Avenger Assembled

"Erin," called Drummer as he stepped out of the cell. "I'm going to press a button on this machine," he said, holding up a little remote control. "And it's going to give you a room to live in. It's going to look strange, so I wanted to make sure you knew first and weren't surprised." At his words he pressed a button, and a modest change came over the room: the walls shifted to a neutral stucco and 'windows' appeared, visible outside was what looked like a lush, exotic rainforest. "What you're seeing is an illusion," he told Erin, "it's not real. But it's nicer to look at than bare walls." As he spoke, he nodded to his guards, and one moved closer to the emergency drop for the big front door: there was a faint electrostatic tingle in the air as the force field came on. "I'm sorry there's so little in your room. I'll try and get more tomorrow."

"There have been more and more of them in the last few months," answered Sharl's sister, folding her arms in front of her briskly. "Physical changes, mental abnormalities...some of them are even supposed to be dangerous just to touch. The council only acknowledged they existed about the time Sharl disappeared. We were afraid Sharl had been taken by them, or hurt, or changed. That's one of the things we were worried about; it's why I moved back in here." "You moved back into my room?" For a moment, Sharl looked like any appalled teenage boy would be. Particularly here, where his personal space was something he'd spent many years trying to maintain."But all my things were in there! And all my space!" He gave a look back at his room, as if expecting to see all his childhood toys piled up in boxes along the side, ready for the recycler. He'd gone to a lot of work to persuade his sister to move out to her artists commune. "Your things are fine!" she shot back, sounding like any older sister. "You think we recycled anything of yours?" she asked challengingly. Sharl looked a little stricken at that, and they both fell silent. "None of us have seen a full-blown mutant," said Bel, wringing his hands a little. "But one of Aba's patients was taken away when his symptoms started showing, and some of the contamination has even appeared in my work. The government keeps downplaying it, but we're not stupid. Something's going wrong in this city. People are scared."

First of all: Everyone take an HP for being caught unawares by Guy Fawkes' triggered plastic explosives. This is a Rank 10 Damage effect with a Burst Area. Everyone roll a DC 20 Reflex save, then a DC 25 TOU save. If you pass the Reflex save, roll a DC 20 TOU save instead. If you have Evasion, well, you know how it works. Go monkey go!

The mall parking lot was quiet when the kids arrived there, though as usual the Millennium Mall's lot was packed with cars on such a nice spring day. After all, Easter was coming up soon and who wouldn't want to pass up a chance to shop for pretty Easter things, buy delicious candy at marked-up prices (smart shoppers know that you buy your candy after Easter, when they sell the good stuff for cheap now that candy season is over), or sit on the lap of the Easter Bunny? Rumor had it that the Mall people imported a special Easter Bunny from upstate New York, a particularly charming fellow much loved by children everywhere. It had been in all the papers. (It had been a pretty slow week in Freedom City, honestly). In the lead, Zap pushed open the revolving doors and the glass exploded in their faces with a deafening roar, sending shards of glass blasting through the air and cutting the teens; Wisp and Zap both had cuts and bruises on their faces, while a shard of glass the size of a pencil lead was visibly sticking out Crow's shoulder, having gone right through his coat. It could have been so much worse; if a nearby support pillar inside the foyer, still emblazoned with the pitiful remnants of an ad for Orange Julius hadn't taken the brunt of the blast, they'd all be much worse off! Inside the mall through the broken interior doors, they could just make out a group of civilians down in the food court through which they'd been about to enter, bound together in a frightened little circle and menaced by a strange-looking man in a white face mask, and an eerily smiling figure in blue and brown. Sitting on a throne in the center was a familiar-looking figure; the infamous Angel, debutante heroine turned sleazy villain, and by her side was a half-visible man in spotless white linen robes with a massive lapis lazuli at his throat. Angel on the throne, fired up her surfboard and said, "Oh, geez, we've got company! Somebody get the new pigs in the pigpen, it's almost partytime!"

"Reading material and television will have to wait until we're sure she'll be safe where she'll be," replied Drummer quietly. "Patients who were formerly invulnerable can be dangerous to themselves before they realize that they can be hurt. If they're unstable enough, realizing that they can hurt themselves _is_ a serious source of problems." Eventually they reached their destination, a wide-open door in the wall that was more like a garage. There was a bed and a sink, and all in all it looked like any standard cell except for the hexagonal grid pattern on the walls. There was a meal tray on a table on one side of the wall, all bolted together. "Erin?" Drummer asked as he walked to the half-open transparent door, obviously talking to Singularity. "I'm sorry your space is so empty right now. We'll get more in for you in the next couple of days. Before we do that: would you rather live in a house in the forest, or in the jungle?"

Sharl flew around with curiosity, taking in the sights and sounds of a very different school. So much space, and so few people, for an education! It was a really nice feeling, especially on such a pretty day. He seemed to relax as they flew past the library, adjusting his coat and glasses decorously. "Wi-fi," he commented to Corbin. "It's very reassuring to be connected. I can get around fine on my own, but I feel better being hooked up. Do you have any scientist students?" he asked him. "Really smart super-genius kids, like tech heroes and stuff."

"You have a working voice recognition program that good?" asked Joan skeptically, frowning down at the little robot. Joan actually did know something about speech recognition, given that it was an important tool of her job. She couldn't help but think how much better use that robot's programming might be somewhere more important, like inside cars or home computers. Sure, super-tech was famously hard to replicate for civilian use, but this was just a little robot thing. It couldn't be that tough. She watched as they got the program up, mostly watching Lois for her reaction. To her chagrin, Lois was obviously having a great time, sticking close to her new best buddy like her mom wasn't even there. "So if Lois did work here in high school, what exactly would she do?"

The walking trip was long and steep, tilting downward into the rock deep in the heart of the island. It was a natural way to move a prisoner in a setting like this: Singularity wasn't someone you wanted to back into an elevator, or have behind you on the stairs. From the flicker of electric eyes in the walls as they passed, they were under some very tight security. It was for the best that Singularity was behaving herself so far. As they went, Drummer murmured to Wander, "Tell me about Singularity. We're going to use one of our cells without bars for her, but I need to know what she can see that won't make her upset. What does she like? Jungles, forests, nature?"

"It's...it's more than that," said Sharl, giving his parents and sister an open, almost hopeful look. "All those reports that I was following about aliens visiting the city? Well...well, they were true," he said, growing in confidence. Impossible as the story was, it was true! "I found a hole in our reality and I stepped through it, and that's where I met Mary and Ema. They helped me, they saved me from being lost in the middle of forever, and they helped me survive." Well, it had been mostly 'Mary' who'd done that, but there was no need to single Dragonfly out now. "I've found out how our reality really works, and I've learned how to transcend it. I-" "Oh, it IS the drugs!" said Aba, throwing up her hands in horror. Sharl's mother wasn't usually this emotional, but after his many months away he could understand why she was so upset. "We're lucky the militia hasn't come and..." Sharl suddenly realized he couldn't bear that look on his mother's face another second, and so he flew up into the air. He was surprised when his family didn't react that much, until he remembered belatedly where he was. Duh! Flying wasn't so unusual in a city where antigravs were as commonly available as internal combustion engines on Earth. He threw off his coat, revealing that he wasn't wearing an anti-grav. "Look, I can fly!" he said, "and I can do this!" He put his hand right through the wall for further emphasis. "They had to adjust me a little so I could survive there. But I'm okay, this was just so I could survive. I...I was so scared," he said, landing before his shocked parents and sister. "But I knew I had to come back here. I'm so sorry I left without saying goodbye, it...it was an accident..." After a long pause, and a exchange of looks, Sharl's family stepped forward and embraced him again. "Oh my baby," said Aba apologetically. "I'm sorry I was so angry, I've just been so afraid for so long..." "Tell us everything," interjected Bel, not impolitely. "What happened, exactly? How were you changed?" Sieva suddenly seemed to jump, hand over her mouth. "Wait, don't you see! Does this explain-" She gave Mary and Ema a hard look. "Were there others like Sharl? People who just wandered into your world and got experimented on?"

Harrier didn't comment that his great age meant he could have been part of an invasion a century earlier. It seemed unnecessarily grim in what was already a grim moment. At least by some standards. For his part, Harrier was almost uplifted at the sight of survival among so much devastation, for all that said devastation had yet to be recovered from. "To live is better than to die," he said reflectively. "It will be faster if I fly," he said apologetically, "Will you be comfortable here? I am going to don my armor now." He armored up as he asked, his body briefly avulsing before transforming into its faceless iron self.

Singularity looked miserable, but stayed calm under the influence of Sage's formidable powers. "We have psychics on staff," Drummer allowed. "We can make sure one is available for her care." The door behind him had stayed open, and without the need to focus on the dangerous powerhouse of Singularity, Wander and Sage could see the small group of black-clad guards out there. Given the choice to come in alone or with armed guards, Drummer had chosen to come in by himself. "Erin, I'm going to take you to a place where there's a bed and there's food. Your friends can come with you. Is that all right?"

"She'll need to be evaluated," said Drummer frankly. "If she's too unstable to be housed here, she'll have to be moved to Providence. My first priority is the safety of the staff and our prisoners, and we're not equipped to handle unstable powerhouses like Erin." He softened, and added, "But I know she's also a frightened young woman far from home, and we'll do everything we can for her until then. If we are able to house her, we do have a facility set aside for her that can be converted for long-term stay." He hefted the circlet. "This is a power nullifier. Will she let you put it on her?"

There was an uncomfortably long delay, though that might just have been the nerves of the very, very long couple of days on everyone's mind. Eventually the door slid open and the warden entered: Joshua Drummer was a middle-aged Native American man, stocky and muscular yet inside his armored prison uniform. Perhaps surprisingly, under the circumstances, he came alone, carrying a metal circlet in his hands that seemed to absorb some of the room's bright light. "Hello Wander, Sage," he said professionally. "Yes, Dr. Atom did call in with your particulars, and just in time. It's not every day we accept a class-S inmate on such short notice." He studied Singularity and asked, "Erin, my name is Joshua. I'm here to help."

Trevor had seen Mark talk himself into, and out of, all kinds of implausible situations in the past, and as the boys got the Gravois family out of harms way, the Lucas heir threw himself into the work of making husband, wife, Caryatid, and her younger sister at home in the Young Freedom headquarters. "You guys just sit tight," he told them warmly, "take it easy in here," which turned out to be the little 'living room' style room that was part of much of the underground dwelling, cast in the retrofuture shape of the mid-1970s. "Take anything you need," he added, "our place is your place." What the hell, they might as well get Alex's wealth working for them. "Midnight, why don't you call the League?" he suggested. "I'll get in touch with the school and handle..." He swallowed. "Mr. Summers."

Flying Brick PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 44 p STR 40 [30] (+15/+10) DEX 12 (+1) CON 40 [30] (+15/+10) INT 10 (+0) WIS 12 (+1) CHA 10 (+0) Combat: 20 pp ATK: +5 DEF: +5 (+2 flat-footed) Init: +1 Grapple: +26 Saves: 10 pp TOU +15 (+15 Con) FORT +15 (+15 Con) REF +5 (+1 Dex, +4) WILL +7 (+1 Wis, +6) Skills: 40 r=10 pp Diplomacy 15 (+15) Knowledge: History 5 (+5) Languages 2 (German, Russian) (Base: English) Notice 9 (+10) Sense Motive 9 (+10) Feats: 6 pp All-Out Attack Interpose Luck Power Attack Takedown Attack Ultimate Save (TOU) Powers: 60 pp Enhanced CON 10 [10 pp] Enhanced STR 10 [10 pp] Flight 6 (500 MPH) [Dynamic] [12+1+2=15 pp] DAP: Super-Strength 6 (Heavy Load: 360 tons) Immunity 10 (aging, life support) [10 pp] Impervious TOU 10 [10 pp] Super-Senses 5 (Extended Hearing [x10], Extended Vision [x10], X-Ray Vision [blocked by lead]) [5 pp] costs abilities 44 + combat 20 + saves 10 + skills 10/40 + feats 6 + powers 60 = 150 pts -- Design Notes: This is my build for Suprema, probably my favorite Alan Moore character. She’s from Alan Moore’s excellent revamp of Rob Liefeld’s crappy Supreme series: Supreme is a Superman expy, while his cousin Suprema was his Supergirl. Moore used Supreme to tell insightful Superman stories that he couldn’t have gotten away with at DC (I really can’t recommend the series enough), and Suprema filled a particular niche: she’d been the cheery Silver Age Supergirl of the Supreme Universe. Always cheerful and optimistic, possessed of great might, she fought for right in a world that rewarded heroes and where the endings were always happy. Until the age changed, and Suprema found herself trapped on the other side of the galaxy. Making her way home, she found herself lost in time: the girl from the height of the Silver Age was plunged into the heart of the Iron Age. The Liefeld Youngblood Iron Age, as a matter of fact! But that was OK, because she was still ridiculously powerful, and she was going to make the heroes of the new age see how a hero was supposed to act. She’s a really straightforward Flying Brick type, a classic sort. She flies in, punches people as hard as she can, and then punches them again; she can also fly in and take the hit for a teammate, absorbing fantastic punishment thanks to her Ultimate TOU. Versus most mundane foes, she’ll All-Out Attack since there’s very little they could do to actually hurt her even if they do manage to hit her. Like a lot of damage-shifted characters, she needs someone around to give her the kind of bonuses (via Teamwork, Master Plan, or Inspire) that let her All-Out Power-Attack all the time and basically destroy anything she gets her fists on. She’s really, really strong. After going back and forth on what Super-Strength power feats to give her, I didn’t use any: power-stunt ones as they come up, and then buy them with PP as you accumulate more points with the PC. Go with what you want! Note that her X-Ray Vision (with the Not Vs. Lead drawback) only costs 3 pp according to our house rules. You lose _some_ of the bite that made the character so much fun in the Iron Age, but I think you can still get a lot of joy out of the culture clash. The Centurion didn’t have a cousin in Freedom City, but I could imagine this as a young heroine who he took under his wing and mentored for many years: perhaps Nova Roma had a native heroine after all. Or maybe she’s the daughter or cousin of the Centurion of another dimension, tossed here by a strange quirk of fate. (She might be the Centuria mentioned in Future Freedom in Worlds of Freedom) Or if you want to make her origin slightly more sinister, maybe she’s from a world canon here on FcPbP: Maybe when Rick Lucas cast a Silver Age version of Freedom City from his own nostalgic memories, one of his creations proved more enduring than most and now she’s loose in a real world she never made!

"I was not part of that invasion," said Harrier suddenly, feeling a stab of guilt at the worry on her face. He knew nothing of this place; he had never been here, and so far he guessed the forces of the Terminus probably had not been here either. "Nor of the previous invasion in the 1960s. My first visit to Earth-Prime was as a free man," he added. "But I...I will recognize an invasion, or an attempted one, when I see it." There were the screams of dying worlds in his ears as he looked up at the sky before asking, "Have you had anyone in to do a global survey?"

Sharl himself was silent as he led the way down the hall, the walls silent and still as they went. In a city so greatly crowded, soundproofing was a very important strategy for sanity. At first it looked like there were no doors at all, but on closer inspection the two tech heroes could easily make out the handpanels evenly spaced in the walls where seamless Tronik-style construction let them hide doors away. At what was evidently his own door, Sharl paused for a moment, composed himself, and placed his hand against the doorpad. "Sharl Tulink," the wall said gently. "You have been away for 8.82 years." And with that the door slid open, and Sharl stepped inside. Despite the tremendous bulk of the massive buildings here, the Tulink family dwelling was small: no bigger than a smallish two-bedroom apartment in Freedom City. Where there were no visible doors in exterior walls, on the inside almost every room was visible: a big master bed in a room on one end and a smaller one at the other, and a big central room with what looked like a tiny, smooth-walled kitchenette, the far wall gone transparent to show the nearest massive structure miles away. Despite the small size of the room, the giant window gave it a feeling of space, along with ceilings cast much higher than they would be on Earth. But Sharl had no eyes for the habitation where he'd grown up, not with his entire family there! A conversation around the table had been interrupted. Aba Tulink, a middle-aged woman who'd gone skinny where Sharl was tall and gawky, stared at him, disbelief written in her eyes; Bel; a bearded man with something of a belly, by her side. At the other end of the small table in the middle of the room, facing him at the head of the little triangle was even his big sister Sieva. She was the first one to say softly "...Sharl?" And then suddenly they were up in a body, and there was tearful embracing, and rejoicing, and then suddenly his mother smacked him in the head! "Where have you been!?!" She stared at him, grief in her eyes. "I've cried my eyes out every night for nearly nine years! We thought you'd gone off and joined the cults, or gotten on the drugs!" "Honey, honey, it's okay," said Bel reassuringly, "Let him sit down and talk. I'm sure our boy has a lot to tell us." He shot Sharl a not-unfriendly look that said he damned well better have a lot to say. "Who are your friends?" "Uh, Mom, Dad, Sis, this is Mary and Ema. They helped me where I was...which is, um, a really long story..."

Master Thief PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 34 pp STR 16 (+3) DEX 18 (+4) CON 18 (+4) INT 10 (+0) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 16 (+3) Combat: 28 pp ATK: +6 (+12 Melee/+12 Thrown Objects) DEF: +14 (+4 flat-footed) Init: +4 Grapple: +15 Saves: 9 pp TOU: +6 (+4 Con, +2 Armor) FORT: +7 (+4 Con, +3) REF: +7 (+4 Dex, +3) WILL: +6 (+2 Wis, +4) Skills: 80 r=20 pp Acrobatics 11 (+15) Bluff 12 (+15) Climb 2 (+5) Disable Device 15 (+15) Language 1 (French) (Base: English) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Sleight of Hand 10 (+14) Stealth 11 (+15) Swim 2 (+5) Feats: 28 pp Acrobatic Bluff Attack Focus: Melee 6 Attack Specialization: Thrown Objects 3 Dodge Focus 6 Equipment 2 Improved Initiative Luck Move-By Action Power Attack Skill Mastery (Acrobatics, Bluff, Disable Device, Stealth) Second Chance (Disable Device checks) Sneak Attack Takedown Attack Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 31 pp Device 1 (Staff) (Easy to Lose) (PF: Subtle [collapsible]) [4 pp] -Strike 3 (PFs: Extended Reach, Mighty) Immunity 1 (own powers) [1 pp] Throwing Stuff Array [24+2=26 pp] Blast 6 (Extras: Autofire, Penetrating) AP: Damage 10 (Extras: Area [Cone], Selective) AP: Drain TOU 10 (Extras: Affects Objects (+0), Area [burst]) (PFs: Reduced Progression on Area 3, Precise) Equipment: 10 ep -Body Armor (Protection 2) (PF: Subtle) [3 ep] -Grapple Gun (Super-Movement 3 (Slow Fall, Swinging, Wall Crawling) and Speed 1 (10 MPH)) [7 ep] costs abilities 34 + combat 28 + saves 9 + skills 20/80 + feats 28 + powers 31 = 150 pts Design Notes: Here’s a Francophone master thief who gets around by throwing exploding objects for fun and profit. He’s not terribly clever, but he’s very pretty: there are better thieves out there, but thanks to his very high total and his Second Chance, he can probably handle himself vs. any mundane lock in the world and do pretty good even vs. various kinds of high-tech stuff. (He still needs to be careful; Disable Device’s difficulties are pretty high, and while he’s very good, he’s not as incredibly talented as the Cat Burglar upthread. But that’s why he fits in better as part of a team when he’s doing superheroic stuff.) He’s also got a staff to bust out if he’s in barfights or something, and doesn’t want to reveal that he’s some kind of crazy superpowered guy. He’s better with his pretty face, unlocking doors by talking the guard out of parting with the key, and he’s equally good with ladies and gentlemen too. (Even if he keeps doing bad stuff, he always seems to be able to talk his way back onto whatever team he’s on) His power revolves around blowing things up, which he can use in a variety of ways: I figure his Area Attack is something like a storm of playing cards, or jacks, or whatever his signature ‘thing’ is, creating an effect that clears the room in front of him. His base power is very effective, doing damage comparable to a super-charged machine gun. The big power, Drain TOU, lets him blow up objects by concentrating on them: this is primarily a tool since it only affects objects, but he can do some effective damage with it: that steel door blocking your way and its jammed lock unpickable? Blow it down! With the Reverse Progression on the Drain, he can limit his destruction to one small area, perfect for taking out that big lock. He’s natural to team up with that Energy-Draining Paragon above thread, or her twin the Mindtaker. Or both at once! (He can dream, can’t he?) His low exotic saves do mean that she was totally right to be worried about poisoning him with her touch. But with the right complications for this kind of character, maybe that sort of thing won’t bother him! He should be something of a laughing rogue and a daredevil, perhaps with an ungrammatical French nickname for everybody. If he’s known as an ex-supervillain, switching sides will be a problem, but a character this sneaky and charismatic shouldn’t be known for stealing anything except hearts. And maybe wallets. And lots of covers in the 90s. And once the Hope Diamond, off a really hot lady.

Edge smiled thinly as he stepped off the platform, heading back to the Gravois family who were watching the spectacle with tense, pale faces. They'd been through a hell of a lot in the last couple of days, and it was probably just habit that was keeping one or all from freaking out in the presence of the super-people. "Probably so," Mark agreed. "But if he's busy being pissed at me, he won't be getting pissed at you guys." His grin turned crooked. "You may not know this," he admitted, "but I can be pretty irritating when I put my mind to it."

I love, love, love the concept. The sheet looks mostly OK: I like that he's primarily a social character given his gradually aging body. You might benefit from setting the abilities so you're rolling all 'round' numbers (10s or 5s), but that's totally optional.. My only real concern is with the bladed disks: Equipment shouldn't have the Accurate feat. That's what the Masterwork feat is for. (Masterwork providing +1 rather than +2). Fix that up, and I think you're good to go. APPROVED

Spinning Hero PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 30 pp STR 14 (+2) DEX 24 (+7) CON 16 (+3) INT 10 (+0) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 12 (+1) Combat: 28 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Melee) DEF: +10 (+4 flat-footed) Init: +11 Grapple: +12 Saves: 8 pp TOU +10 (+3 Con, +7 Spinning) FORT +6 (+3 Con, +3) REF +15/+8 (+7 Dex, +1, +7 Spinning) WILL +6 (+2 Wis, +4) Skills: 36 r=9 pp Acrobatics 8 (+15) Concentration 4 (+6) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Stealth 8 (+15) Feats: 16 pp Acrobatic Bluff Attack Focus: Melee 4 Challenge (Fast Acrobatic Bluff) Dodge Focus 2 Evasion 2 Improved Initiative Move-By Action Power Attack Takedown Attack 2 Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 59 pp Concealment 4 (all visual) (Flaw: Partial) (PF: Close Range) [5 pp] Corrosion 10 [30+2=32 pp] AP: Damage 10 (Extras: Area [burst], Selective) AP: Damage 10 (Extras: Autofire, Penetrating) Flight 3 (50 MPH) [6 pp] Immunity 1 (vertigo) [1 pp] Spinning 7 (PF: Radius Sight) [15 pp] costs abilities 30 + combat 28 + saves 8 + skills 9/36 + feats 16 + powers 59 = 150 pts --- Design Notes: Here's another build that makes use of a rarely-used power: Spinning. As long as our plucky heroine maintains her velocity, she has +7 to her TOU and +7 to her Reflex save. (With Radius Sight, she can see in all directions as she does so, making it very tough to sneak up on her and also making logical that immunity to vertigo. Not to the film stylings of Alfred Hitchcock, that is, but rather that her attacks on her inner ear don't bother her. I've tried to give her powers that I think befit someone with super-speed spinning: she can soar into the air like a top o the breeze, she can only barely be seen while she's going full-speed, and additionally she can cut through enemies like a buzzsaw with rapidly whirling hands. With Takedown Attack and her various attacks, she can cleave through a group like nobody's business. If she focuses all her attention on one dance partner, well, she can just about take them down easy as pie. In my mind, this is the greatest heroine of Hobart, Tasmania: perhaps her native abilities manifested while under stress at a dance competition in the big city? That makes her something of a country girl in the big city, given Tasmania's relative poverty and isolation from the rest of Australia. Plenty of good roleplaying potential there. Despite the low whine she emits in my mind when her powers are operating, she's also a very good sneak, perhaps instead revolving through the air with the invisible grace of helicopter blades. Balancing her career as a dancer and performer is going to be an important part of her superhero career, naturally! Perhaps she's hit it big in her career in more ways than one, and has come to Freedom City to make her fortune. With her decent TOU and massive Reflex bonus, she's basically invulnerable vs. Area attacks: use that to your advantage vs. area spammers! People will think of this as a girly character right up until you punch them several thousand times in a second; use this to your advantage as everyone underestimates the gaudily dressed ballet dancer! Problems you may have with taking other people in Flight (what with the puking and all) are very valuable complications! (They also mean your friends won't want to bum a ride off you!) You've got broad stunting possibilities: Deflect? Nauseate? I could see Impervious too, as the character rotates so fast that anything fired at her bounces off. She'd be pretty fun to play, I think.

"The logistics are difficult," answered Harrier flatly. "Generally magical para-dimensions are collapsed into the larger universal well as it plunges into the Coil." Firing up his pike, he said, "Wander and I will endeavor to destroy the material component of the energy when it materializes. If that fails," he added, looking straight at Wander and the others. "The building must be destroyed and its material components reduced to their basic atoms. There is no safer way to ensure the safety of this dimension from the growing threat of the Terminus."

"If you guys can take charge of Singularity, I'll handle the Gravois family," said Edge, smiling a little before keeping his distance from Singularity on the transporter pad. "I'll contact the League and the school so they know what we're doing, and so they can process the refugees." He smiled thinly. "We can't just show up with Francois and get her registered tomorrow...and I think they like me more than that Erin does. I'll make sure no one comes looking around Blackstone until after you've already processed what needs processing."

Charismatic Magnetic Controller PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 24 pp STR 10 (+0) DEX 16 (+3) CON 14 (+2) INT 12 (+1) WIS 14 (+2) CHA 18 (+4) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Thrown Objects/TK) DEF: +10 (+3 flat-footed) Grapple: +6/+20 Saves: 15 pp TOU +10 (+2 Con, +8 Protection) FORT +5 (+2 Con, +3) REF +7 (+3 Dex, +4) WILL +10 (+2 Wis, +8) Skills: 56 r=14 pp Bluff 6 (+10) Diplomacy 11 (+15) Intimidate 11 (+15) Knowledge: History 4 (+5) Knowledge: Physical Sciences 4 (+5) Languages 4 (Chinese, English, German, Polish) (Base; Yiddish) Notice 8 (+10) Sense Motive 8 (+10) Feats: 16 pp Beginner’s Luck Dodge Focus 4 Improved Initiative Inspire 4 Jack of all Trades Leadership Luck Move-By Action Power Attack Uncanny Dodge (auditory) Powers: 57 pp Flight 1 (10 MPH) [2 pp] Impervious TOU 8 (Extra: Duration [sustained]) [8 pp] Magnetic Mastery Array [33+2=35 pp] Telekinesis 10 (Extra: Damaging) (PFs: Accurate 2, Precise) AP: Telekinesis 10 (Extras: Area [burst], Selective) (Flaw: Range [Touch]) (PFs: Reduced Progression 2, Precise) AP: Telekinesis 10 (Extra: Range [Perception]) (PFs: Attack Specialization (Thrown Objects) 2, Split Attack) Protection 8 [8 pp] Super-Senses 4 (Metal Awareness, Detect 2 (Metal) [Radius]) [4 pp] costs abilities 24 + combat 24 + saves 15 + skills 14/56 + feats 16 + powers 57 = 150 pts ---- Design Notes: Here's a radical mutant activist turned superhero: a Malcolm X after his conversation to non-violence. He's an incredibly charismatic man, capable of leading a team of low-level characters into basically even combat with much more capable and well-trained fighters. He's also a powerful magnetic controller, who has emancipated his powers from the shackles of magnetism to be able to fight and win in very broad terms: his need for some rubber science version of electromagnetism to use his powers is a Complication, not a Flaw or a drawback. In other words, he's really very badass! (If you're looking to build the movie version of this guy, I'd put him at about this range with almost everyone else closer to 6-8; emulating his comics version as an NPC should be in the 12-15 range. After all, he could fight the PL 10 X-Men and the PL 12-15 Avengers and come out about as well each time) He's got broad descriptors. Need to rip the metal out of the bones of the Feral Canadian? Stunt an Incurable Damage, or even Affects Objects Corrosion, off your big array. Need to kill a security guard for the iron in his blood? (Note, hero characters shouldn't do that, obviously!) Drain Con! For stunts like disarming a room full of thugs, you've got your Selective Area TK: your STR score with the Telekinesis should easily let you disarm those bad guys. He's got a very good Will Save, as befits someone who has so often gone up against a famous mentalist, but as demonstrated in X-2 his Fort save is something of a weak spot. I did not include any sort of asteroid base for him; bases are usually jointly shared if he's on a team, and if not he should save his PP to buy something like that in play. A family of annoying super-kids is a complication. (Why do your daughters dress like that? A reaction to their repressive postwar Eastern European childhoods perhaps? Feh! And why does your son never call...) That shapeshifting girlfriend of yours (represented by my Sneak Thief build upthread) is her own character and decidedly not a Sidekick or Minion. In Freedom City, this character is almost certainly a Terminus baby, perhaps a product of the invasion of 1965 who is using his new powers to protect the younger generation of Terminus mutants from a world that fears and hates them. An Immunity to aging is a good idea if you want to make him around and active since WWII; as it is any deaging he's undergone is definitely a plot device. An ex-supervillain will have quite a series of Complications around him, especially if he's still political. But luckily he's persuasive enough that even his enemies still take him in, Revolving Face-Heel Door or not.

Vampire Slayer PL: 10 (150) Abilities: 50 pp STR 24 (+7) DEX 16 (+3) CON 24 (+7) INT 14 (+2) WIS 16 (+3) CHA 14 (+2) Combat: 24 pp ATK: +6 (+10 Ax) DEF: +10 (+3 flat-footed) Init: +7 Grapple: +13 Saves: 13 pp TOU: +10 (+7 Con, +3) FORT: +10 (+7 Con, +3) DEX: +6 (+3 Dex, +3) WIS: +10 (+3 Wis, +7) Skills: 100 r=25 pp Bluff 13 (+15) Intimidate 13 (+15) Knowledge: Arcane Lore 13 (+15) Knowledge: History 8 (+10) Knowledge: Civics 8 (+10) Knowledge: Tactics 8 (+10) Languages 1 (Old Slavonic) (Base: English) Notice 12 (+15) Sense Motive 12 (+15) Stealth 12 (+15) Feats: 23 pp All-Out Attack Attack Specialization: Ax 2 Blind-Fight Dodge Focus 4 Fearless Improved Initiative Leadership Luck Master Plan 2 Move-By Action Power Attack Quick Draw [draw] Second Chance (Arcane Lore checks) Skill Mastery (Bluff, Intimidate, Notice, Sense Motive) Takedown Attack Taunt Ultimate Save (Will) Uncanny Dodge (mental) Powers: 17 pp Device 1 (Axe) (Easy to Lose) [3 pp] -Strike 3 (PFs: Critical Strike [undead], Mighty) [5] Immortality (1/week) [4 pp] Protection 3 [3 pp] Speed 1 (10 MPH) [1 pp] Super-Senses 6 (Undead Awareness, Detect Undead 2 (Acute, Analytical, Radius) (all mental) [6 pp] costs abilities 50 + combat 24 + saves 6 + skills 25/100 + feats 23 + powers 17 = 150 pts Design Notes: WHO drove a stake through the heart of the Grave Power? WHOSE armies burned Atlanta, where the shrieks of the undead within were sweet music to the cause of righteous freedom? WHOSE Emancipation Proclamation ensured that all Americans would be free and that none, white nor black, would ever again be bought and sold like cattle? And WHO, by his sheer force of will, has continued his struggle against the unrighteous hordes of vampires even after his own alleged demise? Ladies and gentlemen, none other than the 16th President of the United States, the Great Emancipator himself, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, VAMPIRE SLAYER! True, his legacy may have been tainted by time: his heirs may have accommodated so-called 'loyalist' vampires so much that ultimately a kind of undead domination survived to hold down the South for another few generations. How many undead Senators held their posts in the Deep South for decade upon decade? Many. But today, only a few would openly call themselves pro-vampire in America. (I do think it's a pretty obvious dogwhistle that the other party keeps calling President Brooks a dhampir; as if his race or his place of birth were an issue in 2011!) So yeah, here's Abraham Lincoln as an immortal vampire slayer. I've had to compromise on the original Lincoln a little (i.e., a faithful non-supernatural Lincoln should be a grappler), but with his mystic rail-splitting ax in hand and his supernatural ability to hunt the undead, this version of Abraham Lincoln is ready to take to the streets of the campaign city with vampire-hunting on his mind. In re the Critical Strike on his ax: I took a page from the corebook Martial Artist for that. If he rolls a critical hit while fighting the undead, he can spend an HP to gain Favored Opponent (undead) and thus score a crit even on something usually immune to them. I figure his century and a half of vampire fighting has given him an encyclopedic knowledge of their ways, and a larger presence in the supernatural community than you might think. Various herbs and treatments have prolonged his life, giving him a supernatural resilience in his battles. With his Master Plan and Leadership, he's a great leader, while his Taunt feat represents all those old-timey jokes Lincoln used to tell, but this time at the expense of the ravening hordes of undead! His STR and CON may seem high, but Abraham Lincoln was a big, imposing guy. His CHA may seem a bit low, but most people who met Lincoln didn't think much of him: perhaps a use of that high Bluff to better confound his enemies? He's got the Blind-Fight so he can engage his enemies in the dark of the night that is their natural home, but of course he's better off fighting them on his own ground. He could benefit from a purchase of the Ritualist feat, but Honest Abe always preferred to rely on specialists rather than being a specialist in everything himself. He'd make an interesting counterpart to the Rough Rider upthread, a solo champion while RR is head of a secret government faction. Perhaps they've been rivals down the many long years?