/shg/ - Superheroes General

Because it gets countered in the next panel with a noose around the neck.

For the record, that guy gets killed when the hero sneaks a noose around his neck and hangs him.

They believed that Atlanteans were the progenitors of theosophical “root races”. Atlanteans were perfect beings who beget the imperfect Homo Dynamis and the outright wretched Homo Sapiens, and their actions in the shadows throughout history were all a part of a great benevolent conspiracy with the end goal of getting humanity to evolve gradual back into Homo Dyanmis and finally Atlanteans. Atlanteans were the “ascended masters” of theosophy, their “immortal manus”. And it was only by becoming more like them through self-denial, self-mastery, and self-transcendence could humanity redeem itself. The theosophists saw their New Years ritual as the first step on a great journey of human redemption.
When the babe was cut from her mother’s womb and breathed her first unassisted breathe of air lightning struck Parliament, the Thames overflowed its bounds, Spring Heeled Jack was finally caught by the law, and leagues away in Deli, India, Aleister Crowley, the self proclaimed world’s wickedest man and father of Thelema, enacted a ritual to steal the child away.

Wat? I dont think Icebreaker is anywhere near evil.
the WMD is all for communism and anti american.

Ha.

Crowley called in favors owed to him by the faeries of the British Isles. Quicker than the theosophists could see they switched out the babe for the traditional changeling. In the blink of an eye the babe was in Crowley’s arms in India and the theosophists were left with monstrous inhuman looking changeling that shrieked at them with a tooth filled maw. They believed they had failed in their attempt, that instead of producing a savior they had produced a mooncalf. They never knew how successful they were, and from that moment on until the death of Madam Blavatsky in 1977 no more attempts were made to birth a Homo Dynamis. Meanwhile the child was raised by Crowley as his own daughter.

And that's all I have right now. Good so far?

...

I have an idea for that magic villain we made, it's tied a bit to Baron Bizarre, but it also serves a purpose in giving him a possible future rival (Malator). It's hard not to bring cosmology into this, so apologies in advance. Besides, the Starter has nothing to do with cosmology yet, so this provides a simple enough jumping in point should GMs go that way.

The Pale

The ritual that created the Bizarre family line had a secret cost. The displacement of spiritual and mental energies created a being that is the antithesis of existence, something made of a lack of spirit. The being was too weak to live on its own, so long it wandered as a husk, until it latched to the body of a man so absorbed in the occult his spirit oozed it's power. The being was named Malator and the pair worked in symbiotic tandem to further the other's goals. The man eventually died, but Malator was now powerful enough to continue inhabiting his body. The man's spirit is too weak to resist the parasite, but his mind is strong like an oak. Unfortunately, years of subtle influence by Malator have twisted that oak, meaning that seldom will his mind ever object to the spirit.

The man used to be Chase Verun, paranormal investigator, kind, compassionate, and always looking for a way to help others, but the beast that remains is The Pale, cruel, unyielding, and with a penchant for causing misery. This is not to say he hasn't found a kindred spirit, another who started as but a bug and became something more. Regardless of this man's hubris, The Pale has found the word for what he is, friend. And this "Science Tyrant" shares his hobby. Misery.

Sounds good! Its a nice combination of ideas from the last thread.

Chase sounds interesting on his own. He could be cool showing up in a retro game with characters like Blue Crab and the Fisherman(men),

He sounds like he has three bodies, so he's odd in that regard like the Barron and Atlanteans. Maybe his raw occult power generated them?

im up to join a m&m group (2ed i guess) and i think about what kind of character i should play. my DM said the Power Level is 10 (ive no idea what this exaclty is...) and i thought about a demon-summoning anti-hero. is this possible? what abilitys will i need for this? (i dont have the rulebook so i try to note anything i will need for a faster creation befor the game starts)

3rd edition Mutans and Masterminds has a Summoner class. You can summon some kind of shadow monster or an "imaginary friend". Not sure if that's in 2nd edition, though.

I don't have a lot of experience with this system, so I'm sorry if this wasn't helpful.

>Demon summoning anti-hero

Go full mystic warrior mage like Illyana Rasputin and take light summoning options for little demon servitors. Get a "stepping disc" teleporation power and be the team's bus.

As you level spend it on buying better summons instead of better spells. Read the Ars Goetia for demon ideas.

Power Level 10 is your average superhero (think Spider-Man in terms of strength and so forth). There is a power that's just straight up "Summon" which allows you to summon from a pool of creatures as described in one of the chapters.

Good job user

Reading through the statesmen and I have ideas about punching them up. Would like some feedback

Wyoming's Black Hole Man: Simple farmer who didn't discover his power until late in life because its to project a pacification field and his neighbors are naturally passive. Runs a peaceful, open-air correctional facility for the most violent and disturbed super criminals. Using his powers he's able to keep them passive and non-violent. He's reading up on psychology to better help his inmates. He sees it like a small community and his inmates see him more as a mayor and less like a warden. Think of it as the anti-thesis of Arkham, a campaign could be about the characters there trying to go straight and seeing how they do outside his field. Black Hole Man is hardly ever called out for action, and like Dr. Glacier he's usually off in Wyoming helping his people and doing his own thing even though he's a member of the Statesmen. He's called away only when the situation is dire enough to warrant risking his inmates acting up and reverting.

A GM could use Black Hole Man as a way to save players while costing them for losing. He shows up and pacifies the bad guy beating them up, but while he was gone trouble happened back in Wyoming when one of the inmates reverted and the PCs have to pay back the save by tracking down the escapee for him.

Buckeye: He knows he can't live up to the legacy of Cleveland Steel, so he doesn't try. This slovenly, crude, anti-social cape sees his position as a job he does for obligation rather than passion. Life gave him powers and being a super hero is the flip side of that. He's a gruff anti-hero, and the name chosen by the higher ups is to soften his bad boy image. He doesn't kill, but when he fights he breaks things-and bones. If he has a positive trait is that his lack of care means power and intimidation doesn't effect him. He's actually pretty brave, and if he could reign in his attitude he actually could be as inspiring as Cleveland Steel.

I like you're idea for Blackhole

In 3e I know there's the summoner archetype. I'm not sure about 2e sorry user

Sure, but nowhere near as much as Baron. Instead of bodies, they'd be more like shadows cast by his mastery of ritual magic. Originally he was a lot like a brighter american version Constantine, and it was inspired by pic.

Buckeye's role in the game would be as a hard to get along with ally. The PCs have to beat up the bad guys with his help-while making sure he doesn't break too many things. He's also a character that can be encouraged into coming into his own as a hero-or fired from the Statesmen depending on whether the party wants to help him or get him suspended.

Turnpike: New Jersey's charismatic speedster with panache that hides a drug addiction as the source of his powers. His super-metabolism amplifies the effects of drugs on his system. The designer drug Spring speeds reaction times in normal human. In him it gives him super speed. However, Turnpike isn't the only one with a super metabolism.

He doesn't know it yet but he's actually the first test subject for a Brazilian based pharmaceutical company. They figured out how to trigger super-metabolisms in certain people and had their agents transform Turnpike into one when he underwent heart surgery at a young age. The company wants to create a group of supers in their back pocket, dependent and addicted to their drugs for their powers. All they have to do is keep drugs like Sprint legal and continue placing super-metabolism supers in the general population. There's nothing illegal about deriving ones power from a legal drug after all. And if the super develops an addiction, then its just like an alcohol addiction. No fault on the brewers.

If Turnpike finds out he's not going to be happy about being a guinea pig. But then he'll have to deal with the company's own superhumans which like him have super-metabolisms but derive different powers from different drugs.

Game wise Turnpike is a problem that gets deeper and more complicated as the PCs investigate. It stars with a Statesman hiding an addiction and developing into a company hiding a conspiracy. Turnpike will want to help every step of the way, but the question is should the PCs let him?

I dig him, I dig him a lot. Good job user!

Thanks user, I hope my Buckeye and Turnpike too bad as well! For a lot of these guys I only had a few lines of description to work off of.

I like the idea of placing cool cape stuff in states. I think peaceful Wyoming having a happy town-prison of Jokers that for the first time in their lives don't hear the voices in their heads could be rather touching. It shows that in a cape world crazy bad guys can actually get help. They don't have to got to an Arkham which looks like a place from Silent Hill.

Didn't we have something similar in the last thread with that speedster except he wa Brazilian

When I get back to my computer next week I'll work on some retro-writefaggotry along with the intro to the PDF. I wasn't here when Blue Crab and The Fishermen came about, who are they?

That one was a badguy ex politician kept on a drug feed by Science Tyant. Turnpike is a guinea pig in a corporate conspiracy to enact social programming and will be furious when he learns the truth. They both involve speedsters and drugs but handle them in different ways to different ends.

Are they too similar? I could try something else with Turnpike if I have to.

maybe as some sort of good end, maybe turnpike can discover he can also get powers from other things then drugs?
like eat a ton of sugar can he gets super reflexes for a bit.
could work as a epilogue thing or a last minute save from the big bad so he can keep being a hero after rehab.
sort of. the speedster pays the company for the drug to boost his powers and they make him do jobs for them so he can keep getting drugs.

The Blue Crab is Maryland's state hero: a crab-shaped submersible with pincer claws piloted by an old seadog with a love for the ocean named Truman T. Rawling.

The Fishermen is a family of vigilante heroes/fishermen from Maine, a legacy family. The current Fisherman representative is Fisher-Girl, a half-human half-Thule girl with bright pink skin and hydrokinesis.

Both Fisher-Girl and the Blue Crab are two of the "aquatic" heroes of the Statesmen, alongside Waveracer of Florida (the face of the aquatic team) and Madame Delphine of Louisiana.

Whos Texas's hero?

So Fisher-Girl and Blue Crab in the Statsmen pastebin.

Basically The Fisherman was a 1920's hero that was actually a single costume swapped out between a family that used their fisherman knowledge to protect the Main coastline form smugglers.

Blue Crab is an old salt and one of the original Statesmen. He uses a big mech-sub called the Blue Crab. He commonly teams up with fellow aquatic Statesmen Waverider, Fisher-Girl, and Madam Delphine as the team dad. He's the one that has to keep them on track when the other three start getting too involved in their teenage love triangle.

I like that idea. It reminds me a little of the Heiress from the Blockbusters. They both give up what was ruining their lives and suffer a decrease in power, but they still keep enough power to be a hero.

He won't be as fast as he was on Spring but after downing some pure cane sodas he can still move pretty damn fast.

>Topic Starter: What are some situations that have come up in your game where the players couldn't use combat to overcome?

Once they had to fight Atlantean Murder-Pirhana Doomsday.
The objective was NOT to engage him in combat but to slow him and ensure that he couldn't get too far into the city while they came up with more effective countermeasures.

Captain Justice, a frail man in a defensive power-suit, complete with non-lethal grenades and other such armaments.

>Topic Starter: What are some situations that have come up in your game where the players couldn't use combat to overcome?
What you don't often see addressed in super campaigns is dealing with natural disasters. There's plenty of opportunity there for heroes to strut their stuff and rescue innocents at the same time. The paragon can grab a firetruck before it falls off a bridge, the speedster can whisk a family out from a burning building, the psychic can block falling debris, and whatnot.

How would you pull off handling a natural disaster?

That sounds pretty cool

NEW HAMPSHIRE'S USHABTI:

The mysterious clay protector of Dartmouth provides a past the GM can fill in however he wants, but one mustn't forget that he/she/it has storytelling potential simply as a quiet, studious guardian.

Ushabti might start following around the PCs if they prove to be strange or novel-not to threaten them, but simply to learn about them by watching. PCs might interpret this behavior as stalking, leading to a talk (or even fight depending on the kind of PCs) with Usabti. But the PCs might like having a Statesman show them such attention. Some might try to show off for Usabti. Some might even befriend it and want to "teach it how to be human". Let the PCs have fun with it. But Usabti can also be used to mess with the players as mysterious watcher in the wings.

Ushabti makes a great fit for a background character in The Librarians cosmic library satisfying its knowledge on his infinite books. Amid all the scholars and scientists working in the library just point out a living clay statues and see if that piques the players' interests.

POSSIBLE ORIGINS FOR USHABTI:

1. Explorer from the Spirit Earth. The clay body is a kind of "Physical Earth astronaut suit". It allows a spiritual being to exist easily in Earth without having to contend with the wall. This could have critical ramifications for any campaign dealing heavily with the cosmology of Cape World as a potent "lost technology". Beyond this there's the question of who the spirit is inside the clay and whether it would be good or not for it to regain its memories...

so..you're saying i cant out punch a tornado?

>How would you pull off handling a natural disaster?
depends on the disaster and what your powers are
interestingly enough there are some Major Superpowers in Heroes Unlimited that deal with just this subject
there one called Tectonic Mastery or something similar that lets you know when an earthquake is going to happen and reduce its strength
you can also reduce the size of a volcano
you basic Weather/Wind Master lets you affect storms (in a limited area) and tornadoes
Space Master lets you summon meteorites to attack with, but nothing to stop them

Dunno if I can fit those in, but a younger Harpy, Doc Chase, and Baron Bizarre are viable to appear at one point or another. For the most part, Chase was a detective not a cape, he knew enough rituals and enchantment to have some tricks up his sleeve, but he was no Baron. What he did have was a sharp mind, a keen eye, and some quick fingers. Standard gear was a fedora and coat, his enchanted revolver, a pack of cigs, bullets kept in a pouch of white ash, and his sigil gloves.

2.Afterlife Protector
The Ushabti in real life Ancient Egypt was a funerary figurine designed to take the place of the deceased servants or subjects. It was meant to be a servant in the afterlife. Ushabti thus "encoded' with the faint memories and personalities of an ancient Egyptian servant. A campaign could be made out of helping Ushabti deal with returning memories of this life. If there is an Egyptian afterlife Ushabti may feel drawn to find some way to go there and check up on the ruler he was made to protect, taking the party along with him for an adventure in the Eternal Nile.

3. The first Robot

Ushabti was simply an attempt to create artificial life by ancient alchemists. When this fact becomes known Ushabti might become famous among the robots of Germany and the Neo-Humanists of Italy as the "first" robot in history. Such a title might attract jealousy from a group of old German robots considered the "first" before Ushabti showed up and the PCs might have to help keep the peace. There may even be anti-robot terrorists gunning for the "first robot" that the party will have to protect Ushabti from.

Because a real life sharpshooter would just headshot the guy and some babies would get squished and that would be the end of it.

book maker a shit
a shit
tripfag piece a fug

>and some babies would get squished
That is what a hero in this situation would try to avoid. That's the point of the armor.

See

I'm looking at Colorado's MOUNTAIN LION Statesmen and she looks interesting. Ruthless but effective cape that hides a dark past as an eco-terrorist. Doesn't have any powers but is highly skilled in guerrilla warfare tactics from her eco terrorist days.

My question is what's eco-terrorism like in Cape World? I'm half tempted to write up evil Planeteers, but would that be too mean spirited?

Would they be anti-ET immigrants? Would they see people like Blue Cobalt as invasive species? Would they like or dislike splicing themselves into animal people?

And my last question is should I kit out Mountain Lion with a few gadgets to up her flavor or should being low tech be a key part of her charm?

I really want to make a reinhardt from overwatch esque character for capeworld.

Yes we know we all know he gets hanged and the gentle swing of his body hanging from the noose lull the babies to sleep. This is not new information.

But that one flaw doesn't make this armor set COMPLETELY useless. Being killed from a distance by a sniper is not an option without injuring babies, same for most strategies.

What if he put some babies on his head and neck? Would that defeat the noose strategy?

Whose he and what does he do?

Just one baby on your neck will prevent hanging, which is good because multiple ones on multiple sides of your neck would make turning your head and possibly breathing difficult.

So it would help, assuming your opponent is not particularly strong, dexterous or skilled with a knife. If that is the case then if they get close enough to tie a noose around the neck they would also be close enough to simply stab the neck on whichever side is unguarded by a baby.

Reinhardt's a power armor dude with a hammer and a hard light shield

overwatch.wikia.com/wiki/Reinhardt

Make baby pauldrons to protect your neck.

I'm looking forward to it

It's going to be a collection of "Case Files" so it will be told retroactively in first person. Probably snippets on other characters, a bit of background on some events later on, and a slow descent from the plucky young PI to The Pale. Ideally, these can be interspersed in the Starter to provide tragedy to The Pale and confront the heroes on if it is mercy to end Chase's "life" so his spirit may be free, or if he should be the vessel for Malator to prevent further problems from the un-spirit.

Sounds cool so far! The Retro years of Cape World have only been hinted at so it'll be cool to see them developed.

On Mountain Lion I'm going to write up an optional gadget load out in case anyone wants to beef her up during a game. Anyone got a good name for her old eco-terrorist outfit? I'm thinking of having them feature in some of her story hooks. I'm thinking they could be called EVERGREEN. Good name?

EVERGREEN sounds good to me

So has anyone ever tried running a solo game before? How did that go and how do you plan it out?

No, but that could be an interesting way to run a game. One of the concerns expressed in a previous thread is how to get a group of pc super heroes to team up and work together organically without them starting as a team in the first place. Having a solo game (if your referring to 1 pc and 1 gm) could circumvent this problem as the story could solely focus on the single pc.

There was a DC comic that crossed over Golden Age Batman with Doc Savage and The Spirit. First Wave I think it was called, and they all were busy off in their own corners of the world before they teamed up.

If you can I suggest trying what the comic did. Have each hero individually discover something about the big evil threat. They all investigate, and they all bump into each other.

Yeah I've only played MnM once when a an user on here ran it

...

You'd probably want to keep the villains lower powered, a lot of RPGs are built with teams in mind, or alternately make the PC very powerful. It really depend on wether you want the game to be Daredevil tier or green Lantern tier

So it only has one design flaw

Not a game example, but Avatar: The Last Airbender had them deal with a volcano using bending.

>use earthbending to build a trench between the volcano and the city
>use airbending to push back and quickly cool/harden the overflowing lava

I'd guess there's similar ways you could deal with that stuff in a game setting.

Two, really--what's he gonna do once those kids start messing their diapers?

Smell like shit, another deterrent. It's fullproof

Well considering we're a wiki search away from knowing it's not too bad. Convince here is always nice.

As the guy who came up with both Buckeye and Turnpike, I'm fine with both revisions/expansions.

That all looks pretty good so far, user. I like that even though you are going back to incorporating the cosmology, which I understand is necessary with Baron's character, you are exploring the more free-to-explore human side of it. Makes for more story rather than just rehashing deep lore.

Don't forgeth the massive jet engine on his back which allows him to charge.

He also has a few on his hammer to help build momentum.

Just did some sketches of Chips.

I'm starting to picture some Astroboy "replacement kid" thing for her. assuming she isn't Julian's real daughter/kid.

Looks adorable.

Not to bother but do you think you'll ever finished up this?

I'm working on it user. Don't worry.
Its been a bit of an off day.

Cool, it's looking great

I didn't mean to bitch or anything.

Hostage situation.

The supervillains had a lot of civilians hostage so first we had to let our sneaky breeki character take out and sabotage them from the inside before we could get to smacking the shit out of those people.

Work on "The Pale Files" has begun in draft form. Current appearances slated:
Harpy
Baron Bizarre
Fisherman
Heart Throb
Doc Chase
Pele
As well as many other possible foes and allies!

The direction I'm taking will follow the ages of comics, Golden to Dark. Born on November 11, 1900 in Providence RI, Chase Verun began work as an investigator at age 18. Fresh-faced and optimistic, he followed his family tradition to confront the creatures of the night and drag them into the light. Armed with only a family book and his wits, Chase embarks on a life of adventure, intrigue, and tragedy.

I will occasionally ask for ideas for characters to include, locales, creatures, and general events. If I have File 1 done before I get home, I will post a picture of the draft.

Sounds like it'll be a fun read

Since nothing else seems to be happening, any things to add to the list or comments in general?

I guess to fill the void, how/why did your superhero/supervillain become a hero/villain?

DM has a mutants and Masterminds Superhero in the world who is, I shit you not, PL Infinite.

you can't harm him, you can't keep up. he can destroy multiverses by punching them real hard. He can mind control galaxys of sentient beings and move the stars with his mind.

He is basically Omnipotent and Omniscient. Can read minds, super senses of all kind.

But he is using him as a "Get out of jail free in case the players fuck up" card.

Every day he reads the mind of all sentient life and banishes any creature who has acted evil into a dimension for rehabilitation.

How are you supposed to be a hero when this guy is around? How are you supposed to be inspiring to anyone when this guy's shadow is larger than the sun itself?

That sounds incredibly retarded. I mean I get having a get out of jail card but that seems ridiculous

Ask the GM what the fuck he intends you to do, and what "evil" is. The first one may cause him to rectify this error, the second gives you a way to poke holes in his hero a bit. Alternatively, tell him that this idea is fucking stupid, optional if you decide to smack him upside the head for being a dumbass.

Clearly all villains have 30 points spent on Immunity(Bullshit)

Well, From what I understand, this guy isn't always around, and is gone of saving multi-universe crises and shit.

He's there just to give the inspiring speech and save us if we get in over our heads. He basically isn't even on earth except for every once in a while. But still, we are supposed to deal with street crime while we learn. we are level 7.

Parents are dead

He was really bad at being a hero, like comically bad through rolls. So he decided to go evil because it's the only thing he's good at. It is yet to be seen if this helps my luck.

Wait why would essentially God give a shit about a couple street level heroes?

>Every day he reads the mind of all sentient life and banishes any creature who has acted evil into a dimension for rehabilitation.

Uh, I fail to see how ANYONE can be a villain. Unless this is not true, in which case this'll be fine, if a bit too excessive.

I think its that its anyone people suspect of being a villain. Like he is our super villain radar if we capture someone or suspect someone. We still have to capture them and prove it or something. its still dumb.

because we are in the same hero organization. Just joined the justice league thing.

my superhero character got superpowers took the phase "with great power comes great responsibility" and tried to become a doctor with his healing abilities. ending up becoming a superhero after getting into a fight with a super villain named dragon, a punk who got lucky and got the ability to turn in to a dragon and no I'm not creative with names.

>my superhero character got superpowers and took the phase "with great power comes great responsibility" seriously and tried to become a doctor with his healing abilities
I always to double check what I'm writing

bump