Some Venture Comics writer was clearly descended from a union family. 
4 Likes
The Randomizers:
Background 2, 2, 7 [Options: Criminal, Military, Law Enforcement, Tragic, Adventurer]
Power Source 9, 7, 7 [Options: Relic, Radiation, Alien, Cosmos, Extradimensional]
Archetype 4, 4, 6 [Options: Marksman, Close Quarters, Flyer, Robot/Cyborg, Minion-Maker]
Personality 6, 7, 5 [Options: Sarcastic, Distant, Stalwart, Stoic, Nurturing, Analytical]
Aquila
Real Name: Julius Calavius, First Appearance: Into the Green #161, August 1976
Background: Military, Power Source: Extradimensional, Archetype: Minion-Maker
Personality: Distant, Principles: Zealot, Tactician
Status Dice: Green d10, Yellow d8, Red d8. Health: 30 [Green 30-23, Yellow 22-12, Red 11-1]
Qualities: Conviction d10, Otherworldly Lore d10, Close Combat d8, Alertness d6, History d6, Child of the Legion d8
Powers: Infernal d12, Presence d8, Lightning Calculator d8
Green Abilities:
- Channel The Legion [A]: Boost yourself using Infernal. That bonus is persistent and exclusive. Damage dealt using that bonus is all Infernal.
- Summon The Legion [A]: Create a minion using Infernal. Reference the minion chart to see what size of minion it is. Choose which basic action it can perform. It acts on the start of your turn. You can only use this ability in a situation conducive to how you create minions.
- Formation Tactics [A]: Boost another hero or one of your minions using Presence. Either use your Max die, or use your Mid die and make that bonus persistent.
- Principle of the Zealot [A]: Overcome a situation that tests your faith and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
- Principle of the Tactician [A]: Overcome when you can flashback to how you prepared for this exact situation. Use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
Yellow Abilities:
- Legion’s Call [A]: Create a minion using Infernal. Use your Min die. Choose which basic action it can perform. It acts now and at the start of your turns.
- From Realms Beyond [A]: Attack multiple targets using Infernal. Then, take irreducible damage equal to the number of targets hit.
- For The Legion [R]: When you defeat a minion, roll that minion’s die and Boost yourself using that roll.
Red Abilities
- Protected from Beyond [R]: When you are Attacked, redirect the Attack to one of your nearby minions.
- Final Option [A]: Attack using Infernal and at least one bonus. Use your Max+Mid+Min dice. Destroy all of your bonuses, adding each of them to this Attack first, even if they are exclusive.
Out
- Boost an ally by rolling your single Red status die.
Minion Forms: Autonomous, Burrowing, Floating, Pack, Explosive, Reinforced, Harsh, Stealth, Swift, Champion, Hive-Mind, Turret
By midway through the Bronze Age, Greenheart had been active for long enough that many readers had forgotten that she had originally been introduced as an amnesiac; that aspect of her storyline had vanished during the Venture Trinity, replaced by more generic adventures about the fast-paced modern world, evil corporations who would be swiftly defeated, and technomagical foes such as Doctor Freak who were tried to steal power from the world. In 1976, however, a writer who had grown up on the Golden Age of Greenheart decided to reintroduce it in a big way with the appearance of Aquila, a Champion of True Rome.
Aquila first appeared as an antagonist, coming out of nowhere to attack Greenheart and swearing revenge for her ‘dark deeds’. Over the course of several issues, he came after her, armed with the power to summon a cohort of ghostly Roman legionnaires and a thirst for her defeat, complicated by his clear unwillingness to involve civilians, even those that were close to Greenheart. At the same time, the three-part miniseries Lost Empire delved into Aquila’s backstory, with the first issue showing his life in the hidden nation of True Rome, the second detailing the nation’s destruction at the hands of an enemy who looked suspiciously like Greenheart, and the third showing Aquila’s desperate attempts to save as many people as possible, ushering a few thousand shell-shocked refugees to a new home before setting out to ensure that the killer of his people was brought to justice.
In the end, what stopped Aquila’s attacks was when Greenheart, tracking him back towards his home, found a small group of refugees in danger from the local police and talked everyone down, saving their lives and preventing violence. When he saw that Greenheart was not who he believed her to be - an exile consumed by vengeance and dark magic - Aquila apologized to her, and swore to fight by her side until he had made up for the harm he had caused. Together, the two heroes sought to discover the mystery of who had truly attacked True Rome, and why Greenheart had no memory of a place that Aquila swore that she was from…
Behind the Scenes
This is a hero who is going to be slow to get going, but absolutely devastating if he’s allowed the time. He prefers to spend his first turn Boosting, and then he can use that persistent boost to make big minions to draw villainous attention. If he’s really feeling it, he can make his first minion do boosts, so that as soon as he hits Yellow he can sacrifice those boosts to make his minions get bonuses to their actions while letting them act immediately and using his persistent bonus to keep their die size up. On the other hand, if for whatever reason he doesn’t have time to build up, he can still fall back on strong Boosts in Green and powerful Infernal attacks in Yellow, plus a deadly final strike.
Narratively, Aquila exists because Greenheart hasn’t been getting a lot of love and I want to write more things about her, and timeline-wise I don’t want too many new comics popping up in the middle-to-late Bronze Age. So Greenheart gets a new sidekick/foil to bring back her tangled history, and things can get messy.
2 Likes
Greenheart’s (very loosely) positioned as a Wonder Woman type already, which makes messy backgrounds and retconned origins almost expected. Not quite up there with Wonder Girl or Power Girl, but Diana’s past has become pretty convoluted over the decades. 
And yeah, minion-makers are nasty if they get the opportunity to get their engine up and running and don’t have their minions cleaned out every turn or two. Even 3-4 minions in play at once is usually massive bad news for the villains, especially if the heroes include some good Boost support and/or defensive reactions.
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The Randomizers:
Background 3, 9, 2 [Options: Criminal, Performer, Academic, Tragic, Dynasty, Adventurer]
Power Source 3, 3, 1 [Options: Accident, Genetic, Experimentation, Nature, Cursed]
Archetype 2, 5, 8 [Options: Shadow, Blaster, Armored, Flyer, Robot/Cyborg, Transporter]
Personality 10, 1, 5 [Options: Lone Wolf, Sarcastic, Distant, Alluring, Stoic, Jovial]
Hyperstar
Real Name: Ash’lyy Harkur, First Appearance: Celestial Travels #467, January 1978
Background: Criminal, Power Source: Genetic, Archetype: Flyer
Personality: Jovial, Principles: Sidekick, Self-Preservation
Status Dice: Green d6, Yellow d8, Red d10. Health: 30 [Green 30-23, Yellow 22-12, Red 11-1]
Qualities: Persuasion d10, Close Combat d10, Deep Space Lore d8, Stealth d8, Fake It Till You Make It d8
Powers: Flight d10, Strength d8, Presence d8, Speed d8
Green Abilities:
- Heroic Lecture [A]: Attack using Persuasion. Other nearby heroes in the Yellow or Red zone Recover equal to your Min die.
- Show Off [A]: Attack a minion using Strength. Use whatever that minion rolls for its save as an Attack against another target of your choice.
- Book It [R]: When you are Attacked while Flying, you may Defend yourself by rolling your single Flight die.
- Principle of the Sidekick [A]: Overcome a challenge that has already flummoxed a more senior teammate and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
- Principle of Self-Preservation [A]: Overcome to get yourself out of immediate danger and use your Max die. Use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
Yellow Abilities:
- Nigh-Invulnerable [A]: Boost yourself using Strength, then either remove a penalty on yourself or Recover using your Min die.
- Flying Strike [A]: Attack multiple targets using Flight, using your Min die against each.
- Trip Up [A]: Hinder multiple targets using Speed. Apply your Min die to each of them.
Red Abilities
- Talk It Out [A]: Hinder using Persuasion. Use your Max+Min dice. Boost yourself or an ally with your Mid die.
- The Strong One [A]: Overcome using Strength in a situation that requires you to be more than humanly capable, like an extreme feat of strength or speed. Use your Max+Min dice. Boost all nearby allies with your Mid die
- Against Your Better Judgement [R]: When multiple nearby heroes are Attacked, you may take all the damage instead. If you do, roll your Flight die + Red zone die and Defend against the Attack by the total.
Out
- Defend an ally by rolling your single Persuasion die.
Over the course of 1978, Venture Comics’ desks collaborated to introduce a brand-new character as they built towards a planned series of shake-ups to the lines in the next year. Rather than being introduced in her own line, however, something a bit different was laid out.
Hyperstar appeared in Celestial Travels #467, in the middle of a storyline in which the Travellers were fighting Subjugator and her pirates on a small word not far from Earth. The heroine appeared out of nowhere, spouting moral parables and platitudes and solving every problem by charging head-first into it, and helped the Travellers save the day before asking if any of them knew the way to Earth. She then popped up two months later in Vanguards #234, arriving to help the Vanguards deal with a crashed alien spaceship filled with dangerous exotic creatures as part of a two-part storyline and informing them that she had been sent to Earth by a galactic congress to help keep it safe; although the planet was remote in the Galactic community, it seemed to be a hub for dimensional activity that needed additional protection. She gave them a way to contact her if needed, and flew away. During this appearance, she was noticeably showy, openly putting on a performance for the cameras.
Many readers were intensely suspicious of this new ‘hero’, but those suspicions turned to utter confusion when Hyperstar was the fifth member in the three-part Hidden Champions adventure from #98-100 over the course of June to August of the same year. When the world was threatened by Doctor Freak’s return, Wonderer’s magic called forth Madame Liberty, Flatfoot, Skybreaker… and Hyperstar. Even Hyperstar seemed to be taken aback to be fighting alongside three of the world’s veteran superheroes, and her usual mawkishness was replaced by uncertainty and more than a little bit of hero worship as she fought alongside them. The storyline also featured the first moment in which Hyperstar got into trouble, which resulted in her panicking and fleeing a key battle before returning at the last moment to save Flatfoot’s life.
By this point, readers really wanted to know what was up with this hero, and her three-part solo series, which began in September and coincided with her final two-parter of the year in the pages of Covert Tactics #199 and #200, pulled back the curtain just before everyone got annoyed and left.
The truth was that Hyperstar was an intergalactic con artist. Born with incredible strength, speed, and the ability to fly due to a mutation in her genetics, she had turned her capabilities to pretending to save the day, then accepting rewards for her ‘great deeds’. In Hyperstar #2, however, her plans went awry when an actual supervillain learned what she was up to and used one of her staged crimes as a backdrop for a real one, resulting in her arrest by Xur’tani peacekeepers and the reveal of her trickery. Hyperstar threw herself on the mercy of the court, and after some deliberation, the Xur’Tani court commuted her sentence, exiling her to Earth to serve out ten years of community service under the watchful eye of her new parole officer, the Steward! The Xur’Tani meant for this to be a chance at redemption for her, and a chance to offer support to their long-lost brother. Hyperstar was more than a little bit terrified of what it would mean to be a hero for real, but did actually intend to try to follow through; she had simply been working up the courage by meeting other heroes first, looking for situations in which she might ingratiate herself to Earth’s heroes without getting in too much trouble - a plan that had been completely undone by getting called in to deadly peril by the Wonderer, prompting her to seek out the Steward as originally intended.
Having finally and reluctantly rendevouzed with the Steward, Hyperstar revealed the truth of her situation to him, and he agreed to act as her mentor and teach her how to be a hero for real, not just as a cover. He tendered his resignation as a member of Covert Tactics, planning to start a new team to train the next generation of Earth’s heroes…
Behind the Scenes
Well, that ended up being a lot of backstory for a character!
I knew that the next few heroes were going to be “Steward’s new team”, but I wasn’t sure what “Steward’s new team” was going to look like. I’d had the idea for it to kick off with an alien mentee coming to Earth, and then I got Criminal as an option, and an old idea that I’d been kicking around but never finished snapped together.
So we get “petty criminal trying to pretend that they’re Superman” as our newest Venture hero, with the twist being that she really does want to be a hero, she’s just fighting her own nature to do it. It remains to be seen if she’ll become a true hero, or get scared off, but I’m leaning true hero because I like redemption stories.
Mechanically, I thought about making her Armored, but the qualities work a bit better with Flyer, and I do like the idea that she’s not actually all that invulnerable, just moderately strong. She also gets a third Red ability; she’s probably not using that “defend everyone” move in most action scenes, but it’s narratively very appropriate.
And of course, the look is somewhat familiar to readers of the comics pages, but just different enough to be legally distinct. It’s probably less of a parody in this setting, since neither “Superman” equivalent in the other comics is actually an alien, but it’s a costume very much designed to push the “all-American homespun hero” buttons.
3 Likes
Thematically, she reminds me a bit of Booster Gold - which is generally a Good Thing.
I’ve found that one can be surprisingly good when you habitually run with one other PC nearby - a “dynamic duo” if you will - while the rest of the team deals with other locations. If the enemy Attacks both of you the reaction can still go off (you’re nearby to yourself of course, and two PCs is still “multiple heroes”) and it lets one reaction do a solid job of covering for both of you.
It’s also worded so that if you use it early (with a twist, usually) in Yellow you still get your Red status die, so that’s a bit of extra versatility. Really funny if you have Resurrection too, which lets you tank a full-party hit and laugh it off no matter what, once per session.
2 Likes
Huh, didn’t think of that option. That might be up to the GM - I had assumed that “multiple nearby heroes” had to be in addition to you, because you aren’t nearby to yourself, but I can see the argument for the other direction and it definitely makes it more versatile.
(One thing that I do wish Sentinels did, and generally houserule when it comes up, is use “ally targets” more often. I assume the intent is to keep heroes from protecting their own minions, but as written heroes can’t jump in front of attacks aimed at civilians or bystanders with these abilities.)
The Randomizers:
Background 6, 5, 8 [Options: Academic, Upper Class, Struggling, Dynasty, Medical, Interstellar]
Power Source 9, 6, 6 [Options: Nature, Radiation, Artificial Being, Genius, Cosmos]
Archetype 8, 7, 8 [Options: Armored, Flyer, Wild Card, Form-Changer, Reality Shaper]
Personality 9, 3, 7 [Options: Impulsive, Stalwart, Inquisitive, Alluring, Nurturing, Cheerful]
Zeitgeist
Real Name: Dorvak vel Gathar, First Appearance: Earthwatch #1, February 1979
Background: Interstellar, Power Source: Cosmos, Archetype: Wild Card
Personality: Cheerful, Principles: Empath, Great Power
Status Dice: Green d10, Yellow d8, Red d8. Health: 32 [Green 32-25, Yellow 24-12, Red 11-1]
Qualities: Creativity d12, Banter d10, Finesse d8, Science d6, Earth Fanboy d8
Powers: Telepathy d10, Telekinesis d10, Presence d8, Intuition d6
Green Abilities:
- Multipurpose Activity [A]: Take any two different actions using Creativity, each using your Min die.
- Flash of Insight [R]: After rolling your dice pool for the turn, you may take 1 irreducible damage to reroll your entire pool.
- Principle of the Empath [A]: Overcome by attuning yourself to the feelings and desires of others and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
- Principle of Great Power [A]: Overcome a situation using one of your highest rated powers and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
Yellow Abilities:
- Precision Targeting [A]: Attack using Telekinesis. Boost all nearby heroes taking Attack or Overcome actions using your Mid die until your next turn.
- Psychic Bombardment [A]: Boost or Hinder using Telepathy and apply that mod to multiple close targets.
- Actual Bombardment [A]: Attack multiple targets using Telekinesis. If you roll doubles, one nearby ally is also hit with the Attack.
- Sincerest Form of Flattery [A]: Use a Green action ability of a nearby ally (using the same size power/quality die they would use.)
Red Abilities
- Creative Solutions [A]: Overcome using Creativity. Use your Max+Min dice. Hinder all nearby opponents with your Mid die.
- Role Reversal (I): At the start of your turn, change any penalty into a bonus.
Out
- Boost an ally by rolling your single Telepathy die.
Launched in February 1979, Earthwatch was a new series designed to help fill in holes in the schedule left by the merger of Fearless Flatfoot and Fly Boy and the incorporation of Fallout’s cast and stories into Covert Tactics. The series covered the Steward, growing older and worrying about the future, as he shepherded three new cosmic superheroes in preparation for becoming Earth’s new team of space-age defenders! Hyperstar had already been introduced as his first student, and the first issue introduced both of the others, beginning with Zeitgeist.
Dorvak vel Gathar was a member of the Kanturi people, whose small colony had been saved a few years before by the Celestial Travellers. Most of the Kanturi were mildly psychic, but Dorvak had been exposed to ruptures in space-time that enhanced his abilities to an incredible degree, leaving him unable to function among his people. Hoping to harness his powerful abilities, Dorvak was sent to Earth, whose people were all naturally somewhat psychically resistant compared to his own and where he could get by with only mild headaches from swirls of thought and sensation. He quickly became enamoured of the planet’s incredible diversity of art, entertainment, and emotion, dedicating himself to protecting it against threats from across the dimensions!
Zeitgeist was an unpredictable element among the members of Earthwatch, largely due to his poorly-controlled psychic powers. While he was generally safe from accidentally reading the mind of a single person, he would often find himself imprinting on the emotions or interests of crowds, getting swept up and becoming a sports fan, a voracious theatregoer, or even a competitive birdwatcher! This occasionally led to trouble on missions as well; terrified populaces could leave him briefly frozen in fear, and when the team was fighting an invasion of furious Uranians, he was overwhelmed with rage and nearly killed them all. It was a constant struggle to control and learn the limits of his powers, which the Steward helped him to direct for the good of the planet he was growing to love.
Behind the Scenes
Spoiler:
Fun fact - there are three different Marvel characters named Zeitgeist, all of whom are dead and none of whom made it more than four issues using the codename. Hopefully this one will last longer!
I like the idea of a psychic whose psychic problem is that they get controlled, rather than being prone to controlling others, and that’s the bulk of where Zeitgeist comes from. He’s not fully in control, fitting a team of heroes who are learning to be heroes; unlike Hyperstar, who has the powers and needs to develop the instincts and skills, he has the instincts but his powers are a problem. We’ll see how our third and final member completes this pattern!
And in keeping with that weakness, we have another new principle for our psychic buddy. It reads as follows:
Principle of the Empath
During Roleplaying: You are attuned to the psychic field of your surroundings, and can always get a feel for the surface thoughts and emotions of groups of people.
Minor Twist: How is your behaviour being affected by your surroundings?
Major Twist: How have you become overwhelmed by the feelings around you?
Principle of the Empath [A]: Overcome by attuning yourself to the feelings and desires of others and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
3 Likes
I’m pretty sure one of the few podcasts dealing with RPG Q&A stuff said you are nearby yourself (but not your own ally) by default, but it’s been a while and C&A’s answers on those have been less than wholly consistent over time.
If you can’t cover yourself that way the reaction is even more suicidal than it already is, since A) you’ll probably be caught in the multi-target villain Attack yourself anyway (since you’re nearby the other hero(es) involved) and B) you’ve only got Red zone Health to work with. It’s hard enough surviving tanking for two, when it’s three+ heroes you’re probably KO’d without some other trick (Resurrection, double damage reduction, e/e damage inversion, etc.) up your sleeves.
Yeah, there are a lot of strange variations in wording that I’m not at all convinced are entirely intentional. IIRC there are only four hero defensive reactions that explicitly mention allies instead of heroes, and all but one is in the Red zone. There’s more “ally” dice-fixer reactions, but usually you have to use Defend actions to cover NPCs from damage. The generic “Hit the Deck!” reaction is a basic Defend done as a reaction so that can cover NPCs as well, but the Minor twists will add up after a while.
I think the one from X-Statix got a “Get Out of Death” pass after being Darth Mauled, but he might have died again since. There might even have been four of them depending on how you count the one in the Adorable X-Babies Mojoverse story.
Honestly surprising there’s no WW2 Nazi supervillain using the supranym, really.
Think that should be 32/24/11 for brackets.
1 Like
Y’know, I never really registered on the fact that ability works with almost all Principles as well - I think Speed is the only non-Action one. Haven’t had a Wild Card in any of my groups in ages.
With your whole team nearby you become a super-versatile Principled Overcome machine in Yellow. Lot more impressive that most other Green choices when weighed against your other Yellow options.
Also one of those “ally” abilities, which comes in handy once in a while if any nearby friendly minions or lieutenants have a suitable action ability to crib.
That’s a good point, and you’ve convinced me!
I suspect the reason is that WW2 heroes and villains tended to be a lot less abstract in their naming structures. You didn’t want a villain with a name that wasn’t immediately obvious to young folks.
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Actual Golden Age supranyms were pretty basic, granted - even outliers like Dynamite Thor and Armless Tiger Man were at least puzzling enough to attract attention. But there are a fair number of supposedly WW2-era supers that were invented long afterward and retconned into existence, and they might use more abstracted supranyms or ones with more actual German in them. Marvel’s Baron von Blitzschlag ("Lightning Strike/Bolt) for ex - he was invented as a replacement for Arnim Zola in a modern story. There’s also Der Metzger (“the Butcher”) who didn’t appear until 2008, two different Zyklons (“Cyclone”), the DC one being a speedster created in 1985 and the Marvel version being a gas-spewing West Coast Avenger foe. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
I’m halfway surprised everyone’s favorite Nazi made of bees (ie Swarm) isn’t named “Bienenschwarm” but I guess they didn’t have a dictionary handy when he was introduced in Champions way back when. Worth noting that there seems to be an marked increase in German (and Japanese - the Italians get overlooked as usual) Axis villain names since the internet made translating them easier - albeit not always accurately.
2 Likes
The Randomizers:
Background 6, 3, 3 [Options: Performer, Upper Class, Tragic, Medical]
Power Source 9, 8, 5 [Options: Mystical, Powered Suit, Radiation, Cursed, Alien, Extradimensional]
Archetype 5, 7, 4 [Options: Marksman, Blaster, Armored, Elemental Manipulator, Sorcerer, Psychic]
Personality 3, 3, 3 [Options: Impulsive, Distant, Analytical]
Ember
Real Name: Indira Seth, First Appearance: (as Ember) Earthwatch #1, February 1979
Background: Medical, Power Source: Alien, Archetype: Sorcerer
Personality: Impulsive, Principles: Lab, Inner Demon
Status Dice: Green d6, Yellow d8, Red d8. Health: 28 [Green 28-22, Yellow 21-11, Red 10-1]
Qualities: Science d10, Medicine d8, Self-Discipline d8, Magical Lore d8, Persuasion d6, Heir to the Flame d8
Powers: Fire d12, Intuition d8, Suggestion d8, Inventions d8
Green Abilities:
- Enflame Emotion [A]: Hinder using Suggestion. Use your Max die. If you roll doubles, also Attack using your Mid die.
- Flame Lash [A]: Attack multiple targets using Fire, applying your Min die against each.
- Principle of the Lab [A]: Overcome while in a familiar workspace or when you have ample research time. Use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
- Principle of the Inner Demon [A]: Tap into your dark psyche to Overcome a problem and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
Yellow Abilities:
- Purifying Flames [A]: Boost, Hinder, Defend, or Attack using Fire. You and all nearby heroes in the Yellow or Red zone Recover Health equal to your Min die.
- Overwhelming Passion [A]: Destroy one d6 or d8 minion. Roll that minion’s die as an Attack against another target.
- Impossible Evasion [R]: When you are Attacked at close range, Defend yourself by rolling your single Intuition die.
Red Abilities
- Gateway to the Undying Flame [A]: Use Fire to create a number of d6 minions equal to your Mid die. Choose the one same basic action that they each perform. They all act at the start of your turn.
- Inferno [A]: Attack up to three targets, one of which must be you, using Fire. Assign your Min, Mid, and Max dice as you choose among those targets.
- Burning Bright (I): If you would take Fire damage, ignore that damage and Recover that amount instead. Use the value of the damage to Boost yourself.
Out
- The hero who goes directly after you may take 1 damage to reroll their dice pool.
No one stays dead in comics, but after the events of Dimensional Devastation it was three years before Ignition would re-appear. In Vanguards #155, the Vanguards discovered her in a small dimension adjacent to the Jotari layers, overcome by the flames within her and seeking to spread her fire by any means possible. Ignition would continue to appear over the next several years, half-possessed by the Empress of Ash and struggling against the fire within herself, trying to find a place where she could burn freely but doing damage as she did. Sometimes she would be together enough to act as an ally of the Vanguards, but her power always got away from her and threatened to cause new disasters.
Finally, in Vanguards #225 in June of 1977, Nucleon enacted a dangerous plan to siphon off much of Ignition’s fire, using it to repair the boundaries between worlds and keep the Empress of Ash at bay. During the ensuing confrontation, Fission was able to reach Indira, convincing her to let her power go. In the aftermath, fire still guttering within her and afraid of the potential outcome, Indira remanded herself into custody in a government facility to try to learn to control her powers and pay for her crimes. It was a year and a half later that she returned, in Earthwatch #1. Indira had been a model prisoner, but the researchers studying her were no closer to controlling her powers than when they had started. When the Steward offered to lend a hand, they reluctantly accepted, remanding her into the custody of Earthwatch as the heroine Ember.
As the fourth member of the team, Indira was a complex and driven figure. The flames within her pushed her to action, and she often was already leaping into the fray before any of the others even knew the details of a problem. The fires spoke to her, although it was unclear if this was the lingering influence of the Empress or her own half-burned psyche calling on her to burn the world. But although she was not the most stable teammate, she fought to make the world a better place, to make up for the damage she had caused in the past, and to make her new mentor proud of her actions.
Behind the Scenes
Technically we’ve had a few reformed villains, but this is the first one who had a decent amount of time as their villainous self before flipping! Ignition was much too compelling to leave on the shelf, but we’ll see if she can stay a hero, or if the comics reversion to mean is going to burn her up.
While she’s very fire-focused, Ember remains much more of a sorcerer than an elemental herself, making use of her abstract abilities around flame as much as her literal uses of it. She can use Fire with Science to create devices, with Magical Lore to work it directly, or even with Medicine to burn the harm out of people. Medical is a bit of a stretch; she was originally written as being primarily an engineer, but she’s so focused on people and how they work that I figured it could fit.
2 Likes
Maybe she picked it up while in custody? The researchers studying her powers must have included some medical specialists, and learning a new field might have been helpful distraction for her while also letting her make some of her own suggestions about what was going on with her own physiology. She was already pretty sharp with all those Info qualities, so likely a quick study.
2 Likes
I love it! Yeah, that’s canon now.
2 Likes
Is Vulnerable Point an editing error or is that an ability you’ve added to that power source / archetype?
Whoops, that is an editing error.
I had started to build Ember as a Blaster before changing my mind; I thought I had deleted everything, but one slipped through, and I didn’t notice because I briefly forgot that Alien doesn’t give a Green ability so she should only have two.
Ahhh, that’s super cool that she gets to be a hero! 
1 Like
Wow, thats a pretty dark character from marvel. Zyklon B is the gas used in the gaschambers of the holocaust…
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Yes, well aware. They also have at least one major villain named Holocaust.
The Randomizers:
Background 3, 5, 8 [Options: Performer, Academic, Struggling, Unremarkable, Dynasty, Adventurer]
Power Source 3, 6, 2 [Options: Training, Genetic, Mystical, Nature, Powered Suit, Radiation]
Archetype 4, 7, 7 [Options: Marksman, Armored, Sorcerer, Minion-Maker, Gadgeteer]
Personality 2, 9, 5 [Options: Natural Leader, Sarcastic, Stalwart, Inquisitive, Stoic, Decisive]
The Penitent (II)
Real Name: Susannah van Horne, First Appearance: Penance #2, Oct 1981
Background: Academic, Power Source: Mystical, Archetype: Gadgeteer
Personality: Sarcastic, Principles: Mastery, Amnesia
Status Dice: Green d8, Yellow d8, Red d8. Health: 28 [Green 28-22, Yellow 21-11, Red 10-1]
Qualities: Magical Lore d12, History d10, Investigation d8, Leadership d8, Criminal Underworld d6, Scion of Wealth and Power d8
Powers: Awareness d10, Gadgets d10, Presence d8, Teleportation d6
Green Abilities:
- Drain Essence [A]: Hinder using Gadgets. Use your Max die, or use your Mid die and make it persistent and exclusive.
- The Arcane Eye [A]: Boost using Awareness. Use your Max die, or use your Mid die and make it persistent and exclusive.
- Principle of Mastery [A]: Overcome in a situation that uses your powers in a new way and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
- Principle of Ambition [A]: Overcome a situation where a completely fresh perspective is useful and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
Yellow Abilities:
- See The Path [A]: Overcome an environmental challenge using Awareness. Use your Max die. Either remove any penalty in the scene or Boost equal to your Mid die.
- Arcane Armoury [A]: Boost yourself using Gadgets. Use your Max+Min dice. Then Attack using your Mid die with that bonus.
- Intervene [R]: When another hero in the Yellow or Red zone would take damage, you may redirect it to yourself and Defend against it by rolling your single Presence die.
Red Abilities
- Twist The Hours [A]: Boost another hero using Awareness. If that hero has already acted for the turn, use your Max die, and that hero loses Health equal to your Min die. That hero acts next in the turn order.
- Break Relic [A]: Attack multiple nearby targets using Gadgets. Use your Max+Mid dice. Take a minor twist.
- Sealing Ritual [A]: Remove a bonus on a target. Hinder that target using Magical Lore. Use your Max die, and that penalty is persistent and exclusive.
Out
- Hinder an opponent by rolling your single Magical Lore die.
The final hero introduced in the Bronze Age was something of a bait and switch. In late 1981, a new limited series, Penance, created a revised origin and backstory for the Golden Age hero known as the Penitent. His name was revealed to have been August van Horne, having taken the van Horne name upon marrying into the wealthy and powerful family. August was a mystic and a scholar, enamoured with learning the occult secrets of the world, but upon learning that his family secretly worshipped the Sovereign of Silence, he had attempted to flee with his baby, but had been caught and trapped between worlds. As the Penitent, he emerged to fight the scions of wealth and power who were summoning dangers into the world, caught in a twilight world.
Susannah was then introduced in Penance #2 as a child growing up in the 1960s. Her mother Jamila tried to keep her away from the family legacy, but Susannah was visited in her dreams by her grandmother Emilia, who taught her spellcraft and led her to the van Horne family’s secret caches of arcane might. Her brother George, meanwhile, was the favoured son, beloved by her father and prone to entitlement; he and Susannah loved each other, but clashed frequently.
All of this came to a head in Issue #3, when Susannah learned of the Sovereign of Silence and her family’s role in its power, as well as the role her own spellcasting had played in laying waste to the van Horne’s enemies. Over the course of the final issues of Penance, Susannah set herself against her family, seeking to break the hold the Sovereign held over them. In the final issue, her grandfather returned from the Dark to help her, as her grandmother attempted to stop her from breaking the family legacy, and her mother sacrificed herself to save her from George’s attempt to kill her to preserve the family legacy.
In the end, Susannah’s family was dead. She was scarred by the experience, and declared herself the new Penitent, seeking to use her ill-gotten fortune to save others who were trapped as she was. In 1983, she joined the Wonderer, Dawn Rider, and Prometheus in the new series World of Wonders, as they sought to investigate the latest magical problems besetting the world.
Behind the Scenes
I was originally leaning towards a straight Penitent reboot, but the idea of a granddaughter of both Penitent and Scion popped up at the last second, and it leads very well into my thoughts for the end of the Bronze Age, so we get Susannah instead! There aren’t any reboots of Silver Age heroes in the Bronze Age, which isn’t a huge surprise, so we are left with a total of 31 more-or-less active heroes right now. I suspect a lot of them will wind down or get rebooted in the Iron Age.
Susannah is a dangerous willworker, someone who assembles a lot of magical artifacts of her own design and then deploys them. I expect that she and Veilwalker would have a lot of interesting conversations, especially since they’re both dealing with evil family members.
And with that, we are done all of our Bronze Age heroes, and by extension all of our Phase I heroes. A few observations:
I was able to keep things mostly fairly even. Out of the Backgrounds, only five options only showed up once, and nothing appeared four times. For Power Sources, two didn’t show up (more on that below), four showed up once, and two showed up four times. For Archetypes, once again two didn’t show up, five showed up once, and only one didn’t show, and for Personalities there were only two I didn’t take and none that showed up four times. I also mostly kept to unique Principles, with only two Principles showing up four times and one showing up three times (fifteen Principles showed up twice, but there are a lot of heroes and each of them needs two!)
The biggest takeaway is that, using the Guided Method, you will never see Higher Power, Multiverse, Divided, or Modular. It’s nearly impossible. Even with my revised Backgrounds and selection method, only three out of twenty Backgrounds even have the potential, and each of them only gives you a 3% shot at Higher Power and a 1% shot at Multiverse. Of the Power Sources, only two (Relic and Supernatural) allow for a chance at Divided or Modular, with the same chance of showing up.
This is much less of a problem for Backgrounds and Power Sources; getting the 19 or 20 result is still rare, but they definitely showed up (heck, I got Created twice.) I didn’t pick Arrogant when it was an option, so I missed that boat, and I didn’t take Mischievous because each time that it showed up it was on a hero who already had enough health that it wasn’t giving any mechanical advantage to make up for its low dice. Even with my revisions.
Mischievous is rough.
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Is that a homebrew? It’s like a weird mix of Combustion and Unload, which are arguably the best heroic multi-target Attack abilities in the game.
“I hated Thanksgiving dinner, didn’t you?”
“Tell me about it. My brother reanimated the turkey one year.”
Yeah, with Divided and Modular I can kind of see making them super-rare so newbies don’t have to deal with them, but there’s no reason for the Power Source ones. And Form-Changer and Minion-Maker are arguably complex Archetypes as well, but not as rare.
We pretty much quit using Guided right away except as inspiration, and when we did we used decks of cards instead of dice so the odds of any given result coming up were even. If I want to randomly generate a hero I’d rather play Villains & Vigilantes, honestly.
Real toss-up between which is worse, Mischievous or Impulsive. They’re both pretty awful and for no good reason. Even the 6/6/12 Personalities are more justifiable for giving you maxed Red status Health without using your Retcon.