I am going to try my darnedest to submit a post a month. This month I am going to touch on Star Trek pbems again. A few months back I wrote a post concerning the cliched Star Trek characters I have come across over the years. I was talking to a friend mine, Dave Zyn, and he mentioned one neat idea he never saw before was rather than the guy from the past, what about a guy from the future? He is an arrogant prick who claims the science those of the "modern" era learned at the academy is learned in grade school in his time. He is a know it all jerk and keeps people wondering whether or not he is there to fix some critical error in the timeline, is some sort of temporal fugitive or is just a highly intelligent mental case. Such a character would be interesting and would require a lot of work with the GM to insure they were on the same page, and it could conceivably create numerous interesting story lines that may or may not involve time travel. Perhaps parts of the character's memory have been wiped, for example. Or he is from an alternate timeline entirely?
How about Mirror Universe guy? In this world his counterpart is a mass murderer or some other total bastard, and he/she has wound up here through some misadventure? Imagine them having to deal with not only their own past, but the past of their infamous evil twin? Goatee optional.
Another character concept I never saw was the colonist. Just about every single human featured in Star Trek is from Earth. How boring! Why not have someone from Mars or from an even harsher world? Imagine them feeling that "Earthers" are soft and weak compared to his/her rough 'n ready upbringing? They are adventurous and self reliant and sneer at luxuries like holodecks.
The un-joined Trill. More than that, the un-joined Trill who thinks placing a slug in their chest is as creepy an idea as you can have.
Mister under achiever. This is the lieutenant Barclay type, the guy who just skates by until something/someone kicks him in the ass. Maybe the department head dies or is suddenly transferred and he is the only guy available to take his place. To quote Gregory Peck from The Guns of Navarone: "You're in it now, Mister! Right up to your neck!"
The Civilian. Not the bartender, but someone who was recruited during the Dominion war or through some other sort of circumstances and stayed on in Starfleet. I am currently playing a doctor who volunteered and decided to stick around. After a couple years at the academy she is now a lieutenant at age 40. I like to role play her as being a bit out of joint in regards to rules and regulations. This might be interesting to play an older ensign who has seen the world and who views superior officers with respect, but not necessarily walking on water.
The mustang. In the Navy, a Mustang is an Officer who has promoted up from the ranks of Navy enlisted personnel through an in-service procurement program, with no interruption of his/her active duty status. It is also understood that the Mustang Officer was a career Sailor, and normally wears one or more Good Conduct Medals.
From Navy Mustangs dot com.
Your character again would be older, possibly promoted due to an emergency or the like. Older, wiser, with their own perspectives on how a starship runs, the mustang might be viewed with mistrust or contempt by other enlisted NCOs and derision from Academy graduates.
So next time you are playing Star Trek, think of different ways to make your character stand out, not just to be different but to also provide yourself and your GM with potentially interesting subplots . Perfection is boring, so is copying something that has already been done to death.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Saturday, August 21, 2010
It's done!
This is a milestone for me. I have worked on this book for years, off and on. I wrote a version of it many years ago but scrapped it entirely because after reading it I felt it was just plain bad. Is this book better? Yes. I know that does not necessarily make it good. But I have not accomplished a lot in my life and it just feels good to look at the body of work and say it is complete.
It is only the draft and I am going chapter by chapter, looking for flaws and inconsistencies, and I know I need to find a literary agent and try and get the darn thing published. It could take months or years or not happen at all.
But damn it, I feel very good right now...
It is only the draft and I am going chapter by chapter, looking for flaws and inconsistencies, and I know I need to find a literary agent and try and get the darn thing published. It could take months or years or not happen at all.
But damn it, I feel very good right now...
Friday, July 30, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
You're a wonder...
Wonder Woman!
Today I saw Wonder Woman's new costume and I have to admit, I like it. I am not a huge fan of WW and I have long thought her costume was 1) busy and 2) impractical. I think this new outfit looks stylish.
Thoughts? Opinions?
Photo's origin is from here as well as J. Michael Straczynski's plans for Wonder Woman. It sounds intriguing enough for me to pick up issue #600.
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Update to Avengers game
It seems based on the messages I've read that Mongon is out. Looks like Chris sent him a private e-mail and Mongon got revamped. So I will concede that perhaps I did not give Chris enough credit. Perhaps he read all the other comments other players made about Mongon and began to realize how unworkable the character was.
And perhaps if I had actually stuck around and voiced those concerns rather than bitching and moaning here I might be playing that game.
I considered trying to jump in, but that would entail me either 1) erasing my posts here (if that is even possible; I never considered having to erase anything before) in case Chris read them, 2) editing the hell out of my old post or 3) saying to the guy "Yeah, you were the subject on my blog, I was a bit of a tool towards you but that's okay if I still play your game, right?"
Uh, yeah...
Short of legal action, I won't delete my posts. I have to stand by what I write, good or bad. I believed in what I said at the time and based on what I saw. I will say I am glad Mongon is gone for Chris' sake and I wish him great success with his game.
And perhaps if I had actually stuck around and voiced those concerns rather than bitching and moaning here I might be playing that game.
I considered trying to jump in, but that would entail me either 1) erasing my posts here (if that is even possible; I never considered having to erase anything before) in case Chris read them, 2) editing the hell out of my old post or 3) saying to the guy "Yeah, you were the subject on my blog, I was a bit of a tool towards you but that's okay if I still play your game, right?"
Uh, yeah...
Short of legal action, I won't delete my posts. I have to stand by what I write, good or bad. I believed in what I said at the time and based on what I saw. I will say I am glad Mongon is gone for Chris' sake and I wish him great success with his game.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
This week I saw an ad for a new PBEM involving Marvel’s Avengers, Called Avengers Uprising. Based loosely on the plots arising from The Heroic Age, the game was to focus on both established Marvel characters as well as new ones. I was excited when I saw the game and based on the rules presented to me I thought I would be able to enjoy this game.
Then a guy named Calvin submitted this character, Mongon:
Residency: Interdimensional traveller.
Internetal plain home: areacode 315
Name: "Mongon" Calvin Merlini
Alias: Mongon/ Matrix of the Dead/ Jack Jester/
Code name: Mongon
Gender: male
Age: looks 18 but well over 1,000
Affiliation:(Hero,Villain,or Other)Friends to the Fantastic four, member to one of the X-teams [X-Squad...different rpg], Dr. Strange
Appearance:
Hair: electric blue , hair cut is normal cut
Eyes: yellow glowing without contacts
with contacts hazel
Skin: light blue
Height: 5'6"
Physique: slender muscular
Other:(Scars,Tattoos,etc.)
Costume:(Appearance in costume)Navy blue trenchcoat with patches from places, dimensions, etc 's he's visited! Under it he keeps his original X-men suit as it once belonged to the team back in the 60's. Footwear is none other the black converse and fingerless gloves for his hands.
Equipment/Tools:(Any Weapons,Tools, or Magicial Armament at his/her disposal) One of Merlin's Staff's, cellphone, and a miniture stargate
Personality: Happy go lucky
Skill/Powers: over the years Mongon has developed many abilities due to his internetal abilities as well as his magic ones.
Internetal
Traveling: Can turn into electricity go into the internetal plain and travel through phones, wires, cellphone waves, and television waves.
Communications: Can travel inside computers and dirrectly communicate with other program and negotiate what he needs. This can lead to rigging slot machines for money/ peeking at security camera's/ or my favorite "switching a Sentinel's objective" hehehehe
Home: Has a internetal home that he has linked to his cellphone and at any point he can dial home to relax.
Magical Abilities
The weird and yet cool thing about magic is where ever you go it's there to learn and similars spells can be diverse as well as slightly different with twists in different lands.
Also unlike mutant powers, spells can backfire for good and for bad! For these two reasons Im not listing the spells what I will say is this "In different places will spark his memory and unlock things he might had known 500 years ago."
The Freak power
Portholes: His internetals and magic abilities clashed together in a chatoic manner opening portholes to different dimensions. These holes would suck him up alone and close leaving him stranded in the strangest places.
This would happen anywhere from 20 days to 20 years and always at random! However recently the ancient egyptians had given him a small coin like stargate that has helped him gain the ability to come and go as he pleases.
Strengths: Age- due to being on the internetal plains and being the son of Merlin and Morrigan he doesnt age
Illness- Cannot get sick due to human virus's but can die to a computer virus!!!
Vulnerabilties: Computer virus's, spell miscalculations, and the freak power.
Secrets: can sing and can play over 500 different musical instruments.
Background: After living over a 1,000 years its hard to write up his whole origin here. To shorten it.
Calvin was adopted into a home but as he got older he became obsessed with video games until he was sucked into the internetal plains after usng an illegal password.
On the internetal plains he found out there way of life was in chains as a monopolistic Artifical Intelligence program known as the SKULL wanted world domination and figured it could start it out by dominating the computers the human's made. Anyone who was deemed a threat was sucked into the internetal plains and forced to work for him..or her!
He quickly joined in the rebellion and using the computer knowledge he had of video games and java codes he smoked out the SKULL. The SKULL challenged him to a dual one on one. The challlenge contested of 6 computer games. Before going out to fight he go a kiss for good luck from the beautiful program known as Jeannie. Little did he know she was the Game Geannie! Taking it out all 6 games he had freed the internetal plains from domination!!!!
When asked for his name he gave them his last name... Mongon! From then on there he was known as Mongon! He was freed to return home but given an internetal key to come back any time. Before he could leave on his own the freak power began and he was sucked into a different dimension.
He landed in professor xaviers school for gifted youngsters. His skin and hair was now blue and his eyes were glowing yellow. He landed in the right place to help. When Xavier disovered a bit of magic in his abilities he sent him to Dr. Strange for help...but before he could go Excalibur had come to visit the school and with them was Merlin.
It was there Merlin came out and explained that Mongon was his son and took him to his magical home to meet his mother Morrigan Aensland the Succubi Queen. He also met his sister. He trained with his family as they taught him what they mostly knew.
Upon coming back to the school he found Juggernaut there using magical attacks. Quickly Mongon jumped in and countered some of the spells and set up a few of his own! This action spooked Juggernaut as noone had revally used magic back on him... possibly ever! He took a mad dash for it running over sabertooth!
Over the years Mongon has visited many other dimensions, seen other cultures and has even had the luck to live very different lives and learn many things. It's time he return back to the marvel universe where he once got his spark.
----------------------------------------------------------
There's always going to be weird questions on Mongon but thats what makes it fun. He's a character who's been used for 13 years now so things are always changing.
I will post up of his past in the future.
For the record, Calvin might be the nicest guy in the world. But when it comes to creating characters he is totally out of control. What we have here is a classic case of Mary Sue-dom. His character is a thousand years old, giving him maybe thirty times more life times worth of experiences than other players (add to that he looks eighteen, so he can easily flirt with the ladies and his potential enemies would under estimate him, not realizing they were dealing with a veteran). His powers are all over the map and he wrote up his origin so that he is friends with the X-Men and Fantastic Four both. He makes himself the son of Merlin, then defeats the Juggernaut. But as bad as this character is, what makes it worse it there was a GM who green lit it.
The GM, Chris, let Calvin run this character. Why? Good question. Perhaps Chris is an inexperienced GM and has no idea how to say “no”. Perhaps Chris and Calvin are friends in real life and he wants to be nice. Perhaps Chris has poor judgment. Certainly one aspect of poor judgment is to no adhere to your own rules. One of Chris’ is:
Also no power is invincible to get around, these are young heroes not experience meaning you won't be tossing airplanes at each other like baseballs anytime soon or at least not in the beginning :p
Hmmm. So why is he letting someone play a character who is an experienced hero, a former X-Man?
Here is something that was amusing, in a sad way. When I asked him for clarification regarding powers he had this to say:
As far as the original character are concerned most if not all will not be as Strong as Thor believe me when I say thats a recipe for Godmodding. But that doesn't mean they themselves won't be significantly powerful in their own right, its hard for me too really give a scale you can focus around since most Comic character seem to be all over the place as power is concerned but let say they could take on a guy like the Rhino by themselves just fine but they need some help against the Juggernaut.
And yet Mongon defeated The Juggernaut single handedly.
If you are going to be a GM consistency is key. Do not tell one player one thing then contradict yourself with another. Do not create rules and then ignore them. Do not be afraid to tell a player “no” when it comes to a character submission.
NOTE: Calvin posted a more complete bio of Mongon here and it is even worse, where he makes himself a member of the West Coast Avengers and a student of Doctor Strange. You know who this reminds me of? Sentry. Sentry, for those of you who do not know, is a Marvel Comics character created by Paul Jenkins who was forcibly retconned into Marvel history so he was known and loved by everyone. He was everyone's friend, the only guy who could calm The Hulk. Heck, he even took Rogue's virginity because he was the only guy who could touch her.
The more I look at Mongon, the gladder I am I dodged this bullet...
Then a guy named Calvin submitted this character, Mongon:
Residency: Interdimensional traveller.
Internetal plain home: areacode 315
Name: "Mongon" Calvin Merlini
Alias: Mongon/ Matrix of the Dead/ Jack Jester/
Code name: Mongon
Gender: male
Age: looks 18 but well over 1,000
Affiliation:(Hero,Villain,or Other)Friends to the Fantastic four, member to one of the X-teams [X-Squad...different rpg], Dr. Strange
Appearance:
Hair: electric blue , hair cut is normal cut
Eyes: yellow glowing without contacts
with contacts hazel
Skin: light blue
Height: 5'6"
Physique: slender muscular
Other:(Scars,Tattoos,etc.)
Costume:(Appearance in costume)Navy blue trenchcoat with patches from places, dimensions, etc 's he's visited! Under it he keeps his original X-men suit as it once belonged to the team back in the 60's. Footwear is none other the black converse and fingerless gloves for his hands.
Equipment/Tools:(Any Weapons,Tools, or Magicial Armament at his/her disposal) One of Merlin's Staff's, cellphone, and a miniture stargate
Personality: Happy go lucky
Skill/Powers: over the years Mongon has developed many abilities due to his internetal abilities as well as his magic ones.
Internetal
Traveling: Can turn into electricity go into the internetal plain and travel through phones, wires, cellphone waves, and television waves.
Communications: Can travel inside computers and dirrectly communicate with other program and negotiate what he needs. This can lead to rigging slot machines for money/ peeking at security camera's/ or my favorite "switching a Sentinel's objective" hehehehe
Home: Has a internetal home that he has linked to his cellphone and at any point he can dial home to relax.
Magical Abilities
The weird and yet cool thing about magic is where ever you go it's there to learn and similars spells can be diverse as well as slightly different with twists in different lands.
Also unlike mutant powers, spells can backfire for good and for bad! For these two reasons Im not listing the spells what I will say is this "In different places will spark his memory and unlock things he might had known 500 years ago."
The Freak power
Portholes: His internetals and magic abilities clashed together in a chatoic manner opening portholes to different dimensions. These holes would suck him up alone and close leaving him stranded in the strangest places.
This would happen anywhere from 20 days to 20 years and always at random! However recently the ancient egyptians had given him a small coin like stargate that has helped him gain the ability to come and go as he pleases.
Strengths: Age- due to being on the internetal plains and being the son of Merlin and Morrigan he doesnt age
Illness- Cannot get sick due to human virus's but can die to a computer virus!!!
Vulnerabilties: Computer virus's, spell miscalculations, and the freak power.
Secrets: can sing and can play over 500 different musical instruments.
Background: After living over a 1,000 years its hard to write up his whole origin here. To shorten it.
Calvin was adopted into a home but as he got older he became obsessed with video games until he was sucked into the internetal plains after usng an illegal password.
On the internetal plains he found out there way of life was in chains as a monopolistic Artifical Intelligence program known as the SKULL wanted world domination and figured it could start it out by dominating the computers the human's made. Anyone who was deemed a threat was sucked into the internetal plains and forced to work for him..or her!
He quickly joined in the rebellion and using the computer knowledge he had of video games and java codes he smoked out the SKULL. The SKULL challenged him to a dual one on one. The challlenge contested of 6 computer games. Before going out to fight he go a kiss for good luck from the beautiful program known as Jeannie. Little did he know she was the Game Geannie! Taking it out all 6 games he had freed the internetal plains from domination!!!!
When asked for his name he gave them his last name... Mongon! From then on there he was known as Mongon! He was freed to return home but given an internetal key to come back any time. Before he could leave on his own the freak power began and he was sucked into a different dimension.
He landed in professor xaviers school for gifted youngsters. His skin and hair was now blue and his eyes were glowing yellow. He landed in the right place to help. When Xavier disovered a bit of magic in his abilities he sent him to Dr. Strange for help...but before he could go Excalibur had come to visit the school and with them was Merlin.
It was there Merlin came out and explained that Mongon was his son and took him to his magical home to meet his mother Morrigan Aensland the Succubi Queen. He also met his sister. He trained with his family as they taught him what they mostly knew.
Upon coming back to the school he found Juggernaut there using magical attacks. Quickly Mongon jumped in and countered some of the spells and set up a few of his own! This action spooked Juggernaut as noone had revally used magic back on him... possibly ever! He took a mad dash for it running over sabertooth!
Over the years Mongon has visited many other dimensions, seen other cultures and has even had the luck to live very different lives and learn many things. It's time he return back to the marvel universe where he once got his spark.
----------------------------------------------------------
There's always going to be weird questions on Mongon but thats what makes it fun. He's a character who's been used for 13 years now so things are always changing.
I will post up of his past in the future.
For the record, Calvin might be the nicest guy in the world. But when it comes to creating characters he is totally out of control. What we have here is a classic case of Mary Sue-dom. His character is a thousand years old, giving him maybe thirty times more life times worth of experiences than other players (add to that he looks eighteen, so he can easily flirt with the ladies and his potential enemies would under estimate him, not realizing they were dealing with a veteran). His powers are all over the map and he wrote up his origin so that he is friends with the X-Men and Fantastic Four both. He makes himself the son of Merlin, then defeats the Juggernaut. But as bad as this character is, what makes it worse it there was a GM who green lit it.
The GM, Chris, let Calvin run this character. Why? Good question. Perhaps Chris is an inexperienced GM and has no idea how to say “no”. Perhaps Chris and Calvin are friends in real life and he wants to be nice. Perhaps Chris has poor judgment. Certainly one aspect of poor judgment is to no adhere to your own rules. One of Chris’ is:
Also no power is invincible to get around, these are young heroes not experience meaning you won't be tossing airplanes at each other like baseballs anytime soon or at least not in the beginning :p
Hmmm. So why is he letting someone play a character who is an experienced hero, a former X-Man?
Here is something that was amusing, in a sad way. When I asked him for clarification regarding powers he had this to say:
As far as the original character are concerned most if not all will not be as Strong as Thor believe me when I say thats a recipe for Godmodding. But that doesn't mean they themselves won't be significantly powerful in their own right, its hard for me too really give a scale you can focus around since most Comic character seem to be all over the place as power is concerned but let say they could take on a guy like the Rhino by themselves just fine but they need some help against the Juggernaut.
And yet Mongon defeated The Juggernaut single handedly.
If you are going to be a GM consistency is key. Do not tell one player one thing then contradict yourself with another. Do not create rules and then ignore them. Do not be afraid to tell a player “no” when it comes to a character submission.
NOTE: Calvin posted a more complete bio of Mongon here and it is even worse, where he makes himself a member of the West Coast Avengers and a student of Doctor Strange. You know who this reminds me of? Sentry. Sentry, for those of you who do not know, is a Marvel Comics character created by Paul Jenkins who was forcibly retconned into Marvel history so he was known and loved by everyone. He was everyone's friend, the only guy who could calm The Hulk. Heck, he even took Rogue's virginity because he was the only guy who could touch her.
The more I look at Mongon, the gladder I am I dodged this bullet...
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Freak Angels
Superboyprime at Scans Daily posted a link to Warren Ellis' Freak Angels. Freak Angels is an online free comic I have been following for a few months now. I just thought I would mention it. This week would be an excellent time to jump on, although to really enjoy the story I would highly recommend starting at the beginning.
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