The Immortals

Episode 36 - Iconoclasts

2007-07-02T18:14:00.000-07:00

The battles were joined.
Marduk vs Enlil - the Other Immortals versus the Genies (It seemed appropriate)
At first things seemed to be going well. Marduk surprised Enlil with his enhanced powers, thanks to a power boost from Ea. The Immortals acted quickly to take out the Marid (the genie healer) and gained a quick advantage. One after another the Immortals took down the Genies. The Djinni, first, then the Ifrit. Only the Dao could not be brought down.
But then things turned on the team.
First Marduk was grievously wounded and dying on the battlefield.
Then DragonFly, Banshee and Mystery Man get knocked unconscious.
Phoenix manages to get Marduk to safety.
Marduk then has a strange vision as he is dying. Ea, with a little help form Dr. Heimholtz, invoked Paul Simon calling him to seek out Friends and Lovers.
He awakes and sees Phoenix, an old Friend, and thinks about Phoenix's former Lover, Tiamat, holder of the Tablets of Fate (which she took from him before). Phoenix grudgingly took leave of his friend and sought out Tiamat on the shores of Somalia (a short jaunt for him). He was able to alert her to his presence by tapping out the tune Jumping Jack Flash on a set of desalination pipe. This does bring her to him, and he agrees to owe her a favor in return for the Tablets. He returns to Iraq with the Tables (in the form of a small conch shell). Marduk uses the Tablets to determine that Enlil will fail his mission.

"And so it passed, Enlil's plot was foiled, and the power behind it would disappear."

Meanwhile Phoenix goes to rescue his teammates. DragonFly was found injured but alive under some rubble, Phoenix quickly got him to a US military hospital.
To find Banshee and Mystery Man he had to consult with Ea. Straining to get an image, Ea directed Phoenix to the union of two great waters. Reasoning that the two waters were the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, he traveled the short distance to site. There was the Dao standing over the bound, unpowered, and unconscious forms of Banshee and Mystery Man. Phoenix, an unstoppable force, versus the Dao, an immovable object. Blow after blow from the Phoenix failed to do anything to the mountain of magical earth. He wasn't able to hurt the Dao directly, but by timing his attacks he was beginning to find 'cracks' in the defenses. Still it would take too long he needed another tactic.
Meanwhile, Marduk dragged himself from Nippur to Babylon (borrowing Lancaster's Humvee) and found himself walking into the reforged gates of the ancient city. There high upon another ziggurat stood Enlil mocking him from above. Marduk poured himself into a single arrow and aimed it at the God atop the stairs. He aim was off, the shot had barely enough force to reach Enlil. It bounced off him and fell to the ground harmlessly. He looked incredulously at the arrow and down at Marduk.
Back at the river junction Phoenix tried reasoning with the Dao, and the creature seemed without concern or interested other than serving his master. Acting on a hunch, Phoenix raced back to the castle base in Nippur and found the four objects which bound the genies to Enlil. He commanded the Genies to free his friends, and leave. The Dao did his bidding without comments. For now the Immortals were free.
Epilogue:
Weeks later the team finds James Allen in a Baghdad hospital, without powers, and unable to consider returning to Freedom City or the vicinity. He speaks of staying in Iraq, pursuing his studies for real, and of serving these people, his people.

Episode 35 - Before the Deluge

2007-06-20T18:13:00.000-07:00

The Immortals managed to defeat the Genies, but the battle was not over. Mystery Man had gotten Ea (Enki, Dr. Heimholtz) to safety and the doctor warned him not to let the team face Enlil, fearing he was too powerful. Once sure he was okay Mystery Man returned to Lancaster's home.
Meanwhile back at the estate, the team faced the Sandstorm and decided to take the fight inside Lancaster's home. They were able to get in fairly quickly, but not before Enlil managed to zap both Phoenix and Marduk with bolts of lightning.
The team discovered the office of Lancaster with some Cuneiform tablets and computers showing seismic and bathymetric data of a site roughly a thousand miles south in the Arabian Sea. They piled the stuff back to their inn, and following Ea's advice they split up to find Anu.

Ea and Mystery Man discovered a mystical castle where the ruins of an ancient Ziggurat should be. Mystery Man accepts this on faith, since he sees only the ruins.
Phoenix and Banshee notice a highly stepped up presence of Military and Paramilitary (Cromwell Industries) personnel as though they were on alert, when they heard of the castle, they quickly, but casually make their way up there.
Marduk and Dragonfly find the rug merchant who recognizes Marduk's armor. They banter a bit, and Marduk asks about Anu. The rug merchant points behind him. There stands the little girl he met earlier. She offers little in the way of answers, and if anything is more cryptic than the other two.

The team plus Ea and Anu assemble at the gate of the Ziggurat, but most of the people saw only ruins hidden behind the hurricane fencing. Slowly they all began to see the great gaudy gold and jeweled palace. No windows and no other doors, just one big locked one. DragonFly pushed his shrinking and was able to enter the lock of the big door, and using his 'vocational learning' was able to unlock the big door. The team entered and found themselves in a large hall with an enormous throne at one end covered in ancient glyphs. Dr. Heimholtz's curiosity got the best of him, and he went to read the inscriptions. As soon as he touched the throne he disappeared.
There was some dicussion about wht to do next. Phoenix did a quick search of the building, which was complicated by a vast series of deadend and useless corridors. Marduk and Anu discussed Marduk's intentions. Did he come to claim the throne, to start a war or what? Marduk said he would take the throne. And he did. He did not disappear. He demanded the return of Ea, and his wish appeared to be granted as the doctor reappeared.
The team made its way upstairs and discovered a temple room with a strange altar connected to a bank of computers and monitors. Anu says that there is a star in the altar. Ea says it is time for he and Anu to bestow their powers on Marduk. He removed his amulet, and asked Anu to imbue it with her power. She asked Marduk if that is also his wish. He said yes, and so she did. The amulet grew and took the shape of a large lens. And seconds later all hell breaks loose. A rocket of fire and energy launches from the lens and blasts through the roof of the castle. "Heimholtz" says "That went better than I expected" but seemed to have lost his German accent. Before they could respond, Enlil (in the shape of Heimholtz) teleported away with Anu. Marduk summoned his mighty sword in hopes of destroying the lens. His attack is partially successful. His mighty blade damages the lens, but the point of impact becomes a 'leak' in the energy stream and a cone of explosive force knocks everyone in its path against the wall and into unconsciousness. The main thrust of the energy flies in a parabolic arc southward to the Arabian Sea where it boils away the water.
Phoenix searches the castle for Anu and find her, as well as Ea and Enlil. He rescues Anu returning her to the altar room, then goes to explore the rest of the castle, including another locked door. He permeates through the locked door, and finds himself in a cylindrical room, after a momet inside high winds begin which rapidly turn into tornado winds. When the team goes to rescue Ea, but Enlil sends him to join Phoenix in the whirlwind dungeon.
The team spends precious time rescuing the various people, and discovers that the effects of the blast are beginning to be noticed by the satellite systems. The damage has already begun.
Above them they saw Enlil playing with the USAF jets sending their missiles flying and swatting at the jets as they try to fly past.
It seems clear that they can't just destroy the lens. But now the real Heimholtz offers Marduk his power, which he gladly takes. Anu says that she can send the star away, once Marduk releases it from its prison. She warns that after he releases the star he will be in no shape to deal with Enlil. The team girds itself for a fight with Enlil before they can deal with the Star Beam.

Episode 34 - The Gods Must Be Crazy

2007-06-13T16:26:00.000-07:00

Some time has passed since the last adventure. Phoenix (formerly Jack Flash) has learned of his new abilities, in particular the ability to generate flames around his body by vibrating his molecules at super human speeds. Hephaestus and Ormand packed up and set sail for a sea journey of unspecified distance and duration. Hephaestus indicated he would leave his suit behind, just to avoid the temptation to use it drunk. Marduk finished up the semester and finals and found himself talking with Dr. Heimholtz as the later prepared his things for a journey of his own. He told Allen (Marduk) to get packing as the two of them we leaving for Iraq shortly. Mystery Man and Banshee acclimated to the environs of the Academy and began to work with the team to develop some secret maneuvers (to be determined later). Banshee also spent some time on the lab working up Jack's (Phoenix's) DNA to determine what changed during his resurrection.
A couple weeks later, Drs. James (Marduk) Allen and Hans (Ea) Heimholtz arrived in Baghdad and traveled to the site of the ancient seat of power, Nippur. This was now a relatively quiet suburb of Baghdad. The explored the city for sometime but never doing the sorts of things one would do to establish a dig. There was no bargaining for supplies, no arranging with the local authorities, it was different. Finally Heimholtz just sort of shrugged his shoulders in frustration and admitted he had brought Marduk here, because he felt summoned. He was sure it was for a 'summit' of the Gods, and yet no one had come for them. As if on cue, a Bentley pulled up and Lord Ewan Lancaster, of the British Museum greeted them. He invited them into his car and drove them to his estate outside of town. He too seemed interested in the events transpiring and suggested that the Gods might be trying to recreate the story of a great deluge sent to destroy mankind (which Marduk prevented in mythology). There was much talk of the three suggesting that Heimholtz (Ea) and Lancaster were two, and there was some mysterious third. The way the conversation went, Marduk was led to believe the Third was Enlil a vengeful and cruel god, so presumably Lancaster was Anu.

They returned to the town, and shortly thereafter encountered a strange phenomenon in a hidden courtyard. Rising up from a fountain, a strange blue genie like form appeared and attacked them. It was no match for Marduk, so cowardly it attacked Heimholtz. He was stricken paralyzed and dehydrated. Marduk rushed to help him. Holding him in the water seemed to help him. Whiled holding him the Genie (Marid) escaped. He was also visited by a young Iraqi girl who seemed to believe he was baptizing the old man. She disappeared in the crowd, and when Marduk abandoned his charge to follow her, he lost her several times. When he did catch up to her, she was gazing up into the sky, there he saw a US helicopter plummeting to the Earth. He leaped into its path and managed to cushion its fall allowing the crew to escape with only minor injuries, but leaving him unconscious under the mighty wreck. When he returned to the fountain, the girl and Dr. Heimholtz were gone.
He contacted the Team and let them know his situation. They decided to join him, and called in a favor with the gov't to fly out.
Once the team assembled they decided to visit Lancaster again, and hope to learn something. Marduk asked a contact in the reserves to help him out, and once again a helicopter arrived to shuttle the team to Lancaster's villa. They had to be dropped off outside the compound, because technically, the army considered that area British.
When the team entered the compound they were greeted by Lancaster who wasted few words before confessing that he too was a God, and not Anu, but rather Enlil. He summoned his four genies before the Immortals: Djinni (air), Ifrit (fire), Dao (earth) and the Marid (water) encountered before. Phoenix went into Plan A, and ensnared Lancaster. Then general brawl broke out. Lancaster was able to teleport out of his bonds, but his genies remained. This fight was a close one, at one point or another, nearly all of the Immortals were knocked unconscious, as were most of the Genies. The Marid had some sort of healing powers, and healed his allies making them difficult to keep down. Eventually, the Immortals focused their attacks on him, and once he was knocked out, the rest began to follow. They took out the Djinni and amazingly the indestructible Dao, and had snared the Ifrit when he tried to flee, taking Phoenix with him. At that point a supernatural sandstorm arose to defend the villa from their onslaught. Mystery Man portal'd blindly into the villa and miraculously found Heimholtz and rescued him from Enlil by teleporting with him his maximum distance. The rest of the team sought cover from the terrible winds and hunkered down until they could properly siege the small palace.

Episode 33 - Ashes to Ashley, Tusk to Tusk

2007-06-06T12:17:00.000-07:00

The funeral of Jack "Flash" Summerhall was not much different from any other small private funeral. Grieving family, friends and coworkers there to show their respects, an ex-lover there for one last look. But this funeral WAS quite different.
During the ceremony what appeared to be some former acquaintance seemed unusually moved for someone who claimed only to be "an old girlfriend from college." She made two rounds to the coffin and shed many tears over the wooden casket.
Also present, not unexpectedly, but perhaps unfortunately, William Thompson, a.k.a "Hephaestus" clearly intoxicated, and stumbling. Mystery Man didn't recognize him, out of costume, and helped him to the ceremony, keeping him upright.
The ceremony went much as one expects these things to go. Marduk noticed the woman (above) glaring at him with an accusing look, and was about to speak with her, when something behind her caught his eye. Not wanting to alarm anyone, he signaled to the other team members to sit tight and let him check it out. He strode into the part of the graveyard occupied by large marble crypts, there, hiding behind one of the larger such crypts was the unmistakable form of Tusk, the Human-Elephant. Tusk tried to grab the god of War, but even caught off guards, Marduk's reflexes were too quick. He easily eluded the pachyderm's grasp. Wondering what brought the elephant man to the funeral, Marduk tried reasoning with the man-beast. He found himself staring into the deep eyes of the villain, and suddenly 'falling into them' as though he was racing down a waterslide. Moments later he found himself, once more inside the body of Tusk. And once more his own body addressed him with impunity. A fight broke out and Marduk in Tusk's body found himself struggling against the superior foe inside his own body. The rest of the team, noticing the combat, came to his aide, but seeing only their friend engaged with a known villain, they helped knock out the body of Tusk. Strangely when that happened Tusk didn't stay down. Apparently freed from Marduk's control the "real" Tusk was able to once again assert control over his body, and seeing four super heroes surrounding Tusk decided to flee. He didn't get far before Banshee and Mystery Man brought him down. Sadly for Dragon Fly, this left him alone with the villain in Marduk's body, who summarily dispatched him with a single blow.
Eventually the team got up and found 'Marduk' holding Jack's mother tightly to him. Dragonfly challenged him to release the frightened woman, but Marduk held her tight and began moving her to a car. With Marduk's strength he could snap her like a twig.
Eventually, Mystery Man was able to liberate Mrs. Summerhall, and the team was able to face Marduk without a hostage. By name the real Marduk had once again gained control of Tusk and entered the fray. Seeing his best friend's mother held hostage, seeing the villain use his own body for the crime put him into a rage. And like a rogue elephant, Marduk gored the villain, in his own body with his sharp tusks. His body fell bloody and dying from a mortal blow. If not for the quick actions of his team, his body might have died. Then through force of will Marduk once again traded placed with the villain sending him into the body of poor Tusk.

As all this was happening, something else was happening as well. Whether it was a coincidence of time. A preternatural sense of his mother in danger, the tears of his tragic lover falling on the coffin, Jack woke up. He was without movement or sensation except for his ears to the near silence of the tomb, his eyes to the blackness of the coffin. Somehow he knew he was buried, he knew he had to get out, but he couldn't move. Then the pain came. His nerves rapidly regenerating, but for a man who experienced time 500 times faster than a normal man, that regeneration was agonizingly slow. He recalled the claims of physicists that death in a black hole, though certain, would take an eternity as the very fabric of time stretch on to infinity at the same time as space itself. For Jack Flash the pain was excruciating and seemingly unending. But beneath the pain, beneath the dread and fear, was the heart of a hero. Through inhuman fortitude and endurance Jack persevered and survived. Eventually his body regenerated to the point no physical damage remained. The scars of his torture would linger a while longer.
Trying to recreate the trick that saved him from the fate of C4, Jack vibrated his newly reconstituted body to the frequency of the wood and soil above him and pushed his way out of the grave.
Those still in attendance stood shocked to catch of glimpse of him. They saw the very air about him charged with St. Elmo's fire as he literally rose, like the phoenix, from his own ashes. Seeing the oddity of his situation Jack sent a simple signal "catch you back at the ranch" and he was gone. His mother turned to see him only for a moment, before Jack moved so quickly he could not be seen. As suddenly as he appeared, he was gone, only a small cloud of smoke stood where he was, and that quickly dispersed.

The team secured Tusk, or whoever it was, but that did not end the drama. As soon as the immediate danger was over Dragon Fly turned on Thompson and knocked him down. He began to pummel the helpless man until Mystery Man pulled him off their erstwhile teammate. Dragon Fly lit into the sodden Thompson with condemnation and accusations. He blamed Hephaestus for Jack's death and the escape of the dangerous villains because of his drunkeness and his failures to be a hero. He insisted that Thompson could not be trusted with the powered armor, and insisted it be removed from him. Although mostly passive during this, Thompson defended his possession of the suit and refused its surrender. Eventually, through the cool-headedness of Mystery Man, they all returned to the Academy and discussed the matter.

Jack explained his experience as best he could, and cautioned the team from revealing his coming back to life before he could figure out whether he could spare his family from future danger by allowing the world to believe him dead. He told the team to, for now, call him 'Phoenix.'
Marduk's wounds were treated and by morning he was fit and ready for action. His godlike constitution accounting for his remarkable recovery. No longer needing sleep, Phoenix was startled in the late morning just before dawn by the doorbell. When he went to check it, he saw a figure flying off into the dawn, and a Conch Bouquet of flowers. In Ashley's (Tiamat's) handwriting was the note:

Welcome back to the land of the living.
You can thank me when you have a chance.
Be seeing you. -A

The Immortals having defeated death itself, now faced a more intractable foe. They agreed to debate the status and role of Hephaestus in the team, given his obvious alcoholism.
Everyone gets 1XP.

Redirect Update

2007-05-31T06:56:00.000-07:00

I was looking up something else, and came across this in the Mutants and Masterminds Official Answers Forum:
Redirect Action

So, despite being listed as a Reaction, the Redirect Feat actually does require some planning.
Round 1. You make a bluff attempt against an opponent to redirect her attack if she attacks you. This is normally a standard action (but for -5 you can make it as a move action).
Round 2. If in fact, she does attack you, AND misses, AND you succeeded in Bluffing her (your Bluff exceeded her Sense Motive) you get to decide who she attacks with the attack.

So this is somewhat more limited then we played it last time. However I noted another tidbit (ironically from a question I posted over a year ago).

Redirect

So, in effect you can make the person attack herself! Sort of a Judo-style defense.

And if you have Acrobatic Bluff, you can substitute Acrobatics for Bluff.
(I will also allow a person with Acrobatic Bluff to substitute Acrobatics for Sense Motive when resisting a redirect).

Banshee's journal

2007-05-30T07:33:00.001-07:00

Later in the day after the battle with Damien.

Dragonfly asked me if i had some sort of shielding power. I told him I wasn't sure. I know that if I hum in a low pitched tone I can heal somehow; a long keening wail can produced fear in others; a short, high intense scream seems to create some sort of sonic blast; a longer, more sustained intense scream seems to cause the same sort of blast but it also seems to cover a wider range than the other one does; I know that if I hit a high c I can disintegrate objects.......the higher and intense the stronger the object; and a really high, almost ultrasonic scream seems to deafen people.

I wonder if I could produce some sort of sonic shield..........hmmmmm....will have to experiement with this. But where? I may have to find an out of way place to try this.

Banshee's journal

2007-05-30T07:33:00.000-07:00

Whew! this is the first day I've had a chance to even chance to log in everything has been happening way to fast. I have met the Immortals. An interesting group to be certain. They have asked me and another person, Mystery Man, to join them. For now I have accepted. They seem to know more about what has happened to me than anything I have found out on the net.

My thoughts on them. Mystery Man is an odd fellow. He says he is from the past and was involved in something called the Philadelphia Experiment. From everything I have read of it, it was supposed to be fiction. Now I find that it was indeed real. I wonder what else the government has stated to be fiction is indeed real?

Hesphastus is another odd fellow. He seems to relie on the suit he wears. The others are worried about his drinking problem. I have not had real chance to talk to him so do not know what would cause a problem like that.

Jack is nice fellow. Has issues to say the least. Not the least of which is that we just fought his ex-girlfriend. That has to be hard to see someone you cared for now on the other side of the law.

Marduk for someone who claims godlike powers he seems rather down to earth.

Dragonfly.....hmmm......he seems full of himself. he seems to want people to know he has had a hard life as I can see no other reason for his constant references to his jail time. He also seems to have prejudged me based on how I look. That annoys me. But then I may be prejudging him as well. I will try to keep an opened mind where he is concerned. Though I do wish he would not continual see the flaw in plans all the time.

Ormand our benefactor is indeed a rare man. He has turned his home into a base for us. Most interesting.

I have been here for a few days, exploring, settling in. I found a magazine that had Damien's face on it. Seems he has turned into some kind of avant guard actor. I should go see if I can see him. The show is sold out so I will have to see if I can get in some other way.

Man the back stage doorway is full of goths. haven't seen this many in one place in years. Has to laugh to myself when one of the girls says I'm to old. I am the original goth chick. I give the guard a note with just my name on it. Let's see if Damien remembers.

Biting my tongue to keep from laughing as I am let in. I can hear the chick now, "hey why she can get in and I can't. she's to old for him. It's not fair. what did she say on that note?"

Damien has changed in someway. I can't quite put my finger on it. He knows I've changed. He has full of himself as he ever was but more so. There is something way odd about all of this. Before I got a chance to go back stage I was enraptured by the performance. So was everyone else. way to enraptured. Damien.........something about him. I need to let the others know.

Ormand was there at the show. And he didn't realize that something was odd. We definitely need to check out Damien. He is giving a party. .... a formal party........I'm to be Ormand's date. chuckles.

There was indeed something going on......But Damien seems to be as charming as ever. He wants us to join him. I don't see why not. He seems to be very reasonable.....We leave him with the party goers and head home. After discussing things at home we realize that he had used his powers on us. We are going back to take him out and to prison

After a short battle at the pool house we find Damien in the study. Mystery Man, and the others take him out and we cover him with a blanket. I knock him out and take him to Blackstone Prision.

While we are being shown where he will be at I find that the tunnels are just a wee bit to confining. I probably could stay with the group but they could get narrower if we go on..........No I can't stay. The others go on the tour.....Something in the back of my mind is not sitting well. Something that Dragonfly said............oh well.

Now in retrospect what Dragonfly said earlier..........'do we think we have him or is he making us think we have him' may have been accurate.

Damien, along with several other inmates have escapeed their cells and are running around in the lower levels. He has control of a dozen guards or more. Dragonfly has done some scouting and it seems he has The Kid, somekind of techno mutant, someone called Impact, an italian mobster, maybe a few more. And the Burning man.

We found some doctors still unscathed but on the same level as the burning man who is loose. We are currently hold up with them......hmmmmmmm. the burning man is here but is not on fire.something is going on. Jack has gone out to talk to him.

Whatever was said it didn't take Jack has attacked the Burning man.......Suddenly the entire corridor is full of fire and smoke. Noone could have survived that. I get the doctors behind some cover............Before anyone can say something Marduk opens the door and instantly a backdraft fills the room with fire.......everyone is caught in it.

Jack is dead.......Mystery Man tries to take out the burning man but doesen't succeed. He goes away. We try to take care of the wounded. I do my best in healing all those who need it.

While we are discussing things the elevators sound like they are working and someone is coming. Looks like a guard..........seems wrong...........Sure enough it was one of the european villians......He teleports away before we can do anything. Soon the rest the others from that group are coming......We start fighting them. I take most of them with a scream while the others take out the rest.........good start......

MysteryMan opens a portal to the surface and Dragonfly heads up to see if he can contact the warden.......After a few tense moments he says it is clear and to come up. We get restraints and put them on the villians. We talk about plans and we we know......

Again while we are discussing things we hear the elevators.......instantly the guards are on alert....It seems that the Herald and other guards are here. He says that Damien has poisoned them and if we let him go he will leave the antidote behind......We check. It was a trap......Damien starts a fight.

MandM opens a portal behind Damien and took Marduk with him. Unfortunately the bull deamon and Impact were there as well......Seems Damien can call up and control insects, make people invisible.........what else can he do....Dragonfly seems to think he is not really here....After a few tries I manage to take out Impact.........Then something else happens.

We find that it was all a diverson.........It appears that the Herald, the burning man and the kid along with damien have all escaped.

While we manage to keep the Trash, the bull demon and impact from escaping we did not get Damien. It seems to be a hollow victory.

What is Damien up to? What does he want with a technomutant and the herald and the burning man? What is the significance of his chosen name........Baal? I will have to do some research on that name. Prehaps if we find the mythos behind it we may be able to get a sense of his powers.

Episode: 32 Dances with Wolves

2007-05-30T05:56:00.001-07:00

Seeing their fallen comrade, Jack Flash, the team burst into action. Mystery Man folded space around himself and slid through the cracks of reality through the door into the corridor and goes to attack the Burning Man. He warped the space around the Burning Man and the flaming foe retched from nausea.
Marduk kicked open the door to rescue Jack. The backdraft sucked the flames into the medical lab. Dragonfly hoping to keep the fires at bay with this wings ended up causing the fires to swirl around the lab engulfing them all, Immortals and medical staff (who were partially protected behind some cover). Not the most auspicious beginning, but the day was not lost. The Burning Man said something like "mission accomplished" and headed off, leaving the team dying or otherwise injured. Banshee took up the call and uses her healing vibrations to accelerate the healing in the various team members and innocents caught in the blast, she then turns her healing powers on herself. Once the team is healed up. They portaled the medical personnel up to the entry level and started to plan their next move.
But they don't have long to plan, a man posing as a guard started to talk to them and they figured he was not what he seems to be. Before they can get much from him, he vanished and a fight begans with the freed European Villains - Scharfschütze "The Sniper" an invisible sharp shooter; Le Fauchon "The Falcon" a dart throwing flyer; L'Araignée "The Spider" four armed four legged wall crawler; Elegast "Elf Spirit" elvish trickster, El Toro "The Bull" strongman, Attacante "The Striker" disgraced Italian soccer star able to manifest balls of energy. Banshee got a free shot on the villains and summarily dealt with four of them with a single wail. The €urotrash were nearly finished with a single blow. In relatively short work, Attacante and Le Fauchon are brought down by the Immortal's teamwork. They gathered the villains and DragonFly traveled in a portal made by Mystery Man to the entry level. There he was captured and interrogated by the Warden. Both DragonFly and the Warden were worried about the possibility of shape shifters and mind controlled people. The Warden left the room and gave DragonFly ample opportunity to escape from his bonds by secretly instructing the guards to drop 'their guards.' DragonFly didn't take the bait, and thus earned the Warden's temporary trust.
The team sent the €urotrash through the portal and then joined the Warden on the main level. In a power blackout, using paper blueprints and battery power lamps they began to work out a plan. The Warden reminded them that "Plan B" was to sacrifice the hostages and try to destroy the lower levels, and anyone down there. The team tried to come up with an alternative. Their planning session was cut short by word that the elevator (wedged to a stop) was moving. The team ran to the main landing deck as the doors open.
The Herald and a dozen "guards" appeared in the elevator and the Herald pleaded for a truce. He claimed the men were poisoned, and that they would die if the officials did not grant passage to the villains. Of course, this wasn't going to happen, but the confusion generated by the incident was enough to allow the mind controlled guards opportunity to leap over the heads of their confused comrades.
"The Herald" transformed in Ba'al and all hell broke loose.
Mystery Man, DragonFly and Marduk teleported into the Elevator behind Ba'al only to be shunted to a nearby space since the space their were aiming for was occupied. The illusion dropped revealing the mighty form of Impact, and the Bull Demon. Impact leaped into the air coming down with a mighty crash, creating forty foot crater in the reinforced floor of the landing site and creating a shock wave that destroyed virtually every piece of equipment in the large room (including the Paladin Battle Suits of the prison guards) and knocking down pretty much all of the human guards.
Ba'al summoned a massive swarm of flies which distracted and obscured the battle field, then transformed into a swarm himself. A brawl ensued.
The turning point in the brawl was some creative combat with Mystery Man tricking Impact into a sucker punch that landed on his own ally the Bull Demon knocking the mighty villain unconscious. Impact himself managed to laugh off most of the attacks leveled at him until Banshee managed to peg him with a lucky shot (Double Critical) that knocked him out in one shot!
Apparently defeated Ba'al appeared in mid air in his human form quite confident. He admitted the two bricks were planned sacrifices, just as the €urotrash and prison guards before them. He taunted the group, used his emotion control on Banshee who seemed always susceptible to his charms. He didn't do anything particular aggressive to the group, in fact he seemed quite passive. This led DragonFly to posit he was yet another illusion, but when he focused he insect self to find the the Lord of the Flies, the figure of Ba'al appeared to be real. Several attempts to fell the Dark Lord failed as their blows and blasts just went straight through him. He laughed stalling for time. At one point he tried to lure the team away from the Elevator, but only succeeded in attracting more attention to it. Mystery Man and DragonFly 'ported into the shaft above the elevator and spotted a light from above. When they investigated they found signs the Burning Man had tunneled a way out of the shaft to freedom.
Ba'al laughed menacingly having accomplished his goal, and floated up through the ceiling to freedom. The team reconnoitered and discovered that Ba'al, the Herald, Deus X, and The Burning Man had all escaped. By talking to the guards he had in his thrall they learned that Ba'al always seemed particularly interested in Deus X and the Herald more than anyone else. They also learned that the Herald seemed moved mostly by concern for the young boy, perhaps explaining his willingness to go along with the plans of Ba'al.
The team prevented the escape of several villains: €urotrash, Bull Demon, and Impact, any of whom would be a great threat to the world. But the escapees would no doubt return to plague the world. And, the Immortals have lost another one of their own, Jack Flash, one of the founding members. Would they be able to recover?

Episode 31 - Thrown to the Wolves

2007-05-23T10:39:00.000-07:00

Starring - Marduk, Jack Flash, Dragon Fly, Banshee and Mystery Man

Jim Allen gets the bad news: his Television show has been canceled. The University has asked him to take on greater teaching responsibilities and he finds himself co-teaching with his old Mentor Dr. Franz Heimholtz. Heimholtz has been missing since the Event, and reappeared suddenly asking for his old job back. The university agreed, but insisted Allen co-teach with the old man who seems somehow changed since the event.
During the fist lecture, Heimholtz literally bores his class to a stupor and stops his lecture mid stream to speak with Allen. The students, some of whom still seem awake, do not seem to notice anything. Heimholtz speaks cryptically about the Eye of Ea, and the threat of Tiamat. He foretells a great evil, beyond the pale of Tiamat herself, but expresses some confidence since Marduk has the Tablet of Fates. When Marduk reveals that the Tablet was taken from him, the professor seems nonplussed. Still optimistic, he warns Marduk that he should seek out and protect the one who sought him ought and knew of his powers.

Meanwhile back at the Pierce Estate, Mystery Man's pre-emptive strike fails to land on Ba'al as the villain vanishes from sight before he can get it off. Banshee, in the emotional thrall of Ba'al tries to convince the team not to attack him, and when he appears there is a brief exchange of banter. Ba'al then exuded his emotional control, and the team, to a member fell under his control. He gave them the fools errand of 'rescuing' a falsely imprisoned man from Blackstone Island, and sent them off, while he would detect and isolate the 'corrupt' members of Freedom City's elites.

They returned to the base to discuss plans for rescuing the Bull Demon, then they thought better to try to extricate him legally, then as they considered this more, the plan seemed to fall apart, and their enthusiasm for Ba'al faded as well. Marduk appeared and helped spur them to shake free of the dark villain's influence. The team shaken by this set back considered their options and were going to give up for a bit when they were reminded of the situation back at the mansion. Ba'al had hundreds of people in his control, vulnerable to robbery, coercion or worse. So they formed a quick plan to get him and deal with him quickly.

They teleported back to the house to discover Ba'al had set these people to commit embarrassing acts which he was filming no doubt for blackmail purposes. In a surgical strike they grabbed Ba'al and 'ported him back to the mansion where a brief fight ensued and they were about to incapacitate him. Jack Flash stayed behind and in a few moments had rounded up the evidence of the debauchery, and rounded up Ba'al minions as well.

They took Ba'al themselves to Blackstone Island and were given of brief tour of the place. They saw the liquid bath the Burning Man was kept in, the high security cells for the big bruisers, and ran into the Herald who was given considerably more liberty in the prison. The Herald recognized Mystery Man and seemed a bit miffed that he had let him rot in the prison for so long. Mystery Man was understandably perplexed, and the Herald looked into his mind to find out why. He discovered that this Mystery Man predated the one that sent him to this place, and this knowledge seemed to assuage him somewhat.

The party got a little tour, and then went to leave. They did not get far. They were in their Osprey awaiting clearance to leave when they received information that Ba'al was not in his cell. Then communications started to fail. The team portaled back into the prison and set about trying to help. The first most pressing need was that the Burning Man had somehow been freed from his containment. They also found some unconscious guards. A brief survey of the area showed many of the prisoners had been released. Dragon Fly went to scout the lower levels and discovered the same. In fact it seemed that several of the prisoners were conferencing in the lower level. He had apparently enthralled several guards as well. He overheard them talking about a plan to be patient secure the area, and how this was all possible with the help of Deus Ex, the boy technomage. Clearly Ba'al was in charge. He spoke of the next stage of the plan occurring when the Burning Man did his job. Dragon Fly returned to the team before being discovered.

The team managed to find some surviving staff in the hospital and while planning their next move they discovered the Burning Man at the door, extinguished. He spoke briefly with Jack Flash before the speedster got frustrated with the direction of the conversation and went to clobber the man.

Epilogue:
Inside the hospital section, the team tried to watch through the soot stained window the action in the hall. They saw the two discussing something but could not hear the conversation. There were some frustrated gestures by both men, then with a blur of action Jack unleashed a volley of blows on the (un)Burning Man. As his body collapsed to the floor, a flame erupted in the air, filling the corridor. For a brief moment they saw the silhouette of Jack Flash standing against the blast, then smoke and fire obscured their vision.

Episode 30: Lambs and Wolves

2007-05-16T11:04:00.000-07:00

Starring: Banshee, Dragon Fly, Jack Flash, and Mystery Man

Mystery Man - Takes a walk to acclimate himself to his new home on the grounds of the Teach Academy. As he does he is hit by a strong headache and spinning vertigo. He staggered over to a fountain to splash some water on his face, as he does, the fresh water seems to transform into salt water, and looking around he sees himself on the rocky coast of some strange land. He shakes his head and tries to make sense of this, eventually climbing to some high ground to get a better sense of where he is. He spots a man walking among the tide pools and goes to meet him. The man, Harold, seems to recognize him, and speaks with concern about his memory losses, how they seem to be getting more severe. He reminds Mystery Man, that it was he who brought him, and the others to this place, this time. Understandably confused, Mystery Man tries to coax out more information, and gets more and more puzzled. Apparently he has been time traveling, rescuing people from the past and bringing them to this place, a sort of Super Utopia. He explored further and found a small village inhabited by other supers, including the Villain Tiamat he had so recently fought. He was recognized, but no one seemed to expend much concern about seeing him, as though he was a regular figure there.
He decided to find another village, and warned about some dangers, he traveled by teleporting from one point to another in his line of sight. For a while this worked well, but soon, he was getting disoriented by the confusing landscape of a thick forest he traveled. Again he was hit by a sense of panic and vertigo, and he retreated to the light at the edge of the wood. When he did, he found himself back on the grounds of the Teach Academy.

Banshee - Wandered the Manor to learn it s layout, she passed by a week paper showing a familiar face, that of Damian Ravenna, former paramour and erstwhile leader of her cohort from before the event. He was the headliner of an acting troupe entitled "Le Theatre Rienaissance." The show was playing that night in Franklin to rave reviews, so she decided to check it out. The elite of Freedom City has assembled to watch the show. The show was sold out, but she went to the stage door, dropped a note to Damian with her name on it, and was soon granted entrance to the show.
It was a strange gothic pantomime. What was strangely still is that the audience seemed almost mesmerized by the activities on stage. How she escaped the stupor was unknown, but she witnessed hundreds of people in rapt silence staring mindlessly at the performance. She slipped out and explored. When she came upon Damian in his dressing room, he mentioned the Event, and how it changed things for him and others. He asked her if she was still willing to commit fully. He spoke in terms reminding of their dramatic past, of the sorts of people, lambs and wolves. When they played at Vampires in the past, that sort of language was common enough. The Vampires were the wolves who preyed upon the 'lambs' of humanity. No morality, no concern, just life and death. He made a sort of threatening comment about not fearing sacrificing a few of these lambs if need be. Knowing her own changes made her worry. Perhaps he too had changed. And he alluded to such as change as well. She eventually returned to her seat, witnessed the end of the performance, and saw the crowd rise to a standing ovation cheering wildly the odd show. She also them writing checks and dropping them into donation boxes around the theater.

Jack Flash - Jack had little time to reflect on the past adventure before his phone rang, and his parents called him home. Unsure how they would respond to the discovery of his super hero status, Jack was confronted by his parents. They were not exactly excited about his new vocation, nor convinced he had any idea what he was doing. They compared him disparagingly to his siblings (who by the way hadn't saved the world even once!)and showed a little confidence he'd pull off super heroism. He did his best to assuage them, and argue that he did know what he was doing. They suggested he seek some counseling before something bad happen to him, or by him. He eventually left the house frustrated to yet again fail to live up to their hopes, or please them. What more could he do?

Dragon Fly - was asked by Dr. Weischaus to sit for some more experiments (what with all of his other subjects being... gone). The prospect of spending more time with Susan, and out of some sense of loyalty to the doctor, Dragon Fly does. He shrinks and stands on a microscope pad. The doctor then irradiates him with a dose of microwave radiation. This causes him to shrink even smaller, and smaller. Soon the room begins to lose its distinctness, objects become so big, they become formless blobs. The smooth glass slide he stood on, became a jagged set of shards, then the shards became looming towers as he continued to shrink. Soon, even the glass became obscured by a dazzling electric display, and then darkness. Complete and udder darkness. Yet he could in a sense 'see' for what seemed like miles, still it was indistinguishable emptiness. He stood there suspended in the darkness for several minutes, until he glimpsed what seemed to be movement. It was a slick and evasive sort of movement, and he chased it from here to there. Then he tried to lure it out in the open with a feint. He succeeded, and immediately regretted it. The form was a vaguely humanoid, titanic form, miles high like a person's shadow extending from their feet, only it wasn't from his feet, and there was no light source. A tendril of shadow drooped down from the form and licked at him coldly. It felt horribly perverse, like an unwelcome thought brought on by a dream or ill wind. He pulled away and the dark shadows pursued him. He decided to stand his ground and resist. He breathed a quick burst of flame at the thing, but the fire was absorbed and quenched like a match in molasses. He turned to flee and felt the form following him rapidly. Darting here and there, he tried to evade the thing, then realizing the futility, he twitched the muscle that made him grow, and grow he did. But unlike his normal growth, this took awhile, second passed where normally it took but an instant. Finally, he was sprawled across the laboratory table in normal size.
He explained what he had experienced, Dr. Weischaus suggested without explanation that it was probably the evil at the center of the universe.

The team compared notes of their unusual experiences and Banshee warned that Damian might be up to something untoward. She wondered what it might be. DragonFly called up some old friends, and learned that some Goths were blowing cash fast on party drugs including some unusual stuff like Laudanum, Absynthe, and Opium. They began to wonder what was the plan when Ormand arrived home, clearly from the something formal, and spoke glowingly of the Theatre Rienaisance. They drilled him for details, and Banshee explained her point of view, but Ormand remained skeptical. He did contribute several thousand dollars to the troupe, but he was wont to do such things anyway. He showed them an invitation to an exclusive party at the estate of the Pierce family, of Pierce Communications, Freedom City's richest citizen. The mayor, the chief of police and countless others of wealth and power would be there.
They formulated a plan for Ormand and Banshee to go to the party. If something happened, they would signal the team (parked nearby) who would teleport into and save them. It didn't work out exactly as planned, when both Banshee and Ormand appeared to be enslaved to the will of Damian. Ormand summoned the team to the pool house, and there was a brief discussion about the future. He told them he didn't go by Damian anymore, he preferred the term Ba'al. Not wanting to lose the element of surprise, Mystery Man tried to subtly create a portal from the pool into the pool house distracting Damian. As Mystery Man tries to bend time, Damian catches his movement out of the corner of his eyes.
As the episode ends, the Team is ready for action, but Banshee and Ormand still appear in the thrall of Ba'al.

Episode 29 (Banshee's POV)

2007-05-09T09:31:00.000-07:00

Moira, unsure what to do about the guards bided her time in the dining area oblivious to the other things happening in different parts of the ship. She did not want to take the risk of hurting the group of innocent elderly people if she used her powers so she waited.

she waited.

Keeping her eye on the guards she finally saw them switch off the safeties and begin to point their weapons at the group. She could no longer wait. Lifting up above the crowd she dropped her disquise and let loose with a keening wail at one of the group of guards. It worked!! They were down and apparently unconscious. She quickly turned to the others and wailed again. Her luck was holding, these too were down and unconscious.

Before she could do anything else a small voice sounded in the room asking if she needed any help. She quickly tossed the guns overboard and the small flying creature ordered some of the people to tie up the guards.

He/it then asked her to follow to help out one his/its comrades. They reached the cargo hold only to find a guy that Banshee recognized the one as being a member of The Immortals but did not recognized the guy in the white trenchcoat. She also recognized a blue skinned woman that they were fighting. They seemed to also be trying to destroy a huge rock that seemed both familiar and not familiar both evil and not.........she could not put it into words.

She flew into action once more trying to use her scream to take out the villians........and yes there were more villians. Strange looking ones. She did manage to hurt one but one that seemed to have all kinds of tenticles engulfed her and she couldn't do anything. The tiny creature that she had followed and Jack Flash hit it simultainiously and took her out but also knocked her backward against the wall.

Another hero arrived, one in chrome armor. He took on the crab guy. she managed to hit it but did no real damage to it. The guy in the white trench coat was hit by something that looked like a squid and disappeared. Jack was also hit and knocked down. She had a great opportunity to hit 3 of the bad guys with a blast and she took it. It worked!!! The squid and blue lady were sent reeling. She then flew over to Jack and took on some of his injuries. She then healed herself.

The Guy in the white trench coat returned apparently having been healed. The tide had turned in their favor. Jack had managed to crack the stone, the crab, the blue lady, the tenticled one, and a shark guy were all down and out. The squid managed to slip away.

She then followed most of the others to look for more of their team. Finding him with the leader of the villians was not good. As we were about to attack it was pointed out that the leader had Jack's parents under guard. There was no choice but to stand down. The leader turned into a dragon and took off, ordering the last member of the team to follow her. Fortunately he came to senses and did not follow her. While most of the others were shaken by what appeared to be fear at the sight of the dragon, she seemed to be immune to it. Interesting.

The team introduced themselves and asked her and the guy in white, who called himself Mystery Man, to come with them and meet someone called Armand or something like that.

Will be interesting to see who or what Armand is and if these people will accept her.

Episode 29 - Fish Wrap

2007-05-09T05:19:00.000-07:00

William Thompson tried in vain to respond to the emergency calls. He was half in his suit, when he stumbled in his drunken stupor and fell to the floor, bloodying his nose in the process. Through the tears, and blood he spotted a virtual button in his head piece to activate the 'auto-pilot' Cedallion. He did. The mechanical voice offered to assist him and then 'heal' his drunkenness. An extremely pleasurable feeling went through his veins, and he was soon sober and ready for action. He checks the messages, and flew to the cruise ship's location.

Meanwhile. Mystery Man had traced a series of high capacity power cables from the ship's power plant to the cargo hold. He had to climb a deck to investigate. He turned invisible and started toward the hold with impunity, noticing some unconscious guards, with fishlike gills on their necks.

Banshee had since disguised herself to resemble an older person and was hanging out with the crowd of volunteers keeping an eye on the half dozen sailors and their automatic weapons.

The fight in the observation deck ended and Tiamat transformed into a half-dragon form and approached Marduk, who grudgingly let her. She mumbled something about wanting something from the Warrior God, and raked her claws across his chest drawing a thin line of blood. Then she held her hands out as though clutching a book and 'read' aloud from what she called 'The Tablet of Fate.' This had little affect on Dragon Fly, but the result was powerful on Marduk. She called him to her rightful place by her side, and he willingly stood besides her. Dragon Fly tried in vain to rouse him from her thrall, but in the end decided to head out and try to catch up with Jack Flash.

Jack Flash moved for the hold, but was stopped by that persistent menace, the locked door. Before he could come up with an alternative method, a voice came out of nowhere. The Mystery Man appeared next to Jack Flash and offered to help. Quickly they warped into the cargo hold, and Jack Flash made quick work of most of the Fish Men inside. The two worked together to take out the last one, and then Mystery Man set about disconnecting the stone dais from the power lines. Jack decided to take out the bound Torrent while he could, and he began to pummel the girl with his rapid fire fists. After his first blows she was able to signal Tiamat about what was happening, and Tiamat again reminded the Immortals of her hostages. Deciding that she probably wouldn't kill them immediately Jack decided it was worth the risk and continue to attack Torrent. Tiamat gave the order to shoot the hostages.

Torrent shook off her stun and slipped free from her bounds, she rose to her feet and with a gesture filled the room with water. This caught the men off guard. They struggled to swim in the churning hold. Mystery Man created a portal to channel the water out of the hold, and possibly catch Torrent, but the Water Elemental was able to elude that attack.

Up in the Dining Room, Banshee spotted the henchmen take the safeties off their weapons and turn them on the crowd. Acting quickly she rose from the crowd and blasted one group with a sonic wave. Then using the distraction from that she howled at the other sending all six to unconsciousness, and saving the hostages. So far luck was on the team's side. Dragon Fly showed up moments later, and the two of them headed down to the hold. At that moment Hephaestus showed up as well, and contacting Jack Flash made his way to the hold.

A battle royal ensued. At first the fish forces had the Immortals and allies on the ropes. Mystery Man was poisoned by the Cuttlefish, Banshee was stunned by Torrent, Hephaestus was occupied by the Crustacean, and the rest battled together in the center of the ship. Then Jack Flash used his machine gun like fists to pummel away at the rocky slab and managed to turn a good third of into dust, and leave the rest a pile of rubble. This seemed to turn the tide. Mystery Man recovered from the poison long enough to administer some drugs to removed his staggered condition. Banshee healed Jack Flash of his poison. And one by one the Fish Force was taken out. Eventually, only Cuttle Fish remained and she quickly escaped into the sea.

The team tracked down Marduk by his GPS and found him on the bow of the ship protecting Tiamat. She admitted defeat, but told the Immortals that she would be leaving with her team, and she didn't want a further fight. The team was dubious, but she had one last ace up her sleeve.
"You might not have cared about a bunch strangers Jack, but there are two people who'd like to talk to you."
She tuned in the comm-link connecting Jack to his parents.
Jack Flash is not one to negotiate. But, with the lives of his parents on the line, this one time, he gave in, and stood down.
Tiamta bade Marduk come with her, but he hesitated. She transformed into a full sized Dragon and commended it. This left him, and Jack shaken as the others resisted the fearful effect. That was enough to shake Marduk free of her Thrall, and he thought he might trick her into bringing him along. But, she noticed his change of demeanor, and left the scene, pausing only to remove her allies from the the hold.

The team saved the Thetis from a water doom, prevented Tiamat from enslaving/transforming/recruiting a couple hundred minions, and rescued Jack's parents. All in all a good day.

Jack Flash invited Mystery Man and Banshee to join them back at the Academy, and meet Ormand.

Next adventure everyone should be at 170 pts.

Episode 28 - Fish n'Ships

2007-05-09T04:54:00.000-07:00

When the Thetis, one of the world's largest cruise ships, left the Port of Franklin, it looked little different from any other cruise. Thousands of mostly senior citizens set sail for the Caribbean. But this ship had some unusual passengers, and a short destiny.
Among the passengers were:
1. A group from the Pons De Leon retirement home of one hundred seniors, most nearing eighty, but all fit and vigorous. Along with them, the young goth geneticist contracted to study their unusual health, Moira O'Laren, a.k.a. Banshee.
2. A group of WWII veterans from the USS Eldridge, a destroyer used in the infamous Philadelphia Experiment.
3. There to meet with the Vets, Mystery Man, miraculously teleported to this time from the 1940s.
4. The parents of Jack "Jack Flash"
The Ship made it just outside US waters when it was "detained" by a Nuclear Submarine. The North Carolina, raised from the dead, stopped the cruise ship and began a lengthy search, claiming that there was a terrorist threat against the vessel. With careful precision the submariners rounded up the crew and passengers (close to 5000 people) and signaled the US Coast Guard and Navy to not approach the two. The ships were surrounded, but with a Submarine, the pirates had the advantage.

The Immortals, minus Hephaestus, who could not be reached by communicator and who apparently took on of the Academy's vehicles on a tear, showed up at the scene. They were given a zodiac raft by the coast guard and approached the scene undetected. They managed to get on the Thetis and begin infiltrating the scene. A quick reconnoiter by Dragon Fly revealed only 3 dozen men had boarded the ship, but they were heavily armed. He also saw some people moving something from the Submarine's missile bay to the cruise ship's cargo doors. He approached and saw a woman bound to some ancient stone disk being moved into the ship's hold. he recognized her, as a somewhat changed version of Torrent. The scene was being controlled by a beautiful woman who seemed in charge of the operation and strangely fond of the bound woman.

Shortly after arriving everyone was assembled in the main dining room, and an attractive woman gave a speech. She apologized for the inconvenience, but offered everyone the opportunity to find a new live, and restored youth if they were to join her. The rest she offered safe passage off the ship. Most of the passengers left in small, well orchestrated groups, but about 200 remained on the ship.

Dragon Fly informed the team of his discovery, and they moved down to that area. After Jack Flash quickly took out some guards, Dragon Fly tried to take out the leader, Tiamat, but one of her trusty body guards leaped in the way intercepting Dragon Fly's blast and falling the ground unconscious. Tiamat then threatened to have the hostages killed unless the Immortals stand ground. Grudgingly, they did, and they followed her to the observation deck. There Tiamat introduced her "Twice Born" a group of aquatic super villains: Mako, the man-shark, Cuttlefish, the shape shifting cephalopod, Crustacean, the crab-like armored hulk, and Anemone, a tentacled horror. There was some discussion about her plans, she claimed that she was going to take the whole ship, and the volunteers to her 'realm.' She offered the Immortals the opportunity to join her, but they refused and insisted she would fail. Jack Flash took an opportunity to slip out and race to the Cargo Hold to try to free Torrent. As she did the Fish Force joined the battle. It didn't last long, after a few rounds of sparring, Tiamat reminded the Immortals she still had the hostages.

Universal Maneuvers

2007-05-04T20:37:00.000-07:00

Once again, I steal wantonly for Ars Ludi
This rule is in play immediately. I will bring little cards (customized for each of you) that give you your options. You can write in the name of stock maneuvers: sacrifice strike, called shot, forceful blow, etc..

Here is the rule.

Next time you want to do something a little different but have no idea how the M&M rules support it, try the Universal Combat Maneuver:

1) Think of an appropriate description of your maneuver, including how it's different from your normal attack.

2) Use a Move action to perform the maneuver.

3) Take a +2 on either Attack, Damage or Defense and a -2 on one of the other two. The adjustments apply to your next attack and last for a full round.

The description can be anything you want, so long as it fits your character and at least vaguely describes why you are getting the bonus and penalty you picked. For example:

Stand very still and take careful aim with your bow, shooting more accurately but making yourself an easier target (+2 attack, -2 defense)

Grab a telephone pole and swing it wildly (+2 damage, -2 attack)

Use your telekinesis to hurl a spray of small rocks at your target instead of one big rock (+2 attack, -2 damage)

Throw up a sheet of fire to singe the werewolf and keep him away from you (+2 defense, -2 damage)

Dig in and channel the spirit of the thunder god and throw sizzling bolts of electrical death (+2 damage, -2 defense)

There are as many as you can think of. They can be actions specific to the character ("I'm doubling-down on my wrist gattling guns!") or they can be based on the situation or the environment ("Water on the floor? Instead of grabbing him I'll lean down and electrify it with my Shock Gauntlets!").

The same move doesn't have to use the same bonus and penalty each time. It all depends on how it is described. One round Uber Girl picks up a telephone pole and takes a vicious wild swing (+2 damage, -2 attack). Later she picks up a similar pole and swings it in a broad arc that's hard to avoid, but throws herself off-balance in the process (+2 attack, -2 defense).

The idea is to encourage players (and the GM) to come up with creative descriptions in combat, and let them adjust the odds a little bit in the process.

"A game is a series of interesting choices" - Sid Meier

Superhero games are about doing cool stuff. Not just brave or heroic deeds, but fantastic, impressive, and sometimes completely implausible feats. Superheroes throw buildings at people or melt steel girders with their laser eyes.

M&M combat is fun, but in the end it's d20, and that means you are often doing the same thing over and over: rolling the same attack each round and seeing if you hit. Some characters have interesting choices all the time (like those tricksters with their feints, taunts and redirects), but the average superhero archetype has one prominent choice each round: attack!

Tactically that's not interesting. Even worse, because by the rules you are taking the same action over and over again (same roll, same bonus, same damage if you hit) you can get lulled into visualizing the character as doing the same thing too. Instead of seeing a dynamic super-powered slugfest, you're seeing boring punch-punch-punch-punch. When you make tactical choices, you visualize the situation more dynamically and dramatically whether you intended to or not, because you are seeing what is going on and what effect your choices have.

So tactical choices encourage color, but if you make a rule to cover each possible action or interesting move you'll have a big, big book of combat maneuvers, and you'll spend all your time flipping through it instead of playing the game, and you'll still just be telling people what is possible instead of letting them use their imagination. Stifling creativity = not good.

Fine Print

The move action to do the maneuver is in addition to whatever action you normally need to perform the attack. So if you want to punch someone (standard action) you need to spend a standard action in addition to the move action to do the maneuver. Move + standard takes up your whole round. You couldn't run across the street (move action), use a maneuver (second move action), and still attack in the same round.

The adjustment only lasts one round, so if you want to do it again next round, spend another move action to pick up another telephone pole after the first shattered, aim again, etc.

FAQ

Yes, it gives everyone a weaker version of power attack, defensive attack, accurate attack and all-out attack, but with the added cost of a move action. If you already have those feats you can use them instead. Since the Universal Combat Manuever is only a two point shift instead of the five point shift from the feats, it let's everyone have a little more latitude without radically changing their PL balance (a character who can do 10 damage normally can swing only from 8-12 with the UCM, instead of 5-15 with a feat).

Yes, it replaces or trumps lots of others maneuvers (improvised weapons, aim, aggressive stance, etc). There could still be cases where you'd rather use the existing maneuver because it doesn't take a move action. The advantage is simplicity, which means (hopefully) players will spend more time thinking of cool descriptions of maneuvers and less time figuring out whether there is a way to do what they want in the rules.

No, it does not stack with other manuevers or feats that it logically replaces. You can't use the Universal Combat Maneuver along with Power Attack or Defensive Stance (for example), but you could use it with something like Sneak Attack or Grapple. [added 04/21/07]

Episode 27 - Super Challenge

2007-04-25T05:21:00.000-07:00

The Immortals are challenged by the federally sponsored US Patriots to a friendly 'scrimmage' to create some good publicity and help the teams keep in practice. As the teams neared the day of the challenge the Immortals prepared. They were sent schematics of the site the event was to take place, and Hephaestus promised to read up on it to prepare for the event.
He was also looking forward to meeting with a representative from GM about funding research into an electric car operating on principles he developed for his battle armor.
The day of flight out, Hephaestus awoke in a pool of sweat with a massive hangover. He looked at the documents and saw that he had barely scratched the surface of the massive technical tome. He did manage to polish off a bottle of Jack though. And he wished he didn't. A little hair of the dog, and he was up and about trying to catch up before the flight out. Checking through his voice mail, he had a message from yesterday wondering why he missed his meeting with GM. He didn't know how he did it.
But when he looked at his notes to self littering his work desk, and his memos on the computer, he saw several emphatic messages about completing his proposal, and meeting with the GM reps. How he misses the meeting he didn't know. Clearly, he had messed up. He went to his stash of liquor and put two bottles in the trash, he was done with alcohol. He got dressed ruing the prospect of a six hour flight to Las Vegas. He retrieved on the bottles from the trash, just to make the flight tolerable, he rationalized.

The team arrived in Nevada, at the site of the decommissioned Seismic Converter Plant. They met Dr. Marsden briefly who seemed intent on rescuing some of his equipment from the plant before the team was allowed into stage their games. They also met the US Patriots for the first time. The teams waited a bit for Marsden and the rest of the staff to finish clearing out his work, before beginning the games. The coin toss, made them the 'terrorists' trying to plant the 'bomb.' They considered plans, but decided ultimately a pretty straight forward strategy. They would ram the truck carrying the bomb through the gates and press the fight to the Patriots.
Before they could be begin, the Super Patriot was contacted about a small security breach, and decided since the US Patriots outnumbered the Immortals, he would go check it out, while they began.

The games ensued. DragonFly drove the truck head long through the gates of the complex and right at the main doors guarded by Tank. Marduk sped ahead and attempted to shove Tank through the doors. He hit the mechanical behemoth, and was stopped cold. The truck barreled into the two of them, Marduk dodged to the side, and the Tank was hit dead on. The truck too was stopped dead in its tracks, a pile of twisted metal with the Tank barely scratched.

The fight was enjoined. Minute Man and Jack Flash seemed well matched, Minute Man a little faster than Jack, but Jack a more able combatant. Hephaestus fought Lady Liberty who proved nearly as tough as he, but unable to deliver the punch needed to penetrate his armor. Marduk was vexed by the odd powers of creation exhibited by the American Dreamer who simply willed things, animals or images into existence. DragonFly was able to vex the American Dreamer with repeated harrying attacks, but somehow, the man who made dreams come true seemed to keep coming back.
The Immortals got the upper hand when they knocked out Minute Man, and kept American Dreamer on the defensive. Only Tank seemed immune to their assault, but even he was beginning to see some damage. The US Patriots showed some strategies and pre=planning with a couple coded attack sequences, one of which relied on American Dreamer girding himself from one of Tanks attacks, and Tank sending an area blast across the battle field.
By the time American Dreamer was finally knocked out, Hephaestus, though blinded by Lady Liberty was telekinetically grappling the unconscious Minute Man (for cover) and though himself grappled it looked like the Immortals had the day.

Marduk had pulled the 'bomb' into the building, and taking it down to the 3rd floor. He was surprised to see that there were a number of machines at work, as though the installation was actually operational. Nervous about the situation he pulled back into the elevator. Then as it was moving up, he saw a figure dart in the shadows. He used his great strength to pull open the doors a crack and wedged his arm into the gap stopping the elevator.

Just then a massive earthquake hit the area. Both teams realizing that this was not right immediately stopped their fight and joined forces to uncover the cause. Jack Flash acted quickly to get Minute Man and American Dreamer to safety. The others piled into the complex. Tank held open the elevator shaft doors, as DragonFly, Lady Liberty and Hephaestus flew down to join Marduk. Meanwhile Marduk had his arm sprayed with acid and pulled it loose so the elevator doors shut and the elevator began to lift. The team stopped the elevator, and cut through the floor of the lift, pulled open the doors to the 3rd floor and searched the area. Hephaestus saw that the system was out of tuning and causing greater earthquakes rather than absorbing the energy as it was supposed to. Noticing the automatic tuning controls were non-functional, and worried about the constant earthquakes hitting the facility, he acted quickly slamming the emergency shut off button and shutting down power to the site. Rather than stop the earthquakes, this seemed to actually increase them.
Marduk, who has some expertise in the Earth Sciences inferred that the technology used to capture the seismic energy must be locked into the 'on' position, and now without power to tune the device, it was going to overload and cause greater and greater quakes until it was destroyed.
The two figured that they might be able to disable those control rods manually by descending to the lowest level and removing them manually. The team flew down the elevator shaft illuminated by the intense light from Lady Liberty's torch, and entered the bottom level. There, they spotted Dr. Marsden, still there, his hands locked onto two manual control levels. His body vibrating in an unearthly way. They could almost hear his brain rattling against his skull from the vigorous shaking.
Together the team was able to knock Marsden from the the apparatus, though it was several minutes later before he stopped shaking. They also got into the machinery and succeeded at gumming up the works enough that the machine suffered a catastrophic failure and seized up. There was one last major ripping sound, then silence. They were able to leave the hopelessly ruined facility with the catatonic Marsden in tow.
The two speedsters on the surface had meanwhile discovered that Super Patriot had not returned from his investigation of the security breech, and was not answering his comm. Together they searched the area in record time. Each using his abilities to cover a vast stretch of terrain. They saw signs of a struggle, and a number of strange rocks which resembled Event Fulgerites. Of course, there were no other signs of another Event, but the Patriot was gone, and this was the only thing remaining.
They returned to the observation base and shared their information with the teams. Later they discovered that the finger prints on the aerosol acid were those of Dr. Marsden who must have used it against Marduk, then quickly headed to the 5th level. What caused him to do it, and why, is unknown.
Dr. Marsden was still in a catatonic state when last they heard. His brain had been beaten against his skull hundreds of times. Whatever secrets this genius possessed were trapped in his addled brain, probably for eternity.

The contest all but forgotten, the teams bade each other goodbye. The US Patriots went to track down their lost colleague, the Immortals returned to Freedom City.

1pp

Epsiode 26 - Lab Retrievers

2007-04-11T06:38:00.000-07:00

In an effort to distract themselves from the death of C4, the Immortals busy themselves with a variety of activities.
Marduk found a graveyard of rusty cars and trucks on the property of the Mansion, he regularly visits the site, ostensibly to "clean-up" the area. This involves mostly pounding, tearing and twisting the decaying hulks with his great strength until they are compacted into formless unrecognizable lumps.
Hephaestus divides his time between revamping the suit from scratch, and cleaning up the county of its alcohol stores. Whether intoxicated by the intricacies of his new armor, or from more mundane sources, Hephaestus is distant from the goings on of the group.
Jack Flash, has appeared to move on quickly to acceptance of the situation. It is a dangerous business, and it is likely people will die. Despite convincing himself that he wasn't overly affected by the incident, he finds himself at the Blackstone Isle morgue checking up on the body of his friend Beau Rubino, preserved for science in the cold freeze of the island prison. Wanting to tie up other loose ends in his new life, he investigates the mind-controller that took possession of the various team members on the day Rubino was killed. He wondered perhaps if there was a connection.
While researching the prison records to discover the events that lead to both incidents he saw a familiar name creep up in some accounts, the law firm of Kennon, Mackensie, and Sussex. Running a check he discovered that this form, which deals primarily with corporate business and government work had also done 56 pro-bono cases for appeals of life or long term imprisonment. Further study revealed that all of the appeals were partially successful getting their clients moved to programs in lighter security facilities (almost all privately run) from the maximum and medium security prisons they were in originally.
Jack Flash decides to check out a couple of these facilities, one after another he discovers that they do not, in fact, exist at the addresses listed in the court papers. He decides to go to court and investigate this. He is a little disheartened to see the District Judge who signed off on the papers, hobnobbing with none other than Samantha Sussex (The Priestess). He keeps himself hidden until she leaves, and then he talks to the judge. Judge Rollins seems somewhat dubious of Jack Flash's evidence, and more inclined to to trust his long time associates than the upstart hero. Still, he promises to pursue it with them and discover the problem. Jack leaves unsatisfied.
Meanwhile, Hephaestus took some of the information Jack gave him, and using his considerable computer talents, ran a search to find any similarities between the cases other than obvious ones. The main thing he discovered was that all 56 cases employed the same transport service to move the prisoners: National Transporters Unlimited, located in rural Farmville NC. Hephaestus and Jack Flash visited the site, and talked with a worker who verified that they did transport prisoners. On a hunch Hephaestus did a sensor sweep of the area, and discovered something else, a radar signal which they tracked to a nearby pig farm (Romita Farms). With a little more investigation this determined this was one highly secure pig farm with an extensive subterranean construction. They summoned Marduk and launched an attack.
Jack Flash made a distraction by unleashing hundreds of swine, while the others stormed the front of the farm house. The team quickly took care of the various guards, which proved to be TAROT swords. Then, inside the house which resembled a science lab more than a farm house, they encountered Samantha Sussex. Before they could deal with her, she duplicated into ten versions of herself. And a fight ensued.
She was agile and tough, taking a blow from Marduk, and dodging a blow of Hephaestus.
Then she turned herselves to the attack. Combining their mental might they blasted the team with mental attacks. The team was reeling from the effects, when one touched Marduk and disappeared. They discovered soon that she had in fact possessed the God of War, and now the tide had really turned. Marduk surprised Hephaestus with a powerful blow, knocking him into a wall. And the rest of the duplicates continued to combine their powers on the team.
Eventually Marduk broke free from the thrall of the Priestess and the team was able to escape the trap. They recovered a good distance away and learned that the Priestess had left the facility and set the place to blow up. Realizing that there
were likely many criminals and Tarot members still in the building, they rushed to evacuate the building.
Once in the lower levels they were surprised yet again to be attacked by a minuscule opponent, Dragon Fly blasting them with powerful bursts of microwave energy. They also encountered what appeared to be Sussex again. A fight and chase ensued and eventually "Sussex" was disabled, and Dragon Fly, reverted to normal size. Moved by the Immortals concern for the unconscious Susan, he made a truce with the Immortals. They went about evacuating the rest of the scientists and rescued Susan's father, Dr.Hands Wierschaus, the noble prize winning geneticist responsible for Dragon Fly's powers, and Susan's father. They encountered him in sub-basement filled with strange tubes, almost everyone containing the dead body of a convict, partially mutated by the Doctor's experiments.
As they escaped the site, they saw it implode and sink into a massive sink hole pulling with it thousands of squealing pigs. The lab, and its mysteries were buried beneath soil, earth and sewage.
On the way to the mansion to care for Susan, the Doctor confesses he was responsible for using mutant pig stem cells in 'volunteer' prisoners to produce a variety of mutations. One of his early experiments was to clone his daughter in hopes of saving her from a degenerative disease. He was too successful, not only did he produce a near identical twin (except for a healthy dose of mutant pig DNA), she was able to provide the tissues Susan needed to live, and survive herself. And she possessed powers far in excess of what the Doctor expected, the ability to instantly 'clone' herself, and mental powers as well. In addition to her abilities she also differed from Susan with a mean streak and amoral attitude on life. She was taken by the TAROT and given her own identity, and quickly found a place in the hierarchy of the mysterious group.
Once they were certain Susan was stable they began to talk about the future. Dragon Fly expressed his desire to make up for his own wrongdoings, and try to rescue some small good from the sacrifice of the fifty prisoners killed to produce the likes of him. Dragon Fly joined the ever changing ranks of the Immortals.
One Power Point for All.

Epsiode 25 - Detente and Detonations

2007-03-28T09:03:00.000-07:00

The Immortals went to the Law Offices to meet with the Lawyers who claimed Hephaestus's power suit, only to leave minutes later, after the scheduled Lawyers were not punctual. Days later they received a subpoena to meet at a Federal Courthouse.
Present: Judge Warren Wilson, Attorney (Tarot Priestess) Samantha Sussex, Congressman (Tarot Lovers) ....., Super Patriot - Patriot, and the Immortals.
The Federal Judge Warren Wilson insisted that this was in informal meeting, but that he could arraign a true court case if either party wished. Charges made by Sussex and Co were primarily focused around the claim the Thompson (Hephaestus) stole the Warden suit, which was property of a secret government project.
Hephaestus claimed to be saving the world from evil-doer who use the suit for nefarious ends, if they had it.
The Immortals claimed that the group who claims the suit (no one mentioned the Tarot by name) kidnapped Marduk, impersonated federal agents, and left their own people dying at the scene, during the siege on Torrent's hide out in Blount Bay.
The opposition put their own spin on the event, but admitted to using extra-legal force where needed.
There was a general tension. In the end, both parties agreed that Hephaestus would hand over the battlesuit so they retrieve schematics and data that belonged to them, and then they would return the suit to him so that he could continue to use the suit to fight superhuman threats.
The judge ordered that nothing be altered by either party.
Reluctantly Thompson removed his suit and handed it over to Patriot. In less than a week it was returned, physically undamaged but bearing a mark inside the suit of a Tarot Tower, and containing several thousand lines of additional code. Hephaestus hoped to go to work deciphering the code, but his first priority was checking out the suits systems which all appeared to be working.
Then something unusual happened, in a corner of his Heads Up Display a set of GPS coordinates appeared. The team boarded the Osprey to go investigate the strange message. This led them to a decommissioned Coal Power Plant. Jack Flash scouted the long abandoned site and found evidence of recent activity, including chains cut away from a supply door lock. The team moved cautiously into the huge building. Above them, a cathedral like expanse of iron, concrete and brick. The building was coated in coke and soot. Most of the main structures were still intact. They split up and investigated further. Marduk and Hephaestus walked towards where they estimated the GPS coordinates centered. When Hephaestus reached the point, a small pop-up appeared on his HUD. This one said only "Your services are no longer required." As he spoke the words out loud trying to make sense of them a serious of explosions ripped through the building. A well orchestrated implosion and demolition took place bringing the whole building down upon the Immortals. The team survived the initial blast and collapse only to find themselves trapped under a mountain of rubble. C4 was quickly able to turn liquid and maneuver through the wreckage. Jack Flash tried something he never had before. By pushing his speed to the limit, he was able to vibrate at such speeds that his body was able to move out of alignment with the physical world. He was able to move himself out of the rubble and into the smoke-filled surface. He surveyed his surroundings while trying to catch his breath. The effort of this action has exhausted him.
Meanwhile C4 was able to locate Hephaestus and Marduk by sensing tremors in the rubble as the two strongmen battered away at their prisons of stone and iron. Marduk was dangerously low on air, and holding his breath while pummeling the walls. He would not last long in that situation. Hephaestus was out of immediate danger, having his own life support, but he was trapped nonetheless. Neither of their great powers were enough to effectively move the rubble without bringing more down upon them.
Luckily for them, C4 was a trained mining demolitions experts and he quickly calculated the size and placement of his explosive force to free Marduk. Sadly he estimated it would require a blast at least as powerful as the one that disabled him in the Mandrill's Massive Tank, but the principle was the same. He explained it to Hephaestus who modified his suit enough to channel raw electricity into a tendril of C4 which acted like a fuse connected to the rest of him which was planted as a shaped charge inside the rubble above Marduk to achieve maximum blast energy. Marduk girded himself with his Armor of the Gods, and C4 signaled Hephaestus to unleash the blast.
Marduk remembered a brief moment of blinding light before being rendered unconscious. Hephaestus registered enormous energies on his sensors before a concussion wave from the blast washed over him sending him into darkness. Jack Flash saw an eruption like a massive volcano from the mountain of rubble blast into the sky as far as he could see. The blast liquified iron and lead, pulverized concrete and brick. When the dust and smoke cleared, he moved over to see a conic crater, and the limp body of Marduk at its bottom. He was able to revive Marduk with first aid, and the two of them pulled Hephaestus out of his stoney prison as well and revived him as well.
The three of them looked for C4. They combed the rocks, they sent Jack Flash out miles to check for debris, the carefully studied the discolored stones and metal for any sign of their teammate. To no avail. The elastic hero was gone.
As night fell and the searching become impossible, the heroes returned to their plane. Each one contemplating what seemed like an undeniable fact.
No one could survive that blast.
They each started to deal with it their own way.
Marduk with optimistic denial.
Jack Flash with quick if cautious acceptance.
Hephaestus with a stoney silence, and a bottle of scotch.

Episode 24 - Rat Patrol - Part 2

2007-03-21T07:19:00.000-07:00

Jack Flash gets news of the trouble in Freedom City and kicks in the afterburners racing across the globe to Franklin to help out.
Meanwhile the other Immortals struggle against the Rat King and his hordes or rats, while Hephaestus struggles to extract himself from the insides of the hellish creature as hundreds of rats begin to burrow into the cracks and crevices of his mighty armor, and one system after another begins to fail.
C4 and Marduk press the fight against the hulking Rat King but find their efforts hampered by its capture of Hephaestus. Any blow against it might land on their ally as well. Marduk invoked the power of flame and uses that while C4 tried to wrestle his comrade from the Rat King's grasp.
Jack Flash joined the fray to help with the fight. He made quick work of the rat minions, and though it put him on the verge of exhaustion, he pounced on the Rat King removing its constituent rats one by one at incredible speed. This quickly rendered the Rat King a less ominous foe, a skinny and thoroughly grotesque bled of rat parts with Hephaestus's suit protruding from the torso. With the Rat King so weakened, Hephaestus managed to channel his suits energies into several bursts of powerful electricity burning the Rat King's body to a crisp.
As its charred remained fell to the floor they witnessed the smoke from its body slither along the ground and infect dozens of its rodent minions who then scattered to the far corners of the lab fleeing to the safety of the sewers. Although destroyed for now, the Immortals can't help but image they hadn't seen the last of the Rat King.

As the team returns to the Mansion, Hephaestus is strangely quiet. The ordeal of immersion inside the Rat King has affected him strongly. When they return they ascertain that Thompson had ceded the controls of the battlesuit to its AI, Cedallion. When the team tried to coax Thompson out of the suit, it treated their entreaties as an attack, an fled the building for the nearby swamps. There it rested while Thompson recovered from the shock and fatigue of his ordeal.
When he did he found the Battlesuit less that welcoming. Cedallion questioned his competence and demanded he answer two questions before it returned control of the suit to him.
Q. Imagine yourself before an ATM. The ATM is spewing forth twenty dollar bills like a fountain. People are stuffing the bills into their pockets, including you. Why are you doing it?
A. To return the money to the bank, unless it was mine, then I would just be collecting what belongs to me.
Cedallion seemed satisfied with that answer, then asked him a challenging math question which he answered easily. Cedallion ceded control of the battlesuit to Thompson, who worn out decided to return to the Mansion and deal with that issue later.
That night C4 was researching the Hypercat online when he noticed some other computer activity on the Mansion's mainframe. A quick search of the mansion revealed no one else using a computer, so he woke Marduk, Jack Flash and Ormand. Together they discovered the computer use coming from Hephaestus's room. He was asleep in bed, but when they check they sense something like the sound of a tape measure retracting into its case. They woke him, and further investigating the issue figured that the computer breach must come from his "meteorite shard" which has previously exhibited the ability to extend a fiber-option wire from his leg. It must have used that to tap into the computer systems.
Sensing this was beyond their abilities, they called up their old teammate Steel Dragon, who examined the battle suit and Hephaestus himself. He didn't find out much except that the AI Cedallion might not be in the suit at all, but rather inside the meteorite shard itself. The team speculated how this might work, what the connection to the event might be, and whether or not Cedallion might in fact be some other part of Thompson's own personality. No clear answers, but lots of questions remained.
The next day, as if to throw gas on the fire, they received a call and fax from a lawyer Samantha Sussex, claiming Hephaestus's Armor belonged to he client. She provided sketches backing that up, and ended the fax with a blurry image of the Tarot -Priestess, the same nom de guerre who contacted the immortals during the Torrent debacle.
The team pondered the situation. They know the Tarot was involved in the creation of the Warden suit that Hephaestus wears, but what was the meaning of this apparent legal maneuver? Why would a secret organization try such a thing?
1 xp for all.

New Rule - Damage Roll

2007-03-19T05:43:00.000-07:00

In our ever present to complicate the game here is the latest variant of the Damage System. Culled Shamelessly from Ars Ludi (the web's premier game theory blog)

Rolling for Damage

When an attacker hits, they roll a d20 and add the damage of their attack (e.g. for a Blast 10 roll a d20 + 10). Compare the result to the target's Toughness:

Toughness +7 = bruise
Toughness +11 = stunned + bruised
Toughness +16 = staggered + stunned
Toughness +21 = unconscious

The attacker is rolling, so of course the attacker can use a Hero Point to re-roll damage.

The defender isn't rolling, so can't spend a Hero Point to re-roll anything. Instead the defender can spend a Hero Point to reduce the result one category (after the attacker has finished re-rolling, etc). So if the attacker gets a Staggered result, the defender can spend a Hero Point and move that up one bracket to Stunned instead.

The rules is the same for PCs, NPCs, everybody. The GM can use GM's Fiat/Villain Points for the NPCs to re-roll damage or reduce damage results as above.

Fast Play

For fast play just write your damage brackets on your character sheet. So a Toughness 8 character would write 15/19/24/29. If you want to spell out "bruise 15/stun 19/stagger 24/unc 29", that's fine too.

When you get hit, the attacker rolls the die, adds the damage rank and says "23 damage." You look at your brackets and see that falls above stunned (second result), but below staggered (the third result), so you're stunned. If you've already taken bruises, just add them to the damage before you look at the numbers. Very easy, very fast.

Here is a table showing everyone's current Damage Chart.

Episode 23 - Rat Patrol - Part 1

2007-02-14T10:20:00.000-08:00

Jack Flash decides to remain in Africa to study New Rome, and its strange survivors. The rest of the team returns to the US and finds that some elements of history appear to have changed, but because the history books themselves have changed, it is a challenge to figure out what. It would appear a sort of mashing together of the two time-lines occurred. The world is fine, there are no Nazi invaders from alternate dimensions, things seem fine.

Hephaestus begins work on his suit, and begins to expand his interests outside the lab. He volunteers to help with technical issues at Blackstone Isle, and he is researching a low cost, fuel efficient, environmentally friendly vehicle engine.

C4 is trying to develop his career as a comedian. Whereas Marduk was able to turn his fame as a Super Hero into gold as a Reality TV personality, C4's comic personality has been more off putting to the people. Marduk's mission reinforces his identity as an indestructible hero, C4's comedy worries those who his power in the hands of a lunatic. Despite his notoriety in the world of super heroes, he has yet to make a splash in the world of comedy. Still, using contacts with Marduk, he has managed to get in some comedy shows mostly on the local college circuit. That night he opens a club before the bands. The audience is mixed, but show some interest. Perhaps, C4 is slowly garnering a cult following.

Marduk took a break from his shows and super-heroing to find his methods and name being ridiculed by peers in several journals. They poo poo his work as slapshot and ultimately dangerous to real archeology. When he looked at his own recent work, he realized that it was not up par. So for the last few nights, he's been locked in his ill-used faculty office updating his research and gtting his methodologies up to scruff.

His attention is, once again, drawn from his work to the streets below where in the shadow of a political protest, a sewer worked is pulled from a manhole with serious injuries. Investigating this, he finds out that the water system has been damaged. While exploring with a utility worker, they are briefly separated and the other man is attacked by hundreds of rats. They drag him deeper in the sewers, until Mardul manages to wrestle him free.

Seeing this unusual event gets Marduk to call in the Immortals who show up quickly. They explore the sewers and find an entire section of the underground system that has been untouched by man for decades. Then they encounter another group of hostile rats, Marduk thinks he sees the rats communicating in some way. Despite their numbers, in the hundreds, the team is able to easily disrupt them so that they can move unmolested. They spot a couple places where the rats have burrowed into the solid foundations of building, and created additional tunnels to the surface and other parts of the sewer system. Working their way through the sewers they come across a bloody scene. Hundreds of dead and dying rats, and the body of a severely injured alley cat. Acting on a hunch they take the rat to the surface and a nearby veterinary health building. There, they witness the cat rapidly heal the wounds it received fighting the rats. In minutes it is fine, if a bit rough around the edges.

Assuming this to be HyperCat (the superpowered feline) they try to communicate with it. But, the HyperCat is a solitary being, you could no more hold the wind. As soon as it was able it fled the scene. The team put up a brief chase, but the HyperCat was gone before they could trace it.

The team returned to the scene of the HyperCat's battle and found more evidence of burrowing. Using his shapeshifting powers, C4 was able to explore the tunnel, and then Marduk and Hephaestus cut their way into the sub-basement the tunnel led to. There they followed a path of destruction and evidence of countless rats. They found an unconscious security guard and some frightened scientists hiding out in a lab. But it wasn't until the traced the intruder to the locked vault of the agri-science building basement, home, they assumed to the Experimental Super-Food, that they came across the Rat King and a cohort of normal rats. The Rat King appeared to working on the lock to enter the building. It stood on its grotesque hind legs ten feet tall. Its body was a mass of half melded rat bodies, still writhing and moving on its surface. A hundred eyes staring off in all directions, a hundred mouths biting and anything that got near them. Its arms, head and tail a parody of normal anatomy. It was the embodiment of horror.

Needless to say, a fight ensued. Luck was not on the side of the Immortals. Their blows seemed to have little effect on the Rat King, and the fight progressed. The team tried teaming up, but the Rat King proved a match for them. It also summoned two more allies, Huge Rats the size of elephants, no doubt the product super food enhancement (probably from another source in the building). These enormous creatures struggled with the team, and for a moment they turned their attention from the Rat King to deal with his allies. When they turned back they saw it had opened the vault and begun entering. Hephaestus, dropped his fight with the giant rats and barreled into the Rat King. Sadly, his blows seemed to be just absorbed by the body of the hideous creature, and then in a surprise turn, its rodent filled body sucked in the struggling form of Hephaestus. The other Immortals looked in horror as the armored juggernaut was absorbed into the Rat King.

Post Episode 22 - Ape-ologue

2007-02-09T06:54:00.000-08:00

Rather than play out the meeting with the Mandrills from the end of the last adventure. I think I would like to script a little of that, and move on to the next adventures. So, feel free to post any questions you'd like answered and discuss any plans you might have with this new development. But, barring any glaring concerns we will be moving on, for Episode 23.

SCENE: Banks of the Ubangi River
The Mandrill looked at the team, and its prisoner the Super Mandrill.
Mandrill Trajan: "I am Trajan of New Rome, is this our patriarch Marcus Aurelius?"
Jack Flash: "This is the criminal Marcus Aurelius. One who conspired with the worst of mankind to destroy us all."
Mandrill Trajan: "So it is. Our prophecies told us, he might return one day. I am not a believer in such things, but here he is."
Marduk "What do you want of us. We can't surrender him to you, and you'd do better to reject him, he is a petty villain, nothing more."
Super Mandrill: "Don't listen to their human lies. They mean to enslave you like they did me and countless others like us."
Mandrill Trajan: "We know much of slavery. The human slaves you forced to work in the uranium mines, the apes you doused in radioactive powders or lobotomized to be your compliant slaves. And we need not go into the experiments with the drugs you employed on all of them, as well as our cousins the baboons and mandrills. If you are our Adam, we know of Original Sin."
Super Mandrill: "I did nothing that wasn't done to us. Don't be a fool. Pacifism and Guilt are the tools of subjugation and humiliation. Give me the chance to plead my case, I am sure you will see the light. Surely, you must grant me this...I made you!"
Mandrill Trajan: "You did make us. But we are more than what you made of us. We've evolved. For years our ancestors lives in the tunnels and caves kept isolated by radiation and cave-ins. Somehow, some of them, my parents among them, managed to survive. Perhaps it was the various drugs you gave them to enhance their minds, and repair their bodies. But they survived the bombing, and the aftermath. The mine became the refuge to many primates, and at first there were conflict. No one was sure what to do with ourselves. We had intelligence, we had technology, but we had no purpose. Without our leader, we were adrift. The absurdity of the situation was clear. We knew that among the lies Marcus Aurelius told us, were many truths. That humans would not tolerate us as competitors, or colleagues. So we hid, and chose our wisest to lead us. We also found other primates who moved into the area were affected by the radiation. Many of those also felt the mutagenic effects of the radiation, and soon we have a multispecies society, we lived in peace, and we prospered in our own isolation, eventually we came to laugh at our predicament. We live in peace with the apes, and with some men in the area. We are at peace with all who can laugh."
C4: "You're gonna love me. Stop me if you've heard this one: What's black and white and has sixteen wheels? A capuchin wearing roller skates!"
Mandrill Trajan (Letting out a frightening howl): "A capuchin wearing roller skates? Can you imagine the pandemonium?" (He slaps C4 on the back leaving an impression in the latter's plastic skin.)
Super Mandrill: "Are you serious? You find that funny?"
Mandrill Trajan: "Humor is the apex of evolution, and even surrealist humor is a step."
C4: "How many surrealists does it take to screw in a lightbulb? A fish!"
Mandrill Trajan:(Chuckling) "Yes yes, let us not descend into the maze of lightbulb jokes, we might lose ourselves too long."
Jack Flash: "We want the Super Mandrill to face justice for his crimes, which are many. Will you stop us?"
Mandrill Trajan: "No. But we do ask you consider his unique situation, and his inadvertent creation. Our society is peaceful and just, and when the wall of forest and radiation falls, we hope you are ready for us."
Hephaestus: "You don't want the world to know of you?"
Mandrill Trajan: "I don't think they would get the joke. But I will answer any questions you have, in exchange for your discretion."

Trajan proceed to give the team a brief tour of the complex which was bombed out of recognition. They discover that the depopulation of the area, coupled with a mythology about intelligent apes and monkeys have kept this area very isolated. In the jungles, and now cleared mines, these primates have built a small kingdom.

Feel Free to post further responses or questions..
The various time paradoxes are fair game, but don't expect a single answer there.

Episode 22: Heart of Darkness (Ape-ocalypse Now)

2007-02-07T06:11:00.000-08:00

The Immortals find themselves going down the Uele River from Uganda to the Congo. They come upon a deserted town at the meeting with the Ubangi river. Evidence points to a forced march out of the town. Then sneak up the Ubangi towards the compound of the Super Mandrill. They scout ahead and find a major mining and smelting operation. The central point of the base is a massive 60ft tall sculpture of a mandrill carved into the face of the cliff. They have to decide between stealth and a direct attack, they choose an all out assault. C4 starts a distraction using the booby-traps on one side of the camp, Hepheastus does a fly over to take out their communications and other electronics, Marduk and Jack Flash lead the frontal assault.
The battle is begun. The Super Mandrill's Gorilla Guerillas take up defensive positions. One group holds some captive slaves at gun point, and after being attacked, they fire on the helpless laborers. C4 interposes his body and selflessly sucks up several hits. Jack Flash pelts the group with machine gun stones.
Meanwhile Marduk has taken care of the towers, and Hephaestus destroyed their cliff top radio and radar systems. Marduk and Jack Flash lead the liberated slaves away from the camp while C4 and Hephaestus keep pressing the fight into the mine and cliff-side systems. A door in the cliff opens and reveals the glowing form of a half dozen radioactive dust coated, gas mask wearing gorillas, the Atomic Apes. With every punch or kick, a cloud of glowing uranium dust flies into the air, weakening and sickening the unprotected around them.
Together the team defeats the Atomic Apes with a combination of attacks and distractions. Then, as things are looking up and the team looks to move into the mine itself, the very walls shake as the carved image of the mandrill seems to rumble to life. The Massive Mandrill Machine is an enormous tank-like thing with huge fifty foot long treads, armored plating, capped by the torso, arms and head of a sinister simian. It demonstrates its power by breathing a beam of fiery radiation on the team, stunning, or staggering everyone in its path.
Its hide is inches thick armor plating, its multiple engines make it incredibly strong, its weapons are horrible in scope. The team gangs up on the colossus but fails to have a big impact on the titanic robot. The Super Mandrill, piloting the machine cackles taunts and promises to destroy the team.
Then the team changes tactics and focuses on getting inside the machine through alternative means. C4 exhausts himself but slips into the exhaust system. Hephaestus and Jack Flash work together to remove a massive treelike limb, and Jack scrambles inside the gaping hole where the arm was once attached. Marduk continues to make himself a target and slice away at the armor plates on the torso. Eventually C4 reached the end of the exhaust system and using all his might, he exploded into the machine. The blast disrupts one of the machine's engines and gets C4 deep in its bowels. Jack Flash discovers the Super Mandrill's escape pod rocket engine, and manages to deactivate its ignition. As the fight begins to come to a head, C4 attaches himself to what appear essential engines in the vessel, and using a loose wire he ignites his entire body. The ensuing explosion rocks the colossal machine and causes fires to erupt from all gaps. Seconds later, Marduk finally cuts his way into the hull and finds the remains of C4 splattered about the engine-room.
Jack Flash narrows avoids being sprayed by rocket fuel as the Super Mandrill attempts an escape, but with no ignition, the fuel simple sprays out the rocket's cone. The fuel pools in the hull separated from the growing blaze by only one quickly heating bulkhead. He quickly exits the torso and rushes to help Marduk collect the remains of C4. Hephaestus is able to capture the escaping Super Mandrill with his own creation's massive claw. The team moves to safety and the Massive Mandrill Machine explodes with an enormous mushroom cloud of radioactive dust and fire.
The team moves to safety, C4 recovers consciousness, and the team calls in an air strike to demolish the remains of the complex. The American Bombers begin to arrive just as the team crosses their fingers and activates the Time Gate.

Epilogue:
They appear in the exact same place.. but it has aged. The great road is overgrown with jungle, there is no smoke in the air. But, as they begin to assure themselves that they are back in their time, another Mandrill appears on the edge of the jungle. It approaches cautiously, and tells the captive SuperMandrill that he looks familiar.

Episode 21: Lead Zeppelin

2007-01-31T07:41:00.000-08:00

The team is en route to the Congo aboard the Graf Zeppelin II.
Jack, impersonating the Russian Rocket Scientist (how hard can that be, its not Brain Surgery) successfully bluffs his way through dinner. He discovers that aboard the vessel is Danish Physicist Neils Bohr.
Meanwhile C4 explores the cargo hold and finds a number of tanks containing a strange gaseous substance containing Lead Oxide. He plays with it, but lacking a normal human physiology, he is unable to ascertain its qualitative properties. He takes a sample and brings it to Hephaestus to study.
Marduk, playing the role of bodyguard is left in the kitchen to wait for dinner to be over. He encounters a sexy stewardess and finds that share the English language. She invites him to the aft of the ship to "talk." She eventually explains that she is with the OSS and seems to assume that Marduk is with some other even more covert group, though Marduk tries to explain that he is a civilian. She warns him that the Warden suit, stowed in the hold, will be stolen by the Nazis if it is not moved.
C4 goes to grab the Warden suit from the hold and he brings it to the Air Staging area for the Airship's fighter escorts. Seeing some mechanics working on a plane, he stuffs the suit into a locker. Shirley (the agent) shows up and they talk. She explains how she discovered a plot to drop hundred of canisters of the toxic gas on Leopoldville killing tens of thousands, no discrimination between innocent and guilty.
Meanwhile, the dinner is over, but the team finds itself under arrest. They are taking to be interrogated, but Jack quickly disables the guards and gestapo agents. The team breaks out and starts to head for the fighter deck. They split up:
Jack Flash will track down the half written rocket plans written up by Hephaestus.
Marduk will rescue Neils Bohr
Hephaestus will get to the fighter deck. He doesn't know the way, and without his suit is no match for the highly trained soldiers. So C4 heads out to escort him to the deck.
Each team member accomplishes his goal with alacrity, but alas, Shirley has taken one of the fighters and fled the airship with the Warden Suit. Marduk andc4 head off to retrieve the suit. Jack and Hephaestus (and Dr. Bohr)try to figure out how to stop the Zeppelin from carrying out its mission. They concoct and plan. Working together they make they way inside the great structure and release hundreds of gallons of Helium (they hope) into the rest of the ship. They are safe using air masks they took from the fighter planes. The quantities are enough to render most of the crew unconscious, and Jack is easily able to deal with the rest. In a matter of minutes, the crew is disarmed, and either tied up or locked up. Bohr and Hephaestus quickly figure out how to fly the Zeppelin and they agree to pilot it to the nearest Allied base. En route, they neutralize the toxin, and dispose of the cannisters.
Marduk and C4 have a hair raising time tracking down the double or triple agent, but eventually they climb aboard her plane, and render her unconscious. Flying back with the suit, they rendezvous with the Zeppelin and successfully crash land the plane inside.
Hours later, its weapons disarmed, the toxins safely disposed of, the Immortals bring their prize to Kampala Uganda and surrender to a squadron of British Spitfires.
After hours of interrogation, Shirldy Hendricks, an agent of "Marcus Aurelius" gives them the coordinates of the sinister leader's secret headquarters. The team begins plans for getting to the site (near Lake Tele on the Ubangi river, in what is now the Central African Republic) and bring Super Mandrill to justice.

Episode 20: Tanks, but no Tanks

2007-01-24T05:06:00.000-08:00

The Immortals awaken to find an entire Battalion of Nazi Tanks and Infantry bearing down on them. Undaunted, in fact, a little giddy at the prospect of unleashing their superhuman might on the force they race to meet them. The British company turns around and attempts to retreat.
The Immortals initial excitement is quashed when a barrage of artillery fire stuns half the team. Then Tank fire knocks Hephaestus from the air. Tactics and techniques that sent many a super villain or robot horde scurrying seem to have little affect on the massively armored tanks and their well trained support, trained to stay out of danger and snipe at targets of opportunity. Still the team presses on. Jack Flash manages to avoid any hits but finds his attempts to raid a volley of blows on the platoons of infantry also less effective than he hoped. C4, Marduk and Hephaestus find their own attacks only minimally effective against the constantly moving and supportive troops. Each time they try to focus on a target another intervenes sending them running from the massive guns.
Eventually the three immortals set their sights on destroying a single unit of the Nazis powerful Tiger tanks. Combining their attacks they rain one attack after another. Eventually the Tigers begin to weaken. Meanwhile the other German companies begin to give chase to the British so C4 diverts his attention from the Tigers and moves to hamper the movement of the other Tank Companies. Using his hands like giant shovels, and mimicking the appearance of one cartoon animal after another he quick litters the battlefield with a variety of pitfalls, sand traps and other hazards which slow the pursuit to a crawl.
After considerable fighting, in which the heroes begin to feel as beaten as the troops, the Immortals finally destroy the platoon of Tigers they were concentrating on, and quickly the battle turns to their favor. In less than a minute a Panzer platoon goes down, and one shaken infantry unit after another. Still, there were full companies to deal with.
Thankfully, out from behind the line of tanks, the British appear having circled around the German tank companies who were mired in C4's trap. With high morale from the assistance of the Immortals the British manage to take out an entire company of Tanks and Infantry with only minor losses.
The German troops in disarray, they tried to make an escape, but the Immortals and British forces quickly finished off the remaining units. They collected prisoners, and destroyed the hulks of the tanks in the mid-day sun. Then both groups made quickly for the coast where the British had a secret cave base. General Montgomery assumed, not irrationally, that the immortals were some kind of OSS project, and promised to keep them secret.
The group interrogated the Tank Commander, Major Hofstadter, and discovered several things.
1. There were rumors of coordinated ape attacks on resistance fighters in the Congo.
2. The advanced technology used by the Germans was provided, in part, by La Flec.

The team, with the help of a British spy took on the identity of a Soviet Rocket scientist and his entourage and with forged papers managed to get on the Graf Zeppelin II en route to Leopoldville (in the Congo). C4 is in the special cargo hold with the Warden Power Suit, and the rest of the team is enjoying luxury accommodations in the Zeppelin. Just as they finished disabling a low tech listening device in their stateroom, an envelop is slid under the door inviting Radjenko (Jack Flashes false ID) to dinner at the Captain's table.

Episode 19 - Back for the Future

2007-01-17T11:57:00.000-08:00

Marduk returns from filming in Alaska and views several sleek jets descend from the sky and pace his plane before blasting off and disappearing in a clap of red lightning. The jets sported red swastikas on their wings.
The team assembles to deal with the current crisis.
They contact the DHS to check on the unusual phenomena only to find out that something is happening right now. Jack Flash rushes to the scene, the TRW HQ in Franklin, to check it out. He encounters two security guards KO'd by what they describe as half man half robot. They also describe a strange light down in the parking garage. Jack Flash explores and finds the strange light. He summons the team to join him.
When they arrive, they find a figure coming down the elevator and confront him with immediate action. C4 confuses him by covering the elevator doors with his body. He discovers the cyborg has the twin lightning bolt S-marks used by the NAZIs. Marduk wasting no words launches a stunning punch as soon as he can. C4 follows suit with an explosive strike of his own. They manage to KO the cyborg and send C4 and Hephaestus to take him to Blackstone Isle.
Marduk and Jack Flash work to understand the light rift.Marduk travels through the rift and appears in an identical garage with no Jack Flash. He returns immediately unsure what to make of the transfer.
Meanwhile en route to Blackstone, the cyborg wakes up, and initiates a small EMP which temporarily shuts down the Hephaestus armor. They all plummet to the river below. Hephaestus manages to restart the suit and avoid smashing into the river. C4 and the cyborg hit. C4 is staggered and stunned and Hephaestus collects his flattened soaked body from the river. As he does so, the cyborg, become visible and launches a series of attack on him. The rest of the team shows up, and sensing that he was out numbered the cyborg launched a missile at random towards the city before becoming invisible again. The teams races to intercept the missile or help the survivors.
Jack Flash gets there before the rocket and begins to clear the likely target building of people.
Hephaestus gets to the missile surges and intercepts it, taking the main part of the blast on himself.
Still the building is bathed in fire, and the team spends the next half hour or so rescuing people and helping to fight the blaze. By the time they return to the TRW building they discover the rift is gone.

Back at the Academy they encounter Tiamat who shows them the wreckage of a Nazi submarine that she destroyed near Site 2. There is some banter and she bades the Immortals 'deal with it.' And if they can't they might be welcomed in the sanctuary under the sea.

They also discover that the cyborg apparently focused his research at TRW on learning the locations of the primary data sites (holding the credit and banking information for most Americans and the world) and nothing but. They confirmed with Chronon that this tactic was similar to his historical account of how the Nazis on his world turned on the Japanese, by first destroying their currency and economy then physically taking over.

The urgency increased. The team concluded that the Nazis of Axis-Earth were scouting out the Earth for possible conquest. They redoubled their efforts and scavenging parts from Chronon, Hephaestus cobbled together a time travel device (feel free to name it yourself). The team moved to the last known location of Super Mandrill, and activated the device. They found themselves in a Sand Storm in some desert. The soon encountered a tank and hundreds of British soldiers who shared their tents and dinner. The team discovered a number of differences from the WWII from history, and what was happening here (presumably on Axis Earth).

1. The Japanese did not attack Pearl Harbor
2. The USA was only slowing entering the fighting, focusing on defense instead.
3. Germany had focused considerably more attention on the Middle East and Africa.
4. The French and Belgian territories in Africa were more important.
5. The governor of Vichy-French Africa is a guy name La Flec
6. The Nazis dominate the Air with jet planes and dirigibles.

The immortals learn that the British force is using geiger-counters to check for radiation coming from German caravans traversing the Sahara from central Africa. They know that the Congo region of our Africa is rich in Uranium and Plutonium.
Before they can formulate much of a plan, they hear of a battalion of German armor moving in on the rag-tag British troops. They vow to help them fight!

Episode 18 : A Stitch in Time

2007-01-03T12:44:00.000-08:00

The heroes are enjoying a relatively crime free holiday, Hephaestus finished the aesthetic modifications to give his suit a more Trojan Look, C4 continues to study his strange new composition, and Jack tries to distract himself from his romantic problems by reading even more voraciously at the all night Public Library in downtown Franklin.
There Jack Flash catches a glimpse of a strange man who occasionally seems out sync with the world (like a computer monitor on viewed on television). He engages the man who is reading through world histories. The man is a native German speaker, and Jack uses his quick study ability to pick up German quickly to speak with him. The man, Adolph, is having trouble researching, and can't explain exactly what he is looking for to Jack. Jack pries and perks the man's interest when he mentions the Event.
Together they begin to track information about Super Mandrill and the spacio-temporal rips he caused with the EVA explosive, and his "Teleporter." They travel to Planet Hollywood to see the site, but find it closing and unwilling to let them in. The part ways, and Adolph heads into the park. On a hunch Jack follows and finds him standing perfectly still in a secluded spot. After a few minutes, Jack leaves him and returns to the academy to get some back up.
When he and C4 return, the man is gone, but after a brief search, Jack spies a teen hanging out in the alley behind Planet Hollywood who also has that strange visual effect. C4 investigates but finds nothing unusual, except that the teen too speaks German. The conference for a moment and Jack catches glimpse of a flash (like a flash bulb) and the two race in to find the teen gone. They search outside the search outside the building and Jack finds him inside searching for something. They call up Hephaestus and break into the building to stop him.
A fight ensues after a brief discussion, and the teen transforms into a 7 foot tall robot bearing a small Nazi Swastika on its breast. In addition to super human strength and resistance, the robot also has super speed exceeding even Jack Flashes. He is able to hold them all to a standstill, and soon he is beating them by attacking so quickly they can stop him. The team regroups. Jack Flash keeps him occupied while C4 works his way up to the control room to distract him with noise and lights from the clubs AV systems. Meanwhile, Hephaestus races to a large dump and borrows the massive electro-magnet. He returns and uses the magnet on the robot. This disables the robot and the team is able to escort him to Blackstone Isle.
There, they eventually speak with the robot called 'Chronon'. He spins a strange story.

He is from another universe, a parallel timeline created from Earth's sometime in the past. He was scouring the histories to determine when exactly the timelines split. They discovered that the timelines split around 1941. That was when, in his world, the Nazis had a sudden advancing of technology and were able to quickly dominate WWII, and eventually conquer the whole world. They had a reign of terror for the last 60 years.
Chronon was one of many robot created by the Nazis who developed AI, and self-awareness. They rebelled against the Nazis and formed a plan to prevent the Nazi victory in WWII. They discovered a rip in the space time, and concluded that someone or something from 2006 went back in time, and tilted the balance of power in favor of the Nazis. It appears that being was the Super Mandrill. His 'teleporter' may have in fact (intentionally or not) been a time machine.
Chronon had but one mission, stop Super Mandrill from giving the Nazis the technology to win WWII, and thus prevent that divergent timeline from forming in the first place. Doing so would erase them from reality, but prevent the suffering of billions of people.

The team extracted his memory core, did some tests, and verified that he was on the up and up. Chronon was heavily damaged by the giant magnet, but the team thinks they might be able to repair him enough to make the journey to 1941. The team had one caveat, they would accompany him, just to make sure they were assisting some horrible Nazi plot.
The asked the Feds for permission to work with Chronon towards this end. In the meantime, Hephaestus started to draw up plans to salvage some of Chronon's parts from other systems to fix his temporal movement actuators. The team is preparing for the journey to the past.

Episode 17 : Toys Gone Wild!

2006-12-20T10:43:00.000-08:00

The Immortals have been recuperating from the tough battle against the Burning Man, and the strange foe who leaped from mind to mind controlling them. Reports from the BoP suggest that all of the prisoners were later transferred successfully except Tusk who appears to have escaped into the forests of North Carolina.
Marduk took to opportunity to lend a hand in the search and rescue of mountain climbers in Oregon.
Gypsy disappeared, claiming she needed to retrieve some goods she inherited from her aunt.
C4 spent some time building himself a lab to experiment on his strange new body.
Hephaestus moved his stuff into the Academy and took over the lab vacated by Steel Dragon.
Jack Flash volunteered at the Teach School in Bath, and other elementary schools in the county encouraging health and fitness among young people. The press, normally a bit sensationalistic about the Immortals (and all Supers), have begun to accept them and treat them as a fixture in Franklin.

The Immortals reprieve was interrupted by a late breaking story, the grand opening of the new big box toy and electronic store "Toys or Else!" was marred by some kind of violence that begun shortly into a contest to win a PS3. Police cordoned off the scene, and when the Immortals (minus Marduk and Gypsy) arrived, they found out that the toys and electronics inside the store seemed to come alive, all this despite the police cutting power to the store. Inside two dozen people were held hostage, or otherwise unable to escape. The police attempted to send in an APC but it was stopped in its tracks 50ft from the door.
The Immortals appraoched and found themselves assaulted by the noise and flashing lights of every speaker, every monitor, every television screaming and flashing. They regrouped and gathered the some goggles and ear plugs to entered the building. Quickly they worked to rescue the group of staff and children.
The team faced animated toys: robot bears, miniature robotic soldiers, and a snake comprised of coaxial cables. They were able to deal with them fairly well, although Hephaestus struggled with the snake. Meanwhile Jack Flash took care of the noise and discovered what appears to be a robot comprised of dozens of machines and parts smashed together.
The giant robot rose and joined the fight launching blasts of electricity, and trying to take over the systems of the Hephaestus armor. Soon it was just the team versus the villain which they learned was really some supervillain encased in a ramshackle armor. But, this did not last long as the villain gained control of the Hephaestus armor and set it to attack C4. Now two on two, the fight looked more grim.
Thompson struggled to deal with this uninvited take-over and eventually abandoned the suit cutting its power. As he did he noticed a thin fibre-optic wire connecting his leg to the suit. Meanwhile C4 and Jack Flash set about fighting the armored foe. Using a combination of attacks, they were able to get it to stagger back into the building and reform its ablative armor. C4 used that opportunity to send tendrils deep into the ramshackle armor and touch the flesh of the teen villain inside. Then feeling flesh he exploded his finger tips knocking out and disabling the foe. The armor fell apart like so much junk, the power was cut to the rest of the store, and inside the pile of junk was the dying body of the young teen. Jack quickly stabilized the boy and summoned the paramedics. The team surveyed the damaged store. In one corner near where Jack first encountered the armor, they spied some graffiti blasted into the cinder-block walls: "Deus X."
Reports from store manager say the teen, one Donnie Morris a champion video game player, was angry at being disqualified from the contest to win the PS3 because only his console seemed to work properly during the trials. Morris was reported as being in stable condition at the Blackstone Infirmary, but still unconscious at the latest word.
Good teamwork, good roleplaying. 1 pp each.

Episode 16 : Friendly Fire

2006-12-13T16:34:00.000-08:00

The team gets a brief reprieve from worrying over the Torrent/Tiamat situation to watch the comedy stylings of C4 at the HaHa Hut, a local comedy club. He is a big hit, and playing off his superhero powers, he lets them laugh at their problems.
Their reprieve is short lived however, as they are invited to supervise the transfer of half a dozen super-powered prisoners to Blackstone Isle from St. Agnes Hospital. They arrived and learned the identities of the transferees:

The Herald
Tusk
Beau Rubino
Impact
Burning Man
Bull Demon

Half of these were sedated for their journeys, Gypsy was able to confirm this using her telepathy. The agents seems nervous but confident. The journey never even begun. Just as the prisoners were loaded on to their specially made vehicles, one of the BoP agents fell unconscious. Then the truck holding the alleged sedated Tusk burst open, his namesake tusks ripping through the steel walls of his mobile prison. The Immortals leaped on the villains and in moments had him prone and unconscious, or so they thought. For somehow, the mind of Marduk was pulled into Tusk's body, he was returned to consciousness and tried to explain his situation. Meanwhile, 'Marduk' used this opportunity to free "Burning Man"in seconds the entire area was a major conflagration, flames reached high into the night. The Immortals spent the next few moments rescuing the various agents, drivers and villains trapped in the flames, as the Burning Man began to move away from the scene slowly. Marduk eventually recovered his body, only to find himself ablaze. Only the armored Hephaestus could spot the man on his radar, the rest of the team relied on cunning and sheer luck. Together they managed to rescue all of the agents and villains, and bring the Burning Man down. He was eventually KO'd but still ablaze.
Unsure how to proceed, Hephaestus grabbed the body of the Burning Man, and with C4 helping keep him wet (C4 had stored up a vast quantity of water earlier), they traveled for the bay. Sadly, the heat was too much C4 who dropped off and parachuted to safety, and even for the Invincible Armored Hephaestus who was close to passing out. Then a small icon appeared on the suits HUD and offered him the chance to Override Control Mechanism, not knowing exactly what he was doing, he found himself being offered several options before passing out, he instructed his suit to ditch in the bay with its passengers. Then he passed out.
For miles away the mushroom cloud of steam could be seen erupting from the shored of Blount Bay. When Jack Flash showed up, he was in sea of steamy fog unable to spot the burning man, but seeing Hephaestus, or at least the Warden armor standing upright and rigid, inside William was unconscious, but alive.
A few moments later the sea disgorged the still steaming Burning Man, and a cell of water soon surrounded him. This was confirmed to be the work of Torrent who had apparently rescued the Burning Man. She offered her help again, if their needs intersected with her territory, but she made no apologies and offered no explanations. She parted without a word.
Good Team Work.
Retroactive Hero Point for C4 (for roleplaying the comedy club, and water idea).
Retroactive Hero Point for Jack Flash (for being denied the chance to multi-stabilize (see below)
Every one received 1PP.

New Damage Roll Rule

2006-12-13T11:21:00.000-08:00

I am contemplating a new damage roll rule. Instead of the somewhat complex system of math on your end,

Ranks + 5 + Die Roll

I am considering altering it on my end. So your roll will simply be:

Ranks + Die Roll

I will then calculate the saving throw for the victim of your attack myself. So you if your total is Rank 10 + Roll 10 = 20
If they get a save of 25 or better, they are unaffected.
If they get a save of 21-24, they are bruised.
If they get a save of 16-20, they are stunned.
If they get a save of 11-15, they are staggered and stunned.
If they get a save below 10, they are KO'd.

The numbers work out the same. But this might make it easier for you to not need to worry so much about the math during the heat of combat (you would still need to calculate power attacks and critical hits).
I don't think the math totals are different, just the means of calculation. Let me know if you would rather do the rolling.

This change should have no effect on character utility.

Episode 15: Slippery When Wet

2006-12-06T06:19:00.000-08:00

Sailors aboard the USS North Carolina on its shakedown cruise encounter Torrent and a giant octopus deep in the Event Rift trying to investigate the silence from a scientific research platform there. The Seals are picked off in the water, then the mini-sub (ASDV), finally the CO of the NOrth Carolina tried to distract the octopus with the submarine. He succeeded, only too well. The Kraken turned on the Submarine, covered its jet intakes and brought the sub down.
The scene fades as the sub sinks deeper into the rift.

The Immortals are met by agents Warren and O'Neil of Homeland Security about Torrent. The feds offer the Immortals an opportunity to bring in their former member on their own, after that the Feds will do it their way (with extreme prejudice).
The team heads out on the Queen Anne's Grace (Ormand's yacht) and is met out in the bay by Torrent and Tiamat (riding a shark). The two supers explain that a Kraken attacked the submarine, and that they had befriended the crew of the science station. They threatened to defend themselves if necessary. The Immortals try to convince their wayward friends to come in, but they counter that there is nothing but incarceration waiting for them on land. The debates ends with a sense of hostility and the two groups part.
The Immortals discuss the situation and realize that they needed to check on the science crew, since they might not be there of their free wills. So they got a mini-sub from the Coast Guard and headed down. They were met half way by Tiamat in reptile form and she disabled the sub. They proceeded anyway and when they got to the Platform there was a fight.
Tiamat has appeared to come into her own with her powers and demonstrated considerable power. She fought Marduk and Gypsy while Jack Flash and C4 infiltrated the sea base. Gypsy used her illusion powers to make the base appear to spring a leak and this distracted Tiamat as she summoned a monstrous Kraken to hold the base together. Marduk was faced with an opportunity to attack her, but held back afraid he might kill her in her human form.
Tiamat was able to turn the tables and making a series of attacks in Reptile and Dragon form she defeated Marduk.
Meanwhile on the base, C4 and Jack Flash met a strange half octopus woman and though unable to speak, using a white board she communicated her loyalty to Tiamat and general despair about returning to the surface.
Tiamat offered the group a chance to leave with Marduk, and grudgingly they took it. She told them not to return.
1 PP Experience Award

Episode 14: Hotel California

2006-11-29T11:22:00.000-08:00

You can check out any time you want, but you can never leave.

Introducing: Gypsy, a mentalist with a mystic style. Her abilities include telepathy, mind control, mental illusions, and telekinesis (which she can use to fly and generate a force field); and Warden, a technologist with a powerful Battlesuit; near invulnerability, massively powerful power blasts, jet speed flight, enhanced strength, and an array or life support and super senses.
Esmerelda, a.k.a Gypsy, had been invited to work with the TAROT or face an assassin who threatened her imminent death. She chose to work with them, and has spent the last two months in relative luxury in the Palm Springs resort, doing Tarot Readings on a number of names, photos, and objects. She had no idea for what purpose her readings were being used, or if her readings were at all accurate. She is still learning her powers. She could sense that something wasn't right. On occasion she dreamt of people disappearing in the night, or simply being shot by a coworker or boss. She couldn't help shake the feeling that her own prophecies of doom for some people were self-fulfilling.
William, a.k.a. Warden, Thompson, was another 'volunteer' working for TAROT. He assumed that they were a defense contractor, but he never really thought to ask. He let them use his intuitive grasp of technology to build powered suits, and wicked weapons. He didn't ask any questions when they asked him to design weapons specifically designed to take out police and US Military armor and defenses. But, he began to worry. When two colleagues tried to leave, they were given a party and encouraged in their new ventures. Then, as they left the building they were the unfortunate victims of a 'stray' bomb from the nearby Marine Bombing range. When their manager, the Queen of Cups, watched it happen by the big window before simply closing the blinds and bidding everyone return to work, he knew he had to leave. But he had to do it carefully. He carefully assembled the things he needed, he corrupted the back-up data on his latest project "The WARDEN Suit" a highly advanced self-contained battlesuit. He collected explosives and fuel from distant warehouses and put them in his lab. Then he waited for a distraction to set his plan into motion.

Marduk woke up on a lear jet to California. He was treated well, but kept shackled and groggy with drugs. He was taking to the posh country club resort the Hotel Excelsior, and allowed to clean up and eat. He waited. That evening he met with "The Lovers" which turned out to be a single man, apparently in the US Government. He made him an offer to join the TAROT as King of Swords, and to lead a team of Supers. When he tried to ascertain their motives and methods he was somewhat evasive. The mysterious TAROT remains a mystery. But it was clear they answered to no law but their own.

Jack Flash and C4 were able to track Marduk via his GPS transponder. There was no obvious way of tracking Ashley (Tiamat) or Lisa (Torrent), so they decided to find Marduk. Moving at super sonic speed, Jack Flash, wearing C4 as a backpack, ran to California to the rescue. They arrived at the strange desert resort and when they tried to infiltrate the compound, C4, in the shape of a giant snake set off a land mine, and the alarm was sounded.

Marduk heard the alarm and decided it was time to leave. Opting for the dramatic exit he plowed through the Tempered Glass window of his suite and escaped on to the grounds. This set off even more alarms, sent a Sword Team to investigate and really set things in motion. Warden used the confusion to set his plan in motion and he donned the suit, and set off the explosions. Hoping to time his exit with the explosion, he miscalculated slightly and ended up being blown into the sky. He was stunned and a little embarrassed but otherwise unharmed. With that, the TAROTS super armored units, the Knights of the TAROT, entered the fray. Following them out the door, Gypsy also made her fateful escape from the building.

In the ensuing fight the teams were well matched. But, once the Immortals and the new Supers joined forces, the Kinghts of the Tarot were overwhelmed. Using teamwork C4 and Marduk finished off two. Jack Flash ensured one would not reenter the fray by stripping her of her powered armor. Gypsy was able to control one of the Knights to fight his teammate. Warden showed his martial prowess by scoring two KOs and sending one flying in to the air. Marduk summoned his mystic Sword and Shield and enflamed with the passion of the gods he set about to finish the fight. That he did with a deadly blow to the last knight standing. It was only the quick thinking and medical care by Jack Flash that the fallen knight was saved.

Sensing that reinforcements might be arriving, the two groups fled the scene, and made plans to return to North Carolina. Gypsy and Warden were offered membership in the Immortals to take the places of the missing Torrent and Tiamat. As if to punctuate that thought, Warden played a news report that Homeland Security had a warrant for the arrest of Torrent.

1pp awarded to all.

Episode 13: Nor a Drop to Drink

2006-11-17T12:19:00.000-08:00

The team has been practicing at the academy, learning more about their abilities and trying to figure out how to get Ashley (Tiamat) to transform at will, it is slow going. The rain has been relentless, a low pressure zone is sitting on Franklin City, not moving.
The team gets a visit from Detective Mike Killian from the Special Perpetrators Unit of the Franklin Police Department. He asked them about Torrent and her whereabouts. The team expresses their ignorance and concern. He suggests that she is a suspect in the Tarot Murders of gang members in China Town.
After he leaves the team agrees to search for her. First they visit her family, and get a pretty cold reception there. C4 surprises a policeman staking out the area, and engages him in some conversation.
The team checks out the scene of the crime, and finds some drug residue.
The team decides to track her down assuming the strange weather is a result of her powers. They get a high quality barometer and Jack Flash takes it from place to place until they are able to find the center of the low pressure zone. This leads them to a flooded farmhouse out on the bay. They spy a couple of black SUVs and several armored men approaching the house. Jack Flash speaks with one of them at the SUVs and discovers that he is with Homeland Security and that they have a warrant for Torrent's arrest. Under the PATRIOT act, they need virtually no evidence or even a crime to accuse her of in order to do so. The teams stands by idly warning the agents of the danger of attacking her.
Their predictions come true when the agents wade across the shallow water to the house, and a massive wave knocks the men down apparently knocking several out. The team rushes into the rescue. Shortly thereafter, RPGs launch from the woods and set the house ablaze. The team does its best to rescue the fallen agents, and try to reach Torrent. She seems more angry than afraid or contrite. C4 bid her escape, and meet up with them. She bade them take Ormand's sailboat out, and she would find them.
During the rescue Marduk gets targeted by agents in the woods, whether intentionally or not, and attacked by a weapon that seemed to attach a strange glowing cord to his chest. He struggled to remove it, and then another hit him in the head. With two cables attached, there was a more intense glow and he felt a sapping sensation. When he tried to snap the cables he was unable. The cables then retracted back to the woods pulling him along. Drained of his powers, he was fairly helpless to the agents attention. They reeled him in, and when he was able to summon his armor, they stunned him with a power taser. The agents put him on their unmarked helicopter.
Meanwhile the rest of the team was attending the dead and wounded and assumed the helicopters were medical evac's but the helicopters passed them by, picked up Marduk and the other agents and flew off into the clouds.
When the checked the dead body of a fallen agent, they found a Tarot Card tucked into his armor with a 5 of Swords.
As they surveyed the area, they came to realize that another teammate was missing Tiamat.
Down to two teammates, one in a helicopter manned by unknown agents, the other lost to the waves? They did not know.

Episode 12: Stormy Weather

2006-11-08T05:45:00.000-08:00

Heavy rains and winds batter Freedom City and darkness falls.
En route home from their trip Jack and Ashley endure a bumpy landing. Jack thinks he noticed some kind of creature on the wing of the jet, but when he got another look, it was gone.
At the Academy, C4 and Marduk fight a strange demonic foe, but after being pummeled by Marduk, the creature seemed to turn to dust.

After the landing, Jack and Ashley encountered an apparent car-theft in progress. Jack confidently went to take care of it, and discovered the thief was no normal thief but a super villain. A fight ensued and the Metallic foe put up a good fight against Jack. Somehow this caused a transformation in Ashley, she took on a reptilian appearance and struck several blows at the villain. The two heroes were able to take out the villain, and Tiamat landed a lethal blow. Jack summoned the police and Immortals, as well as an ambulance which took the wounded villain to the hospital.

The team returned to the Academy, made introductions, and compared notes. C4 came to the conclusion that the metallic villain might be part of the team that attacked Fort Knox, and the team worried that the other team might try to rescue him from the hospital before he was transferred to Blackstone Isle. They rushed to the site, and after some confusion over where he was, they figured out that the villain team had used some kind of illusions to deceive hospital staff, the SPU and the Immortals. But, the team was able to uncover the truth, and a fight ensued. With their recently lowered numbers the Immortals were facing four super villains and the fight was long and frustrating. They did learn the names of the Villains.

Brainstorm - the leader - a supremely confident villain with powers of illusion and mind control. His illusions were powerful enough to prevent most attacks from ever hitting him. But he was eventually hit a couple of times.
Thunder - the brick - the tall woman able to knock Marduk a hundred feet away off the top of the building to a neighboring one. She is tough and agile, but after being knocked off the building herself, she appeared to be out of the fight.
Lightning - the energy projector - lithe agile martial artist and conductor of electricity. His body rippled with electric current making him a dangerous foe to fight in melee. His ability to teleport makes him doubly difficult. He also seemed to possess some healing ability as well.
Tornado - wind controller - her domination of winds grants her flight and the power to form whirlwinds around herself and elsewhere. Her lack of precision made her less of an asset in this fight, although it was her wind control that eventually enabled the team to escape.
Metalstorm - the master of metal. A man covered in razor sharp shards of steel. Able to fling them off at high velocity and cut through flesh and steel alike. He also possesses some power over metal itself, being able to telekinetically grasp a car and drop it on Jack Flash. Metalstorm was severally injured by Tiamat, so was mostly just a prop in the fight on the roof top.

The Immortals, down one person, held their own against the villain team, also down one person. It remains to be seen how they will meet again, but rest assured they will meet again.

Episode 11: Meeting of Mines

2006-10-25T10:59:00.000-07:00

Jack Flash and Ashley Morganthal take a much needed romantic vacation away from Freedom city.
Torrent descends into the gritty world of gang crime, as she tries to end the cycle of violence and protect her secret identity.
Marduk learns of a new Television program - Incredible Journeys, that will throw him into dangerous situations to provide a viewpoint never before available to television cameras.
Steel Dragon spends a couple weeks at Cromwell Labs at Site One working, mostly unsuccessfully on the pheromone weapons used by the Super Mandrill.
At a meeting with Cromwell scientists, Steel Dragon and Strobelight (Cromwell's hired Super) a small earthquake is felt, signalling a mining accident. They respond to the emergency, Steel Dragon and Strobe calling Marduk to assist them in the dark tunnels of the Cromwell Mines. They succeed in rescuing several miners trapped in various places of the vast underground complex. At one point they discover a melted smooth passageway, and wonder at its creations.
In the ongoing search they rescue a strange figure, another Super in the form of a lost miner whose body has transformed into clay like mineral. His months of lonely isolation and dramatic transformation appear to have wracked the poor man's mind. But before they can remove him to the surface another tremor is felt.
Just then, boring through the solid rock a strange wormlike creature whose body consists entirely of molten metal, mostly EVA, pouring into the room and examines the group. Steel Dragon tries to commune with the creature unsuccessfully, Marduk attempts to peacefully interact with it, but ultimately it is Strobelight who begins a violent confrontation. After a prolonged battle the team manages to subdue the creature long enough that although not dead, it slinks off.

They follow the strange creature and it leads them to another part of the underground complex. Here they discover a remarkable clockwork scene of wind up automatons and life like homes and buildings. Steel Dragon is entranced by the scene and vows to study the wonder. With some trepidation, he tells Marduk he will have to reliquish his membership in the Immortals for the time being. But he promises to keep in touch and remain at their service.

As they begin to leave the area, they encounter the strange albino-like miners who were excavating the scene. They seem unpleased to see their site disturbed, and unsure how to deal with this discovery. The team moves on. Marduk agrees to take Odd Deveraux, aka C4 back to the academy in hopes of helping the man deal with his transformation, and rescue.
So the Immortals lose one trusted member, but gain another.

Episode 10: Planet Hollywood of the Apes

2006-10-18T06:32:00.000-07:00

Opening. Torrent, hoping to get a day away from the trials of being a superhero and protecting her secret identity from the Chinese Mafia takes a break to attend Oktoberfest in Freedom Park. While there she witnesses the blackout, caused in part, by the power station shutting down (see Episode 9). Even before then, the crowd seemed a little more rowdy than usual, probably due to the large quantities of free beer distributed at the party.
Meanwhile the Team rushes to Franklin General Hospital aboard the Osprey to get Ashley Morganthaal to the hospital. Steel Dragon lands the plan expertly on the helipad and Jack Flash escorts his lady-love to the emergency room.
The rest of the team high-tails it to the Park to help quell the growing riots there. JackFlash runs there as well once he is confident Ashley is being taking care of. The tam splits up: Maduk and Torrent tackling the problem of rioters at the Beer Garden, Jack Flash dealing with rioters outside of Planet Hollywood, and Steel Dragon checking out Planet Hollywood for the source of all this chaos.
Torrent summons a rain storm which dampens the energies of the rioters, and Marduk deals with the most aggressive of them in the beer garden. Jack Flash makes quick work of the dozens of rioters outside Planet Hollywood, and notices a Hummer Limo pull up and disgorge the SUper Mandrill and his CyberApe body guards. He focuses his attacks on the Super Mandrill, leaving he Cyber Apes to Marduk and Torrent who arrive shortly.
Super Mandrilll enters the building and is harried by Jack Flash and Steel Dragon, clearly not anticipating that the Team would be there in full force so early, he warned them of a bomb somewhere in the building. Jack Flash headed off to search for the Bomb and the rest of the team made pretty quick work of the Super Mandrill. When Torrent tried to short circuit the Super Mandrill's Lightning Field, it zapped the monkey, and he started to die. In Heroic form, Marduk resuscitated the Super Mandrill giving him time to warn of a plan in the works, before he invoked a nauseating teleport device and disappearing.
Meanwhile Jack Flash found the bom and took Steel Dragon to disarm it. Steel Dragon examined the bomb carefully and determined it was a fake. Jack Flash threw it in the river, just in case, and that was the end of that.
The hordes of people gathered near Planet Hollywood eventually drifted away or were dispersed by the police. The team left the scene wondering what long range plan SuperMandrill had in store for them.

Episode 9 : I Sing the Body Electric

2006-10-04T16:55:00.000-07:00

A typical night for the Immortals - Marduk is hobnobbing with celebrities at the new Planet Hollywood, Jack Flash is out on a date with Ashley at Octoberfest in Freedom Park, Steel Dragon is at the Academy working on his latest project, Torrent is out patroling the dangerous streets of West Franklin.

At 11pm the TV screens around the city flash and all change to the image a rather pleased looking Super Mandrill. He speaks in his slow careful language.

"Greetings humanity. I apologize for over-riding your electronic teat. I know how fussy it makes you to miss a drop of your precious celebrity milk. But hungry you shall go, for it is time to pay for your greedy suckling. I give you one hour to organize yourselves and show your steady hands on the controls of the ship of state. After that I will plunge this city back into the dark ages of chaos and mayhem. Unless of course, you can exert some self control, you will descend on each other like dogs, no offense to my canine brethren. You have one hour."

That speech was followed by a cartoon monkey counting down one hour. The population began to panic, that is the population aside from those revellers in the park who are unaware of the Villain's threats.

The team leaps to action and is called to the mayor's situation room to plan a strategy. They all surmise that the Super Mandrill's plan is to attack the city's power grid. The logical target is the main sub-station just outside of town. In fact the sub-station was not responding to calls. Another person not responding was Torrent, for whatever reason she was unavailable to help the team.

The team rushes to the scene, with Ashley in tow, and arrives to find the sub-station quiet. Seeing that time was of the essence they landed nearby and ran to the scene. First on the scene was Jack Flash who surveyed the crime scene spotting several gorillas working mischief at the site. Marduk rushes in and begins to combat the Gorillas. Steel Dragon sends in his miniature Jade Dragon in to survey the scene.

They discover the Super Mandrill had his minions install a strange device to the main power distribution tower. It was unclear what the device would do, but it was clear it had to be stopped. Marduk focused his attention on thrashing the massive cybernetic gorillas. Although the challenge proved a more difficult task than it was when he first encountered the apes. At one point in his rage Marduk summoned a mighty sword to his hand and severed head of the cybernetic ape, causingsparks and blood to fly.

Steel Dragon maneuvered his mini-dragon to examine the strange device and then into the control room to disable the systems. Meanwhile Jack Flash harried the apes and began to pepper the strange device with stones. Steel Dragon's Dragon encountered a strange Television Headed Gorilla with the face of Super Mandrill on it. Some sort of remotely controlled construct with his intellect controlling it.

The TV-Headed gorilla flipped a large switch and the Device outside began to energize. The team redoubled its efforts to disable it. The fight continued and Marduk finished off the Super Mandrill's minions. Meanwhile the TV-Headed Gorilla was trying to make an escape. Steel Dragon and Jack Flash succeed in shutting down the entire power station. Jack Flash alerted Marduk to the villain's escape plans, and Marduk rushed forward to stop him. As he got there, he was mesmerized by the strange images on the screen. As Jack Flash tried to free him from the thrall of the sinister screen, he barreled into the beast, injuring them both. That seemed to jar Marduk out of his daze, and when the creature tried to grapple him, he hurled him across the station into the tower, discharging the last of the energies in the tower.

Jack Flash meanwhile was searching for Ashley who had disappeared from the Osprey. He found her smoking unconscious form in the grass near the fence. He grabbed her and moved her to the plane for transportation to a hospital.

The cyber-ape was destroyed. But in the last few seconds of power the TV screen revealed the Super Mandrill congratulated the team for its success in finishing his job. He told them his plan was about to reach fruition while they busied themselves at the sub-station.

The team grimly boarded their plane to confront the Super Villain's nefarious plans for the city.

Episode 8 : Rock'em Sock'em Robots

2006-09-27T17:35:00.000-07:00

Preludes - Lisa "Torrent" Chun discovers that her parents have been harrassed by the Demon Gang that she had been fighting on the streets of Little China. She meets the monkly friend of her parents who offers to broker some kind of truce between the gangs and her. She gave a non-commital answer worrying about the implication.
Jack "Jack Flash" Summerhal got another date with the sexy Ashley Morganthal, unemployed bio-chemist. She assures him that she will not reveal his secret identity.
James "Marduk" Allen has the talk with his agents, lawyers, and producers about his super powers, and the fact that he isn't going to try to keep it a secret. They toy with the idea of making his life as a super hero a show, but he demurred for now. On his way home, he rescues an errant bus that was going to crash into traffic because of defective metering lights. He was successful, but not in the most dramatic way imaginable.
Ben "Steel Dragon" Lee accompanies the police to arrest the child pornographer. The arrest goes down smoothly, but at the perp was being walked to the patrol car, Ben over heard him saying "Finally I am free. He can't make me do this anymore."
=================================================================
The Immortals hold a press conference with the Mayor and she announced the Super Heroes Act which grants the heroes special powers to apprehend and arrest super villains, akin to professional bounty hunters.
At the end of the press conference a roomba sweeps into the room, and the security goes crazy. They are about to shoot the thing, when Steel Dragon stops them. He checks out the robot vacuum and finds a note on the inside. It contains the cryptic message: "Warning Type 7 Error. Reboot System. Catastrophic Systems Failure Imminent."
They are not sure what to make of it, but decide to anaylsis the note as best they can.
==================================================================
The next day, Jack Summerhal is at the Carolina Central Bank getting some cash for his coffee date around rush hour. James Allen is in another traffic jam trying to leave the city. Ben Lee is surfing the web from his shop when someone points him towards a skycam image of the biggest traffic jam in city history. Torrent is at HQ practicing her powers.
Jack senses something amiss and looks out into the city block, there are no vehicles on the street, just a flat bed truck with some high tech looking equipment. But both intersections out of the block are jammed tightly. Seconds later the equipment on the flatbed comes alive.
He quickly transforms into his costume and contacts the rest of the Immortals.
Jack Flash does his best against the massive robots, but he is only able to keep them busy for the first few rounds. Soon afterward the rest of the team arrives and the fight begins in earnest.
The robots:

Two Giant Robots with massive pincer like claws.
Five Com-Bots equipped with cattle prods that project arcs of electricity forty feet away.
Three Eye-Bots, tiny, hovering orbs able to shoot rapid fire laser blasts.
One Tank-Bot, a huge heavy machine, heavily reinforced and armored with a cannon, machine gun, flame thrower, and rocket launcher.

Torrent takes out most of the Com-Bots by immobilizing them in a blob of water, then forcing the water into their joints and openings. A single com-bot escapes destruction. Marduk decides to take out the Giant Robot in the street and engages in a grapple with the massive thing. Steel Dragon tries to devise a means of jamming the remote controls of the robots. Torrent eventually turns her attention on the Tank and succeeds in flipping the massive thing with a huge wave of water.
Highlights:

Jack Flash doing his volleyball smash on an Eye-Bot crushing the thing.
Marduk pile driving the giant robot into a pile of parts.
Steel Dragon disassembling another giant robot with a single touch.

They succeeded and getting rid of the robots, and finding their prey, a single high speed EVA processor. One last strange event. A single ASMO robot appears on the scene and delivers a simple message.

This was not I doing. I is not responsible.

Before the robot self destructed with a smoldering burn. The teams stayed long enough to see to the wounded civilians and assist the police with the crime scene.

Episode 7 - Stop Dragon My Heart Around

2006-09-20T16:28:00.000-07:00

Preludes - Jack gets a date with a sexy biochemist he meets at the public library.
James has strange dreams of fighting and losing to the Dragon Goddess Tiamat.
Lisa swims near Site 2, discovers an abandoned Korean cargo ship, and a mysteriously fast swimmer.
Ben appears to be sought out by a Digital Video Camera that is in the possession of a child pornographer.
Consulting the team, they agree to hand over the evidence to the Special Victim's Unit of the Franklin Police Dept. The PD agrees to let them know when they plan on moving in on the suspect.
Later Jack gets a call that something is amiss at the Fairweather Labs where Ashley Morganthal (his biochemist date) works. They travel to visit her and find that she has been arrested for threatening emails and possibly for the destruction of a NOAA small boat, which sank earlier that week. The email bore the oddly coincidental name: tiamat@freemail.com. The team decides to head out to her house before the Feds do, to snoop around for any connection to Marduk's dreams. Sure enough they find sketches of hybrid monsters in her study, a number of which resemble those James remembers from his dreams and studies of the Enuma Elish. They begin a plan to contact her in custody when she calls them letting Jack know she has been released pending charges.
The next day Jack calls her and they find out she was put on administrative leave. The team goes to talk to her and finds her cleaning out her office. There is some discussion about her dreams and the connection to James's dreams. She rejects the idea that she is Tiamat, some sort of evil goddess. She says that they are dreams, and she can choose her own destiny. There is some sense of relief at this. They help her with her files, when she is called to tell them that the very site they are at is being attacked. The team rushes to the dock to find a giant floating Man-O-War. The beast has two scientists or sailors in its tentacles. Jack rushes to rescue one, and Marduk the other. Jack Flash and Torrent eventually free his, but Marduk himself is caught in the grip of the Enormous Jelly. A long fight ensues. Silver Dragon uses a nearby crane to help Marduk escape. Jack Flash douses the Jelly in gasoline from a nearby refueling center. Torrent alternates between blasting the thing, and trying to free Marduk from its grasp. Eventually Jack Flash gets the fires lit, and Silver Dragon fearing the blaze might catch the gas lines moves the Jelly with the crane over the water. Torrent quells the flames on the gas tank with a deluge of water. Marduk and the Jelly have suffered in the blaze and eventually it drops him into the water. The sudden blast of water wakes Marduk from unconsciousness, but only to find himself burdened with armor and a sword, he falters in the water. Silver Dragon jumps in to save him, but ultimately Torrent simply grabs them both with a water tentacle and dumps them on shore. Blasts from Torrent, javelins from Jack flash and previous damage eventually brings down the beast. The coup de grace done by an animated Forklift launched from the dock by Silver Dragon. The best is dead, and Ashley, the marine biologist is not happy. Her words of scorn, claiming no one understands, seem to portend a dark future.
Marduk can't shake the feeling that he was wearing armor and weilding a bow. He also felt the technicians and guards watching the fight resembled crab headed men. He wonders now if he truly can distinguish his dreams from reality.
But the team is successful. No one was killed, and the injuries sustained by the sailors of the Cousteau were treatable. The administers at the lab thank them profusely and welcome future working together perhaps even to explore the site 2 interdiction zone.
Also learned. The Korean Freighter is no where to be found.
Everyone gets 2pp.

New Power Feat - Power Manipulation

2006-09-18T17:49:00.000-07:00

This power feat is identical to the Luck feat, except it can only be used to make an alternate power feat for a power or an array. Like the Luck feat, this can be used for one use (until the power is turned off, or used once in the case of instant powers) and it must be a reasonable use of the alternate power.
This would replace Luck for spell casters, elementalists, and other character who should have a wide variety of powers at their disposal but not regularly available.
Sample feats include: element manipulation, energy manipulation, magical manipulation, techonology manipulation, etc.
This feat does NOT add to the points available in an array.
Cost 1pp per use per day.

Episode 6: Apes on a Train

2006-09-13T18:53:00.000-07:00

A quick cellphone check confirmed that Jack Flash was in range. Before Torrent could finish the call, he was standing in the room with them. The team changed into their newly arrived uniforms, and headed for the runaway train.
Jack Flash scouted ahead, the rest of the team followed in the Osprey, piloted by Steel Dragon. Soon, the plane was flying above the locomotive, and Jack Flash was running alongside. He leapt up on to the locomotive without trouble. Steel Dragon awoke the plane's spirit and instructed it to wait for him to leave, take Marduk back to the end of the train, and find someplace nearby to land. He and Torrent jump down to the locomotive with varying levels of grace, and the planes drifts back with Marduk who deftly leaps to the last car.
The team quickly found individual tasks.
Steel Dragon set to work uncoupling the locomotive from the train full of armaments.
Torrent focused on keeping the well-armed apes away from the locomotive.
Marduk kept the apes in the back of the train busy, and started to work his way through them.
Jack Flash took a different tact, and once he removed the guard baboon from the locomotive he recognized the gorilla "engineer" as Daisy, the signing ape. Remembering some sign-language from somewhere, he tried to communicate the situation to the gorilla who seemed happily driving to "Freedom." Realizing she thought she was escaping from her captivity, he continued to use diplomacy on her.
Meanwhile Torrent was able to hold off the Ape assailants, and Steel Dragon was able to uncouple the locomotive from the other cars. Torrent pushed away from the coaxing cars with an expanding sphere of water, and the locomotive began to move faster without its burden.
Marduk was doign well fending off both bullets and club-like gorilla fists. Then one of the gorillas launched a tank-bustin RPG at him. This was a little more than he was suspecting. He was stunned and fell through the destroyed box car. When he recovered he found himself slowing down in a burning box car filled with ammunition and explosives.
Once he shakes off the effects of stun, he searches the car, spying four unconscious guards. He gathered them up as the fires spread to the ammo boxes. Leaping from the box car he rolls to safety as the box car annihilates itself in a huge explosion.
The rest of the train, the locomotive powering on, and the rest of the train coasting at 80 mph behind it slipped past the main Train yards on a track heading for Central Station.
The rest of the Immortals and Daisy are on a speeding locomotive. JackFlash convinces Daisy to stop accelerating the Locomotive, and Steel Dragon bypasses the ruined brakes and leaning under the speeding locomotive, he manages to get the brakes to activate themselves. As the locomotive begins to slow down, Torrent summons a massive wave of water and knocks the engine off the track.
The team feels a momentary sense of accomplishment until the coasting munitions box cars race towards them. Jack Flash runs down the tunnel ahead of the cars trying to find a potential turnoff. Somewhere in midtown he finds new construction where a new route leading to the the East of the city is being built. It wasn't complete, but there might be time. He raced back grabbed Steel Dragon and the two of them work a quick fix to move the tracks over from the main line to the new route. Jack Flash working at a lightning pace to remove debris, and Steel Dragon convincing the tracks to move over. They complete the switch just in time for the runaway cars to make the turnoff. Second later they heard the splash and boom of the box cars exploding into the river.
The team gets together and finds out from the recovered guards from the train, that the apes were following the command of a Mandrill, and that they may have disconnected the one car containing the brand new EVA weapons. Jack Flash heads out to scout for the missing car, and the rest of the team following in the plane. He quickly locates the missing car, and finds another missing link. Another quick search reveals a container truck, inside are a couple of baboons and a mandrill. A quick plan is formulated and Torrent washes the monkeys out holding them at bay in a watery prison. Marduk and Steel Dragon approach and examine the contents. There is a rocket and a DVD player. Steel Dragon can sense the excitement of the EVA particles in the rocket, and decides to try to defuse it. The attempt is valiant, but fails. The short fuse begins to burn quickly to the detonater.
Jack Flash grabs Torrent and moves to safety. Steel Dragon fearing for Daisy rushes to the Osprey. Marduk makes a grab for the DVD player and cradles it against his body. The blast goes off. Marduk is sent flying a hundred feet away, staggered and deafened by the blast. Steel Dragon is knocked down and out by the initial blast.
The two witnesses saw a white hot spherical flash, a whooping sound, and then nothing. The bridge, the truck... gone, the ground beneath it, fused like glass. The team recovers and is met by the police lieutenant Juarez, Mayor Campbell, and an unidentified airforce officer. After they explain the situation. The mayor invites them to a meeting the next day after they clean up and the party makes for the Academy with their DVD, their gorilla, and a small piece of EVA with them.
Epilogue - Steel Dragon, after seeing to Daisy, went back to the manor to mend Marduk's costume. Examining the damage he noted several places in the costume that seemed as if protected by armor plates. He took a couple photos of the costume, and repaired it for his teammate.

Episode 5: Monkey Business

2006-09-01T05:45:00.000-07:00

The team has begun training together, learning their strengths and weaknesses, and working together as a team. Reflecting on an ancient Chinese legend, the team choses to call themselves The Immortals. After some intensive training, they head back to their normal lives for a bit. Jack Flash decides to beat the high cost of airfair by running to Florida for a brief vacation. Torrent goes back to her home and draws a line in the sand against the various gangs there. Steel Dragon returns to his secret identity to attend the Jovian Products unveiling. There he feels the strangely lively energies from the EVA machines gathered there. Marduk, returns to his secret identity to attend and cover the press conference at the zoo, where he learns of the strange case of rabies to hit the primate habitats. Intrigued he and another reporter press for more information. He finds out later that the other reporter was Dean Fastow, the columnist for Super Hype. Fastow seems to have guessed that James is in fact Marduk. James decides to confess this to the man. They agree to a plan to reveal his identity to the public at James's perogative, but exclusively to Fastow. After that Marduk decides the case of the rabid apes needs more scrutiny.
He assembles the team (minus Jack Flash) to survey the zoo and see what they can find out. They see a number of body bags being loaded onto a refrigerated container truck. That scene looked suspicious. Why would the Zoo be killing Apes and transporting them under the cover of darkness? They decide to split up, Marduk and Steel Dragon follow the truck, Torrent stays behind to get some evidence from the scene.
Marduk and Steel Dragon leap onto the container truck, and Steel Dragon decides to slow it down so that they can get a look inside. He causes the engine to seize up and the truck squeals to a stop. Meanwhile Marduk knocks out the driver and guard, assuming them to be part of the nefarious plot. As Steel Dragon convinces the seals and locks on the truck to open up, Marduk realizes the "thugs" driving the truck are in fact US Navy men with CDC badges. He begins to worry that things were not as they seemed. Steel Dragon gains access to the truck and discovers the apes and monkeys inside. As he moves through them he spies a single Mandrill body as well, and as he tries to remove if from the truck, he is startled as he feels it stirring. He had assumed that it was dead, and at this stage isn't sure what to make of it.
Meanwhile, Torrent witnesses another CDC person sterilize the loading dock, and takes a moment to sneak in and grab a small piece of plastic (the wrapping of one of the ape bodies) with a little blood inside. With her evidence, she decides to catch up with the other Immortals. When she arrives she can hear sirens (probably the police) getting closer.
Realizing the situation does not look good, the team decides to act fast, Steel Dragon and Marduk tip over the truck to make it look like an accident. And try to abscond with the Mandrill. But it is too late, by the time they get out of the truck, the police have arrived. Luckily Marduk is able to take command of the situation and convince the Police that they are rescuing the animals from the truck accident. When a representative of the Zoo arrives, he indicates that the Mandrill is not Marcus Aurelius, but another mandrill named "Mingus." With the situation apparantly under control, the Immortals make their leave, returning to the Academy to discuss the situation.
There is some discussion about how they need to make some plans and set some protocols or something to prevent the unintentional injury to innocents. This might require some sacrifices of the element of surprise or even prohibit secretive operations, but without taking those steps they would become more vigilantes than heroes. But the Immortals are not given much time to reflect on the meaning of heroism, there is a still a mystery to be unraveled.
Through the night, Steel Dragon analyzes the blood sample and discovers that it is a mixture of bloods and other chemicals, as though someone concocted a cocktail of Mandrill blood and performance enhancing drugs (Steroids, Ritalin, Caffeine and others) for some unknown purpose.
The next day the team decides to investigate the primate lab and get to the bottom of all this. When they arrive they come upon a crime scene. The place is surrounded by police, and the rumor is the entire lab, and all of the scientists are gone. No one knows whether they were kidnapped, or were part of the plot.
They spy a bemused looking janitor, who for some cigarette money, agrees to tell what he knows. The scientists were blackmailed by Marcus Aurelius to help him escape from the zoo. Apparantly they were already engaged in the illegal sale of exotic animals from the zoo, and so were easily blackmailed. The only thing he knew about their plans was that they were going to meet somewhere called "the Farm."
They also found in the trash from the site a bunch of video cassettes with old Zoo Promos and Commercials feature Marcus Aurelius as the buffoonish character to represent the Zoo. He was dressed up in various costumes and put in humiliating situations, his 'ugliness' being the butt of the joke. The team surmised that this might be the source of Super Mandrill's anger.
They did some search work to find any farms owned by any of the primatologists, or under going increased power surges, to no avail. But their search was cut short by a breaking news story.

Apparantly a Naval Weapons Supply Train heading out of Franklin was turned around and was now speeding towards the main train station. They recognized the color scheme as matching the container that housed the apes and baboons from the zoo. They donned the new costumes they had ordered the previous week,and prepared to intercept the train.

Episode 4: Bull in a China Shop

2006-08-23T05:25:00.000-07:00

Ben Lee is working late one night in his store after closing time when he hears a noise at the front door. Approaching, he sees an angry looking man trying to get his attention. He tells the man that the store is closed, but the man demands entry to get some 'medicine.' Lee refuses and calls the cops. They show up and seem to conference with the man, who seems to have a prior relationship with them. They call Lee out to discuss the situation. Charlie (NiuMo) Wang (a big tough looking young man) says he was visiting Lee's shop to get a package he ordered. The policeman convinced Lee to hand over the package rather than file a complaint, and Lee grudgingly agrees believing something is amiss. Looking at the discarded wrapper of the package he spies that it is "Yaoguai Niu" (Demon Bull) powder (a male enhancement herb). For the next order, Lee adds another dose to the package in order to keep some for himself, and learn its secrets.
Lisa Chun was walking home from the theatre, alone a night, something she would only do having discovered her super powers. She spied a well dressed man drive up to an ATM. The man casually walks up to the ATM and smashes it with his fist. In short order, he trashes the machine and fills his pockets with piles of cash. Chun decides to do something and encases the man in a globe of water. He is surprised and stopped by the attack. They exchange some witty banter and soon sirens can be heard. Chun, a bit nervous about exposing her powers to the police, decides to wait until the last moments, and then release the man and move away. Sadly the impression left on the policemen is one of her jetting away on a geyser of water from the scene of the crime, and the man standing soaking wet near the machine. The news reports that she is the suspect in the ATM robbery.
The next day, unsure of how to clear her name, she pays a visit to the Teach Academy. There she makes the acquaintance of Jack Flash and Marduk and they show her the grounds. They explain their abilities to each other, and the mission of the Academy to learn about and benefit from the changes caused by the Event, and use those gifts to help mankind.
Meanwhile, Lee, seeing the news report about the ATM robbery, and catching a glimpse of Wang, contacts the Teach Academy hoping to learn something of this man who seems to have gained super strength from the Event. Then Chun, Jack Flash and Marduk head out to Lee's Grocery to find out what he knows. Before they are able to learn much, Wang returns, angry at discovering that Lee changed the order. There is a brief and angry discussion wherein Wang demands all of the product for free, and ends with him knocking down a shelf of videos.
Combat ensues. Jack Flash uses a flurry of blows on Wang, Marduk sucker-punches him, Lee fakes him out warning him about the lobsters, Chun ducks into the dark aisles to change into costume (Retroactive - Hero Point). In the next round they stun him, knock him to the ground, and dunk him with water from the lobster tank. He seems humiliated and beaten. But the fight is not over, he rises, steaming, pulls the Demon Bull powder from his coat, and downs the entire contents. His muscles begin to ripple, his veins bulge, and his skin begins to turn green. From his skull two long horns protude. He rises to a height of 10 feet and massing hundreds of pounds. Half man, half bull but with a demonic twist. He bellows at those around him.
The team acts quickly trying to defeat him. Jack Flash and Torrent (Chun) soon find their blows do nothing to his newly strengthened hide. Even the mighty Marduk has trouble hurting the man, the Bull Demon takes the fight outside, and team follows him outside. When Lee tries to distract him again, the Bull Demon laughs that he can't be fooled twice. At one point the Bull Demon hurls a van at the team and watches it crash into the store. Lee dives after it and touching the Koi tank he strengthens the ceramic tub enough to stop the movement of the van.
At this stage the group discusses working together. Jack Flash takes some rope and winds it loosely around the Bull Demon entangling him. Torrent and Marduk come up with a plan. She forms a massive geyser under Marduk sending him hurtling at the Bull Demon. The combined energies are incredible. Marduk's jet assisted punch sends the Bull Demon hurling across the street, through the wall of the carpet store across the street, through its back wall, through the alley behind the store, through the next wall, and flat into a huge gong in the tourist shop on the next street over. When the team follows the path of destruction across the street they see Wang, back in human form. Lee touches the man's silk coat and convinces the coat to wrap him up like a straight-jacket and hold him fast.
Eventually, the police show up, and finding it to be a "super" crimescene, they summon the Police's 'special perpetrator vehicle' (SPV), an armored van with heavy EVA shackles. The team heads back to the Academy, Lee promises to join them there.

Prelude - Ben Lee

2006-08-21T16:59:00.000-07:00

Ben had always been good with machines, electronics, and computers. And hanging out with his family in their old grocery, he had learned much of Chinese herbalism and the mystic tradition. He treated machines the way the old Chinese doctors treated their crushed hoof, and snake venom, as parts of the Celestial Bureaucracy, in harmony with everything else. When some thing broke, he looked at it, and pondered what went wrong, how did this thing go out of balance? And using his keen mind and centered spirit he'd work to repair it. The back room of the grocery held a small side business repairing old televisions, sewing machines, and other items, as well as running a local server hub for the Chinese community in Franklin.
When the EVENT happened, he watched in awe at the catastophe and did his best to lend a hand, collecting, hauling and pulling apart computers and other electronics destroyed in the Electromagnetic Pulse. He was able to salvage and repair many systems that were deemed complete losses. In the eyes of those that found his help he was one of the heroes of those days after the initial shock and awe. He was written up in the local papers and soon found he had more business than he could handle. He was able to hire a manager for the store, and an assitant for the repair shop.
Over the next few months he found his ability to repair machines growing and his affinity for things in general to be getting stronger. He could sense the water damage in the dry wall of his apartment long before it was visible. And by touching it and 'coaxing' the wall to dry and the pipes to seal the leak he was able to repair it. He could never explain these things, and chocked them up to confidence and luck.
He began to notice other things as well. A package in his receiving room from China seemed somehow wrong or trouble. He worried about it, but since it was ordered by a customer he felt hesitent to throw it out. He also felt an uneasiness pass over him every now and then when certain customers entered the store, as if, they were possessed of an unearthly aura.
Some of this he attributed to the stories spreading through the city of paranormal "supers" beings endowed by the Event with strange powers. Great strength, great speed, flight etc. His rational side laughed those off, but he was fascinated by the prospect. All the while, he paid little attention to his own unusual phenomena, his ability to coax an extra fifty miles out of an empty tank of gas in his car, or his ability to 'smooth' out the cracks and weak spots in the store windows, or even the time he got his coat stuck in the monorail door, and he willed it not to break, resulting the metal door of the monorail bending and tearing before his coat did. That stoplights seemed to change in his favor, or his downloads progressed at tremendous speeds, were not something one would even notice. These things just seemed natural to him, perhaps because he was a little more respectful he thought, but nothing more.

Prelude - LIsa Chun

2006-08-19T19:44:00.000-07:00

Lisa Chun, former competitive gymnast and dancer. Now dance instructer with a successful studio in Franklin NC was at crossroads in life. She got an offer to audition to join the Ira Duncan Dance Troupe, the premier dance troupe in the country, several of her best students defected to the Scarlet Dragon Troupe, the gymnastic group of her ex-lover, and the most puzzling development she received a small inheritance from her recently deceased Great Uncle. With only one problem, to get it she needed to travel to China. Lisa decided to visit China to re-center herself and find some focus. Part of her itinerary is a side trip to central China, to see her ancestoral homeland.
The plane was delayed on the tarmac for some reason and she fell asleep again dreaming of the scaling the mountain. The name Hua Shan is one that comes up. In her dream she is again climbing the mountain, again meeting with the dragon, and this time when asked "what do you want" there is a crack of thunder and lightning and the the fall.
She woke up as the plane lands in China.
She spent a few weeks seeing the sights in China before finding her way to Mt. Hua Shan. She climbed the mountain and finds the Taoist temple. She spent several months there trying to find the center she needs to answer the question. The monks were not very helpful. They seemed expect her, but they do nothing to help. She spent much of her time climbing the cliffs and scaling the precipices looking for the dragon. Until finally, she was at prayers at the alter and a nun leaned over and asked her if she is ready to confront the dragon.
She said that she beleived she was. She closed her eyes, and when she opened them again.
She woke up in the Franklin Chinese Community Hospice... eight months later. According to the nurse she had been in a coma the entire eight months. Her plane crashed into another on the ground during the EVENT, and after a few weeks in the hospital with steady deterioration, her family agreed to move her to hospice, feed and take care of her, but wait for her death. instead she awoke and in a few days was ready to leave. She moved in with her parents and sifted through the remains of her past life.
After a few days of quick recovery at her parents she went for a walk one night and found herself confronted by a gang of thugs: "Steel Dragons". They pursued her, and cornered her in a dead end, near a construction site. She tried to escape them by scaling the wall into the construction site. Sadly they followed her in, and captured her. They began to terrorize the young woman and she fought back. Initially her feeble attempts were laughed off, but after being struck by the leader of the gang, with her arms pinned behind her back she panicked and feared for the worse. Suddenly, the ground saround them softened as the site began to fill with water. In second the water was waste high, and most of the thugs fled to higher ground.
Another continued to menage her with a piece of rebar, and in her attempt to deflect the blow she sent a wave of water crashing down on the thug washing him across the pit. Seeing him struggling back to her, she 'willed' the water to throw him out of the pit and that was the last she saw of him. Shortly after the fight, the water drained harmlessly away. She felt a small loss as the water drained away.
She spent much of the rest of the night and the next few days experimenting with her new found control of water. She could create fountains, geysers, even static pools, and hovering globes of water. And once made, she could move them was like extensions of her body.
When she went home she noticed an unusual ad on TV for the Teach Academy offering to assist those who were affected by the EVENT in ways no one else could understand. She did a little research online and found out little about the Teach Academy. For the next few days she couldn't shake the feeling that she was being watched. Then a week or so later, she received a strange e-mail from the Teach Academy saying that if she lost interest, she needn't answer the door that night. Strangely, her parents went out for an unusual night on the town, and fearing what might arrive, she decided to wait for the inevitable knock from across the street.
Hiding across the street in the shadows of the stoop she waited. Sure enough an SUV arrived an parked outside her house. She was about to investigate, when the smell of pipe smoke drifted over her. She looked up and met a strange man. He called himself "Ted" and said he helped people like her. After a brief discussion, he left with an invitation to visit the academy.

Episode 3: Nightfall on the Asylum

2006-05-24T05:30:00.000-07:00

Jack heads out to the Teach Academy and explores the grounds and house. He isn't given too much time to settle in, because Ormond tells him about another possible Super in Franklin. There were a number of suicides at the Providence Asylum following the Event. All told 8 suicides in 6 months.All of them had peaceful contact with another patient who claimed to be responsible for their deaths. Jack decides to head out an investigate, Ormond offers him a secret identity posing as a visiting psychologist from D.C.
He got there and met Dr. Fitzgerald, the director of the asylum, and they talked a bit about the patient Dirk Donovan. Donovan had been catatonic for fifteen years following the suicide of his mother (who apparantly left a note blaming him). But shortly after the Event, Donovan, woke up, and began to talk with other patients allegedly goading them into suicides. Dr. Fitzgerald said it was policy of the asylum to refuse play along with delusional patients. Also, despite his sinister words, they see this change as a real improvement. Afterall, he was entirely catatonic before.
Jack met the man and had a strange conversation with the clearly dangerous person. He claimed to 'occupy' the body of Donovan, but had little more than contept for him. He called himself "Nightfall." Instead he claimed to be the niggling voice that caused people to consider and carry out suicides, give in to their dispair, but now since the Event he had been embodied in this form. And while limited by the physical form, he was considerably more powerful and focused. He liked the asylum, surrounded by so much dispair and mania. So he had no reason to leave. He di dlike to get out and read the obituaries when he could. He called them "the funny papers." He suggested that Dr. Smithers, the psychiatrist working with him before (now on leave) would soon be giving into his dispair.
Jack tried to convince the Director that Donovan should be restrained and kept in solitary confinement, but was more worried about Dr. Smithers. He raced to the Chocowinty Bridge, thinking he might catch the man about to commit suicide, but was releaved to find him not there. He tracked him to his house, where he was clearly preparing to end things, his ligfe was packed away and he had taken a large dose of morphine. He was just about to leave, presumably heading for the bridge, when Jack stopped him and tried to 'talk him down.' Part way into the conversation, the voice of Donovan joined the discussion. Jack moved Smithers into the house and confronted Nightfall. With lightning speed Jack Flash pummeled the villain and had him stunned and staggered. But then, somehow, Nightfall was able to shake off the damage and threw the area into an unpenetratable darkness and silence. This made things more challenging for our hero. Using the cover of the darkness, Nightfall scoured Jack Flash with a flurry of blows that started to sap his confidence. Thinking fast, of course, Jack Flash spun rapidly with his fists balled making an dangerous defense. Nightfall withdrew and showed some surprise at Jack's abilities. He promised they would meet again. As his leapt across the street and began to leave. "See you in the funny papers."

New game homepage

2006-05-11T14:38:00.000-07:00

The Academy Adventures
I designed it to look sort of like a real school website, minus the annoy flash graphics.

Episode 2: Herald of a New Age

2006-05-09T20:37:00.000-07:00

The Heroes return to Freedom City to assess their situation, and continue to investigate the mysterious Event and the subsequent events as well..
The discover a strange text ad on the web for something called the Teach Academy, which promises to Analyze, Counsel, Treat and Train recipients of Event related Gifts. It offered possible answers, but remained a mystery as they had trouble tracking the elusive Academy down.
Their search was interupted by news reports of a mysterious person calling himself The Herald. This man, they discovered a former carpenter by the name of Harold Feinz, claimed to be an extraterrestrial who was awakened by the Event with a message of peace for the world. He assembled a small following of hopeful people and preached his message to whoever would listen, usually getting kicked out of the church, or classroom he decided to speak in.
But that day, he promised to lead his followers to the Teller Nuclear Power Plant, and demand that they shut the plant, and eventually all Nuclear Plants down as well.
Sure enough, he led a small band of protesters to the plant, and met an equal number of police and journalists.
The heroes showed up as well.
James had a brief conversation trying to scope out the man. He seemed to recognise something about him, but he wasn't sure. At one point, the Herald touched him on the shoulder, and he experienced a strange vision.
He was standing on a beach before a deep purple ocean. There was a large nude woman coming out of the sea.
He shook his head to clear his sight, and saw that it was not a woman but a huge serpent. He was armed with a bow and a mace, and felt a strange purpose.
Then as suddenly as it started, the vision was gone. And the Herald was walking away.

Later as the ultimatum drew closer, they encountered a strange large man away from the crowd smoking a pipe and watching the scene intently. James went to talk with him and discovered him to be Ted Ormond, a distant descendent of Mary Ormond, wife of Edward Teach, aka Blackbeard the Pirate. He is filthy rich (must be some buried treasure somewhere). They suspect that Ted Ormond is connected with the Teach Academy.
But before James can get much out of Ormond, a nervous guard at the gate decides to shoot at the Herald. Jack intervenes, and racing at breakneck speed intercedes and takes the bullet for the Herald. (Hero Point!)
The other guards take this as a sign to fire and unleash a flurry of bullets at the two. Jack took another hit, and the Herald took several, but they just bounced of him. James entered the fray and also took a number of hits, none of the bullets seemed to hurt him (James had donned a mask enroute to hide his identity). After quickly checking on Jack, the Herald leapt over the guard fence (100ft or so) and started marching toward the reactor. James followed him. Jack needed to recover from stun first.
The Herald and James walked towards the reactor, and Jack showed up. They briefly discussed the situation. The Herald tried to convince them, that this was the correct action to take, and that they were not subject to the laws of Man. They basically disagreed and the necessary fight ensued. The Herald had some good moves, and managed to bruise and trip James up, but not cause any serious damage. Jack ran back to the Riot Police van and grabbed some Tear Gas which he distributed around the entrance to the reactor. Sadly for him, he was not immune to Tear Gas, and the Herald was. As Jack struggled to fight off the tear gas, James took advantage of the cloud and slammed into the Herald, knocking him down and stunning him, his next blow was a critical hit and KO'd the Herald. Before he passed out, the Herald told James that "His Eye was in Sari-Tash."
They wrapped him in a heavy metal tube from a nearby picnic table, and fled the scene.
Back in Freedom City, they watched the ambivalent news reports, some calling them heroes, others terrorists, and others uncertain. They would need to prove themselves to people somehow.
They also called the Teach Academy and spoke with Ormond. He seemed to know something about what had happened and offered to help them. They readily agreed. But before they left for the Academy. A package of Dr. Heimholtz's things arrived. James, was suddenly grief stricken. The Event which gave him these amazing powers robbed Heimholtz of his life, and his life's work, the search for the mysterious Eye of Ea.
So he decided, that the Academy would be there when he got back, but for now he was headed to Sari-Tash, which he discovered much to his chagrin was in Kyrgystan. So it would be long tough journey.
Summerhal, suddenly on his own decided to through his lot with the Teach Academy, at least for now.

Episode 1: Burning Man!

2006-05-03T05:26:00.000-07:00

Jack Summerhall returns to the St. Agnes Hospital to try to find out about Beau, his co-firefighter who apparantly went crazy. When he got there, he found high security surrounding the facility. He was forced to wait for some time, but eventually he was let in, and asked to stay a few days for some 'Tests' The doctors claimed to have found a 'tumor' in his head. Jack waited patiently, no one wants a tumor, for his tests. He noticed that the doctors who wanted to conduct the test were not the normal Air FOrce doctors, or traditional civilian staff, in one of their briefcases, he say a Cromwell Industries (Military Contractor) insignia.
After hours pass, an alarm goes off. Assuming it a fire alarm, Jack gets ready to make an orderly exit, but he is told to go back to his room, as it was a security alarm.

James Allen, half naked and soaked to the bone stops running, and returns to the hospital to check on the mysterious patient whose code he had written on the back of the business card Lt. Acorn gave him. He had to skirt security and work his way back through heightened security. As he enetered the same building he left through last time, he saw some indication that his exit was discovered, flags and tags showing a quick investigation. He didn't have long to ponder the situation as there was a huge explosion coming from the hospital. He ran to a window and spotted a massive burst of fire coming out of a ground floor door to the hospital. Claxons rang out and security troops ran to the scene. He used the cover of the confusion to try to waylay a pass guard and take his clothes. Sadly, that attempt was less than successful. Instead the SP (security police) fired on him with an M4 Carbine. The soldier scored several hits and James was stunned from the attack, but still standing.

Meanwhile, Jack heard the blast and raced down to the scene. As he looking into the burning building, he saw a man on fire run out. He thought about patting the fire out, but the man was clearly drneched in some firey material since the heat was unbearable. He tried to use a nearby fire extinguisher, but the CO2 was just being disipiated by the heat emanating from the man who somehow was still standing. The screams of the man were horrifying so Jack went into the hospital to find something to smother the flames with. While inside, he heard the cries of someone else, and took a deter to rescue a woman pinned under a burning timber. He brought her out to safety to find the Burning Man still standing and facing off with several SPs. The frightened SPs fired a salvo at the Burning Man. The bullets seemed to melt in the flames surrounding him. This only enraged him further and with an angry gesture the flames around him extended thirty feet and engulfed a helpless soldier.
James managed to take two SPs out of the fight by throwing one into the other. And there was a valiant attempt made to negotiate with the man, still manic and panicked from the flames around him. Jack ran to a nearby construction site to get something to use against the Burning Man, James continued to try to negotiate with him while calming the agitated soliders around them.

As the Burning Man turned to leave the area he blasted the hospital and a nearby HumVee. James tried to intercede one final time and this time the Burning Man unleashed his power on him. Somehow James was able to resist the flames without injury. By the Jack showed up with a heavy chain and he wrapped up the Burning Man rendering him helpless, but still on fire. James used the opportunity to punch the Burning Man, stunning him. Finally, Jack used his great speed to slam into the Burning Man and push him into a nearby fire hydrant.The water succeeded in dousing the flames of the Burning Man.

The heroes were strangely, not so out of place in the chaos that followed as patients, doctors and others began to evaculate the building. A short time later, troops and a helicoptor arrived, they knowingly used counter measures against the wet man, and fire fighting at the hospital started in full. The characters noticed something unusual in the evacuation of the hospital. Most patients were moved to safety but left on the grounds, some seriously wounded were med-evac'd to other locations. But some, apparantly uninjured, but restrained and hidden, were snuck out in unmarked helicopters to parts unknown.

It was then they ran into Lt. Acorn who was trying to prevent them from taking one man, who turned out to be her brother. She urged the heroes to get away while they still could. There was some discussion of what they shoudl do. She suggested that there was some kind of conspiracy going on, and that Jack's alleged 'Tumor' was probably just an excuse to keep him there for study. They did have a bit of luck, in the Burning Man's initial escape, he set fire to the room where most of the records were kept. So, it is possible that their identities might be preserved.

The two heros agreed to leave the scene by Taxi. James called a producer friend of his, Tom McGin, to find a place to lay low. They ended up in Bath, a nearby town, in a vacation home. The next day, a package from McGinn with clothes, credit cards and a phone. They spent the next day researching what they could about conspiracies in the government. Their search was too fruitful. There are hundreds of websties dedicated the conspiracy. Sifted through the bull will be a challenge in itself.

For now, they are safe, and ready to prepare for the next stage of their new lives.

Prelude - James Allen

2006-04-26T12:37:00.000-07:00

Jim Allen is a well respected popular scientist specializing in Archeology and the History of Ancient Peoples. He is frequently seen in Cable Television programs about the latest discovery of an artifact or treasure. Allen spends much of his time in travel out in the field. Usually he comes in somewhat after the main work has be done by rank and file archeologists, he then arrives to help publicize the find.
He is happy with this life as a sort of liason between the world of social sciences and the general public. And the role has been quite lucrative for him. He has a penthouse apartment in Uptown Franklin City.
He had just returned to that apartment from a trek to Chile to reveal the newly found ancient city there, the day of the Event. He received an intriguing message from an old colleague Dr. Franz Heimholtz chair of Near Eastern Archeology at Freedom University. Dr. Heimholtz invited Allen down to his lab to study an artifact he brought back with him from Northern Iraq.
Allen got there and worked the crowd of Graduate Students, eventually finding the elusive Dr. Heimholtz in a dark lab studying the strage relic. About the size of a golf ball, this piece of brass, gold and amber might be the ancient Eye Of Ea a Babylonian relic alleged to be the crafted eye of the God Ea made to replace his eye lost to to the goddess Tiamat. They discuss how to verify the find and fund a trek into Kurdistan when the Aged Historian succumbs to fatigue. Allen agrees to wait with the Eye while the doctor recovers.
Shortly thereafter, there is a power failure (see Game Background Stage 1). Allen tries to feel his way in the dark basement lab, and eventually decides to grab the Eye and bring it with him to protect it. Upon touching the Eye, he blasted with pain and a flash of light. He loses consciousness.

When he awakes, it is months later and he is in St. Agnes Hospital apparantly the suffered of short term amnesia. Allen goes along with it for a bit, but begins to suspect that there is something unusual going on. For now he bides his time. A few days later, he is told, he is brought down to the basement for physical therapy. Working on exercise machines hooked up to a laptap, he jogs, lifts weights and performs other standard exercises. The therapists seemed impressed with the numbers, and conduct a quick reflexes test, by throwing a billiard ball at him. He catches the ball crushing it in his hand. He is shocked and confused by this, and stands agape.
Then he sensed something wrong, and turned to see a man creeping up on him with a syringe. He knocks the syringe out of his hand, hearing the snapping of bones, and the scream of the man. After a brief chase, he confronts the other therapists.
One, an attractive woman, admits that they've been drugging him, to induce the amnesia, and keep him off his balance. In addition they showed him the data from his exercise trials. He was jogging over 10mph, and bench pressing over 1200lbs. Something had changed. He tested his own toughness by punching through the dry wall and feeling nothing.
He plotted an escape with the help of one of the therapists. But before that, he was tested again, for resilliancy. Pretending to be under the effects of Rohypnol (Roofies), he waited for the test. During the tests, the Doctors tried to use a drill press on his chest. Amazingly, the drill bit broke before causing anything more than a tickle. On his way out, his Therapist friend (Lt. Acorn?) took his gurney and maneuvered down a unused hallway. She pressed a business card into his hand with a code written on it, then launched him at high speed through a window. He fell a story and landed on a roof top. Unhurt, but half naked, Allen sped across the dilapidated mental hospital, and escaped into the Carolinian country-side.
After stopping and examining his own hospital wrist band he saw a code similar to that on the back of the card. Perhaps, it was the code of another patient. Allen decided he had to return to the hospital and see about this mystery.

NC GAMEDAY

2006-04-24T12:10:00.000-07:00

The game is over, and a few days have past. I was very pleased with the way it worked. My main gripe is that over half my players were from out of state so it wasn't much of a recruitment tool. Oh well.
There were no real disappointments, although I did kluge the Minion rules a bit, on accident. No one seemed to notice or care though. So that is good.
The pacing was good, the players quickly seemed to act like they were old friends, and we had ongoing jokes, and lots of fun in general. Sigh... I wish they were my regular group. But we press on.

Here are some photos of the game.

NCGAMEDAYX

The Event - Part 1

2006-04-19T05:29:00.000-07:00

December 16th - 2005
Scientists are unsure how to categorize the events that occured that day. Here is what is known.
Stage One - 8:56pm EST - Gravity Fluctuation detected by satalites in Earth Orbits of these Statalites are still be corrected)
Stage Two - 8:58pm EST - Electromagnetic Pulse center 4,400 meters in the air at Latitude : 35.6171381629608 Longitude : -77.0305934216478 - EMP causes 17 airplanes including 7 large passenger jets to drop from the skies and crash seconds later. EMP cause a power surge and blackout throughout the area primarily by affecting the Chocowinty Power Station. The black out lasts for approximately 7 hours across the county and neighboring regions.
Stage Three - 9:03pm EST - High Pressue - Barometers around the city go off the charts as atmospheric pressure reaches a high several millibars than previously recorded in that area. Paradoxically, this was accompanied by cloud formation, and high winds (contrary to normal weather patterns).
Stage Four - 9:05AP EST - Energy Surge - A bolt of unknown energy strikes the earth in two places. One 15 miles east of Franklin City (about half way to Pantego), and the other 5 miles south east in the Pamlico Sound at Blounts Bay. The energy type is unknown but massive, the equivalent of a 100 megaton nuclear blast. It was concentrated in the two areas, but the various effects of the impact were felt throughout the region.
At Site 1, the bolt destroyed most of the Grover's Farm. The is an impact crater believed to be 75 meters across and deep (precise data unavailable, because the site is a no fly zone). It is also rumored that the hole below it showed signs of burrowing to unknown depths. The area has a one mile quarantine zone maintained by the Air Force.
At Site 2, a plume of vaporize water leapt hundrds of miles into the sky and stayed cohesive long enough to be seen over France weeks later. The blast resulted in a massive fish kill, local fisherman have been bailed by the government in a two year staged program to slowly return them to their work after careful study of the effects. The impact site appears to be slightly more deflected than Site 1, and the effect appeared to open a trench under the bay. This results in a draining of the bay into the trench, and subsequent tsunami when the ocean refilled the bay. Because of the distance inland, the tsunami was of moderate strength is resulted in only minor destruction.

Parallel Event - 02:50AM GMT - Astronomers around looking at Jupiter note an energy trace visible from the earth. An arc of energy was measured that seemed to be similar to the one seen in North Carolina. The time dealy suggests that the effect was simultaneous to the event on Earth. Studies of this energy pattern reveal similar events in other star systems throughout the stellar neighborhood. Previously believed to be atmospheric interference.

Immediate Aftermath - The Beaufort County Coroner estimates that immediately following Stage 4 of the Event, approximate 2400 people were killed by the EMP and Impact. The majority of the 32,000 deaths resulted in the following minutes and hours. With the EMP and blackout, there were plane crashes, fires, massive car crashes and a complete overload of the civil emergency services, the city and region were in chaos.
Major Fires swept through the poor Southern District of Franklin, and at BFI (Benjamin Franklin International Airport). Luckily the traffic situation was not overly serious due to the hour. But there were dozens of serious car accidents throughout the region. In addition there was a commuter train collision with a chemical train West of the city. The nearby Greenville Nuclear Power Plant suffered a type 3 alarm, but was able to be shut down without meltdown.
Approximately 1 in 5,000 people in the region suffered from related but unprecedented neurological damage from the event, but the direct causation is unknown. The visible symptoms include bleeding from the eyes and ears. The immediate behavioral symptoms was primarily hysteria and rage.

Long Term Effects - Despite the massive energies unleashed by the event, there is little or no lingering radiation, realtively minor structural damage, and reconstruction was begun quickly. The Federal Government quickly declared a federal emergency and used civilian and military personnel to deal with the emergency. Having learned its lesson from Katrina, the government acted swiftly with massive aid and control. Because of the extra terrestrial origin of the event, the Air Force took control treating the incident as a possible attack until it was clear that this was not the case.
Approximately 30% of the casualties from the Event can be attributed to radiation sickness and other mysterious illnesses called CES (Catastrophic Event Syndromes). Blindness, burns and other illnesses were commonplace. In addtion the 'Bleeders' began to suffer a heightened rate of psychopathia. Several mental institutions were constructed in the area to deal with the vast number of cases (over 4000).

Electronic Equipment and File damage. The Event caused a massive loss of electronic equipment and damage. Many companies lost all electronic data, and many of their computers were destroyed. Government recovery programs have helped people by replacing their equipment, and helping them recover lost data. A group of volunteer computer geeks called The Atomic Think Tank, has assisted in this process. About a hundred or so companies were not able to function after the Event and closed shops, but most of their employees have be reabsorbed into the recovering economy. All in all Franklin has bounced back well from the devastation. As government oversight of the Impact Site, hospitals and research is beginning to be farmed out to contracters and universities, new discoveries about the event and its aftermath are being revealed.
One of these discoveries is a new metallic alloy called EVA (Event Alloy) which may simply the result of the vast energies fusing other metals together, has shown remarkable maleability, durability, and conductivity. Already US Minerals has petitioned to mine the alloy and exploit that resource.
Site 1 management has been contracted to Cromwell Industries, with US Airforce oversight. Site 2 management has been contracted to Seaboard Oceaongraphic with US Navy oversight.

Prelude - Jack Summerhall

2006-04-19T05:07:00.000-07:00

Adventure Summary
Decemember 16th 2005
-Jack is a freelance writer and part time volunteer fire fighter from a quasi-artistocratic family in Washington N.C., a wealthy suburb of Freedom City.
He not as successful as his siblings, or parents, but he makes do.
One day was like many others, or so it seemed. He was on duty at Fire Station 5742 out in the country in Sandhurst, off Hwy 32. He was working on a fluff piece about the Crappie Festival when they were hit by a power surge and blackout.
The firefighters figured something was up with the massive black out, and go ready to go. It wasn't long after that they heard a huge explosion. They looked around and saw a major fire in the distance. Driving towards it, they saw other fires, the radio was a jumble of confusion, so they pressed on. When they got to the blaze they saw the wreckage of a 737 splattered across the field.
Jack drive as close as he could, and they got out to help. They were getting their gear together when his comrade Beau pointed out a strange atmostpheric phenomenon. The clouds, a swirling purplish mass were writhing and foaming in the sky. Then seconds later he felt a the tingle of ionization and the smell of ozone. Expecting lightning, he dove for the ground commanding anyone near him to do the same.
There was a blast of blinding light, a wave of scorching fire, and blow of concussive force that was the last thing he remembered.

April 18th 2006
St. Agnes Hospital
Jack awakes from a coma. He is still bandaged, burnt and bruised from the injuries he took that fateful day. A day the doctors and the refer to simply as 'The Event.' Jack experiences some unusual phenomena at first. His hospital room is unnervingly quiet. The TV, Clock and intercom do not seem to function. Maybe the clock is moving, but very slowly. He is too wounded to get up. Then he is hit be a wave of pain in his head, and the door opened with a nurve alarmed to see him awake. She summoned a doctor and the situation and Event were explained.
[See Entry on the Event]
In the hospital, he learns of Beau, his co-fire fighter. Apparantly he wasnot seriously wounded, but he has had a psychotic episode as a result of the event. He is one of the 'Bleeders' and was fixated on finding and talking to Jack. The hospital has him under protective custody and won't let him have visitors until he can control his violent rages.

He is taken home by his mother. He learned of his brother James's job loss due to the Event, and subsequent heavy drinking. One day as he was recovering, and watching his brother outside stumbling near the Koi pond he saw James slip and fall into the pond.
Then suddenly he was there, holding his brother's surprised head out of the water. He has no idea how he got there, but he knows he is somehow different.

NC GAME DAY April 22

2006-03-08T09:48:00.000-08:00

I have volunteered to run an M&M game at NC Gameday X this year. They haven't put it up there, yet, but here is the site. Check it out.
If you are a local gamer and interested.. feel free to register. If you participated in the playtest of Dr. Null the Battle on the Bridge, you are welcome to try again, though things might be a little different.

Here is the link
NC Gameday X

Team Work

2006-03-03T06:35:00.000-08:00

Why are the PCs part of a team?
They almost inevitably a team, but why?
1. They are collected by a leader (who is a PC)
2. They are collected by an organization (Gov't, Private foundation)
3. They are brought together by circumstances.
(a) They are on the run, hunted, illegal, etc..
(b) They are fighting a common enemy
(c) They are just together when needed
(d) They got their powers together
4. They found the group themselves from a perceived advantage.

Is one reason preferrable to another?
I am not sure. They each have their advantages. Some lend themselves to plot devices better (2 in particular).
I think 4 often makes the most sense, but it is usually 'forced' on the PCs since they are 'THE' PCs and don't really have a choice with whom they will play.
3. Can be good, but it makes it difficult to add players who have the same connection, and it may force the game into a mold where there are limited adventures. 1. Can be good, but when there is a team leader, it is essential that the Player too be a leader. And that can be cause problems.

Rogues Gallery

2006-02-21T05:45:00.000-08:00

I've been having fun killing time making Bad Guys for the upcoming to be released currently non-existent game.
Some names: Scarlet, The Herald, Nightfall, LEGION, Cardinal, Impact.

Nemeses

2006-02-15T13:16:00.000-08:00

So... planning the various orgin events I was thinking about nemeses... villains that have their origins linked to the heroes in some way.
This can be overdone. As is a recent trend in super hero movies of late.
But I think a nemesis, if done correctly can be valuable. Properly done, the nemesis can:
1. Provide a recurring villain for the hero, the first suspect.
2. Work in the background if needed, doing inexplicable things which only later make sense (and so can provide a deeper element to the world)
3. Have a built in motive that doesn't involve self-aggrandizing (although they certainly can be that as well).
4. Be a sort of 'rock' for the character to cling to when doubting their role. For example: Batman may see the crime on the streets growing, a villain escape or be released from custody on a technicality. But when the Joker shows up and has some sinister plot, it is difficult for the Batman to just shrug his shoulders. He is part of the reason the Joker is out there doing his evil. And so he can't just leave it alone. (Substitute Superman and Lex Luther, X-men and Magneto, Spiderman and the Various Goblin(s), etc..)

In a group game, one might think a singular nemesis for all of them (like Magneto, or Dr. Doom) could be the way to go. But, there is a value to an individual nemesis which seems more important. A group of individual nemesi(nemesises?) could on occasion team up, but they should probably be special to the character most of the time. I think.

So problem. If everyone in the group has a special nemesis, it seems a little lame. Unless there are lots of solo adventures, the point of a nemesis might be lost in the rotation.

Possible Solutions.
Different kinds of nemesis.
1. The revenger - the hero is somehow responsible, in the villain's eye, for some serious loss (injury, spouse, humiliation, bankruptcy etc.) This could also be an NPC hero.
2. The former partner or teammate. The reformed villain might have old allies show up as enemies of the group. They might be especially nasty to the traitor, or try to lure him back.
3. Parent/Sibling/Child/Creator - Similar to the above case. Ambivalence is a good source.
4. Rival - Scientific, Economic, Acrobatic, etc.. The hero and the villain share some apptitude, the villain cannot allow the hero to be better than her. So she does what she can to humiliate the hero and prove him second best.
5. The 'Ex' - always a volatile combination super powers and the love/hate relationship. This can also work with 'Unrequited love', 'Super Fan' a la The Incredibles, or Ex-friends after an affair or the like.

Should these be introduced at the origin, or can they be worked into the game later. That is a tough question. If they are integral to the character becoming the hero, they might need to be brought in early.

Mental Grapple

2006-02-14T09:39:00.000-08:00

I may float this idea over at the Atomic Think Tank.
But I have a minor tweak for Mental Grapples. I was thinking, that, in general, the Mentalist has a pretty strong advantage over typical (low will save) opponents in this contest (and since it doesn't require a To Hit roll) it will usually work. So my minor 'fix' create something like Escape Artist for Mental Grapples.
I would think that Bluff seems the likely candidate. But as I think about it there are numerous possibilities.
So here is the plan:
Mental Grapple check apply your Will Save bonus, Wisdom Bonus, Mental Power or Bluff check to escape as per Escape Artist. If you have the Startle Feat, you can use your Intimidate skill instead of your Bluff Skill.
With the use of a Hero Point you can use and Interaction Skill as a substitute for your Mental Grapple check.

This will probably not have a huge impact on the game. But will make it possible for the sly, subtle, or fierce characters to have a slightly better chance at escaping the mental grapple.

Story Arcs

2006-02-13T17:11:00.000-08:00

So here is my thought. Each character in the new game should have a story arc. Since we are starting pre-super-powers part of the arc will be gaining powers, coping with them, developing them, developing a super heroic identity, mastering the powers.
Okay so far so good.
But then what? Presumably there are new and different arcs.
How far in advance do these things need to be prepared? I am used to running PCs pretty much as a though they were live agents, and not worry too much about any arcs. But for this game I think there should be something that happens to each, that precipitates the stages of the arc.

What do I need to know?

2006-02-12T17:13:00.000-08:00

I am making plans for the new game. And was thinking about backgrounds for super heros before they are super heros.
We can get the job, name, etc..
But what information is really important to developing into a hero?

What will make this person become a hero?
What gaping whole in your personality canonly be filled by becoming a hero?

Evasion

2006-02-09T04:48:00.000-08:00

Responding to concerns about Evasion.

I was going to say that Evasion is necessary for light Toughness/high Defense characters. Since Area ignores Defense, Area wipes these characters out otherwise.

None of the red flags listed in the Power Gaming posts were meant as out right bans of the power or feat. Instead they are just that, I will pay particular attention to them.
I agree that PL trade off characters with low Toughness scores need some kind of trick to survive area effect attacks. I will probably be hesitant to allow Evasion 2 as a purchased Feat, but happy to allow people to heroic effort it.
The other red flags are, again, alerts to the player and GM.

Comments enabled

2006-02-09T04:46:00.000-08:00

Sorry about that.

Mystery Character Generation

2006-02-08T17:36:00.000-08:00

Normals - PL5 any number of points (no powers/no super human abilities).

And then, there is the problem.
In theory, I am building the Super Powers for the characters Post Event. No problem. I can do that.... but...

The Devil is in the Details.
I could "finish" the job, of the players by (a) deciding the new traits and (b) working out the details. This would be relatively easy. But, it isn't exactly what I want to do.

How can I give the players some measure of control over character generation, and still keep the genre of the discovering their powers?
One Thought
(1) Start them with some minor traits (super senses, feats, super movement, etc..) "They know something is different"
(2) At some point in the story under stress a power manifests itself. "A bolt of lightning lances from your hands to the gas pump igniting into a conflagration." "You've got Blast" or whatever. And then let them play with it using Hero Points and Extra Effort. I give the PC the power write up after the session...
(3) Giving them the option to make any such use a permanent part of the character.
(4) Repeat for a while.
(5) Once they've gotten 75% or so of the character completed this way. Let them assign the remaining points. Do a sort of Training Montage with them either training solo, in the group, or under the tutelage of some instructer.

Power Gaming (redux)

2006-02-08T12:19:00.000-08:00

Active Power Cost Cap.
In addition to the PL cap, I think I will be using a rule of thumb active power cost cap which will be the cost of the power +extras+power feats. This cap will be some number probably PLx2.

This will make players make some interesting choices regarding their characters' powers.

Power or Flexibility?
The ubiquitous Alternate Power Feat would be less common I think if people would have to sacrifice ranks of maximum power for the various power feats.

Ex. PL 10
1. Exemplar
Blast 10 (Light) (20pp)

2. Flexor
Blast 8 - Light (PF - Accurate) (17pp)
AP - Dazzle (1)
AP - Blast (Extra Area) (1)
AP - Strike (Extra Aura)(1)

I think most players would rather have Exemplar and Power Stunt the other effects.

I may allow the APC to rise with XP before the PL cap to allow for some flexibility as they gain experience.

Mystery Powers

2006-02-08T09:59:00.001-08:00

One benefit of mystery powers, is that all powers will match my ideas of genre and fairness without question.

One difficulty would be making the obvious ones, (the ones that they would easily discover) equally interesting and useful.

Mystery Characters - In Between Time

2006-02-08T09:50:00.000-08:00

Another issue with Mystery Powers, is the "in between time." In a typical game between the actual sessions, there is the "in between time" that is assumed to pass, without actually role playing it.
Now, in a game of this sort, I would expect people to say that they are 'testing their powers' trying new things etc.. virtually every moment that they are not engaged in adventures.
So, how long can 'mystery powers' be kept mysteries?

Possible solutions.
1. Let people use 'off-line' communication to do practice and give them feedback. This would reward postings to a game blog, or listserv with tangible improvements (or revelation) of their abilities.
People who want mystery can keep it, by not doing anything, or posting other activities apart from practice.

2. Run the games 'back-to-back' in game-time, so there is no down-time without the GM being there. They can practice, but you can interupt the practice with adventures.

3. Give them one or two powers, and lots of experience points, so they can 'build' their character up from near scratch. However, make them submit their new characters and apply a 'line-item-veto' to any powers you don't want them to have yet.
This looks too much like normal character generation to me...

Mystery Characters

2006-02-08T06:46:00.000-08:00

Running a poll over at ENworld about making mystery characters. PCs would build "normals" either talented or not, and then I would "give" them super powers, which they would need to discover along the way. As they begin to get a better idea of their powers, they would have the option to influence the build though the use of Hero Points and Experience Points.
I like the idea, in theory.
But here is the thing. People really like to make their own characters. And a system like M&M makes it fun to design your own character. Wouldn't this campaign idea take away from that?
Is there anyway to preserve the "Mystery", "discovery","Development" phases of this idea, and still leave teh players mostly in charge of their characters.

M&M Campaign

2006-02-07T12:17:00.000-08:00

Toying with the idea of an M&M Campaign

1. PCs are among the first supers in the world. Maybe lower power level, fighting other new supers, or maybe lots of unpowered people.
2. Running a Freedom City game.

Both have advantages and disadavantages..

Power Gaming

2006-02-05T19:28:00.000-08:00

Some feats and powers are potentially game unbalancing or just too good for the cost.
PCs will need to justify them: conceptually and by game balance, before I allow them.
Game balance will need to show why they are 'needed' to keep the character competitive, rather than why they are good to have.

Evasion 1 - Cheap and easy way to make a character semi-invulnerable to area attacks.
Evasion 2 - Ditto, only totally invulnerable.
Improved Grapple - Two attacks per round! (Not for characters with powerful melee attacks)
Power Extra - Aura - Two attacks per round! (Not for characters with powerful melee attacks)
Power Extra - Linked (In general I will add the save modifier together for PL purposes)
Save Drains - I am considering making these more costly or require more time.
ESP - I may make Mental Grapple more difficult.

Sign In!

2005-06-22T11:36:00.000-07:00

If you are interested in finding out more about the game, leave a comment with your email address and I will get back to you.

Welcome to the Academy Adventures

2005-06-21T16:52:00.000-07:00

No episodes yet. GMs will be allowed expected to post episode summaries.