Here's a big list of the powers you chose and the rank you rolled. For obvious reason I'm paraphrasing their descriptions. For future updates I'll be putting more of this information into your hands so that I don't have to do all this crap. That should be easier now though, since there aren't a bajillion talents like there are powers.
Gravity Manipulation (Incredible) – You “can alter the attractive forces of gravity.” Unfortunately the ugly forces of gravity are beyond your reach. You start with one Power Stunt: Flight at (Rank -2CS) speed, Levitation at (Rank -1CS) speed, Levitation of others at (Rank -1CS) speed, Reduction of Weight (not mass) by (Rank), or Increase of weight by (Rank) on a target. This power lasts as long as the hero concentrates, unless it’s from technology or a spell, in which case it lasts 5 rounds.
Light Manipulation (Good) – You “can generate light and manipulate existing light energy” of (Rank) intensity in either a burst or a line. This doesn’t do any damage, but it can blind targets. You don’t start with any Power Stunts for this power.
Mechanical Intuition (Amazing) – You have “a specific form of Ultimate Skill that affects repairs, inventing, and building things.” In practical terms, this means that you always have an Unearthly rank when determining whether an invention works or not. The rank you rolled for this power doesn’t actually matter, which is fine because Unearthly is higher anyway. You do still need the necessary Resources rank to actually be able to invent things, but you’re darn good at it when you try.
Body Transformation Others (Incredible) – You can “convert living tissues to other substances.” You get to choose a material type and a transformation duration of up to one hour. I don’t know if that’s per use or a permanent choice, so good luck with that. Anyway, when you use your power, you have to make flesh-to-flesh contact with the target, so if you’re wearing gloves or touching their clothes it’s a no go. You have the option of accepting “a -2CS shift in initial Power” - which I’m assuming means your Rank goes down by two, but it’s not really clear – to be able to affect non-living tissues as well, as long as they’re not a material with a higher material strength than your Rank. Now that we’ve gotten through the legal requirements of your power, I can finally tell you that when you use the power successfully, you turn the target into whatever material you chose. During that time the target has no recollection of what has occurred, they have the material strength of the substance you chose, and they regain their normal form when the duration is up, even if they were broken up or otherwise dispersed.
Ensnaring Missile (Good) – You are able to use “a device that makes a form of grappling attack.” This entangling is the equivalent of a grappling attack of (Rank) Strength, and the ensnarement has (Rank) material strength. This particular power can be increased in Rank by accepting one limitation: Only affects one target, Wears off after 1-10 rounds, Weakens by one material strength rank each turn, or Has a limited number of charges.
Energy Generation (Good) – You can “fire bolts of force that inflict Energy-type damage, Force-type damage, or either (determined before attack).” You only get one of those types at first, but you can develop the other type later. The bolt has up to (Rank) range and hits for up to (Rank) damage.
Density Manipulation Others (Remarkable) – You can “alter the density of other individuals on touch” and either increase or decrease their density. If you reduce density, the target “becomes vaguely transparent” and all Physical attacks against the target and made by the target are reduced by (Rank). The target also gets blown around by strong winds. If you choose to increase density, you make the target so heavy that they can fall unconscious and die.
Computer Links (Good) – You can “communicate and retrieve information from computer systems.” You can do this with (Rank) ability. You have to be able to access the computer in some way, but doing so uses (Rank) against the target’s Reason. This power also lets you reprogram some robots (but not PCs).
Electrical Manipulation (Remarkable or Incredible) – You can “manipulate and control electricity.” Apparently this just means you get free Resistance to Electricity at (Rank). Eventually you can develop Power Stunts, but you don’t appear to start with any. If you already have Electricity Resistance you get to raise either that or this by one rank.
Energy Touch (Monstrous) – You can “inflict damage and effects from the Energy column of the Battle Effects table, with a Bullseye regarded as a possible Stun.” I’m sure we’ll figure out what that means in a later update. You can affect multiple targets by touching some kind of conductive material. You also get Resistance to Electricity as a bonus power.
Resistance to Electricity (Remarkable or Incredible) – For you, “all damage resulting from electrical-based attacks” is reduced by (Rank). Any electricity weaker than (Rank) is completely ignored. You have the heavy burden of deciding whether this power is conductive (the electricity passes through you into those you’re touching) or non-conductive (the electricity stops at you and goes no further).
Electrical Manipulation (Good) – You can “manipulate and control electricity.” Apparently this just means you get free Resistance to Electricity at (Rank). Eventually you can develop Power Stunts, but you don’t appear to start with any. If you already have Electricity Resistance you get to raise either that or this by one rank.
Body Armor (Amazing) – The entry for body armor is really long. The short version is that it absorbs physical damage equal to (Rank Number), energy damage equal to (Rank Number - 20). You can choose to have either natural or artificial body armor, and each type is more effective against different kinds of attacks. You can choose to take a -1CS to Agility to increase your Power Rank by one. If you’re a high-tech hero, you can choose to have a battle-suit that integrates all your other powers and does some other stuff possibly, though it’s not at all clear what any of that means.
Flight (Typical) – You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Darkforce Manipulation () – You can “manipulate the extra-dimensional energy known as the Darkforce.” You get one power stunt for now from the following list: Flight at (Rank -1CS) speed, Darkforce Distance Weapon at (Rank -1CS) range and damage, Creation of specific shapes of Darkforce (one shape per stunt) of (Rank) material strength, Teleportation at (Rank -2CS), or Create Darkness of (Rank) intensity in three areas.
Extra Body Parts (Wings, ) – You have wings. If you have an available power slot, you get Flight at (Rank +1CS) as a bonus power. If you don’t, then I guess your wings are decorative.
Regeneration (Remarkable) – You heal really fast. Instead of healing (Endurance Rank) per day, you heal (Endurance Rank) per 10 turns, or about 1 minute. Don’t be fooled by the use of turns as a measurement of time though. You can’t do anything while you’re healing, and if anything interrupts your rest at any point you have to start over again. If it’s not clear, your Power Rank for this power doesn’t matter.
Enhanced Senses (Good) – One (or more) of your five senses is increased to (Rank). You can use (Rank) instead of your normal Intuition “to discover clues, spot items,” and also to determine Initiative if you chose to enhance your hearing. Having a super-sense also means that it’s super-vulnerable, such that attacks against that sense are at +1CS.
Ice Generation (Incredible) – You can “draw water from the ambient atmosphere … and convert it to ice,” which you “may then use initially as a missile weapon.” These missiles have up to (Rank) range and up to (Rank) damage. You also get one extra Power Stunt to start: Entrap others in ice of (Rank) material strength up to 2 areas away, Create Body Armor of (Rank -1CS) that is vulnerable to fire damage, Create walls and other ice shapes of (Rank -1CS) material strength, Create ramps of ice that allow you to move at (Rank -1CS), Create slick spots of (Rank -1CS) slipperiness, Create waves of cold that make it harder for opponents to do stuff, or Absorb cold or ice with (Rank) ability and capacity.
Fire Generation (Excellent) – You can project fire with up to (Rank) range and (Rank) damage. In addition to your fireballs you get one Power Stunt to start: Create a flaming shield around one area that deals (Rank) damage to anyone passing through it, Body Transformation in to fire giving you Body Armor and Flight at (Rank -2CS), Create flaming images at (Rank -1CS), Control other fires at (Rank -2CS), Absorb heat and fire at (Rank) ability and capacity, or Project heat at (Rank -1CS) which makes it harder for people to do stuff.
Resistance to Emotion Attacks (Remarkable) – You use (Rank) instead of your Intuition rank when opposing any “Emotion-related attacks that affect the Intuition.”
Raise Lowest Ability (N/A) – You raise your lowest ability score by 20 points. Not exactly exciting, but effective.
Power Absorption (Remarkable) – This is “the acquiring of other individuals’ super-human Powers and abilities.” Normally only natural powers can be absorbed, but if you’re a robot you can also duplicate technology-based powers. The target resists your efforts with either Psyche or Endurance (you choose which one at character creation). You can acquire one Power or ability up to (Rank), and if you try to absorb one of a higher rank you risk getting knocked out. If you manage to successfully grab someone’s power, they can’t use it while you have it. There is no mention of how long it lasts.
Flight (Good) – You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Resistance to Radiation (Excellent) – You reduce all damage from radiation-based attacks by (Rank). You completely ignore radiation that is less than (Rank).
Air Control (Amazing) – You can “manipulate air, winds, and (potentially) weather.” You can create shields of air up to (Rank) strength, missiles of air that inflict (Rank) damage, or winds up to (Rank) intensity. You also start with one Power Stunt: Flight at (Rank) speed, Limited Weather Control that can create tornadoes of (Rank) intensity and damage, Summon Storm, Summon Fog, Lightning of (Rank) range and damage, or Reduce weather conditions with (Rank) ability.
Phasing (Good) – You can pull “the molecules of a body out of phase with those of the surrounding area,” which means you can move through solid objects. While you’re phased, you are immune to physical and “most energy attacks,” but you’re still vulnerable to mental and magic attacks. If your Power Rank is greater than the material strength of an object, you can pass through it. You can’t make physical attacks while phased, but you can cause electronic devices to malfunction by phasing through them. Oh and by the way, you can’t breath while phasing, so watch your O2 meter.
AntimatterDevo Was RightGates of SteelRegistered Userregular
I am... the Technoler Fighting: Good | Agility: Good | Strength: Good | Endurance: Incredible | Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Typical | Psyche: Remarkable Resources: Remarkable
Powers: 4 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 3 of 4 Health: 57 Karma: 67 Popularity: 10 Powers
Computer Links (Good)
Electrical Manipulation (Incredible)
Energy Touch (Monstrous)
Resistance to Electricity (Remarkable) – Conductive
Talents: 87, 91, 8, 49
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
The rolls for the strengths of my powers: 2d100=71, 43. I think that's Remarkable and Good.
I'll bend the rules a bit and say that my wings are also a Darkforce ability/manifestation, allowing me to fly when I choose to use my Darkforce Manipulation power. I could combine that with the "create shapes of Darkforce" stunt.
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AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
Aw man.. You mean to tell me that I can turn people into any substance I want, and as light and/or heavy as I want, but after a certain period of time they'll return to normal and reconstitute?
Well then. Time to turn people into liquid steel, put them into a few different drums, and then drop those drums down into the ocean.
Aw man.. You mean to tell me that I can turn people into any substance I want, and as light and/or heavy as I want, but after a certain period of time they'll return to normal and reconstitute?
Well then. Time to turn people into liquid steel, put them into a few different drums, and then drop those drums down into the ocean.
remember, as long as they were F-list Villains or lower, no-one will care.
Flight (Good) – You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Air Control (Amazing) – You can “manipulate air, winds, and (potentially) weather.” You can create shields of air up to (Rank) strength, missiles of air that inflict (Rank) damage, or winds up to (Rank) intensity. You also start with one Power Stunt: Flight at (Rank) speed, Limited Weather Control that can create tornadoes of (Rank) intensity and damage, Summon Storm, Summon Fog, Lightning of (Rank) range and damage, or Reduce weather conditions with (Rank) ability.
I can't decide if I want to keep Flight (Good) and pick up Lightning of (Amazing) range and damage, or change to Levitation (Good) and pick up Flight (Amazing).
Think I'll probably keep Flight and pick up Lightning. Otherwise I'd have to actually use Fighting to hit stuff, and then I'm screwed.
Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Poor
Resources: Excellent
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 3 of 4 | Contacts: 1 of 4
Health: 32
Karma: 47
Popularity: 10
Powers:
Electrical Manipulation (Good) - Good thing my suit is well-grounded
...You can “manipulate and control electricity.” Apparently this just means you get free Resistance to Electricity at (Rank). Eventually you can develop Power Stunts, but you don’t appear to start with any.
Body Armor (Amazing) - Battle Suit! This guy is plated with chrome, and it is sleek like a motorcycle. It also integrates the other powers, flight and electrical manipulation.
...The entry for body armor is really long. The short version is that it absorbs physical damage equal to (Rank Number), energy damage equal to (Rank Number - 20). You can choose to have either natural or artificial body armor, and each type is more effective against different kinds of attacks. You can choose to take a -1CS to Agility to increase your Power Rank by one. If you’re a high-tech hero, you can choose to have a battle-suit that integrates all your other powers and does some other stuff possibly, though it’s not at all clear what any of that means.
Flight (Typical) - Okay, so maybe this feature needs some work.
...You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Talent rolls: 3#1d100 99 9 64
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 3 of 4 | Contacts:2 3 of 4
Health: 99
Karma: 62
Popularity: 0 (DARKBOT CARES NOT FOR YOUR ACCOLADES)
Powers:
Resistance to Emotion Attacks (Remarkable) (DARKBOT CARES NOT FOR YOUR NAME-CALLING)
... Use (Remarkable) instead of your Intuition rank when opposing any “Emotion-related attacks that affect the Intuition.”
Raise Lowest Ability
... Agilty +20 (1 -> 21)
Power Absorption (Remarkable) (YIELD YOUR POWERS TO DARKBOT, YOU CANNOT RESIST)
... Acquire one Power or ability (natural or technology-based) up to (Remarkable), and if you try to absorb one of a higher rank you risk getting knocked out. The target resists your efforts with Psyche. If you manage to successfully grab someone’s power, they can’t use it while you have it. There is no mention of how long it lasts.
I'm very amused by the idea of a mentally abusive robot hero that no one likes.
Honestly, your character would make for a good guard/jailer of super-powered people. No emotions to worry about, not affected by them, absorbing powers of villains trying to escape, etc. It's not a popular job but you don't care.
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
You know what? Resources are lame and powers are cool. I'm going to go ahead and reduce my resources two more to get another power.
New level of Resources: Good
New power roll: 1d10074. Let's go with Telepathy, at rank : 1d10059.
Updated character:
Player: Tzeentchling
Character name: ___________
Type: Robot
Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Typical | Endurance: Good | Reason: Good | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Incredible
Resources: Good
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 2 of 4
Health: 67
Karma: 52
Popularity: 0
Powers: Darkforce Manipulation (Remarkable), Extra Body Parts (Flight/Wings, Good), Telepathy (Good)
Issue 04 Talents Mega-Issue! Guns, Magic, and Trivia!
Now that we've uncovered your primary attributes, your secondary attributes, and your powers, it's time to move on to the mundane things that you can do. A notable exception here is the practice of magic, which is not a super-power for some reason. But we'll get to that later.
Similar caveats to those present in power rolling/selection exist here. Some talents are just too great to occupy one slot, so they have an asterisk to indicate that they take up two slots. Some talents also give you bonus stuff, so watch out for that.
-WEAPON SKILLS- Snowballs: The Frozen Killer.
These are the talents that deal with using weapons, be they knives, bows, guns, or something else designed for the express purpose of hurting and/or killing things.
If you rolled 01-20, you can take a stab at a Talent from this category.
Guns: You can fire any kind of gun at (Agility +1CS). People without this talent only fire at (Agility Rank).
Thrown Weapons: You can throw any weapon that was designed to be thrown (like spears, shuriken, or snowballs) at (Agility +1CS). I don't know why snowballs are considered a weapon. I guess you can thank Iceman for that.
Bows: Anyone without this Talent fires bows at (Agility -1CS). However, if you do choose this, you shoot at (Agility +1CS), can fire and reload in a single round, and can potentially fire multiple arrows.
Blunt Weapons: You get (Fighting +1CS) when attacking with blunt weapons.
Sharp Weapons: You get (Fighting +1CS) when attacking with things like swords, spears (unless you throw them), and daggers (unless you throw them).
Oriental Weapons: This is a special Talent that gives you either (Fighting +1CS) or (Agility +1CS) when attacking with this specific list of weapons: shuriken, crossbows, sais, oriental swords, and oriental daggers.
Marksman*: You get (Agility +1CS) when attacking with "any distance weapon that requires line of sight to hit." That means bows, crossbows, guns, artillery, shuriken, and all kinds of other crap. Weapons Master*: This talent simply gives you (Fighting +1CS) for any attack with a weapon that would normally require the use of the Fighting attribute.
Weapons Specialist*: This gives you (+2CS) with a single weapon, and also increases your initiative by 1 when using that weapon.
-FIGHTING SKILLS- Breakdance Fighting sadly did not make the list.
These are the talents that deal with not using weapons in a fight. Alphabetical martial arts, wrestling, and acrobatics for some reason are all in this category.
If you rolled 21-45, you get to kick it with a Talent from this category.
Martial Arts A: Type A is supposed to represent forms like judo and karate. If you have this talent, you can Stun and/or Slam a target regardless of your comparative Strength and Endurance ranks.
Martial Arts B: Boxing is given as an example of Type B, which is supposed to cover "offense and inflicting damage in short, quick bursts." In mechanical terms, you just get (Fighting +1CS) when in unarmed combat.
Martial Arts C: Type C is all about holds and escapes, though it isn't given an example for illustration purposes. Mechanically, you get (Strength +1CS) for Grappling attacks and damage, (Strength +1CS) for Escaping, and (Agility +1CS) for Dodging.
Martial Arts D : This is the style where you sit and watch an opponent for a while before moving in and striking their weak point for massive damage. Actually not damage, but the chance to ignore Body Armor (but not force fields) for determining Stun and Slam results, provided you spend two rounds studying your opponent first.
Martial Arts E: This is another "quick striking" type, but instead of +1CS to your Fighting, you get a +1 to Initiative rolls in unarmed combat.
Wrestling: This talent covers sumo wrestling in addition to other styles of wrestling, which translates into a +2CS bonus to Grappling attacks (but not damage).
Thrown Objects: This talent gives you a +1CS bonus to Throwing attacks and to Catching. Interestingly, this applies to weapons as well, so it's basically Thrown Weapons but better.
Tumbling: This talent lets you make an Agility check to land feet-first after any non-damaging fall.
Acrobatics: This one is all about being limber, which apparently gives you a +1CS bonus when dodging, evading, and escaping.
-PROFESSIONAL SKILLS- It cost him two talent slots to be able to make that quip.
These are jobs, or job fields if you want to be more accurate. I guess if your hero went to college, this is one of the categories you better have rolled, otherwise you probably didn't.
If you rolled 46-65, you can work with a Talent from this category.
Medicine*: Being some kind of doctor, you can heal characters that have reached the Shift 0 rank of Endurance up to 20 turns after they got there. You can also restore one rank of Endurance to a character per week (plus their natural healing), and you have (Reason +1CS) for things like medical problems, poisons, and surgery.
Law: You're a lawyer (or almost a lawyer, if you choose). That means you get a +1CS when doing law-related things. It may not be exciting, but it could be lucrative.
Law-Enforcement: You're a cop, or cop-adjacent, or otherwise have a background in law enforcement. This means you have the Gun and Law talents, and are legally allowed to carry a gun and make arrests if you're still a member of an agency. I'm pretty sure by the way it's written that Gun and Law don't take up any extra slots, but it's not clear.
Pilot: You get a +1CS bonus when doing stuff involving aircraft, including flying them. Depending on your background, this can also apply to spaceships.
Military: This talent gives you a +1CS when dealing with military stuff, and a bonus Contact that is a member of the armed services.
Business/Finance: Selecting this gives you a minimum Resources of Good, a +1CS when dealing with money, and a bonus Contact in the Professional category.
Journalism: You get two bonus Contacts. You're not better at anything, you just know some people. That sounds about right.
Engineering: You're good at building stuff, such that you get a +1CS whenever you're trying to build stuff.
Crime: Also referred to as Criminology, you know about criminals. You get a +1CS bonus on Reason and Intuition when dealing with criminal practices. You also get a bonus Contact "in either the police or crime areas."
Psychiatry: You get a +1CS on everything "involving the mind." Specific powers that are pointed out as working with this Talent are Mental Control, Domination, Hypnosis, Emotion Control, and Mental Probe.
Detective/Espionage: You're a detective or are otherwise trained to notice clues. You get a +1CS "to discover clues to a crime," and also get a bonus Contact in either crime, law enforcement, law, or espionage.
-SCIENTIFIC SKILLS- Professor Spider-Man points to a blackboard, where science happens.
Okay, so maybe you went to college, but you didn't want to be a doctor or a journalist. If you spent your time in the lab doing science stuff or whatever, then here you are.
If you rolled 66-85, you can distill a Talent from this category.
Chemistry: You get a +1CS bonus when doing chemistry stuff. You will quickly notice a pattern with the Scientific talents.
Biology: You get a +1CS bonus when doing biology.
Geology: You get a +1CS bonus when doing geology.
Genetics: You get a +1CS et cetera et cetera.
Archeology: You get the idea by now.
Physics: Same deal.
Computers: Here too.
Electronics: And here.
-MYSTICAL AND MENTAL SKILLS OR ABILITIES- His real friends call him Master of Mystical and Mental Skills or Abilities.
That mouthful is the name of the category that gives you access to going into a trance, performing card tricks, or DOING ACTUAL MAGIC. If you're not into manipulating the very fabric of the universe, I guess you could also just know stuff about the occult. That will be super useful.
If you rolled 86-90, you can conjure up a Talent from this category.
Trance: You can make yourself appear dead. While in a trance, you reduce your need for food and water "to a minimal level," whatever that means, and you also regain one Endurance rank per day.
Mesmerism and Hypnosis: This talent gives you sort-of-Mind-Control at the same rank as your Reason. It also gives you sort-of-Mental-Probe, I assume at the same rank. The limitation is that you can't make your target do or say anything that it wouldn't normally do, which is another way of saying that it only works when the Judge wants it to.
Sleight of Hand: You can do sleight of hand at (Agility +1CS). Is this your talent? No? Because it's kind of lame?
Resist Domination: You can resist mental attacks at (Psyche +1CS).
Mystic Origin*: If you have this talent, you can say that your Powers are actually spells. We'll cover what that means when we eventually get to the Magic issue.
Occult Lore: You know about mystical junk, giving you a +1CS bonus to Reason when working with items of a magical nature.
-OTHER SKILLS- Definitely in the "other" category.
This is the catch-all category for stuff that the designers didn't want to put in other categories. This is also the category where you get to find out that being able to train animals is on the same level as being an actual wizard.
If you rolled 91-00, you can pick a Talent from this category.
Artist: You can make art. This sounds lame until you keep reading and realize that this is a Karma generation engine. You can spend 1-10 weeks creating a work of art, and then receive (10 x Weeks Spent) Karma. You don't even have to spend all your time doing it, since you only need to "allocate some time daily" to your work.
Languages: You get one additional language to start, and you can add other languages for half the cost of a Talent. I'm sure that will come up all the time.
First Aid: You can stop a character from dying, and when you do so they regain one Endurance rank immediately. You can also stabilize a dying character up to 5 rounds after they reach Shift 0 Health.
Repair/Tinkering: You get a +1CS bonus to Reason when fixing things. This does not apply to making new things.
Trivia: You pick a subject and get a +1CS bonus to Reason when dealing with that subject. You can't pick "everything" as your subject. It has to be something useless like "old movies" or "jazz."
Performer: You can perform in some fashion, and you get 10 Karma for every week that you do so.
Animal Training*: You can train animals. If you have Animal Empathy or Animal Communications and Control, you raise those powers by +1CS.
Heir to Fortune*: This is supposed to give you a bunch of money, but the way it's worded leaves me wondering what it actually does: "This is not a Talent, but a situation which brings the character into a lot of money. The minimum Resources of a character with this Talent is Remarkable (If your character is making Excellent Resources or less, do not take this Talent). This "Talent" may not be gained by a character after the generation process is finished, and may only be chosen by characters being generated." Someone clarify that for me, because it sounds like the talent is supposed to give you Remarkable Resources, but then says that you can't take it if you don't have at least Remarkable Resources.
Student*: This talent prevents you from starting with any other talents, but it allows you to learn new talents easier. Worth it? Not really.
Leadership*: If you are the leader of a team, you add 50 points to that team's Karma Pool. Those points disappear if you leave the team, and you don't get to take them with you. I don't know if they recharge once used or what, because all these things are described in natural language, which is a bad way to describe game mechanics.
The book mentions that ranks for talents are rolled on Column 2 of the Random Ranks Table, but none of them actually require a rank, so that should save us some work. Choose your talents, then stay tuned for the next update, in which we talk about contacts and other miscellany of character creation.
tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
edited July 2012
My character has: 15, 12, 89, 21. Two aspects of using weapons, one fighting skills, and one Mystical/Mental.
Let's do Acrobatics for the fighting skills section.
Let's use both slots on Marksman for the Using Weapons bit. If I use my Darkforce Manipulation ability to form Darkforce Distance Weapons, this could come in handy.
As tempting as Mystic Origin is, I don't have two slots for it. So I guess I'll have to go with Resist Domination, which will pair nicely with my Telepathy.
The levels for these are: 3d100=63, 64, 86.
Having said that, if I can swap one of my scores around, I'd totally make room for Mystic Origin. Assuming I switched a Using Weapons score, I would take:
Sharp Weapons (63)
Acrobatics (64)
Mystic Origin (86)
Current character:
Player: Tzeentchling
Character name: ___________
Type: Robot
Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Typical | Endurance: Good | Reason: Good | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Incredible
Resources: Good
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 2 of 4
Health: 67
Karma: 52
Popularity: 0
Powers: Darkforce Manipulation (Darkforce Distance Weapons, Remarkable), Extra Body Parts (Flight/Wings, Good), Telepathy (Good)
Talents: Acrobatics (_), Marksman (_), Resist Domination (_)
Contacts: 2d100=39, 78
Basically, I have two ideas for the origin of/idea behind this character.
1) The character is an artificially created being/android, created by the Russian government to use the Darkstar gem without the instability/psyche of Laynia Petronova taking over the body. Programmed to be a hardcore Russian nationalist, Darkstar v4 serves in the new Winter Guard.
2) The character is a clone of Magik/Illyana Rasputin, and was created by a cabal who worship Blackheart with the intention of creating a daughter for him after the failure of Kid Blackheart (or maybe potentially his consort). The soul-less body was invested with power from the Darkforce Dimension, but the ritual was interrupted by Ghost Rider/Johnny Blaze before it could be completed, leaving the character with powers (including the wings, composed of pure darkforce and typically worn draped around her like a cape) but no knowledge of who or what she is. He is currently tutoring her in the use of her powers, but the relationship is a strained and frustrating one at times. The cabal is still after her and eager to make up for their failure, and the character is both horrified and fascinated by their plans.
tzeentchling on
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Lord Palingtonhe.him.hisHistory-loving pal!Registered Userregular
Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Poor
Resources: Excellent
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 3 of 4 | Contacts: 1 of 4
Health: 32
Karma: 47
Popularity: 10
Powers:
Electrical Manipulation (Good) - Good thing my suit is well-grounded
...You can “manipulate and control electricity.” Apparently this just means you get free Resistance to Electricity at (Rank). Eventually you can develop Power Stunts, but you don’t appear to start with any.
Body Armor (Amazing) - Battle Suit! This guy is plated with chrome, and it is sleek like a motorcycle. It also integrates the other powers, flight and electrical manipulation.
...The entry for body armor is really long. The short version is that it absorbs physical damage equal to (Rank Number), energy damage equal to (Rank Number - 20). You can choose to have either natural or artificial body armor, and each type is more effective against different kinds of attacks. You can choose to take a -1CS to Agility to increase your Power Rank by one. If you’re a high-tech hero, you can choose to have a battle-suit that integrates all your other powers and does some other stuff possibly, though it’s not at all clear what any of that means.
Flight (Typical) - Okay, so maybe this feature needs some work.
...You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Talent rolls: 3#1d100 99 9 64
Repair/Tinkering - Gotta fix my suit.
...You get a +1CS bonus to Reason when fixing things. This does not apply to making new things.
Guns - Gonna add a few into the suit design, should probably know how to fire them.
...You can fire any kind of gun at (Agility +1CS). People without this talent only fire at (Agility Rank).
Engineering - Someone had to build the damn suit, might as well have been me.
...You're good at building stuff, such that you get a +1CS whenever you're trying to build stuff.
This seems hilariously awesome. I'm trying not t muck up the thread with incessant interjections, but I am following it closely. If you guys start up a PbP of this or anything, I'd be... super interested.
Talents are updated. As an alien, I have a greater level of knowledge of the universe and the particles that comprise it, but the sciences of you puny humans and your living things eludes me yet.
Flight (Good) – You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Resistance to Radiation (Excellent) – You reduce all damage from radiation-based attacks by (Rank). You completely ignore radiation that is less than (Rank).
Air Control (Amazing) – You can “manipulate air, winds, and (potentially) weather.” You can create shields of air up to (Rank) strength, missiles of air that inflict (Rank) damage, or winds up to (Rank) intensity. You also start with one Power Stunt: Lightning of (Rank) range and damage.
Phasing (Good) – You can pull “the molecules of a body out of phase with those of the surrounding area,” which means you can move through solid objects. While you’re phased, you are immune to physical and “most energy attacks,” but you’re still vulnerable to mental and magic attacks. If your Power Rank is greater than the material strength of an object, you can pass through it. You can’t make physical attacks while phased, but you can cause electronic devices to malfunction by phasing through them. Oh and by the way, you can’t breath while phasing, so watch your O2 meter.
Talents:
Chemistry, Physics: +1CS bonus when making Chemistry or Physics related checks
Wow. Every single one of my Talent rolls was for Martial Arts.
Well then!
Evil will fear the crushing blows of Quasar Fist.
Fighting: Typical | Agility: Good | Strength: Feeble | Endurance: Remarkable | Reason: Remarkable | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Good Resources: Excellent
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 1 of 4 Health: 40 Karma: 42 Popularity: 10/10
Powers Gravity Manipulation (Incredible) – You “can alter the attractive forces of gravity.” Unfortunately the ugly forces of gravity are beyond your reach. You start with one Power Stunt: Flight at (Rank -2CS) speed, Levitation at (Rank -1CS) speed, Levitation of others at (Rank -1CS) speed, Reduction of Weight (not mass) by (Rank), or Increase of weight by (Rank) on a target. This power lasts as long as the hero concentrates, unless it’s from technology or a spell, in which case it lasts 5 rounds.
Light Manipulation (Good) – You “can generate light and manipulate existing light energy” of (Rank) intensity in either a burst or a line. This doesn’t do any damage, but it can blind targets. You don’t start with any Power Stunts for this power.
Mechanical Intuition (Amazing) – You have “a specific form of Ultimate Skill that affects repairs, inventing, and building things.” In practical terms, this means that you always have an Unearthly rank when determining whether an invention works or not. The rank you rolled for this power doesn’t actually matter, which is fine because Unearthly is higher anyway. You do still need the necessary Resources rank to actually be able to invent things, but you’re darn good at it when you try.
Talents
Martial Arts A
Martial Arts B
Thrown Objects
Acrobatics
Stilts on
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
Which is very amusing, given your Feeble strength.
The last bit of mechanical character creation is taking care of your Contacts. At some point you rolled for how many initial contacts you have, but you can also get bonus contacts from your Talents. The book isn't particularly clear about how the bonus contacts work. In one part it says that heroes with more contacts (from Talents) than initial slots have to discard the excess, but in another it gives the example of a hero starting with no contacts, but still getting a bonus contact from one of his Talents. Like most important questions, it is left needlessly vague by natural language and a general disregard for consistency.
But whatever, we're not actually playing. Go wild and load yourself up with as many contacts as you can justify. When you do select them, make sure you note which identity the contact belongs to. According to the book, mark contacts that only know your hero identity with an "H", your secret identity with an "S", and both with no mark at all.
One last note about contacts before we finally get to the list: you can have fewer contacts defined than you have slots. It's just assumed that you'll make one up at a convenient time after you start playing.
Now, with all that out of the way, here they are:
-PROFESSIONAL CONTACTS-
Medicine – Doctors, nurses, researchers, whatever.
Law – Lawyers or other law-knowing types.
Law Enforcement – Beat cops, detectives, commissioners, etc.
Military – Someone in the military, from a low-ranking soldier to a fleet admiral.
Business World – Accountants, CEOs, bankers, or anyone else in the word of business or finance.
Journalism – Reporters, editors, photographers, and other poor people.
Crime – Mobsters, crooks, and other shady characters.
Engineering – Someone who can build stuff.
Psychiatry – Psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, and the like.
Espionage – A person in the FBI, NSA, SHIELD, HYDRA, or some other secret/spy organization.
Hero Group – The X-Men, Fantastic Four, or some other super-group.
-SCIENTIFIC CONTACTS-
Chemistry – A chemist.
Biology – A biologist.
Geology – A geologist.
Genetics – A geneticist.
Archeology – I'm sure.
Physics – You get.
Computers – The idea.
Electronics – Watermelons.
-POLITICAL CONTACTS-
Local – A mayor, councilman, etc.
State – A governor, state senator, or someone else in a state agency that isn't law enforcement.
National – A congressman, senator, the president, or someone else with national influence.
Other National – Same deal as above, but in a different country.
International – Someone in the UN or some other multinational agency.
Planetary – The inhabitant(s) or ruler(s) of another planet. Only Alien heroes can choose this one.
-MYSTIC CONTACTS-
Mystic Arts – A wizard or someone else "aware of extra-dimensional powers greater than our own."
Occult Lore – Someone who studies occult or mystical lore and stuff.
Mythology – Someone who knows a lot about one "pantheon" like the Olympians or Asgardians.
You may have noticed that you can decide to be buddies with anyone from an electrician to the President of the United States. Just keep in mind that the more powerful your contact, the more likely they are to ask you for favors, and the more likely those favors will be life-threatening missions of global importance. Depending on the antagonism (sorry, "realism") of your Judge, that could either be majorly problematic or just what your heroes are doing anyway.
We have now concluded character generation. The rest of the chapter talks about how to add flavor to your stats to create a complete picture of your hero, but I'm not going to go over those examples. I think you're all creative enough to look at Fire Generation and Extra Limbs (Tail) and come up with the Human Charmander.
From here on out, updates will be about how the game is actually played, which should be interesting. I'm really looking forward to showing everyone the Periodic Table of Roll Resolution.
Contacts: Law Enforcement H
Computers S
Electronics S
Antimatter on
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tzeentchlingDoctor of RocksOaklandRegistered Userregular
edited July 2012
Player: Tzeentchling Character name: Lucy Crumm (assumed/"real"), Obscura (heroic name) Type: Robot (Clone) Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Typical | Endurance: Good Reason: Good | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Incredible Resources: Good Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 2 of 4 Health: 67 Karma: 52 Popularity: 0 Powers: Darkforce Manipulation (Darkforce Distance Weapons, Remarkable), Extra Body Parts (Flight/Wings, Good), Telepathy (Good) Talents: Thrown Weapons, Acrobatics, Mystic Origin* Contacts: Mystic Contact (Ghost Rider [Johnny Blaze]), Professional Contact (Psychologist [Dr. Martin Kairos], S)
Origin:
Christ's Crown simply can't catch a break. Years after Blackheart's last attack on the town, things were finally beginning to attain a semblance of previous life. Families had slowly returned, stores re-opened, church re-consecrated. Life was, if not good, then at least honest and rewarding.
Then the strangers arrived. Oh, they were friendly enough, but the townfolk were naturally wary. For all the good it did them, anyway. A cabal known as the Hearts of Darkness, worshipers of the demon Blackheart, forced their way into the town, terrorizing the citizens. Their true goal was darker: to mystically clone the body of Lucy Crumm, the mortal whom Blackheart once tried to take as a wife to rule aside him in Hell. They looked to create a version of her without the innocence of the original, which they believed was the source of her ultimate refusal of the demon lord. To do so, they intended to create the clone with Darkforce energy, the energy of Blackheart himself.
In a way, the cultists were successful. The ritual was enacted, and the cloned body of Lucy Crumm was successfully constructed and imbued with Darkforce. Before the cultists could present their prize to Lord Blackheart, however, their ritual was interrupted by Johnny Blaze, the Ghost Rider. While some of the cultists did manage to escape, the remade “Lucy” was rescued. Recognizing the young woman from his battles with Blackheart in Christ's Crown before, Johnny vowed to protect Lucy at all costs.
Lucy herself doesn't quite know what to think, or for that matter who she really is. She realizes that Johnny saved her from the cult, and for that she is grateful, but the name and history of the original Lucy Crumm come only in fleeting glimpses, half-remembered fragments of a life she never lived. Johnny realizes he can only help so much, however, and has enlisted the help of a trusted psychologist in NYC, Dr. Martin Kairos, to help her with her personality disorder and fragmented memories.
Still, of all the supernatural beings, Ghost Rider is possibly one of the better ones to help her determine who she is and, perhaps more importantly, how and why to use her powers. Her telepathy may be a remnant from the original Lucy Crumm, but the shadowy wings of Darkforce that drape around her like a cape when not flying her through the air are decidedly new, as are the projectiles of solid Darkforce that she can throw some distance. Relishing the sense of purpose that fighting crime with Ghost Rider gives her, Lucy has given herself the heroic name of Obscura. Unfortunately, the Hearts of Darkness have not given up on their creation, and still seek her to offer her to Blackheart – after all, Ghost Rider can't always be there to get in their way....
Now that we've gotten character creation out of the way, let's look at how you actually use those characters. I'll let the book explain, because after this the chapter gets horribly disorganized:
In the role-playing situation, you are cast as your hero. You, the player, are a puppeteer, controlling the actions and reactions of your character. Your character is limited in what he or she can do as a result of the character's abilities. Any time you check against these abilities to see if you complete an action, you are making a FEAT roll.
Great! FEAT rolls are the main resolution mechanic of the game, so obviously we'll jump right into explaining what those are and how they work … as soon as we look at time scales and initiative, because those come first in this chapter for some reason.
Time Scales – The Turn
Like other games, Marvel Super Heroes is run in turns that are approximately six seconds of "real" time. The book explains that this is supposed to represent the average amount of time represented in a single panel of a comic book. It also takes a moment to help you with your math, in case you couldn't figure out that ten turns equals a minute and 600 turns equals an hour.
Don't be alarmed by that mention of 600 turns. After helping you with your multiplication tables, the book goes on to remind you that running through all 600 turns of an hour would be silly, and turns are only important when time is a crucial factor in what's going on. That's when the turn sequence comes in, which is inexplicably convoluted. Let's take a look:
The Judge determines what is happening in the world around the heroes, involving those characters and actions not controlled by the players. He notes these to himself, or, if he wishes, writes them down (writing things down is generally time-consuming, but helps in key situations).
Translation: The Judge figures out what the bad guys are going to do, but doesn't tell the players.
The players in turn determine what their heroes are doing. Player's may perform more than one action during a turn, but this may limit the success of other actions. The players tell the judge what their characters are doing.
Translation: The players figure out what they're going to do, then tell the Judge.
Roll Initiative. Initiative is only important when one action may change or override another action. The side with the highest initiative has its actions take place first. Initiative is usually used in combat and other damage-inducing situations.
Translation: Roll Initiative and try to roll high.
Pre-Action rolls are made. In certain situations, such as defensive actions (dodging, blocking, and evading), a FEAT roll may be made before anyone on either sides takes any actions. These are Pre-Action FEATS and are rolled at this time. Certain moderator planned actions (such as explosions) may occur at this time. See Changing Actions, below.
Translation: No one has acted yet, so obviously you should get out all your defensive rolls before knowing whether or not you're being attacked. You know, to save time.
The actions of the side that got the lower roll take place. Run the remaining side's actions.
Translation: Now the other side goes.
Got all that? To summarize: Everyone determines what they want to do, then rolls initiative, then does things. Oh, and since we're talking about rolling initiative, it might be helpful to cover how that's done.
Initiative
In short, I don't know. The book never tells you what to actually roll. You might assume that you roll a percentile like you do for other ability checks, but that doesn't quite fit with some of the caveats that come with rolling initiative. These rules are that 1) you get a bonus (from +0 to +6) depending on the highest Intuition on your side, and 2) a roll of 1 is always a 1 and doesn't get a bonus.
So given those things, do you think a percentile fits? Is a 1 in 100 chance of not getting a bonus a big deal? Is a 6 point bonus in a range of 100 a big deal? At this point, I think the initiative system is poorly designed (it is) or the book is missing something (also probable).
Anyway, let's say you figure out what to roll, and then you lose initiative. Because the turn order is weird and you have to have already declared what you're going to do before you find out when you'll be doing it, you get a chance to change your action. This requires a "yellow" Agility FEAT during the Pre-Action phase, and if you're successful you get to change what you're going to do (although you do it at a -1CS as punishment for not being able to see the future). If you fail, you're out of luck. Your action may be entirely negated by what happens before your side gets to go, and if that occurs you just don't get to do anything.
All of that sounds messy enough on its own, but I should also mention that you roll initiative every turn, meaning that a string of lucky rolls and choices can mean that one side doesn't act at all for an entire fight. Fun!
FEAT Rolls
Okay, now on to the good stuff. Let's talk about what FEATs actually are, and how you do them. To that end, I present to you the crowning achievement of game design:
The Periodic Table of Conflict Resolution
That beauty right there is where you go to find out how well you did whatever you were trying to do. These are the columns that you're shifting (a -1CS is 1 column shift to the left, so if you're normally rolling on the Remarkable column you're now rolling on the Excellent column), and what degree of success you attain. White is usually a failure, and Green, Yellow, and Red are usually successes (Red being the best). Sometimes something is really hard and requires a certain degree of success for you to be successful at all. This is represented by the added complexity of Intensity, which is a required color for an action to be successful.
Intensity is set using the same rank system as abilities. The Intensity rank is then compared to the rank at which you're rolling, and that determines the color you need to be successful. If the Intensity is higher than your ability (say, Monstrous Intensity versus Remarkable Agility) you need a red result. If the two are equal, you need a yellow result. If the Intensity is lower, you need green.
One last note about Intensity: In general, if the Intensity is more than three ranks lower than your ability rank, you can be assumed to automatically succeed.
In the next installment we'll talk about what kinds of FEATs you can actually do, now that you know how to do them. It will be an installment full of special exceptions, charts, and convoluted explanations, because that's how this system does things.
Okay, now that you know how to make a FEAT roll, let's see what kinds of FEATs you can actually make. I'm going to take a break from typing all this crap out and show you some FEATs (if you don't shout that in your head every time you read it, you should) in action. I'll be doing this by adding commentary to some actual comic book pages (which were made readily and freely available by Marvel on their digital comic store).
Posts
These Be the Powers
Here's a big list of the powers you chose and the rank you rolled. For obvious reason I'm paraphrasing their descriptions. For future updates I'll be putting more of this information into your hands so that I don't have to do all this crap. That should be easier now though, since there aren't a bajillion talents like there are powers.
@Stilts:
@Athenor:
@Antimatter:
@”Lord Palington”:
@tzeentchling:
@dresdenphile:
@jdarksun:
@Tox:
Fighting: Good | Agility: Good | Strength: Good | Endurance: Incredible | Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Typical | Psyche: Remarkable
Resources: Remarkable
Powers: 4 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 3 of 4
Health: 57
Karma: 67
Popularity: 10
Powers
Computer Links (Good)
Electrical Manipulation (Incredible)
Energy Touch (Monstrous)
Resistance to Electricity (Remarkable) – Conductive
Talents: 87, 91, 8, 49
I'll bend the rules a bit and say that my wings are also a Darkforce ability/manifestation, allowing me to fly when I choose to use my Darkforce Manipulation power. I could combine that with the "create shapes of Darkforce" stunt.
Well then. Time to turn people into liquid steel, put them into a few different drums, and then drop those drums down into the ocean.
remember, as long as they were F-list Villains or lower, no-one will care.
I can't decide if I want to keep Flight (Good) and pick up Lightning of (Amazing) range and damage, or change to Levitation (Good) and pick up Flight (Amazing).
Think I'll probably keep Flight and pick up Lightning. Otherwise I'd have to actually use Fighting to hit stuff, and then I'm screwed.
- Fighting: Good | Agility: Excellent | Strength: Poor | Endurance: Typical
- Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Poor
- Resources: Excellent
- Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 3 of 4 | Contacts: 1 of 4
Health: 32Karma: 47
Popularity: 10
Powers:
Electrical Manipulation (Good) - Good thing my suit is well-grounded
...You can “manipulate and control electricity.” Apparently this just means you get free Resistance to Electricity at (Rank). Eventually you can develop Power Stunts, but you don’t appear to start with any.
Body Armor (Amazing) - Battle Suit! This guy is plated with chrome, and it is sleek like a motorcycle. It also integrates the other powers, flight and electrical manipulation.
...The entry for body armor is really long. The short version is that it absorbs physical damage equal to (Rank Number), energy damage equal to (Rank Number - 20). You can choose to have either natural or artificial body armor, and each type is more effective against different kinds of attacks. You can choose to take a -1CS to Agility to increase your Power Rank by one. If you’re a high-tech hero, you can choose to have a battle-suit that integrates all your other powers and does some other stuff possibly, though it’s not at all clear what any of that means.
Flight (Typical) - Okay, so maybe this feature needs some work.
...You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Talent rolls: 3#1d100 99 9 64
Honestly, your character would make for a good guard/jailer of super-powered people. No emotions to worry about, not affected by them, absorbing powers of villains trying to escape, etc. It's not a popular job but you don't care.
New level of Resources: Good
New power roll: 1d100 74. Let's go with Telepathy, at rank : 1d100 59.
Updated character:
Character name: ___________
Type: Robot
Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Typical | Endurance: Good | Reason: Good | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Incredible
Resources: Good
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 2 of 4
Health: 67
Karma: 52
Popularity: 0
Powers: Darkforce Manipulation (Remarkable), Extra Body Parts (Flight/Wings, Good), Telepathy (Good)
Talents Mega-Issue! Guns, Magic, and Trivia!
Now that we've uncovered your primary attributes, your secondary attributes, and your powers, it's time to move on to the mundane things that you can do. A notable exception here is the practice of magic, which is not a super-power for some reason. But we'll get to that later.
Similar caveats to those present in power rolling/selection exist here. Some talents are just too great to occupy one slot, so they have an asterisk to indicate that they take up two slots. Some talents also give you bonus stuff, so watch out for that.
Snowballs: The Frozen Killer.
These are the talents that deal with using weapons, be they knives, bows, guns, or something else designed for the express purpose of hurting and/or killing things.
If you rolled 01-20, you can take a stab at a Talent from this category.
Breakdance Fighting sadly did not make the list.
These are the talents that deal with not using weapons in a fight. Alphabetical martial arts, wrestling, and acrobatics for some reason are all in this category.
If you rolled 21-45, you get to kick it with a Talent from this category.
It cost him two talent slots to be able to make that quip.
These are jobs, or job fields if you want to be more accurate. I guess if your hero went to college, this is one of the categories you better have rolled, otherwise you probably didn't.
If you rolled 46-65, you can work with a Talent from this category.
Professor Spider-Man points to a blackboard, where science happens.
Okay, so maybe you went to college, but you didn't want to be a doctor or a journalist. If you spent your time in the lab doing science stuff or whatever, then here you are.
If you rolled 66-85, you can distill a Talent from this category.
His real friends call him Master of Mystical and Mental Skills or Abilities.
That mouthful is the name of the category that gives you access to going into a trance, performing card tricks, or DOING ACTUAL MAGIC. If you're not into manipulating the very fabric of the universe, I guess you could also just know stuff about the occult. That will be super useful.
If you rolled 86-90, you can conjure up a Talent from this category.
Definitely in the "other" category.
This is the catch-all category for stuff that the designers didn't want to put in other categories. This is also the category where you get to find out that being able to train animals is on the same level as being an actual wizard.
If you rolled 91-00, you can pick a Talent from this category.
The book mentions that ranks for talents are rolled on Column 2 of the Random Ranks Table, but none of them actually require a rank, so that should save us some work. Choose your talents, then stay tuned for the next update, in which we talk about contacts and other miscellany of character creation.
Let's do Acrobatics for the fighting skills section.
Let's use both slots on Marksman for the Using Weapons bit. If I use my Darkforce Manipulation ability to form Darkforce Distance Weapons, this could come in handy.
As tempting as Mystic Origin is, I don't have two slots for it. So I guess I'll have to go with Resist Domination, which will pair nicely with my Telepathy.
The levels for these are: 3d100=63, 64, 86.
Having said that, if I can swap one of my scores around, I'd totally make room for Mystic Origin. Assuming I switched a Using Weapons score, I would take:
Sharp Weapons (63)
Acrobatics (64)
Mystic Origin (86)
Current character:
Character name: ___________
Type: Robot
Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Typical | Endurance: Good | Reason: Good | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Incredible
Resources: Good
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 2 of 4
Health: 67
Karma: 52
Popularity: 0
Powers: Darkforce Manipulation (Darkforce Distance Weapons, Remarkable), Extra Body Parts (Flight/Wings, Good), Telepathy (Good)
Talents: Acrobatics (_), Marksman (_), Resist Domination (_)
Contacts: 2d100=39, 78
Basically, I have two ideas for the origin of/idea behind this character.
1) The character is an artificially created being/android, created by the Russian government to use the Darkstar gem without the instability/psyche of Laynia Petronova taking over the body. Programmed to be a hardcore Russian nationalist, Darkstar v4 serves in the new Winter Guard.
2) The character is a clone of Magik/Illyana Rasputin, and was created by a cabal who worship Blackheart with the intention of creating a daughter for him after the failure of Kid Blackheart (or maybe potentially his consort). The soul-less body was invested with power from the Darkforce Dimension, but the ritual was interrupted by Ghost Rider/Johnny Blaze before it could be completed, leaving the character with powers (including the wings, composed of pure darkforce and typically worn draped around her like a cape) but no knowledge of who or what she is. He is currently tutoring her in the use of her powers, but the relationship is a strained and frustrating one at times. The cabal is still after her and eager to make up for their failure, and the character is both horrified and fascinated by their plans.
- Fighting: Good | Agility: Excellent | Strength: Poor | Endurance: Typical
- Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Poor
- Resources: Excellent
- Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 3 of 4 | Contacts: 1 of 4
Health: 32Karma: 47
Popularity: 10
Powers:
Electrical Manipulation (Good) - Good thing my suit is well-grounded
...You can “manipulate and control electricity.” Apparently this just means you get free Resistance to Electricity at (Rank). Eventually you can develop Power Stunts, but you don’t appear to start with any.
Body Armor (Amazing) - Battle Suit! This guy is plated with chrome, and it is sleek like a motorcycle. It also integrates the other powers, flight and electrical manipulation.
...The entry for body armor is really long. The short version is that it absorbs physical damage equal to (Rank Number), energy damage equal to (Rank Number - 20). You can choose to have either natural or artificial body armor, and each type is more effective against different kinds of attacks. You can choose to take a -1CS to Agility to increase your Power Rank by one. If you’re a high-tech hero, you can choose to have a battle-suit that integrates all your other powers and does some other stuff possibly, though it’s not at all clear what any of that means.
Flight (Typical) - Okay, so maybe this feature needs some work.
...You can fly up to a speed of (Rank).
Talent rolls: 3#1d100 99 9 64
Repair/Tinkering - Gotta fix my suit.
...You get a +1CS bonus to Reason when fixing things. This does not apply to making new things.
Guns - Gonna add a few into the suit design, should probably know how to fire them.
...You can fire any kind of gun at (Agility +1CS). People without this talent only fire at (Agility Rank).
Engineering - Someone had to build the damn suit, might as well have been me.
...You're good at building stuff, such that you get a +1CS whenever you're trying to build stuff.
I'll go now. Sorry.
Attributes:
Primary:
Agility: Amazing (46)
Strength: Good (8)
Endurance: Amazing (46)
Reason: Typical (5)
Intuition: Amazing (46)
Psyche: Remarkable (26)
Secondary:
Health (FASE): 101
Karma (RIP): 77
Popularity: 10/10
Powers:
Resistance to Radiation (Excellent) – You reduce all damage from radiation-based attacks by (Rank). You completely ignore radiation that is less than (Rank).
Air Control (Amazing) – You can “manipulate air, winds, and (potentially) weather.” You can create shields of air up to (Rank) strength, missiles of air that inflict (Rank) damage, or winds up to (Rank) intensity. You also start with one Power Stunt: Lightning of (Rank) range and damage.
Phasing (Good) – You can pull “the molecules of a body out of phase with those of the surrounding area,” which means you can move through solid objects. While you’re phased, you are immune to physical and “most energy attacks,” but you’re still vulnerable to mental and magic attacks. If your Power Rank is greater than the material strength of an object, you can pass through it. You can’t make physical attacks while phased, but you can cause electronic devices to malfunction by phasing through them. Oh and by the way, you can’t breath while phasing, so watch your O2 meter.
Talents:
Contacts: 1 of 4
Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Excellent | Endurance: Remarkable | Reason: Typical | Intuition: Incredible | Psyche: Feeble
Resources: Typical
Health: 96
Karma: 42
Popularity: 0
Powers: 4 of 4
Regeneration (Remarkable)
Enhanced Senses (Hearing - Good)
Ice Generation (Incredible)
Fire Generation (Excellent)
Talents: 1 of 4
Medicine - Doctor
Fighting: Good | Agility: Good | Strength: Good | Endurance: Incredible | Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Typical | Psyche: Remarkable
Resources: Remarkable
Powers: 4 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 3 of 4
Health: 57
Karma: 67
Popularity: 10
Powers
Computer Links (Good)
Electrical Manipulation (Incredible)
Energy Touch (Monstrous)
Resistance to Electricity (Remarkable) – Conductive
Talents: Blunt Weapons
Detective/Espionage
Resist Domination
Repair/Tinkering
Well then!
Evil will fear the crushing blows of Quasar Fist.
Fighting: Typical | Agility: Good | Strength: Feeble | Endurance: Remarkable | Reason: Remarkable | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Good
Resources: Excellent
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 1 of 4
Health: 40
Karma: 42
Popularity: 10/10
Powers
Gravity Manipulation (Incredible) – You “can alter the attractive forces of gravity.” Unfortunately the ugly forces of gravity are beyond your reach. You start with one Power Stunt: Flight at (Rank -2CS) speed, Levitation at (Rank -1CS) speed, Levitation of others at (Rank -1CS) speed, Reduction of Weight (not mass) by (Rank), or Increase of weight by (Rank) on a target. This power lasts as long as the hero concentrates, unless it’s from technology or a spell, in which case it lasts 5 rounds.
Light Manipulation (Good) – You “can generate light and manipulate existing light energy” of (Rank) intensity in either a burst or a line. This doesn’t do any damage, but it can blind targets. You don’t start with any Power Stunts for this power.
Mechanical Intuition (Amazing) – You have “a specific form of Ultimate Skill that affects repairs, inventing, and building things.” In practical terms, this means that you always have an Unearthly rank when determining whether an invention works or not. The rank you rolled for this power doesn’t actually matter, which is fine because Unearthly is higher anyway. You do still need the necessary Resources rank to actually be able to invent things, but you’re darn good at it when you try.
Talents
Martial Arts A
Martial Arts B
Thrown Objects
Acrobatics
Like I said before.
I'm Krillen.
Making Friends
The last bit of mechanical character creation is taking care of your Contacts. At some point you rolled for how many initial contacts you have, but you can also get bonus contacts from your Talents. The book isn't particularly clear about how the bonus contacts work. In one part it says that heroes with more contacts (from Talents) than initial slots have to discard the excess, but in another it gives the example of a hero starting with no contacts, but still getting a bonus contact from one of his Talents. Like most important questions, it is left needlessly vague by natural language and a general disregard for consistency.
But whatever, we're not actually playing. Go wild and load yourself up with as many contacts as you can justify. When you do select them, make sure you note which identity the contact belongs to. According to the book, mark contacts that only know your hero identity with an "H", your secret identity with an "S", and both with no mark at all.
One last note about contacts before we finally get to the list: you can have fewer contacts defined than you have slots. It's just assumed that you'll make one up at a convenient time after you start playing.
Now, with all that out of the way, here they are:
You may have noticed that you can decide to be buddies with anyone from an electrician to the President of the United States. Just keep in mind that the more powerful your contact, the more likely they are to ask you for favors, and the more likely those favors will be life-threatening missions of global importance. Depending on the antagonism (sorry, "realism") of your Judge, that could either be majorly problematic or just what your heroes are doing anyway.
We have now concluded character generation. The rest of the chapter talks about how to add flavor to your stats to create a complete picture of your hero, but I'm not going to go over those examples. I think you're all creative enough to look at Fire Generation and Extra Limbs (Tail) and come up with the Human Charmander.
From here on out, updates will be about how the game is actually played, which should be interesting. I'm really looking forward to showing everyone the Periodic Table of Roll Resolution.
Fighting: Good | Agility: Good | Strength: Good | Endurance: Incredible | Reason: Incredible | Intuition: Typical | Psyche: Remarkable
Resources: Remarkable
Powers: 4 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 3 of 4
Health: 57
Karma: 67
Popularity: 10
Powers
Computer Links (Good)
Electrical Manipulation (Incredible)
Energy Touch (Monstrous)
Resistance to Electricity (Remarkable) – Conductive
Talents: Blunt Weapons
Detective/Espionage
Resist Domination
Repair/Tinkering
Contacts: Law Enforcement H
Computers S
Electronics S
Character name: Lucy Crumm (assumed/"real"), Obscura (heroic name)
Type: Robot (Clone)
Fighting: Good | Agility: Amazing | Strength: Typical | Endurance: Good
Reason: Good | Intuition: Good | Psyche: Incredible
Resources: Good
Powers: 3 of 4 | Talents: 4 of 4 | Contacts: 2 of 4
Health: 67
Karma: 52
Popularity: 0
Powers: Darkforce Manipulation (Darkforce Distance Weapons, Remarkable), Extra Body Parts (Flight/Wings, Good), Telepathy (Good)
Talents: Thrown Weapons, Acrobatics, Mystic Origin*
Contacts: Mystic Contact (Ghost Rider [Johnny Blaze]), Professional Contact (Psychologist [Dr. Martin Kairos], S)
Origin:
Then the strangers arrived. Oh, they were friendly enough, but the townfolk were naturally wary. For all the good it did them, anyway. A cabal known as the Hearts of Darkness, worshipers of the demon Blackheart, forced their way into the town, terrorizing the citizens. Their true goal was darker: to mystically clone the body of Lucy Crumm, the mortal whom Blackheart once tried to take as a wife to rule aside him in Hell. They looked to create a version of her without the innocence of the original, which they believed was the source of her ultimate refusal of the demon lord. To do so, they intended to create the clone with Darkforce energy, the energy of Blackheart himself.
In a way, the cultists were successful. The ritual was enacted, and the cloned body of Lucy Crumm was successfully constructed and imbued with Darkforce. Before the cultists could present their prize to Lord Blackheart, however, their ritual was interrupted by Johnny Blaze, the Ghost Rider. While some of the cultists did manage to escape, the remade “Lucy” was rescued. Recognizing the young woman from his battles with Blackheart in Christ's Crown before, Johnny vowed to protect Lucy at all costs.
Lucy herself doesn't quite know what to think, or for that matter who she really is. She realizes that Johnny saved her from the cult, and for that she is grateful, but the name and history of the original Lucy Crumm come only in fleeting glimpses, half-remembered fragments of a life she never lived. Johnny realizes he can only help so much, however, and has enlisted the help of a trusted psychologist in NYC, Dr. Martin Kairos, to help her with her personality disorder and fragmented memories.
Still, of all the supernatural beings, Ghost Rider is possibly one of the better ones to help her determine who she is and, perhaps more importantly, how and why to use her powers. Her telepathy may be a remnant from the original Lucy Crumm, but the shadowy wings of Darkforce that drape around her like a cape when not flying her through the air are decidedly new, as are the projectiles of solid Darkforce that she can throw some distance. Relishing the sense of purpose that fighting crime with Ghost Rider gives her, Lucy has given herself the heroic name of Obscura. Unfortunately, the Hearts of Darkness have not given up on their creation, and still seek her to offer her to Blackheart – after all, Ghost Rider can't always be there to get in their way....
The Color of Success
Now that we've gotten character creation out of the way, let's look at how you actually use those characters. I'll let the book explain, because after this the chapter gets horribly disorganized:
Great! FEAT rolls are the main resolution mechanic of the game, so obviously we'll jump right into explaining what those are and how they work … as soon as we look at time scales and initiative, because those come first in this chapter for some reason.
Time Scales – The Turn
Like other games, Marvel Super Heroes is run in turns that are approximately six seconds of "real" time. The book explains that this is supposed to represent the average amount of time represented in a single panel of a comic book. It also takes a moment to help you with your math, in case you couldn't figure out that ten turns equals a minute and 600 turns equals an hour.
Don't be alarmed by that mention of 600 turns. After helping you with your multiplication tables, the book goes on to remind you that running through all 600 turns of an hour would be silly, and turns are only important when time is a crucial factor in what's going on. That's when the turn sequence comes in, which is inexplicably convoluted. Let's take a look:
Got all that? To summarize: Everyone determines what they want to do, then rolls initiative, then does things. Oh, and since we're talking about rolling initiative, it might be helpful to cover how that's done.
Initiative
In short, I don't know. The book never tells you what to actually roll. You might assume that you roll a percentile like you do for other ability checks, but that doesn't quite fit with some of the caveats that come with rolling initiative. These rules are that 1) you get a bonus (from +0 to +6) depending on the highest Intuition on your side, and 2) a roll of 1 is always a 1 and doesn't get a bonus.
So given those things, do you think a percentile fits? Is a 1 in 100 chance of not getting a bonus a big deal? Is a 6 point bonus in a range of 100 a big deal? At this point, I think the initiative system is poorly designed (it is) or the book is missing something (also probable).
Anyway, let's say you figure out what to roll, and then you lose initiative. Because the turn order is weird and you have to have already declared what you're going to do before you find out when you'll be doing it, you get a chance to change your action. This requires a "yellow" Agility FEAT during the Pre-Action phase, and if you're successful you get to change what you're going to do (although you do it at a -1CS as punishment for not being able to see the future). If you fail, you're out of luck. Your action may be entirely negated by what happens before your side gets to go, and if that occurs you just don't get to do anything.
All of that sounds messy enough on its own, but I should also mention that you roll initiative every turn, meaning that a string of lucky rolls and choices can mean that one side doesn't act at all for an entire fight. Fun!
FEAT Rolls
Okay, now on to the good stuff. Let's talk about what FEATs actually are, and how you do them. To that end, I present to you the crowning achievement of game design:
The Periodic Table of Conflict Resolution
That beauty right there is where you go to find out how well you did whatever you were trying to do. These are the columns that you're shifting (a -1CS is 1 column shift to the left, so if you're normally rolling on the Remarkable column you're now rolling on the Excellent column), and what degree of success you attain. White is usually a failure, and Green, Yellow, and Red are usually successes (Red being the best). Sometimes something is really hard and requires a certain degree of success for you to be successful at all. This is represented by the added complexity of Intensity, which is a required color for an action to be successful.
Intensity is set using the same rank system as abilities. The Intensity rank is then compared to the rank at which you're rolling, and that determines the color you need to be successful. If the Intensity is higher than your ability (say, Monstrous Intensity versus Remarkable Agility) you need a red result. If the two are equal, you need a yellow result. If the Intensity is lower, you need green.
One last note about Intensity: In general, if the Intensity is more than three ranks lower than your ability rank, you can be assumed to automatically succeed.
In the next installment we'll talk about what kinds of FEATs you can actually do, now that you know how to do them. It will be an installment full of special exceptions, charts, and convoluted explanations, because that's how this system does things.
Those Things They Do
Okay, now that you know how to make a FEAT roll, let's see what kinds of FEATs you can actually make. I'm going to take a break from typing all this crap out and show you some FEATs (if you don't shout that in your head every time you read it, you should) in action. I'll be doing this by adding commentary to some actual comic book pages (which were made readily and freely available by Marvel on their digital comic store).
i see