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Strike Force


Michael Hopcroft

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One of those hero books that i wish i still had was Aaron Allston's book describing his classic Stirke Force campaign for 3rd edition. Strike Force was a team that, instead of being created for a specific book, had acvtually evolved over the course of a long campaignt hat had run for several years. Thus the whole team had backstory and history that few supplements could match when done out of whole cloth.

 

The book is now one of the rarest and most sought-after Champions collectibles. Has anyone ever figured out how to convert any of the characters to 5th edition? And is Strike Force part of the Champions Universe ocontiuiity in any way?

 

My favorite character from the book was the seemingly useless but surprising effective Stunner.

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rarity

 

Good luck finding a copy. I've played Champions since it began, and only seen ONE copy of Strike Force. And my friend owns it, and WONT part with it. As far as updating the characters.............anyone with enough patience could, but what would the champaign characters be in for? The Strike Force characters were very powerful, didn't they have a 2nd team of heroes or something, JUST TO WATCH THEIR BASE!!!!!!!! I could be wrong about that, but that's what I seem to remember. I imagine that it would be a very high powered campaign.

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Strikeforce was and is my favorite book. It had wonderful characters and great ideas for helping move campaigns along. And also great tips for game mastering. I have used many ideas out of that book in every campaign I have ever run from bluebooking to other little ideas but just as important. I am obviously one of the lucky ones that has a copy. I have not thought about it but it would be good to update the stuff to 5th edition if for no other reason to see how they turn out.

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If I ever updated the Wrath of the Seven Horsemen there would be some serious revision as well as simple rules updates. I love the concept and half the characters but it could use some tightening up.

 

I love To Serve and Protect but, since I wouldn't have the Protectors be bad guys too long, I would think this would be less practical as an investment of time.

 

VOICE could use some revising as well as updating.

 

Harvester sold me his copy of Strike Force through these boards so there is still hope for those of you without one.:)

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Re: rarity

 

Originally posted by drrushing

Good luck finding a copy. I've played Champions since it began, and only seen ONE copy of Strike Force. And my friend owns it, and WONT part with it. As far as updating the characters.............anyone with enough patience could, but what would the champaign characters be in for? The Strike Force characters were very powerful, didn't they have a 2nd team of heroes or something, JUST TO WATCH THEIR BASE!!!!!!!! I could be wrong about that, but that's what I seem to remember. I imagine that it would be a very high powered campaign.

 

The way you talk about me :D

 

And you know that I've been working on my Champions/HERO library since I started playing the games. Still regret the books that I wasn't able to get when they came out.

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I'd like to get my hands on a copy of this book myself.

 

If anyone has one who would like to trade it, I'd be willing to part with up to five of any of the new books. I have multiple copies of everything after The Ultimate Vehicle and would be willing to trade five different titles for Strike Force. I know it's probablly a pipe dream, but thought I'd make the offer.

 

Oh, and I'll also give 100 million dollars to whoever breaks me out of jail.

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Re: rarity

 

Originally posted by drrushing

The Strike Force characters were very powerful, didn't they have a 2nd team of heroes or something, JUST TO WATCH THEIR BASE!!!!!!!! I could be wrong about that, but that's what I seem to remember. I imagine that it would be a very high powered campaign.

 

Many of the characters in Strike Force were given two descriptions: one at the beginning of their career and one later on. The early ones were quite weak. The later ones were reasonably tough, but not absurdly so, IIRC.

 

Other characters were just given a single set of stats.

 

There were two teams described in detail: Strike Force itself, plus a splinter group called the Shadow Warriors who split off over the lethality problem. Strike Force eventually had a team of agents plus various support people and hangers-on. drrushing's memory of a team "just to watch their base" is probably based on this.

 

As a 3rd Edition product, the characters in Strike Force probably could use some more non-combat skills, but I wouldn't imagine many of them would need much other tweaking to convert them to FREd. If anything, some of them would be too weak, not too strong - some of the beginning characters were build at around 190 points!

 

Alan

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This is an interesting proposition, Nato.

 

Star Hero

Viper book

Fantasy Hero

Fantasy Hero Grimoire

MMM

 

for a copy of Strike Force.

 

You can contact me by email. You can also contact me via MSN Messenger tonight by the same email address. I'll be online until about 11pm EST.

 

Originally posted by Nato

I'd like to get my hands on a copy of this book myself.

 

If anyone has one who would like to trade it, I'd be willing to part with up to five of any of the new books. I have multiple copies of everything after The Ultimate Vehicle and would be willing to trade five different titles for Strike Force. I know it's probablly a pipe dream, but thought I'd make the offer.

 

Oh, and I'll also give 100 million dollars to whoever breaks me out of jail.

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Originally posted by lemming

I'm pretty sure Aaron Allston still owns them. I think there was some talk of updating for Fifth. I could be wrong.

 

Steve Long has mentioned on the boards that the estimable Mr. Allston does indeed retain the rights to the Strike Force characters. Aaron has been working on updating and expanding his SF campaign world for years. Apparently there's quite a lot done already. Steve has seen it and really likes it, and there has been tentative discussion with AA over possibly publishing it one day, but nothing concrete was ever proposed.

 

According to Steve, if Hero Games were to consider publishing it, it would probably have been as an e-book; with the disappointing sales of Shades of Black, I fear that the prospects for that are now exceedingly dim. :(

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Re: rarity

 

Originally posted by drrushing

Good luck finding a copy. I've played Champions since it began, and only seen ONE copy of Strike Force. And my friend owns it, and WONT part with it. As far as updating the characters.............anyone with enough patience could, but what would the champaign characters be in for? The Strike Force characters were very powerful, didn't they have a 2nd team of heroes or something, JUST TO WATCH THEIR BASE!!!!!!!! I could be wrong about that, but that's what I seem to remember. I imagine that it would be a very high powered campaign.

 

What you may be thinking of is the Strike Force's cadre of agents, the "Main Mission Team." It's the only published Champions hero team besides the Protectors to use agent support.

 

The SF and Shadow Warriors characters ranged quite a lot in power level, even among those with comparable Experience; everything from 6d6 Martial Arts attacks from Lorelei, to a 20d6 EB from Bolo's "Golden Gun." I used to think that some of the Strike Force characters were overpowered, but since Conquerors, Killers and Crooks came out they seem pretty reasonable. ;)

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Power Levels

 

You're rightabout that LL, CKC was a definite sign of a change in power levels in official products. Strikeforce is one of the Hero classics but I actually felt that the heroes were underpowered compared to their main nemesis: Overlord. His main attack does BODY to all but 2 Characters and only 3 can penetrate his defenses which are up close to Gravitar's. 53/50?

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Originally posted by Lord Liaden

Steve Long has mentioned on the boards that the estimable Mr. Allston does indeed retain the rights to the Strike Force characters. Aaron has been working on updating and expanding his SF campaign world for years. Apparently there's quite a lot done already. Steve has seen it and really likes it, and there has been tentative discussion with AA over possibly publishing it one day, but nothing concrete was ever proposed.

 

I'm not "in the know" in any way, shape, or form. This is just what I understand....

 

From various rumblings here and on Mr. Alliston's web page I sort of got the idea that while alot had been written for a new Strike Force book it was all in a very rough form and would require a moderate amount of work to be presentable.

 

The problem with that is that Mr. Allston makes his living writing books that tend to sell (and therefore pay) better than your average RPG supplament. I got the sense that Steve and Co. payed him more than anybody else would have gotten for Champions and he still mainly did it for old times sake. If DOJ were to pay for a Strike Force revamp that would take him away from his other novels it would once again be a drain on Hero games and would further rely upon his nostalga for the subject.

 

Steve has generally been very specific about not giving anyone hope that anything like that will happen anytime soon.

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