Robin

Here's the first of my writeups for the teen Titans, Robin! I'm designing a Marvel event that's a reboot of the Teen Titans cartoon series. I plan to write up as many Titans as I can, grabbing people from the later seasons of the cartoon as well as other DC heroes too.

Robin (Dick Grayson)
Affiliations:

Solo d10 Buddy d6 Team d8

Distinctions:

I'm nobody's sidekick!
Flying Grayson
Professional Crimefighter

Power Sets:

Vigilante Training
Enhanced Reflexes d8
Enhanced Stamina d8
SFX: Counterattack – On a reaction against a Physical Stress attack action, inflict Physical Stress with your effect die at no PP cost, or spend a PP to step it up by +1.
SFX: Focus – If a pool includes a Vigilante Training power, you may replace two dice of equal size with one die +1 step larger.
Limit: Exhausted – Shutdown any Vigilante Training power to gain 1 PP. Recover by activating an opportunity or during a Transition scene.

Utility Belt
Bo staff and Birdarangs (Attack) d8
Swingline (Movement) d6
SFX: Bola – Add a D6 and step up your effect die by +1 when inflicting a “Tied up” complication at range.
Limit: Gear – Shutdown Utility Belt and gain 1 PP. Take an action vs. the Doom Pool to recover.

Specialties:
Combat Master d10
Crime Expert d8
Covert expert d8
Acrobatic Master d10
Tech Expert d8

Milestones:

Shadow of the Bat
1 XP the first time in a scene when you insist that you're not a sidekick
3 XP when you call on your training with the Batman or your reputation as the Boy Wonder
10 XP when you accept the Batman's influence on your career or vow to never become like him

“Titans, Go!”
1 XP when you perform a support action in a team
3 XP when you come up with a plan in battle
10 XP when you're declared the leader fo the team, or you step aside and allow someone else to lead

GM Style

I recently found out about GM merit badges here, and decided to try and pin down my style of running a game. Here goes:

• Story - The events in my games will form an interesting story. it's not pre-written, but I try to employ storytelling techniques such as three act structure, foreshadowing, and cliffhangers. Major NPCs will have unique personalities and at least cursory backgrounds.
• Exploration - My games take place in interesting and, for the most part, unexplored, locations. Characters have little idea what they'll find when they journey past the edge of the map, and new discoveries could have far-reaching consequences.
• Mystery - Either by intrigue or legend, the facts are usually hidden from characters in my games. It'll take effort and determination to uncover the truth.
• Mirror - I take ideas from the players and add them to my bag of tricks. You'll never know if you guessed correctly or if I took your idea and made it happen.
• Rule Zero - In my games, the GM is the final word on what works and what doesn't. I try not to mess with the rules willy-nilly, but I like to improvise and hate when the rules get in the way of a fun game for all. My goal is to not break any PC's abilities, however.
• Destined for Greatness - Characters in my games represent exceptional members of society, and are a cut above the common man (or woman). Ability scores will be determined by generous methods, and characters will get opportunities to do great things, if they wish. In return, players are expected to put some effort into their characters.

I figure, even if this isn't a completely accurate representation of how I GM, it'll at least give me something to fall back on in dire straits. When I'm completely at a loss, I'll think back to these statements and pick the choice that reinforces them.

Floating Island dream

when I was little, i lived on this floating island. It was windy and dry, like a little desert about a quarter mile across. It looked like a jagged upside-down cone sitting in the sky above a bay on the coast of Oregon.

I went there again recently. they'd put in a highway overpass that led in, even though nobody visited anymore. when we left, they hollowed out the bottom and put an expensive garage for rich people to store their cars. It's safe because no one ever went there. So safe, the keys for all these cars were stored on a little rack on each level. While I was exploring this garage, car thieves showed up and started breaking into cars! I couldn't get into one, as even with the keys the chirping of the alarm would alert the thieves to my presence. I was able to find a place to hide as the thieves took a car, and then took a small electric go-cart type thing to escape myself.

I came back later, and met a group of resistance fighters who lived on the top levels of the island's underground area. It was more like a hand-dug basement than the parking garage below, and they were scavenging parts from the cars below to fund their war on the surface dwellers. I joined them as a reluctant volunteer - they wouldn't let me leave alive if I hadn't. I became friends with group, which was felt more like a family. There were only 3 of them, a crazy leader, and a young girl and boy who followed him because they had nothing else. While scavenging the cars, I found some awesome Yu-Gi-Oh cards and added them to my collection. I returned to the surface to sell them, and also return some cans for the cause.

When I came back, it was as a spy. I tried my best to talk the leader out of his war on the surface world. I led him to the top of the island, to the small desert plain I'd lived as a child. I showed him the remnants of my home - the walls had long since eroded, but surrounding our old fire pit there were two stone chairs and a thick wooden table (suspended somehow on only two stout legs on one side). While up there, I explained that he could live on this island in peace, away from the surface dwellers he hated so much. He could build a windmill to power car batteries from the garage, and live off the energy generated by the fierce wind. But when he realized I'd been a spy and was trying to talk him out of his mission, he ran down into the garage levels.

The leader was insane with rage, and started taking gas cans and pouring them everywhere. Before I could stop him, he lit the gasoline and started a huge fire. I ran up to the underground levels, where the crude living quarters were, and tried to get the young girl and boy to safety. It was too late! We braced ourselves against the doorway as the floating island came crashing to the ground!

When we came to, the floating island had landed roughly a half-mile out into the ocean. I led the young girl and boy, and the humbled leader, to the surface of the island, where we could see the beauty of the surface world. Their were fish in the ocean, so many that the three could live their whole lives here without depending on those they hated. I stayed and became their new leader, claiming the island as my birthright (my parents had never wold the island, they'd just moved away because it had become too unstable.)

NO MORE HEROES: Brand New World

More than a year has passed since the Avengers foiled the alien invasion attempt in New York. In that time, many others have stepped forth to become defenders of humanity - groups like the Fantastic Four and the X-Men, and individuals like Daredevil and Spider-Man. Others like Blade and Ghost Rider lurked in the shadows, mysteries to the world. Together or alone they fought the evils that plague our world - super powered menaces, mutant terrorists, murderous gang leaders. We came to rely on Superheroes to protect us. Until the day they disappeared.

Iron Man was towing a wrecked oil tanker when it happened. Witnesses saw a strange purple light flash over him and then, poof! Iron man was gone, the oil tanker sinking to the depths. The same happened to Spider-Man, all that's left of him are videos of webs left whipping in the wind. Millions of eyewitness accounts described the same phenomenon - a purple flash of light, and then nothing. At the exact same moment, all around the world, the super powered beings we knew vanished.

That day saw our greatest villains taken the same way. Magneto was giving a speech from a captured television station. Victor Von Doom vanished from his castle in Latveria. A super-villain prison referred to as the Raft was emptied, as all the inmated disappeared in the same flash of purple light. In an instant, we were robbed of our greatest hopes and fears.

That was two weeks ago.

The rioting and insanity that followed the heroes wake is subsiding. Planet Earth is regaining its senses. But will this brand new world be safer? Will it make more sense? Or, having lived with gods and monsters among us, is it too late to go back?

 

Basically what I'm thinking is that players would create new street-level heroes who don costumes to fill the void left by the vanished superheroes. Only heroes who'd shown themselves prior to the event were taken, so someone who didn't use their powers in public before the event would still be around. They'd fight normal crime, which has skyrocketed since the heroes went away, and new villains who see the same opportunity.

I didn't explicitly state it in the blurb, but this game would be set in a version of the movieverse where all the Marvel movies happened. The Avengers and it's prequels plus the FF, X-Men, Spider-Man, Daredevil, Ghost Rider, and Blade movies. Let me know if there's any I forgot! This way we can tie in to lots of marvel heroes but the game should be much more accessible. A timeline for the universe might be a little tough since most of these movies weren't made with considerations for the others. For that reason, I figure I won't bother unless it becomes necessary.