Justice is Like the Hawk

Looking for pawns in a contest with Kang the Conqueror, the Grandmaster decided to recreate members of the Crime Syndicate of America from an alternate Earth to fight the Avengers. He called his creations the Squadron Sinister. The current Owlman in the world of the Crime Syndicate was Bruce Wayne, the son of Thomas Wayne, jr., the eldest son of Thomas and Martha Wayne. This Bruce Wayne had no exact counterpart on the Earth of the Avengers, but privileged, scion of wealth, Kyle Richmond had the same mother (or technically, her alternate Earth counterpart) and the same arrogance and sense of entitlement.

The Grandmaster manipulated Richmond into assuming the identity of Owlman and partnered him with his Ultraman and Power Ring doubles. The Avengers defeated the Squadron, though Grandmaster ultimately out-maneuvered Kang. The game finished, the Grandmaster left the Squadron to their own devices. Owlman continued as a criminal for a time, but ultimately turned against his fellow Squadron members when they sought to aid the alien Nebulon in melting the polar ice caps. He alerted the Defenders and joined them in battle against his former allies.

Richmond’s heroic actions nearly cost him his life, but he was saved by the Defenders and granted “membership” in their (non-)team. Turning his back on his old life, he took the name Nighthawk after the masked crimefighter of the Old West, a hero of his youth. The road to reform wasn’t easy for Richmond, he faced legal troubles and the ghosts of his past. Ultimately, he died defeating a plot to precipitate World War III by a psychic attack on the Soviet Union.

Only a few years after his death, another young man would take up the identity of Nighthawk and form a new iteration of the Teen Titans. This was Dwayne Taylor, whose parents had been killed by white supremacists, whose group, ironically, was being supported by Richmond’s own company without his knowledge.

Weird Revisited: The Wonderbuss

This post originally appeared in February of 2011. It will show up in a couple more Weird Adventures posts after that...

Magical blunderbuss-type firearms were used by some wealthy Dwergen in their early conquest of the Strange New World. The weapons gave these sorcerously inept folk help against the shamans of the Natives and the thaumaturgists of rival Grand Lludd. Today, these antiques sometimes find their way into the hands of adventurers--in this world, and perhaps others.

Though they were manufactured in a variety of styles, they’re all muzzle-loading weapons with short, large caliber barrels and flared muzzles. They all can fire relatively normal projectiles of appropriate size (provided there is gun powder) , but their real power lies in specially designed spherical ammunition called “shells.” Interestingly, it appears likely that it was the prior existence of these magical shells which spurred the development of the gun, and not the other way around. No one knows who originally designed the shells, nor for what weapon.

Thaumaturgists (with alchemical aid) can manufacture new shells, but the process is tedious and expensive, so they tend to be rare. Sometimes, a supply is found in Ancient ruins or even other planes. The shells are classified by number, which denotes their effect. All shells of the same number historically tend to be of similar appearance, and modern manufacturers have kept with this tradition. Shells don’t not require gunpowder.

Magic Blunderbuss (Wonderbuss)
Dmg: 1d10 or special; Rof: 1/2 ; Range: 50’/100’/300’

Shells: (all spell references per the SRD)
#1: appears to be a lead ball, but too light for its apparently size. +1 weapon; Dmg. 1d12.  These are 80% of all shells found.
#2: brass-appearing. Casts two shadows, one distinct the other shimmering like heat-haze. Leaves a fiery streak when fired. 4d6 fire damage.
#3: appears to be a steel sphere etched with three 7-pointed stars. +2 to hit, 2d8 points of damage.  These are 5% of shells found.
#4: glass, containing a roiling green liquid. On a successful strike creates an Acid Fog as per spell.
#5: glass, faintly glowing and warm like the mantle of a lantern. Acts as the spell Sunburst, though it misfires on a roll of 1-2 on 1d6, and only does 1d10 damage.
#6: smoked glass. Faint moans can be heard within. Target’s soul is imprisoned on sucessful hit as per Magic Jar.
#7: silver and etched with glyphs which seem to shift when its not being watched. 1d10, deals double damage to lycanthropes, and extraplanar beings of evil. These are 5% of shells found.
#8: white, with the look of fine china, cool to the touch. Explodes for 5d6 damage in a 20 ft. radius.  Sleeping near (2 ft.) of one of these shells has a 75% chance of causing a ringing in the ears (leading to a penalty for rolls to detect things by hearing) lasting 1-4 days after removal of the shell from that distance.  Wrapping the shell in cloth will prevent this effect.
#9: appears as a flawless sphere of obsidian. Acts as a Sphere of Annihilation, though it can’t be moved, and exists only for 1 round before winking out.

Some scholars believe that more shell types are yet to be discovered.

Random Paths from the Crossroad of Worlds

In Incredible Hulk #300, Dr. Strange tried to get read of the menace of the Hulk (who was in one of his brutish menace periods) but banishing him to another dimension. The Hulk ended up at the Crossroad of Worlds in a trippy, Ditko-esque space. Throughout the next 313 issues, he went to a number of weird worlds. The details of these worlds would make interesting places to visit in a fantasy rpg, but the brief, descriptive names given to the them by the folks at the Marvel Universe Appendix are in many ways even better for just getting the creative juices flowing.

Here's the list made into d30 random table (I had to add one to the end to get 30):

1. Crossroad of Worlds (choose a path, roll again!)
2. Acid Rain World 
3. Barren World 
4. Burning World 
5. Daniel Decyst's World 
6. Demon World of the N'Garai 
7. Desert World
8. Devil World 
9. Frozen World 
10. Furry Blue People World 
11. Glob World of Floating Things 
12. Idol World 
13. Mist World 
14. Octopod World
15. Paradise and the City of Death 
16. Poisoned World of Spine Creatures
17. Purple Giant World
18. Quicksand World 
19. Radiation Monster World 
20. Robot World 
21. Sky Shark World 
22. Swamp World
23. Toad World 
24. Vacuum World 
25. War World 
26. Underwater World 
27. Wind World 
28. Yellow Dwarf World 
29. Purple World of Exile
30. Chiming Crystal World

Obscured Vision (Reprise)

In 1918, Alistair Crowley made contact with an entity he called “Lam.” Crowley drew a picture of Lam, and much has been had made of its passing resemblance to the popular image of the “Grey” extraterrestrial, but that vision of Crowley’s also resembles another Vision, the first super-being called by that name in the 1940s. Timely Comics gives us three different origins for this Vision, perhaps revealing three different occasions he made contact with our world. The only one of these that is verified is the assertion that, on at least one occasion, Dr. Enoch Mason’s “Dimension Smasher” brought him to Earth. We suspect this is true, because Dr. Saul Erdel, a one-time colleague of Mason’s, had a similar thing happen when operating a related device some fifteen years later.

With his “Dimension Smasher,” Mason was doing further work in the field pioneered by Tillinghast. Mason seems to have breached a place called “Smoke World” in older texts, which is otherwise known as the Still Zone ( and maybe the Phantom Zone. And/or Immortus’ Limbo). From this realm emerged a Martian from the distant past. A Green Martian, more precisely, a descendant of exiled Skrull Eternals. This Green Martian was a lawman named Roh’Kar.

Roh’Kar’s task was to monitor the White Martin criminal exiles in the Still Zone. He had noticed periodic “soft places” permeable to (from his perspective) future spacetime coordinates, localized to Thu’ulca’andra (Sol III). Roh’Kar, following protocol, made what contact was necessary to shore up the breaches, but did not reveal his true origins. Indeed, he cloaked himself in mysticism and altered his form for purposes of misinformation. (When actively pursuing a criminal decades later, he would be more forthcoming when enlisting the aid of Batman.) He was a lawman through and through, however, and could not resist helping to bring criminals to justice during his visits to earth.

Some accounts suggest Roh’Kar escaped the plague that killed most of his people, but was captured and held captive by the U.S. government.

Obscured Vision

Even allowing for the fact that he is prone to mental instability, Ultron’s plan regarding the Vision seems needlessly complicated and poorly thought out: he creates a super-powered android with uncontrollable human memories and sends him to destroy the Avengers, knowing he probably won’t do it, but instead lead the heroes back to Ultron, so he could destroy them? He never even seems to have considered the sudden betrayal that seems virtually inevitable between artificial beings and their creators (the unstated Finagle’s Law of Robotics), and he of all beings certainly should have! Still, it is quite possible that this plan wasn’t as inane as it seems, and that it wasn’t even Ultron’s.

At one time, it was believed that Vision was constructed from the damaged body of the original, android Human Torch. This origin was cast into doubt later, though Immortus revealed that he had created a temporal duplicate of the Human Torch, which became the Vision. Immortus’ general duplicitousness is enough reason to doubt his word--and in fact, he is lying, for inscrutable reasons of his own. The android body that the Mad Thinker directs Ultron to resembles the Human Torch, but is in fact a creation of the Manhunters.

The Manhunters were the first attempt by the Guardians of the Universe to create a cosmic police force. “Many light years away from possibility of corruption, grey and calm with inflexible authority,” the robotic Manhunters' narrow and pitiless view of justice came to trouble their creators. When the Guardians tried to rein in the Manhunters, the enforcers decided their masters were corrupt, too. The Manhunters' rebellion was put down, but they were never fully eradicated. They went underground, forming the Cult of the Manhunters to infiltrate and subvert other cultures, to build a secret army for their eventual coup attempt against the Guardians.

The Manhunters wanted an agent on the Avengers and Ultron was a convenient dupe. The Mad Thinker was either their agent or another unknowing instrument.

Vision served ably within the Avengers, until contact with another Manhunter agent, the AI ISAAC, led to the activation of his secret programming. The Vision was defeated, but the fact remained he had seized control over the U.S. nuclear arsenal, and SHIELD was taking no changes. Vision was kidnapped and dismantled, and his memories wiped clean.

His teammates on the West Coast Avengers were allowed to retrieved him, but it would be sometime before he regained anything resembling his former personality.

Incumbents are from Earth, Sivanas are from Venus

In September of 1936, all across America aircraft beginning dropping flyers proclaiming a new candidate for the highest office in the land. At the urging of her father, Beautia Sivana was running for President. Thaddeus Bodog Sivana planned to stage a coup once his daughter was in office. Hers was the most massive, multi-media, write-in campaign this country has ever seen. Her beautiful visage graced the covers of magazines and full page newspaper ads. Her captivating voice could be heard on radio addresses. Women were cool to her candidacy, but men were enthralled. Most men. Boy reporter, Billy Batson, wasn’t fooled one bit. His alter ego, Captain Marvel foiled the Sivanas’ plot and returned mad scientist and would-be president to Venus*, where Beautia would have to content herself with being Empress.

Ultimately, Beautia didn’t share her father’s devotion to evil and in fact pursued a career in social work upon her return to Earth, according to some accounts.

*Or what Sivana said was Venus. It is difficult to square the real planet with its depiction in this record.

Operation Unfathomable is Out

In case you missed it, Operation Unfathomable was released in pdf this week and is (as of this writing) number 1 on rpgnow. I can say that everybody in Hydra was excited to be involved in bringing this adventure out. I personally have played in the con game version, and it was a blast. I'm also honored that my somewhat Scooby-Doo homage logo made the cut and wound up gracing the final product.

The adventure has a great tone, like Shaver Mystery, 50s monster movies, and Jack Kirby Atlas monster comics. Get it now, before the rave reviews start rolling in, so you can have the satisfaction of knowing you got there before the crowd!