Ari

GM With a rush of wind and the now-familiar sickening shock of the Earth's gravity loosing its grip, the Scarab took flight. Soaring past the flicking flashes of windows reflecting the broad, genial Moon, the darkened streets rushing up to meet her, Kamala had mere moments to enjoy the wonders of wings before she was spotted. The men in the uniforms hadn't gotten far, but had just enough space to hear and see her coming before she could reach them. One looked up, started, and let go of their line with one hand to point frantically upwards. "Hey! She's-!" The apparent commander cut them off "Shut up! We've got eyes! Open fire!" With a little awkward fumbling, spinning and swinging on their rappel lines, the men in Titan Security gear managed to raise their weapons, take aim, and fire! Unfortunately for them, they were aiming at a moving target in the air. Most of the shots whizzed past harmlessly(though true to its design, the force-field generator recognized the chemical composition and vaporized them when they struck the perimeter. No sense taking any chances), but not all. Two shots struck the force-field square with enough power to break through!

Okay, for the close proximity to the Building, going to need a DC15 Reflex check to keep the descending bears in the Scarab's sights. Otherwise -3 to hit. For their part, they have disadvantage/partial Cover to deal with due to their being on swaying rappel lines. The Bears: 12, 14, 7, 7. Half of them miss, the other two manage to at least get shots in the general vicinity of the Scarab III: 24, 18. Both strike her armor, forcing a DC20 TOU save unless she can make a DC15 Dexterity save to halve the Blast ranks to DC17.

Dol-Druth saw himself, for the first time, as meat. More to the point, he saw himself. Alone, cut off from the herd, metaphorical jaws and claws and lashing blades skulking, waiting for that perfect moment. His huge black eyes blinked and twitched, atavism setting in slowly as the carapace and mandibles, the soft, sensitive fur, all the countless signs of their distant ancestry sliding back in as the animal inside quavered. Bloated from lack of mental exercise, weak from leaning on billions of other minds for protection, swimming with distracting minutia. He hadn't a chance against the lean psychic predator he had brought into the heart of Dotrae. Even the Hounds of the Khans, starved and beaten and twisted into balls of seething psychic aggression and hunting-instinct, were nothing like this. This was like nothing natural, not training but conditioning, not skill but programming, not power but load-out. For the first time, Dotrae turned countless eyes to behold a true abomination, a psionic blade sheathed in human flesh. Tears spilled from Dol-Druth's now-compound eyes as he stared at the repeating flashes of sensation, felt all that had been done to ensure "Elias" would turn out like this. "This...this is monstrous" he breathed, wobbling with sympathy and terror. He took a stumping fumble backwards "Who...why would anyone do this?" You know Dotrae was best envisioned as eyes, so eyes were what the duo on that towering pillar saw cluster about them. A night sky made of black, pitiless insect, spider-like eyes. The visions of lives past and present flickered out, replaced with bloodless scrutiny. This is what they're all like, deep down. Terres is a prison, this is an inmate born into the system, they cannot be allowed to escape. "Then why did we decide we should move to their system?" Dol-Druth briefly regained some of his own features as he boggled furiously at the psi-sky "If we all thought that, then how in Bird's own name didn't we know?!" Your predecessor learned to hide his thoughts from us. The reverse was therefore possible. We learned how. Throwing up his pudgy, ham-sized hands, Dol-Druth turned back to Elias with a profound grimace on his face "W-Iee beg your pardon, Sri Silvestri, Iee had no idea my fellow Dotrae wanted to-" he twisted his improbably-thick neck to glare up at the manymind "-do what, specifically?" We will teach him better coping methods, shoulder some of his mental burden to give his plan greater odds of success and absorb his memories so we can forestall the enslavement of the stars by these creatures. "That last was much more eloquently put by ourself, but Iee cannot deny our part in this, Elias" Dol-Druth fumed, crossing his arms and sitting down with a *whump*, rear legs folding under the distended thorax "If you desire an exit I can arrange one." Elias, we are ready, through our Speaker we see your suffering and stand ready to receive it. Reach out to us.

In conjunction with Mo the Morlock. @Exaccus Any thoughts?

Player Name: Ari Character Name: Mag-Might Power Level: 7 (105/105PP) Trade-Offs: +- Attack / +- Damage, +- Defence / +- Toughness, or None Unspent Power Points: 0 In Brief: Upper-strata Magmin bruiser, dispatched to the surface on an impossible quest. Catchphrase: "MRGH!" Theme: Alternate Identity: Magh'kee/Maggy (Secret: nobody knows Maggy is Mag-Might) Birthplace: The Glasslands, Sub-Terra Residence: An apartment complex in downtown Emerald City, Oregon Base of Operations: The Emerald Cities Occupation: Underwater welder/ knight of the Chasm Affiliations: The Chasm, Sub-Terrans, the Oregon Welder's Union Family: 3000 brothers and sisters born from the same sorcery. Description: Age: 53 (DoB: 1964) Apparent Age: N/A Gender: Woman Ethnicity: Green obsidian Height: 4'6"/1.5m Weight: 330lbs/150kg Eyes: Opal Hair: dark green/black strings Maggy is stocky, a vaguely human-shaped block of green and blue obsidian crystal, burning inside with a never-ending green flame. Her eyes glow, her crystal skin is warm to the touch and slight wafts of flame lick from her mouth when she's angry or excited. Her long strings of glassy hair is shaped into small, numerous loops that frame her head like an elegant crown. Her hands are huge and powerful, and her feet are little more delicate. She's slightly top-heavy, with broad shoulders and a disproportionately large head. Most of the time, she wears large coats and hats to disguise herself among humanity. Sometimes she remembers to wear shoes. On the job, she wears proper protective gear. As Mag-Might, she wears nothing at all. History: Magmin are born from sorcery, transformative spells laid on humans, sub-terrans, morlocks and lemurians. Maggy was born from from fire and volcanic glass, what she once was a mystery never to be revealed, not that she's interested. She had a new life to live. She joined the communities of upper-strata magmin that dwell far above the seething magma flows and smoking lava tubes of their blazing brethren, in the dazzling gardens and wide, pitch-black meadows of razor-sharp. She learned the ways of war by endless skirmishes in broken ruins, ambushes in the depths of sunless seas and one-on-one duels at the blinding mouths to the overworld. Despite the violence and fear, she was content. There was the clan, those who meant it harm, and her, who stood between them. The Chasm was her home, with all its beauties and horrors, and that was all the world she needed. For fifty years Maggy lived like this, and the few times she saw people from the surface she kept well-hidden, her bright eyes watching the slender, frail creatures with awe and pity. Then came Lord Quake and the stonekin. A race of giants who could mould and reshape the very world around them, gods with fiery eyes and an endless hunger. Lord Quake named himself the King-Under-The-Mountain, the Black Spear of Justice and the Saviour of Monsters. He brought hundreds of surface creatures with him, pitiful things not meant for the deep, and made them lush and peaceful homes in the great Chasm. He made a new sun, one that even the morlocks could bear to see by, carved out palaces, reactivated long-forgotten technology that protected all in his dominion, banished or slew terrible monsters and named all Sub-Terra as his rightful domain. He told the people of the underworld of the evils of humanity, their rapacious greed and the need to band together to survive. He demanded peace between all who would join him. The morlocks and the magmin were the first to break this truce, a squabble over tunnel rights leading to a pitched battle which boiled over into Chasm's tiers. Both sides found themselves separated within moments, and forced to confront the fury of Lord Quake. He spoke softly, but in his wrath he forced a terrible price on the feuding peoples: to each give up one of their number in a mission to the surface. Two were chosen, one of them Maggy, who hadn't even been in the fight. They were charged with finding an ancient artefact which was rumored to control the flow of continents, giving one the power to cause or avert earthquakes at will. They had a year to succeed. Training was swift and to the point, instructing the pair in surface politics, culture and language relevant to their mission in the Emerald Cities. They were dismissed with enough money and legal cover identities for their sojourn amongst the humans, aided by a strange fact about the Emerald Cities. For decades they had become a haven for metas and mutants with no interest in heroics or villainy. As a result, truly strange appearances and minor powers weren't as uncommon as they are on most of the surface. Maggy found herself a job helping in the underwater construction of the city's new wave-power generator, with more than enough money coming in to support herself and her strange, chatty partner. Now all she needs to do is find a mysterious mystical weapon, bring it back to Lord Quake, and all will be back to normal. She hopes. Personality & Motivation: Maggy is a straightforward and uncomplicated person. She's the muscle of the operation, a role she's inhabited for half a century, one she understands and enjoys. She's mildly curious about the strange world of humanity, but always as a tourist attraction rather than as a place to really appreciate for its own sake. It's still relatively the same routine as her old life, but the stakes are higher. Deep inside, she relishes this as a jolly, inconsequential adventure. She doesn't entirely trust Lord Quake, but in her own calculations it would be much riskier to defy him than to obey. Her relationship with Mo is one of strict lines and boundaries. He deals with all the things with talking and making problems go away, she steps in when things can't be talked out. She doesn't see Mo as a friend so much as an invaluable tool for their mutual success. Powers & Tactics: By and large Maggy charges in and punches, then punches again. Then breathes fire by venting the inner furnace that powers her crystalline body. Then punches some more. She's a competent but uninspired fighter, with the additional mobility of creating launchers out of the ground. She's confident that if she gets into real trouble she can just regenerate her way out of it. Power Descriptions: All crystal and fire, Maggy is an upper-strata magmin with the power to partially reshape herself and the world she stands on. All the elements that make up her body are, in a real sense, part of her no matter where they are or how scattered throughout the crust. They can be summoned into a fragile pillar that rockets her into the air, used to repair her crystalline lattice and even bolster her already prodigious strength by partially bonding her to the planet. Her inner fires let her create light in deepest darkness and can be concentrated into white-hot bolts or great green waves of fire. Her crystal body lets her ignore most mundane concerns, but has drawbacks. She must eat, sleep, avoid cold places and is totally incapable of human-style speech. Complications: Code: Unlike Mo, Maggy operates on a very strict code of ethics. She can't refuse a challenge, must keep her word under any circumstances and must never reveal the secret of the Sub-Terran Chasm. Mission: To find the Claw of Ghorummaz, a powerful artefact. To protect her ally 'Mo'. To serve the mighty Lord Quake. Secret: To most people she's encountered, Maggy is just a weird mutant with a disfiguring condition and severe disability. That she's kin to the magmin of Sub-Terra must be kept secret, to avoid a LOT of awkward questions and scrutiny her mission can't survive. Speechless: Maggy cannot talk in any human tongue. She's learned how to communicate via sign language but she cannot do so verbally. The Thinnest Veil: Keeping the secret that she's not Mag-Might is impossible in the long-term. Abilities: 10 + 0 + 8 - 2 - 2 + 6 = 20pp STR 20 (+5) DEX 10 (+0) CON 18 (+4) INT 8 (-1) WIS 8 (-1) CHA 16 (+3) Combat: 10 + 8 = 18pp ATK: +5 (+7 Unarmed, Blast) DEF: +7 (4 Base, +3 Dodge Bonus, +2 flat-footed) Init: +8 Grapple: +17 Saves: 3 + 5 + 6 = 14 pp TOU +10 (+4 Con, +3 Protection, +7/+0 Impervious) FORT +7 (+4 Con, +3) REF +5 (+0 Dex, +5) WILL +5 (-1 Wis, +6) Skills: 6pp = 24r Intimidate 9 (+12) Language 3(American ASL, English, Igneous, Sub-Terran(native)) Notice 6 (+5) Sense Motive 6 (+5) Feats: 10pp Attack Specialization (Unarmed) 1 Dodge Focus 3 Improved Initiative 2 Luck Power Attack Second Chance (Intimidate checks) Uncanny Dodge (tactile) Powers: 45 pp Burrowing 1 (1MPH)[1PP] Environmental Control 2(10ft radius, Light, Flaws: Range(Touch))[1PP] Immunity 7 (All Suffocation, Hot, High-Pressure, Radioactive Environments, Disease, Poison) [7pp] Immunity 10 (Fire Damage, Heat Damage; Flaws: Half-Effect)[5PP] Impervious Toughness 7 [7 pp] Protection 3 [3 pp] Regeneration 5 (Bruised 3(No Action), Resurrection 2(1 Day); Power Feats: Regrowth; Flaws: Source (stone))[3PP] Super-Senses 2 (Tremorsense) [2 pp] Mantle Array 7 (14PP Array, Feats: Alternate Power 3)[17PP] Base Power: Blast 6 (Feats: Accurate, Precise)[14PP] AP: Damage 7 (Extras: Area(Cone)[14PP] AP: Damage 2(Extras: Penetrating 2, Feats: Mighty[DMG7])[5/14PP] + Super-Movement 3(Wall-Crawling 3)[6/14PP] + Enhanced Burrowing 2(to Burrowing 3(5MPH); Extras: Penetrating 1)[3/14PP] AP: Super-Strength 10(+50, 70 (+effective STR; Flaws: Duration(Sustained); Feats: Groundstrike(50ft radius), Shockwave(50ft max range, DC20 TOU))[7PP] + Leaping 7(x250 jump distance(3750ft long-run/1875ft long-stand/937ft vertical) Drawback: -4 pp Disability (Cannot Speak) (Very Common, Moderate) [-4] Vulnerable (Cold) (Common, Major(x2 DMG rank)) [-4 pp] Cost: abilities 20 + combat 18 + saves 14 + skills 6/24 + feats 10 + powers 41 - drawback 8 = 105/105PP

@Tipop Praetorians are based in deep space far beyond Sol, but their home of Coalition Victory Station is accessible via a wormhole orbiting Pluto. Basically the Legion of Superheroes, but wholly extraterrestrial. As for joining one of their threads, I feel it'd be good to have a slightly stronger tie than just random happenstance. What if CoVic Station is in the same place as an ancient starspire Prof. Pec read about back in the day, once the home of powerful warriors of light who were destroyed when they ventured too far into the depths of space unprepared. CoVic Station is known to the superhuman community at large, the wormhole to the scientific community, and Prof. Pec figures that history might repeat?

You can just hit him, and he's not readied his Force Field generator, and is flat-footed, so Wolf takes the hit. Minion, and you're taking a Fatigue condition, so Wolf fails his Toughness save in full and is knocked out. Fox hears and bursts in. Initiative, if you will. Fox goes on 17

GM All to Salmon, please. A Waste of Water Do It Again Edison vs Tesla 2k17 Everything is Illegal Here! Lines & Lining Stronghold Blues The Speaker Meeting of the Minds on an Exponential Level Lord a sorry month.

OOC thread for this thread. @SomethingHere @TheAbsurdist Initiatives, if you would!

GM August 4th, 2017 Outside the Eastern Seaboard Bank, Lincoln Branch Summer was fading away. It was still too hot for non-summer wear, but every Freedonian felt the chill coming off the bay a little stronger each day. They were cramming as much summer into their lives as they could. Including the criminals. With a shattering *SKREE* the bank's windows exploded outward, letting a dozen women in yellow and black, ski masks with welding glass on their heads and chunky electro-punk guns in their hands, into the streets of Freedom! At that moment, ensconced in a limousine that he had, on some unaccountable urge, called from its cubby hole back at the Transnational Building, Amir al-Misri had spent the last half hour with a voluable redheaded man with a thick beard, a $350 haircut streaked with a light dusting of grey, and a 12,000,000 watt smile. Max Mars, of MarsTech, who had somehow talked him into listening to a spiel about wave power generators. The explosion had, mercifully forced him to pause and politely wait until the crisis was resolved. Meanwhile, just down the street was a certain Carol, who unlike the rest of the running, shouting Freedonian, could do something about this.

GM The giant smiled one of those all-too-familiar smirks. The kind that urged you to cross the street and consider an alternate route home, even in absence of all other evidence. "Get physical? I can do that." Then he tensed and leaped, the puny colossus rocketing straight at Moira's face! Only to jerk to a halt with a cry of surprise and pain, hissing, red-hot chains holding him still and coming from seeemingly every direction, all but that of the nondescript man who had just moments ago been in a blue-collar disguise and now sulked in a plain brown exomis tunic, manacles embracing his wrists and ankles. "Lady Edone, please excuse my comrade Tityos. He is an idiot. I'll take you up on your offer." The leonine fellow in the fine suit now wore kingly dress, a thin gold band around his head and a sea-blue tunic conveying the same message as his corporate uniform from moments ago. Spreading his arms genially, he went on with a smile "I am Sisyphus, lately king of Ephyra, the man who dared tweak Olympus' up-turned noses. Most unjustly imprisoned in Erebus, I've petitioned...the Lord of that realm to release me on parole. He has accepted and sent these other former inmates with me, on one condition: we return that which belongs to him and the divine family from Earth. The rest were daunted by the challenge, but I met it willingly!" As he spoke, Tityos had grimaced and writhed in his bonds, flesh sizzling, but unable to cry out thanks to the chains locking his mouth shut. At the one-time king's description of their departure, a roar of rage burst from his searing lips. Only Ixion seemed to notice, flinching and glancing hatefully at Sisyphus, who smiled blandly and added "Tityos is the exception, he has been released to keep him away from the tender ladies of the outer realms." The lean one had seemed to lose his stutter. The wine, probably. "They sent me, Tantalus" the hollow-eyed scarecrow of a man whispered, but his voice carried far and clear, clad in the tattered remnants of old finery stained with food and drink "down there because...I made a bad meal. Very, very bad. Not savory at all. Then they let me out like King Sisyphus says." He licked his lips and said no more. Sisyphus nodded to Ixion, who was laboriously pulling Tityos through the air back to the small semi-circle "Our third king there got it into his head to seduce the Olympian queen. Now he's the father of centaurs. A man who adjusts his expectations is such a rare thing." He was the only one who laughed. The water-bearer was now in simple white linen, which did not mesh well with the water pouring steadily down her side. With an air of utter weariness she looked at Divine and asked bluntly "Will you just hand over the jewelry? I promise, nothing else needs to happen. I need...we need to atone for our crimes, or we'll never leave Tartarus again. Murdering my husband was bad enough. 'Alethia' is 'truth' in your tongue, such was I named and such do I speak." She turned sharply to Ixion, pointing at the struggling giant "Drop him. We all need to at our best." The chained man ground his teeth but obeyed, letting Tityos fall in a heap on the asphalt. At a gesture from Alethia water flowed from the amphora. It flowed over the cuts and burns, washing them away and leaving soft pink skin in its wake. The giant stumbled to his feet, feeling his face with wide eyes...until he saw Scion, whereupon the softness vanished. "You might best one of us, Lady Edone," Sisyphus' voice was cloying, as patronizing as someone talking to a small child "But surely, as you observed, this fight is hopeless? Surrender the weapon, there's a good girl." With long, swinging strides, the past king stepped up to Moira and stretched out a hand expectantly, his gun in his other hand.

GM The small grey speck bounced across the floor. For all of second. Then a two-foot square of flat red shone under it. The next it had vanished in a cloud of dust and nigh-identical grey specks and shards exploding out of the ground, blown to nothing by the wall-mounted guns. It was only as the cacophany of bursting rocks and scattering shrapnel died down that a very odd fact was noticed: the guns themselves, for whatever reason, were silent. The obelisk of obstruction(the Disciples: The Following card his nephew had placed entirely too much faith in) gave no sign of pleasure or dismay at is terrible destructive power. At the least some kind of attention would be expected, but the pile of archaic tech turned to far-future application was unfazed. Perhaps it would be best to speak with it. Make some common ground.

Additional requestment: The 21-Gun Kid, Omega's gofer and probably a Rawhide Kid expy but go nuts.

No worries, Phoenix! In that case, alternative request: gravity-controlling battlesuiter.

Variable Descriptor exists in 2E, don't worry.

Preserver Stones & virdian Stones Fragmented remnants of efforts to crystallize raw energy, these relics of Preserver science have lain buried under the Atlas Mountains for millennia, only recently becoming unearthed and exploited. History The Star Stone, power source of the mighty Citadel, its master, the artificial being called Mentor and the famous Star Knights. The Nightstone, gateway to the Schattenwelt and conduit of yet darker secrets, long lost on Zultas and recently come to Earth. The Moonstone, core of Farside City's society and infrastructure, with unimaginable transformative power. These and more were created by the enigmatic Preservers to sustain and empower their creations throughout the cosmos. But, as with all science, there is no clean line from hypothesis to successful result. A small group of gems, enough for one human to count within their lifetime, were preceded by countless failures that had to be shattered to avert catastrophe. These fragments of searing cosmic power could have been dumped into some black hole, but the Preservers had different ideas. Most of these shards had exhibited a loose kind of intelligence, a compatibility and drive to connect with other forms of life. On Earth their experiments in uplifting new intelligences were just beginning to bear fruit and they had already noticed a faint glimmer of what might be psionic potential. The tribes with roughly the strongest strains of this potential were taken to a preserve on the Moon while the Preservers started a little terraforming. Where the Columbia River would one day empty into the Pacific Ocean a mountain range arose, covering a titanic extraterrestrial mineral deposit emitting a subtle psychic pull on humanity. The Preservers then left the deposit be, confident that humans would discover it and be guided further towards a future mirroring the Preservers' own. But all those shards' competing energy impulses slowly warped the shattered, failed cosmic gems. The pull on human minds ebbed to nothing in mere decades. By the time the people who would become the Chinook had moved into the river delta thousands of years ago, their migration had nothing to do with the staggering wealth hidden in the harsh and game-poor mountains. For millennia the Preservers' gambit mutated and fused, until something totally new simmered beneath Mt. Stanley and Mt. Forge as the young volcanoes hurled fire and ash into the sky. One eruption sent a rich vein of viridian scattering over the globe. It's only recently that the so-called viridian Stones have started to come out of the ground and directly into human hands, starting with the 1840's gold rush where the mania swept all the way to tiny Fort Emerald. Though the Atlas Range turned out to have a startlingly rich supply of gold, silver and precious stones, it put Fort Emerald on the map when Viridian Stones were discovered. Their composition by then had bonded with terrestrial chemistry, the lustre and quality of these "Atlas Emeralds" raising many eyebrows. However their still-latent bond to living things made it hard for people to sell or trade them, feeling an irrational attachment to the gems and little urge to find more. That and the trouble and expense of shipping said riches out of isolated Fort Emerald helped slowly kill the mining industry in what shortly became the first Emerald City, though viridian stones have recently undergone a renaissance thanks to a dedicated tourism and heritage marketing campaign focused on the rugged frontier days of the 1800's. In the 1860's Emerald City's one and only brush with the American Civil War occurred when Confederate agents stole stocks of precious metals, gemstones and cash from the Red River Diamond Exchange, including a shipment of viridian stones meant for Freedom, New Jersey. In the modern day viridian stones are usually found in centuries-old heirlooms, chic handmade jewelry, arranged into street art sculptures, or as components in secret supertech labs scattered throughout the Emerald Cities. In the Sub-Terran Chasm(other upcoming Guidebook entry) created by the dimensional reshaping which resulted in the Atlas Range, viridian stones are the universal currency among the Igneous and Magmin kingdoms, as well as the basis for the new technology of the Morlock coalition. They have no psychic impression on non-humans, so the stones trade monsters' hands with ease. What they are A viridian stone is in some ways analogous to one of its greater cousins, a nigh-limitless and effectively infinitely-malleable power source accessible to both technology and organic beings. The chief difference is focus and scale. A viridian stone isn't capable of the same stunning feats as, for instance, the Star Stone, but it is also much less overwhelming and manageable. Physically the viridian stones are, in natural state, raw minerals found nowhere else on Earth. They are smooth and faintly warm to the touch, with obvious jagged breaks where they were shattered and partially-reformed in Earth's volcanic furnace. Polishing and shaping them is easy even for unskilled persons, and a common hobby around the Columbia river delta, revealing an inner light. What they do viridian stones enhance and strengthen existing attributes of the beings they bond to and who bond to them. It makes insightful people more empathetic, the strong-willed are even more unshakable, if superhumans get their hands on them they discover new things about their powers. Some of them are similar to daka crystals and can transmit and store energy in an incredible variety of forms, a quality being investigated by ASTRO Labs. Some people who bond with viridian have their latent powers awakened. But usually the stones cannot spark "real" powers in isolation, most being far too weak. There is a loose correlation between the colour of the Stone and the trait it strengthens, though that varies drastically thanks to humans normally only capable of seeing in the visible light spectrum. Roughly, the most common colours are: RED: Red viridian stones strengthen inner resolve, focusing existing drives and making it easier to push through fears or distractions. Stronger bonds can make one all but impervious to outside influences but at a cost. Some become obsessively fixed on something that used to be a mild interest, given to enormous mood swings or driven at a goal to the point of irrationality. Mechanically speaking, they usually affect Will saves and Will effects along with Concentration checks. ORANGE: Orange viridian stones increase one's attention to detail, to how things work. Most commonly this makes their people better in social situations or in understanding technology, but culture, physics and other areas of academia open up as well. As the bond strengthens innovations and new angles come more naturally and a viridian bearer can get an accurate read on a mark or comprehend alien power systems with a mere glance. The problem is how it tends to push people toward determinism or fatalism, restricting their potential unless the bearer has a powerful will and sense of self. Bearers of orange stones also run the risk of megalomania thanks to seeing around the veil that blinds the world. Mechanically it effects Craft, Knowledge, Notice and Sense Motive checks, gives bonuses to Assessment, Artificing and Invention rolls and can give access to the Analytical(Normal Visual) or Detect Weakness Super-Sense. YELLOW: Stones of this color attract and hold the attention of other beings on its bearer, giving them an imposing and magnetic presence. Bonding with a yellow viridian stone lends itself well to natural commanders or shyer types who hate being talked over. Bearing this stone runs the risk of autocratic tendencies, loss of empathy and otherwise having trouble being a follower and not a leader. Mechanically, it can give bonuses to Intimidate checks, Daze, Fascinate and Startle rolls and enhancement to Emotion-Control: Fear and Mind-Control rolls. GREEN: Verdant viridian stones deepen ones understanding of their own and others' wellbeing and mental and physical state. Closer bonds with the stone even allow bearers to tangibly affect the health of other beings at a fundamental level, and improve their own phsyical capabilities. Stronger ties to greenstones can weaken the sense of humanity as bodies and minds become more under the bearer's control, either aloof and inhuman or savage and bestial. Mechanically they can give bonuses to base Attributes. Handle Animal, Knowledge(Behavioural Sciences/Life Sciences), Medicine and Sense Motive checks and enhance powers with a Constitution or Fort check. BLUE: The most common colour are the sky-blue stones. These tie minds together with thin threads, enhancing empathetic and persuasive traits, artistic skills and deception. Stronger bonds with the stone can turn a merely eloquent speaker into a spellbinder, evoke hope in the depths of utter despair, give insights into the depths of another's thoughts and feelings and radically alter other's perception of the bearer. Mechanically, they give bonuses to Bluff, Diplomacy, Disguise, Handle Animal, Perform, Sense Motive and Sleight of Hand skills, at higher levels they add to the bonuses from Aid actions, Distract, Inspires and Fascinate rolls, Mind-Reading, Mind-Control and Morph(increasing the DC on checks to Notice) rolls. INDIGO: The deeper blue expands perception. Bonding with an indigo stone grants eyes eagles would envy, or the skill to feel the tug and ebb of gravitons, the gift of never failing to know where anything you have touched is. Mechanically, indigo stones can give bonuses to Notice, Search, Sense Motive, Survival, Tracking, gain access to the Blind-Fight and Uncanny Dodge Feats, add a bonus to rolls on Perception range effects VIOLET: BLACK: WHITE:

GM @Exaccus Blessedly, the old quasi-temple to some forgotten ego wasn't a lesson in architectural excess. Exiting to the south took Nathaniel through a few crude concrete corridors with small rooms branching off of them. All were layed out so a single glance could see all inside, even without the long-broken lights in the walls. A Spartan(literally, faded images of the Doric militarists festooned the walls)bedroom with one rotted end table beside a rusted-out iron bed, a washroom dominated by a broken tank proudly labelled "INFINITE WATER SOURCE", three cramped store rooms filled with now-useless electronics that must have once been the pinnacles of engineering and a kitchen so sparse it was frankly comical. Mold, grout and fungi crawled across the filthy walls. The air was close and damp, something Nathaniel was at liberty to notice now that he wasn't pressed for breath underneath an invisible EM fist. Whatever damp and decay could erode and disintegrate, they had done. As well, great fissures gaped where some past tectonic event had shaken the building to its foundation. Actually, two events. One very recent. Dr. Deoxy arrived at the front door with no incident, guided by the sheer impossibility of going astray. At least, to the foyer's doorway. There he saw the first major obstacle the Conductor had put in his way: The front door, a massive pair of granite slabs that looked more expensive than Nathaniel's house, had been smashed in and lay in pieces throughout the cavernous, domed front hall. In their place was nothing. Nothing, that is, except for an obelisk of science, a copper and steel and golden giant stabbing out of the floor like some infernal javelin. Cables thrummed, visible through vents and emerging from the spearhead in a rainbow of thick black cords leading to a small battery mounted to the ceiling. It was covered in roaming cameras that slid noiselessly along its surface, twisting on stalks that let the bloodless Argus watch every inch of the foyer's floor. What the thing would do was unclear. Much more obvious in fuction were the turrets ringing the room, created by attaching crude robotic arms to ball joints welded to the walls. A crackle and hissz of static announced a hidden PA system. Over it sounded the brisk voice of the Conductor, distorted by the old-fashioned radio equipment. "Ah! My favorite opener, the good old 'the floor is death' test! We're starting off easy, so keep in mind the cameras I scavenged could only "see" in a pretty narrow spectrum." "This message was pre-recorded, don't worry. Activated by something thick as a person breaking a little current. Constant surveillance is unsporting, not to mention exceedingly tedious! Good luck." Meanwhile, @Sailor As if in answer to her question, a crystal-clear woman's voice barked out in a heavy European accent. "Attention, intruder! You've just crossed the BIG line! Captain Allspark and I, Tesla reborn, own this island and you are not allowed. I do not know who you think you are, or who you think I am, or if you think at all, frankly, but that's not the point! The point is I'll find you with my badass robots! They will capture you to avenge Orby Boo-Bot #9! Then... ...Uh... ...I'll... I'll think of something! Bye!" All around Mary the jungle began to seethe and clatter. She could hear things darting and buzzing, scrabbling and leaping, all of them harrying the steaming oddity. Through gaps in the misty canopy she could see squads of the "Orby Boo-Bots" trundle overhead, while in the distance stranger shadows slid from tree to tree. A gust of wind and one small slice of that all-enshrouding fog was briefly thrust aside, revealing something Torpedo Lass had never thought to see again rearing above her. A bulwark and castle of steel sunk into the jungle. Studded with rusted antennae and spotted with RADAR dishes. A battleship bridge. Two masts. A landscape of torn and melted metal she knew all too well. The USS Oklahoma. Something she hadn't seen since she'd been flung through time. The very ship she had been helping tow to her breakup right before that fatal storm and final battle. A cloud of the Orbies swung close to Mary...and veered away to give the wreck a wide berth.

Request: Magnetism controller with a sun for a head.

GM Silence stepped in after Endeavor's final words. Silence and immobility, as the hedron paused in mid-air and its sweeping 'eye' stopped inches from Powers' foot. The dull thrumming of the armory's fluorescent lights took over, even Sakurako's own breathing sounding like the labouring of a bellows. A brusque clopping, clicking noise began to sound against the door. Hardwire drumming her nails on the barrier. Dr. Volk caught Endeavor's eye, darting her own back and forth at the door, the implicit question hanging in the air long before she mouthed "Is this working?" With the Eye-dron still, but still activated, it was impossible to tell if Hardwire was earnestly or mockingly considering the figurative olive branch that had just been extended. She hadn't seemed too interested before, but that was then, before she knew about the common tie beyond blood that set the women apart from the greater number of humanity. The rattling accelerated, a staccato like dancing spider legs. On the other hand, she didn't have forever. By the sound of it she was on the clock and her vendetta was cutting into an already tight schedule. Besides which, someone who saw the notorious Dr. Otaku as a viable business partner wouldn't have much of an eye for scruples, to say nothing of Hardwire's open admission of working for the mysterious Ghostworks. The secretive cabal of super-scientists had shown precious little regard for scientific ethics or even those relating to human life. Could be that Hardwire and they had something more than just a mutual love of money. The tapping stopped, Sakurako felt the passage of some powerful EM signal, and the Eye-dron darted back through the door from whence it came, passing through like a pyramidal ghost. "Fine. I'll meet you where Dad took Mom fishing back in 2005. Got a job to do. Later, 'Rako." More silence happened, infringed with the growing noise of AEGIS rallying outside. Director Powers slid the safety back on, getting slowly to his feet and suppressing a wince, rubbing a calf with his free hand. "Goddamn cramps...Endeavor, thanks for that. Now that she's back on the run, it'll be easier to head her off. Know any way we can track her?" "Now hold on, Harry!" Dr. Volk struggled back to her feet, hampered by the clumsy armor, her face red and plastered with damp hair as she pulled off the helmet and squinted fiercely at her Director. "Ms. Hino just got Hardwire to back off with a good-faith offer. If we chase her, we could make that progress evaporate." "So? Doctor, Hardwire may be Endeavor's relative, but that doesn't exactly outweigh attacking and stealing from a secret government facility. She won't be expecting an attack from her, this is a chance we can't pass up." "She could very well lead us to Ghostworks! Assist us in that program you want Ms. Hino in!" "She can do that just as easily from behind bars." Horatio turned his remaining eye, coal-dark and cold, to Endeavor. "Your thoughts? We're losing time."

GM Citizen His counterpart had started, narrowed his malfunctioning eyelids and opened his mouth to protest his orders, but by then he was facing the Gems' Guardian's back. 'Larhs' grumbled something Sharl didn't catch as the latter was whipped out of sight, but Citizen did hear him rev up his own magnetic launch and hurtle back to the looming Fallen Heavens tower. Meanwhile, Dr. Lo was audibly shaken by the news that a living antimatter engine, with the power to split into dozens of equally-powerful clones, was unleashed on a city with almost no superhuman presence. ~'What-...how?! O-okay, calling, uh, everyone!'~ ~'...Which besides you and E-Spider would be that magic scarf guy and that speedster the cops want for murder. I'll add AEGIS to the list. I think they have some Super-Max suits...'~ For a little while Citizen was perfectly alone. The radio signals bouncing through the tunnels were a more than adequate guide, on top of the rapidly-approaching evacuations of matter from the universe. The Emeralds had even more of a problem with seasonal floods than Freedom, thanks to the close proximity of the Atlas range and their yearly deluge of snowmelt. Combined with the winter storms that lashed the Pacific coast, the Upper Emerald had built on top of itself once already to escape rising water levels, creating the vast underground labyrinth of the Undercity. It was theorized that, in the coming decades as global climate shifted, they might have to again. "!uoy ƨɘɘƨ xɘƚɿoƆ !uoy ɘɘƨ nɒɔ ɘHHe can see you! Cortex sees you!" Pink and red eyes blazed in the darkness as the many faces of Michael/Leahcim hurtled into view, limbs shuddering with the power to unmake reality reaching and grabbing at Sharl as he spend past! Fast enough to knock the wind out of the Negator who had lagged just a moment behind the rest. The two went smashing down into the filthy water into a cacophanic tangle, smashing through the concrete like wrecking balls through particle board. They ended up in a pile of what felt and behaved like tank parts. The former scientist shoved Citizen off his shoulders and darted back into the stale air, eyes a stark and sickly pink "Escape! Before he makes me kill you!" As he spoke his hands began to glow and crackle, small hollows in the atmosphere collapsing with thudding BOOMs. Emerald Spider The stream of data flowed freely. Even as one camera clicked off, its feed lost, several hundred others all but handed over their records and current observations with a smile and a bow. It wasn't immediately obvious if what Ming Xi was doing was illegal or unethical, but it was certainly suspect for the security firm to be dissecting aliens, monsters and robots. As she got a more holistic view, Peri saw how the whole system worked, from the top-most levels where the more mundane work took place, with people manufacturing electronics or working on the software that went into them, to the bottom where staggering varieties of life and creation were meticulously sorted for examination. Or termination. A twenty meter by twenty meter square in the corner plunged a metal shaft into the earth, which when opened revealed a flow of magma from the subduction zone on which the Emerald Cities were built. It was ordinarily sealed, but for what seemed to be its intended purpose. A man was being propelled towards this gulf. Or at least something shaped like one, towering over the Ming Xi techs flanking him like a muscular colossus. His skin was craggy and dark, with the texture and heft of black granite. Two pools of semi-molten metal burned in his eye sockets, partially obscured by the heavy, hanging mattes of obsidian-like hair that flowed to his back. He was dressed in rich but archaic clothing, like a man from the Iron Age of Vietnam, with huge bracelets and armlets in the forms of twisted snakes, an armored skirt embroidered in the fashion of dragon scales and long daggered sleeves hanging with precious stones. He was fastened to an upright rolling frame, which was proceeding with neither haste nor deviation towards the open pit. Though ungagged, the man made not a sound and looked neither right nor left. But just for a moment his eyes lifted to the camera pitilessly recording him. His eyes and Peri's met.

Alright, so, @Avenger Assembled, options: 1: attack the Negators HEAD-ON in which case a Grapple check DC35 to break free when he slams into and is enveloped by very surprised fusions of matter/antimatter, then Initiative. 2: Bypass the Negators, in which case A DC20 Reflex save and DC20 Bluff check to get them to follow him and not just continue out on their mission to 'chastise' Ming Xi Visions. 3: Something Else. @Tiffany Korta, complications. Enacting the With Great Power Complication. As shall be decreed by the GM post, one of the many, many subjects being contained by the Hermits is a 7-foot colossus with skin like black granite and hair like braids of obsidian. He's in restraints and being wheeled towards a pit of magma. Emerald Spider sees this, and the maps showing how to get to the 'Chasm' sub-level. Peri is compelled to step in.

He does have some kinds of electronics in a utility belt, but if any of them have anything to do with the cuffs is pretty far outside Roland's pay grade. And the cuffs are more or less indestructible, so they give a +2 to Roland's Unarmed damage, though at a -2 to hit because they bind his hands together and that's super-awkward.

Evil Robin, someone who learned both Batman's skills of psychological warfare and honed an acid tongue to a lethal point. Acrobatic and hard to pin down, which is good 'Cause they can' t take much before they fall. Gimmick weapon in the form of a winged harness allowing mild flight and extendable blades.

Though I feel we should establish a style for the new aliens, first, so it's not a pile of randomness. I like something like what they originally had as the Dominion in Deep Space 9, evil mirror of the Federation where adaptive and flexible humanity was reflected by the chameleonic and ingratiating Vorta, the Klingons' the brutally violent Jem'hadar and the austere, contemplative Vulcans in the secretive and manipulative Changelings. Similarly I feel something like that will help give the great exodus fleet(GEF hereafter) and its components more of a flavour and character. Of course a 1-1 analogue would be too clumsy. More like similar use of the new aliens to the narrative role the old aliens play. Fo example: one of the more aggressive exodus branches fitting the vampiric role of the Grue and needing to feed on strong emotions to survive. With the side-effect that after prolonged exposure their victims become like deadened husks. What do you people think?

@Avenger Assembled. That is actually a little better than what I had in mind. Works for me! @Tiffany KortaKortaOkayKortaKortaOkay that begins with no hitches at all. Quick questions 1. To where in physical space is this data going? and 2. Would you work in an aside about how Peri is technically doing the same thing as Amanda in Illegal?