McCoy

Re: Ah, screw it. Not that I know of. I'd keep the adder for heal limbs. Complicates bookkeeping a little, but in my game if you have Regen equal to your SPD you get back 1 BODY every phase. If more than SPD but less than twice SPD the leftover is in post phase 12. Just seems more in keeping with the genra.

I disagree that the Dark Side affects the character gradually. The Force is only to be used in defense and protection. As soon as a Force sensative buys an offensive power, uses a non-offensive power in an aggressive maner (such as choking someone with TK), or uses excessive (lower-case f) force in combat (such as drawing a lightsaber on an unarmed opponent, participating in an ambush, or not offering an opponent a chance to surrender), they have turned toward the Dark Side. Simularly there is no gradual way back. A Force Sensative on the Dark Side must have a Road to Damascus conversion, must renounce the Dark Side totally, not just taper off. They might have a period of meditation and atonement, buying off all Dark Side disads (berserks, enrages, certain psych limits), but the final step of the process is they must give up the Dark Side powers, remove them (and the temtation to use them) from the character sheet. (GM's option if these points may be re-asigned, like a transformation or radiation accident, or are gone forever as part of the atonement process). I would suggest that some powers (the psychic lightning for example), all attack powers, should get a 1/4 to 1/2 limitation, "only can be used by those inclined toward the Dark Side." This represents the “path of the Dark Side is intoxicating, faster, and more powerful in the short term†idea. Other, gentler, powers, especally the psychic immortality survival of death by becoming One with the Force, get a +0 limitation, "cannot be used by character with berserk, enrage, or Dark Side only powers". This limitation should be absolute, either One has spiritual purity, or One does not. There is no slight turn toward the Dark Side, one is turned toward it or completely away from it. Would suggest that Healing and Aid, if Force powers in your campagine, would fall into this category. Just some thoughts.

1) I don't know. 2) Yes, heros like Spider-man and Batman are perfect for one on one gaming. One player running a team is not recomended until both of you are comfortable with the mechanics. 3) If you are a comic fan and familiar with the conventions of the genre, I would recomend Conquerors, Killers, and Crooks. On the one hand it is the "monster manual" of the game, on the other it serves as a seminar on character design. Plot seeds with each character should be enough to inspire a GM to some interesting adventures.

In a couple of months Istvatha V'han is going to show up, offer to have her people telepathically examine all criminals currently under a sentence of Death, Natural Life, or more than ten years. Any being held for a crime they did not commit will be reported to the authorities for pardons. Non-violent criminals will be "adjusted" so they can be returned to society in weeks instead of years. Violent ones wll be removed from human society, don't worry about them, they will not prey on anyone on your world again. Wonder if the PC's will see the problem with this.

Re: Location of Stronghold In RL Alcatraz was too expensive to operate, half an hour from a major city. In my campagine Stronghold is dug into a mesa in the middle of a still radioactive abandoned nuclear test range in New Mexico. No roads, staff and deliveries chopper in. Staff stays on site for two weeks, then has two weeks off. No dependants on site. Foci go to a secure research facility in New England. These are the second and third most secure US instalations (after Dreamland).

Once when I was running a mass breakout at a super powered prison, I included Shamrock. Being active in the IRA, Shamrock considered Orange to be the Devil's color, and absolutely refused to wear the orange coveralls all the prisoners were issued. So there he is, attempting to break out of super-max in only his tighty whiteies. Sixteen year old female PC saw him, and was seriously smitten. He was recaptured and didn't make it out of prison that time, but started a relationship between the two. This lead to a reconciliation between the PC and her mother, a rather talented mentalist. She asked Mom to arrange a prison break so Shamrock could go back to Ireland. Out of the blue Shamrock was subpoenaed to testify at the trial of another IRA terrorist in Boston, despite his frequent, and colorful, insistence that he was not answering any questions. "Contempt of Court? I have plenty of contempt for this godless court and don't mind showing it! What are you going to do to me? Throw me in here?" He was moved from super-max to a regular jail. According to the surveillance tapes, his guards put him into the cell, and walked away, forgetting to close, let alone lock, the door. He stood there looking confused for several seconds before walking out.

Are you going to post your whole list? Here or the names thread?

Balok? Been a while. Going to post your seven?

They were all good, and the weakest better than Mr. Bean. Seems to me that Balrick begain as a competent henchman, and seemed to get more retarded as the centuries progressed. I always assumed more inbreding between each time period. "I have a cunning plan."

My suggestion is that potion making is an NPC art. Not only rare ingredients, but bulky, immobile and fragile foci, and lots of extra time. Think of making wine. Ingredients are available a few weeks a year, you need fermentation vats and conditions must be constantly monitored. Brandy or wiskey present aditional problems, the fermented raw product must be further processed, distilled (fragile mechanism) over a fire that is hot enough yet not too hot, then aged. 1 to 5 years extra time would be reasonable to make a potion, and put it comfortably in NPC hands. PC's might cultivate the friendship of an alchemist. He has a small stock of whatever potions the GM wants to introduce in his campagine, and will supply them to the PC's at reasonable prices as long as they agree to a lunatic scavenger hunt for said rare ingredients (which sets up plot hooks).

No, he was a well conceived pulp fiction character in 1939. His peers are Doc Savage and the Shadow, not Superman and Wonder Woman. He preceeded the genre he is most fameous for, and each incarnation (Silver Age, Television, Movies) has diluted that conception. Some writers in the Bronze/Iron ages recaptured the original concept, most did not. He is NOT a well conceived Champions character.

You were the one citing Batman as a well-conceived character.

Most of mine would be retro. Instant change and regeneration returned to seperate powers, but keep the adders on regren for regrowing limbs or resurection. Defenses allowed in EC's (as long as the EC is united by SX). Enhanced senses as in 3rd edition (full price for two most expensive, half price for next two, quarter price for the rest). Cap skill levels. Maybe make teleportation and desolidification more expensive, seems I'm seeing a lot of those lately.

How about HKA without a focus limitation? Take persistant and useable by others if you like.

Seems that he gets suprised or ambushed about one time out of three, which I interpet as Danger Sense on a 12 or 13 or less. Spider-man has Danger Sense on at least 22-. Call it hyperdeveloped combat instincts, but that's just SX. Bottom line, Bats is prepared for suprise attacks more often than not.

That's 825-850, and you left out Talents, including but not limited to Ambidexterity, Combat Sense, Danger Sense, Double Jointed, Eidetic Memory, Lightning Calculator, Lightsleep, Perfect Pitch, and Speed Reading. Batmobile, Batplane, and Batcave on 200 points? Maybe. That's still 525-550. For the scaled back version. So I ask again, is Batman really the example you want to go with?

Again, would you post a character sheet for Batman? I don't think the character can be done, EC or no, on less than a thousand points without a VPP that includes gadgets, talents and skills, which I feel is cheeser than anything I've ever seen done with an EC. If you are going to continue to cite Batman as a Good Example, let's see this example.

Character never fully written up, much less played. Dorothy Gale from Wizard of Oz. Focused teleportation, luck, whines until she gets her way. But had an indirect AoE EB, 1 daily charge, could drop a three bedroom ranch house on someone.

Should also mention that my games take place in an alternate Marvel universe, one player did worship Apocalypse as a god, another was a time traveler (and Magneto's great-great-granddaughter) who had a religion founded by Sam Guthre worshiping Professor X, Magneto, Cable and Apocalypse.

I have had players play Christian, Wiccan, and Satanist characters. My characters tend to be either agnostic or Buddhist. Right now I'm working on some fanfic with Marvel's Legion, David Charles Haller Xavier, who is a devout Sunni Muslem and lassez faire Jewish at the same time. The wonders of multiple personalities.

Jezabele, a martial-artist/egoist/energy projector, a pyrokinetic whose hobby was burning churches. "And you want her to play a hero in this campagine?" "Something wrong with that?"

Re: Witchcraft -IMO Ever seen Dogma? Holy objects can be found if a character looks. This was discussed in an old Adventurer's Club, the example as I recall was a PC that took the psych crock "fear of snow geese" when the campagine was set in El Paso. Several examples of how to work in snow geese were given, then summed up something like if the player says snow geese are common around the Rio Grande, it's up to the GM to supply them.

"Terror in the Treasures" has been fun with a number of groups. "The Mechanon Gambit" was underwelming (Mechanon wasn't there, just some of his assembly robots).

Re: How to build this curse? First thought is a supress to healing also, only with a time delay. Otherwise a Suceptability to magic healing, again with a time delay (takes 1 Body for each 1 Body healed by magic).

Mentally reviewing fire hoses used for crowd control, I would say 6d6 or 4d6 with increased KB. Maybe tell GM about stunt before hand so they can have a damage assigned (even if your character doesn't know just how much). Locating a gas line without some enhanced senses or luck would be more difficult. Only thing I can think of is find a meter and trench backward. Lure the combat into an ally, find the back of a restraunt, that meter should give a 3 or 4 d6 continuous RKA 1hex area.