james_davis_nicoll (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
james_davis_nicoll) wrote2011-07-01 04:43 pm
james_davis_nicoll) wrote2011-07-01 04:43 pm
Entry tags:
Wednesday Night Icons
Only two players could make it this week so when the Authorities called, the only people hanging out in the boat [1] were Peerless, the Mighty Absorbo and Scorcher, the Mighty Absorbo's ex (or at least exish) criminal girlfriend. Turns out there's doings transpiring down at the long-delayed prison for supers.
Lt. Johnson from SHARD shows up to ask for a little help; the new prison up in Labrador was being tested for breakoutability when a serious design issue became apparent: apparently the architects were not really people named Milton, Bradley, George Parker and Charles Parker but some new wackaloon using the name Killer Gamemaster who decided to have the provincial government pay to build his death trap. Unfortunately this was only discovered after SHARD sent in the Iota Extraction Team, their team of supers, to test the place. The masks have been taken prisoner, along with the guards, and even as Johnson speaks, a nuclear bomb is ticking down to zero. Peerless, the Mighty Absorbo and Scorcher have 46 minutes to infiltrate the prison, defuse the bomb and defeat the bad guy.
Killer Gamemaster turns out to be the former crossword puzzle guy from the Globe and Mail. Peerless likes to do his crosswords and knows the fellow's voice.
Happily SHARD has a teleporter on staff. Unfortunately the prison is filled with power nullifiers [1] so he cannot just take the trio down to Killer Gamemaster. The prison is built a bit like the facility in The Andromeda Strain (minus the lethal defenses).
Poor Scorcher loses her flame projecting abilities right off the bat while Peerless and the Mighty Absorbo manage to make their saves. She was not pleased.
The first scuffle was with a pair of costumed goons named Null and Void; Peerless discovered after punching Void that Void has a touch-range power theft deal going on. Suddenly Peerless is as weak as a kitten while Void is inhumanly strong. And desolid too.
Turned out to attack, Void has to turn solid so Peerless slides a chair through him just as Void takes a shot. A satisfactory and yet non-lethal boom followed; unfortunately Scorcher, who was feeling depressed, also stepped into Void as he solidified. The Mighty Absorbo's (dead) sister assured MA that Scorcher was OK; this turns out to be different from "alive" and some panic ensued before MA worked out how to use his amazing abilities to save Scorcher.
I cannot recall what Null did, except go down fast as soon as the Mighty Absorbo noticed him. In general, the Mighty Absorbo was the heavy hitter in this session; my notes fovour my character.
Luckily, Void carries the cure for his own power theft and so Peerless was not Strength 1 for the rest of the adventure.
The next set piece involved robots and was just a matter of exploiting a design flaw: two on one attacks exceeded their software's ability to cope and they'd freeze up. Must be running Win95.
The third one seemed to set the trio against the Iota Extraction Team: (c&p from doc_lemming):
Happily it turned out they were just robots. Not that it would have affected what Peerless did - pounding supers is pounding supers, whether they are good or bad - but presumably The Mighty Absorbo was less conflicted. Also, the software on these guys wasn't much better than for the first set of robots although the Killer Gamemaster did take the trouble to program in an assortment of show tunes for EXEMDEE. That's a promising attention to detail.
The confrontation with Killer Gamemaster goes a bit awry when it turns out the detonator for the bomb is broken; Peerless casually asks to look at it (paying a determination point to sound friendly) and the Killer Gamemaster hands it over without thinking. Peerless in turn gives it to the Mighty Absorbo, who makes sure (with the help of Peerless' probability control) that it will not set the bomb off.
A discussion of how to be an effective supervillain follows and I do mean a discussion. The idea is that going for a plan that kills a lot of people including the bad guy is not an effective long term strategy: it's more satisfying to challenge the good guys in a way that leads to lots of confrontations. This seems to require the bad guy lose but Killer Gamemaster seemed to be OK with that.
Unfortunately Scorcher was listening and I don't think she's all that reformed. I am also not 100% sure the Mighty Absorbo's dead sister is a force for good, either, and now they're friends. And I think at one point Peerless introduced Scorcher to Josephine.
Back at the boat, Evil Eagle or an Evil Eagle has been cooling his heels. Turns out someone is selling Evil Eagle franchises in the area and one of the tests is taking on Mole Man. Peerless gets a description of the person selling the franchises. It turns out to be a very well-preserved woman in her 60s, a woman who sounds remarkably like Peerless' significant other Josephine "The Black Rose" Balsamo.
The GM's version
Let me highlight one short section:
1: Last refurbished in the 1970s. Apparently there's lots of shag rugs and wood paneling.
Lt. Johnson from SHARD shows up to ask for a little help; the new prison up in Labrador was being tested for breakoutability when a serious design issue became apparent: apparently the architects were not really people named Milton, Bradley, George Parker and Charles Parker but some new wackaloon using the name Killer Gamemaster who decided to have the provincial government pay to build his death trap. Unfortunately this was only discovered after SHARD sent in the Iota Extraction Team, their team of supers, to test the place. The masks have been taken prisoner, along with the guards, and even as Johnson speaks, a nuclear bomb is ticking down to zero. Peerless, the Mighty Absorbo and Scorcher have 46 minutes to infiltrate the prison, defuse the bomb and defeat the bad guy.
Killer Gamemaster turns out to be the former crossword puzzle guy from the Globe and Mail. Peerless likes to do his crosswords and knows the fellow's voice.
Happily SHARD has a teleporter on staff. Unfortunately the prison is filled with power nullifiers [1] so he cannot just take the trio down to Killer Gamemaster. The prison is built a bit like the facility in The Andromeda Strain (minus the lethal defenses).
Poor Scorcher loses her flame projecting abilities right off the bat while Peerless and the Mighty Absorbo manage to make their saves. She was not pleased.
The first scuffle was with a pair of costumed goons named Null and Void; Peerless discovered after punching Void that Void has a touch-range power theft deal going on. Suddenly Peerless is as weak as a kitten while Void is inhumanly strong. And desolid too.
Turned out to attack, Void has to turn solid so Peerless slides a chair through him just as Void takes a shot. A satisfactory and yet non-lethal boom followed; unfortunately Scorcher, who was feeling depressed, also stepped into Void as he solidified. The Mighty Absorbo's (dead) sister assured MA that Scorcher was OK; this turns out to be different from "alive" and some panic ensued before MA worked out how to use his amazing abilities to save Scorcher.
I cannot recall what Null did, except go down fast as soon as the Mighty Absorbo noticed him. In general, the Mighty Absorbo was the heavy hitter in this session; my notes fovour my character.
Luckily, Void carries the cure for his own power theft and so Peerless was not Strength 1 for the rest of the adventure.
The next set piece involved robots and was just a matter of exploiting a design flaw: two on one attacks exceeded their software's ability to cope and they'd freeze up. Must be running Win95.
The third one seemed to set the trio against the Iota Extraction Team: (c&p from doc_lemming):
Cassandra Sparks (electrical elemental control), EXEMDEE (the Experimental Earth Moving Device, which accidentally developed sentience: it's quite strong and well protected, but wants to be on Broadway--its inhuman appearance and treads will probably keep it off, but it does have a lovely singing voice for showtunes), the Maskmaster (Canadian corporal who found the Mask of Eris, which grants him emotion control, mental blast, and phasing powers, but who is trying to use it for good), and Thunderstrike, a linguist who is the team's martial artist.
Happily it turned out they were just robots. Not that it would have affected what Peerless did - pounding supers is pounding supers, whether they are good or bad - but presumably The Mighty Absorbo was less conflicted. Also, the software on these guys wasn't much better than for the first set of robots although the Killer Gamemaster did take the trouble to program in an assortment of show tunes for EXEMDEE. That's a promising attention to detail.
The confrontation with Killer Gamemaster goes a bit awry when it turns out the detonator for the bomb is broken; Peerless casually asks to look at it (paying a determination point to sound friendly) and the Killer Gamemaster hands it over without thinking. Peerless in turn gives it to the Mighty Absorbo, who makes sure (with the help of Peerless' probability control) that it will not set the bomb off.
A discussion of how to be an effective supervillain follows and I do mean a discussion. The idea is that going for a plan that kills a lot of people including the bad guy is not an effective long term strategy: it's more satisfying to challenge the good guys in a way that leads to lots of confrontations. This seems to require the bad guy lose but Killer Gamemaster seemed to be OK with that.
Unfortunately Scorcher was listening and I don't think she's all that reformed. I am also not 100% sure the Mighty Absorbo's dead sister is a force for good, either, and now they're friends. And I think at one point Peerless introduced Scorcher to Josephine.
Back at the boat, Evil Eagle or an Evil Eagle has been cooling his heels. Turns out someone is selling Evil Eagle franchises in the area and one of the tests is taking on Mole Man. Peerless gets a description of the person selling the franchises. It turns out to be a very well-preserved woman in her 60s, a woman who sounds remarkably like Peerless' significant other Josephine "The Black Rose" Balsamo.
The GM's version
Let me highlight one short section:
I admitted that I think the reason the silver age quotient in this campaign is higher is because over the long term, the power nullifiers in prisons are addictive. After being under them for a couple of years, the villains get out and feel...bad. Only being in jail will make them feel better, so they come up with a scheme that probably won't hurt anybody and will cause massive property damage so they'll get sent back. And it has to show off their powers, or they'll get sent to a "normal" prison. No one knows that the nullifiers are addictive, though.
1: Last refurbished in the 1970s. Apparently there's lots of shag rugs and wood paneling.