Balabanto

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... The Denver Team finally selected a name, the Crusaders. During the process of name selection (Always a problem in my world) some disputes erupted. Streamline: "Well, we could always put a spoiler on the Cybervulture." Cybervulture: "I don't have a rear spoiler. And if you put one on me you'll be in big trouble, buddy." Streamline: "Yet..." ------------------------------------ Airborne: Well, maybe we should consider a team uniform, so that we all look the same. Golden Fencer: Well, unless you all want to dress in bright gold lame... Streamline: Do you know how much it's going to cost to repaint this thing. Cybervulture, about to speak... Golden Fencer: And yes, we know. You're a cybervulture...

Re: Suggestions needed: Animal super villains Garden Weasel and his robot sidekick, the lawn gnome.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Today in one of my Forgotten Realms games, my players encountered a man who collects artwork that glorifies evil deities. While he is evil himself, he is merely an interested collector with no desire to actually worship any of these deities. To this end, he hired the PC's gloomy bard (He sings dirges and gloomy chants) to staff his once a year evil artwork party. During the break before dinner, he walked over to his host and said "Would you prefer the music to be lighter during dinner, or more gloomy?" His host replied "Oh, lighter, of course. We wouldn't want anything to interfere with the meal." So, after dinner, he plays even CREEPIER, GLOOMIER music. All the other PC's left him alone there, creeping out the other guests. The best part? Even though it was wintertime, he purchased light fluffy spring dresses for the women in the party the next day, in the hope of leaving them less upset.

Re: Suggestions needed: Animal super villains Stegron is a peripheral character in X-Men. He's primarily a Spider Man villain.

Re: The Super Darwin Awards Mephron has informed me that I need to tell this D+D story too, mainly because it deals with messing with a creature of effectively cosmic power. The PC's are trying to discover information about their enemy, a Marilith Demon named Sefnu. So one of the PC's gets the cocky idea of hiring a wizard to summon a pit fiend. The wizard, being evil, still asks the rogue Lorynar if he's crazy. Lorynar says "Sure! Let's do this." So the NPC wizard summons a Pit Fiend, which can grant the wishes of others, among it's other abilities. The Pit Fiend arrives. He is extremely unhappy. A series of questions and answers ensues, which finally leads to the question on the part of Lorynar. "So is your magic more powerful than the magic of the demons?" The Pit Fiend, being arrogant and trapped in the magical circle, said "Of course. My magic is the mightiest in the multiverse." Lorynar responded with "Don't be ridiculous. We've fought archmagi and liches and other sundry creatures. How can your magic possibly be the most powerful?" The Pit Fiend said "Would you like to see some pit fiend magic?" Lorynar said "Why not? Go ahead." So the Pit Fiend granted Lorynar's wish. Lorynar was transformed into a pit fiend under the control of the pit fiend in the magic circle, did not make his saving throw, and permanently became a pit fiend. Lorynar had to give me his character sheet. As a side note, the NPC wizard who Lorynar hired to summon the pit fiend did not have a second spell of binding memorized, lost initiative, and died screaming...

Re: WWYCD/W:The gift Well, most of my characters would ask for coats for the homeless or food for the starving. However, one of my characters who is a cybervulture would probably ask for his genitals back.

Re: Suggestions need: Animal super villains Go against type. Make them intelligent animals with standard superpowers, only meaner. Dynamo Bear: His electrical bursts will make you cringe, and you still can't close with him, because he's a big bear with claws. The Dream Gorilla: When Charlie the Chimpanzee goes to sleep in the zoo, he plans revenge on the hairless ones everywhere. His psychic self awakens, going on a rampage as "The Dream Gorilla!" Gazellion: Lightning quick and tough to hit, Gazellion wears spiked body armor and possesses small horns on her head. An anthropomorphic gazelle, she is the team's brutal and vicious martial artist. Hippodrome: A humanoid hippopotamus, Hippodrome is the most intelligent member of the team, and wears a suit of powered armor loaded with gadgets, rockets, and other unpleasantness. He disdains biting, believing it to be beneath his nature, but if he is bloodied, he flies into an animalistic fury. The Great Turtle: The most disturbing and creepiest member of the team...On the back of the Great Turtle, the world was formed, or so the Great Turtle believes. While the others spawned various powers and abilities, the Great Turtle reached out for this ancient mystic concept and it answered. He reached deep into his spirit, and began to study the mystic arts. His rage is terrible and his power great, although he's a little slow physically, he makes up for it with massive amounts of armor and terrible spells based around the destruction of the environment and control of the natural world. He lets Zootopia lead because he reacts faster and out of loyalty for awakening his intellect. However, if Zootopia were to die, he would struggle to awaken intellect in other animals. Zootopia (Leader): Once an animal rights activist, Zootopia was captured and experimented on, along with some of the animals he was advocating protecting by a group of right wing hunters and animal experiments activists. They injected him with the DNA of multiple animals, and his latent mutant powers activated. He used those powers to awaken the intelligence of the other beasts, and now he fights for the rights of the animal kingdom that he alone shall rule. Zootopia constantly shifts in form, and believes himself to be like the animals he is kin to.

Re: Realism vs cynicism The world's reactions to superhumans You liked Street Fighter? We TRIED to play this game. We broke the system by accident in three sessions and had to stop.

Re: With even greater power.... "Senator, here's a bag of money to vote my way, and if you don't, I'll show the public this video of you having sex with Naugtenticula, Deranged Divinity of the Deviant Dimension" Someone PLEASE rep this man.

Re: The Super Darwin Awards Clearly, your two hour time limit is insufficient to earn a Darwin Award. Some time ago, when D+D was still second edition, one of my players asked me if he could play a drow. I told him he could come in at any time, as long as it was within the bounds of the story. So, the PC's are having a random encounter, which I rolled as "Giant Solifugids' So the PC's are fighting these big bugs which belong to the arachnid class of creatures, and are typically servants of...you guessed it...Lolth. So the new Dark Elf PC steps out from behind a tree and says "So...do you need some help?" The PC's charged the Dark Elf before she could act, killed her, and then finished off the bug monsters. Total time of play....10 minutes.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... In today's exciting episode of Knight Rangers, the heroes accidentally blew up yet another machine, switching several of their minds with the minds of sentient gorillas. Please keep in mind, all apes are male. Some characters don't realize this yet, and some of these characters are married. Emerald takes the Juggler, and begins teleporting away with him. Ape #1 (Knighthawk): Emerald, put my husband down right now! Emerald: Uhm....what happened? Ape #2 (Flea): Stick blew up the machine! Ape #3 (Stick): Honey...wake up...(Begins waking up his wife, Redwave.) Redwave (Wakes up, sees a big gorilla....):AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! This is not what I meant by Gorilla my dreams! Juggler: What's going on. Oh...my god...my wife is a gorilla. A male gorilla. You are NOT getting the bed when we get home! Ape #1: If you don't want to be kicked out of the house for good, you will get me OUT of this body! Juggler: I don't want you IN that body! Stick (Ape #3) : I really think we need to figure out what happened and try to fix this. Ape #1: For once, I agree with Stick. Ape #2: This is so not good...

Re: Acronym help! Interactive National Security Expedition Committee (Plus, this way, the PC's really get to be the stars. Nothing ever gets done once you assign it to a committee!)

Re: The More I Kill, The Stronger I Get! Your adventure after this should probably be EXTREMELY silly. If you want my take on Super Powered Serial Killer Shtick, I'll give you the one that I used in a private message. It's really too gruesome to put on the public boards.

Re: The Incredibles and Registration Well, there's a little problem. We KNOW that the government official who runs this program is NIXON. Heck, he even LOOKED like Nixon. And you guys think the government in the incredibles isn't evil? He's not a crook...no...not at all.

Re: Is it really so wrong? Actually, in my game, most animal people and characters are kind of feral. Unfortunately, every so often, another intelligent cat pops up.

Re: Gestalt - An awful thought Could be worse: Dick Cheney could be a gestalt. Fred Phelps could be a Gestalt. Ann Coulter could be a Gestalt. Anyone from Wizards of the Coast could be a gestalt of insanity... And lets not forget the Gestalt of Corporate Expedient Behavior.

Re: Why you shouldn't play Champions while Intoxicated Yeah "Let's play fuzion" would shock me back to sobriety...or kill me if I were drunk enough to not be able to stand.

Re: Why you shouldn't play Champions while Intoxicated 15) Rolling to hit=rolling to hit on. 16) Foxbat wakes up next to Doctor Destroyer in bed. 17) Teleportation is NOT just for the scatter chart anymore. 18) A superhero suddenly finds themselves jewish after being knocked back into a Mikvah. What now?

Re: "Your girlfriend works for VIPER!" Huh? You should make her the local Nest Leader. That will lead to some tough moments.

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... While this is D+D, it's still pretty funny. The characters are planning to visit an Efreet Pasha in the wilderlands near the City of Brass. Lashakara (Half Dragon Cleric Female): Well, one of our two brothers here will have to pretend to be a rich merchant, and the other his Eunuch! Tirinaith (Half Elf Rogue/Wizard/Magelord) Female: Well, Korag is a monk. He can pretend to be a eunuch. We can make an illusion in case they try to test it. Korag: Umm...is there some way we can do this without pretending to be a Eunuch? Lashakara (Thinking): Well, we could really cut it off, but.... Laucian (Elf Ranger/Scout): I don't really see why we don't go in and tell him the truth! I mean, we're all children of the same father. Tirinaith: This enables him to save face, Laucian. So, is Korag going to be the Eunuch or are you? Korag: This is a really bad idea.... Laucian: There has to be a better way. Lashakara: Well, there is, but we have to pretend to be your wives. Laucian: You're my SISTERS, that's not right! Tirinaith: Lashakara can be the happy one, and I'll be the waspy one. Laucian: I can't believe we're going to do this... Korag: This is the worst idea I've ever seen....

Re: MancerBear's Art Den I would also prefer a #3. I think you can draw a more stylish ninja cow...

Re: Why do you like to play Super Hero Games? Because I've always loved superheroes since I was five years old and started collecting comic books.

Re: No way to win...? I wouldn't use time travel. This is a case where if you want to do this, you just have to let it play out based on what the PC's do. If they don't check up on Katya, regularly pay her visits, etc, then Vhan takes the kid, and when she shows up, she says "You guys didn't care enough. Isthvatha Vhan did." Take the IC means of dealing with the problem. That way, if they don't do the work, they are rewarded with a supervillain.

Re: A Thought Experiment: The Buffest Heroes vs Dr Destroyer The problem is that your assessment of the other stats is not correct for anyone who views things the way that the system was created by the framers, and Steven S. Long, while he's a great line developer, is not one of the framers. The truth is that all the stats in Champions function on an exponential scale no matter how much you try to have them not do so, because doing so breaks every skill roll in the game, and rewards people for taking a skill roll on their powers. So, I have to agree here that under YOUR interpetation, Kirby, that IS the way it works, even though you CAN spread and MPA at the same time, and pretty much make the combat take an entire phase. And as to the soliloquy issue, you don't only get to soliloquy on your action, you can soliloquy on the top of your turn no matter what, because it's FREE. You don't just get to do it on your DEX. But I prefer to believe that Steve Peterson and George MacDonald were a little smarter than many of the people in this discussion are giving them credit for being, and that Destroyer's brilliance was actually a function of his partial insanity, and being willing to take risks that most people wouldn't consider safe or sane.

Re: A Thought Experiment: The Buffest Heroes vs Dr Destroyer How is that even possible? Combat begins on phase 12. No one should be going before Doctor Destroyer. He presence attacks at the top of the phase, rolling around 70-80 PRE. Everyone loses their action. On his action, he drops his DCV to half, as it is now irrelevant. He takes three shots at three targets and spends 45 end, of which he will recover 30. No levels may be allocated because they cannot take actions to do so. On phase 2, Lather, rinse, repeat. On Phase 3, Lather, rinse, repeat. Destroyer has spent 105 end. On the other hand if he actually missed anyone, half the city behind the PC's is gone and they have failed as superheroes, so either way, he wins. Second, how is anyone going before Doctor Destroyer, even with a DEX of 1.5 x his? The characters you use may suffer from DEX inflation. The idea behind an ubervillain like Doctor Destroyer is, to paraphrase the old school champions rules, "He's as strong as the brick, has more raw power than the energy projector, is as quick as the martial artist, and kicks the shrimp with the armor piercing attack around like a tin can." Your accusations of cheese notwithstanding, a seemingly invincible archvillain should not crumple like a wet noodle, because you're artificially limiting the battle by not properly reading the combat rules. As for the Normal Characteristic Maxima thing, you're using an artificial scaling chart to determine things instead of looking at them logically according to the Champions Scaling system, and that's fine, but if Normal Characteristic Maxima is 20, then what exactly does this mean? "I am only legendary if I have an INT higher than 20?" If you use that logic, Einstein is a peabrain. This is why I don't use the CU or their scaling system, because it's not consistent with the rules of the game and doesn't make sense according to the logarhythmic progression of the voodoo math. (And let's face it, Champions is nothing but voodoo math and roleplaying, it's just a question of what kind of voodoo math your GM is willing to allow.)