A Descent into Dullness

A new Thunderbolts unexpectedly out this week. And after last issues encounter with Jennifer Kale, the powers in charge of the program want Cage to recruit someone of a mystic nature. So Cage goes to his fellow Avenger, Stephen Strange, who sends him to his fellow Defender Damion Hellstrom, who sends them off to chat up his sister Satana, Daughter of the Devil. Oh and can I just say how dissapointing Dr. Strange's new look is? I mean, really, if you're going to ditch the classic Sorceror Supreme get-up why go with the now cliched battered trench coat? *sigh* I mean remember the cowboy/shitkicker one someone did? Such a wasted opportunity...

Also from Marvel a new Avengers Academy. Where Veil's activates Pym's mostly theoretical idea for bringing back the Wasp. And instead draws back Korvac. Aka the Guy Who Almost Conquered the Universe...

ps238 is one more closer to the end of its floppy run. And here Cecil, Secret Agent Kid, takes charge as he brings both the Zodon and VonFogg in an alternate universe and the Ron and Moonshadow lost in space plots together...

Darkwing Duck continues his team-up with Stealbeak and into the deepest secret lair of F.O.W.L. At the same time Morganna and Launchpad investigate signs that speak of the rise of Duckthulhu...

Tommy starts to understand some of the deeper purpose in the Unwritten from within the belly of the Metaphor That Swims Like a Whale. Now to just understand what he's meant to be doing with it...

And finally the relaunch of the Milestone book Xombi. And the book jumps right into things with only a couple expository infodumps to help catch up the unfamiliar. With the nanomachine empowered weirdness magnet David Kim being sent to investigate a possible break-out from a secret prison for the magically influenced...

Another heavy pull this week. Helped along by the start of the second Incognito mini-series by Brubaker & Phillips. Which I somehow managed to miss when it came out sometime in the last couple weeks. Which has Zack Overkill going from super-villain to office drone in Witness Protection to government agent...

Sadly Young Allies comes to an end with its 6th issue. Which concentrates on Firestar and guest start Emma Frost. Who, back when she was a bad guy, had recruited the teen-age Angelica to try and train her into being her personal assassin. Oh well, one less book from the Big Two cape lines to keep up with...

But the other young supers book from Marvel, Avengers Academy looks to doing well. This time around the focus moves to Reptil, who has just been made class leader. Not that he isn't just as mentally screwed up as the others...

And lastly from the House of Ideas for the week is the next Strange Tales II. A great cover here by Jaime Hernadez, which ties into the Space Phantom story he has in the issue. His brother Gilbert has an amusing Iron Man/Toro team-up short also. Jeffrey Brown's X-Men story is also a stand out. Though Paul Maybury's Spider-Man story with Peter Parker telling various people various lies to explain his super-hero injuries, which leads to Aunt May thinking Mary Jane is beating him, might be my favorite...

The new ps238 concentrates mostly on Zodon and Victor VonFogg's cross-dimensional caper. Though we do get to check in with Ron/Argonaut and Tyler/Moon Shadow in space a few times...

Invincible hits its 75th issue with the climax of the Viltumite War. With the Coalition Viltrumite's and their most powerful allies going after the remaining Viltrumite Empire leaders. Also some nice Science Dog and TechJacket back-ups...

G0dland briefly becomes D0gland with a look at Maxim's people. And lots of..er..look its all very crazy and Kirby-tastic and I'm really going to need to give this one another read or two to follow everything thats happening here...

The cover for Secret Six has Bane wearing crude armor, wielding a bone lance and riding a T-Rex/Allosaurus type dino. Do you need anything else to sell you on this?

And we finish up with the latest iZombie. Gwendolyn (zombie) does some grave digging, Horatio goes hunting (monster hunter), Scott (were-terrier) gets a date, Galatea(?) makes her debut and Ellie (ghost) bonds with a new friend...

Marvel Zomies V finishes up with a trip to the Marvel-"Real World"-Earth. Where only one comics nerd stands between humanity and the zombie apocalpyse. I do like artist Fernando Blanco's version of Howard here, looking more Warner Brother's duck than Disney...

Luke Cage's Thunderbolts team manages to survive their first mission and even take a prisoner. But no rest for the wicked as they take the Man-Thing Express to look for both a missing U.N. and S.H.I.E.L.D. team that went off-line while investigating a possible new source for Terrigen Mist. Thats the stuff the Inhumans use to mutate their people...

The Dynamo5 "Sins of the Father" mini-series continues, with three sons of an alien villain defeated by a group of Earth heroes arriving to avenge their dad's honor. Leaving it up to the kids of the original group (OmniMan, Captain Dynamo, Supreme, Doc Noble, Firebird & Dragon) to stop them. With the 5, Firebird 2 and Invincible arriving this issue...

And more legacy action as ps238 splits its focus between Atlas, Argonaut and Moonshadow on Atlas' homeworld and Julie/84 being drafted to try and mentor the governement's attempt at a fill-in for Atlas...

So this week we'll go with the request for Champions/Hero System. Which will give me a chance to use my new ps238: the Roleplaying Game book. Based on Aaron Williams' comic and written by long-time Champions scribe Steven S. Long. But what kind of character to make? The settign already has two patriotic themed kids, a "Son of Superman", a Green Lantern type, three genius kids, the non-powered Dark Avenger of the Night, a wise-cracking insect themed kid. Even a ninja. So whats left? Hmmm. One of the early comics, that was a back-up to some other comic has the principal seemingly dealing with a combo Wonder Woman/Over-achieving Mom type. Right, Right, Athena daughter of Lady Valiant. So perhaps this junior Amazon child? Sure...

Right so to start the book recomends going with a 150 point build. Thats a 100 points plus up to 50 points from Disadvantages. For the Hero System starting stats are all set at 10 (though the book mentions that for a kid character non-enhanced stats are more realisticly in the 5-8 range. Which is another way to juggle points. But those base characteristics are Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Body, Intelligence, Ego, Presence and Comlieness...

Ok, first off I'll lower her INT by 1 and her EGO by 3. Thats 1 point gained from INT and 6 from EGO. Next we bump all those physical stats to a nice 15. Which is pretty damned good for a 10-year old. STR is x1, BODY and CON x2 and DEX x3. So thats 40 points. And we'll raise PRE to 13 and COM 18. So she's charismatic and cute. PRE is x1 and COM is x1/2, for a mere 7 points. Leaving me with 59 of my base 100. And with stats that are impressive for a little-kid, but wouldn't be super-human really for an adult...

Next are secondary Characteristics; Physical Defense (STR/5), Energy Defense (CON/5), Speed (1+DEX/10), Recovery ((STR/5)+(CON/5)), Endurance (CONx2) and Stun (BODY+(STR/2)+(CON/2)). Everything rounds up or down, with a .5 rounding in favor of the character. EXCEPT for Speed which always rounds down. SPD also costs the most at x10 (mostly becuase it directly affects how many actions you can take a turn) so we'll bump it just 1. We'll raise PD and ED both up to 5 with both costing x1. REC is x2 and is fine at 6. END is at 30 and we'll give it a big boost to 50 at a cost of x1/2. And STUN, with a x1 cost we'll jump up 9 to 40. Thats a total cost of 35...

We can also figure Offensive Combat Value (DEX/3), Defensive Combat Value (DEX/3) and Ego Combat Value (EGO/3). The first two start at 5 and ECV is 3...

Next we have skills. Each has a base cost and a +1 cost. For the Platinum Shield we'll take Acrobatics (3/2) at +2, Breakfall (3/2), Combat Skill Levels (a 2-pt one, giving her a +1 OCV with the shield she gets her name from and the 8-pt one that will let her take a +1 OCV OR DCV with any attack) and lastly a 2-pt Weapon Familiarity (Common Melee Weapons) and 1-pt Weapon Familiarity (shields). Thats 23 points there. Hey, still 1 point left from the base. Neat...

This book has only a few Talents, but I wasn't really looking to load up on them. So we'll just grab Ambidexterity for 9 points...

Next we'll go with her one "power", that Platinum Shield. I'm thinking +10 PD/ED and Mental Defense. All hardened (making armor piercing attacks treat it like normal). Plus it gives a +2d6 Hand-to-Hand Attack. And it will have the Limitations of Obvious Inaccessible Focus (its strapped to her arm), Requires A Skill Roll and Only in Heroic Identity (its a magic shield that is a bracelet until she activates it). So thats 40 points +1/4 (Hardened)to 50 then -1 1/4 (OIF, Skill Roll, Heroic ID Only) to 22...

So right now Ms. Athena Reyh is at -30. All students at ps238 are expected to take Secret Identity as a Disadvantage, which is 15 points. We'll also give her Overbearing Mother as a Social Limitation, Very Frequently in Circumstance (Lady Valiant plans on doing a lot of volunteer PTA work) and Major in Effect. So thats a 25 point disadvantage. We'll also give her a Vulnerability. We'll say her mystic heritage is linked in some way to the Greek Pantheon, so any magics derived from the same do x1 1/2 damage to her. Normally this would be an Uncommon thing, but the Goddess Hestia is a student at ps238 so we'll up that to Common for a final 10 point disadvantage...

And we've got 20 points to spend again. With the background thing, we'll give Athena the Language: Greek skill at +4 for 5 points. And one of the mundane teachers has inspired Athena with a love for both poetry and rap, something she's hiding from her mom. She'll take a +2 Knowledge in both fields for 6 points. Then Knowledge: Greek History and Stealth for 5 points. And we'll dump the last 4 directly into PD which jumps it to a 9...

*looks at clock*

Well that took over an hour. I used to be able to do this in about 1/2 the time, but its been awhile since I mass-created Champions NPCs and PCs...

But there we go, one future warrior Amazon Super-Heroine. One who is likely to have a very explosive teen rebellion phase I think...

Pretty much anytime people ask for recomendations in the Supers genre of comics I try to point them towards Aaron Williams' ps238. And thats because its probably the best thing out there. Amusing, dramatic, fully developed characters and most of all FUN. Something that most Supers comics are sadly lacking. And yet I keep forgetting that Williams has been putting the comic up online as well. Starting with the back-up strips from the zero issue and moving onward from there. So anyone who hasn't checked out the comic yet, now is the perfect chance to see it for yourself...

FOR JUSTICE!