Mark Rand

Eide's Entertainment on the edge of the Strip District and Phantom of the Attic in Oakland are comic book specialty shops.  Both also sell things related to comics.
We can put it on West Carson Street in the borough of McKees Rocks, disguised as a house.  There are sections of it where there are only a house or two.

It would be cool for Pittsburgh to have a bar catering to alien supervillains, like having the cantina of Mos Eisley right here on Earth.

Retired Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is the namesake of multiple sandwiches, which are usually named using a pun on his last name’s similarity to “burger” or “hamburger”.  For instance, the Pittsburgh restaurant chain Peppi’s sells the “Roethlisburger”, at a price of $7.00, in correlation with his jersey number “7”, and also having ingredients that describe his playing style (scrambled eggs for “scrambler”, beef and sausage for his size and strength).  A Findlay, Ohio, restaurant named Tony’s and an Oxford, Ohio, restaurant named Brick Street also sell “Roethlisburger” sandwiches.

That's one of the ideas behind The Light-Fingered Lady.  Sure, there are cat burglars there, but so are people who think the look is cool, and a few police detectives, some of which are known to be cops.  Detective Eve Belding, who was named for two characters on the Raymond Burr show Ironside, is a regular there, listening for leads.  She's also a good source of information about retired cat burglars who can give the heroes leads.

There are a number of alleys in Pittsburgh.  All have "Way" designated the type of thoroughfare.  Some have addresses like regular streets.  It could be hidden in what looks like a house on an alley.
 
Another is The Light-Fingered Lady.  It's for cat burglars and people who like to dress like them.  Like The Clockwork, it's neutral ground.  The staff dress the part, too, with stocking masks under their ski masks.

Isn't technically Franklin Stine the gadget guy type? Mad scientist with electricity gadgets anyone? Sure, he will provide his agents with tech to help them do whatever the job he needs them to do.
 
Boris the robot is the mussel of Franklin Stine. Igora and maybe Igor (if he exists) are his skilled hands, doing what he needs without using brute force. 
 
Franklin Stine and his henchmen are a nice group of solo villains, but can also be part of a supervillain group (a kind of a Pittsburgh "Rogues" or "League of Doom"). They can be kinda silly at times. Or at times rather serious also.

That works. Coyote's actions can easily explain a not super to suddenly super world. Also a repopulation of supers in a world which had them but lost them ("world" in this case means "city").
 
A villain idea for the city.
 
Doctor Franklin Stine is a electricity obsessed mad scientist of an evil bent. He is also has an obsession around Benjamin Franklin. This, he dresses up almost like Benjamin Franklin and uses his invented electric inventions to commit crimes to fund his next experiment.

Tabitha Jean Clark, a Conservative Jew, is going to get turned into a magical girl.  I'm not sure what her heroic identity will be, yet.
 
As it happens, I'm a Conservative Jew, too.  I attended Tree of Life * Or L’Simcha Congregation for a number of years.

As a hero 
The Pittsburgh Steelers Cheerleader
I know that the Steelers do not have cheerleaders and she plays this as a running gag. Dressed in black and yellow while operating in the city and white and yellow outside she can appear with or without a football styled helmet. The helmet has a quasi perspex shield which is effective against flash attacks as well as energy blasts and bullets.
She uses martial arts and an insane level of acrobatic and gymnastic skill to fight her opponents and not take an injury. She can name anyone who has played for the team and the results of most games.
She is also resistant to any mind control or illusion which would have her badmouth or insult the team and the city. She does not wear any sort of mask except the helmet but no-one recognises her unless she is fighting crime.
The Steelers keep a quiet eye on her as they are concerned about her going bad. However they also play along with the joke as they say 'she would have been at the game only she was taking a crook to the police for booking and there was a quite a queue'

I'm planning on supplying an NPC hero to the project (Lady Heart). Prehaps more if they need it. It all depends on what the campaign book needs.
 
The spots Lady Heart fills...
 * Healing support hero.
 * Contact with the mystical world.
 * Contact with college/young adult world.
 * Protental romantic partner character. Or friendship partner. Depending on story needs.
 
Will be working on hir when I get off my lazy arsh (sorry SCUBA).

Breaking this project off from the Fifth Edition Renaissance thread.
 
 
Working Title:  Pittsburgh: City of Champions
 
Purpose:  Provide a setting and campaign book.  With P:CoC and Champions Complete, GMs and players have everything they need to actually run a Champions campaign.  Bring in new players and folks who want a ready-to-run game and campaign, not a toolkit.  Support with future products, if sales support it.
 
Format:
Introduction - Explain where all of the toolkit toggles are set (Silver Age, Standard Superheroic characters, power levels, and so on) History Geography and Government Transportation, Media/Arts/Entertainment, Subcultures Police, Emergency Services, Underworld, Superheroes, Supervillany Places of Interest GMs Vault Villains (include an organization and master villain) Adventures Continuing the Campaign  
Note that bullet points 2-7 follow the structure of Millenium City and Vibora Bay.  MC clocks in at 135 pages, VB at 157.  Much of the difference in page count is VB's extended GM chapter and adventure seed ideas.  P:CoC would be longer, based on the Introduction and extended Adventures/Campaign sections.  Make the adventure/campaign arc related to why the previous super-team is no longer around and the new PC team has to pick up the mantle.
 
One concern that I have is that CC only has 64 print copies left in stock, and I don't know if it will be reprinted.  Or possibly I'm an old pencil-and-paper grognard and that's not a big concern, folks today buy the pdfs and, if they want, use PoD or the local copy store for a paper copy.
 
Funding: Kickstarter.  Based on previous successful Hero System Kickstarter campaigns, rough estimate of $15,000. Start with a nice color cover and minimal B&W interior artwork; stretch goals would add more artwork and then upgrade it to color. Mention (and have) plans for future supplements: more linked adventures, a city development book; also to use Kickstarter.  Maybe have a second adventure arc, linked to the first, at a high enough stretch goal to fund it.
 
Staff:  Writers. Editor. Proof-reader. Artist(s). Project coordinator.  Mark Rand is providing backgound on Pittsburgh.  Need another writer to do the gamey stuff.  I am neither a writer nor an editor, but I can proof-read and coordinate (I am also qualified to do character write-ups.)

Being 71, almost 72, having bad knees and no car, I’ve compiled a list of  Pittsburgh landmarks.  I have images of some of them on my computer.  This list is, of course, just my opinion.
 
Mount Washington with Station Square and Gateway Clipper Fleet in the foreground
 
Mount Washington with the Fort Pitt Bridge and Tunnel in the foreground
 
View exiting the Fort Pitt Tunnel
 
Point State Park fountain
 
Gateway Center
 
PPG Plaza with obelisk dubbed “The Tomb of the Unknown Bowler”
 
Gulf Tower
 
Koppers Tower
 
Fifth Avenue Place
 
Mellon Square
 
Omni William Penn Hotel
 
Kaufmann’s clock at Fifth Avenue and Smithfield Street
 
PNC Park
 
Heinz Field
 
Carnegie Science Center
 
University of Pittsburgh’s Cathedral of Learning (aka Cathy)
 
Saint Paul Cathedral
 
WQED antenna tower
 
Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens
 
Station Square
 
Waterfront stacks (the Waterfront’s on the site of the United States Steel’s Homestead Works)
 
Dippy (in front of the Carnegie Institute)

 

Forbes Field remnants and plaza

 

Light Up (on the University of Pittsburgh campus between Hillman Library and Posvar Hall)

 

A Song to Nature (aka The Mary Schenley Memorial Fountain at the entrance to Schenley Park and directly in front of the University of Pittsburgh’s Frick Fine Arts Building)

 

Ode to Space (in front of the University of Pittsburgh’s David Lawrence Hall)
 
University of Pittsburgh panthers outside the William Pitt Union, the Petersen Events Center, and Heinz Field

 

Walking to the Sky (on the Carnegie Mellon University campus outside Warner Hall)
 
 
Joy of Life (fountain at Baum Boulevard and South Whitfield Street)
 
George Westinghouse Memorial in Schenley Park
 
Edit: The above list is subject to change based on what I can find.

Updating the previous rough proposal...
 
Product: Coastal City Champions (working title).
 
Purpose: Bring new players into Champions. Hopefully get them interested in broader Hero System products.
 
Method: A single book that provides a ready-to-play campaign with all the toolkit settings specified (a 'campaign+game' not a 'toolkit') plus tips on how to play, power levels, attacks and defenses, a sample hero team and villains, including an organization (Viper?) and master villain (Dr. Destroyer? Mechanon? New?), and a city setting developed enough to start a campaign (Mark Rand is considering the Pittsburgh area, transplanted to the West Coast) with a ready-to-run scenario that launches the players and GM into that city. Brief info on the larger world.  In D&D terms - Champions Complete is the DMG and PH, Coastal City Champions is the setting (i.e., Greyhawk) and MM.
 
Power Level:  Keep attacks at the standard 60AP/12d6 and defenses at the standard 20-25 to maintain parity with previously published material.  BUT:  simplify.  Maybe 350CP and 60 Complications??  The beginning superhero has (at a baseline) a single attack rather than a Multipower or a Unified Power.  Simpler builds; keep Advantages and Limitations to a reasonable minimum.  Let the characters (and players) grow into 450CP supers with Multipowers, etc. - *and* a better idea of adn appreciation for how to play and use those additional abilities.
 
Funding: Kickstarter. Start with a nice color cover and minimal B&W interior artwork; stretch goals would add more artwork and then upgrade it to color. Mention (and have) plans for future supplements: more linked adventures, a city development book; also to use Kickstarter.  Maybe have a second adventure, linked to the first, at a high enough stretch goal to fund it.
 
Staff:  Writer (Mark Rand for the setting, either Mark or someone else for the non-setting content). Editor. Proof-reader. Artist(s). Project coordinator.  There are several pro-level, accomplished Hero authors.  I am neither a writer nor an editor, but I can proof-read and coordinate.

I was considering Coastal City from the 3E module Atlas Unleashed.  However, Bay City, from the Champions: New Millennium line is a good city, too.

It was in the 3E book Atlas Unleashed.  I'm hoping someone might have fleshed it out from the description given.  We were given a swank hotel, a fine art museum, a power company, an overcrowded freeway system, a harbor, a bay, a factory-lined channel (which may lead from the harbor to the bay), an air force base outside of town, and a nearby NASA telemetry station.

I didn't create San Angelo, Gold Rush Games did.  I just used it, and some additions to it that were created by some of the good folks here, in a couple of clubs I ran here.

There's a guy called The Human Capitalist in the 5E book Dark Champions Animated.  Look on page 53.

Aboard the Batboat, Batgirl says, "It isn't too bad out.  If necessary, I'll turn the Batboat into the Batsub."
 
Over the marine radio comes, "Gotham Harbor Lighthouse to Batboat.  I have you on visual.  Come on in.  Over."
 
"Figures," Batgirl says.  She picks up the microphone and says, "Batboat copies, Gotham Harbor Lighthouse.  Thank you.  Over."
 
"You're welcome, Batboat.  Gotham Harbor Lighthouse out."
 
"Batboat out."  She hangs up the microphone and adds to Lady Heart, "In high school, Sara and I surfed together."
 
(OCC: Gotham Point was a location in the 1966 Batman TV series episode Surf's Up! Joker's Under!  Although Barbara Gordon was at the beach there, nothing was said about her being a surfer.)

I'm working on updating Bay City from Champions: New Millennium for a play by post campaign.  One thing I've decided that the Champions Headquarters from those books, and the team, is gone, but I'll, probably, keep the sub.  Marvel's Avengers Mansion will serve as the basis for the new headquarters.  Any other ideas?

Yeah.  Norfolk Southern, CSX, and Amtrak go through Erie.
 
A thought I just had was Santa Barbara County.  Wayne Air Force Base could by replaced by Vandenburg Air Force Base.

Plus, the shortest distance between two points in Pittsburgh is always under construction. 
 
The idea was to use the map of Pittsburgh as the map of Coastal City.  But, using Erie as the basis for Coastal City is worth looking at.  Presque Isle Bay could become Coastal City Bay.

I had the idea of using a map of Pittsburgh, oriented so that the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers would be at the narrowest part of the bay. 
 
The various streams could feed either the bay or the rivers and the part of the Erie Canal in the city would use its rivers.

Okay.  Coastal City Bay is on Lake Ontario in the Finger Lakes Region of New York State.

Sodus Bay is renamed Coastal City Bay.


 
There is a channel, that may be one of many creeks or a river, lined with factories.  There is also a lighthouse, with two buildings, operated by the Coastal City Bay Historical Society, at the end of the 7,500-foot-long barrier beach.  One building is the Coastal City Bay Museum.


 
Frederick Douglass - Greater Rochester International Airport is the closest commercial airport to Coastal City.  The other area airports are Wayne Air Force Base, Wayne County Airport (a general aviation airport preferred by business travelers), and Chimney Bluffs Airport (a general aviation airport near Chimney Bluffs State Park and the NASA telemetry station).


 

Since it's my home town, I used Pittsburgh's map as Coastal City's map.  The factory-lined channel to Coastal City Bay was the Ohio River to the downstream end of Brunot Island.  The island itself is, in real life, occupied by an electrical generating plant.