The Tri-City Foursome, A Small-Time Super-Team

Four hero writeups from one of the games I'm actually playing in, and the only current series where I've actually racked up a couple of collections worth of game time.  I'll leave it up to the readers to decide which one of them is my alter-ego in game.  The other three heroes are written up with permission of their players.

Our team operates around the Albany-Schenectady-Troy region of New York state as part of a federal hero initiative thing, with a hypothetically secret base underneath a huge abandoned high-rise warehouse building that's something of a legendary real-life eyesore in Albany's downtown.  It's as good an explanation for why the fool thing is still standing as anything.  Our logo is a spiffy "3C4" graphic one of our more artistically-talented players made up for us.  

Mostly we've been punching android shapeshifters bent on...something?  Taking over the state legislature?  Also some minor supernatural weirdness and an alien tourist who turned out to be a con man trying to steal the Egg, Albany's most noteworthy architectural feature.  Or at least the only one They Might Be Giants have sung about.  We've also been ordered to stay out of New York City for, ah, reasons.  Campaign vibe has been pretty gonzo and very focused on the local scene, to everyone's satisfaction since we're all from around here. 

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Name: Richard Reed, the Malleable Man

Origin: The Malleable Man will be happy to tell you that he isn't a "stretchy guy" hero at all, that's just your personal perception of reality at work.  What looks like stretching or teleportation is just (!) him bending the fabric of space-time through sheer force of will.  He actually has to keep his mind on it to avoid casually distorting his local and personal reality in ways others find disturbing or unnatural.  

Richard didn't always have that problem and still isn't sure why he developed his condition a few years ago.  Most likely it was one of his many experiments, or an unanticipated interaction of several of them.  Regardless, it's given him a new insight into the working of the multiverse as well as proving helpful in his frequent encounters with criminals interested in his inventions.  Reed doesn't really think of himself as a superhero, but he's too good-natured to ignore injustice and evil-doing.  There's also something to be said for a chance to field test his latest creations around supers who aren't likely to (say) experience molecular decohesion from a little casual Z-Wave exposure.

Description: Smiling young man of average height and weight, but unless he's paying attention his body and face tend to distort in an odd, cartoonish fashion.  Wears a medium blue jumpsuit whose many pockets bulge with various gadgets and tools he's invented, and a hefty dark gray utility belt carries more in its many pouches.  Almost always has a set of odd-looking goggles on, although he's got many sets of them that do different things and swaps between them regularly.  If he expects to need them he'll dig out a set of jet boots but usually just wears comfortable but sturdy black work boots instead.

Gender: Male                 Age: Mid-Twenties           Height: 5'11"            Eyes: Blue

Hair: Blonde Buzzcut           Skin: Lightly Tanned           Build: Average or Cartoonish

Background: Academic               Power Source: Unknown                Archetype: Reality Shaper

Personality: Cheerful                   Health (G/Y/R):  30/22/11

Powers: Elasticity d10, Inventions d8, Teleportation d6                                        

Qualities: Self-Discipline d12, Investigation d10, Banter d8, Reality Is Subjective d8, Science d8, Technology d8

Status: Green (30-23) d10 / Yellow (22-12) d8 / Red (11-1) d6

Abilities:

Green

Playing Dice With the Universe (R) After a dice pool is rolled, adjust any one die up or down one value on the die.

Principle of the Gearhead (A) Overcome a technological challenge.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What device just shorted out?  Major twist: What machine just went terribly off the rails?  RP: You always know the general state of repair and function of an item of technology, regardless of complexity or origin.

Principle of Science (A) Overcome a challenge while applying specific scientific principles.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What were the surprising effects of leveraging that principle in this situation?  Major twist: What just blew up?  RP: You are up to date on and understand the most modern scientific theories and can quote from them in conversation.

Twist Space-Time (A) Attack using Elasticity.  Move the target anywhere nearby in the scene.  If the target goes next in the turn order, you decide who takes the next turn after them.

Yellow

Flexible Fighter (A) Attack using Elasticity.  Hit one target with your Min die, another target with your Mid die, and Boost with your Max die.

Nix (R) When a nearby enemy would create a mod, you may remove it immediately.

Testing Some New Toys (A) Boost all nearby allies using Inventions.  Use your Max + Mid dice.  Hinder yourself with your Min die.

Red

Break Reality (A) Overcome using Self-Discipline.  Use your Max + Min dice.  Hinder all nearby opponents using your Mid die.

Reform the Form (A) Hinder yourself using Elasticity.  Use your Min die.  Recover Health equal to your Max + Mid dice.

Time-Space Stutter (I) When you use an action ability, you may also perform any basic action using you Mid die on the same roll.

Out

Bend Reality A Bit (A) Boost an ally by rolling your single Elasticity die.

Tactics

The Malleable Man starts most action scenes by judiciously using Twist Space-Time to reposition opponents both physically and in the turn order, frequently waiting to act in a round until second to last so that the heroes can have a villain act last while still controlling the first activation of next round.  He'll try to use Play Dice With the Universe or Nix on every round, with the former useful on any dice pool and the latter being a strong counter to a big Hinder or Boost.  In the Yellow zone his go-to ability is Flexible Fighter and he'll often save up several "Pumped Up" bonuses for later use with it.  Testing Some New Toys is a strong way to grant multiple allies a solid Boost - average result will be a +3 bonus and +4 isn't impossible - for a small self-Hinder.  If pushed to the Red zone by damage he'll use Reform the Form while using his free basic action from Time-Space Stutter.  Break Reality lets him apply his raw willpower to Overcome almost any problem while impairing the actions of his foes.  When Out, his allies will still benefit from Bend Reality A Bit as his unconscious will reaches out to support them.

Reed's biggest weakness is the lack of defensive reactions, and his damage output is pretty lackluster as well.  Teammates with tricks to Defend allies are a big help for him, while his dice manipulation, mod countering and mass boosts are beneficial for them.

When building dice pools, Elasticity will generally be paired with Self-Discipline (the quality that helps him maintain his apparent form and the fabric of the universe around him) or Reality Is Subjective.  Inventions can do almost anything but usually pairs with Technology, Investigation, or Science - and some social qualities when he's using his hypno-goggles or psycho-sonic irritation inducer, which absolutely sounds like a vuvuzela on steroids.  Reality Is Subjective reflects his quirky sidewise view of how the cosmos works, and like most RP qualities can fill in for others situationally, particularly esoteric information or mental ones.

Outside of an action scene, Reed is an excellent researcher, incredibly self-controlled (making it easier to stay upbeat about things no matter what), quick with a joke, and well versed in comic-book science and technology.  He's no great physical specimen and can be a little dense about social nuances, though.

Trivia

His supranym "Malleable Man" is a bit of a private joke, since (no matter what it may look like) he's not changing at all, the universe is.  It's only his iron will that keeps him from bending it more than he does, making him the very opposite of "malleable" by definition.

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Name: Troubleshooter

Origin: You're not cleared for that information.  "John Smith" is the only name he'll give, and he prefers to go by "Troubleshooter" in the field.  He'll admit to being a former super-agent (although he's vague about what agency he worked for, or even what government) but says he's operating on his own these days, having "activated himself" in response to the return of [insert sinister conspiratorial organization here].  He must have some kind of serious security clearance given the way officials react to him but isn't well-known in the supers-community.  "John" is obviously the product of some kind of elite training program, and his equipment is bleeding-edge even by mad science standards.  His exotic firearm (who goes by "Gun" socially) is almost certainly smarter than he is, but Gun doesn't rub it in and they work well together as a team.

Description: Tall, lean man wearing a sleek smart matter suit with adaptive camouflage, usually set to a default gray when not in use.  The suit sports chunky gauntlets and vambraces studded with emergency defensive systems and tool pouches on both thighs but is otherwise featureless and as snug as light powered armor can be.  The helmet is a featureless opaque oval but is usually kept retracted, forming a thick collar.  

He carries a hefty Kirby-tech firearm that's also made of smart matter and alters its form (and output) for optimal effect on any given shot, as well as giving the artist a chance for some creativity.  The firearm hosts a sophisticated artificial intelligence which is capable of speech, both vocal and over radio frequencies or even laser comms.  It isn't shy about speaking up, and uses a variety of voices as it pleases, usually sticking to a default TTS voice while on missions.  In more relaxed circumstances, its favorites seem to be Mel Blanc and Clint Eastwood.

Troubleshooter is often accompanied by his signature vehicle, the Universal Mobility Unit.  This is a arrowhead-shaped platform about seven feet long and three feet wide at the base, sporting the same adaptive camouflage of his suit.  It can be ridden either lying down, kneeling or standing thanks to inertial dampers and the smart matter of the flight platform adhering to its rider.  The UMU lacks visible controls and is operated by its own limited AI, usually networked with the operator's suit and smart gun.

Gender: Male                 Age: Fifties?          Height: 6'4"            Eyes: Gray

Hair: None                Skin: Weathered                Build: Lanky

Background: Retired               Power Source: Training                Archetype: Marksman

Personality: Decisive                   Health (G/Y/R):  28/21/10

Powers: Adaptive Smart Gun d12, Power Suit d8, Agility d6, Universal Mobility Unit d6

Qualities: Criminal Underworld Info d10, Imposing d10, Ranged Combat d10, Alertness d8, Stealth d8, Veteran Government Agent d8                                            

Status: Green (28-22) - d8 / Yellow (21-11) - d8 / Red (10-1) - d8

Abilities:

Green

Principle of Detachment (A) Overcome a challenge related to duress or fear.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: Who have you alienated with your distant behavior?  Major twist: How have you withdrawn from the current scene to cope?  RP: You are detached from emotional situations and always keep your cool.

Principle of the Detective (A) Overcome to learn hidden information  Use your Max die.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What important clue did you just miss?  Major twist: What major secret was just revealed that you would rather have stayed hidden?  RP: You can always tell when an important piece of information is being left out or obscured, though you might not know exactly what it is.

Scoped Out (A) Boost using Ranged Combat.  Use your Max + Min dice.  This bonus can only be used against one chosen target, and is persistent and exclusive against that target until it leaves the scene.

Target Designation (A) Boost using Adaptive Smart Gun.  Create one bonus using your Max die and another using your Mid die.

Yellow

Adaptive Countermeasures (R) When you are Attacked by a nearby enemy, the Attacker also takes the same amount of damage.

Steady Fire (A) Attack using Adaptive Smart Gun.  Use your Mid die to Attack one extra target for each bonus you have.  Apply a different bonus to each Attack.

Supporting Fire (A) Attack using Alertness.  Boost another hero using your Max die.

Tailored Shot (A) Attack using Ranged Combat.  Use your Max die.  If you roll doubles, use your Max + Min dice instead. 

Red

Access To the Files (A) Overcome using Criminal Underworld Info.  Use your Max + Min dice.

Emergency Measures (A) Attack multiple nearby targets using Power Suit.  Use your Max + Mid dice.  Take irreducible damage equal to your Min die.

One Perfect Shot (A) Attack using Adaptive Smart Gun and at least one bonus.  Use your Max + Mid + Min dice.  Destroy all your bonuses, adding each of them to this Attack first, even if they are exclusive.

Out

Independent Tac Analysis (A) Boost an ally by rolling your single Adaptive Smart Gun die.

Tactics

Troubleshooter is aptly named.  He sees trouble, it gets shot.  His signature weapon can reconfigure itself on the fly for optimal effect on almost any target, mixing customized projectiles with exotic energy emitters as needed.  Perhaps surprisingly for someone who comes off as very grim and no-nonsense, he generally tailors his shots to be non-lethal.  He explains this as being better for questioning afterward as well as attracting less negative media attention.  Troubleshooter's signature vehicle isn't real fast but it's small, maneuverable, and can fly, swim, maneuver in zero gee, and generally go just about anywhere.  John's suit is lightweight by power armor standards and is optimized for stealth, recon, reactive defense systems and communications functions rather than being loaded with integrated weaponry or impenetrable armor and force fields.

In a fight, he'll open by using Target Designation to aid himself and/or allies, or spread Scoped Out over key targets until he's pushed into the Yellow.  At that point he switches to Tailored Shot for maximum damage, Supporting Fire to assist an ally, or Steady Fire to gun down multiple targets - the latter being especially powerful if he has a Scoped Out bonus on more than one enemy.  If Attacked he'll return the favor with Adaptive Countermeasures, using the reaction against whatever seems to be the biggest threat.  In the Red he'll either take one Perfect Shot to try to drop the biggest threat, or use Emergency Measures to deal with multiple foes at close range.  His Access To the Files means he's very good at Overcomes while under pressure, making him very versatile when it comes to dealing with challenges - and keep in mind that "hiding with Stealth so you don't get finished off" is also a perfectly valid Overcome action.

Outside of action scenes, he's a good detective, makes a great scout or sentry, is very good at intimidating people and nearly impossible to rattle or get a rise out of.  His mysterious past has given him a lot of official contacts and a knack for dealing with bureaucracy.  He's also incredible at darts and an amazing baseball pitcher.  Throws southpaw, too.        

His weaknesses are pretty obvious.  He's fragile, he prefers to stay at range, and without his gear he's pretty much just a very skilled human.  Many people find him distant and cold as well, which actually suits him better than he'd like to admit.  Getting close to people usually gets them hurt - but maybe supers will be up to the risks he lives with?

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Name: Stalwart

Origin: Shannon O'Connor is the heir to her deceased parents' controlling interest in O'Connor Industries, a sprawling business that's been growing steadily since the 1800s.  She hasn't let her billions blind her to the state of the world though, and it was her desire to push the company in a more socially responsible direction that led to her gaining her super-powers.  Two of her uncles were bitterly opposed to her progressive business initiatives, and resorted to literal black magic to attempt to put their wayward niece under their arcane domination.  Sadly for them, their diabolic ritual was disrupted by a cult-hunting superhero, and the resulting mystic backlash granted Shannon amazing powers.  She took it in stride, and now splits her time between doing what good she can as a wealthy philanthropist and fighting super-villainy in her guise as Stalwart.  She may eventually adopt other super-identities, but for now she's still getting a feel for the whole hero business.          

Description: She's a shapeshifter, and a pretty good one.  Her preferred super-self is a towering example of (her idea of) physical perfection, blue-eyed, raven-haired and gracefully athletic.  Her costume is prone to change without warning, but currently she she favors a tunic, long pants and calf-high boots in shades of white and off-white.   

Gender: Female           Age: Twenty-something (Thirty-something)        

Height: 5"6'  (Varies from 3" to 12', usually 8')      Eyes: Green (Blue)       Hair: Red (Black)       

Skin: Freckled (Flawless Ivory Perfection)      Build: Compact (Statuesque)

Background: Upper Class         Power Source: Supernatural         Archetype: Physical Powerhouse

Personality: Stalwart                   Health (G/Y/R):  30/22/11

Powers: Presence d10, Strength d10, Vitality d10, Shapeshifting d8, Size-Changing d6

Qualities: Conviction d10, Fitness d10, Billionaire Philanthropist d8, Insight d8, Persuasion d8

Status: Green (30-23) - d8 / Yellow (22-12) - d8 / Red (11-1) - d8

Abilities:

Green

Confront My Foe (A) Attack using Fitness.  The target of that Attack must take an Attack action against you on its next turn if possible.

Mighty Strike (A) Attack using Strength.  Use your Max die.

Principle of the Indestructible (A) Overcome in a situation where you charge headlong into danger.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What goes wrong with your defenses?  Major twist: Who gets hurt other than you as a result of you not being able to take damage?  RP: You ignore damage from unpowered close combat attacks and primitive ranged weapons.

Principle of the Mask (A) Overcome using knowledge from your civilian life.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What clue about your real identity did you leave behind?  Major twist: Who from your civilian life is now in imminent danger?  RP: You have a career that allows you to slip between identities with ease.

Yellow

Boundless Energy (A) Boost yourself using Vitality.  Use your Max die.  This bonus is persistent and exclusive. 

Take Heart! (A) Boost an ally using Presence.  You and nearby heroes in the Yellow or Red zone Recover health equal to your Min die.

Enduring Spirit (I) Reduce any physical or energy damage you take by 1/2/3 while you are in the Green/Yellow/Red zone.

Red

Draw Their Attacks (R) When an opponent Attacks, you may become the target of that Attack and Defend by rolling your single Fitness die.

Protect Them All (I) You can take one Reaction each turn rather than one each round, but for each Reaction after the first in a round you either suffer 1 irreducible damage or take a minor twist.

Still Undefeated (A) Hinder yourself using Vitality.  Use your Min die.  Recover Health equal to your Max + Mid dice.

Out

Fight On! (A) Boost an ally by rolling your single Presence die.

Tactics

Stalwart is an iconic hero; strong, tough, and confident while remaining connected to the those she's protecting.  Her Shapeshifting ability is a secret she protects as much as her civilian identity, although she's used her Size-Changing in public on rare occasions.  It's entirely possible that she might try adopting other heroic facades under different names, but for now she prefers her striking 8' tall form.  In a fight she opens with hard-hitting Mighty Strike attacks or ties up enemies with Confront My Foe.  In the Yellow zone she'll use Boundless Energy as soon as possible and may even take a twist to use it early in Green, especially if she has a temporary bonus from another source to pump it up further.  After that she'll continue with her Green abilities or aid allies with Take Heart! for group healing supplemented by bonuses.  Enduring Spirit lets her resist a lot of incoming damage, although she needs to watch out for psionic/mental/emotional onslaughts.  When things get dire, she can use Draw Their Attacks with Protect Them All to defend against every Attack the enemy attempts, at least until she runs out of Health or gets swamped with minor twists.  On her first turn in Red she'll use Still Undefeated to regain a large amount of Health and likely go back to Yellow status.  If the scene tracker reaches Red while she's still got a lot of Health left she can reasonably expect to react to every single enemy Attack till the timer runs out, stopping ~8-9 damage each time if the damage is physical or energy type.  If taken Out she'll still offer some support to an ally with Fight On!

Outside of action scenes, she's remarkable good in most negotiation situations, absurdly healthy, practically radiates confidence, and has a slew of connections in business, legal and activist circles.  She's part of that 1% of the 1% that uses her enormous inherited wealth and power for things that actually help people, although most of that will be done outside of her super-persona.  She can also use her Shape-Shifting and array of qualities to disguise herself with ease, letting her access places and people neither her real self nor her Stalwart persona could normally get anywhere near without major complications.  Her Size-Changing lets her vary her size from 3" to about 12' without having to push things with an Overcome, which can be handy for various things.  She's uncomfortable about "getting small" but not enough so to stop her from doing so when need be.

In terms of weaknesses, her versatility is rather limited by her reluctance to reveal her Shape-Shifting power, which she could otherwise use to (at the very least) cover for her lack of mobility powers by emulating Flight, Wall-Crawling or Swimming and the like with suitable body modifications.  She's also lacking practical experience in much beyond philanthropy, money management and some sociology.  College gave her an excellent education, but it was broad rather than deep and she's still pretty young.

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Name: Upshift

Origin: Sam Quade grew up with and on the internet, using it from childhood as a creative outlet that his musician parents didn't entirely understand but were generally supportive of.  He'd acquired a degree of internet fame as a versatile content creator by his late teens - and then at 18 his mutant powers spontaneously manifested, and suddenly his personal "connection speed" to the universe increased by several orders of magnitude.  With the best internet sites too slow to keep his full interest any more, he got off his couch and looked outside for a change.  He didn't like a lot of what he saw, and as a super he had more power to make the world a better place than he'd ever had as youtuber.  Upshift was born - but he's been careful to keep his secret identity secret while continuing to put out online content as his cover.  Not the right time for a face reveal yet, and video editing is so much easier at superspeed.          

Description: A slender young man, unassuming in appearance when out of costume.  In his hero persona he wears a sleek white bodysuit with red boots, gloves, and snug "ski mask" style hood that leaves only his eyes and mouth exposed.  The suit has a large upward-pointing red arrow icon on its chest and a smaller white arrow on the forehead of the hood.  The entire outfit is made of a tough low-friction material except for the soles of the boots and the palms of the gloves, making it easier to quickly don or remove as well as harder for others to get a grip on.

Gender: Male                 Age: Twenties          Height: 5'9"            Eyes: Brown

Hair: Brown                       Skin: Caucasian                      Build: Lean

Background: Performer        Power Source: Genetic         Archetype: Speedster

Personality: Inquisitive                  Health (G/Y/R):  34/25/12

Powers: Agility d10, Speed d10, Awareness d8, Teleportation d8, Vitality d6

Qualities: Acrobatics d10, Finesse d8, Fitness d8, Internet Content Creator d8

Status: Green (34-26) - d6 / Yellow (25-13) - d8 / Red (12-1) - d12

Abilities:

Green

Everywhere At Once (A) Attack multiple targets using Acrobatics.  Use your Min die.  Hinder each target with your Mid die.

Flash Healing Aura Strike (A) Attack using Agility.  Other nearby heroes in the Yellow or Red zone Recover using your Min die.

Principle of the Everyman (A) Overcome when using a bonus from another hero.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: Which hero did you just make look good at the expense of yourself?  Major twist: How are you utterly, totally out of your league?  RP: When needed you can make yourself just another face in the crowd.

Principle of Speed (I) When you successfully Overcome, you may end up anywhere in the current environment.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What physical drawbacks do you suffer from going too fast?  Major twist: What critical detail did you speed past earlier that is now coming back to haunt you?  RP: You're fast, and like to be on your way as quickly as possible.

Warp Time (A) Boost or Hinder using Agility.  Use your Max die.  If you roll doubles, Attack using your Mid die.

Yellow

All-Out Attack (A) Attack multiple targets using Agility.  Use your Max die against one target and your Mid die against each other target.  If you roll doubles, take irreducible damage equal to your Mid die.

Metabolic Amplification (A) Boost yourself using Agility, then either remove a penalty from yourself or Recover using your Min die.

Time Sight (R) When damaged by an environmental target or a surprise Attack, Defend yourself by rolling your single Awareness die.

Red

Instant Zoom Gate (R) When an Attack would deal damage to a nearby hero in the Red zone, you may take 1d6 irreducible damage to redirect that Attack to a target of your choice other than the source of that Attack. 

Maximized Flash Healing (A) Hinder yourself using Vitality.  Use your Min die.  Recover Health equal to your Max + Mid dice.

Out

Shared Awareness (A) Choose an ally.  Until your next turn, that ally may reroll one of their dice by using a reaction.

Tactics

Upshift is a mutant with greatly accelerated reflexes as well as the ability to slice "zoom gates" in space-time that let him instantly move himself and other people or objects over considerable distances.  He also perceives time strangely, not only processing sensory input almost instantaneously but often being able to see the results of actions fractions of a second before they occur, which helps him target his zoom gate teleports more accurately.  Upshift starts with a wide variety of useful abilities in a fight, including a multi-target Attack & Hinder in Everywhere At Once, a Max-die Boost or Hinder that also Attacks on doubles with Warp Time, and an Attack with built-in party healing when using Flash Healing Aura Strike.  In the Yellow he adds slightly risky higher damage option with All-Out Attack, a Boost with some self-healing or penalty removal with Metabolic Amplification, and a somewhat limited defensive reaction with Time Sight.  In Red Upshift has a phenomenal but painful reaction with Instant Zoom Gate, which he usually follows with Maximized Flash Healing to heal back into Yellow.

His qualities make him good at most physical tasks while his powers let him go almost anywhere and expand his senses.  He benefits from being in the Yellow zone for a better status die, since his metabolism responds to stress by hyper-accelerating.  Upshift's Internet Content Creator quality stems from a lifetime of blogging, vlogging, video creation, voice acting and digital art projects, and he pretty much lived online prior to his mutant powers manifesting.  He's an encyclopedia of trivia about a crazy variety of subjects and is a wizard at online research, although he's not a hacker as such.  His civilian ID is also "internet famous" and can reasonably expect to get help from his fans when needed.

If he's got a major weakness I'm not sure what it is.  Lack of deep knowledge of any particular subject?  Mediocre face to face social skills?  He used to have a serious internet addiction issue but the web is too slow for him now, so he's broken that habit.  He needs to get amped up a bit to have a decent status die, and tends to catnap a lot owing a weird metabolism.  He's also a fairly new hero and sometimes feels like he's in over his head but he's also a quick learner so that won't last long.

Blog Content Index

Downfall, Legendary Hero-killer

This guy's a one of relatively few mercenary villains willing to take killing contracts on other supers, and he's legitimately a threat even to a hero with a team to back them up.  Maybe even especially to teams - he's gotten a little too accustomed to fighting multiple opponents and has lost a bit of his edge in one-on-one confrontations.

Downfall

Marco Kull was once a minor criminal who specialized in smuggling restricted technologies - super-tech, alien artifacts, and weird science gadgets of all kinds.  He gained his remarkable powers when accidentally exposed to strange cosmic energies from a damaged mechanism during a superhero team's raid on one of his operations.  Panicking, he attacked the heroes with his newfound abilities, defeating all of them with ease, killing three of the four and badly injuring the survivor in the process.

Saddled with a reputation for being a hero-killer, Kull opted to lean into it.  As Downfall he's gone on to become a much-feared mercenary villain, willing and well-equipped to take jobs to eliminate other supers, even those who operate in teams.  He has tremendous gravity-manipulation powers capable of crushing foes and deflecting attacks with glowing energy constructs, as well as inhuman strength and a combination of flight and phasing abilities that make him very hard to catch - or avoid, when he's got a contract on you.  His years of experience have also made him alarmingly good at tracking down his targets, even those with secret identities and hidden headquarters.  Not all his jobs involve killing, but his willingness to tackle that kind of work makes him stand out among his fellow super-thugs.

Description: When deliberately powered down he appears to be a powerfully-built Caucasian male with unremarkable features.  With his powers active, he's nothing but a man-shaped void of shadows, seemingly filled with colorful stars and nebulae.  Think Silver Surfer if he was jet black and jammed full of Kirby-space.  

Gender: Male          Age: 35         Height: 5'11"          Eyes: Glossy Black

Hair: Bald           Skin: Glossy Black, Full of Stars & Nebulae         Build: Muscular

Approach:  Prideful                  Archetype:  Guerrilla

Health:  45 + (5 x H)

Powers: Cosmic d10, Flight d10, Strength d10, Intangibility d8

Qualities: Close Combat d10, Ranged Combat d10, Investigation d8, Legendary Hero-killer d8, Stealth d8

Status: # of Opponents Engaged 0-1 - d6 / 2-3 - d8 / 4+ - d10

Abilities:

Implacable (I) Reduce all damage dealt to you by 2.

Singular Focus (A) Attack one target using Cosmic.  Use your Max + Min dice.  Defend yourself against all Attacks from anyone but the target until the start of your next turn with your Mid die.

Utter Contempt (I) At the start of your turn, gain a bonus equal to the number of opponents that have Attacked you since your last turn.

Your Friends Can't Save You (I) If you are outnumbered by nearby opponents, reduce all damage dealt to you by 2.

Upgrades & Masteries (optional):

Group Fighter (I) +20 Health.  When you take an action that lets you make an Attack, also Attack with your Mid die.

Master Mercenary (I) If you have a contract for a specific task, automatically succeed at an Overcome when your payment is at stake.

Tactics

Downfall prefers to deal with one enemy at a time using Singular Focus to remorselessly crush his target using his gravity manipulation powers while being protected against other opponents.  Implacable makes him hard to hurt, and Your Friends Can't Save You ramps that durability up a lot when outnumbered.  Any bonus he gains from Utter Contempt will be channeled into further increasing his defenses by bumping up his Mid die.

With his upgrade he further increases his damage output, and he'll concentrate the extra Attack on his main target till they drop.  His mastery makes good and certain he gets his paycheck at the end of a job.

Blog Content Index

Doctor Atomico, A Nuclear Hero

This hero writeup is an example of how you can use different combinations of power sources and archetypes to produce different takes on the same basic character.  The Radioactive/Elemental Manipulator version here is much more offensively focused and somewhat self-destructive, while the Mystical/Blaster combination is quite a bit more versatile when it comes to environmental threats and team support.  They're still the same person with the same powers and similar qualities, but reflect the kind of change-over-time character progression you might execute when you finish a collection (and meta-textually, get a new creative team assigned to you).

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Name: Doctor Atomico

Origin: John-Jack Kincaid was a talented physics researcher with a specialty in nuclear medicine, but not especially well known outside of scientific circles.  That changed when he was one of the few survivors of an encounter with Atomic Infernovox, and he became downright famous when he manifested super powers and a megalomaniacal personality disorder while recovering in the local hospital.  Dubbing himself Doctor Atomico, he spent several years as an up-and-coming "mad science" villain with a penchant for grand schemes to irradiate the world so everyone could experience the joys of atomic energy.  He also committed quite a few robberies to fund his plans and acquire rare isotopes or equipment, working with a variety of super-criminals in the process.  He was eventually captured, and during his pre-trial assessment it was discovered that he was, in fact, under the mental control of an infernoid, an extra-dimensional spirit of fiery consumption.  The entity was exorcised, and Dr. Kincaid's original personality reasserted itself.

Appalled by his involuntary actions over the last few years, he vowed to use his powers and his considerable intellect in the service of justice and the public good.  He would remake Doctor Atomico into a hero and redeem himself in the eyes of the public  Surprisingly, the court system did eventually drop all charges against him, although he did voluntarily agree to government supervision to ensure he didn't have any "relapses" into atomic villainy.  So far everything's gone well, although he's yet to get entirely out from under the shadow of earlier actions.

Description: A gangly, large-headed man with a beaklike nose and prominent ears, dressed in a hazard-orange bodysuit marked with a yellow-and-black trefoil radiation hazard symbol on its chest.  He wears black calf-length boots, elbow-length black gloves, and a bulky black utility belt.  When his nuclear powers are active (which they usually are) he's surrounded by Kirby crackle and blue Cherenkov radiation, shading to purple when absorbing energy.  His flight expels beams of blue light and considerable kinetic energy, and makes a fairly loud crackling noise.  Of course, there's nothing to see when he's invisible.    

Gender: Male                 Age: 40           Height: 5'10"           Eyes: Hazel

Hair: Chestnut                          Skin: Caucasian                 Build: Scarecrow Thin

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Background: Former Villain    Power Source: Radioactive     Archetype: Elemental Manipulator

Personality: Jovial                   Health (G/Y/R):  32/24/11

Powers: Absorption d10, Nuclear d10, Invisibility d8, Flight d6

Qualities: Science d10, Conviction d8, Medicine d8, Reformed Supervillain d8, Stealth d8

Status: Green (32-25) - d6 / Yellow (24-12) - d8 / Red (11-1) - d12

Green

Atomic Rays (A) Attack up to two targets using Nuclear.  Take Nuclear damage equal to your Mid die.

Concentrated Beam (A) Attack using Nuclear.  Use your Max die.  Take Nuclear damage equal to your Min die.

The Power of Science! (I) You may reroll any ones you roll.  You must accept the result of the reroll.

Principle of the Atom (A) Overcome a challenge involving nuclear energy and radiation.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What other energy is currently causing your powers to go on the fritz?  Major twist: What other energy is currently dampening all of your powers?  RP: You can easily interact with nuclear energy and radiation.

Principle of Science (A) Overcome a challenge while applying specific scientific principles.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What were the surprising effects of leveraging that principle in this situation?  Major twist: What just blew up?  RP: You are up to date on and understand the most modern scientific theories and can quote from them in conversation.

Yellow

Radiation Surge (A) Boost yourself using Nuclear.  Then either remove a penalty from yourself or Recover using your Min die.

Siphon Energy (A) Attack one target using Absorption.  Hinder that target using your Max die.

Nuclear Fallout (I) Whenever you take Nuclear damage, you may also inflict that much damage on another target.

Red

Radioactivity Spike (A) Attack up to three targets, one of which must be you, using Nuclear.  Assign your Max, Mid, and Min dice to the target(s) as you choose.

Reactor Recharge (I) If you would take Nuclear damage, ignore that damage and instead Recover and Boost yourself using the value of that damage. 

Out

Afterglow (A) Defend an ally by rolling your single Science die.

Tactics

Doctor Atomico is all offense in Green, with Concentrated Beam offering the best single target damage while Atomic Rays is better for multiple weaker enemies at the cost of inflicting more self-harm.  The Power of Science! can selectively improve his dice pools, but remember its use is optional and there are times you might want a one on your Min die.  His Principles require more imagination and justification to use than some, but reading up on science trivia may supply some inspiration and if he ever needs to (say) disarm a nuke or prevent a reactor meltdown he's the man.

In Yellow, Nuclear Fallout vastly improves his Green offensive abilities, where their self-harm also becomes free damage on a target - any target, and it isn't an Attack so many reactions fail against it.  Siphon Energy gives him an Absorption-based Attack that (unlike his Green zone Attacks) doesn't harm him, as well as getting around resistances to Nuclear damage.  Radiation Surge is a situational ability that combines a modest self-Boost with penalty clearance or minor healing.

Once he hits Red, Reactor Recharge turns all nuclear damage he takes into a combined Recovery and self-Boost.  This makes an insanely good combo with Radioactivity Spike, which lets you use your entire dice pool each turn, hitting up to two enemies and turning the die of your choice into health and  a bonus.  Because of the way it's worded you can also pile multiple dice on a single target, and in an emergency all of them can be allocated to yourself for massive healing and probably a +4 bonus.  I'd call it broken, but it takes two Red abilities to set this up and it does render Nuclear Fallout nearly useless while in Red since Reactor Recharge negating your nuclear self-damage isn't optional.  Your best bet is probably to heal just enough with the combo to pop back up into Yellow while still dealing some damage and getting a bonus to exploit.  Your foes will put you back in the Red soon enough.

Outside of action scenes Doctor Atomico is a talented scientist and medical doctor, although he'll be quick to point that he's not a technician or engineer.  He's also uncommonly dedicated to his heroic ideals as a result of his past, although he hasn't forgotten how to sneak around when he needs to.  As a Reformed supervillain he has lingering criminal connections, familiarity with law enforcement and the general supers community, and a talent for ordering around minions, intimidating civilians, or bantering with other supers.  He's best known for his devastating nuclear blasts (which he also uses to fly) but also possesses a very flexible ability to absorb and transform many varieties of energy.  At its extreme, he can absorb and redirect light so effectively he becomes invisible over a large part of the spectrum, although the effect is somewhat ruined while he's flying owing to his brilliant (and noisy) thruster beams.  His scientific training helps him get the most out of his energy manipulation powers. 

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Name: Doctor Atomico

Background: Former Villain    Power Source: Mystical     Archetype: Blaster

Personality: Jovial                   Health (G/Y/R):  32/24/11

Powers: Flight d10, Nuclear d10, Absorption d8, Invisibility d8

Qualities: Imposing d10, Science d10, Conviction d8, Medicine d8, Reformed Supervillain d8, Stealth d8

Status: Green (32-25) - d6 / Yellow (24-12) - d8 / Red (11-1) - d12

Abilities:

Green

Beam-Jet Blasts (A) Attack using Flight.  Hinder using your Min die.

Concentrated Beam (A) Attack using Nuclear.  Ignore all penalties and Defend actions during this Attack, and it cannot be affected by reactions.

Principle of the Atom (A) Overcome a challenge involving nuclear energy and radiation.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What other energy is currently causing your powers to go on the fritz?  Major twist: What other energy is currently dampening all of your powers?  RP: You can easily interact with nuclear energy and radiation.

Principle of Science (A) Overcome a challenge while applying specific scientific principles.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What were the surprising effects of leveraging that principle in this situation?  Major twist: What just blew up?  RP: You are up to date on and understand the most modern scientific theories and can quote from them in conversation.

Yellow

Atomic Bolt (A) Attack using Nuclear.  Use your Max die.  If you choose another hero to go next, Boost that hero using your Mid die.

Beam-Jet Strafe (A ) Attack multiple targets using Flight.  Take irreducible damage equal to your Mid die.

Radiation Surge (A) Boost or Hinder using Nuclear.  Apply that mod to multiple nearby targets.

Siphon Energy (A) Overcome an environmental challenge using Absorption.  Use your Max die.  Either remove any penalty in the scene, or Boost using your Mid die.

Red

Radioactivity Spike (A) Attack up to three targets, one of which must be you, using Nuclear.  Assign your Max, Mid, and Min dice between the target(s) as you choose.

Reactor Recharge (I) If you would take Nuclear damage, ignore that damage and instead Recover and Boost yourself using the value of that damage. 

Out

Afterglow (A) Defend an ally by rolling your single Science die.

Tactics

Doctor Atomico has a pretty versatile array of abilities.  In Green Concentrated Beam offers a nearly-unavoidable strike, although it won't bypass inherent damage reduction.  Jet Blasts combines damage and a modest penalty and the wording lets you hit one target while impairing another if desired, unlike some similar abilities.  His Principles require more imagination and justification to use than some, but reading up on science trivia may supply some inspiration and if he ever needs to (say) disarm a nuke or prevent a reactor meltdown he's the man.

In Yellow, Jet Strafe provides a strong but self-harming multi-target Attack, which can be ramped up with bonuses to become very dangerous but risky to the user.  Atomic Bolt is strong single-target damage with a potential free Boost for an ally, and asks you to keep an eye on the flow of the turn order.  Radiation Surge is an extremely versatile multi-target mod creator, probably the best of its kind.  Siphon Energy gives you a strong way to deal with almost any environmental challenge (Absorption being a very flexible power) that also offers some penalty removal or a targetable Boost as a perk.

Once he hits Red, Reactor Recharge turns all nuclear damage he takes into a combined Recovery and self-Boost.  This makes an insanely good combo with Radioactivity Spike, which lets you use your entire dice pool each turn, hitting up to two enemies and turning the die of your choice into health and  a bonus.  Because of the way it's worded you can also pile multiple dice on a single target, and in an emergency all of them can be allocated to yourself for massive healing and probably a +4 bonus.  I'd call it broken, but it takes two Red abilities to set this up, which is a significant cost.  Your best bet is probably to heal just enough with the combo to pop back up into Yellow while still dealing some damage and getting a bonus to exploit.  Your foes will put you back in the Red soon enough.

Outside of action scenes Doctor Atomico is a talented scientist and medical doctor, although he'll be quick to point that he's not a technician or engineer.  He's also uncommonly dedicated to his heroic ideals as a result of his past, although he hasn't forgotten how to sneak around when he needs to.  As a Reformed supervillain he has lingering criminal connections, familiarity with law enforcement and the general supers community, and a talent for ordering around minions, intimidating civilians, or bantering with other supers.  He's best known for his devastating nuclear blasts (which he also uses to fly) but also possesses a very flexible ability to absorb and transform many varieties of energy.  At its extreme, he can absorb and redirect light so effectively he becomes invisible over a large part of the spectrum, although the effect is somewhat ruined while he's flying owing to his brilliant (and noisy) thruster beams.  His scientific training helps him get the most out of his energy manipulation powers.

Blog Content Index

Redd Hott and Fever Dream, A Pair of Pulchritudinous Perpetrators

A pair of villains that are almost always found working together, either as part of a larger team or as a duo with some expendable lackeys in tow to act as a distraction and carry loot.

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Redd Hott

Megan Doyle's origin, personality and motivations have fluctuated a lot over the decades (see the end of this post) but her power set has been pretty consistent.  She's got excellent reaction speed and hand-eye coordination, can hold her own in any kind of fight, and can generate flames at will for both offense and defense.  Her fine control over her flames is good and she can even propel herself through the air, flying with great agility but rather modest speed.  Unlike some fire users she can't smother flames, only produce and direct them in her immediate presence.  She's learned to be careful about setting things on fire carelessly. 

Description: Absurdly voluptuous young woman with red-orange hair and glowing eyes, costumed in a snug fire-engine red bodysuit with a short charcoal black half-cape.  In a fight she's generally wreathed in an aura of flames, and she leaves a trail of fire in her wake when flying or sprinting.  She has a marked New Orleans accent and enjoys embarrassing straight-laced heroes with flirtatious behavior before setting them on fire.    

Gender: Female            Age: Mid-Twenties?            Height: 5'8"           Eyes: Fiery Orange

Hair: Red-orange          Skin: Deeply Tanned          Build: Shapely

Approach: Skilled                     Archetype: Bruiser

Health: 35 + (5 x H)

Powers: Fire d10, Agility d8, Flight d6

Qualities: Acrobatics d10, Ranged Combat d10, Alertness d8, Close Combat d8, Hot-Tempered Villainess d8, Persuasion d8                                       

Status: Green Zone Health - d6 / Yellow Zone Health - d8 / Red Zone Health - d10

Abilities:

Blazing Evasion (R) When Attacked, Defend yourself by rolling your single Acrobatics die, and deal that much damage to another target.

Scorcher (A) Attack one target using Fire.  Use your Max die.  Either Hinder the target using your Mid die, or Attack another nearby target using your Mid die.

Stoked Flames (A) Attack using Fire.  While you are in the Green zone, use your Max die.  In the Yellow zone, use your Max + Min dice.  In the Red zone, use your Max + Min dice against one target and use your Mid die against another target.

Warming Up (A) Take any basic action using your Max die.  Recover Health equal to your Mid die.

Upgrades & Masteries (optional):

Group Fighter (I) +20 Health.  When you take an action that lets you make an Attack, also make an Attack using your Mid die.

Master of Total Chaos (I) Automatically succeed at an Overcome when you throw out all the rules during a situation that is spiraling out of control.

Tactics

Redd is an aggressive fighter with a (literally) hot temper, and usually concentrates on pouring on the damage, hammering targets until they drop before shifting to the next.  She'll usually open with Scorcher until she reaches her Yellow zone Health, then switch to Stoked Flames to maximize her damage.  Blazing Evasion helps keep her in the fight longer and adds in more damage, although it does delay her status die climbing.  Warming Up gives her a bit of healing in a pinch, as well as making her a versatile combatant who can use her Max die for anything.  It mostly gets used for Overcomes or Defend actions (often for Fever Dream) but she might use it to Hinder just before her partner in crime uses Boiling Over for a big harm and heal combo.  Redd is best at range, but none too shabby in a face-to-face brawl either.

Her upgrade makes her better at threatening multiple foes at once, and her mastery reflects her unpredictable nature the same way Warming Up does.

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Fever Dream

Desiree Jones' origin, personality, and motivations have been as variable as her partner's over the years (again, see the last part of this post) but her powers have always involved making people feel disoriented and weak as though they were suffering a high fever.  The effect is entirely mental so physical resistance to disease is no defense, and even most AIs and supernatural creatures are susceptible to her "fevered" penalties.  Victims often suffer delusions as well as alternating chills and fevers.  With some effort she can also fine tune her mental powers to apply specific compulsions or force people seem phantom images, or to not see things she wishes to conceal.  Her default power use is always a sickening psychic malaise, though.  

She's also been consistently portrayed as knowing her way around the "spooky" side of the supers community.  While none of her powers are actually magical she knows enough to identify, analyze, and respond appropriately to supernatural threats when she encounters them.  

Description: Ridiculously curvaceous young woman with a definite Goth look, dressed in a tight-fighting black bodysuit accented with deep purple frills and ribbons.  She often accessorizes with silver jewelry with arcane sigils and symbology.  Has a sultry voice with a gentle New Orleans accent, and is almost hypnotically attractive when she wants to be - which is usually the case unless actively avoiding attention, in which case she somehow seems to fade into the background.   

Gender: Female            Age: Mid-Twenties?            Height: 5'6"           Eyes: Smoky Gray

Hair: Raven Black         Skin: Pale Caucasian          Build: Shapely

Approach: Skilled                     Archetype: Inhibitor

Health: 25 + (5 x H)

Powers: Suggestion d10, Intuition d8, Illusions d6

Qualities: Persuasion d10, Insight d10, Acrobatics d8, Creativity d8, Magical Lore d8, Scheming Villainess d8                                      

Status: (# of heroes with penalties) 0 - d6 / 1-2 - d8 / 3+ - d10

Abilities:

Boiling Over (A) Each hero loses Health equal to the total penalties on them.  Recover the same amount of Health.  Remove those penalties.

Dizzying Heat (R) When Attacked by someone with a penalty you created, Defend yourself by rolling your single status die.  The Attacker also suffers that much damage.

Fevered Thoughts (A) Hinder multiple targets using Persuasion.  Use your Max die.  If you roll doubles, also Attack each target using your Mid die.

Fire In the Blood (A) Hinder using Insight.  Use your Max + Min dice.  That penalty is persistent and exclusive.

Upgrades & Masteries (optional):

Calming Aura (I) +10 Health.  The heroes act as being in the Green zone for status die, ability access, and all abilities.  Heroes may remove this ability with three Overcome successes.  If a hero takes a minor twist while attempting these Overcomes, you may use a reaction to Hinder them by rolling your single Suggestion die.

Master Behind the Curtain (I) As long as you are not directly involved in the fray and are using your influence indirectly, automatically succeed at an Overcome to manipulate a situation.

Tactics

Fever Dream's abilities revolve around inflicting psychic hinderances that manifest as a psychosomatic fever accompanied by hallucinations - a consuming mental flame as a counterpart to Redd Hott's purely physical ones.  She prefers to spread lasting penalties with Fire In the Blood, but if pressed Fevered Thoughts gets more sweeping and immediate results.  Dizzying Heat protects her against her victims while damaging them in the process.  Once she has a good number of penalties in play she'll siphon them off with Boiling Over, dealing damage while healing herself in the process.

Her upgrade spreads a nasty aura of malaise that can seriously handicap heroes, and her mastery lets her use her potent mental powers and subtle social skills to get what she wants without open conflict.

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Infatuated Dupes d6 minions

Description: A miscellany of petty criminals, often garbed in themed outfits (Redd Hott favors a construction worker motif, while Fever Dream is fond of tuxedos, but it could be pretty much anything).  All are moderately attractive in a generic sort of way but none too smart.  They tend to be lightly armed with easily-concealable weapons, although some costumes may offer more obvious theme-appropriate weapons, eg lumberjacks with axes or baseball players with bats.

Got Your Back, Babe!: When taking a Defend action targeting a villain, add +2 to the result.

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You could just leave it at that, but these two were inspired by a rare desire to dip into the same kind of metatextual "these characters have a publication history" motif the Sentinel Comics setting uses.  As such they can offer an opportunity to look at the changing ways female characters (particularly villains) have been portrayed over the decades.  If you want to go that route, here's some suggestions for different eras of their fictional careers:

Golden Age - When Redd Hott and Fever Dream first appeared they had a definite "gangster moll" feel, although they quickly transitioned to obviously being the ones in charge with their mobster "boyfriends" cast as suckers they had wrapped around their fingers.  Their motivations were entirely monetary, and the closest they came to characterization was some mean-spirited flirtation with opposing superheroes.  Their powers were explicitly the result of experimenting with a mad science drug of some kind, with more than a hint that it was something meant to replace opium on the market.  Despite their stories being fairly shallow, they were popular with both readers and artists alike (the vast majority of whom were male), quite probably because they were drawn about as sexy as you could get away with in the era.  

In 1954 they got a brief mention in Seduction of the Innocent for glorifying crime, implied drug use, and what he insisted was lesbian coding.  Then again, Wertham also insisted that Colonel Courage (one of their regular heroic foes in the 40s and 50s) was involved in "unnatural relations" with his sidekick Champion the Super Dog.

Silver Age - When superhero comics came back into vogue the duo's origins were scrubbed clean of any drug references, with their powers now granted by a super-science "chemical" tested on them by an unscrupulous researcher pretending to be a reputable doctor.  Their organized crime motif was also pared back and they became much more generic super-crooks, sometimes teaming up with other villains for extra muscle.  The stories were a bit less primitive but often very strange, with a lot of weird science showing up.  While they got more defined in terms of personalities, it was mostly misogynistic stereotyping.  Fever Dream was often shown as bitterly jealous of the looks and fame of female heroes, and Redd Hott started aggressively flirting with male heroes, especially the more "pure" ones.  Their costumes actually got a little more tame, covering more skin and not getting as strategically ripped as they had in earlier stories.

Bronze Age - This era saw the two finally getting some more serious stories, as well as more origin retcons.  The "superdrug" element of the Golden Age returned, but now they'd been forced to try the stuff by their mobster boyfriends, driving them to get revenge and go on a rampage to destroy the gang's drug labs and distribution network.  They started showing some serious misandry coupled with a violent streak toward male criminals and heroes alike.  There were also some seriously awkward stories trying to portray them (and several other female villains) as being "loose cannon" supporters of the Women's Liberation Movement.  Their costumes got a little more risque again as the grip of the Comics Code Authority weakened.

Iron Age - The Nineties saw a series of "extreme" character re-imaginings, and Redd Hott and Fever Dream were pretty hard hit.  They'd always been drawn as voluptuous but this decade saw them become much more objectified and their costumes were more revealing than ever.  Their stories were almost universally shallow and writers couldn't seem to figure out what to do with them.  Several ignored previous canon and had them acting as drug dealers and one arc had them stalking a superhero with an eye toward wrecking his marriage by pretending they were his lovers.  There was a "big reveal" that the drug they'd gotten their powers from was an alien mind-control compound and they wound up working alongside a invasion force with other supers on both sides of the law.

Early 2000s - The worst excesses of the previous era were quietly forgotten and never spoken of again, and the two shifted back to traditional money-hungry villains.  More sophisticated plots saw them doing more behind the scenes manipulations and fewer heists, using blackmail and fraud to extract money from shady businessmen, hypocritical religious figures and corrupt politicians.  They never quite got to the point of being anti-hero types fighting the powers that be, but did help several female heroes bring down the targets they'd been victimizing - after they'd bled them dry, of course.  Their misandry remained a key personality feature, partly explained by delving deeper into the Bronze Age version of their origin and making their "boyfriends" even more overtly abusive monsters.  Their costumes and character designs were toned down to a more realistic look, with the Iron Age pure fan service look vanishing into history.

Recent Years - While not appearing as often as they had previously, the two did get a long story arc that lampshaded the fact that they'd been around for over seventy years and still looked like twenty-somethings.  Their chronology was played with a bit, some fun was poked at the more bizarre Silver and Bronze Age stories, and the drug that empowered them was retconned into being something that also prevented their aging.  It was also revealed to be highly addictive and going without the stuff for an extended period would result in their deaths.  Most of the loot they'd stolen over the years had gone to paying to have a steady supply of the stuff synthesized.  

This culminated in them being tied in to a broader storyline involving them helping various heroes fight against an organization selling a similar "empowerment" drug.  Some critics complained that this was all just a pity play to make them more sympathetic characters, but others loved it, especially for the tongue-in-cheek references to older stories.  Most people agreed that it was the strongest writing the two had ever had, even if that wasn't the highest bar to get over.

While none of that's very relevant to a roleplaying game, it might be interesting to use in a time travel story where the players wind up running into the two in multiple eras as they hop farther and farther back in history.  A GM could have fun portraying the fluctuating behavior and motivation of these two, and the players can worry about breaking spacetime if they mess around with past versions of villains they know in the future.  Or maybe the heroes' actions in the past are why these two have such a beef with them in 202X?

Blog Content Index

Sergeant Adamant, Bionic Hero

A hero written up for and in collaboration with a friend of mine who served in the military in years past.  While he earned his purple heart several times over, he thankfully escaped the kind of injuries this hero went through.  The focus on cybernetics are more the result of a shared fondness for the old Six-Million Dollar Man TV show and its spinoff, the Bionic Woman.  Our childhood nostalgia takes a decidedly campy tone most times.   

Name: Sergeant Adamant

Origin: Adam Kowalski had been promoted to sergeant only three days before he was caught up in a fight between two groups of supers that also damaged the research installation his platoon had been assigned to as a security detail.  His unit died in the fighting, and he was horribly injured and would have perished in the aftermath without the intervention of the site's medical staff assisted by one of the victorious heroes.  This wasn't solely an act of altruism.  The research being preformed at the site involved advanced cybernetics, and Kowalski had already come to the staff's attention due to a genetic quirk that made him a perfect test subject for augmentation.  By the time he recovered consciousness a his life was already being precariously sustained by implanted organs, and it took very little convincing to get him to agree to undergo a more extensive rebuilding procedure.

He came out of the process as much machine as man, but over time and with therapy and support he's gone on to become a well-known mid-tier hero.  International law forbids him from officially serving in a national military so his army career is over, but he's maintained his patriotic and generally pro-government ideals and has many contacts with the civil administration that deals with the superhero community.  Kowalski's military training comes through in his heroics with him being very focused on whatever his perceived mission objectives are, only getting distracted when civilians are endangered.

Description: Tall, fit man in a loose-fitting drab green costume reminiscent of a US WW2 army uniform with sergeant's chevrons on the sleeves.  When he's not in "civilian mode" his limbs are obviously mechanical, and he frequently winds up shredding his sleeves, pant legs, and boots as he uses his built-in weaponry and jump jets. 

Gender: Male                 Age: Mid-Twenties           Height: 6'1"            Eyes: Black

Hair: Black                           Skin: Swarthy                   Build: Athletic

Background: Military               Power Source: Tech Upgrades            Archetype: Robot/Cyborg

Personality: Analytical                   Health (G/Y/R):  30/22/11

Powers: Cosmic d10, Cyberware ("Power Suit") d10, Awareness d8, Shapeshifting d8, Strength d8, Vitality d8

Qualities: Fitness d10, Technology d10, US Army Veteran d8, Leadership d8

Status: Green (30-23) - d10 / Yellow (22-12) - d8 / Red (11-1) - d8

Abilities:

Green

Amplified Attack (A) Attack using Cyberware with a bonus equal to the number of bonuses you currently have.

Cosmic Dynamo (A) Boost using using Cosmic, assigning your Max, Mid and Min dice to three different bonuses, one of which must be given to an enemy.

Principle of Dependence (A) Overcome a challenge in a situation that your cyberware was made for.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies gain each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: How was your cyberware damaged or lost?  Major twist: How is your dependence preventing you from functioning as a hero?  RP: You are reliant on your extensive cybernetic prostheses and cannot function normally without them. 

Principle of the Gearhead (A) Overcome a technological challenge.  Use your Max die.  You and your allies each gain a Hero Point.  Minor twist: What device just shorted out?  Major twist: What machine just went terribly off the rails?  RP: You always know the general state of repair and function of an item of technology, regardless of complexity or origin.

Resilient Mechanisms (I) Reduce the amount of physical damage dealt to you by 1/2/3 while you are in the the Green/Yellow/Red zone.

Yellow

All-Out Onslaught (A) Attack using Cyberware.  Use your Mid die to Attack one extra target for each bonus you have, applying a different bonus to each Attack.

Cosmic Conversion (R) When Attacked, treat the amount of damage taken as a Boost for yourself.

Recharge Protocol (I) When you would take damage from Electricity, Recover that amount of Health instead.

Red

Defensive Tactics (R) When an opponent Attacks, you become the target of that Attack and Defend yourself by rolling your single Fitness die.

Sarge In Charge (A) Make a basic action using Leadership.  Use your Max die.  All other heroes who take the same basic action on their next against the same target receive a Boost from your Mid + Min dice.

Out

Cosmic Suppressors (A) Remove a bonus or penalty of your choice.

Tactics

Sarge usually opens an action scene by amping himself up with Cosmic Dynamo, handing one bonus off to an enemy minion if possible.  He'll sit on his bonuses whenever possible to improve Amplified Attack or to fuel a big All-Out Onslaught once he reaches Yellow status.  Resilient Mechanisms reduces the amount of physical damage he takes, and Cosmic Conversion lets him Boost himself further as a reaction.  If he's taking a lot of damage he'll try to find a source of electrical damage to use Recharge Protocol for healing, which is made easier if he's fighting in an urban or industrial environment or has a teammate with electrical powers.  If he dips into Red status Defensive Tactics gives him a very versatile damage prevention reaction to use, and Sarge In Charge is a versatile way to concentrate his team on a single objective, whether it be pounding on a villain or quickly handling a vital challenge.

In or out of a fight, his Principle of the Gearhead make him reliably good at handling technological challenges, and his extensive cybernetics let him apply Principle of Dependence quite broadly - but beware of twists temporarily disabling aspects of his powers in the process.

Trivia

Sergeant Adamant's powers all stem from his cybernetic components, which include all four limbs, both eyes and ears, several internal organs and extensive skeletal reinforcements.  His Strength and Vitality powers reflect the most basic of those enhancements.  Awareness covers augmented senses including an integral radio transceiver, full EM-spectrum vision and hearing that extends far beyond human norms, all with overload buffers.  His Shapeshifting is limited to concealing the artificial nature of his prostheses while in "civilian" mode and reconfiguring his hands into various specialized tools while in "hero" mode.  The general Cyberware power emulates some of the functions of a power suit, including an array of built-in weaponry, jump jets for mobility boosts, and short-term environmental/NBC warfare protection.  Everything is powered by an experimental cosmic energy generator, which is also used to manipulate the localized probability spikes that make up the bonuses his abilities create.

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Strongarm, Two-Fisted Cyborg

A bionic supervillain who came by his powers involuntarily and has been making the best of it ever since.  Mostly in it for the money and tech support.  Quite possible he's slowly being turned into a something truly inhuman, but he doesn't know that.

Strongarm

Lukman Ali was a mundane henchman for a "mad science" supervillain when he was "volunteered" to be a test subject for some poorly-understood bionic parts that had been acquired through dubious channels.  The original intent had probably been to remove the limbs once they'd killed Lukman, but to everyone's surprised the grafts flourished and within days he'd integrated with them to an extent that safe (for the bionics, that is - the organic henchman was a secondary consideration) removal was no longer possible.  His employer was still mulling over what to do about the situation when his base was raided by a superhero team, the villain was apprehended, and Lukman led a few of his former co-workers in a last-minute escape before they vanished into the criminal underworld.

Since then Lukman has adopted the supranym Strongarm and gone on to become a reliable super-thug for hire, usually working for tech villains and organizations who can offer him some technical support for his bionics.  He lacks any real knowledge of how they work although they seem to be self-repairing and need no maintenance, but he still worries about them failing him and arranges for regular "check-ups" just in case.  Most of the people who've had a good look at Strongarm's bionics just tell him what he obviously wants to hear, but a few have realized how sophisticated they really are and how much they've spread through his body.  Lukman is clueless about all that, but he's been marked for observation by a number of important villains and groups at this point.

On a psychological level Lukman talks a good game but still has some serious self-confidence issues from his time as a mook and involuntary test subject.  That doesn't make him much easier to deal with in a fistfight, though.    

Description: Tall, fit man whose biological parts are dwarfed by comedically oversized cybernetic arms melded to him at his shoulders.  He wears black knee boot and a dark red uniform with white detailing and a white double fist logo on the chest, leaving his arms and head bare.  His bionics are obviously artificial, metallic blue, and have beam emitter ports in the fingertips, palms and forearms.  Despite his height he can still put his palms flat on the ground while standing upright.  When hurrying, he'll use his oversized arms to knuckle-walk or swing along athletically like a gorilla.  Medical examination will reveal more subtle bionics laced throughout his body, including subdermal armor weaves, bone and muscle reinforcements and less obvious upgrades that appear to be slowly spreading and replacing internal tissues and organs.  He speaks English, Arabic, and Lebanese with an Midwest American accent, and has a smattering of Hebrew, German, and Italian as well.  He's been around some, although he was born in the USA and doesn't take kindly to those who assume otherwise.   

Gender: Male        Age: Early Twenties      Height: 6'1"      Eyes: Hazel

Hair: White                       Skin: Swarthy                Build: Trim and Muscular

Approach:  Bully                               

Archetype:  Formidable (Weakness: Fear, Threats & Embarrassment)

Health:  50 + (5 x H)

Powers: Mighty Metal Arms d10, Presence d8, Strength d8                                  

Qualities: Blustering Badass d8, Close Combat d8, Ranged Combat d8                                

Status: No Weakness Penalties - d12 / Both Bonuses and Penalties - d8 / Only Weakness Penalties - d4

Abilities:

Clinch (A) Attack using Mighty Metal Arms.  Use your Max die.  Defend against all Attacks from that target using your Mid die until the start of your next turn.

Showboating (A) Boost using Presence.  Use your Max die.  That bonus is persistent and exclusive.  Attack using your Mid die.

Sneering Disdain (A) Boost using Presence.  Use your Max + Min dice.  Remove all penalties on yourself.

Strongarm Tactics (A) Attack two nearby targets using Mighty Metal Arms.  Use your Max die against one target and your Mid + Min dice against the other.  If either target Defends against the Attack, the Defend works against both Attacks.

Upgrades & Masteries:

Group Fighter (I) +20 Health.  When you take an action that lets you make an Attack, also make an Attack using your Mid die.

Master Mercenary (I) If you have a contract for a specific task, automatically succeed at an Overcome where your payment is at stake.

Tactics

Strongarm's cybernetics give him a real punch (literally and in the form of built-in beam cannons) but he's something of a coward at heart and goes to pieces when seriously threatened or humiliated.  This leads to him spending a lot of time in a fight blustering and putting on a show to hide his weakness, using Showboating to encourage himself and Sneering Disdain to try throw off attempts to intimidate or embarrass him.  When he feels confident he prefers to use Strongarm Tactics when facing more than one foe, or Clinch against a single enemy.

His upgrade makes him more effective against multiple foes (and works with three of his four abilities) while his mastery makes him a more reliable hireling, getting him better pay in exchange.

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Mister Big Junior, Towering Tough Guy

This one's fairly low-powered as Titan archetypes go, but even a "weak" Titan is no joke to deal with.

Mister Big Junior

Tom Donovan is the son of Jim Donovan, aka Mister Big, a super-powered mobster who was active in the early 1950s and died in prison in 2012.  Tom has inherited his father's powers and criminal connections and continues in the family business to this day as Mister Big Junior, a supranym he's stuck to despite being 52 years old.  He hopes to continue the tradition with his offspring, but to date has been unable to have a son with any of his four estranged ex-wives and (as far as he knows) none of his eight daughters have manifested powers of their own.  Word is he's courting a candidate for Mrs. Donovan Number Five while continuing to work as trusted super-muscle for various organized crime figures, both within the US and internationally.

His powers let him cocoon himself in a gigantic man-shaped shell of what he calls ecto-powerplasm, granting him great strength and protecting him from harm as well as letting him manipulate huge objects and produce deafening shouts and handclaps.  Concerted effort can crack the shell and start a power leak that will eventually lead to it collapsing until he's had some time to recover, but he's been doing this long enough to start looking for a getaway route before that happens.  Tom has  a flair for the dramatic and a knows how to play up to the news media when he wants to.  A lot of people have made the mistake of falling for his gift of gab over the years, forgetting the hardened criminal behind the mask.  

Description: A short, balding middle-aged man of Irish descent complete with accent, usually dressed in a tailored black suit.  Most often seen hovering within a forty foot tall construct of gently glowing yellow-orange energy in the shape of a powerfully-built but somewhat abstract humanoid.  He (as well as his construct form) lacks two joints on his left pinky finger, having lost them in a accident years ago.    

Gender: Male            Age: 52        Height: 5'7" (usually 40' at peak)       Eyes: Blue

Hair: Red, Balding          Skin: Lightly Freckled           Build: Wiry (Muscular Shell)

Approach: Generalist

Archetype: Titan (Status Challenge: Get Cracking 00  Vent Power 0)

Health:  55 + (5 x H)

Powers: Ecto-Powerplasm Shell d10, Strength d8, Vitality d8, Sonic d6

Qualities: Imposing d10, Showy Criminal d8, Close Combat d8, Ranged Combat d6

Status: Titan Challenge Start - d12 / Stage 1 Completed - d10 / Stage 2 Completed - d8

Abilities:

BAM! (A) Attack multiple targets using Strength.  Use your Max die.  Hinder each target using your Min die.

Big Trouble (A) Activate one of the environment's twists in its current zone.

Bigger Is Better (I) Whenever you roll a one on a die, you may reroll that die once.

Endurance Fighter (I) Reduce physical and energy damage dealt to you by 1/2/3 when the scene is in the Green/Yellow/Red zone.

Growth Spurt (A) Hinder multiple nearby targets using Ecto-Powerplasm Shell.  Boost yourself using your Max die.

Power Feedback (R) When a hero takes a minor twist in the Titan's challenge, in addition to the chosen twist roll your status die and deal that much damage to that hero.

Upgrades & Masteries (optional):

Defense Shield (I) You cannot be damaged by anything except yourself until the defense shield is destroyed.  The shield has 40 Health, or can be deactivated with three Overcome successes.  If a hero takes a minor twist working on the shield, you can use a Reaction to Attack that hero by rolling your single Inventions die.  Gain Reestablish Shield (A) Overcome using Vitality.  Use your Max die.  On a success remove one success from the deactivation challenge.  Alternatively, instead of an Overcome, use your Max die to Recover that much of the shield's Health.  This ability cannot be used if the shield has been completely removed.

Master of Annihilation (I) If you can cause massive collateral damage without regard for casualties, automatically succeed at an Overcome in a situation where a show of overwhelming force would help.

Tactics

Mister Big mostly relies on his prodigious size in a brawl, although he's less powerful than it might appear at first glance.  He'll use Big Trouble to trigger interesting environmental twists when appropriate, BAM! when he wants to be direct, and Growth Spurt if he's getting mobbed and his status die is dropping fast.  Bigger Is Better bumps up his average die rolls a bit and mostly prevents whiffs, Endurance Fighter makes him tougher as time goes by (and encourages him to trigger twists to advance the scene tracker), and Power Feedback will hopefully deal some damage back to those trying to break down his giant ecto-powerplasm form.

With his upgrade his powerplasm is far more durable, making him extremely tough to bring down with raw damage and a real action sink to Overcome him into a weakened state.  His mastery represents his ruthlessness when it comes to putting on a big show or making a point to an enemy.

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