Chat about the game...

The Mighty Flea! was a character of mine for an online (Yahoo Groups) play by post in the early 2000s. I didn't really have a clue about the Champions game (it was 5e by then and the book is intimidating to say the least) so it took me ages to come up with the character. Basically a bouncing brick but I figured every post would have some quip or joke in it and stuck to the game for about a year or so. Then I logged on one day to update the posting and found out some of the other team members had been mind controlled by a villain, Flea had been immobilised then one shot killed by one of the others and would I like to make a new character?

Somewhat miffed I politely declined, left the group and that was the last I'd ever had to do with the Champions game! I may be able to dig out the character sheet on one of the other computers somewhere but its years old. It wasn't very good, looking back. He wasn't bulletproof so was vulnerable to a degree (if you could hit him as he was a great dodger) but the 'immobilise him in place then one shot kill him and when the player logs on tell him to cook someone else up' thing turned me off the game. Plus I was the only Brit so my posting schedule was all out of whack with the others.

Anyway, as a homage the new 'Flea' is related in a way to the original. Even his back story has a nod to the first one but I figured it's purely down to Dave as Frosty is in charge and if Flea annoyed him he was off the team. As it is I consider him a bit part player as someone that annoying generally wouldn't last long on a team!

I'll probably come up with a few more blast from the past characters at some point. I cooked up a 250HP version of the Legion of Super Heroes to use in modern day with rip offs of the legion characters (Kon El was a Daxamite hybrid, Cosmos had magnetic control, Lightning Boy blasted electricity etc). Couldn't do justice to most of them as they were weak cardboard cut outs in the 7-10 AP range for the most part. Fun though as the PCs were part of a twenty odd strong super team and got to choose an NPC each to go along on missions with them. Chicago Champions I think they were called. Most of them were laden with weaknesses (Loss all attributes/power/skills) to bump the points up. This was in 1985 so in a pre crisis setting they were very weak, Teen Titans or lower level.

Looking at all the RPGs I played or ran over the years D&D I played the most, and the tie is between D&D and DC Heroes with Golden Heroes, Marvel, MERP and AD&D making up the bulk of the rest of the time.

Heh. Trip down memory lane. So in answer to your question Flea is a homegrown character about 15-20 years old!

Yeah, memories. I just downloaded this morning, now 1:45 PM, the 4-5 issues of a golden age character called the Bouncer. Haven't had a chance to read any of the stories yet but ....

“Anteas, son of Mother Earth, won great renown in ancient Greece, with the marvelous strength he gained from contact with the Earth. Anteas, now personified as The Bouncer, a statue sculpted by his descendant of the 20th Century, Anteas, Jr., springs to life and fights side-by-side with him, whenever evil threatens!”




So strong leapy characters who may or may not be punny? funny? Are not that unusual.

But BOY! is that costume BAAAAAAAADDDDDD

WAIT A MINUTE! You guys still have payphones in Britain?! Lucky Dogs!

I"m like the only person in our agency who doesn't own a cell phone or smart phone or whatever they are called. Not a payphone in sight in any of my counties I cover though I do find the occasional phone box that they have been removed from.

Huh, I wondered if any were still knocking about. As far as I know there may be some in the cities but honestly it's been decades since I used one. I assumed the USA would have gotten rid of some and even as I typed I figured "Who would use these?" and all I could think of was people whose batteries were flat and criminals...

And you're right, bouncer is dripping with cheese... *shudder*!

And I'm not sure underwear existed in Ancient Greece so he could be flapping his unmentionables every time he jumps.

Golden Age characters are so much fun. Some of them have the strangest origins or powers.

Green Mask is a wonderful example of this. There were two of them.

The first Green Mask debuted in Fox's Mystery Men Comics #1 (August 1939).[1] The writer was not credited (although it may have been Will Eisner); the artwork was by Walter Frehm. This Green Mask's final appearance was in Mystery Men Comics #31 (February 1942).

Originally, the Green Mask really was a mystery man, the secret identity of this "modern Robin Hood" kept that from the readers for many of his earlier appearances and known only to reporter "News" Doakes (later "News" Blake) who was the only one who could contact the pulp-style costumed vigilante when needed.

Eventually though, the Green Mask was revealed to be Michael Shelby (or Selby, in some early stories), wealthy private investigator and son of a crusading senator murdered by white-hooded gangsters known as the Grim Circle. He was transformed into a super-powered "Miracle Man" (no relation) after being exposed to an experimental "vita-ray" machine created by family friend Professor Lascomb. In Green Mask #1 (1940), he was joined by a young orphan named Don who, after surviving an explosion meant for the Green Mask, was taken in by the hero and became his non-powered, boomarang-throwing sidekick, Domino the Miracle Boy, and wore a costume almost identical to his own.


The second, of which I have one comic with one of his stories in it,
Fox Feature re-introduced the Green Mask moniker in issue #10 of The Green Mask (August 1944); the artist and writer were uncredited.[2] In this version, the Green Mask is secretly Johnny Green. He is the son of a previous Green Mask, named Walter Green.

Johnny is a meek bespectacled teenager often taunted as a "sissy boy" by his high school peers who transforms into an adult "Avenger of Wrong" whenever he becomes angry and cries out at any display of injustice ("Eee-ow!"), changing back once he has finished beating up the bad guys, grows tired and yawns (making him a sort of cross between Captain Marvel and the Hulk). While some stories had him aware of his alter-ego, others indicated that he either didn't retain the memory of anything he did while transformed or perceived them as only a dream.


I read once that there was a continuing foe to a minor hero from a minor comic book publisher whose name was actually the name of a certain female part but with the "C" being changed to a "K" and apparently no one in the editorial staff was educated enough, it was the 1940s after all, to know what the name meant.

I had no idea idea halucinogenic drugs were in widespread use back then but looking at some of the stuff that was turned out it's the only conclusion that makes any sense. Clearly in the silver age with gorillas they were snorting away again. Or the golden age, whatever it was

Since we might see a revival of magical heroes of yesteryear, I found a link that list all superheroes with magical origins that are in the public domain so we can stea ... do wonderful homages any or all of them we might like. And not just American characters either.

https://pdsh.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Magic_Characters

Marvellous. Thanks for the link. I shall rai... I mean stea... borr... pay homage to as many of the characters as I can. in other news you can see the effect of lockdown related gaming...

https://pdsh.fandom.com/wiki/Stardust_the_Super_Wizard

Crickey this guy takes the biscuit for new levels of Mary Sue ness. I won't bother to stat him up, I can make better use of the time required to grow old and die of extreme old age.



I suppose if I were to have a serious go then you're looking at an extensive range of powers at zero aps and just use Adrenaline surge to boost them all to whatever APs required. Or power reserve and the same. facing off against orindary guys int he 40s means AV/Ov/Ev/RV of 2 or 3 at most I guess. If Stardust the Super Wizard had 8 across the board he'd be godlike to ordinary folk

Guess the best way to do that guy would be to give him sorcery with maybe 100 APs of it?

As to Wonder Man, he was a Superman rip-off and sued out of publication after his first appearance and the first to be so sued out of existence.  

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ComicBook/WillEisnersWonderMan
The story is about Fred Carson, a timid radio engineer and inventor that traveled to Tibet where their monks gave a Power Ring that makes its carrier a kind of... superman, in exchange to use these powers for the good of humanity. Fred, disguised as "Wonder Man", has invulnerability to bullets, can leap traveling large distances, can move fast enough to catch bombs in mid-flight and enough power to throw them back with his bare hands, jumps high buildings and even has such great lungs to shout a crowd since the tallest part of a building. If this story sounds a lot like Superman to you, you're not wrong. And, obviously, neither did DC Comics.

Eisner was commissioned by Fox Publications to, as he would later describe in court: "create another Superman" after the original became a sensation. Eisner's creation "Wonder Man" appeared for only one issue before DC caught wind of it. What would happen next was the first ever lawsuit over comic book copyrights in the history of the industry. Eisner refused to perjure himself and testified against Fox, costing his company a large contract (or so he said).

So using that as a guideline, I would put his physical stats at:

Dex: 15
Str: 15
Body: 12
Int: 7 since he is a radio engineer which indicates high level of education

Powers:
Iron Nerves [advantage]
Leaping: 8
Running: 8
Sealed Systems: 4? Hold his breath a long time against gas
Skin Armor: 6-12? Artillery shells could hurt him
Super Ventriloquism: 8

Think that covers his shown powers.

Close, but I wouldn't have put him above Superman as of Action Comics #1... You have a point about catching shells with his hand though...

First go at Wonder Man... Discuss!!!



Bear in mind at the time there were no super powered bad guys, only spies and ruthless dictators so his opposition was hardly challenging!

I'd up the Skin Armor a couple of APs. He was taking fired from heavy machine guns and ignoring them. Other than that, and assuming he was active for a couple of months before his forced retirement, looks pretty good to me.

Here's my thinking...

With reflexes fast enough to time leaps and 'catch' howitzer shells that makes him superhuman (at least 11).
The jumping is pretty obvious but I'm not sure he leaps tall buildings in a single bound. Maybe we'll find out in issue #2...
Strength was tricky.He lifts a truck without effort, tears up howitzer type cannons that are mounted on building rooftops (???) and makes short work of a steel wall (which according to the DCH3e book is Body 12 or thereabouts)
That puts him stronger than Superman of Action Comics #1 but Superman got stronger as time went on (and developed the ability to fly etc)
Mental stats - he's pretty smart and compared to an ordinary person Int 7 is genius level
Mystical stats - given his powers come from a Yogi and seem to be magic based he's not particularly resistant but the magic field gives him a bit of extra toughness. He may not even know he has it but it seems logical given his origin.

Shouting is a way of 'captivating crowds' but he doesn't seem particularly charismatic or likeable.
Regeneration and Sealed systems seem to be fairly obvious given his 'mightiest human on earth' tag but without any more issues we'll never know if he really was that mighty

His various skills (all at low level but still useful) might have increased over the years, again we'll never know

Skin Armour was the trickiest. Stopping a fired shell from your hand suggests he is pretty invulnerable and a 105mm howitzer is 9APs Effect. Easily blocking something like that or those huge cannons (which might be 10-12APs) and that bomb from the plane suggests the RV 13-15 and Str in the same range or so.

The ring with cling to prevent it being removed by ordinary people was something I thought appropriate. He can remove it, for instance if compelled by a magician or similar. It doesn't grant him his powers but it does activate them and removal deactivates all of his superhuman abilities. At some point (probably around issue 10-11) he'd have run into magicians and been imprisoned in some dungeon or other...

Gah! Who knew combining chores around the house/garden and having a few beers would a) burn up most of the day and b) make me sleepy. On the plus side I'll probably wake up at 0220 like I did this morning and post/update like crazy, so expect crazy update times in the morning unless I can get a decent nights kip for a change... Hope you're all staying safe.

You might want to add a new section in the background section of our current game. We have a couple of new organizations, like the Academy the Kid is at and The Order of Preservers [OOP]. Not sure what other groups or organizations still exist that heroes might run into or could use them to help set up their own origins and backgrounds. You know, for when we get another 2-3 new players wanting to join in, that information could help them get up to speed. And help refresh us old gamers as well.

Maybe start listing some of the heroes and villains and teams we have met as well?

Yup, good call... Have a look at the background section... (when I've put stuff in it)

Ok, if anyone/everyone wants to submit an organisation write up of some description (can be anything, but if it has a groovy acronym for its name so much the better!) feel free to submit it here so we can all put some input in/tweaking and I'll post it in the background section of the game which is locked so as to avoid any chat in there and having to prune all the chatter out to restrict it to information only.

We need info on:

'The Academy' for Patricks Kid Kinetic game
OOPS for Davids Prof Wynde game
The Vanguard for Dave E's game
I'll do the UKChampions and Ultrahumans (who might appear in any/all of the games)

Anything else. I can/will help flesh out all of the stuff for each if you so wish. I'd invite anyone else to throw some details/info in for discussion too.

the idea is to build a shared game world and add to it when new stuff crops up. We can all add input, characters, background, general information and anything else which fleshes out the game world. Once done any new players or existing players who cross over can quickly access info on stuff that everyone should know...

OOP - Order of Preservers - a worldwide mystical order that has been in existence for hundreds if not thousands of years, though not necessarily under the current name. They train those that they find that have magical aptitude and don't seem that they would use their newfound magical abilities for evil or crime. Mistakes happen though but no one wants to talk about that.

When a student, in modern times, has learned enough magic that the Senior Preservers [SPs] think that they are ready to go out to face evil and darkness, they are given an outfit/costume and a codename that matches up with their magical abilities. They are then graduated to be an OOPS Mage [Order of Preservers Second Class Mage]. Apparently there have been a number of wits in the upper echelons of OOP to come up with these acronyms, especially since the upper echelons are called SOOP Mages [Superior Order of Preservers Mages].

They used to travel the world trying to find those who might have any once of magic in them. Once they found such a candidate, they would observe them for awhile to try to glean their moral compass. A very slow and tedious process that meant a number of candidates were never found ... by them.

But then the Internet came along and they found out that they could use it more easily to do worldwide searches, planting subconscious magical clues in various websites, ads and chat rooms, which would eventually lead a candidate to a special website where they would be tested and if found adequate given directions to actually meet one or more SOOPs. Many times the website, which would change names and domains from time to time, would be something seemingly simple like "What Kind of Mage are You? Take the Quiz and Find Out!" site, which is how the man who became known as Professor Wynde was recruited.

OOP provides some support, both physical and financial, and information services to their graduate students but are big believers in letting the 2nd class mages increase their powers and knowledge through conflict with the forces of evil, rather than studying for decades in order to gain the greater understanding and powers of a Superior Mage. Being a very ancient order, they are also fabulously wealthy what with centuries long saving accounts and such. The senior mages tend to run the organization and do the searching and training and tend to let the 2nd class mages handle the evil and crime in the world, though they will step out of the shadows to fight alongside their students if they feel it is drastic enough for them to take part. [These would generally be 2000+ pt mages]

No one knows how big the order is but many who are knowledgeable of such things believe that they have over 1000 members worldwide.

A few questions...

1) Are they exclusively good, or do they serve their own interests?
2) are there any bad apples, or some who have left the organisation to form their own nefarious group?
3) any major successes/failures of note, or do they pop up to do some good then fade in the background? Were they active in any world wars?
4) where do they get their money? Are they like the masons with fingers in every pie? Who really doesn't like them...?
5) In mechanics terms, what are we looking at 450HP means barely talented, 2000HP means top dog with sorcery? Is that innate or artefact provided?
6) what is their stance with regards ADVENT? A policy of non intervention or do they suspect the aliens to be up to no good (they'd be right)

Think that's it for now.

Updates tomorrow, been to work today all day and am shattered! On call tomorrow morning but *fingers crossed* they won't call me in...

Trying to leave this open-ended so not too detailed.

1.  OOP fights the mystical forces of darkness and evil but that doesn't mean members go out and fight crime.  That is sort of an individual choice among the members.  So a member may prevent a demon incursion but won't go out and stop Major Bad Guy from trying to takeover a city.  But another member might decide to go fight Major Bad Guy.  So OOP is somewhat open-ended as to what its member can and should do.  They tend to watch mostly for mystical dangers but do not always ignore more mundane dangers.  Though they try not to interfere too much in nation-building or nation-fighting, unless evil mystical means get into that mix.  
It is not a regimented group.  Think like doctors, they are all in the field of medicine, they have a code of ethics that they follow, they have an association, they publish works on things they have discovered, etc.

2.  Always bad apples.  Every organization or job type has them, policemen, firemen, doctors, train engineers, all have bad apples amongst them.  And like the best groups, they try to rid themselves of such bad apples.  Now whether those bad apples formed their own groups or organizations or went solo or got killed, well, over the centuries of its existence all have happened.

3.  The organization itself is fairly secretive.  Other mystical groups know something about them but Joe Public wouldn't, not even searching the internet would help Joe find out about them.  Intelligence agencies who have people working the supernatural would probably find out about them or at least that they exist.  Heck, they might even have a member or two who are part of OOP.  Actually, they probably do, as such agencies would be good sources of information for OOP.
Individuals have taken actions where they feel it is needed or can do some good.  So, yeah, they have been involved in some way in all major wars and other major events.  After all, bad events tend to bring out the worst in some people, which can result in demon summoning, human sacrifices, trying to raise the Elder Ones, preying on peoples' fears to enrich or empower themselves with magic, that kind of thing.

4.  Their money comes from centuries of investments and savings [think how much 10k pounds put into a savings account with Lloyd's in the 16th century would now be worth], members donating a share of ill-gotten gain that couldn't be returned to their rightful and probably now dead owners, and the last century or so - membership dues.

5.  OOP runs the gamut on powers, whether the mages has innate magic or has magical knowledge and some sort of magical artifact, all could be members or trained by or given magical artifacts by OOP.  So all those nice mages or magic enhanced heroes in the 1930s and 1940s who seemed to only have the ability of mass hypnosis like Mandrake or had a magic ring or coin or amulet that gave them power or like the Shadow who could cloud men's minds so as to appear invisible to them, could all have been trained by OOP.  In the early 20th Century some of their main training centers were in the East.  
The super-powered 2000+ HP characters tend to be the mostly retired from active duty types.  They are the new trainers, the bureaucracy of the organization, maker of new magical items, Givers of Advice, Announcers of Missions Needed to be Completed, etc.  They will come out of the shadows to help fight something earth-shattering, like Advent when they take the kid gloves off or the Gates of Hell opening all across the world, but tend to leave most of the things to the younger members.
Some might not have been trained by OOP but joined them at a later date.  So a lot of those 30s & 40s characters who died and came back with ghost powers could have joined OOP - Mr. Justice, the Gay Ghost, Sgt Spook, the Spectre, Kid Eternity - those types.

6.  They know Advent is up to no-good.  They took noticed when some superhero went online when Advent first appeared and tried to warn everyone what was truly happening [Wonder what his name was?].  
They send out a monthly membership magazine which outlines, among other fun member articles and letters, threats and potential threats growing across the Earth, primarily the magical ones but do flag the non-magical ones too.  Though they generally believe other heroes would handle most of the latter.  So Advent would be on their "We really need to watch these guys and if you learn anything let us know" list.  They probably even have a Top 10 Evil Mages Wanted list and a Top 10 Evil Organizations Wanted list that they publish in the magazine as well.

Great work! I'll try to combine all of that history/background into a condensed 'who's who' style entry into the background section. I have plenty to write up on the official organisations (law enforcement, DICE/SMITE/SPRITE in the UK, the US and Russian versions plus Europes now defunct or absorbed organisations) and super groups, good and bad. The plan is to work up a 'go look at that' but try to shrink it so a text wall doesn't glaze the eyes over.