really loving the meta stuff here 
1 Like
The Randomizers:
Background 10, 1, 3 [Options: Blank Slate, Performer, Military, Unremarkable, Dynasty, Medical]
Power Source 8, 2, 7 [Options: Training, Relic, Powered Suit, Radiation, Tech Upgrades, Genius]
Archetype 1, 7, 7 [Options: Speedster, Armored, Flyer, Minion-Maker, Gadgeteer]
Personality 9, 3, 10 [Options: Impulsive, Inquisitive, Alluring, Nurturing, Analytical, Jaded]
Kynetic
Real Name: Joe Samson (?), First Appearance: Rogue Agents #1, Oct 1990
Background: Blank Slate, Power Source: Tech Upgrades, Archetype: Armored
Personality: Analytical, Principles: Split, Indestructible
Status Dice: Green d10, Yellow d8, Red d8. Health: 28 [Green 28-22, Yellow 21-11, Red 10-1]
Qualities: Close Combat d10, Acrobatics d10, Investigation d8, Imposing d8, Military Machine d8
Powers: Swinging d10, Gadgets d8, Awareness d8, Vitality d8
Green Abilities:
- Subcutaneous Plating (I): Reduce any physical or energy damage you take by 1 while you are in the Green zone, 2 while in the Yellow zone, and 3 while in the Red zone.
- Grab and Pull [A]: Attack using Swinging. Defend another target with your Min die.
- Surprise Attack [A]: Attack using Acrobatics. Ignore all penalties on this Attack, ignore any Defend actions, and it cannot be affected by Reactions.
- Richochet [R]: When you would be dealt damage, you may deal damage to a
- nearby target equal to the amount reduced by your Armored ability.
- Attack Cables [A]: Attack a target using Swinging. Hinder that target with your Min die.
- Principle of the Split [A]: Overcome a situation that benefits from having a completely new outlook and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
- Principle of the Indestructible [A]: Overcome in a situation where you charge headlong into danger and use your Max die. You and each of your allies gain a hero point.
Yellow Abilities:
- Agile Combatant [A]: Attack multiple targets using Swinging, using your Min die against each.
- Recalibrate [A]: Boost yourself using Awareness. Then, either remove a penalty on yourself or Recover using your Min die.
Red Abilities
- Wrap It Up [A]: Attack using Swinging. Use your Max die. Then, Hinder that target using your Mid+Min dice.
- Tough Customer [R]: When an opponent Attacks, you may become the target of that Attack and Defend by rolling your single Close Combat die.
Out
- Remove a bonus or penalty of your choice.
The agent that Guardian Industries sent after Matrixx was a hyper-skilled combat cyborg codenamed Kynetic. Equipped with a pair of prehensile tendrils that extended from his arms, Kynetic was a nigh-indestructible, relentless combat machine that successfully tracked Matrixx based not on her digital footprint, which she had easily scrubbed, but by physically following her locations. However, Guardian made a critical error. Desperate to recover the data Matrixx now possessed, they instructed Kynetic to take her alive.
The cyborg captured Matrixx easily, but during the fight she was able to remotely access his mission briefings, discovering that he was a human being whose conditioning was overriding his reluctance to attack an innocent woman. Successfully hacking his systems, she freed him of the conditioning Guardian had placed on him, leading him to rebel against his corporate overlords and join her in her search to take them down.
Kynetic had no memories of his life before becoming a robot. He had identification claiming that he was war veteran Joe Samson, but he had no proof that Samson had ever existed; any information about him beyond his birth certificate had been purged from government databases, and his recorded parents were long dead. As he and Matrixx sought to learn the truth about the Omega Protocols, he also searched for hints about his old life.
Kynetic was equipped with OVERSIGHT, an artificial and possibly sentient combat system that offered advice and tactical suggestions. OVERSIGHT was loyal to Kynetic, not to Guardian, but had little compunction about suggesting lethal force against opponents; in a few situations in which Kynetic was incapacitated, OVERSIGHT was able to control his body to get him to safety, which occasionally resulted in dead Guardian agents.
Behind the Scenes
Did anyone else out there watch The Zeta Project? Because this is definitely inspired by The Zeta Project. With more than a dash of Omega Red in the mix.
I like how Kynetic and Matrixx interact, and boy are they X-TREME! A hacker and a super-solider on the run from the government and an evil corporation, with a murderbot in the soldier’s head egging him on? Good times. I don’t know if they’re going to appear after the 90s are over, other than as minor cameos.
2 Likes
Always nice to see a character whose abilities use Swinging a lot. Too much Spider-Man during my childhood, no doubt.
Y’know, I never noticed Split and Amnesia have nearly identical Overcome conditions. Swap “new outlook” with “fresh perspective is useful” and they’re the same sentence. And they’re both Identity Principles to boot. Ah well, at least the twists and during RP parts are different.
They’re certainly spelled like 90s characters. Could have sworn Image had a “Kinetik” 30 years back as well, but the only one I see is the correctly spelled Kinetic from Invincible, and another from a DC miniseries.
1 Like
Yeah, there are a few Principles that have nearly identical wording. I figure that Split is meant to be “an outlook from your other half”, whereas Amnesia is meant to be “a perspective that’s not burdened with pre-existing assumptions”.
And also: yes! One small problem with Sentinel Comics powers is that certain powers tend to be marginal enough that they don’t get picked often, especially in the Mobility field. Like, I can’t remember the last time I gave someone Leaping rather than either Strength or Agility.
They’re still useful for flavour purposes, but they don’t come out to play a lot.
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hell yes, this is getting properly xtreme, and you can tell because his name is spelled with edgy letters!
2 Likes
Could be a suddenly-manifesting bit of past knowledge too, which would help differentiate it further from Spotless Mind - which is yet another Identity Principle.
Flight and Teleport tend to be the big winners there, although I’ve seen Leaping paired with Strength or Inventions (jump jets) pretty often. Leaping and Wall-Crawling are a solid combo, and Spidey completes the trifecta with Swinging or Inventions or Hallmark Weapon (web shooters), but in practical terms that’s a lot of powers to sink into one overall schtick that’s still trumped by Flight a lot of the time.
You could house rule to give powers or qualities that aren’t chosen much due to relative lack of versatility a die size bump or something, of course. Doubt it would break the game.
Yeah, that’s the trick.
Because if I were going to build Spider-Man, I need to give him Wall-Crawling, but I’d probably give him Signature Weapon (Web-Shooters) to reflect his swinging, and use his Strength and Agility for his jumping. He still needs Awareness for his spider-senses, after all, and Strength, Agility, Wall-Crawling, Awareness, and Web-Shooters is five powers to add to Banter, Acrobatics, Ranged Combat and Science for his Qualities (bolstered by "Investigative Photographer as an RP trait.)
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I might go Inventions over Signature Weapon so I can use it for the web-shooters and the spidey-trackers and the belt-light-logo and whatever other random thing he’s cobbled together for an issue, but if so I’d drop Ranged combat for Technology to reflect the egghead-science-nerd side of things (and use it for actually hitting things at range with the webs). Unfortunately the Reds for Hallmark and Technological aren’t great thematic fits for webs, but Info has a couple of good ones.
But yeah, he calls for some multipurpose “bundling” of effects under one power.
1 Like
Randomizers:
Approach: 7, 8, 5 [Options: Bully, Focused, Mastermind, Tactician, Creator, Adaptive*]*
Archetype: 1, 1, 2 [Options: Predator, Inventor, Bruiser, Domain*]*
Upgrade: 6, 7, 10 [Options: Power Upgrade II, Quality Upgrade I, Calming Aura*]*
Mastery: 4, 6, 3 [Options: Conquest, Enforced Order, Mercenary*]*
Shadowspear
Real Name: Sgàthach an Eilean Sgitheanach, First Appearance: (Silver Age) Skybreaker Stories #35, April 1961. (Iron Age) Spectacular Skybreaker #6, May 1985.
Approach: Tactician, Archetype: Domain
Upgrade: Power Upgrade II, Mastery: Enforced Order
Status Dice: Based on environment minions, lieutenants, and/or challenges. 3+: d10, 1-2: d8. None: d6. Health: 50+5H (Upgraded 70+5H)
Qualities: Magical Lore d10, Leadership d8, Conviction d6, Warrior Demigod d8
Powers: Presence d8, Shadow d8, Awareness d6, Agility d6
Abilities:
- Master of Shadows [A]: Boost using Magical Lore and use your Max die. That bonus applies to every ally’s action until the beginning of your next turn.
- Challenge of the Gods [A]: Activate one of the environment’s twists in its current zone or one zone closer to red.
- Realm of Shades (I): Ignore damage from an environment source during the environment turn.
- Focus On Your Mission [R]: When Attacked, redirect the Attack to an environment minion.
- Increase Difficulty [R]: Take 1 irreducible damage to reroll an ally’s dice pool.
- (U) Full Attention (I): Increase your Presence and Shadow to d10 and your Awareness and Agility to d8.
- (U) Master of Enforced Order (I): If you have complete control over your immediate surroundings, automatically succeed in an Overcome to organize rabble to accomplish a task.
Common Scene Elements:
- A deadly environment primed to test the heroes’ mettle.
- Shadow Actors. D8 minions who cannot be targeted until they take direct action against the heroes, or until the heroes complete an Overcome to sort them out from civilians.
- A Complex Challenge. The actual situation that Shadowspear demands the heroes solve, with serious penalties the longer it persists.
Along with Skybreaker’s new status quo was a new slate of enemies. His old Fomorian foes continued to appear, but Garrett wanted villains who would lean into the hero’s conflicted nature. Her first choice, introduced at the end of the first story arc of the comic, was Shadowspear.
Shadowspear had technically appeared three times through the 1960s, as Spearmaiden Scathach. There, she had been an imperious and seemingly all-powerful warrior queen, a confused blend of Cu Culainn’s teacher and the war goddess known as the Morrigan, who summoned Skybreaker to her Castle of Shadows to put him through tests designed to prove his heroic nature. She hadn’t proved popular, and had soon faded into obscurity.
Garrett changed that. Under her tenure, Scathach came back with a vengeance, a shadow-commanding fury intent on punishing Skybreaker for abandoning the world when he was needed most, and forcing him to make terrible decisions with the goal of making him abandon his civilian life and take up the mantle of hero once and for all. Her powerful fae magic could reshape the world, throwing buildings or entire neighbourhoods into chaos and unleashing threats which she could direct and command to attack the things that Skybreaker cared about, all with the goal of pushing him to his limit. Shadowspear wanted Skybreaker to win. She did not consider herself his enemy. But she did consider his friends and career to be acceptable losses if that was what it would take to toughen him up, and while she didn’t intend to break him in the process, it was not entirely clear that she would recognize a limit when she reached it. The only people she did not target were Rhonda and Seamus, Skybreaker’s son, perhaps recognizing that losing them would, indeed, break him.
Shadowspear did not remain confined to Skybreaker for long, either. Through him, she attacked the Champions of Truth, challenging their beliefs and ideals in the hopes of ‘forging them into stronger heroes’. She faced off against Covert Tactics, and even made an appearance in Broken Mirrors, nearly preventing the Drifter from saving a world in which the Golden Age Skybreaker had fallen to the Fomorians.
Behind the Scenes
Venture Comics finally gets their own “surprise, it’s time for challenges” character, but rather than a Fun And Whimsy cosmic imp she is the harsh taskmaster who is going to grind you into the dirt, but you’ll definitely thank her later she’s sure.
Shadowspear is actually loosely based on a character from an old anime I watched as a teen, “Flame of Recca”, which was… in retrospect, it wasn’t a great anime, but it was moderately fun. But it did feature a mentor who was deliberately throwing horrible dangers at the leads because she wanted to train them to overcome those dangers so that they’d be ready to fight the real threat. Combine with Cu Chulainn’s classic mythological teacher (which I also have a historical soft spot for, having first encountered her in high school as well under the auspices of the sidhe House Scathach in Changeling: the Dreaming) and we have a real nightmare and a half.
Tacticians don’t get wonderful dice, but Domain doesn’t need them, so we’re good! Shadowspear mostly alternates between creating new environment problems, and powering up the problems that already exist, with a side order of being almost impossible to fight directly. Between that and her health pool, trying to solve an action scene she’s in by punching her is likely to end up running out the clock. Better to play her game.
2 Likes
Yeah, that’s a good pairing. Tactician benefits from the usual Domain durability, Domain gets some solid ability options for times when they aren’t fiddling with environment twists.
1 Like
Randomizers:
Approach: 4, 3, 8 [Options: Prideful, Underpowered, Focused, Mastermind, Generalist, Tactician]
Archetype: 1, 1, 2 [Options: Predator, Inventor, Bruiser, Domain]
Upgrade: 11, 7, 9 [Options: Quality Upgrade I, Defense Shield, Power Dampening]
Mastery: 4, 10, 3 [Options: Conquest, Enforced Order, Total Chaos]
X-Caliber
Real Name: Baron Lance Carmichael, First Appearance: Knightgrave #3, Oct 1985
Approach: Prideful, Archetype: Bruiser
Upgrade: Defense Shield, Mastery: Conquest
Status Dice: Green d6, Yellow d8, Red d10 (use health chart.) Health: 45+5H
Qualities: Close Combat d10, Imposing d10, Alertness d8, History d8, Manners Maketh Man d8
Powers: Power Suit d10, Gringolet (Signature Vehicle) d10, Presence d10, Intuition d8
Abilities:
- Duelist [A]: Attack one target using Close Combat. Use your Max+Min dice. Defend against all Attacks against you by all other targets until the start of your next turn with your Mid die.
- Joust [A]: Attack using Gringolet and use your Max die. Either Hinder that
- target with your Mid die or Attack another nearby target with your Mid die.
- The Thrill of Battle [R]: When Attacked, use the amount of damage taken by the Attack to Boost yourself.
- Steel Frame (I): Reduce all damage dealt to you by 2.
- (U) Energy Shield (I): You cannot be damaged by anyone except yourself until the energy shield is destroyed. The shield has 40 Health, or can be deactivated with three Overcome successes. If a hero takes a minor twist working on the shield, you can make an Attack as a reaction by rolling your single Power Suit die.
- (U) Restore Shield [A]: Overcome using Power Suit. Use your Max die. On a success, remove one success from the deactivating challenge. Alternatively, instead of an Overcome, use the Max die to Recover that much of the defense shield’s Health. This ability cannot be used if the defense shield has been completely removed.
- (U) Master of Conquest (I): As long as you are in command of your own forces, automatically succeed at an Overcome involving seizing an area or capturing civilians.
Common Scene Elements:
- Neo-Knights. H/2 D8 lieutenants riding robo-stallions. The first time they would fail a damage save, they are unhorsed instead, applying a -1 persistent Hinder instead of taking damage.
- Footmen. D8 minions who deal +1 damage as long as they are in close combat alongside a knight or X-Caliber.
- An urban environment with twists and challenges suitable for a hunt.
While Knightgrave had battles with criminal gangs, monstrous foes, and a long storyline through 1987-88 in which a powerless, drunk and depressed Merlin showed up on his doorstep asking for sanctuary from the many, many demons who were after him, none of his foes throughout the Iron Age proved more popular than X-Calibur, Lord of the Modern Round Table!
Baron Lance Carmichael was a British aristocrat whose family claimed to be descended from King Arthur himself. Mordred found the claim laughable, but Carmichael took it extremely seriously, believing that this made him the rightful heir to the throne of England. He schemed for the crown, using his family wealth to design robotic jet-horses, electro-blades, and vibrational armor that he would use to equip a new Round Table and conquer the nation. When he heard rumors of a mysterious knight with a magic sword on the streets of London, Carmichael became convinced that King Arthur had returned to hand Excalibur to his descendents, and began producing the weapons he had designed.
To say that he was not happy to learn that Knightgrave was, in fact, the Traitor Knight Mordred would be an understatement.
Carmichael declared war. He dedicated himself to removing this stain on his supposed family line, hoping to claim Clarent from the undead knight and usher in a new era of power over the world. Although he was a vicious and brutal fighter, Carmichael was also determinedly polite and proper, hounding Knightgrave through the city when he could find him but refusing to strike him from surprise. His inability to put Knightgrave to eternal rest only drove him into further frenzy, and he dedicated himself to Knightgrave’s removal.
In addition to his battles with Knightgrave, Carmichael briefly became a foe of Covert Tactics after lending his mechanical genius to the Dread Dynasty; this alliance foundered with the Dynasts discovered that he did not, despite his dreams, have any powers of his own and turned on him, valuing their supremacist ideology more than his money and technology.
Behind the Scenes
About the only thing that I knew going into this was that I didn’t just want to revive someone else from Camelot as Knightgrave’s primary foe. I’d been leaning towards some variation on a holy monster hunter who wanted to put Knightgrave down, but I didn’t get any masteries that met it - and then I thought, “cyber-knight on a robo-horse with a small army of would-be Camelot lovers” and here we are.
X-Caliber is an extremely direct opponent. He charges at his enemies, and he hits them, and he doesn’t stop until they drop. This makes him pretty dangerous, especially in a duel, but not really a match for an enemy who won’t play fair. If I were going to fight him one on one as Knightgrave, I’d play keep-away, Boosting myself and then dropping Hinders on him while I power up and play the environment against him, in preparation for a truly nonsense attack when he finally batters me down to Red.
3 Likes
Dig the concept, and the falling out with the Dread Dynasty bigots is pretty hilarious, but he’s Wanna-Be King Arthur, right? So why did he name his robo-steed Gringolet? That’s Gawain’s ride, and nobody wants to be Gawain, at least in the later works where he winds up getting his reputation smeared by the writers and ultimately dying at the hands that intolerable ponce Lancelot.
Arthur’s warhorse was Hengroen. I owe this knowledge entirely to the old Samurai Cat books and the fact that Robert E. Lee’s horse was named Traveller, spelled just like the RPG. Long story, with an absurdist joke at the heart of it.
Also a very minor mechanical suggestion:
By making their ability a mandatory triggered effect the first time they’d have their die stepped down, you eliminate the technically legal and very silly loophole of having them fall off their robo-horse repeatedly. A GM would have to be deliberately trolling to even think to do that, but the change idiot-proofs things. 
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The short answer to the robo-horse’s name is that X-Caliber is a weird hodgepodge of roles who kind of wants to be all the knights. That’s why his name is Lance rather than Artie, for example. I expect that in the comics, his various high-tech weapons are named after weapons belonging multiple Round Table knights.
The slightly more behind the scenes answer is that when I was looking up horses, I discovered that Arthur’s horses only have names in the Welsh version of the epics, and this guy seemed too English to give his horse a Welsh name. Gringolet was the only horse I could find that was named in the English epics.
Good idea on the reframe, I’ll make a revision
1 Like
Good grief, what an overachiever.
2 Likes
Randomizers:
Approach: 2, 6, 3 [Options: Skilled, Prideful, Bully, Disruptive, Mastermind, Specialized]
Archetype: 6, 3, 3 [Options: Bruiser, Overlord, Loner, Fragile]
Upgrade: 8, 7, 11 [Options: Quality Upgrade I, Quality Upgrade II, Power Dampening Field]
Mastery: 7, 1, 10 [Options: Annihilation, Mysticism, Total Chaos]
Bog Body
Real Name: Lost to Time, First Appearance: Twilight Carnival #22, Sep 1986
Approach: Skilled, Archetype: Fragile
Upgrade: Quality Upgrade, Mastery: Total Chaos
Status Dice: Green d10, Yellow d8, Red d6. Health: 10+5H
Qualities: Close Combat d10, History d10, Stealth d8, Imposing d8, Magical Lore d8, Victims’ Memories d8
Powers: Toxic d10, Wall-Crawling d8, Intuition d6
Abilities:
- Erosion [A]: Attack using Close Combat. Then remove all bonuses from the target.
- Quick Recovery [A]: Take any basic action using your Max die. Recover Health equal to your Mid die.
- Splatter [R]: When Attacked, Defend yourself by rolling your single status die. If the damage is reduced to 0, you may move to anywhere else in the scene.
- Slippery Character (I): When you gain a penalty, reduce the size of that penalty by 1.
- (U) Quality Upgrade (I): Increase Close Combat and History to d12, and Stealth, Imposing, and Magical Lore to d10.
- (U) Master of Total Chaos (I): If you are in a situation where everything is spiraling out of control, automatically succeed in an Overcome to accomplish a task by throwing out the rules.
Common Scene Elements:
- The Body. Bog Body can project from its current victim while still controlling them. The victim is a D8 lieutenant who gets +2 to damage saves as long as Bog Body is active and who can use their reaction to redirect a physical attack from Bog Body to themselves. If Bog Body is defeated, the victim passes out or dies, depending on whether Bog Body has consumed them yet.
- Boglings. D6 minions scattered by Bog Body. When they deal damage, they Boost themselves equal to the damage dealt.
- A Shadowy Area. An environment reflecting a quiet area full of distractions and a handful of civilians.
While some of the foes faced by the Twilight Carnival were dangerous because of their goals, and others were threats because of their powers, the most terrible threat that the team faced didn’t come from their most powerful foe, but from their most malignant.
An ancient sorcerer who lived thousands of years ago, the Bog Body’s exact identity was never revealed in the pages of Venture Comics. All that was known about them is that they were captured and executed by drowning in a bog in Denmark, and that their body was exhumed in the mid-80s by a team of archaeologists and sent to Atlanta, where the soul still bound within it oozed out of its body and possessed one of the museum researchers before striking out on its own.
The Bog Body soon crossed the Twilight Carnival’s path outside a small town in northern Georgia, and was attracted to the magic flowing from their circus. It attended the circus, then stalked and possessed a young man, Derrick Randall, who Dawn Rider and her team had saved from witch hunters all the way back in Issue #8, and who was in the early stages of a love triangle with Ophelia and Frank.
The possession left the Bog Body’s previous host a withered husk. Investigating the murder, the team became aware that Derrick was acting strangely, but not before the Bog Body began to shed tiny versions of itself, sowing chaos in the community. In the ensuing battle, the Body Body was seemingly reduced to a smear of slime… but it had already devoured Derrick, and he died in Ophelia’s arms.
The incident scarred Ophelia, and the return of the Bog Body six issues later did not make things any easier. The creature was seemingly impervious to death, even from Dawn Rider’s soul knives, and continued to appear periodically to stalk the carnival. Each time, Ophelia searched for a way to stop it for good, and each time some fragment escaped to kill again. The situation finally culminated in 1993, in Twilight Carnival #100, when Ophelia, at the urging of the voices in her knives, learned a spell that would shackle the soul of the Bog Body, tearing it to shreds and trapping the remnants in a soul knife for all eternity. The decision was met with shock by her teammates, who feared what the effects of such a spell might be on its caster…
Behind the Scenes
We’ve got it all!
We’ve got a tar-monster that oozes out of people’s eyes. We’ve got a brutal murder of a loved one. We’ve got a hero being pushed to commit a terrible sin, and unknown repercussions. This villain started as “hey, it’s kind of neat to have a Fragile character who can quickly and easily heal, I wonder where it goes from there” and it turned out that it goes to very, very bad places.
The Bog Body has one of the lowest Health scores possible for a villain, but a solid defensive reaction, resistance to Hinders, and powerful healing mean you really can’t let up against it - and since it can quickly run away, you might not have a choice. Action scenes are probably mostly about stopping it as it checks off Overcomes by oozing into new people and leaving boglings behind, and it is going to have a body count.
2 Likes
Creepy all around. The very low base Health and limited offensive output makes it one of the relatively rare villains that a lone hero or pair could face off against safely, letting you build around the Bog Body and an environment, or a mix of its signature henchies. Not a big threat to the hero(es) but it can spend its time doing Quick Recovery Overcomes and healing itself, putting civilians at risk regularly.
Why am I not surprised that at least some of the soul knives know how to make more of themselves?
1 Like
What a fantastic idea 
2 Likes
Randomizers:
Approach: 1, 3, 4 [Options: Relentless, Prideful, Underpowered, Bully, Focused]
Archetype: 8, 2, 4 [Options: Inventor, Guerilla, Inhibitor, Squad, Legion]
Upgrade: 4, 11, 1 [Options: Mook Squad, Villainous Vehicle, Power Dampening Field]
Mastery: 12, 2, 10 [Options: Behind the Curtain, Superiority, Malice]
Onryo
Real Name: Nagako Sato, First Appearance: Into the Green #288, March 1987
Approach: Relentless, Archetype: Legion
Upgrade: Mook Squad, Mastery: Malice
Status Dice: 9+ minions: d4. 5-8 minions: d6. 3-4 minions: d8. 1-2 minions: d10. No minions: d12. Health: 15+5H
Qualities: Acrobatics d10, Stealth d8, Alertness d6, Terrifying Leader d8
Powers: Agility d10, Intuition d8, Teleportation d6
Abilities:
- Deploy Ninja [A]: Add two minions of size equal to one die size lower than your current status.
- Poisoned Shuriken [A]: Attack and Hinder using Acrobatics. If the target has a D6 or less status die, use your Max+Min dice; a D8 status die, use your Max die; larger than a D8, use your Mid die.
- Flank [R]: When one of your allies Attacks an opponent, roll your single Stealth die and add that amount of damage to the Attack.
- Kawarimi (I): Whenever a Legion minion larger than D4 rolls a save against physical or energy damage, if its save is successful, it splits into two dice of one smaller size instead of being reduced a die size, and you take 1 irreducible damage. If it fails its save, the minion is only reduced one die size, rather than being destroyed.
- Inverse Ninja Law (I): Whenever multiple Legion minions all take the same action against the same target, you must roll all of their dice at the same time and use the lowest rolling die amongst them for each minion’s result on that action.
- (U) Call the Clan [A]: Replenish your Legion minions up to the number of heroes.
- (U) Master of Malice (I): When you take an action to demonstrate or indulge in cruelty, automatically succeed at an Overcome to inflict pain or fear.
Common Scene Elements:
- Elite Iwanesaku Ninja. When these D10 lieutenants Attack, they also Hinder using the final damage dealt as their roll.
- Front. An environment containing criminal enterprises behind a civilian facade, with both innocents and criminals in the area.
- Rival Targets. D8 environment lieutenants that Onryo is targeting for assassination; they are not cooperative and will panic or try to fight Onryo’s forces.
By the late 1980s, Japan was the new big thing in American comics, and Venture Comics was not immune. A few minor stories taking place in Japan had already occurred in the pages of Covert Tactics, many of them taking advantage of the team’s established Japanese-American member, and a few Japanese monsters had appeared in the pages of Twilight Carnival, but one thing had yet to appear - an order of ninja. After some deliberation, a new storyline was launched in the pages of Into the Green, whose writer liked the idea of a clash between ancient Roman and classical Japanese traditions playing out across its pages.
Nagako Sato (properly Sato Nagako, but the writers at the time didn’t think American audiences would ‘get’ the family name coming before the given name) was the wife of a prominent Japanese politician and businessman who was working tirelessly to reform political and business corruption. This drew the attention of the local Yakuza, who bombed his car, killing him and badly injuring Nagako. On the verge of death, she was offered a chance at vengeance - against the men who had killed her husband, the system that had allowed it to happen, and a world that pretended that malice and cruelty were not the bedrock of society. Lost and grieving, she accepted without hesitation.
Nagako was trained as an elite ninja of the Iwanesaku, a secretive clan of ninja dating back a thousand years. The clan drew its members entirely from those who had been affected by tragedies and horrors, reshaping them into an intensely loyal and vicious organization that would destabilize the pillars of power. While they were based in Japan, the Iwanesaku recruited from around the world, with outposts hidden in dozens of countries. They acted subtly, lacking the power to direct events but having the capability to influence them towards destruction.
The Iwanesaku first appeared in Into the Green #288, when their agents attacked the survivors of the True Roman Empire. Aquila called on Greenheart for aid when several magical icons of the Romans were taken, and she ended up following them to Japan, setting off a two-year period in which she clashed repeatedly with the ninja clan, undermining their efforts and preventing them from securing divine powers like hers. In the process she met and fought Onryo, finding that she sympathized with her foe’s desire for vengeance, but not her willingness to kill anyone in her path to get it. Although the storyline ultimately ended with Greenheart recovering the icons and dealing a terrible blow to the Clan, Onryo escaped the destruction of her compound, and would return occasionally to seek vengeance, or simply when her path and Greenheart’s crossed. She would also make appearances later in both Spectacular Skybreaker and Covert Tactics, seeking other sources of might for the clan.
Behind the Scenes
There’s a lot of “what does the Iron Age need” in these stories, and an angry murderous ninja clan is right up there. Venture is actually a little behind here; Marvel started doing things with the Hand in 1981, and DC had the League of Assassins taken over by a Japanese villain in 1980. But better late than never!
The idea of a Legion villain representing how ninja just always seem to get weaker the more of them are on the page at once was very tempting to me when it popped up, and everything else kind of went from there. Eagle-eyed readers will note that I slightly powered up the inherent minion-splitting power in much the same way that I powered up the defensive reaction with Poison Pen. I refuse to apologize.
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FWIW, comics were seeing ninjas in small numbers well back into the 1970s thanks to the martial arts craze. In Sentinels Black Fist is a primo example of the real-world Blaxploitation martial arts flicks that (along with waves of dubbed Hong Kong imports) led to comics imitating the fad. There was definitely “ninja awareness” in some books (Shang Chi, Master of Kung Fu being a good example from 1973-74) even if the writers were offensively inept at differentiating various Asian cultures from each other.
So you could easily drop ninjas in the previous decade, but they wouldn’t have been as grim as Miller’s Hand or the 80’s version of the League of Assassins - and they’d have been just as likely to be Chinese or some nebulous “generic Asian” thing as Japanese.
Very cute way to model a very common trope.
It needs it, I think. Too easy to access E/E damage with simple risky actions or Overcomes for it to work reliably. Even expanded to physical and E/E types most heroes will still be able to produce Attacks that bypasses the defensive tech pretty regularly, scaring them off with Intimidate or Presence, tricking them into disabling themselves with some galling Banter or fancy Acrobatics like Jackie Chan or just plain drugging them unconscious with Toxic or Medicine.
Legion’s got some issues with the way it works, in part because it was written way too much with Proletariat in mind.
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Randomizers:
Approach: 1, 6, 2 [Options: Relentless, Skilled, Prideful, Disruptive, Focused, Mastermind]
Archetype: 7, 2, 3 [Options: Inventor, Bruiser, Indomitable, Formidable, Loner, Squad]
Upgrade: 6, 11, 8 [Options: Power Upgrade I, Quality Upgrade I, Power Dampening Field]
Mastery: 9, 11, 3 [Options: Conquest, Superiority, Unfathomable]
Jimmy Hix
Real Name: Jaime Rojas, First Appearance: Company Town (Vol. 2) #1, May 1988
Approach: Focused, Archetype: Loner
Upgrade: Power Dampening Field, Mastery: Superiority
Status Dice: No other villains d10, 1-2 other villains d8, 3+ other villains d6. Health: 25+5H (Upgraded 35+5H)
Qualities: Finesse d10, Alertness d8, Smooth Criminal d8
Powers: Intuition d12, Presence d8
Abilities:
- Unlucky Break [A]: Attack one target using Intuition. Use your Max die. That target cannot Defend or use reactions against this Attack. Attack multiple other nearby targets using your Min die.
- Smooth Recovery [A]: Hinder multiple targets using Intuition. Recover Health equal to the number of targets Hindered this way.
- Send a Message [A]: Hinder one target using Presence. Use your Max die. Attack that target using your Mid die.
- Convenient Sidestep [R]: Defend against an Attack against only you by rolling your single Intuition die. Boost yourself by the damage reduced.
- The Brush-Off [R]: When you would be Hindered or when an Attack would reduce you to 0 Health, reduce the penalty to -1 or reduce that damage to 1.
- (U) Zone of Chaos (I): While the scene is in the Green zone, all heroes’ power dice at d8 or above are reduced one size. In the Yellow zone, all heroes’ power dice at d10 or above are reduced two die sizes. In the Red zone, all heroes’ power dice are treated as if they are d4. Heroes may remove this ability with three Overcome successes. If a hero takes a minor twist, the hero must lose access to a power entirely until this ability is removed.
- (U) The Luckiest Man Alive (I): As long as you are manifesting effects related to a power you have at d12, automatically succeed at an Overcome involving usage of those powers.
Common Scene Elements:
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The Table. Despite preferring to work alone, Jimmy Hix is often sent out with one or more other villains. These include:
- Little Joe, a hulking Relentless Bruiser who prefers to get his hands dirty
- Boxcars, an invisible but Fragile Ninja who remains mission-focused
- The no-nonsense Bully Inhibitor Square Harriet, whose gaze paralyses foes.
- Shooters. Risk-taking small-time crooks. D6 minions who get +1 to even rolls and -1 to odd rolls.
- Unfriendly Neighborhood. An environment with civilians to place in the line of fire, crumbling infrastructure to collapse, and corrupt cops to wade in on Jimmy Hix’s side.
While the defeat of Hank Ferris was her ultimate goal, Paradox’s primary foes in the early days of Company Town were the Table, a collection of super-powered mobsters that the industrialist had assembled as deniable assets and which, Salma knew, he would use in the future as subjects for his genetic experiments. The most dangerous member of the Table to her was Jimmy Hix.
In Salma’s future, Jimmy Hix was an older man, the undisputed leader of the Table and Hank Ferris’s right hand. In Company Town #1, he led the chase against her, easily guessing her whereabouts and cutting off her escape; if she hadn’t time-jumped, he would have captured her. He would continue to appear in flash-forwards as a cool, confident, and utterly merciless fixer and enforcer, taking out anyone who threatened the system he supported.
In the present, however, Jimmy Hix was a brand-new member of the gang, easy-going and laid back, relying on his powers to do the work for him. And those powers were substantial. Jimmy Hix was lucky. Impossibly, overwhelmingly lucky. No matter what was going on, the world twisted itself to ensure that everything would work out positively for him. He didn’t always get what he wanted, but he’d never suffered a setback in his life and he barely understood what it felt like to get hurt. Complete insulation from the consequences of his actions had left him without much empathy or patience for others, and a petty mean streak had led him into the world of organized crime. His powers shielded him even from other superhumans, causing their abilities to become unpredictable and dangerous around him.
As Paradox tried to prevent Ferris from gaining hold of the city, she inadvertently removed several Table agents that were between Jimmy Hix and the reins of power. She also became the first person to defeat him, which led him to become fascinated by her strange abilities and determined to beat her once and for all. Jimmy’s insistence on treating their battles as a game, no matter who won or how many people got hurt, infuriated Paradox, and she had no patience for Jimmy’s one-sided amusement at her struggles or even his own setbacks. For his part, though, Jimmy Hix wasn’t worried. Things would work out for him in the end.
They always did.
Behind the Scenes
I could have set up another super-scientist or rebooted Hank Ferris again for Paradox, but I wanted someone new, and a craps-themed gang of supervillains seemed right. I like the idea of a Focused character who’s just so, so, annoyingly lucky. He is the worst. Everything’s fun and games because he’s never going to lose an eye.
This is our second villain who likes their nemesis a hell of lot more than their nemesis likes him, but unlike Mary Molotov and Skybreaker, Jimmy Hix doesn’t have a romantic interest in Paradox, and if she actually went away he wouldn’t go after her. He just finds the interplay fun and he’s somewhere between a hedonist and a nihilist, so he doesn’t care what happens as long as he’s okay. I don’t know if there’s ever a storyline in which Paradox actually gets to him, but there might be. Even luck can only carry you so far, after all.
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