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The bundle is first ed which is perfectly useable; the new edition largely adds polish and some background info. Nice, but not essential.I own five parsecs and some related stuff from a bundle or something but have hardly looked at them. Maybe I'll break it out this month.
Day 10:
Dr. Midnight - (systemless modern-day supers character)
Lewis Allen (born in January of 1930) is the son of a prominent New York historian. His father’s name and Harvard pedigree led him in turn to Cambridge, and he graduated from MIT with an electrical engineering degree. Allen went into the burgeoning field of computers, working for Control Data Corporation for many years before returning to New England to join DEC in the late Seventies for the VAX/VMS project. His last post was as project director of the VAX 9000 Aquarius before DEC’s downturn started in the early Nineties. Selling his DEC stock for a great deal of money before it was too late, he settled into comfortable, secluded retirement in a suburb of Boston and dropped out of the public eye.
That’s the official bio.
Lewis slowly became aware that he was superhuman in the Seventies, as he realized he wasn’t aging past 30; he hadn’t before thought his night vision and rapid healing were anything overwhelmingly out of the ordinary. As his biological age increased, he took to cosmetics and other tricks to “age” himself. Switching jobs to DEC (and homes from Michigan to Massachusetts) was a deliberate attempt to duck uncomfortable questions, and his “retirement” another one. He maintains a computer consultancy under an faked identity, which accords him reasonable access to electronics parts, sold his house to said identity, lives under it, and figures on killing off his nonagenarian birth persona pretty soon.
With several million dollars with which to play, Lewis has indulged his streak of liberal politics. A fellow traveler from the counterculture Sixties, he’s anti-war, anti-Republican, anti-whaling, a PETA supporter, a global warming activist, a BLM activist ... you name it, he’s probably dabbled in it. From an early age, he liked comic books, his favorite being Dr. Midnite, and decided to become a costumed adventurer to more directly fight for his causes. He took up hapkido to become a skilled fighter, and met his future wife Elizabeth at the dojang. (She’s a civilian biochemist for USAMRIID out of the Army’s Watertown biohazard facility, specifically on countermeasures for biological warfare. Beyond that, she’s expert in investigation, all manner of biological sciences, and like Lewis an expert hapkido practitioner. She’s around 30, and married Lewis a couple years ago.)
Among his activities is an ongoing pirate radio program, “Calling Dr. Midnight.” He sets up rogue transmitters playing burst tapes (sometimes piggybacking off of other equipment) that generally reach throughout metro Boston which push his environmental message as well as play a mix of eclectic tunes (two hours, looped) and identify his costumed activities. The transmissions last for up to several hours while the FCC tries to track them down and shut down the equipment. Elizabeth has wondered whether he’d get more traction with YouTube videos, but he’s convinced he’d be more easily tracked down over the computer.
Powers:
1) He’s unaging. He has no idea (and Elizabeth is researching) whether he’s genuinely undying or whether he’s just going to keel over in five years or so; the issue preys upon him a bit. As part and parcel, he regenerates, if quite slowly.
2) He sees far into the UV range and thus has near-perfect night vision.
3) Shadow Powers: He “melts into shadow,” becoming invisible as long as he’s completely in shadow. He can also project a “wave of shadow.” This has the appearance of spikes of darkness, and looks rather like he’s throwing several blades of shadow at once. The effect is chillingly cold (and chills the area, come to that) and does stunning damage to living beings. The wave is intangible and does no damage to inanimate or solid objects, though it passes through thin physical barriers; a riot shield or body armor won’t block it, for example. He needs to wave his hand or arm to do this, and can’t do it immobile.
Since he’s only discovered what he can do by trial and error, or through his wife’s researches, he may have other powers as yet undiscovered. (Cue XP.)
Abilities:
1) He is an expert in electronics, and a skilled programmer and hacker.
2) He is a 5th dan hapkido master and skilled with tonfa and other hand-to-hand low-tech weapons.
3) He is generally skilled in disguise and specializes in aging disguise. He’s also pretty knowledgeable in illegal documentation, and with it getting harder to manufacture such identities, has created a dozen for both himself and Elizabeth, over a wide stretch of birth dates.
Personality: He’s fairly reserved in person. He deliberately eased off friendships in the 1980s, and Elizabeth is the only person he really trusts. In consequence, he’s a pretty lonely guy, and clings to Elizabeth as his life line. By contrast, he tends to swashbuckling in disguise, between his costumed adventures and his pirate radio antics. He’s also paranoid about being “discovered.” He believes that the government will wire him up like a lab rat if they find out about him, and has nightmares about being eviscerated on a lab table.
I wanna read this comic book series!
Love the details, set-up, and style!
Cheers,
TGIDragonfly
Heh, another cheat on my part, really. My wife and I were looking to play together -- something we hadn't had a chance to do since we both stopped LARPing together in 2002 -- and we looked into Some Guy Advertising For Players on the then-active Bostongamers Yahoo group in 2006. He was pitching a low-level gritty supers game ... helpful, because Amanda's not keen on the supers genre, feeling that she couldn't possibly play the sort who'd lock the Joker in Arkham Asylum only to break out and kill more people, and then do it over and over again expecting happy results. Utterly unfamiliar with the system, we both did up system-agnostic long character writeups, so he could walk us through creation and a trial combat in person.
It was an utter disaster. He wanted to start the group with fewer points than a normal minimum character, and so we had effectively Golden Age super-normal level guys whose speed would've been dealing with bank robbers and suchlike. (Amanda's character's powers were "chemical vision" and immunity to chemical, radiation and metabolic hazards.) And he threw flying battlebots against us. Which, of course, trashed us. Never mind that he couldn't shake himself clear of using system jargon to explain everything, even with us explaining over and over that he needed to find layman's terms for things until we knew what that meant, or that sub-normal characters in the system had strikingly poor odds to accomplish tasks (Amanda's highly intelligent medical doctor character failed seven straight First Aid rolls). We were fuming on the train ride home, I wrote a letter expressing out concerns, he replied that such was the opposition he planned on having us face and that he was standing pat on how many points we were allowed, and I replied with a never-mind-then.
So that writeup's been gathering dust in my hard drives for 15+ years, alas ... I expect I could do the character up with Champions or GURPS Supers easily enough.
I'd never heard of this game but its Pay what you Want on Drivethrurpg so I'm browsing it now.Day 10
So, I'm exhausted after my first day back at work after getting better from COVID and have very little energy for character creation. Consequently, I decided to open my hard drive, go to the first RPG that I've purchased but never played, and follow whatever steps they give me for character generation. At the top of my list is AFG or Adventure Fantasy Game. Honestly, I don't remember when, why, or specifically how I picked this up, but here's seeing what it's all about.
Melee: | 20 | Health: | 80 | Spells | Energy Type | Level | Rank | |
Agility: | 20 | Fate: | 36 | Combat Awareness | Self | 1 | 40 | |
Strength: | 30 | Renown: | 20 | Anchor | Self | 2 | 50 | |
Stamina: | 10 | Melee Damage: | 12 | |||||
Intellect: | 20 (30) | Init. Mod.: | +3 | |||||
Vision: | 6 (10) | Armor Value: | 10 | |||||
Ego: | 10 | MEL: | 120 | |||||
Skills | Trait | Level | Rank | |||||
Arcane Lore | Intellect | 1 | 40 | |||||
Archery | Agility | 2 | 40 (50) | |||||
Blunt Weapons | Melee | 2 | 40 | |||||
Dodge | Agility | 2 | 40 | |||||
Edged Weapons | Melee | 3 | 50 (75) | |||||
Riding | Agility | 1 | 30 | |||||
Spell Craft | Intellect | 2 | 50 | |||||
Stealth | Agility | 2 | 40 |
Weapon | Type | Range | Damage | ||||
Long Sword | Slashing | - | Str +10 (40) | ||||
Long Bow | Piercing | 7 Sectors | 10 | ||||
Dagger | Piercing/Slashing | 1 Sector | Str +6 (36) / 6 |
Skill | Difficulty | Cost | Total Skill Points Spent | Level |
Spellcasting | 8 + 4 = 12 | 12 | Unranked | |
General Magic | 6 | 6 + 12 + 18 + 4 = 40 | 52 | 3 |
Light Magic | 4 - 1 + 2 | 5 | 57 | 1 (total 4) |
Illumination | 1 + 2 | 3 | 53 | 1 (total 5) |
Darkness | 1 + 2 | 3 | 56 | 1 (total 5) |
Blur | 1 | 1 + 2 + 2 = 5 | 61 | 2 (total 6) |
Body Magic | 4 - 1 | 3 + 6 + 4 = 13 | 74 | 2 (total 5) |
Heal | 1 | 1 + 2 + 2 = 5 | 79 | 2 (total 7) |
Sleep of Health | 1 + 2 | 3 | 82 | 1 (total 6) |
Close Wounds | 1 + 2 | 3 | 85 | 1 (total 6) |
Metamagic | 4 - 1 | 3 + 6 + 4 = 13 | 98 | 2 (total 5) |
Detect Spell | 1 + 2 | 3 | 101 | 1 (total 6) |
Detect Enchantment | 1 | 1 + 2 + 2 = 5 | 106 | 2 (total 7) |
Disrupt Enchantment | 1 | 1 + 2 + 3 + 2 = 8 | 114 | 3 (total 8) |
Counter Magic | 1 + 2 | 3 | 117 | 1 (total 6) |
Staff | 3 + 2 | 5 | 122 | 1 |
Wilderness Living | 2 | 2 | 124 | 1 |
Riding | 2 + 1 | 3 | 127 | 1 |
Singer | 1 | 1 | 128 | 1 |
Native Language | 3 |
Name | Murray VanDerWal | |||||
Height | 6'3" | |||||
Weight | 220 lbs | |||||
Age | 67 | |||||
Sex | Male | |||||
ATTRIBUTES | ACTIONS | |||||
Agility | 8 | Maneuver | 8 | |||
Dexterity | 8 | |||||
Endurance | 7 | |||||
Strength | 6 | |||||
Intellect | 8 | Trick | 8 | |||
Mind | 8 | |||||
Confidence | 10 | Intimidation | ||||
Charisma | 10 | Taunt | 12 | |||
Toughness | 7 | |||||
Life Points | 5 | |||||
Skills and Specialization | ||||||
Skill | Add | Specialization | Add | Attribute Value | Skill Value | |
Charm | 2 | 10 | 12 | |||
Persuasion | 3 | 10 | 13 | |||
Taunt | 2 | 10 | 12 | |||
Con | 2 | 10 | 12 | |||
Interrogation | 2 | 10 | 12 | |||
Linguistics | 2 | 8 | 10 | |||
Perception | 3 | 8 | 11 | |||
Business | 2 | 8 | 10 | |||
Psychology | 2 | 8 | 10 | |||
Advantages | Compensations | |||||
Contacts | 4 | Elder | 4 | |||
Culture | 3 | Enemy | 3 | |||
Wealth | 3 | Reputation | 2 | |||
Rating | Half | Fifth | |
Strength | 60 | 30 | 12 |
Constitution | 65 | 32 | 13 |
Size | 60 | 30 | 12 |
Dexterity | 30 | 15 | 6 |
Appearance | 40 | 20 | 8 |
Intelligence | 65 | 32 | 13 |
Power | 40 | 20 | 8 |
Education | 85 | 42 | 17 |
Baseline | Skill Rating | |
Appraise | 5 | 45 |
Archaeology | 1 | 66 |
History | 5 | 45 |
Language(Ancient Greek) | 1 | 41 |
Library Use | 20 | 60 |
Spot Hidden | 25 | 55 |
Mechanical Repair | 10 | 40 |
Science(geology) | 1 | 51 |
Firearms(Rifle) | 25 | 55 |
First Aid | 30 | 40 |
Persuade | 10 | 40 |
Survival | 10 | 45 |
I think I have the box set down in the basement. I bought it because it was similar to TORG and I really liked that game. The Shatterzone setting didn't click as well with my players (stuck on d6 Star Wars) so we never got around to playing it. Now I want to go dig this out and give it another read through.Day #11
Shatterzone
Name Murray VanDerWal Height 6'3" Weight 220 lbs Age 67 Sex Male ATTRIBUTES ACTIONS Agility 8 Maneuver 8 Dexterity 8 Endurance 7 Strength 6 Intellect 8 Trick 8 Mind 8 Confidence 10 Intimidation Charisma 10 Taunt 12 Toughness 7 Life Points 5 Skills and Specialization Skill Add Specialization Add Attribute Value Skill Value Charm 2 10 12 Persuasion 3 10 13 Taunt 2 10 12 Con 2 10 12 Interrogation 2 10 12 Linguistics 2 8 10 Perception 3 8 11 Business 2 8 10 Psychology 2 8 10 Advantages Compensations Contacts 4 Elder 4 Culture 3 Enemy 3 Wealth 3 Reputation 2
Murray was a fairly celebrated career diplomat. That is until he was caught taking a bribe during a negotiation. Some say the scandal played a part in the Presidents failed re-election campaign. He's still seen as a competent negotiator and diplomat but he wont be holding any office of prestige anytime soon.
* Shatterzone has a fairly simple character generation. This was nice and if the system plays as well as character generation I could see using it.