SCRPG Resource Blog Updating Again

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

@fjur

Wait, so you’ve added another meta-layer to the whole thing? KO Clown is from a fictional cartoon that exists in a fictional comic book universe?

If Sentinels Comics can have an animated series I can have Clown Town. Besides, you know Wager Master has to have either brought the animated characters to life or thrown the “real” heroes into the show at some point - or more likely, had the two swap places. There’s probably guise story where he manages to get stuck in a TV too…

@fjur

Really? Not even for a gag where he bashes it over a baddie’s head?

He might go for that, but anyone examining the dictionary would find all the words are a ten-year old kid’s vocabulary repeated over and over again. And some will be misspelled.

@fjur

Does he also display the Wouldn’t Hit a Girl trope?

Going by the ten-year olds I’ve known (and been) he’d sock a gal while roughhousing and feel bad about it afterward. She’d probably have to hit him first, though.

@fjur

Yes, but does he have a long black handlebar moustache with which to twirl evilly?

Part of what makes him so mean is an inability to grow decent facial hair. Sometimes he’ll go for an obviously fake beard and/or mustache though, usually as part of a disguise.

@fjur

(Although this does bring up the question of why they’d return to a (presumed) empty location. I suppose an unresolved challenge or some other sort of MacGuffin. (Or, perhaps more likely, a villain (or the heroes themselves) are simply fleeing.))

Maybe the heroes need to do something in environment A, then go do something in B, then return to A to finish the job? Even just something like "open portal from Niceplace to Helljail, fight through the place, grab prisoner, return them safely to Niceplace and close portal is a possible scenario.

[fjur]

@Chief_Lackey_Rich

@fjur

Really? Not even for a gag where he bashes it over a baddie’s head?

He might go for that, but anyone examining the dictionary would find all the words are a ten-year old kid’s vocabulary repeated over and over again. And some will be misspelled.

This probably isn’t what you had in mind, but your description reminded me of the infamous Super Dictionary.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Heh. KO Clown would have been thrilled to face a villain who was foolish enough to try stealing forty pies on his watch.

One of my lingering regrets is that I’m just slightly too old to have owned a copy of that thing. One of my younger sister’s friends got one through some school book club thing, but I was past the grades where they had those by 1978. On the plus side, I did get a bunch of those big oversized DC treasury comics that year as reading material for a road trip to Florida. To this day I remember Superman vs. Muhammad Ali and the Batman vs. Ra’s al Ghul stories better than going to Disney.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

And another post on the blog, this time looking at Hero Points, alternate rewards, and a few house rules you might consider using with them.

[fjur]

It does seem like all three of the alternate options are probably more powerful than the default. Interesting . . .

I definitely agree that Sidekicks are the most narratively interesting alternate rewards. In general, I enjoy whenever a game system provides mechanics for players to “gain” allies — it’s not necessary, usually (as allies can simply show up without being connected mechanically to a PC), but it does encourage players to become more invested in them. GURPS, for instance, does this. (Although in a . . . less than elegant way, as that’s how GURPS does most things.)

One oddity about favors is that they can’t be used for Boost or Hinder actions. I assume something in playtesting caused a problem with them, but for the life of me I can’t see what it would be. A GM who wanted to make favors more versatile and a little better could let a hero use them to Boost/Hinder as well as Attack, Defend and Overcome as a house rule and I don’t think anything would break down - the game has plenty of reactionary mod producers already.

I can’t see anything wrong with allowing them to Hinder, but I believe that the reason they can’t Boost is because it’s simply sub-optimal — 5 Hero Points can either equal a +5 bonus, or a dice pool that, when rolled to Boost, will only create a +2 bonus on average. That’s a pretty crummy deal.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

@fjur

It does seem like all three of the alternate options are probably more powerful than the default. Interesting . . .

It’s really the third category (temporary ability improvements and dice size bumps) that stands out to me, although obviously sidekicks can easily be stronger than a 1-time exclusive bonus if they don’t get immediately blown away by a villain with a multi-target Attack. Favors are probably pretty equal - they’re less predictable in terms of what they’ll do but (even as just Attack/Defend/Overcome reactions) more versatile than straight bonuses.

@fjur

I can’t see anything wrong with allowing them to Hinder, but I believe that the reason they can’t Boost is because it’s simply sub-optimal — 5 Hero Points can either equal a +5 bonus, or a dice pool that, when rolled to Boost, will only create a +2 bonus on average. That’s a pretty crummy deal.

That’s certainly true at the highest end of the scale, but at the low end 3d4 costs the same HP as a +1 bonus does and generates a marginally better average bonus (assuming at least two of the dice roll 4 and get you a +2) - and one that isn’t exclusive either, but at the cost of a reaction. The other three tiers aren’t as good for Bonuses, getting steadily worse the more you spent.

And of course a favor can be used for other things. Using a favor for a bonus is generally suboptimal but if you really need to squeeze out a little more oomph on a key roll the fact that the bonus could stack with an exclusive one and be applied as a reaction to own roll if need be is meaningful.

Still, favors might not need the help of more options. One of the people I play with has taken all their HP as 3d4 bonuses a few times and it seemed to work pretty well with just the official three action choices.

Narratively it represented a severed magical hand her PC cut off a demon a while back, with one of the digits curling up as each favor got used, all monkey paw style. Every now and then the GM has let her recharge the thing by thumping on cultists and other related mystical threats, whereupon she does another session full of favors. We are all terrified to see what happens if she tries to use one of the thing’s favors for an Overcome and has to twist for success. Hasn’t happened yet but we know sooner or later we’ll be desperate enough to try.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Huh. How did I not already do a hulking crab-man mutant villain bodyguard? Easily fixed…

Karkinos

And as long as I’m at it, how about a nice generic alien troop transport for all your world invasion needs?

Ro-Man Invasion Saucer

That last one’s designed to be easily re-skinned. Also an interesting Creator/Titan build that relies entirely on it deploying its payload of troops (minion and lieutenant creation abilities in game terms) for effectiveness. All its other abilities are defensive inherents and reactions that make it tough to take down.

[fjur]

Both of these are cool. Nice job with the “Ro-Man” name especially — 'tis very Silver Age. : )

Gender: Male Age: 74 Height: 5’7" Eyes: Glittering Red
Hair: Mousy Brown, Thin and Graying Skin: Wrinkled Build: Bony

I don’t think you meant to write that.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

@fjur

Both of these are cool. Nice job with the “Ro-Man” name especially — 'tis very Silver Age. : )

The pun was irresistable. Also a Robot Monster reference, of course. A wonderful terrible film.

@fjur

I don’t think you meant to write that.

Indeed not. Fixed. Copy and paste in haste, repent at leisure.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Yet another villain with an odd schtick, as well as a nod to fine old SPI solo game from the days of my youth.

Timetripper, Temporally Discombobulated Villain Who Fights Alongside Himself

And another “villain” in the form of high-end robotic guard for super-prisons and high-security facilities:

Series-7 Peacekeeper

[fjur]

Timetripper is certainly a unique way to make a duplicator villain. Most such baddies are Creators, Legions, and/or Overlords, of course, but having a villain without minion-making abilities who just shows up with multiple copies is quite new.

The Peacekeeper robots are also interesting in that one of their gimmicks seem to be that their AI is not smart, whereas most villainous robots have superintelligence as a schtick.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

@fjur

Timetripper is certainly a unique way to make a duplicator villain. Most such baddies are Creators, Legions, and/or Overlords, of course, but having a villain without minion-making abilities who just shows up with multiple copies is quite new.

If my records are correct, I’ve done 25 different Creator, Legion, and Overlord villains at this point. Felt like it was time to try something different with the concept - and of course Squad is a good archetype for the idea, since it’s all about cooperation with allies, even if those allies are yourself from a slightly different point in spacetime.

He/they work fine with just two of them/him, so you don’t have to fill the scene budget with Timetrippers, but his sweet spot is around four villains total, like all Squaddies.

@fjur

The Peacekeeper robots are also interesting in that one of their gimmicks seem to be that their AI is not smart, whereas most villainous robots have superintelligence as a schtick.

Yeah, they’re dopes, relatively speaking. Not Ed-209 levels of dumb but no match for tech-genius super-hacker or mecha-telepath or invasion of really smart nanites, and in a big confused riot what smarts they have can get tangled up by hard-coded protocols about “keep super-beings in cells” and the like. I can see them being quite apologetic toward heroes as they’re forced to attack them by their auto-targeting subroutines.

But of course if they worked properly all the time the heroes wouldn’t have as many excuses to fight them, would they?

In a dystopian alt-timeline they’d also be used as heavy crowd control backing up riot police, where their hypothetically non-lethal weaponry lets the local dictator (Iron Legacy?) claim they’re being merciful.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Another villain, this one a fanatical anarchist assassin with a bit of black magic on her side.

Red Vendetta

And three more villains, two different forms of a genetically-engineered atomic kaiju and the cyber-psychic symbiote that partners with the second form.

Ettin-class Mega-Mutate (original and refit forms) & Intellect Alpha

The first one is definitely the fault of my campaign’s Number One mad science practitioner. Jury’s still out on whether he’s responsible for the symbiotes that came later. They also raise a minor rules glitch that could probably use a fix if there’s ever a revised second printing. To whit, this Tactician approach ability:

I’ll Back You Up (R) When a nearby ally makes an Attack, you may also Attack the same target by rolling your single Quality die.

The catch there is what happens when the Attack you’re reacting to has more than one target. Pretty clear that the reaction isn’t intended to let you hit every target of a multi-target Attack ability, but the wording isn’t quite strict enough. Rephrasing it is easy enough, but still ought to get done eventually:

I’ll Back You Up (R) When a nearby ally makes an Attack, you may also Attack one target of that Attack by rolling your single Quality die.

[Sea-Envy]

pretty sure Christopher has mentioned having a list of rules update/errata for when there is a 2nd printing. make sure you send that one in as a question on The Letters Page.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

I’ll do so. Not really a question, though - and there are probably some things that need attention more. Break the 4th Wall, for ex…sigh.

Anyhow, another work-for-hire villain, this one a trained pugilist who’d really like a good sparring partner. Hard to get a good workout with mundanes. Less of a sociopath than average, as supervillains go.

Southpaw

Bully/Predator is a surprising good combo for a boxer baddie. Nice Hinder synergies and they understandably work best against one foe at a time. This guy was intended to be a C-lister but I think he might be a B as long as he doesn’t get gang-tackled by the whole team.

[fjur]

Nifty. I especially like the kind-of Punch-Clock Villain thing he has going.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Southpaw’s still a pretty bad person - I mean, he didn’t have a problem playing along with the Mob by winning rigged fights, and probably would have taken that dive they wanted him to if his powers hadn’t manifested at the worst possible time - but he’s less greedy and/or sociopathic than many mercenary supers and mostly likes a good fight - as long as he doesn’t lose too often. Kind of used to winning bouts at this point, even if he knows a lot of them weren’t entirely honest.

Anyway, new villain today, this one a mutant warlord from a post-apocalyptic alternate future who’s brought his raider horde to our reality for some good old-fashioned pillaging.

Grand Marshal Grakko & His Blitz Company

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Ugh, my allergies are crippling me, this took way too long to finish up. New Mastermind/Domain villain, the former control program for a heroic “danger room” training facility turned into a sadistic “instructor” bent on “testing” heroes. Remember, “F” is for Fatal.

Professor Peril

Also includes its signature “Doom Room” environment, three associated minions, and a Mastermind/Inhibitor variant of the Professor for when they’re out on a “field trip” for one reason or another.

[Chief_Lackey_Rich]

Another villain, this one a flat-out monster of the type Nightmist usually deals with. Sadly, my multiverse doesn’t have a Nightmist…although I suppose that’s true of Sentinels these days too.

La Dama Sangre

This also marks a milestone for the blog. I started doing villains as an experiment to see if I could make one for every one of the 252 possible combination of Approach and Archetype. Lady Blood there is number 168, putting me two-thirds of the way done. Whether I’ll actually manage another 84 baddies is highly debatable, but I’ve gotten farther than I really expected I would.

[fjur]

I know I’m really late saying this, but I wanted to mention how it’s interesting that Grand Marshal Grakko is an Overlord villain lacking any ability to add minions to the scene, save for his upgrade. It certainly still works as a build.

Nice Job with Prof. P. The world needs more always-malfunctioning danger rooms/holodecks.