Avenger Assembled

OOC

Continued from >The End of the Beginning Earth-M-Lucas-1 Young Freedom left the grim darkness of an Erde morning and found themselves beneath a blue, sunny sky. They were in a clean, well-maintained alley in what was clearly downtown Freedom City: the trashcans all had their lids, none of the windows were broken, and there was no sign of Nazis. Visible to their left was the Pyramid Plaza, the triple towers rising high against the clear morning sky, the American flag flying high overhead. For a moment, anyway, those of them not familiar with other dimensions could think they'd all gone home. That was, at least, until the black Pontiac Firebird Trans Am came roaring down the street opposite, and the first blasting sounds of funky disco came their way from its overpowered speakers. Outside, the streets of Freedom City looked to be pulled from the pages of the 1970s seen through a warped modern lens: men with elaborate mustaches and half-open shirts that showed off their hairy chests walked alongside ladies in brightly-colored wide-hemmed bell-bottoms, over their heads computerized billboards advertising a too-young Farrah Fawcett starring in the latest Michael Bay movie. The streets were certainly more diverse than they'd last seen, with muscular black men with magnificently coiffed hair in the company of ladies with impressive afros: indeed, from the lady speaker on the corner calling for equal rights for all men and women to the hippies playing in the park, it looked as if someone had gone around and collected as many oppressed minority groups as they could and dropped them on the funky streets of Freedom City. Suddenly, a startled exclamation came as a policeman walking by the alley spotted the quintet of dimension-lost heroes. In a hammy Irish stage accent that nonetheless sounded all too real, he exclaimed, "It's...it's...oh mother of Mary, it's Counter Freedom!" He took out his whistle and blew it as hard and loud as he could. "I knew you crazy criminals would be back one day!" he called, whipping out his gigantic belt radio as he backed away from the teens. "You just stay back! The Freedom League will set you whippersnappers right!"

As if at Midnight's words, everything seemed to happen at once: a sphere of shimmering black light appeared over the heads of the dimension-lost heroes and began to descend over them, Rick Lucas' power unmistakable as it began to pull them on to another world. Nearly simultaneously, an explosion in the nearby wall blasted free a huge chunk of steel as a squadron of a half-dozen stormtroopers in crude-but-so-functional power armor tromped inside the huge warehouse, their machine guns chewing up the floor as their rounds beat a path towards the other Midnight. Without a trace of hesitation, Travis grabbed up the unconscious Archeville and used him as a shield as he returned fire, diving for cover and back into the shadows that were his natural home. "Now, Midnight! Now!" And then the exploding sphere blotted out everything from sight in a brief dazzling burst as plastique destroyed the Terminus tech, leaving Erde with only its own monsters to fear... And then the heroes were gone. END OF PART THREE Continued in >Familiar Faces

DNAscendant PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 34 pp STR 30 [20] (+10/+5) DEX 30 [20] (+10/+5) CON 30 [20] (+10/+5) INT 10 (+0) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 10 (+0) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Melee) DEF: +10 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +30 Grapple: +20 Saves: 4 pp TOU +10 (+10 Con) FORT +10 (+10 Con) REF +10 (+10 Dex) WILL +6 (+2 Wis, +4) Skills: 48r=12 pp Acrobatics 10 (+20) Climb 5 (+15) Knowledge: Streetwise 5 (+5) Languages 2 (Chinese, Japanese) (Base: English) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Stealth 10 (+20) Feats: 16 pp Acrobatic Bluff Attack Focus: Melee (4) Challenge (Fast Acrobatic Bluff) Evasion, Dodge Focus 4, Fearless, Move-By Action, Power Attack, Second Chance (Acrobatics checks) Takedown Attack 2 Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 60 pp Concealment 4 (all visual) (Flaw: Only While Moving) [4 pp] Enhanced CON 10 [10 pp] Enhanced DEX 10 [10 pp] Enhanced STR 10 [10 pp] Super-Movement 3 (Wall-Running 2, Water Walking) (Flaw: Only While Moving) [3 pp] Super-Speed 4 [20+1=21 pp] -Quickness 4 (x25), Speed 4 (100 MPH), and Initiative +20 Free: Quickness 8 (total Quickness 12 (x10000) AP: Rapid Attack (20 ft) costs abilities 34 + combat 24 + saves 4 + skills 12/48 + feats 16 + powers 60 = 150 pts --- Design Notes: In the World of Freedom, superpowers come in a bottle. Through the DNAscendant process, if you’re willing to pay about five thousand dollars a power point, you can have your own superpowered bodyguard, minion, or assassin. The nice people behind the process will even provide the meat for it if you have nobody handy: given the risks of insanity, mutation, and death associated with the process, it’s not something you want to do for yourself unless you’re very sure. They’ll even provide an origin story for them for a little extra, giving you that fanatical Jesuit, loyal ninja warrior, or longtime friend you’ve wanted. (That also helps wipe away whatever inconvenient life the subject in question had before the Labyrinth kidnapped them to brainwash them.) All they ask is your soul, and of course your money will eventually flow through shell companies and cut-out men all the way to the massive, grasping hands of Taurus the minotaur himself. This lady is one who broke free. Maybe she got loose before the brainwashing and made her escape that way, or maybe they thought the transformation had killed her and dumped her body only to have her revive and make her escape. Maybe she has amnesia and no idea how she got these powers, maybe she’s all-too-aware of how her kidnappers ripped her away from the bosom of her family and made absolutely sure no one would ever come looking for her. Either way, she’s a lethal wrecking machine; capable of running faster than the eye can follow, up walls and over water, and tearing through a crowd of bad guys when she gets there. She’s strong enough and fast enough to chase down a speeding car, tear it apart with her bare hands, and never be seen by the people inside it. She’s not bulletproof and she has the same physical ailments as a normal human, but with her incredible speed and power it shouldn’t ever be an issue for her. She’ll never lose initiative save to the select few who are already faster than she is, and she’ll do a whole lot more damage than those people are likely to. The risk you run with characters like this, examples of the Living Weapon archetype, is that they’re easy to write as terrible, terrible characters: all violence and grim and grit, with no personality and nothing interesting about them. So just don’t do that! Write about them enjoying the rediscovery of their humanity, the joys of their first love affair or challenges of their first job, reconnecting with a family they had thought they’d lost or taking up a hobby like painting or cooking that makes them happy. Giving them humanity will make the violence they have to do actually _mean_ something, and get the audience all the more on their side when they do finally track down the people who changed them against their will and are confronted with the high cost of revenge. Hurting that general or that scientist who changed you won’t give you the old you back. Don’t let them win.

Silversmith PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 20 pp STR 30 [16] (+10/+3) DEX 14 (+2) CON 16 (+3) INT 10 (+0) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 10 (+0) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Melee) DEF: +12 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +7 Grapple: +22 Saves: 13 pp TOU +8 (+3 Con, +5 Protection) FORT +8 (+3 Con, +5) REF +6 (+2 Dex, +4) WILL +6 (+2 Wis, +4) Skills: 44 r=11 pp Concentration 8 (+10) Craft: Chemical 4 (+4) Craft: Structural 10 (+10) Notice 8 (+10) Ride 3 (+5) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Survival 3 (+5) Feats: 16 pp Attack Focus: Melee 4 Dodge Focus 6 Improved Initiative Power Attack Takedown Attack Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 66 pp Alternate Form 7 (Silver) [35 pp] -Enhanced STR 14 [14] -Immunity 4 (sleep, starvation and thirst, suffocation) [4] -Impervious TOU 8 [8] -Protection 5 [5] -Super-Strength 2 (Heavy Load: 6 tons) [4] Shape Matter 10 (1000 lbs) (Extra: Duration [Continuous]), (Flaws: Metal Only, Range [Touch]) [30 pp] Speed 1 (10 MPH) [1 pp] costs abilities 20 + combat 24 + saves 13 + skills 11/44 + feats 16 + powers 66 = 150 pts Design Notes: Okay, my idea here is that this lady is the guardian of Boston, heir to a lineage of alchemical heroes going back to the 18th century. She’s bulletproof, covered in silver, and she can shape metal and other substances with just a touch, cleaving through steel doors, welding guns shut, and generally having a very formidable backup to go with her otherwise low-rent powerhouse abilities. I couldn’t quite get the weight up to that of an 18th century cannon (which I figured was a primary target of her ancestor), but she could certainly affect things like cannonballs and the various shells of heavy artillery. With Impervious 8; she’d be formidable, but not invulnerable, on even an 18th century battlefield. (Though even there she’d have to take a cannonball directly to the face to even run the risk of being hurt; not much of a risk given her abilities.) With her skills and feats, she could stand in well enough for her 18th century ancestor, but I think she works just fine as a modern-day heroine carrying on a centuries-old all-American legacy. (Plus, there probably weren’t too many PL 10s fighting openly in the 18th century…) As far as origins, I was inspired by a comment trollthumper made in chat about "Johnny Tremaine getting burned with some alchemical silver" and took that to build this very successful young lady. I didn't limit her powers to silver or anything like that, because that would frankly bite the wax tadpole in a modern setting. She could use some density if you want to play up her metal body as well; and maybe more immunities if you want to give her some more internal changes. If you don't like the alchemical origins, she certainly has the skills to alter her own body: maybe she followed up on the historical accident and recreated the circumstances that had helped give rise to America’s first superhero back in the 18th century? If that’s the case, she certainly needs an enemy from the motherland, a wicked British imperialist determined to restore the power of the monarchy at any cost! This all-American young patriot isn’t going to allow any such nonsense on her watch. As it is her silver body is something she can dismiss at a whim, and be stunned out of in a fight: consider saving up the points to make it Continuous if you want to avoid the latter risk, or making it Permanent if you want her perpetually inhuman body to be a serious source of valuable complications. Freedom City’s superheroes started in 1938 with the Centurion, but people with superpowers date back to an older era. Don’t be afraid to come up with awesome Victorian and pulp adventures for previous generations of Silversmiths if you don’t mind explaining what they were doing and why it didn’t make it into the press. Of course, if you really want to make AA happy, you can use this as a Civil War-era hero and have her go down south to introduce New England to the plantation South by punching people in the face until they fall over...

Power Controller PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 26 pp STR 10 (+0) DEX 16 (+3) CON 16 (+3) INT 10 (+0) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 18 (+4) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 DEF: +12 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +7 Grapple +6 Saves: 12 pp TOU +8 (+3 Con, +5 Protection) FORT +5 (+3 Con, +2) REF +8 (+3 Dex, +5) WILL +8 (+3 Wis, +5) Skills: 12 pp=48 r Bluff 6 (+10) Diplomacy 11 (+15) Knowledge: Current Events 5 (+5) Knowledge: Pop Culture 5 (+5) Medicine 2 (+5) Languages 3 (French, German, Spanish) (Base: English) Notice 7 (+10) Sense Motive 7 (+10) Feats: 16 pp Dodge Focus 6 Elusive Target, Evasion 2, Improved Initiative, Inspire 4, Leadership, Move-By Action, Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 60 pp Boost Array [30+2=32 pp] Damage 10 (Extra: Range [Perception]) 'overclocking' AP: Healing 10 (Extra: Range [Perception], Flaw: Others Only) AP: Transform 10 (living to living) (Extra: Range [Perception], Flaws: Action [Full], Powers Only) Flight 3 (50 MPH) [6 pp] Luck Control 4 (spend an HP for another character, give HP to others, spend HP to negate HP/Fiat, force reroll) (PFs: Luck 5) [17 pp] Protection 5 [5 pp] costs abilities 26 + combat 24 + saves 12 + skills 12/48 + feats 16 + powers 60 = 150 pts Design Notes: Here’s someone who is loosely defined as a power controller/booster. He’s the perfect PC for someone who likes playing a supporting role: with his Inspire, Leadership, and Luck Control he makes the people on his team more powerful just by being there, and with his Boost array he can heal their injuries, briefly change their powers around (or change up his own), and even attack bad guys by infusing more power than they can handle into their bodies. He’s a good way to play a ‘good luck charm’ character who actually is quite useful to have around, and can do more than just hang back and boost others. (Which is not much fun, really, and not really appropriate to the superheroic genre) The big problem with Power Control and Boost is that, despite the name, they’re not actually that useful: Power Control is at best a limited form of Mind Control (which, in fact, it is) and requires lots of luck to actually be useful, while Boost is so dependent on not breaking caps that it almost has to be Personal to be useful: and even then, you’re stuck with not being at caps half the time! My basic idea for this character is that they’re a superhero groupie who lucked into powers that made him not just a superhero, but one who made other superheroes better as well. You can mix that up however you want: I could see this as a scientist studying the nature of superpowers, a super-soldier who wound up with broader abilities than the government expected, and the like. All that Healing could easily be boosted by a character with a decent amount of Medicine: as it is, his powers in that direction are mostly instinctual. You could tie him into a specific descriptor, I suppose, but making him a ‘power booster’ in general is the sort of thing that often works cross-class, as it were. Make sure you understand exactly how his (quite broad) powers work. Consider having a Complication if there are a given type of abilities (magic, mutant, science) that he just can’t change (maybe by giving him Fort damage): as written he can weaken or boost everything from Iron Man’s suit to Spiderman’s stupid face. (Stupid Spiderman and his face) Luck Control and Inspire are two requirements for someone who makes his team better just by being around them. (I use Luck Control a lot in my builds, but make sure you are coming up with a good reason why a given PC has such a formidable ability: it’s a utility power, but make sure you know why they have them) I could see this character going in other ways as points developed: as I mentioned, a Fort save seems perfectly natural to put on his Damage. He’s a Perception fighter right now, but you could save points in doing as Wesley Knight did and making him all about the range, or even melee. With his high Diplomacy, he’s a great team player in general, and makes an excellent faceman for your team if you need somebody to go do negotiating. You could adjust that and make him really scary if you wanted to play up the Unfortunate Implications of his powers, but honestly there’s something to be said for a perfectly nice guy with perfectly nice powers. Not everyone has to be a big ol’ creepazoid.

Video Game Hero Abilities: 20 pp STR 30 [14] (+10/+2) DEX 16 (+3) CON 16 (+3) INT 10 (+0) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 10 (+0) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Melee DEF: +10 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +3 Grapple: +21 Saves: 10 pp TOU +10 (+3 Con, +7 Protection) FORT +6 (+3 Con, +3) REF +6 (+3 Dex, +3) WILL +6 (+2 Wis, +4) Skills: 36 r=9 pp Computers 10 (+10) Knowledge: Pop Culture 10 (+10) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Feats: 11 pp Attack Focus: Melee (4) Dodge Focus (4) Power Attack, Takedown Attack, Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 76 pp Datalink 2 (100 ft) (PFs: Machine Control, Subtle) [4 pp] Enhanced STR 16 [16 pp] Flight 1 (10 MPH) [2 pp] Immunity 9 (Life Support) [9 pp] Protection 7 [7 pp] Super-Strength 1 (Heavy Load: 1.5 tons) [2 pp] Video Game Mimicry 4 [36 pp] ‘20 pp’ costs abilities 20 + combat 24 + saves 10 + skills 9/36 + feats 11 + powers 76 = 150 pts Design Notes: This hero is powered by video games; she’s able to assume the powers and abilities of any video game character. Most of her sample powers are pretty generic and where she got them from pretty obvious: doing that (giving a specific connection to a classic character) is a good way to make sure you’re not abusing the descriptor. Just make sure you’re not breaking the fourth Wall, either! I’ve given her the abilities of your average low-rent paragon outside of her Video Game Mimicry (a reskinned Animal Mimicry), so she can fly around and punch people really hard, lift heavy objects, and do the various things that your average video game character can probably do. She also has limited machine control abilities; enough to look inside computers and consoles when she’s not near them, and enough to play her X-Box from across the room. (Do you kids still play X-Box? I dunno). I got the idea for her from the winner of Stan Lee’s awful Who Wants to be a Superhero; the powers have to be watched carefully to make sure you don’t get ‘too cool’, but I think there’s definitely the seed of a good idea here. She has the skills of a generic videogame player with her decent Computers and Pop Culture score: in my mind, this is probably a high school kid, but you could easily make her just a random officedrone whose superpowers played into her favorite hobby when they finally did emerge. There’s nothing wrong with having a solid connection to pop culture, just make sure you pick a good ‘theme’ to avoid sounding like some generic, easily-dated computer nerd. I went with semi-classic video games for the lady in question, but you could easily adjust that however you want. Consider other games; like more Flight and Space Flight for an asteroid fighter, or another kind of blast for someone fighting Space Invaders. Consider giving her an Arcade expy as a natural antagonist, perhaps one determined to punish videogames for killing pinball. (Maybe use the Pinball Hero from upthread?) You could tighten her theme even further and give her the powers of one specific videogame character, but you really need to be careful to avoid copyright infringement there.(Plus, it makes you look pretty lame and uncreative, honestly, unless you have a very good justification) Another way to go would be to tie her into another kind of game: maybe she has a chess theme and can use her powers like the various chess pieces, or the kingly powers of checkers. Either way, this should be a fun character: she’s got powers she probably thinks are great, she’s got plenty of potential for in-universe licensing, and the crossover story where everyone gets sucked into an old Atari game is a natural for her. There’s nothing wrong with having a cool theme. Just watch out for Asteroids and Space Invaders!

Terminus Costumed Adventurer PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 56 pp STR 30 (+10) DEX 20 (+5) CON 24 (+7) INT 14 (+2) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 14 (+2) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Melee) DEF: +10 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +5 Grapple: +20 Saves: 9 pp TOU +10 (+7 Con, +3) FORT +7 (+7 Con) REF +8 (+5 Dex, +3) WILL +8 (+2 Wis, +6) Skills: 48 r=12 pp Craft (Mechanical) 4 (+6) Gather Info 4 (+6) Intimidate 8 (+10) Investigate 4 (+6) Knowledge (Technology) 2 (+4) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Stealth 10 (+15) Feats: 13 pp Attack Focus: Melee (4) Dodge Focus (4) Move-By Action Power Attack Startle Takedown Attack Uncanny Dodge (radio) Powers: 41 pp Concealment 3 (ESP, Mental, Radio) (Flaw: Passive) [3 pp] Enhanced Feats 4 (Extended Reach, Improved Crit, Variable Descriptor 2 [any technological]) [4 pp] Flight 3 (50 MPH) [6 pp] Immunity 9 (Life Support) [9 pp] Impervious TOU 9 [9 pp] Protection 3 [3 pp] Space Travel 1 (1c) [1 pp] Super-Senses 6 (Darkvision, Detect Weakness [Radio], Radio) [6 pp] Drawbacks: -5 pp Weakness (magnetic fields; Uncommon, Major [-1 all physical ability scores], per 1 minute; -5pp) costs abilities 56 + combat 24 + saves 9 + skills 15/60 + feats 13 + powers 41 - drawback 5 = 150 pts -------- Design Notes: He awoke in darkness and cold, fully aware of what he was: just another one of Omega's castoffs, a failed prototype sent to the Pits for burning. But he wouldn't give in: he clawed his way free and made his escape, his 'damaged' implants leaving him free of Omega's control. And there, in the dark and cold, he made his decision: he would take back his own stolen life and the lives of so many others, becoming the hero his people needed even if they rejected him for his face, his voice, and the terrible things he'd done: yes, this is a build for an Omegadrone-turned-costumed-adventurer, the Batman of Nihilor. (What can I say, I was inspired by the picture above, not recognizing the video game I now know it's from) Being the native superhero of the Terminus is almost shockingly tough, but this guy could just about pull it off: his big advantage is the Concealment which makes him invisible to the various sensors all over Omega's stronghold. He'd certainly have a dangerous life ahead of him; this might make a good build for another Omegadrone student at Claremont. That's with the assumption that he managed to secure backers; probably the Furions who are the New God expies and allies of Earth's superheroes. If you're put off at playing someone from so far away, I could see this hero working just fine as a free Omegadrone active on Earth. His appearance is certainly terrifying enough to strike fear into the hearts of enemies, and a heroic Omegadrone is bizarre enough that it's likely to get written off as an urban legend until he encounters other superheroes. Of course, they may think he just has a very tasteless costume designer until he shows them that no, this is real armor. (As I've written elsewhere, I much prefer the idea of Omegadrone armor as being something that's implanted under the skin: that Omegadrones can just take off their armor may make for good infiltration purposes, but it seems so...undramatic). Note that he doesn't actually die of magnets, but they do drain enough energy from him that he'll have to be extremely careful about his encounters with them. Naturally he doesn't want to run into any in his native environment. He doesn't have the power pike of your typical drone, but he can extend blades and such that have a similar effect: with his variable descriptor and his Detect Weakness, he should have no problem pulling out whatever melee weapon he needs to destroy whatever enemy he's engaged with. His lack of tradeoffs keep him street-level, but he's a terrifying knight in iron on those streets. He's also a pretty good build for any kind of cyborg turned Batman, though I'd drop his Space Flight and use it to kick up his Impervious, or maybe his Super-Senses, if he doesn't come from Kirbytech.

With an air of injured robot dignity, the bee buzzed up to talk to them, this time staying well out of melee range of the heavily armed heroes. "Follow me," it said, sounding a little less agitated, its voice now more like a robotic person than an angry automaton. "I will show you." The path the bee led them on was through the dark, red-tinted corridors of the prison, their feet squicking in honey as they went. Some of the prisoners here were calling out from their shuttered cells, some with taunts directed at the Bee-Keeper in particular, but so far no one else in the prison knew the heroes were associated with what was going on. "It izzz not faaaar...."

As Midnight pulled the rod free, the glowing red lights within the sphere died down to nothing, leaving only a hollow shell behind. With Trevor's expertise, it wasn't that hard to get the plastic explosive planted all around the Terminus device. "Okay," said Edge, looking impressed at Trevor's acumen, "I think we've got that taken care of!" He eyed the rod, giving it a strange look of recognition. "I could swear I've seen that thing somewhere before, but I don't..." He shook his head, and spoke louder, raising his voice over the sound of the battle outside. "Anyway, we need to get moving. I don't know how long it'll be before we get our pickup, and-" BLAM! BLAM! Mark spun around, they all did, as die Eule crumpled to the ground with two holes in his torso: the German costumed adventurer dropping the Luger he'd raised while everyone was focused on disarming the bomb. From the shadows behind the bleeding Owl came a grim figure in black, still carrying his smoking .45s. He'd lost his fedora somewhere in the struggle outside, but for the moment, the man who'd been faced with a last stand that evening looked to have a new lease on life. "A fitting end for his kind. Your work here is done?"

Okay, we're out of rounds.

"I know you are just an automaton," said the angel of Freedom, dodging and weaving himself as he tried to score a hit on the giant bee, his electrical probe bouncing off its metal hull. "but I believe you have a consciousness of your own, however limited. I have no wish to injure you..." Freedom Angel's stungun didn't seem to do any more damage than had anyone else's attack, "but if you continue to threaten innocents with kidnapping, I will be forced to use...violence!" And with that, he hauled off and punched the robot bee in the face! It jerked back, a fist-sized dent in its face-plate, and flew away, yiping like a startled puppy. Freedom Angel peered over the side after it, careful not to touch the honeyed rail. "I did it no serious damage." Sure enough, the bee was still down there, watching them but making no move to attack. "Perhaps we've persuaded it to embrace diplomacy?"

17 Dang, I think I made this sucker's Fort save too high! Okay, Heyzel is up. Heyzel Power Attacks the bee with the taser. 14 Boo. Yay HP! 25 That hits. Fort vs. 22 27 ... You know, I'll surge and just punch the damn thing. Power Attack 19 Tou vs 26: 18 Bruised and stunned

The man-sized sphere was easy enough to dismantle for a mechanic of Trevor's acumen: while avoiding the minor cosmic energy discharges inside was somewhat tricky (given that their innate energy was enough to make his hair tingle), it was just a matter of disengaging the power core from the rest of the device, the loss of its internal current turning it from a dangerous piece of Terminus tech to something that Trevor's belt explosives could destroy easily enough without harm. More to the point, Trevor also spotted the bomb’s detonator: a sort of “cosmic energy lightning rod” and if removed completely disarms the device, rendering even the shell useless to the Nazis. Thus, taking the rod guarantees no one can rearm the bomb in the heroes’ absence. The detonator is easily portable, being only about ten inches long and an inch in diameter

Even better, Mark spends an HP on your behalf.

Living Vampire PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 28 pp STR 26 [16] (+8/+3) DEX 26 [16] (+8/+3) CON 26 [16] (+8/+3) INT 10 (+0) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 16 (+3) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+12 Melee) DEF: +12 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +8 Grapple: +20 Saves: 5 pp TOU +8 (+8 Con) FORT +8 (+8 Con) REF +8 (+8 Dex) WILL +7 (+2 Wis, +5) Skills: 56 r=14 pp Bluff 12 (+15) Intimidate 12 (+15) Diplomacy 2 (+5) Language 1 (Greek) (Base: English) Notice 6 (+8) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Stealth 12 (+20) Survival 3 (+5) Feats: 17 pp Attack Focus: Melee 6 Distract (Bluff) Dodge Focus 6 Fascinate (Bluff) Power Attack Takedown Attack Uncanny Dodge (olfactory) Powers: 65 pp Enhanced CON 10 [10 pp] Enhanced DEX 10 [10 pp] Enhanced STR 10 [10 pp] Flight 1 (10 MPH) [2 pp] Immunity 10 (aging, life support) [10 pp] Impervious TOU 8 (Flaw: Not vs. Fire/Silver/Wood) [4 pp] Regeneration 2 (Resurrection 1/day) (PF: Regrowth) [3 pp] Super-Senses 3 (Acute Scent, Darkvision) [3 pp] Vampire Array [10+4-1 pp] (Drawback: Power Loss (in sunlight) [uncommon, minor]) Vampiric Unarmed Damage (PFs: Improved Crit 2) AP: Emotion Control 10 (Flaw: Sense-Dependent [visual]) AP: Healing 10 (Flaw: Personal) AP: Mental Transform 10 (Flaw: Sense-Dependent [visual]) AP: Mind Control 10 (Flaw: Sense-Dependent [visual]) Drawbacks: -3 pp Vulnerable (Silver) (uncommon, major) [-3 pp] costs abilities 28 + combat 24 + saves 5 + skills 14/56 + feats 17 + powers 65 -drawbacks 3= 150 pts - Design Notes: Vrykolakas, the daughter of Avenger and Divine, was pretty unlucky in her choice of parents, honestly. Growing up on Mt. Olympus as the monstrous cast-off daughter of a minor godling, she had it pretty tough and had to learn how to hunt the magical beasts on the slope of that ancient mountain to survive. When she proved herself by helping defeat the armies of Hades during his attempted seizure of his brother's domain, she asked for the only thing she'd ever really wanted in return: to get the hell off Mt. Olympus and back to the world where she'd been conceived. Life was tough there, too, but it didn't take her long living in back alleys and slums to realize that there were monsters here too: petty men and women of power who hurt and abused their inferiors simply out of ego. Fashioning a costume together, she took up her role as protector of the streets against those who would abuse and injure them; a jackal defending the gazelles from the lions. OK, so here's my attempt at a 'living vampire'; this is more like a human being infected with a virus (i.e., like many modern 'scientific' takes on the vampire mythos) than the walking undead monster I made at the very beginning of this thread. She's fast, tough, beautiful, and she's very scary. She's also bulletproof, able to cloud men's minds just by looking at them, though she does have a poisonous allergy to silver. (Things like garlic and such are really best left as complications). Why do a living vampire? Well, there is something to be said for being a person with a disease rather than a supernatural infection in a dead body. If nothing else, you're likely to be able to find a cure, though of course that's something that'll require some serious contemplation. (i.e., the vampire turned living person is suddenly not going to have superpowers, which may well be a handicap for your superhero! One thing to do is accumulate a lot of points in play, and then make a change over that makes you a perhaps-slightly vampirized badass with lots of skills and feats) Note that she doesn't _need_ to drink blood on her sheet; I'd put that down to definitely a Complication. Perhaps she can get by without it, but lack of regular blood (or maybe a 'serum') makes her crabby and more inclined to let the vampiric infection in her body run riot. She has no particular problem with holy symbols or holy places (hey, she did grow up on Mt. Olympus) as befits a human being who just happens to be Blessed with Suck (Hah hah, you see what I did there?), aka, vampire powers that she inherited from her father. She may well have bad relationships with the dead vampires running around, who in your own campaigns you may want to treat as natural antagonists for her. (This build would also work fine for a 'regular' vampire who was semi-cured) If you want this lady more like Blade, give her some melee weapons and body armor; machine guns and such are probably not suitable for most campaigns.

"Contrary to what the senior students may tell you this year, Mr. Marston, I am not an ogre who seeks to crush the spirits of his students and reshape them into my 'old and busted idea' of a superhero." His mouth twisted slightly, and it sounded like Summers was making a direct quote. Looking satisfied, Summers rose to his feet and shook Marston's hand. "Welcome to the school, Darwin. You will find that gaining personal discipline is not the same thing as losing personality." He smiled thinly, then, showing an old man's yellowed teeth.

"I'll show you a separation!" The thief pulled out her pistols again and opened fire, spraying Dragonfly's temporary savior with a hail of bullets. Sharl started briefly, mostly for the sake of the bullets that were passing right through his body, but luckily he'd entered through a stairwell's door, so the rounds mostly ricocheted harmlessly off where no one could be hurt. "Look, you primitive screwheads," fumed the electronic teenager, "there's nothing you and your ballerina buddy here can do to hurt me unless you're a lot smarter than you look. So if you don't surrender right now, I'm going to track you down and pound on you till you do!"

Sneak Thief is going to use her standard action to shoot Sharl. EPIC FAIL! KD, when does Fenris shake his stun?

Die Eule's last stand proved as undramatic and unsuccessful as it had been in the real world, and the Nazi terrorist was blasted across the room and into unconsciousness before he could say another word. They could hear alarms and sirens going off all over the base, interrupted suddenly by distant explosions: evidently Midnight I's promises of arranging a diversion were paying off. With the rest of the Ubersoldaten thoroughly defeated, Archeville's normally-handsome face, pressed against the floor as she thoroughly pinned his arms, had assumed a truly malevolent leer. "You may think you haff defeated the Reich, heroes, but der real enemy is more powerful than you can possibly imagine. Strike me down and mein real victory will be complete!"

Despite the timely assault by the two heroes, the robotic bee proved to be made of implausibly stern stuff. "FLEUR DE JOIE! FLEUR DE JOIE! CAPTURE FLEUR DE JOIE!" Despite the bee's tough talk, the press of heroes around the pregnant lady made it impossible for the bee to reach her. Evidently all that armor didn't make for a particularly fast or maneuverable bee. "STATEMENT: I JUST WANT TO TALK, HONEY." it added as it swooped and dived to try and get at Fleur, sounding oddly like the Bee-Keeper for a moment.

19 Stupid bee! Okay, the bee goes and attacks Fleur again. Swing and a miss! Gabriel is up

Covered in slash marks, die Eule somewhat shakily got to his feet. "You...you verdammt Amerikaners! You think you can strike us down? This entire base is covered in soldiers in power armor!" He pulled his very last boomerang, lifted it high, and hurled it in a swift, deadly arc towards Corbin that bounced off Cobalt Templar's armor. It looked like the Nazi costumed criminal was running out of options. Putting a brave face on it, he threw open his arms and shouted, "I die a hero of the Fatherland, you subhuman scum, and I will be AVENGED! For the Reich!"

Hokay, can't beat that taunt on a nat-20. Fort vs. Stun: 23 Okay, that passes. (I realized that +15 was way too high when I gave you guys tasers, so the bees will be rolling 10-12 as their Fort save)

Jill: 22 (Sidekick) Gaian Knight: 19 (2 HP) Robot Bee: 19 (Bad Guy) Gabriel: 12 (5 HP) Freedom Angel: 9 (1 HP) Fleur de Joie: 6 (4 HP from Complication) Jill is up