internationally recognized government of France for a couple of years, with the Gaullists being seen as an appendage of Britain. ("Internationally" probably really means "by the US" in this case, of course.) Alan

I imagine that the Traveller fans might have some involvement in this too. The Traveller Mailing List is one of the biggest collections of Mad Scientists I have ever seen. I can just _imagine_ how well they would get on with the WoD crowd. I haven't read the FRED version of Star Hero yet, but it would be scary to see what they would do to its economics... Alan (still chuckling)

So what's his sidekick's name: "Curly"? That's a reference to a humourous comic strip of the period, for those who don't know. More seriously, the first Australian superhero comics were produced during WWII, so there are some precedents. Most were pretty standard ripoffs of US characters. In addition, though, a larger number of non-powered and non-costumed characters were being published. Australia was more directly affected by the war than the US: the Japanese were in New Guinea, Timor, the Solomons and so on - within spitting distance of Australia. In those circumstances, I would suspect that Australian supers would have been more militarised than their US counterparts. What I would do, in fact, would be to actually use very few Australian supers, but to supplement them with a larger number of highly trained normals, possibly initially drawn from former pulp adventurer types. These would probably be organised into some kind of military framework. Historically, there were a number of Australian covert special operations and intelligence organisations during the war. One, 'Z' Special Unit, specialised in covert commando operations behind enemy lines. Their best known operations were the raids by the fishing boat "Krait" on Singapore harbour. In my Champions Universe, 'X' Special Unit also exists. It consists of highly trained (and in some cases superpowered) operatives, who specialise in countering Japanese superbeings (who are themselves mainly non-powered ninjas and similar). 'X' is thus a mixture of superteam and agent group. It's quite possible that a specialist Air Force unit might exist too, as flying adventurers were quite common in the source material. You could even have a Blackhawk type outfit, with Dutch, Chinese, French and even Portuguese pilots finding their way to Australia... Finally, having a character that is a "homage to" the Phantom would be quite appropriate. There have been Australian editions of the Phantom printed for many decades. In many more remote areas, it has often been the only regularly available superhero comic. It is also available in places like Papua New Guinea, and probably other Pacific island nations, where DC, Marvel and so on aren't. I would probably base this "homage" somewhere in northern New Guinea. This would give him lots of access to areas where piracy was quite prevalent in quite recent historical times, and, for that matter, still exists today. It also gives him access to interesting "natives", as well as the very thin on the ground Australian patrol officers, who could be treated as a "Jungle Patrol" of sorts. Alternatively, you could place him in Dutch territory... Anyway, somewhere in this mess there should be some useful ideas. Alan

My standard joke is: the Good Guys aren't. I'm halfway through a campaign design at the moment, so I can't give you a decent example without changing it tomorrow. A "work in progress" idea is that there is a separation between "Blue Masks" ("Red, White and Blue Masks") and "Black Masks" (non-sanctioned supers - heroes, villains or whatever). Are your PCs Blue Masks or Black Masks? What happens when they run into members of the other faction, even if the other faction are "heroes" too? My campaign probably won't use this concept, because I think it is actually a bit more American than my campaign tends to be. A more general answer to your problem is: if you are playing with people that you weren't playing with twenty years ago, they don't remember the stories you told back them. Even if they were around back then, it was a very long time, and they have probably forgotten. If they haven't, consider it to be a tribute to a "classic story". In short, don't stress. Old jokes are often good jokes. Alan

OK, well I've been thinking about this some more. This is kind of my third draft. The Viper lead is sucker bait. Fiacho is smart enough to realise this isn't real. That's OK, because the real plan is far more complicated than any "mere mortal" can understand. You see, the real plan is to steal the Mental Enhancement doohickey in some other city. The whole Eurostar plot is a distraction, to draw away the local supers and whatnot while the real theft happens. Of course, if Mentalla falls into the hands of .. umm, the mastermind..., then she will be an adequate instrument in his plan for mind controlling the entire world, but, let's face it, Menton would be a better mind-slave. But, if neither of them are available, there are various twinkies from PSI, or there's that young mutant from Australia. Mwa ha ha ha ha... Alan

Re: Mass Destruction Paranormals Any PC in my games, especially the ones _I_ play ain't registered. The whole Cold War thing may happen, but my PCs don't play the game. If some geek wants to take us over, "we" (including my characters) will try to stop them, but otherwise we are more likely to completely disregard all this horse apples. My present day personal PCs tend to be telekinetics. They have force wall, TK, flight, and a certain amount of telepathy, mind control, enhanced strength and all the other junk. If somebody holds up a bank, "I" can chuck a force wall in front of the hostages. Somebody else can whack the bad guys. It works for me. Alan

Re: Re: Re: Re: Cheating Death I've been thinking about this a bit. A fake Muerte would work pretty well. Basically, someone runs a Black Op against Eurostar by making them think that Muerte is alive. This could cast a bit of doubt on Scorpia and Feuermacher's loyalties, incite them to hunt down "Muerte" and suck them into a trap, and could cause the already paranoid Ultrasonique to go even more crazy. Result: a villain team in disarray, possibly with some dead members. There is an infinite number of possible culprits. Viper comes to mind, but I might go with someone else. Setting Eurostar against Viper might be phase two of the plan... Maybe this is the option I should go with. Let's see: find Giganto, recruit some former Terror, Inc. agents, and some new ones. A fake Muerte is easy... A couple of mercenary villains... Stir well and simmer for a couple of weeks... A fake trail to Viper shouldn't be too hard, although you might want to find a Nest to betray to Eurostar. That could be easier said than done, but it should be possible for a mastermind capable of pulling this kind of job off. Motives for all of this: get Eurostar and Viper out of your way, while settling some old scores. Suspects: any old mastermind, really. Hmm. I might actually run this. I don't usually run my games in Europe, so getting the PCs involved might be a bit tricky. Maybe I need to get them travelling a bit more. Unfortunately I've tended to have a bit of fun with them being bush league provincial heroes who aren't considered to be as tough as the Big Boys. I may have to change this a bit. A thought: maybe we need a European city along the lines of Millennium City? Something well documented that can make playing scenarios in Europe easier. (It would have to be written by a European writer, of course.) Of course, picking a flavour for it could be a bit difficult: is it "French", "German", "Italian" or whatever. Of course, it would be "all of the above", but it still would have an underlying social context. Tricky, but possibly interesting. I'd like to see it, anyway. Alan

Thank you all for your suggestions. You have renewed my faith in Mad Science. Alan

OK, well it seems people aren't familiar with the character, so here is a brief summary: He first appeared in one of the Enemies books way back in the days of first edition! He was a fan of Dr Destroyer, who had a suit of armour similar to, but weaker than that of Dr D. He had his own little superteam, agents, and all that. In CKC, we discover that Scorpia and Feuermacher, two of his former followers, had murdered him and defected to Eurostar. Hence, if he survived, he might be a little bit annoyed with them. The murder is described in Scorpia's writeup in CKC. She poisoned him, and then Feuermacher slagged his suit around his corpse and dumped him into the Pacific. He's a science based character, so I'm tempted to consider some kind of solution along those lines, rather than something mystical, but I'm open to any ideas. Of course, if he could do something like downloading his personality into a new body, Dr D could do it better... Other possibilities that have occurred to me have included aliens, mysterious Lemurian artifacts and so on, but none of them really appeal to me yet. It's quite possible that he wasn't quite as dead as Scorpia thought, too. After all, Dr D built his suit for him originally, and probably did a bit of surgery on him, so he might have had some backup life support systems Scorpia wouldn't have known about. I dunno. Simple is good, but so is ridiculously corny. Alan

I'm thinking of bringing back Professor Muerte as nuisance for Eurostar. Unfortunately, he's dead. Obviously I need a way for him to not be dead. Does anyone have any good ideas? I think that he would work well as a shadowy figure whose identity would come as a nasty shock when it is revealed... Alan

My games are set in Australia. I don't use indigenous (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) supers in my games at all. There are a couple of reasons for this, of which the "Apache Chief" problem is the most important. I'm simply not going to use characters that will end up as stupid and insulting stereotypes. Well, apart from New Zealanders and Americans, anyway. If I ever decide to use a version of the current official CU, I will simply leave Walkabout and Wanambi Man (Wannabe Man) permanently offstage... Of course, I suppose I could use indigenous characters that aren't "stupid and insulting stereotypes", but that requires a bit of skill and effort. For what it is worth, though, indigenous people make up about 1.5% of Australia's population. Statistically, the most likely number of indigenous superbeings in Australia is: Zero. This number might be bumped up by certain possible assumptions about magic and mysticism, but magical critters and people are likely to spend most of their time minding their own business, and not interacting with the rest of the "superhuman world" too much. Since both Walkabout and Wannabe Man are mystics, it is quite likely that they might never interact with PCs operating in Australia. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it. Alan

My thoughts: I didn't buy Bad Medicine for Dr Drugs, but I enthusiastically seized it when a friend was giving away some of his older and less useful RPG stuff. My opinion of it is that it is a "cult classic" - you either hate it, or you have a sneaking fondness for it despite its weaknesses. I like it. Then again, I also watch Plan 9 every chance I get... I wouldn't list BMfDD as the worst. I didn't buy European Enemies, and have never read it. I didn't buy Wings of the Valkyries, but fairly recently got to borrow a copy. It sucks. It sucks in ways that annoy me more than the ways that BMfDD sucks. It's just - contrived. The whole thing is a terrible exercise in railroading the PCs into a set course of action. Bleah. But I'm reluctant to call it the worst. I would have to give The Mutant File a dishonorable mention, too. It's ridiculously overpowered characters really bug me for some reason. Sure, it would probably work really well if you toned down the characters a lot, but, still... It probably doesn't help that I'm not a big X-Men fan. For overall badness, though, I can't really bring myself to say that I actually regret buying (or "inheriting") any of the products that I have bought or "inherited". I'm more likely to wish that I had been able to buy every single Hero system product that has ever been produced. Worst? Actually, there's none that isn't of some value or interest. None are useless, and none are therefore "worst" in my book. Alan

Re: How do your characters see each other? Assault responds (in character): "How do I see my teammates? With my eyes, of course. Are you stupid or something? Now get that microphone out of my face before I stick it where I stuck Foxbat's Ping-Pong Ball Gun..." I don't know if that says much about the subject, but it says a lot about the speaker. Alan

Re: What would your character do? III Assault would focus on containing the rampager (Protecting Innocents). He would be essentially unconcerned by the diamond theft (property crime - yawn). After finding out what had happened, he would probably team up with the elemental brick to hunt down the villains, particularly if the elemental guy's family had been killed or injured, or if anyone was hurt during the diamond robbery. Ideally, of course, he would have backup, which would make both containing the rampage and hunting down the villains easier. Assault is a brick - he likes having telekinetics and gadgeteer/detectives around. Alan

... AlHazred is absolutely correct. In our particular context, of course, we are trying to get acceptable character names for our various CUs, too. Ideally, this would eventually flow through to the official CU, as soon as somebody gets their act together to actually write some articles, adventures or whatever for Hero Games... Actually, there is still a bigger problem than Silly Name Syndrome in the official CU, and that is the distribution of supers. If you follow what is written in the book, it would be next to impossible to run a campaign in New Zealand, and awkward to run one in Australia. Of course, everyone runs a variant CU anyway (at least as soon as they start designing their own characters and running scenarios), but it's still a bit of a pity that our characters can't even notionally coexist at some level. At this rate, I am going to have to start playing a gadgeteer who starts handing out supertechnology to anyone who asks nicely. (Well, someone has to test his prototypes for him. Just don't complain if your flight pack flames out on you in midair!) Alan

I presume you mean Brolga. Well, I hadn't thought about that one. I probably wouldn't use it. Then again, I probably wouldn't have a specifically Queensland "flagsuit". Back in the '80s, in a wonderful but rather short lived Australian produced comic, there was a character from Queensland called "The Jackaroo". This was from the same publisher as the equally marvellous "Southern Squadron". (Stick these titles into a search engine and see what you can dig up, if you are interested.) Unfortunately, real life Queensland sporting teams tend to have lame names like the "Broncos", "Lions", and "Bulls". Alan

No. Sorry. You let our PM go. If you had KEPT him, then you could have had the name. As it is, no. As an aside, is it true that there is an NZ hero team called Group 6? Or am I getting confused with the uplifted mammal called Sheep 6? (For those outside Australia and NZ, that is an accent joke. The Kiwi pronunciation of the letter "i" sounds like a cross between "e" and "u" to Australian ears.) Alan

Flying Fox is a good name, and I've used it in the past. I was really annoyed when DC used it for one of the Young All-Stars back in the '80s. On the other hand, that series is so obscure that I might just go ahead and use it again. Thanks for reminding me of it. As for the animals themselves - yes, you are weird for thinking they are cute! As an aside, you can actually catch a rather interesting disease (Lyssavirus) from them. Actually, Redback is quite a good name, too, IMHO.(It is one word, incidentally.) I use it. Redbacks look quite a bit like Black Widows, but are more poisonous. I dextrously avoided one at work today, when I had to go rummaging about in a junk storage area. There are a number of other interesting beasties you can use - CU has Taipan, which is pretty good. Alan

Hmmm... No. No. No. No. And No! I would stick with Southern Cross. It has the significant advantage of not being terminally stupid. In my CU, Southern Cross is a speedster, but you can make him or her anything you want. As an aside, Uluru is the official name of what was formerly known as Ayers Rock. Personally, my approach with Australian characters (and I'm Australian) is to go with any old generic super names. I rarely bother with anything specifically "Australian", and, frankly, I'm just as likely to use "foreign" character names, assigned to characters that have migrated from somewhere else. Australia, of course, has people who originated in every country in the world, just like the USA, or a bunch of other countries. Alan