GURPS Speedsters

What is a Speedster?

I would say the defining trait of a speedster is mobility. Most run fast, but any movement mode is viable and speedsters often have more than one - even if the others are gimmicks or variations of thier core ability.

High mobility alone wont do damage and its of limited defensive value, mostly staying out of reach or making opponents have to deal with heavy range penalties.

Speedsters often have high reflexes (DX), Enhanced Defense (especially Dodge), and Altered Time Rate for further defenses. Damage Resistance (Crushing) is also common to help them cope with falls or being tripped. Danger Sense or 360 degree senses, even Cosmic Defense on Dodge are also helpful here or Obscure (anti-targeting) usually as a speed blur. The primary speedster defense is avoiding getting hit.. 

Offensively speedsters may rely on attacks based on momentum or a special effect of their powers. Vibration, Teleport, Throwing things, Martial arts, time powers, and more can all apply to speedsters.

Special Effects

As with most Supers builds the special effect is key to getting a good set of useful abilities.

Energy Form

Energy forms like light or electricity are often seen as fast and can give good versatility and speed. Insubstantiality, Flight, and ranged energy attacks are typical. This type usually has above average DX and agility and excellent mobility. Its a good choice for a newer player.

Examples: Lightray

Enhanced Speed

Easily the most common type is the speedster who is simply just fast. High DX, Basic Speed, and Move are standard and Enhanced Move is very common. Enhanced Move with Second Nature (GURPS Power-Ups 4: Enhancements) changes Enhanced Move to Basic Move, allowing for good combat mobility at a decent price and 1/10 the total Basic Move counts as a Step so they can avoid penalties for a Move and Attack maneuver. Certain cinematic options such as Heroic Charge, slams, or techniques are also a good option. Altered Time Rate and Enhanced Time Sense are also common here, at least for Four Color supers.

Examples: Flash, Makari, Quicksilver, Superman

Spatial Manipulation

An unusual type of speedster is one that does not have superhuman reflexes but can either bypass or alter the distance between two or more points. Most often this is based on teleportation but it can also use stretching or size alteration powers to either bring objects closer or extend your own reach and step.

Warp is the most common power, but Stretching, (Growth/Shrinking) are also seen in the comics.

This type of speedster is generally more of a challenge to build and play. They tend to be less effective in combat than the Enhanced Speed type but often more versatile and effective outside of combat.

Examples: Ant Man and Wasp, Dr. Manhattan, Mr. Fantastic, Nightcrawler, Spot

Time Manipulation

More common than spatial manipulators but far less so than enhanced speed types are those who can accelerate or slow down time.

Altered Time Rate is the goto ability here but Afflictions to slow others down, Time Stop fields (Jumper) and other abilities are typical. They may attack by aging things to dust.

Examples: Chronos and several time traveling gadgeteers.

Character Design

Speedsters tend to rely on avoiding being hit but no matter how good your dodge is a critical hit can ruin your day. Area attacks are also a vulnerability. Speedsters tend to be glass cannons, they can hit fast and often hard but cannot take a hit themselves.

Speedster bricks are an exception in that they have bodies tough enough to withstand the stress of high speed and martial artists may have learned how to toughen themselves up.

As a general rule though the speedster needs to be able to zip around the battlefield and get out of others reach while still being able to attack.

High HT, Hard to Kill, Regeneration, and even Extra Life are all useful for when things go wrong and you take that big hit meant to stop the brick!

Armor Piercing is especially useful on offense, hit often for lower base damage but good penetration - ether from accuracy or penetrating power. 

Attacks with Aura (counterpunching) or Area Effect/Emanation (rapid attacks) are effective staples of this kind of character.

Martial arts training, possibly with weapons is also effective and plausible with most speedster designs. Thrown weapons are really good choices, letting you keep your distance.

Playing a Speedster

Speedsters tend to go first and often and rely on tactical advantages and movement. Players should be very familiar with GURPS Combat and able to think fast before considering playing a speedster. No one wants to wait for their turn while you stop everything to figure out your actions. The player of a speedster thus should be prepared ahead of time and constantly paying attention to the battlefield.

Speedsters can often get to a fight faster than the rest of the team so need to have good ways to survive or reasons for delaying.  The rest of the table will generally not appreciate being left out of every fight either. On the other hand a speedster that can transport the whole party can really be an asset! 

Being the groups transporter can be very expensive but here are some ideas.

Warp or Permeation with Tunneling.

Enhanced Move or other movement power with Affects Others, +50% can carry one extra person per level of Affects Others. Optionally a group can be carried by encasing them in a Forcefield with Area Effect and just one level of Affects Others.  The latter is called out for defensive powers so may not be allowed by your GM, though many will as its a "keep the group together" power and not so effective in most combat situations.

Simply being able to carry a lot is another options, use Payload, Can Carry, Extra Carrying Capacity, or simply high ST to do this. This is generally very expensive for a whole group though.

Optionally some speedsters may invest in a vehicle to haul their friends around.

Summary

Many teams will get by without a speedster, but most have one. I have played in campaigns where every PC was a speedster with different special effects and abilities. Speedsters can be very versatile so don't limit yourself to just buying up DX and Move!

AEON Season 7, Session 7

 Cast

• Amie-Belle T. W. Lee aka Whisper (Played by Curtis): Cold War era super-soldier/spy that got put in the Freezer, because she got poisoned. After getting thawed out and cured she tried to back to work, and was given an “adjustment period”. Uncle Sam called 2 years later, with work… because once you’re in, you’re in for life. Tagline: “In and out without a whisper.”
• Beauregard K. “Bo” Ratnam aka Wirerat (Played by Brice): Technopath, inventor, and hacker. He specializes in co-opting enemy systems and tech assets. Tagline: “Nice tech – I’ll borrow that.
• Stainless Steel Rat aka “Sir” (NPC Ally): Bo’s best friend and assistant. A sentient drone in the shape of a stylized shiny metal rat mindlinked to Bo. Specialties are rapid repair construction and modifications. Imagine if K-9 and R2D2 made a baby and it looks a bit like a rodent. Tagline: “Repairs and upgrades in progress”
• Derrick K. Ratnam aka Ledgerdemain (NPC Ally): Spin doctor and media liaison for Project VANGUARD. Twin to Bo. Tagline: “Well, actually that’s not how it happened.
• Rafe Hanlon aka Nyx (played by Chris D.): An umbrakinetic petty thief still on work release several years later, on his way to becoming a true agent and hero. Tagline: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
• Layla A. de Blackburn aka Nox (NPC): CIA-trained child assassin all grown up to be Daddy’s Little Monster. Maybe a little mad. Argues with her shadow often. Tagline: “No, we shouldn’t do that…should we?”
• June B. O'Neill aka Prodigy (NPC): Savant with hyper-intelligence that may have cracked the universal power-dampening conundrum. Fresh out of the Meraki Institute for the advanced and gifted. Extremely intelligent, but young (she's 16).
• Vincenzo L. dePrezzo aka Threshold (Played by Rory): Doctor, Mathematician, and Scientist (yes, capitals) and Spatial Manipulator. Threshold can bend space like a pretzel, teleport, obliterate things, and has extraordinary senses. He’d rather be in a research lab than fight. Better known for his work with Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, and disaster relief than famous battles. Tagline: “I can be there in a snap!”
• Nawang Sonam aka Wan Shi Tong (NPC): Martial Artist with a mysterious past. Thresholds mentor, experienced and highly capable, indeterminate age.
• Grant L. Wojcik aka Fridge Boy (NPC): Can control icer/cold, but mostly the ability to create ice that explodes. 16 year old emancipated orphan, Our janitor. 
• Rudy A. Coldwater aka Gimmick (NPC): Mildly hyper-intelligent savant. Stutters. Makes very accurate guesses. Typical nerd, not yet 20. Wants to make a difference, assigned to support duties.

Dates: Monday, May 4th, 2020 1400 to 2200 hours.

We Last Left Off

Last session we were down a player who was back this time so we took care of that part of the days activities. Whisper and SiR had gotten themselves in trouble while investigating Mole Trolls HQ.

OOC: We got off to a bit of a rocky start. I for example did not correctly recall where we ended up, there were a couple of extra explosions at their same time I thought were earlier and I forgot my Teleport had been blocked.

The Subway HQ

Threshold was very surprised when his power sent him back in front of the HQ instead of to the subway that Wirerat directed him to where Whisper had vanished. Smart money would probably have been to go inside and assemble the full crew and head over, though that would have lost several minutes time.

Threshold opted instead to use his Space Folding ability to travel quickly to the station and see what was going on, knowing the others were slower but could still get there pretty quickly.

Not the smart move, and Threshold is really smart but he is not used to leading others and Whisper was possibly dead and if not seconds would make the difference, also the teleport blocked showed it was a trap and he was darn curious how they managed that.

Threshold reached the Subway and went down the stairs. A lot of people were there, all duplicates of Mole Troll or someone looking like a homeless guy with a laser rifle. His radio was blocked so he could not send out the details of what he found.

He quickly stepped towards a column for partial cover and threw up a distortion effect. Basically he used his powers to ripple the area around him making it hard to to focus or hit with ranged attacks. His plan was to stall for time, take out the closet guy in hand to hand and move around the battlefield trying to keep them at a distance so he could use his powers to punch at a distance while making it hard for them to hit him. he also through up his reflection shield in case they got a lucky hit in.

Sucky plan.

They missed with most of their shots but the two that landed easily blew through his shield like it wasn't even there. In a moment his leg was cut off with a high powered laser beam and he was writing on the ground in pain. Luckily he managed to maintain consciousness, even as Nyx and Nox ported in.

Nyx went to rescue Whisper on the other side of the complex, buried under rubble with SiR and Nox stayed to help cover Threshold. Sir Had kept Whipser from being completely crushed and Nyx managed to to get them out and brought Wirerat with him to heal Sir.

Nyx took a leg hit from a rifle, despite Threshold boosting his shield and having the cover of the distortion field.

Threshold, knowing he would not last long and another good hit could kill him, Nox, or both used a power he had hoped to never use in combat. He created a small singularity behind the bulk of the enemy, immediately sucking up 12 of them into it.

Whisper, having been freed of the rubble ran out and hit one in the head with an axe then threw it at another.

Wirerat placed SiR into a new body and messed with the charged third rail of the subway station. Most of the foes had jumped into the track depression to avoid being sucked up by the singularity behind them and were thus electrocuted.

Threshold thinks Nyx got one but it was pretty far away and he was distracted and passed out after canceling the singularity (it would have only lasted a few more seconds anyway).

Wirerat put a tourniquet on the leg and Nyx got Threshold and Nox to the hospital.

The fight lasted about 5 seconds.

We end up in the Hospital, Again.

Threshold arrived still unconscious and Nyx took care of the paperwork, pretty easy as the staff knows him from his work there and likely are pretty familiar with the entire team by now. MedEvac sees what happens, cant replace the le and tells the staff not to operate she will be right back. 

She brings back Pusher a medical healer who can create any drug she wants to. Apparently she can create and accelerate tissue growth as well!

A critical HT roll later and her powers have Thresholds leg as good as new, after about 15 minutes of the worst pain he has ever felt as each nerve was regrown. She tells MedEvac she owes her a favor. Threshold thanks them both, barely able to speak from the screaming.

Nyx is fully healed by MedEvac.

We break there.

 Afterthoughts

Mistakes were made.

I was a bit out of it and not really thinking things through. The GM also kind of rushed the fight, possibly a little annoyed at my stupidity and had me just do three rounds of All -Out Defense in the beginning till others arrived. I had plans on how to try and stay alive while stalling them, might not have worked but would have been nice to see how it worked out. I understand his desire to get the others involved as quickly as possible but just dictating a players actions for 3 turns felt a bit rough.

Everyone else pretty much did what they needed to, once combat started everyone had their heads on straight, including me.

It was kind of fun using that Singularity power which I really figured would never be used. 

So this bad guy has  been dealt with but we still do not really know what is going on and who may or may not be behind him.

AEON Season 7, Session 6

 

Cast

• Amie-Belle T. W. Lee aka Whisper (Played by Curtis): Cold War era super-soldier/spy that got put in the Freezer, because she got poisoned. After getting thawed out and cured she tried to back to work, and was given an “adjustment period”. Uncle Sam called 2 years later, with work… because once you’re in, you’re in for life. Tagline: “In and out without a whisper.”
• Beauregard K. “Bo” Ratnam aka Wirerat (Played by Brice): Technopath, inventor, and hacker. He specializes in co-opting enemy systems and tech assets. Tagline: “Nice tech – I’ll borrow that.
• Stainless Steel Rat aka “Sir” (NPC Ally): Bo’s best friend and assistant. A sentient drone in the shape of a stylized shiny metal rat mindlinked to Bo. Specialties are rapid repair construction and modifications. Imagine if K-9 and R2D2 made a baby and it looks a bit like a rodent. Tagline: “Repairs and upgrades in progress”
• Derrick K. Ratnam aka Ledgerdemain (NPC Ally): Spin doctor and media liaison for Project VANGUARD. Twin to Bo. Tagline: “Well, actually that’s not how it happened.
• Rafe Hanlon aka Nyx (played by Chris D.): An umbrakinetic petty thief still on work release several years later, on his way to becoming a true agent and hero. Tagline: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
• Layla A. de Blackburn aka Nox (NPC): CIA-trained child assassin all grown up to be Daddy’s Little Monster. Maybe a little mad. Argues with her shadow often. Tagline: “No, we shouldn’t do that…should we?”
• June B. O'Neill aka Prodigy (NPC): Savant with hyper-intelligence that may have cracked the universal power-dampening conundrum. Fresh out of the Meraki Institute for the advanced and gifted. Extremely intelligent, but young (she's 16).
• Vincenzo L. dePrezzo aka Threshold (Played by Rory): Doctor, Mathematician, and Scientist (yes, capitals) and Spatial Manipulator. Threshold can bend space like a pretzel, teleport, obliterate things, and has extraordinary senses. He’d rather be in a research lab than fight. Better known for his work with Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, and disaster relief than famous battles. Tagline: “I can be there in a snap!”
• Nawang Sonam aka Wan Shi Tong (NPC): Martial Artist with a mysterious past. Thresholds mentor, experienced and highly capable, indeterminate age.
• Grant L. Wojcik aka Fridge Boy (NPC): Can control icer/cold, but mostly the ability to create ice that explodes. 16 year old emancipated orphan, Our janitor. 
• Rudy A. Coldwater aka Gimmick (NPC): Mildly hyper-intelligent savant. Stutters. Makes very accurate guesses. Typical nerd, not yet 20. Wants to make a difference, assigned to support duties.

Dates: Monday, May 4th, 2020 1400 to 2200 hours.

The Setup

Threshold and Wan Shi Tong go out on patrol, Whisper and SSR go to Mole Trolls lair, Nyx keeps an eye on the prisoners were holding, and Wirerat starts hacking records and shoring up electronic defenses - also a secret project.

Threshold and Wan Shi Tong pass a bakery just as it explodes. Luckily Wan Shi Tong senses the threat in time to throw up a forcefield to partially protect them, though Threshold still gets hit pretty hard.

Threshold scans for survivors and heads inside to pull people out. Wan Shi Tong senses more danger and watches their backs. Threshold triggers another bomb in the back but teleports out of the way in time to avoid damage.

They get everyone out as the first responders arrive and the bomb squad takes over the scene. Threshold power stunts his Spatial Sense to search the area for more bombs, the explosive was the same experimental type as the one in Prodigy's father's apt.

He doesn't find any more but plans to check all of Flushing as soon as possible. Also he belatedly informs HQ about the incident. He figured they all knew from surveillance systems but acknowledges Wirerats complaint that he should inform them directly and immediately rather than assuming the rest of the team knows whats going on and knows they are not needed. Threshold determined that they needed no assistance and didn't want the entire team to respond to every emergency as that could make them more vulnerable and leave people undefended. However people should be kept in the loop.

• This Power Stunt adds Scanner for skill -5 (-16) and 2 FP so pretty reliable but checking the entire borough will take awhile. Taking another -1 to skill doubles range to 200yards.

Disobeying Doctors Orders has Consequences

Wirerat decides to use his technopathy to hack some computers instead of relying on pure skill. He gets brain hacked again and the two prisoners also get hacked and die, turning into goo.

Fridge Boy freezes the bodies, somehow keeping them from exploding which is the usual result of his powers. Nyx pokes them experimentally then rushes to assist the screaming Wirerat.

Threshold is summoned, stops Nyx from killing the patient with kindly but poorly executed First Aid, and gets Wirerat to the hospital, luckily MedEvac is on scene and heals him up.

Wirerat demands to be taken back to base but Threshold gets a promise he wont use his powers before doing so. The team learns about Mia a nascent AI that Wirerat was working on and it just woke up.

Up Next and Afterthoughts

Whispers player was absent so we skipped that part of the activity. Threshold and Wirerat discussed communication and surveillance protocols and some options. Threshold decides the entire team needs to have some training as soon as everyone of the new people are on board.

Everyone needs to learn First Aid training if they do not already have it and be  reviewed regardless of what the dossiers may say. Also everyone needs to learn police codes and basic response (PS: Law Enforcement) to enable better coordination within the team and with first responders.

Threshold and Wirerat discuss a few things while watching Mia, both are worried that someone seems to be targeting the team and not minding a lot of collateral damage. Threshold asks him to try and track down any connections between the bombing, maintenance, deliveries, crime (reported vandalism or break in), location, ownership, etc. Both he and Nyx will try and work the chemist shop angle, see who might be supplying or making the explosives.

Personal Thoughts

I remarked that Wirerats pretty much going to single handedly be responsible for Threshold learning Spatial Surgery. This lead to some frustrating conversation that was fairly quickly resolved but is important to think about.

Players and GMs need to be on the same page in an RPG, and I feel this is especially important in a Supers campaign. The genre tropes are all over the place and not everyone even knows or uses the same definitions Silver Age, Golden Age, Iron Age, Four Color, Anti-hero, etc. Supers allows and often encourages a lot of creativity and that can create conflict, confusion, and take people in different directions.

In this case the GM didnt want Threshold having Healing because as he said it wasn't his niche. The GM also assesses UB costs for different niches as well as certain abilities. Something I hadn't really figured out yet, I knew certain powers got a UB tax but hadn't realized it was in part a "niche" thing.

However, I am a tinkerer and analyst in nature and a large part of what I enjoy in a game (and a big part of why I love GURPS) is taking a power set and figuring out interesting things you can do with a "special effect". An ideal character to me has a clearly defined special effect (usually just one) that can be used in different ways. Fire powers can give Innate Attack, Temperature Alteration, and brighten an area. But they may also allow Flight (rocket, lighter than air, or updrafts), welding or cutting torches. How do you breath if your on fire? The special effect needs to take these things into account (or multiple power sets that help each other).

Threshold spatial manipulation lets him bring things closer together or father apart and sense the distance between things and their velocity and orientation. This includes large objects or even subatomic particles and the primary uses are movement (Enhanced Move with Second Nature and Warp), disintegration (pulling objects apart, Innate Attack with Corrosion), sensing things (Para-Radar, Microscopic and Telescopic Vision, Parabolic Hearing) and more exotic tricks like stretching or shrinking by making things appear longer or shorter by altering the distance.

Healing seems pretty obviously off the table, you can't recover HP by just teleporting blood into them or making a limb longer or shorter. But if you can teleport bullets out of the body, remove or disintegrate foreign substances (Using Para-Radar with Microscopic, Penetrating, and Bioscan to sense what your doing) you can do a limited form of surgery (Healing with a bunch of modifiers, including no HP recovery). Basically its like using laser surgery and radiation treatment to treat cancer. Not nearly as good as full Healing but useful (removing a bullet without worrying about infection or lack of tools) but needing regular things like bandages instead of regenerating tissue or even stitching (like TK could do).

Now those details are a bit long for most of you dear readers and the GM already approved it. But I wanted to share this as a worked example of possibilities people may come up with in a Supers game. Not everyone enjoys that kind of thinking, much less the math or putting in the work to make it work. But for some people that is an important part of the game and it can make things more complicated.

Supers is a great genre, just communicate and know your group so you are all on the same page. Dungeon Fantasy typically has more narrow tropes like Scout, Warrior, Cleric, Mage, Thief, etc. What to expct to and from everyone is usually much easier, though GURPS allows a lot more variety here than most other games so communication is still valuable.

Steve Jackson Games new webstore based on Shopify

 The company moved from its old web store to a new system. Its still got some bugs and content with missing or errant tags but shows regular improvement. The thread on the forums asked for feedback and people have been giving it. I like that customers are being listened to and feedback is being implemented.

For example ago or so I asked for categories such as Settings and Adventures to be listed. Low and behold they now are! Mind you I dont know if my suggestion was the reason they did it or if it was already planned so not taking credit here.

Settings is still missing some such as Casey and Andy and Girl Genius that I do not see in this search query.

Supplement Type has the following options 

• Rules Expansions
• Campaign Settings
• Adventures and Scenarios
• Abilities
• Items and Technology
• NPCs and Creatures

You can filter by multiple categories such as Format (Digital, Physical, both) (another suggestion someone made and several supported) Collections for a quick but broad sort, product type, or edition.

Steve Jackson Games has one of the longest lifespans of a gaming company around and that comes with a huge backlog.  So it will take awhile to get everything properly migrated and recategorized but overall I am pleased.

Take a look for yourself! 

AEON Season 7, Session 5

 

Cast

• Amie-Belle T. W. Lee aka Whisper (Played by Curtis): Cold War era super-soldier/spy that got put in the Freezer, because she got poisoned. After getting thawed out and cured she tried to back to work, and was given an “adjustment period”. Uncle Sam called 2 years later, with work… because once you’re in, you’re in for life. Tagline: “In and out without a whisper.”
• Beauregard K. “Bo” Ratnam aka Wirerat (Played by Brice): Technopath, inventor, and hacker. He specializes in co-opting enemy systems and tech assets. Tagline: “Nice tech – I’ll borrow that.
• Stainless Steel Rat aka “Sir” (NPC Ally): Bo’s best friend and assistant. A sentient drone in the shape of a stylized shiny metal rat mindlinked to Bo. Specialties are rapid repair construction and modifications. Imagine if K-9 and R2D2 made a baby and it looks a bit like a rodent. Tagline: “Repairs and upgrades in progress”
• Derrick K. Ratnam aka Ledgerdemain (NPC Ally): Spin doctor and media liaison for Project VANGUARD. Twin to Bo. Tagline: “Well, actually that’s not how it happened.
• Rafe Hanlon aka Nyx (played by Chris D.): An umbrakinetic petty thief still on work release several years later, on his way to becoming a true agent and hero. Tagline: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
• Layla A. de Blackburn aka Nox (NPC): CIA-trained child assassin all grown up to be Daddy’s Little Monster. Maybe a little mad. Argues with her shadow often. Tagline: “No, we shouldn’t do that…should we?”
• Vincenzo L. dePrezzo aka Threshold (Played by Rory): Doctor, Mathematician, and Scientist (yes, capitals) and Spatial Manipulator. Threshold can bend space like a pretzel, teleport, obliterate things, and has extraordinary senses. He’d rather be in a research lab than fight. Better known for his work with Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, and disaster relief than famous battles. Tagline: “I can be there in a snap!”
• Nawang Sonam aka Wan Shi Tong (NPC): Martial Artist with a mysterious past. Thresholds mentor, experienced and highly capable, indeterminate age.
• June B. O'Neill aka Prodigy (NPC): Savant with hyper-intelligence that may have cracked the universal power-dampening conundrum. Fresh out of the Meraki Institute for the advanced and gifted. Extremely intelligent, but young (she's 16).
• Rudy A. Coldwater aka Gimmick (NPC): Mildly hyper-intelligent savant. Stutters. Makes very accurate guesses. Typical nerd, not yet 20. Wants to make a difference, assigned to support duties.

The Trap

Using the information Nyx got from the pawnshop fence who sold the captured phones Wirerat, Nyx, and Whisper all contributed to finding out the technopath who worked on them. A haphazard plan is created .

Wirerat goes to StacksOverflow and posts the bad guys code with some modifications. He gets mad then calls Whisper under a fake identity they pretty much made up that afternoon. Whisper vamps him with a bit of help from a psych profile Threshold made up. The guy takes the bait and meets Whisper at the pizza joint across the street.

Whisper decides to have some fun and has the bad guy "m0le_tr0ll" hack Legerdemains records and destroy his credit rating, social life, and other things. Still annoyed at how he takes care of his brother aka Wirerat. Eventually she gives the signal and Threshold who has been waiting across the street teleports in and asks him to come with him.

The guy panics, apparently not recognizing Threshold. Despite Threshold being extremely recognizable, recently in the news, having 6 PhD's an MD, and numerous other degrees, and among the best spatial manipulators on the planet. Oh and ruggedly handsome and charming as well, if he does says so. Threshold is understandably confused and thrown off by this but gives him his name (what still not recognized? Thought this guy was supposed to be smart.)

Threshold again tells him top come with him, a little less patiently this time and asks if the goons coming to help him or robots and safe to disintegrate or should they just stand down.

Moldy Troll, still seemingly slow on the uptake doesn't quite get it and so calls Wan Shi Tong to take care of them. Threshold dodges a punch by Moldy Troll and grapples him using his modest Judo skill. Then frog marches him out of the diner, across the street, and into the firehouse. Wan Shi Tong carries the other two whom he knocked unconscious.

The Interrogation

Having determined that Moldy Troll can somehow make copies of himself or is a large family of identical siblings the team questions him on his activities. Threshold leads the interrogation, Wirerat tries to hack his laptop but the firewall delays him, Nyx and Whisper mostly watch.

Threshold tries the "Bad Cop" routine, but really is not very good at it. The y guy has to see Threshold disintegrate a cup before he even believes Threshold has any powers. Mentioning that he is not yet under arrest but that he is being investigated for the incident at the Brooklynn Bridge finally gets him talking.

Its mentioned how the real bad guy may opt to clean up any loose ends and the faster we catch him the safer the troll will be. He elects to take us to his "lair".

Aftermath

A decent length session. Several of us were having computer problems and we did more stepping on each other than usual. Also Threshold got a new nickname "Bureaucracy Guy" and called out for being the most boring super hero ever.

Hey, someone has to handle the paperwork and manage things!

Seriously though, Thresholds primary motivations involve him in the lab or out on patrol. Need to work on that a bit more.

Magically Altering Evidence

 A thread on the Steve Jackson Games Forums about using Glamor or other means to magically tamper with or remove evidence from a crime scene.

There are a lot of ways to go about this.

Obscure (Forensics) would give a penalty to the skill to analyze the crime scene. However it has a duration and though that can be bought up it adds cost and is more suited to illusions.

Telekinesis, especially with One Skill only is a good way to alter and especially move evidence.

Of course you can also destroy evidence with Innate Attack, though that is likely to be messy and just call more attention to things!

Payload is good for sneaking evidence offsite or carrying things in to frame someone else.

Ultimately my choice is Control from GURPS Powers. 

Control (Evidence) is a very broad category so fair at 40/level, making it rather pricey. However that would let you manipulate solids, liquids, and gases and even a single level would handle most evidence. Even minor changes could ruin evidence for practical use, remove fingerprints, reshape bullets to hide ballistics, move chemical traces, etc. Alternatively, instead of  just damaging things beyond useability or moving material the evidence could be altered to frame someone else or make it look more like an accident.. This should definitely require skills and knowledge to do but the user could change fingerprints, writing, DNA, etc. to try and match another sample if desired.

Create (Evidence) with Destruction is another way to go and fits a spell or power that simply removes evidence.

Another variant would be a cheaper version of Control (Evidence) [5/level] that required a contest of skills or a per level penalty. The tradeoff of an absolute for a minor penalty justifies a much cheaper cost.

AEON Season 7, Session 4 Family and Walls fall Apart

 

Cast

• Amie-Belle T. W. Lee aka Whisper (Played by Curtis): Cold War era super-soldier/spy that got put in the Freezer, because she got poisoned. After getting thawed out and cured she tried to back to work, and was given an “adjustment period”. Uncle Sam called 2 years later, with work… because once you’re in, you’re in for life. Tagline: “In and out without a whisper.”
• Beauregard K. “Bo” Ratnam aka Wirerat (Played by Brice): Technopath, inventor, and hacker. He specializes in co-opting enemy systems and tech assets. Tagline: “Nice tech – I’ll borrow that.
• Stainless Steel Rat aka “Sir” (NPC Ally): Bo’s best friend and assistant. A sentient drone in the shape of a stylized shiny metal rat mindlinked to Bo. Specialties are rapid repair construction and modifications. Imagine if K-9 and R2D2 made a baby and it looks a bit like a rodent. Tagline: “Repairs and upgrades in progress”
• Derrick K. Ratnam aka Ledgerdemain (NPC Ally): Spin doctor and media liaison for Project VANGUARD. Twin to Bo. Tagline: “Well, actually that’s not how it happened.
• Rafe Hanlon aka Nyx (played by Chris D.): An umbrakinetic petty thief still on work release several years later, on his way to becoming a true agent and hero. Tagline: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
• Layla A. de Blackburn aka Nox (NPC): CIA-trained child assassin all grown up to be Daddy’s Little Monster. Maybe a little mad. Argues with her shadow often. Tagline: “No, we shouldn’t do that…should we?”
• Vincenzo L. dePrezzo aka Threshold (Played by Rory): Doctor, Mathematician, and Scientist (yes, capitals) and Spatial Manipulator. Threshold can bend space like a pretzel, teleport, obliterate things, and has extraordinary senses. He’d rather be in a research lab than fight. Better known for his work with Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, and disaster relief than famous battles. Tagline: “I can be there in a snap!”
• June B. O'Neill aka Prodigy (NPC): Savant with hyper-intelligence that may have cracked the universal power-dampening conundrum. Fresh out of the Meraki Institute for the advanced and gifted. Extremely intelligent, but young (she's 16).
• Rudy A. Coldwater aka Gimmick (NPC): Mildly hyper-intelligent savant. Stutters. Makes very accurate guesses. Typical nerd, not yet 20. Wants to make a difference, assigned to support duties.

OOC Notes

Everyone showed up, one play a bit late due to internet issues. So we did a bit of a retcon since last session and played catchup for the first part of the session. I'm not fully sure where everything is at but think most of it will work out the same.

Watercooler Chat

A week has passed since the last session and its Monday morning. The new hires have not all been brought aboard yet, and apparently some not yet interviewed (kinda murky).

So were still very short staffed, Nyx and Nox are sleeping in one of the two bedrooms, Whisper is on patrol and drops in for lunch. 

Wirerat is still on bedrest from his brain surgery and being a slightly annoying patient, keeps trying to get people to sneak in food for him. Threshold is monitoring his condition and treating him. Wirerat should still be in the hospital but Threshold is a highly qualified M.D. and has access to powers and equipment that can monitor his condition better than an ordinary hospital. 

Gimmick has come on board and is fantastic at handling paperwork. Gimmick has already gotten some permits, scheduled interviews and started the approval process for the new members. They need to get certified, pass some tests and get authorized by the city and state.

June (Prodigy) drops by to speak with Nyx, her father is missing and had previously told her to go to him if there was any trouble. Her father is a guard at Rykers and had met Nyx in that capacity.

While waiting June talks with Whisper and Threshold, revealing that she never expected to be hired and had just interviewed in hopes of talking with Nyx. Threshold explains that was not necessary as the team is very open to the community. She also demonstrates her power-dampening tech on threshold and he is impressed.

Whisper sneaks in some food to Wirerat over Thresholds objections. Truthfully Wirerat could probably survive one of Nyx's dumpster diving meals, much less quality food prepared by Whisper. However he takes his medical duties very seriously and strongly favors proper procedure and protocol.

Some minor griping about the tarps covering a blown out wall are made, but Bricklayer is not scheduled to rebuild the base for a few weeks.

Family Matters

Nyx is woken up and talks privately with June. Her father has been missing for about 4 days and she is concerned and was told to reach out to Nyx if anything happened.

They go to his apartment in Brooklyn to see what they can find. Nyx spots that the lock has been picked and June notices that the penny didn't drop. Apparently he is paranoid enough that he places a penny on the top of the door whenever he goes out. June notices a few things out of place and an empty picture frame. 

Then the world blows up!

A rocket hits the apartment from across the street, critically wounding June and injuring Nyx. SSiR phones home, getting Wirerat in the game. Wirerat puts the call out and Threshold and Whisper arrive on scene. SSir undoes the neck tourniquet Nyx applied to June (crit fail on First-Aid) and after a quick scan Threshold warps her to Cedar Sinai where he works part time as a Resident.

Nox tries to get Nyx to a dark room to heal up but takes him to Cedar Sinai due to his protests to look after June. Nyx then fills out paperwork for June and is treated by MedEvac. Apparently, Junes father set it up so Nyx would take over guardianship of June. MedEvac is working the front desk and heals Nyx then takes him to June and heals her.

We pretty much end the session there.

Aftermath

Threshold did not recognize the explosive used but Whisper did, recalling reading about it in some classified papers. The rocket launcher self destructed and there is very little useable evidence at the scene,

Nyx, Nox, Threshold, Wirerat, and Whisper all checked the scene over. Threshold went back for a further check after June was released to Nyx.

The GM informed us that the next few sessions will be in fast time, probably over a few days.

AEON C-Team: Season 7 Session 2 & 3

 

Cast

• Amie-Belle T. W. Lee aka Whisper (Played by Curtis): Cold War era super-soldier/spy that got put in the Freezer, because she got poisoned. After getting thawed out and cured she tried to back to work, and was given an “adjustment period”. Uncle Sam called 2 years later, with work… because once you’re in, you’re in for life. Tagline: “In and out without a whisper.”
• Beauregard K. “Bo” Ratnam aka Wirerat (Played by Brice): Technopath, inventor, and hacker. He specializes in co-opting enemy systems and tech assets. Tagline: “Nice tech – I’ll borrow that.
• Stainless Steel Rat aka “Sir” (NPC Ally): Bo’s best friend and assistant. A sentient drone in the shape of a stylized shiny metal rat mindlinked to Bo. Specialties are rapid repair construction and modifications. Imagine if K-9 and R2D2 made a baby and it looks a bit like a rodent. Tagline: “Repairs and upgrades in progress”
• Derrick K. Ratnam aka Ledgerdemain (NPC Ally): Spin doctor and media liaison for Project VANGUARD. Twin to Bo. Tagline: “Well, actually that’s not how it happened.
• Rafe Hanlon aka Nyx (played by Chris D.): An umbrakinetic petty thief still on work release several years later, on his way to becoming a true agent and hero. Tagline: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
• Layla A. de Blackburn aka Nox (NPC): CIA-trained child assassin all grown up to be Daddy’s Little Monster. Maybe a little mad. Argues with her shadow often. Tagline: “No, we shouldn’t do that…should we?”
• Vincenzo L. dePrezzo aka Threshold (Played by Rory): Doctor, Mathematician, and Scientist (yes, capitals) and Spatial Manipulator. Threshold can bend space like a pretzel, teleport, obliterate things, and has extraordinary senses. He’d rather be in a research lab than fight. Better known for his work with Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, and disaster relief than famous battles. Tagline: “I can be there in a snap!”

Off Topic

Its been a rough several months for the campaign, We have had 3 game sessions since picking up for the new season and its hurt my motivation for writing up the session recaps.  Sorry about that!

Session 2: The Bridge

Two black capes attacked the Brooklyn? bridge, for no obvious reason. Bombardo and Behemoth, a blaster and brick respectively. Both have a record of alleged murders but have never been caught and tried and both considered mercenaries. Threshold portaled everyone to the bridge using a nearby dashcam for the targeting link. Several emergency vehicles were already on scene and there was a large hole in the bridge with some cars on fire.

Whisper went into stealth mode and snuck up towards Behemoth. Nyx and Nox quickly moved towards them and Threshold used his space folding to give Whisper a boost forward.

Nyx bound Behemoth in darkness and Whisper then hit him in the head with her hatchet (critical called shot). Nox encased them all in darkness but Bombardo flew up above the darkness and blasted a lot of people with a lot of small explosive attacks.

Nyx then portaled up to her and took her out with his darkness tentacles.

Fight ended in a few seconds!

SSR and Threshold did not have time to do much fighting and got in on the emergency first aid and recovery services. Wirerat traced their phones and ran into some kind of serious black ice that nearly killed him with a massive brain hemorrhage.

Threshold got him to the hospital and did some emergency brain surgery to keep him alive. He was in recovery for a week after.

Session 3: Aftermath and Recruitment

Nyx took the recovered burner phones and using his street contacts found where they were purchased but it was pretty much a dead end as to finding the person who hired them. At least so far, Wirerat may be able to follow up on some of that info later.

Threshold spent most of his time over the next week taking care of the injured.

We determined that we need more staff so we had better patrol coverage and did some job interviews.

We picked up several candidates, more on that next recap.

Post Take

The GM has decided to try and run if even one person shows up, normally the rule is 3 but we have two players who are often unable to make the game due to other conflicts.

We feel that the bad guys were paid to attack the bridge, possibly to test our team. If so they would have learned that we can respond in force and very quickly and that we have good crowd control (darkness), stealth, and at least two of our members (Nox and Whisper) can hit pretty darn hard. Much of this was already well known and Threshold has a public identity and I thin his disintegration powers are fairly well known, though its possible people underestimate them as he hasn't often used them on camera or in public. though an older metahuman he has only recently been active in a crime fighting role with most of his activities involving disaster relief. Wirerat as a gadgeteer is going to be fairly unpredictable, and Nyx is a long time white cape having worked for Team Vanguard for a few years. So they likely learned the most about Whisper, our super soldier.

 

Spirit Contracts and Magic

On the Steve Jackson Games Discord server, a question came up. A poster wanted a magic system that represented negating with spirits for various effects. GURPS has Spirit Assisted Magery and other options, mostly in GURPS Thaumatology but these did not quite meet his expressed need.

So here is an initial run at addressing that. Note that there are many ways to handle things in GURPS and it gives GMs a good foundation to work out options and come up with specific things to address their needs for their campaigns. So this is just one way to do it and by no means the only way and has not been play tested by me. But it’s a fun exercise and interesting idea, so here goes.

 

What System?

Book/Path Magic, Divine Favor, GURPS Magic, Realm Magic, Ritual Path Magic, Sorcery, Syntactic Magic and more exist. I think Book/Path is the best fit here. Default spells take longer to cast which can represent negotiating time. Divine Favor would be good if each spirit was a Patron or if they were taken collectively as a single Patron but this implies an existing good relationship.

 

Book/Path as Spirit Bargains

I think the Effect Shaping variation is best here, though Energy Accumulation could work too.

Effect Shaping means the result of the negotiation is from a single die roll. Energy Accumulation provides “energy” over a period of time and repeated rolls so could be more of a :slowly winning the spirit over” approach. I just recommend Effect Shaping as a cleaner and less convoluted method.

Ritual Magic represents a knowledge of spirits and rituals for entreating them for power. So we keep the core skill, perhaps elaborating on it for the setting and different cultures may have different specialties representing the difference between kinds of spirits.

 

What I would change though is the Paths or Books. Each Book/Path should represent either a specific powerful spirit (say a book for a named demon outlining common deals it is known to make) or a Path for a collection of related spirits (Fire spirits, ghosts, Djinn, Nature spirits, Fairie, etc.).

Assign and create new rituals to appropriate Book/Paths, many rituals will be in multiple paths as is the current case. In this case each ritual is pretty much a boilerplate contract for specific services rendered. The ritual may be all that is required of one or both parties or it may involve something more from one, especially the magician. Perhaps a sacrifice or promise to do something in exchange for the service provided by the spirit. This could lead to some interesting spells, though each spell would need some work by the GM to come u0p with just what the magician has to do to honor their side of the deal.

I would put the Fetish ritual into every Path and many Books though. Or rather a variation on it that only applies to the appropriate spirit. This represents a prearranged deal and allows casters to have some effects be very quick because the deal was already made.

Alternatively create a new ritual for this and charms are effectively tokens that trigger the already bargained for effects.

 

Using this in a Setting

I could see using this in a setting, though I would want to make up new rituals and outline spirits to help me formulate the Paths. My upcoming supplement GURPS Template Toolkit: Spirits as lenses for various types of spirits with a vey brief description of personality and other traits so that would help a GM using this system but ideally that GM would come up with more detail.

GURPS Wealth Revisited

Wealth in GURPS is a weird advantage. It can influence how much money you make from a job or even transactions. It can benefit from high Rank or Status and it can be a game breaker if one PC is the group financier.

Mburr on the forums suggested a breakdown into Income, Starting Cash, Assets, and Lifestyle.

Income is currently covered by Wealth and Independent Income.

Starting cash reflected by the above (usually 20%) and possibly debt, Signature Gear, or points for cash.

Assets is covered mostly by Wealth, but Patron can also factor in here.

Lifestyle is mostly from Status level but modified by some disadvantages.

It can be a complicated and nuanced combination to get just the flavor you want.

Abstract Wealth, Pyramid #3/44 Alternate GURPS II by Jason Brick has another take. It converts Wealth into a secondary attribute. It uses a table instead of a flat number for different levels and you roll against the level by comparing the item value to wealth level to see if you can purchase said item. I kinda like the concept but the execution feels overly complicated. Its main claim to fame is to avoid having to track actual money and thus save bookkeeping.

So how could we change the current system to make something simple yet fun and useful?

Start with Wealth (p. B25)

Dead Broke [-25]

Poor [-15]

Struggling [-10]

Average [0]

Comfortable [10]

Wealthy [20]

Very Wealthy [30]

Filthy Rich [50]

Multimillionaire [+25/level] over the cost of Filthy Rich.

You have to have a job to earn this money. Independent Income lets you get money based on Wealth level without working for it and assumes passive income like an allowance, interest, royalties, etc.

Patrons do not generate revenue (though you may get a salary if employed there) but can provide equipment and other assets on a decent roll. I used Patron to handle being a ships captain/owner without having to be rich in my article The Captains Boat, Pyramid #3/71 Spaceships II. I wanted a way to get characters like Han Solo who had their own ship but were not wealthy. The idea is a ship (including a crew) can be seen as a small company.

Lets take a look at treating Wealth like most advantages and apply modifiers.

Independent Income: You get a percentage of your income without having to spend time working for it. Gives +1%/level up to +20%. Gives full income at +50%. [+1%/level up to +20%; Full income for +50%].

Supernatural Access: You can get your funds anywhere. No need to get to a bank or worry about a lost credit card! [+50%].

I used this for a submitted article (not published) for Conjurors, inspired by the Dragon Knight series.

In High Tech settings it may not be needed and is often overkill.

Liquid Wealth: Your wealth is liquid and does not include the normal assets associated with it. You may still earn the normal amount and have other perks but live a nomadic lifestyle that does not include fixed assets. Instead of the usual 20% liquid and 80% permanent fixtures it is 100% liquid and available for adventuring gear. This gets more for adventuring use but precludes assets like a house or car that you could borrow against. In some settings this may be the default and it severely cramps a stable lifestyle.[-0%]

Starting Wealth: This is a case of one use ability or ability that costs character points. Wealth is purchased at 1/5 cost but once used the money is gone! Wealth can be purchased multiple times at different levels this way to represent markers that can be called in. Impulse Points may be allowed, especially for cinematic wealthy characters.

Optional Rule: Patronage

Appropriate Patrons or Contacts (but not Allies) may be purchased as alternative abilities to Wealth. The total points in alternative abilities cannot exceed the points in Wealth. This can represent well established characters who own or have controlling interest in companies and can leverage that asset.

Summary

This is an initial thought on how to make Wealth a bit more intuitive. By applying modifiers we can tailor Wealth to meet the needs of the character or campaign without a lot of complicated and scattered rules.

Bruce Wayne would have high level Wealth + some incidents for Starting Wealth for say when he needs to buy a bank or build a space station. As Ben Affleck answered Flash, his superpower is being rich.

A super with a lab? Wealth + Patron as an alternative ability, and if they can occasionally get very expensive gear seemingly out of nowhere they may have had a use of Starting Wealth saved up/

Han Solo? Starting Wealth would be another way he started the campaign with his own starship.

Lifestyle is not addressed here, I think that is still well represented by Status and I have some ideas on that in my upcoming GURPS Template Toolkit: Spirits supplement.