General Character Discussion Thread

[Solomon Black]

Glad to be working with you all. I think I have Medusa all but set mechanically and shall keep plugging away on the RP end. Until then here are some vital points I'm working with:

• Her real name is Lilian Grey, she's a law student in her 20s so probably resident at SU.
• I've built her as an all around physical powerhouse (so a brick as this game uses it I guess) but with exploitable weak points. She also lacks refinement aka minimal skills and specialties.
• Under that mask this is more or less what she looks like but THIS is what happens when her Evil Eye hits you and she doesn't have perfect control over it. Thus she's a known as a freak and has to pull a Scott Summers to function in society.
• Medusa is named pretty literally. Her parents were involved in an ancient secret order of monster hunters called the Sons of Perseus, who these days have gazed too long into the abyss and become an occult/mad-science transhumanist cabal obsessed with improving humanity through hunting and harvesting non-humans. Which of course is only half as evil as their day job as Pegasus Pharmaceuticals, though only a very tiny portion of the employees are anything but regular working stiffs. For petty revenge they injected Lilian with Gorgon blood expecting she either die or turn into a crazy monster for their sport. Instead she killed a bunch of them instead.
• She might have killed her parents and more but was stopped by a hero named Night Striker. Who became her mentor before retiring several years ago. Night Striker is like if Batman ran on ninja shadow magic instead of money, though still he's well off and well connected. While known as a superhero most of Night Striker's deeds happened well out of public view, making him more of an urban legend figure.
• Through both her origin and mentor Medusa is connected to [workshopping something catchy] or an urban fantasy community of magic characters/creatures who go back centuries but unlike these newfangled superheroes politely stay out of the public eye. So she might occasionally have to go hunt down a troll or a vampire or something who's been making kids disappear.

 

@GleefulNihilism With the changes I made to cut costs you're now actually immune to her Evil Eye. And I think we can get a decent bond going as spooky terrors of the night with sight related issues and alternative senses.

[crimsonjoe]

So here's what I have for the group:

 

Player	Character	Concept
@GleefulNihilism	The Shriek (Sergio ?)	Sonic Blaster with Sonar-based powers
@hakootoko	Recuer (John Harcourt)	Mentalist with Alien Symbiote
@leons1701	Iron Tiger (Johnny Chen)	Martial Artist
@RedRajah	Geist (Eleanor Wrigley)	Former Podcaster, now Ghost
@crimsonjoe	Chess (Chester Alsworth)	Lucky ex-cop
@Solomon Black	Medusa (Lilian Grey)	Literal Gorgon
@RagallachMC	The Fluke (Charles Martinez)	Rich and Lucky Scion

Looks like a good mix.

 

I'll be glad to work with others as a contact. @RedRajah and I already figured out a history with our characters. Given Chess' past as a cop, he could be a way for the others to meet each other.

I'm thinking Chess' office is in the East Havens.

[leons1701]

Jonny's family lives somewhere around the border of East Haven and Brookhaven in one of those neighborhoods that keeps cycling between quiet cheap blue collar housing and even cheaper gang territory.

[GleefulNihilism]

The Shriek's full name is Sergio Pearson. Adopted son of Mrs. Ophelia Pearson, the Music Teacher at an inner city high school in Draydon Flats. He currently lives in the Mours though. He's kinda a local boy making good with his music. @crimsonjoe In my head Chester might also know Sergio as "that baby that was blinded with bleach on that f#$%ing boat". Been calling the boat "The Piper Maru" in my head for some reason. @Solomon Black And that sounds weirdly adorable. Alright, so Medusa's main meta-whammy has a quirk that it only really works if you make eye-contact with her, which has as a bit of a trade-off that blind people are completely immune to that main attack. Wonder how long it took her to figure that out.

[TheDude2371]

Sorry I couldn't make this one. I got so caught up with work and a couple of other projects (my PF 2e game GreyPath, along with moving my writing projects from Scrivener over into Obsidian) that this fell by the wayside.

@Papa Bear If you ever run another HERO game, I'll definitely give it due consideration.

Good luck to everyone and have fun!

 

[RagallachMC]

On 4/13/2024 at 1:27 PM, hakootoko said:

 

@RagallachMC Perhaps John rescued you from your chemical accident and got you to the hospital, and sympathized with your new superhero-ish-ness. (John isn't open about how he became a super, but can sympathize, since he wasn't born one). Maybe recently you got back in touch with him because of your app, and found him dubious. John isn't in this for the mony. John's popularity sells his art, which keeps him funded.

I like the sound of that. If you helped Rescue (Get it!) him, he would remember that and seek you out. Fluke really thinks that his app is a great opportunity for both heroes and the general pop. Even if Rescue doesn't need the money (who doesn't need money?!), it's a way to use our abilities in a more proactive fashion. He's got a high Personality and he'll definitely try to pull all the all your strings.

On 4/13/2024 at 5:46 PM, GleefulNihilism said:

 

• Fluke is a sellout, lol.

Maybe it looks that way, but he's really trying to help other heroes and the people of Sovereign City. The rising crime in the city shows that the police can't be everywhere. And what are the police going to do when some psycho with laser eyes starts melting people at the local mall? Powerful problems need powerful solutions. Solutions like HeroixTM

On 4/13/2024 at 2:21 AM, Papa Bear said:

 

You probably should 'track' the freebies in that second post so we (me really) have quick reference to where your character lives (what district, not like 3265 Franklin Street) and operates (you might not live in the same place where you go beat up bad guys). Yeah, let's please list where your character's typical stomping grounds are when they are out wearing their cowls.

 

The Fluke's HQ is in Riverside. It's an old shipping warehouse that's been turned into Heroix Headquarters and part of it has been converted into a living space. His 'home' is pretty modest, but well furnished. The business side has a couple of offices, a working space for the tech people, and a data center that runs the app.

Patrol-wise, he does work on the southside of the river quite a bit, patrolling Riverside, and the Havens. He'll hit Emmy Mours at night and branch out into West Sovereign and Draydon Flats.

[leons1701]

Jonny (Iron Tiger) is based firmly in East Haven and rarely operates outside the Havens. Of course, if he just happens to be somewhere else when he sees something going on, he's not going to worry too much about location and his job as an Uber driver does get him around the city a fair bit. His family lives in a not so bad neighborhood on the border of East Haven and Brookhaven, he, on the other hand, shares a house a few miles west with a bunch of 20 somethings in the sort of neighborhood where at least one house on every block is boarded up and condemned and at least one other probably should be.

[hakootoko]

4 hours ago, RagallachMC said:

Maybe it looks that way, but he's really trying to help other heroes and the people of Sovereign City. The rising crime in the city shows that the police can't be everywhere. And what are the police going to do when some psycho with laser eyes starts melting people at the local mall? Powerful problems need powerful solutions. Solutions like HeroixTM

Looks like you've got a good angle on getting the party together.

My character has social skills and contacts for dealing with The Man, not being party leader. Looks like you're getting set up as leader, if I'm not mistaken.

[hakootoko]

@GleefulNihilism You have EGO 20 and PRE 20, both of which say 14- on your character sheet. When I put 20 into Hero Designer, I only get a 13- roll. I'm unsure which of us is doing this wrong, and since I have a high PRE, too, I'd like to get what I deserve.

Edit: looks like all the other app agree with mine, that a 20 stat gives a 13- roll. Maybe I'm misreading your skill levels somewhere.

Edited April 16 by hakootoko (see edit history)

[GleefulNihilism]

19 minutes ago, hakootoko said:

@GleefulNihilism You have EGO 20 and PRE 20, both of which say 14- on your character sheet. When I put 20 into Hero Designer, I only get a 13- roll. I'm unsure which of us is doing this wrong, and since I have a high PRE, too, I'd like to get what I deserve.

Edit: looks like all the other app agree with mine, that a 20 stat gives a 13- roll. Maybe I'm misreading your skill levels somewhere.

Nah, doesn’t surprise me if my math isn’t mathing. New to the system and all that. Thank you for the head’s up.

Edited April 16 by GleefulNihilism (see edit history)

[Papa Bear]

Yes, the rolls are Characteristic divided by 5 +9, that's an 11- for normals at scores of 10 and increases by 2 every +10 (so yes, 13- at a score of 20)

[Papa Bear]

OK, I believe everyone has a 'final copy' of their toons now. I have to say that IF there is something I missed that is against the rules, doesn't do what we thought it was supposed to do, or was a "!" or "Stop" Power (I basically just allowed them all, nothing seemed untoward), then I reserve the right to work with you to figure out a better way to make it work. Champions character sheets are very complicated so, yeah, sometimes things pop out after the fact. Plus, I'm no champions Guru and, I believe I've said this before, you're probably smarter than me.

[hakootoko]

Anyone have one of them AI portrait programs? (The good ones, not the free ones). I'm having a hard time finding a superhero image I like.

I'm not too particular. A man in a fireman-like superhero suit, with no mask, buff and attractive.

[RedRajah]

[hakootoko]

Cool! Thanks!