Cypher - Claim The Sky [PDF]

Zitiervorschau

Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

Y K S E H T M I CLA

Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

Credits Designers Development Creative Director Managing Editor Editor/Proofreader Art Director Cover Artist

Monte Cook, Sean K. Reynolds, and Bruce R. Cordell Sean K. Reynolds Monte Cook Teri Litorco Ray Vallese Bear Weiter Roberto Pitturru

Cartographer Lee Smith Artists Mauro Alocci, Javier P. Beltrán, Biagio D’Alessandro, Sarah Dahlinger, Giuseppe De iure, Michele Esposito, Michele Giorgi, Guido Kuip, Katerina Ladon, Brandon Leach, Raph Herrera Lomotan, Patrick McEvoy, Federico Musetti, Mirco Paganessi, Angelo Peluso, John Petersen, Roberto Pitturru, Scott Purdy, Aaron Riley, Riccardo Rullo, Seth Rutledge, Martin de Diego Sádaba, Lee Smith, Matt Stawicki, Cyril Terpent, Cory Trego-Erdner

© 2021 Monte Cook Games, LLC. CYPHER SYSTEM and its logo are trademarks of Monte Cook Games, LLC in the U.S.A. and other countries. All Monte Cook Games characters and character names, and the distinctive likenesses thereof, are trademarks of Monte Cook Games, LLC. Printed in Canada

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Table of Contents Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

PART 1: GAMING WITH SUPERPOWERS

5

Chapter 1: BUILDING A SUPERHERO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Chapter 2: CHARACTER OPTIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Chapter 3: SUPERPOWERED RULES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 Chapter 4: A WORLD WITH POWERS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Chapter 5: COMIC BOOK STORYTELLING. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Chapter 6: SUPERHERO STORIES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 Chapter 7: SUPERHERO BASES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 Chapter 8: HEROES, VILLAINS, AND OTHER NPCs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106 Chapter 9: CYPHERS AND ARTIFACTS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .157

PART 2: BOUNDLESS

159

Chapter 10: BOUNDLESS OVERVIEW. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Chapter 11: HISTORY OF THE WORLD. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165 Chapter 12: SUPERPOWERED SURVEY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .175 Chapter 13: DEATH, THY NAME IS GRAVITAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202 Chapter 14: TALONS OF DOOM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207 Chapter 15: BENEATH A RED SUN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .214

Superhero Character Sheet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .223

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t c i u o d n o r t In S

ome of my earliest memories are about superheroes. I remember being kind of scared at a very early age at an image on the cover of a Batman comic (probably a Neal Adams cover). After getting just a little older, I remember collecting Super Richie comics—that was Richie Rich’s superhero identity. I watched the Super Friends on Saturday mornings, and this was before they fought supervillains, and instead ran around with kids named Wendy and Marvin and helped save the environment. The 1970s were an odd decade. The first true superhero comic that I read, like many kids, was Superman. I had an issue where his powers were out of control because of the Parasite that I read about a thousand times. This was just the beginning for me, though. I was deeply immersed in the Marvel Universe by the time I started playing roleplaying games. So when I learned through an ad in Dragon magazine that there was a superhero game (Villains and Vigilantes), my friends and I pooled our money and ordered it right away. But mail order took forever then (and being a kid made things seem longer still), so while we waited, I created my own superhero rules and statted up Iron Man, the Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, and Captain America, and we played a game based in the little town we grew up in. I don’t remember a thing about that game system, but the characters faced off against villains from the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe. I believe it was Basilisk, Batroc the Leaper, and the Controller (only the first couple of issues of OHOTMU were out at that point, so

we had only A–C to choose from). We tossed it aside as soon as V&V arrived, but equating superheroes and roleplaying games was now a core part of me. Professionally, I worked on Champions and the Marvel Super Heroes RPG, but the opportunity to create Claim the Sky is really the crowning achievement of that progression. This was an opportunity to work alongside my friends Sean and Bruce and really portray superheroes the way we saw them. The advice and rules you have before you, and in particular the Boundless setting, is one big love letter to the comic book worlds starting in our youth and going right up to today (I am still an avid comics reader). And of course the universes we now see so remarkably portrayed on the screen as well. As an aside, every time I sit down to watch a superhero movie today, the ten-year-old in me can’t believe what he’s seeing. When I was a kid, superhero TV and movies were absolutely horrible—and I still loved them. So Claim the Sky is almost as much about the superheroes we see in movies and television as those we see on the comic book page. Superhero stories are pure wish fulfillment, and some people think that makes them immature. But I would argue that there’s never been a better time to dream of being able to fly, to save the world from evil, and to be a true hero. Using your power to help people who have none—that’s the opposite of immature, I believe. It’s a great time to be a superhero fan, and every word of this book was written with the joy and enthusiasm of a kid with their first comic. I hope that reading it conveys that same joy. Monte Cook May 2021

USING CLAIM THE SKY Claim the Sky is a companion to the Cypher System Rulebook. This means you won’t find introductions to the Cypher System, how to create characters, full rules of the game, or other related concepts here. Claim the Sky assumes you’ve got all that in the Cypher System Rulebook, and that you’re ready to dive right into superhero-specific content.

Throughout this book, you’ll see page references to various items accompanied by this symbol. These are page references to the Cypher System Rulebook, where you can find additional details about that rule, ability, creature, or concept.

For more information about consent in gaming, download the free Consent in Gaming PDF at myMCG.info/consent

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Part 1

GAMING WITH SUPERPOWERS

Chapter 1: BUILDING A SUPERHERO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Chapter 2: CHARACTER OPTIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 Chapter 3: SUPERPOWERED RULES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 Chapter 4: A WORLD WITH POWERS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66 Chapter 5: COMIC BOOK STORYTELLING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Chapter 6: SUPERHERO STORIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 Chapter 7: SUPERHERO BASES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 Chapter 8: HEROES, VILLAINS, AND OTHER NPCs. . . . . . . . . . . 106 Chapter 9: CYPHERS AND ARTIFACTS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .157

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1 CHAP TER

a g n i d l i u b

r o e h r e su p

This chapter is intended for players and GMs, and has no spoilers.

Type, page 20 Focus, page 60 Descriptor, page 38 Flavor, page 34 Influence Swarm, page 153 Control Swarm, page 122

Tiny hero, page 37

B

ecause you’re reading this, you’re probably a fan of superheroes and already have an idea of what kind of superhero you want to play—perhaps one based on your favorite superhuman character from comics, television, or films. Or maybe you’re new to supers as a genre and want to get an idea of what sorts of powers and characters are common. This chapter discusses many superhero archetypes (common hero concepts) and gives suggestions about how to create characters like that in the Cypher System. If you’re eager to get started and want to recreate a popular superhero in the Cypher System, see the box on the following page for suggestions on what type, descriptor, and focus to choose. If

ACTERS EXTENSIVELY PUBLISHED CHAR comics end

GM Tip: For a fun one-shot game session, have each player create a variant of the same superhero, each coming from a different timeline or multiverse.

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g history in Superheroes with a lon they improve their up changing over time— es, and learn from skills, develop new abiliti even retire and allow their experiences. Some e up the mantle of a worthy successor to tak This means that many their costumed identity. ilt as RPG characters in superheroes could be bu ent types, descriptors, multiple ways—with differ rsion of the character foci, and powers. Any ve the “right” version. that you want to play is superhero with the When recreating such a specific snapshot of the game rules, try to find a , use that as the main character that you enjoy ter, and choose the concept for your charac riptor, and focus) based game options (type, desc on that concept.

you want a more detailed look at various hero archetypes and the choices you can make to build those heroes, continue reading here. The archetypes in this chapter include suggestions for your character sentence—what type, focus, and descriptor to use for your character. Types appear in the Cypher System Rulebook. Most of the descriptors and foci in this section appear in the Cypher System Rulebook; the new ones are found in Chapter 3: Superpowered Rules. Some of these archetypes recommend swapping out a type ability for an ability from one of the character flavors, such as combat, magic, or stealth. Some suggest going beyond the sets of flavor abilities and swapping a type or focus ability for an unusual ability that fits the idea of your hero. For example, the tiny hero archetype is mostly about being small and stealthy, but it’s a common variant for that kind of character to also command an army of bugs, so the archetype gives suggestions for bug-influencing abilities like Influence Swarm and Control Swarm. The general idea is that the game is flexible enough to let you build the superhero you want to play, even if the defined abilities here and in the Cypher System Rulebook aren’t exactly what you’re looking for. Part of the fun of building a new superhero is adding your own personal touches and quirks that make them unique compared to the famous established characters in superhero media.

building a superhero POPULAR HEROES IN THE CYPHER SYSTEM If you want to quickly create a popular superhero using the Cypher System, use these character sentences for a standard interpretation of a tier 1 version of that hero. Then assign points to your Pools, choose your type abilities, pick your power shifts, and you’re ready to play! For more advice about customizing your hero (including what power shifts to choose and other abilities to swap in), see the archetype entry for that hero. Character Ant-Man Batman Black Panther Black Widow Captain America Daredevil Deadpool Dr. Strange The Flash Green Lantern Hawkeye The Hulk Human Torch Iron Man Magneto Namor Professor X Spider-Man Storm Superman

Summary Ant-sized hero Dark knight King and chosen guardian of his country Deadly superspy Super-soldier with a shield Man without fear Mercenary with a mouth Master of the mystic arts Fastest man alive Hero with a power ring Perfect archer Big green rage monster Flying, fiery young hero Inventor with power armor Master of magnetism King of Atlantis World’s most powerful telepath Teenager with spider powers Goddess of storms Man of steel

The Thing Thor Wolverine Wonder Woman

Big orange rock monster God of thunder Canadian with claws Princess of the Amazons

In some cases, you might need to tinker with the aesthetics of the abilities described in the character options to make them fit your character. For example, it’s easy to create a fire-themed superhero using the choices in the energy master archetype, and you can also use those recommendations to create a hero whose powers are based on nuclear radiation or solar plasma. Likewise, the elastic hero abilities assume you’re making a human character with stretching powers, but you can also use that archetype to build a robot character with telescoping limbs or a plant-alien character whose body is made of coils of vines. Work with your GM to be sure any changes you make are suitable for the campaign.

Sentence Jovial Explorer who Shrinks to Minute Size Perceptive Warrior who Solves Mysteries Honorable Warrior who Needs No Weapon

Archetype Tiny hero Genius Master martial artist

Appealing Explorer who Infiltrates Honorable Warrior who Masters Defense Perceptive Explorer who Looks for Trouble Chaotic Warrior who Never Says Die Mystical Adept who Masters Spells Swift Explorer who Moves Like the Wind Strong-Willed Explorer who Sculpts Hard Light Sharp-Eyed Warrior who Masters Weaponry Incredible Explorer who Rages Brash Explorer who Bears a Halo of Fire Mechanical Adept who Wears Power Armor Strong-Willed Adept who Employs Magnetism Strong Explorer who Performs Feats of Strength Intelligent Adept who Commands Mental Powers Amazing Explorer who Moves Like a Cat Intuitive Explorer who Touches the Sky Beneficent Explorer who Flies Faster Than a Bullet Strong Explorer who Abides in Stone Mighty Warrior who Rides the Lightning Tough Warrior who Never Says Die Virtuous Warrior who Performs Feats of Strength

Superspy Master athlete Master athlete Master martial artist Sorcerer Speedster Hard light master Weapon master Rage monster Energy master Powered armor hero Energy master Atlantean Mentalist Bug hero Nature master Paragon

The archetypes suggest how to assign your power shifts. This is an important aspect of designing your hero because power shifts are what make your characters exceptional in a “supers” way. Superheroes are known for being faster, tougher, stronger, or smarter than regular people, and that sort of comparison isn’t always part of the abilities you get from your type or focus. A regular person might be very skilled at martial arts, but a superhero martial artist might punch through an iron door, dodge a burst of bullets from a machine gun at close range, or quickly recover from a mortal wound, all thanks to power shifts. This part of each archetype writeup assumes your

Friendly thing Energy master Unkillable beast Paragon

Shrinks to Minute Size, page 47 Amazing, page 42 Incredible, page 42 Mighty, page 43 Sculpts Hard Light, page 46 Touches the Sky, page 47 Power shifts, page 57 Energy master, page 17 Elastic, page 16

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Claim the Sky Chapter 2: Character Options (page 42) has several new descriptors that get to the heart of your nature as a superhero and how you fit into the world (or don’t fit). If you have a good idea of what your hero persona is but are still working on what the person under the mask is like, choosing one of these descriptors lets you focus on fighting crime while you figure out the rest of your character behind the scenes. Master athlete, page 24

You can always work with the GM to swap out an ability that doesn’t suit your character and swap in one that does— perhaps a basic energy attack ability like Concussive Blast (121), Frost Touch (144), Onslaught (167), Shock (183), or Thunder Beam (191).

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hero starts with five power shifts, but most archetype descriptions give only two or three suggestions, allowing you some flexibility to customize your superhero. For example, a master athlete with two power shifts in healing is a very different character than one with two power shifts in resilience. As you think about the archetypes and how you might create your character, remember that this chapter offers recommendations on how to build these kinds of superheroes. They’re not rules on how you must build them. You might come up with a clever way of making your favorite kind of superhero that doesn’t follow any of these suggestions; that just means your character will be unique and fun to play, and probably a surprise for your group and any villains they encounter. The small numbers you see after abilities throughout this book are Cypher System Rulebook page numbers for easy reference.

POWER SOURCE As you’re figuring out what type, descriptor, focus, and power shifts you want for your character, think about how you got your powers. Are you a mutant, born with special abilities? Do you have a high-tech costume with built-in nanotechnology? Are you a sorcerer, or maybe a psychic? The source of your powers is character flavor—for example, there’s no game mechanics difference between the mental powers of an alien member of a telepathic species, a human character who built a brain-augmenting helmet, or a faerie character from the starlight dimension who knows mind-magic. All three of those characters could have the same type, focus, descriptor, and power shifts, but they’d be very different people and have very different reasons for being a part of the RPG campaign. If you can’t decide how you got your powers, or if you like leaving some things up to chance, try rolling once or twice on the Power Origin table and pick the result that you like better, or combine the two into something weird and unique.

building a superhero POWER ORIGIN d100 01

Origin

51–55

Absorbed powers of someone else

Latent mutation activated by extraordinary event

Alien exile

56

Magically augmented (accidentally)

04

Alien orphan

57

Magically augmented (unwillingly)

05–06

Alien refugee

58

Magically augmented (willingly)

07

Alien symbiote

59

Meteor

08–09

Alien visitor

60

Mutant at birth

10–14

Built a device

61–64

Mutant at puberty

15–17

Chemical exposure

65–67

Nanotechnology

02–03

Chosen one

68

Near-human fantasy species (elf, orc, etc.)

19–20

Cosmic rays during test flight

69

Passed through a wormhole

21–23

Cybernetics

18

24

Dark matter explosion

25–26

DNA-splicing accident

70–71 72

Psychic Reincarnation of a legendary being from the past

27

Energy being in physical form

73–75

Revived after dying and got powers

28–30

Experimental medical process

76–78

Robot

31–33

Experimental technological procedure

34–35

Found a device

80–82

Stolen device

36

Found a magical item

83–85

Studied magic

37

From another dimension

38

Gamma rays

39–40

Genetic engineering

41–42

Given an experimental device

43

Given an item by a powerful entity

44

Given a magical item

45–47 48 49–50

Government technological device Inhuman creature (plant, evolved animal, unknown) Intense training

79

Stole powers from someone else

86

Supernatural creature (demon, angel, werewolf, vampire, etc.)

87

Superpowered ancestor

88–90

Surgically implanted device

91–92

Survived a disaster, unharmed

93

Teleportation accident

94

Time traveler from the future

95–97

Unexplained drug reaction

98

Unexplained event at birth

99

Unknown

00

Unusual weather

STARTING JUST PAST TIER 1

An interesting option for a GM starting a superhero campaign is to immediately give each PC 4 XP, which they must spend on a special advancement option to gain another type ability. It’s another way (along with power shifts) to make new superhero PCs feel a cut above player characters in other genres—and gives players a little more wiggle room in building the character they want to play.

Remember that you can permanently increase the range of one of your abilities with the increased range power shift. Power shifts, page 57

Other Options (Character Advancement), page 240

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Claim the Sky

THE GM ISN’T OUT TO GET YOU

Type, page 20 Focus, page 60 Descriptor, page 38

As you think about your character and how they got their powers, you might wonder whether it’s better to have innate powers (like a mutant) or equipment-based powers (like a high-tech costume or powered armor). You might worry that if your powers come from your equipment, it could be broken or stolen during the game, turning you into a normal person. Although heroes sometimes lose their powers in superhero stories (usually for dramatic tension or to change up their routine), in the end they get their powers back and return to being a superhero. The GM always has the option of using a GM intrusion to change something about an encounter, and each of the foci here and in the Cypher System Rulebook gives a couple of suggestions for intrusions.

It doesn’t matter if your hero is an alien, robot, or mutant, has a magical hammer, or wears a high-tech suit of armor, sometimes a weird thing happens and your powers don’t work quite right (and remember that you and another character get 1 XP every time the GM intrudes, which balances out this kind of complication). In other words, just because your hero might accidentally leave their super-gizmo at home or drop their power ring down the kitchen sink, it doesn’t mean the GM will pounce on that as a free reason to mess with your character. A jerk GM could depower a mutant, alien, or robot just as easily as they could depower an equipment-based hero, but this isn’t that sort of game. Trust that your GM isn’t a jerk, and choose the source of your powers so you’re playing the superhero you want to play.

CHARACTER CONCEPTS Use the advice in these character concepts to choose the type, focus, and descriptor that suits your character. This section refers to many types, descriptors, and foci in the Cypher System Rulebook; the small numbers you see throughout are page numbers for easy reference.

SUPERHERO ARCHETYPES Atlantean Bearer of the item Beastly hero Beastmaster Bug hero Builder Cyborg Dark energy master Elastic Energy master Extra limbs Force field master Friendly thing Genius

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Giant hero Half-vampire Hard light master Hunter Illusionist Master athlete Master martial artist Mentalist Multiplier Nature master Paragon Phase master Plant Power replicator

Powered armor hero Rage monster Robot Sensory adept Shapechanger Sorcerer Speedster Superspy Telekinetic Teleporter Tiny hero Unkillable beast Weapon master

building a superhero ATLANTEAN

BEARER OF THE ITEM

You’re from an underwater city or realm such as Atlantis.

Your powers come from your use of a specific object with strange abilities.

Living beneath the sea means being strong enough to swim everywhere and tough enough to endure the crushing pressure of water, so when you come to the land you have a superhuman physique. A focus like Never Says Die (73) or Performs Feats of Strength (73) emphasizes your physical prowess. If your home is in the wilder parts of the ocean instead of a city, you could instead choose Lives in the Wilderness (71) or Sailed Beneath the Jolly Roger (74). If you rely on unusual technology from your aquatic homeland, foci like Brandishes an Exotic Shield (64) or Wields an Enchanted Weapon are also possibilities. Most of the Atlantean heroes who come to the surface world are Warriors or Explorers, perhaps because they intend to challenge polluters or track down the enemies of the sea realms. With an Atlantean’s natural advantages, you’re likely to have a descriptor like Brash, Rugged, Skeptical, or Strong-Willed. To play up your physical gifts, choose Fast, Hardy, Strong, or Swift. If you have a complicated or troubled relationship with your own people, pick Doomed, Exiled, or Mysterious. If you’re more inhuman than you let on, either in body or mind, try Exiled, Guarded, Hideous, or Weird. Put shifts into resilience and strength, and either accuracy or single attack. If your type and focus don’t give you all the physical skills you want, put a shift into savant. Swap in Eyes Adjusted (138) to allow you to see in the darkest depths of the ocean, Swim (188) to let you swim at a decent speed, and Water Adaptation (196) to let you breathe water or air. If you can befriend fish or other creatures of the sea, swap in Influence Swarm (153) and Control Swarm (122) for multiple weak ones or Soothe the Savage (184) and Communication (121) for larger ones. (Note that if most of your activities are on land, you won’t get much use out of fish-controlling powers.)

You have a connection to an object that grants you amazing abilities. Maybe you chose it, or it chose you. Maybe you don’t fully understand or trust it, and maybe it seems intelligent and has its own agenda. Regardless of these things (all of which are opportunities for character arcs), the bond is undeniable. If this object gives you energy powers (like a lightning-imbued hammer or a flaming sword), choose Wields an Enchanted Weapon as your focus. If the object is or contains a creature that can act independently of you, try Keeps a Magic Ally (71). If the object is a shield instead of a weapon, pick Brandishes an Exotic Shield (64). If the object is a weapon and you primarily use it as a weapon, choose Warrior as your type. If the object is a tool or otherwise has many noncombat abilities, you’re probably a Warrior or an Explorer. If the object is actually a psychic or magical manifestation of your own powers, you’re probably an Adept with other weird abilities. If the object is merely a tool for your innate heroism, pick a descriptor like Honorable, Jovial, Mystical, or Virtuous. If you’re cautious about using the object because you’re not sure of its goals or using it has side effects, choose Hideous, Mysterious, Naive, or Weird. If it seems like the object is in charge and you’re just along for the ride, try Chaotic, Doomed, Lucky, or Mad. If you can attack with the object, put a power shift into single attack with its offensive ability (or accuracy, if it has multiple attack abilities). If it has an ability that isn’t based on damage (like breaking objects or mind control), put a shift in power for that ability. If it helps keep you alive and safe, put a shift in healing or resilience. You can swap in just about any kind of ability, whether that’s a special attack (104) like Ray of Confusion (174), a protection (102)

Character arcs, page 238

Wields an Enchanted Weapon, page 48

Instead of being native to Earth’s oceans, the Atlantean archetype could be an alien from a water world or a magical creature from a mystical realm of enchanted lakes.

If you’re a bearer of the item, the source of your power might be a futuristic weapon, an alien crafting tool, a magical artifact, a creature that takes the shape of an object, or a psychic entity embedded in your mind.

For a hero whose powers derive from a suit of armor, try the powered armor hero archetype, page 30.

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Claim the Sky power like Magic Shield (159), or a special form of movement (101) like Void Wings (196). An interesting ability like this might be the core of what the object is, such as an alien crowd-control device, the wand destined to kill an ancient evil wizard, or a demon of darkness.

BEASTLY HERO You have animal powers—speed, strength, enhanced senses, and so on.

If you’re a superhero who fully transforms into an animal, try the shapechanger archetype, page 33. If you’d rather control beasts than act like one, see the beastmaster concept.

If communicating with and controlling beasts is just one of your mental powers, you might be a mentalist (page 25) instead of a beastmaster.

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Many kinds of animals are stronger, faster, more agile, and more dangerous than humans. You might have a combat style that emulates an animal, or you might have mystical, genetic, or technological enhancements that actually give you the strength of a bear, the reflexes of a tiger, or the ferocity of a wolf. (And maybe you even physically resemble a humanoid animal, all the time or some of the time.) If your chosen animal is more fast than strong, choose Moves Like a Cat (73) as your focus. If it’s more strong than fast, pick Performs Feats of Strength (73). If you just want to emulate predators in general, try Hunts (69). If you are overcome with animalistic fury, you might like Howls at the Moon (69) or Rages (74). Beastly heroes are almost always Warriors or Explorers. Just choose a type that matches the ideal of your animal— more about ferocity and threat, or a blend of combat and enhanced skills. Your choice of descriptor depends on the personality of your beast self. For a confident, aggressive creature, choose Brash, Resilient, Strong, or Vicious. For an agile, sly, or sneaky creature, try Clever, Fast, Graceful, Stealthy, or Swift. For a wise, observant, or sensitive beast, pick Empathic, Intuitive, Perceptive, or Sharp-Eyed. Use your power shifts to emulate your chosen animal. For a strong animal like a bear, lion, or constrictor snake, put shifts in strength and a single attack (such as a claw or a punch). For an agile animal like a leopard or viper, put shifts in accuracy

and dexterity. To pick up some skills appropriate to your animal (like climbing or stealth), put a shift in savant. If your animal can fly and you don’t have a flying ability from your type or focus, consider putting a shift in flight. If your type and focus haven’t quite hit all of the aspects of your animal, swap out an ability or two to get the powers you want. For a poisonous or venomous creature, get Create Deadly Poison (123). For claws, get Fists of Fury (140) to increase your unarmed attack damage. If you need skills like climbing, jumping, or swimming, choose Physical Skills (170). For enhanced senses, pick Eyes Adjusted (138) or Sense Ambush (181). If you need a special attack that’s not too fantastic, try Dual Light Wield (132), Opportunist (167), or Surprise Attack (188).

BEASTMASTER Animals and other simple creatures obey your commands. If you have a beast companion and can communicate with animals, choose Controls Beasts (65) as your focus. If you have power over swarms of smaller creatures (like bats, rats, or spiders) instead of one bigger beast, pick Masters the Swarm (72). If you’re good with people as well as animals, choose Speaker as your type. If you fight as well as an animal, pick Warrior. If you make equal use of survival skills and combat, you’re an Explorer. Descriptors like Perceptive, Rugged, and Sharp-Eyed are usually good fits for a beastmaster hero. An especially agile beastmaster might be Fast, Graceful, Stealthy, or Swift. A burly one is probably Hardy, Strong, or Tough. If you want to play up an animal-like aspect of your personality, Brash, Clever, or Vicious might be appropriate for you. Put shifts in accuracy and dexterity. If you have a beast companion that can fly, you might want to put a shift in flight so you can travel together. A shift in healing lets

building a superhero you take a moment to recover while your animal allies continue fighting. Swapping in Command Beast at tier 3 (or earlier with a prodigy power shift) lets you command other beasts you meet while fighting crime. If you want to have more than one allied animal accompanying you, swap in Beast Companion (112) again or Critter Companion (123). Swap in support (105) abilities like Encouragement (134) and Inspire Aggression (154) to boost your allied animals as well as your humanoid friends.

BUG HERO You have the proportional strength and speed of some kind of bug! You can jump a hundred times your body length like a flea, or climb walls like a spider, or lift twenty times your own body weight like an ant, or survive radiation and crushing pressure like a cockroach—and it’s time to use these powers to fight crime! If agility is your thing, pick Moves Like a Cat (73) as your focus. If you’re more about phenomenal strength, choose Performs Feats of Strength (73). If your shtick is that you’re incredibly tough and hard to kill, try Never Says Die (73). Picking Warrior or Explorer as your type gives you fun things to do in combat and access to skills and abilities for movement and survival. Go with Warrior if you’re an aggressive bug, or Explorer if you’re more of an ambusher or sneak. Actual bugs don’t have much of a personality, so your descriptor should be about your personality. Ones that work for just about any bug hero are Fast, Lucky, Stealthy, Strong, and Tough. If your powers come from a suit or devices you invented or tinker with, Mechanical might fit you. If you’re a friendly neighborhood bug hero who is just trying to help the average person, something like Appealing, Beneficent, Jovial, or Kind can make people like you despite any bad press. If you’re a reformed crook trying to use your powers for good, Clever and Exiled are a good

mix of advantages and baggage. Heroes with bug powers are often kind of quirky and prone to showing off, so maybe a descriptor like Brash, Impulsive, Mad, or Risk-Taking would suit you. Depending on what kind of bug you are, power shifts in accuracy, dexterity, resilience, and strength are appropriate choices. If you’re a flying bug, put a shift in flight. Once you’ve chosen all of your power shifts, you may need to swap in an ability to round out your suite of bug-themed powers. It’s okay to choose an extraordinary ability and make it part of your theme, even if you need to change how it’s described. For example, if you’re a spider hero, you can know when trouble’s about to happen with Danger Sense (124), describe Far Step (138) as pulling yourself around on elastic webs, and reflavor Entangling Force (136) so it involves using your webbing to bind foes. Other unusual ideas that you could fold into a bug hero archetype are a wasp hero using an electrical blast like Shock (183), a beetle hero creating a protective bubble with Force Field (143), or a flea hero becoming as small as an actual bug with Shrink.

Command Beast, page 51

If you control bugs rather than emulate their abilities, see the beastmaster archetype, page 12. If shrinking to tiny size is your main theme, see the tiny hero archetype, page 37.

Shrink, page 55

BUILDER You can build amazing things beyond the bounds of normal science. While regular engineers and scientists struggle with making better cars and smartphones, you’re building dimensional portals, human-intelligence robots, and energy weapons—for you, super-science is normal and “regular science” is baby stuff. If you mainly want to create robots, pick Builds Robots (65) as your character focus. If you’ve invented a cool suit for yourself and all of your inventions get added to it, try Wears Power Armor (78). If you really want the potential to create just about anything— teleporters, ray guns, force field belts, flight rings, telepathy helmets, and so on— choose Crafts Unique Objects (66). Or maybe in a post-apocalyptic superhero setting,

Of the builder foci suggested here, Crafts Unique Objects is the most complex because it can build almost anything, given enough time and materials. If your hero Crafts Unique Objects, make sure you understand how the crafting rules work.

Crafting, page 227

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Ability categories, page 95

Always Tinkering, page 48

If you’re a builder hero, be sure to read the Inventor or Gadgeteer? box on page 15.

If your machine parts are all in your brain and make you smarter, try the genius archetype, page 20. If your brain implants primarily let you control machines, see the mentalist archetype, page 25.

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perhaps in a future timeline where much of civilization has been destroyed, you might consider a focus like Scavenges (75). If you want to have access to a lot of other super-science abilities (presumably things you’ve invented), you’re probably an Adept. If you build stuff because you want to visit and study dangerous environments like other planets and parallel dimensions, pick Explorer as your type. If you see yourself more as a millionaire genius philanthropist and you use your crafting to boost your image and good works, Speaker might be a more appropriate type for you. If you make things to protect yourself and obliterate your enemies, you might be a Warrior, but it’s more likely that you’re an Explorer who has chosen some aggressive abilities (see below). Your descriptor is probably Creative, Intelligent, Learned, or Mechanical. If under that heroic outer persona you’re actually a quiet or nerdy sort of person, you might instead be Calm, Inquisitive, or Naive.

Put a power shift into intelligence to make your crafting easier and better, and one shift in power or single attack for your main attack ability. As a builder, in theory you could have any kind of ability because you crafted it yourself; just figure out whether you want a movement (101) ability, a special attack (104), or something from another category entirely. If you’re the sort of hero who keeps coming up with weird inventions to test out, swap out an ability for Always Tinkering. Also, it doesn’t hurt to look at flavors like skills and knowledge (37) or technology (35) to add more ability choices (although depending on your type and focus, many of them may be redundant with the choices you already have). If you’re an aggressive sort of builder, the combat (36) flavor might give you a thing or two to round out your archetype.

CYBORG You’re part living creature, part machine. Being this kind of superhero gives you a lot of options! The most common focus for a cyborg is Fuses Flesh and Steel (69), which gives you a mix of abilities. If you’re more about armor, Stands Like a Bastion (77) and Wears Power Armor (78) are good choices. If your cybernetics are all internal and you’re really strong, try Performs Feats of Strength (73). If your mechanical implants require so much energy that you have to steal it from other machines, choose Siphons Power (76). If you were sent back in time from a dark future to stop the apocalypse, Scavenges (75) represents your ability to survive and thrive. Most cyborg heroes like you were rebuilt or enhanced to make them better in combat, so Warrior is the obvious type for that. Others were made to search dangerous places, survive hazards, and retrieve useful things, and those cyborgs are generally Explorers.

building a superhero INVENTOR OR GADGETEER? There are two main kinds of characters who craft useful objects: • Inventors, who create long-lasting pieces of equipment that they’re frequently upgrading and tinkering with (such as a suit of mechanized armor, wrist-mounted web-shooters, or a set of robotic arms mounted to a belt). Inventors sometimes also create specialized items that they put in storage or disassemble once they’re no longer needed (like a shapechanger-detector, a water-breathing helmet, or a transdimensional communicator). • Gadgeteers, who create single-use devices. The character might build and use these devices so often that gadgets are considered part of their standard gear (like an explosive arrow, a stunning boomerang, or a tiny tracking device to throw at a fleeing criminal), or they might have a constant turnover of new convenient gadgets (like sleep gas arrows, web arrows, cable arrows, and so on). Informally, as a player you might say that things inventors build are inventions and things that gadgeteers build are gadgets, but in the superhero world people probably don’t make any distinction between the two kinds of crafted objects. In game terms, long-lasting pieces of equipment are either part of a character’s superpowers (and are activated by spending Pool points), or they’re artifacts and have a depletion stat that determines when they stop working. Single-use devices are manifest cyphers—physical objects that have a specific effect. A gadgeteer hero probably uses manifest cyphers instead of subtle cyphers (which are not physical), or uses a mix of the two. One advantage of having manifest cyphers instead of subtle cyphers is you can give one to a teammate to use. If you’re a character who crafts items (whether you’re a builder, a genius, or some other archetype), think about whether you’re more of an inventor, a gadgeteer, or a mix of the two. It doesn’t affect your game choices for building your character, but it does help define how their powers work in the world. The following are special abilities related to manifest cyphers, which a crafting character may want to swap other abilities for:

TIER 1

TIER 3

1 Always Tinkering

1 Modify Cyphers

1 Extra Use (138)

TIER 2 1 Boost Manifest Cypher

TIER 5 1 Boost Manifest Cypher Function

Artifacts, page 204 Manifest cyphers, page 379 Subtle cyphers, page 378

Always Tinkering, page 48 Boost Manifest Cypher, 51 Modify Cyphers, page 54 Boost Manifest Cypher Function, page 51

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Claim the Sky Your machine parts might make you cold and unfeeling, or even erratic, in which case a descriptor like Calm, Cruel, or Mad suits you. Or maybe you have a new lease on life after surviving a terrible accident that led to you getting your cybernetics, so you’re Brash, Chaotic, or Impulsive. If you’re trying to live a normal life despite everything you’ve been through, pick Guarded or Mysterious. If you’re still adapting to your new body parts, or they’re distractingly ugly, choose Clumsy, Hardy, or Hideous. If whoever gave you this technology is hunting you, try Craven, Doomed, or Exiled. Put power shifts in accuracy, resilience, and strength. Although usually most of your machine enhancements are to make you stronger and tougher, it’s good to have a trick up your sleeve so your opponents underestimate you. Try swapping in advanced senses from Heads-Up Display (148), a ranged energy attack like Thunder Beam (191), or jet boots that let you leap with Far Step (138).

DARK ENERGY MASTER You emit and control a strange force, energy, or substance from another dimension. The dark energy master archetype is supposed to have an unnatural and possibly dangerous aspect to it. For a more “normal” kind of energy, even if it’s fantastical or mysterious (like “vita-rays” or “omega flame”), try the energy master archetype, page 17.

Stretches, page 47

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There are superheroes that can control fire, electricity, air, water, metal, or other mundane materials, but your power is over much weirder stuff than that. Is it slime from a realm of alien horrors? Sentient darkness from a dimension of shadows? Ectoplasm from the afterlife? Whatever it is, it’s weird and dangerous. The focus Dances With Dark Matter (66) is perfect for this archetype, whether you use it as is or change the aesthetics to something different, and gives you a wide range of abilities. If you want a more specific set of powers, try a focus like Rides the Lightning (74), Shreds the Walls of the World (76), or Siphons Power (76). If you see yourself as using your powers mainly for fighting, pick Warrior as your

type. If you want to develop your abilities in even weirder ways, choose Adept. If you’re more of a sneaky, stealthy type, using your powers to infiltrate and subdue, try being an Explorer. (Whatever the source of your power is, it’s probably spooky enough to people that being an effective Speaker would be very difficult.) If you want a hero with a strange power source and not a lot of emotional baggage, pick the Stealthy descriptor. If you need mental strength to restrain your powers from causing inadvertent harm, consider Calm, Mystical, Resilient, or Strong-Willed. If your dark energy powers are tied to your negative emotions, or they are slowly corrupting you, choose a descriptor like Craven, Cruel, Dishonorable, or Doomed. If your abilities have already warped your body or mind, try a descriptor like Cruel, Hideous, Mad, Vicious, or Weird. Put power shifts into power or single attack for your main offensive and defensive abilities. Putting a shift into dexterity helps you be more stealthy and avoid attacks. Depending on what you want your powers to do, a shift in healing or resilience is probably a good idea. Because nobody (maybe not even you) really knows the source of your abilities, you can swap in just about any superpower that fits your archetype—wall-crawling, flying, teleportation, slashing blades of darkness, and so on. Choices from the stealth (34) and magic (36) flavors are especially appropriate.

ELASTIC Your body can stretch and compress like rubber. If being stretchy is your main thing, choose a focus like Stretches to give yourself all the expected abilities that come with this archetype, like resistance to injury, weird movement, and squeezing through tiny spaces. However, you instead could pick a focus like Fights With Panache (68), Masters Defense (72), Moves Like a Cat (73), Never

building a superhero Says Die (73), or Solves Mysteries (77), and just describe your powers as being partially due to your elasticity. If you use your stretching abilities to create a unique combat style, pick Warrior as your type. If you’re a genius who just happens to be elastic, choose Adept. If you’re an amazing sleuth with a nose for clues, try Explorer. If you’re a wacky hero who plays up how weird and crazy your abilities are, try a descriptor like Chaotic, Clumsy, or Weird. If you emphasize how your powers make it hard to harm you, choose Hardy, Lucky, Resilient, or Tough. If you’re a serious hero despite the strangeness of your powers, Calm, Inquisitive, or Intelligent may be the best option for you. Put shifts into healing and resilience. Depending on your nature, shifts in dexterity, savant, or single attack might be good for you. Swapping in an ability like Flight Not Fight (141), Resist the Elements (176), Sturdy (187), or Weather the Vicissitudes (197) can round out

your rubbery protection. Attack powers like Control the Field (121), Misdirect (163), and Opportunist (167) reinforce the image that you’re bouncing around your foes and striking from unexpected angles.

ENERGY MASTER You create or manipulate energy—fire, electricity, cold, sound, and so on. This is a flashy, well-known superhero archetype, whether you make fire, ice, lightning, radiation, or some other kind of energy. The good news is you have a lot of focus options for this kind of character. If fire, radiation, or light is your thing, choose Bears a Halo of Fire (64) or Blazes With Radiance (64). If your energy type is cold, pick Wears a Sheen of Ice (78). If electricity is your power, you’ll want Rides the Lightning (74). If you harness destructive sound, try Thunders (77). If the more subtle aspects of the electromagnetic spectrum are your specialty, consider Controls Gravity (66) or Employs Magnetism (67). If you want to drain

Technically, cold is the absence of heat, not its own type of energy, but for flavor and artistic purposes we treat it like it’s a unique energy type. Likewise, sound is just vibrations, but it’s more fun if “sound” is a specific energy type.

If the “energy” your hero manipulates is something weird like dark matter or protoplasm from another dimension, try the dark energy master concept, page 16.

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Other versions of an extra limbs hero might be a person with flexible organic tentacles or hyper-elastic skin, an alien with very fine moveable tendrils, a malleable hero made of mud or sand who forms as many arms as they need, or a robot with nanobot-directed solid-state wires.

For a weird variant of the extra limbs archetype who controls hairlike energy pseudopods, pick Dances With Dark Matter (66) as your focus.

If you gain the Telekinesis (189) ability, instead of moving remote objects with your mind, you’re giving your hair the strength to move objects as explained in that power’s description.

Ability categories, page 95

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power instead of creating it, pick Absorbs Energy (64) or Siphons Power (76). Choose Warrior as your type if your priority is attacking and destroying things, Adept if you want to push your energy control in some weird directions, or Explorer if you want a variety of options for combat and skills. If you bring the heat, you’ll do well with a descriptor like Brash, Chaotic, or Impulsive. If your power is ice, try Calm, Resilient, or Rugged. Electricity and thunder are noisy and overt, so you could pick something appropriate, or take a different tack and choose Fast, Strong, or Swift. If your energy powers come from a technological weapon or suit, maybe Mechanical is a better option for you. If you got your powers in a freak accident, you might instead want a descriptor like Lucky or Mysterious. Put a power shift into power or single attack for one of your abilities (one that requires you to make rolls). Choose dexterity or strength for another, depending on what sort of physical abilities you rely on. If your main energy attack requires you to touch an opponent, consider selecting increased range as a power shift for that attack. If you don’t have a direct energy attack, swap one of your abilities for something like Concussive Blast (121), Onslaught (167), Shock (183), or Thunder Beam (191). Your type of energy might give you a unique sort of perception (like seeing in the infrared or detecting the electrical signals in machines), so consider the senses (103) ability category to see if something there fits your concept. Energy powers are often the source of weird special attack (104) abilities.

EXTRA LIMBS You have extra limbs, like a set of robotic tentacles, animated hair, or prehensile vines. Why limit yourself to just two arms and two legs? Get some extra limbs and suddenly it’s easier to fight people, maneuver through the city, or do multiple things at once. Maybe you use these limbs in conjunction with your normal arms and legs, maybe you just rely on your extra limbs, or maybe you don’t even have “normal” arms and legs at all, and everything you do is with your extra limbs. Maybe your limbs aren’t even physical, just telekinetic hands, psychic force, or helpful ghosts or demons that immediately respond to your mental commands. If you mostly use your extra limbs like hands and fingers, you could choose a focus like Fights With Panache (68), Masters Weaponry (72), Needs No Weapon (73), or Wields Two Weapons at Once (78), using your limbs to make attacks. If your limbs are something that normally can’t move on their own (like hair or vines) or your limbs aren’t physical, you might be using a very specialized kind of telekinesis, in which case Focuses Mind Over Matter (68) is a great way to define your powers. Most heroes with extra limbs are Explorers, but there’s no reason you couldn’t be a Warrior who relies more on agility than strength. You could even be an Adept if you want to have other strange powers, such as camouflaging yourself with color-changing tentacles or psychically stiffening an unusual limb to act as a shield or force field against attacks. Heroes with extra limbs tend to be visually impressive or intimidating. Heroes with animated hair are often very attractive, and therefore a descriptor like Appealing, Charming, or Graceful is an easy fit. Maybe you’re good at using your additional limbs for movement, so you’re Fast or Swift. Or perhaps your odd abilities mean you’re a wallflower or live in your

building a superhero own head, in which case you’re Creative, Naive, Tongue-Tied, or a little bit Weird. Put power shifts into increased range and single attack, and one into strength if your extra limbs are effectively stronger than your arms and legs. Assign a shift to healing; it’s useful when you’re hurt and easily justifies being able to quickly regrow a damaged limb if cut. Abilities that let you move nearby objects and creatures are appropriate things to swap in, like Block (115), Control the Field (121), Fetch (139), Grasping Foliage (146), and Push (173). Your extra limbs probably attack as light weapons, so if you don’t have an ability or power shift that increases their damage, you may want to swap in something like Fists of Fury (140) or Weapon Master (197).

FORCE FIELD MASTER You use a force field for offense as well as defense. A typical hero who has a force field can create translucent or invisible walls, shields, and other barriers. If that’s you, and you want to be able to turn invisible, pick Wields Invisible Force as your focus. If your force field literally takes the shape of a shield, and your combat style is based on using this shield, choose Brandishes an Exotic Shield (64). If your goal is to protect as many innocent people as possible, consider Defends the Gate (66) or Defends the Weak (66), with your force fields augmenting your physical might. On the other hand, if you use your force fields to enhance your attacks and protect only yourself, you could have Needs No Weapon (73) as your focus. A hero who goes all-in on force fields probably is an Adept or an Explorer, as they give you access to other thematic abilities and useful skills. In theory, a force field hero could be a Warrior (especially one who relies more on defense than offense) or a Speaker (who influences others from behind the security of a force field), but those are unusual for this kind of character.

You have a lot of possibilities for your descriptor. If you like protecting others, choose Beneficent, Kind, or Virtuous. Your amazing defenses might mean you’re Brash, Chaotic, or Resilient—or you’ve developed these abilities because you’re Craven or Guarded. The mental strength needed to shape and move force fields could mean you’re Clever, Creative, Intelligent, or Strong-Willed. Put power shifts into power or single attack for one of your abilities that requires you to make rolls. A resilience power shift fits the theme of a force field hero. If your type or focus doesn’t give you a protective force field right away, swap out an ability for Deflect Attacks (127), Force Field Shield (143), Magic Shield (159), or Ward (196). Likewise, if you need an appropriate force attack, swap something for Advantage to Disadvantage (109), Concussive Blast (121), Entangling Force (136), Onslaught (167), or Push (173).

If you primarily use your force fields offensively to move and deflect other objects, look at the telekinetic archetype, page 36.

If you manipulate strange, otherworldly stuff instead of force fields, look at the dark energy master archetype, page 16.

FRIENDLY THING You’re big and strong, and you don’t look human, but in your heart you’re a hero. Maybe you’re a walking pile of rocks, an inhuman alien knight from a faraway planet, a supernatural creature like a dragon, or a battle robot who chooses not to be a weapon of war. You’re too big and strong and . . . different to blend in with regular humans, but eventually they’ll learn that you’re a superhero instead of a monster. For your focus, if you’re made of rocks, try Abides in Stone (64). Otherwise, if you’re strong and on the offense, consider Performs Feats of Strength (73). If you’re more about defense, you might like Defends the Gate (66), Never Says Die (73), or Stands Like a Bastion (77). If your power increases when you get angry, choose Rages (74). Most heroes like this are Warriors or Explorers, choosing abilities to enhance movement and combat—it’s what people expect when they see you duck to fit through a doorway or accidentally crush a car by leaning on it. A more unusual choice would

Wields Invisible Force, page 48

If you’re a friendly thing, you don’t need game rules to decide what your appearance is. Any of these options work no matter what you look like.

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If your main interest is using your genius to build things like robots and weird devices, see the builder archetype, page 13. Most builders tend to be geniuses, but not all geniuses are builders.

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be to play an Adept as a nerdy scientist whose physical bulk hides a brilliant mind, or a personable Speaker who everyone loves because they’re actually a big cuddly monster. If you’re an alien or from another dimension, all bets are off—maybe everyone on your planet looks like a troll, and you just happen to be a computer scientist. If you want to play up that you don’t fit in or are a fish out of water, try a descriptor like Exiled, Hideous, or Weird. If you want to reinforce the stereotype that you’re a brute, try Clumsy, Hardy, Resilient, or Strong. But if there’s more to you than appearances indicate, something like Intelligent, Kind, Learned, or Skeptical might be what you’re looking for. You’ll want power shifts that make you stronger and tougher, so select resilience and strength. A fun option for a hero like you is to select flight as a power shift, but you’re actually leaping rather than taking sustained flight. Your type or focus should cover the typical abilities you want. If you’re not a

Warrior, try the combat (36) flavor or swap in an ability from the Warrior list. Depending on how you got your powers, you might want an energy blast ability like Concussive Blast (121), Onslaught (167), or Thunder Beam (191), either as a natural ability or as some kind of implant or weapon.

GENIUS You’re incredibly smart, perhaps one of the best minds in the world. If your intellect is a level beyond what a typical human can achieve, choose Calculates the Incalculable (65) as your focus. If you have technological brain implants that turn your brain into a supercomputer, try Fuses Mind and Machine (69). If you’re more about thinking fast on your feet and reacting to new situations, Learns Quickly (71) might be what you’re looking for. If your genius lets you dabble in updating and creating things, pick Conducts Weird Science (65). If you’re the world’s greatest detective, choose Solves Mysteries (77). If

building a superhero you’re good at hacking computers and human minds, try Works the System (79). Genius superheroes are usually Adepts (if you want access to other weird abilities) or Explorers (if you apply your genius to directly moving around in and understanding the world). If your motivation is to help or protect others, try a descriptor like Beneficent, Honorable, or Kind. If you’re very cerebral and live for your work, a descriptor like Calm, Inquisitive, Intelligent, or Learned might suit you. You’ll want power shifts in intelligence and savant so you know more and think better than your typical smart person. Being a genius means you could have just about any sort of superhero ability, whether it’s a mental power, something unrelated to your intelligence, or a physical device. For example, you could have a Robot Assistant (178), an invention that lets you Repair Flesh (176), elastic flesh that makes you a Contortionist (121), a telepathic link to the internet that lets you search for information with Network Tap (165), a Hover (149) belt, or a prototype suit of Powered Armor (171) for defense—or maybe your big brain is so powerful that you can transmit excess energy through your hands with Shock (183).

GIANT HERO

Your choice of descriptor is wide open. Ones that fit well with your powers are Brash, Clumsy, Hardy, Resilient, Rugged, or Tough, but you might want to choose something unusual like Calm, Inquisitive, Jovial, or Learned to get some options that are useful when you’re normal-sized. This type of hero leans hard on the strong and tough concept, so good power shifts to take are healing, resilience, and strength. It’s common for a giant hero making big attacks to move or stun opponents, or hit more than one creature with an attack, so consider swapping an ability for Bash (112), Control the Field (121), or Successive Attack (187). If you see yourself more as a giant death robot or a living avatar of a strange god who shoots destructive rays, try swapping one of your abilities for an energy blast like Concussive Blast (121), Onslaught (167), or Thunder Beam (191). Some giant superheroes started out as tiny heroes who learned how to grow, but you might be a big hero who learns how to get small, in which case you could choose Shrink in place of one of your abilities at any tier (and maybe learn Smaller at tier 2 or higher, and Tiny at tier 6). You won’t ever be as good at shrinking as someone whose main ability is shrinking, but being able to shrink or grow is pretty handy.

Shrink, page 55 Smaller, page 56 Tiny, page 56

HALF-VAMPIRE

You’re big and strong. And you’re not done growing yet.

You’re a creature of the night.

The obvious focus for this kind of hero is Grows to Towering Heights (69), which from the get-go lets you grow bigger than any normal human, and scales up from there. You’re probably a Warrior; being big, strong, and tough is a natural fit for punching bad guys. You might be an Explorer, giving you a broader set of skills instead of focusing on combat. You’re probably not an Adept (unless you invented these powers to defeat people who bullied you) or a Speaker (you can be very intimidating, but that doesn’t make you a “people person”).

Although most people consider half-vampires monsters instead of superheroes, you’ve turned your back on evil in order to hunt villains and supernatural terrors. Obvious choices for your focus are Hunts (69), Moves Like a Cat (73), and Never Says Die (73). However, you could instead pick Needs No Weapon (73) or, if you mainly fight other supernatural creatures, Slays Monsters (76). If you’re the sort of vampire who gathers other undead to yourself, try Consorts With the Dead (65), and if you’re an energy vampire, choose Siphons Power (76).

If you’re a full vampire instead of a half-vampire, take a look at Stay Alive! from Monte Cook Games, a book with options for vampire PCs, their weaknesses (like sunlight and garlic), and additional vampire abilities.

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If you hunt because you’ve mastered a specific kind of weapon, see the weapon master archetype, page 38.

Sculpts Hard Light, page 46

If you mostly make defensive objects like walls, shields, and other barriers, look at the force field master archetype, page 19.

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Your physical vampire gifts make Warrior or Expert the most likely type options for you. If you’re more of a mystical weird vampire, Adept lets you explore what other undead powers you have at your disposal. If you want to play up your physical abilities, choose a descriptor like Fast, Hardy, Resilient, Stealthy, Strong, or Tough. If you want to emphasize your mental or magical side, try Mysterious, Mystical, Perceptive, or Strong-Willed. If you’re constantly fighting your vampire instincts, pick Calm, Cruel, Doomed, or Vicious. Assign your power shifts to dexterity and strength, and either healing or resilience. Vampires are said to have many strange powers, so you could swap out abilities for a special attack like Advantage to Disadvantage (109), a movement ability like Get Away (145), a defense like Block (115), a mental ability like Calm Stranger (118) or Mind Reading (162), or something strange like Minor Illusion (162) or See the Unseen (180).

HARD LIGHT MASTER You create visible constructs of hardened light. Swords, shields, walls, chains, huge fists, a motorcycle—if you can think of it, you can create it out of solid light. The most versatile focus option for you is Sculpts Hard Light, but if you have a specific theme like a glowing shield, instead try Brandishes an Exotic Shield (64). A hero with this sort of power is usually a Warrior or Explorer—someone who needs a wide variety of weapons, armors, and tools, and has the creativity to think them up on the spot. If you’re a more cerebral type who imagines weird things to create, choose Adept. Most characters of this type do well with a descriptor like Clever, Creative, Resilient, or Strong-Willed. If you’re a cocky and sarcastic hero who believes in social justice, choose Brash, Perceptive, or Virtuous. If you’re obnoxious, a bit of a

wild card, and the kind who never quits, pick Chaotic, Impulsive, or Tough. If you’re a serious, dutiful protector, try Beneficent, Guarded, or Honorable. Put shifts in accuracy and intelligence. Consider putting a shift in prodigy to get Sculpt Light (180) at first tier so you can create longer-lasting constructs. Flight and resilience are also good choices. If you prefer to make direct attacks with your abilities instead of creating physical weapons to attack with, swap out an ability for Concussive Blast (121) or Onslaught (167). If you’re meant to be patrolling space and communicating with aliens, swap in Adaptation (108) and Telepathic (189). If you can precisely analyze creatures and objects, get Scan (179).

HUNTER You study, find, and capture your intended prey. If you’re a hunter of beasts in the wild, choose Hunts (69) or Lives in the Wilderness (71) as your focus. If your goal is to track down and punish the guilty, pick Metes Out Justice (72). If you’re a conventional or supernatural sleuth, try Works the Back Alleys (79), Separates Mind From Body (75), or Shepherds Spirits (76). Pick Warrior or Explorer as your type, depending on whether you want more combat abilities or more skill and utility abilities. Hunters tend to be intense and have descriptors like Brash, Mysterious, or Rugged. Others are more subtle, with a descriptor like Perceptive, Stealthy, Swift, or Tough. If you’re a hunter who is quick-witted or cool-headed, pick Calm or Clever. If your work means you have to interact a lot with regular people, being Charming, Empathic, or Intuitive is very useful. Put power shifts into accuracy, dexterity, and resilience. Think about swapping in an ability from the senses (103) category, whether it’s something to help you see in the dark like

building a superhero

Eyes Adjusted (138), plan a trap like Familiarize , or turn the tables on a target like Sense Ambush (181). You may want an ability that lets you nonlethally capture someone, like Entangling Force (136), Grasping Foliage (146), or Ribbons of Dark Matter (178). (138)

ILLUSIONIST You create illusions, sprung from your creativity or taken from the minds of others. Most illusionist heroes have the Crafts Illusions (66) focus, creating visible images based on whatever they can think of. If you’re the rare kind of illusionist who borrows images from dreamers, choose Awakens Dreams (64) as your focus. Most illusionists focus on their mental abilities, and therefore you probably are either a Speaker (if your primary goal is to persuade and manipulate people) or an Adept (if you want to augment and supplement your illusions with other strange abilities).

Just about any illusionist does well with a descriptor like Creative, Mysterious, or Perceptive. If creating your illusions requires a lot of mental discipline, Calm, Intelligent, or Intuitive may be a more appropriate choice for you. If you use your illusions to make people like you, pick a descriptor like Appealing, Charming, Empathic, or Kind. If you’re mainly smart and sneaky, choose Clever, Craven, or Stealthy. If your powers are more about nightmares and fear than beautiful things, Mad and Weird are fun descriptor choices. You’ll want to put at least one power shift into accuracy to improve your attack rolls for people to believe your illusions (and the fact that this affects all of your other attack rolls is a nice side benefit). As a mental-focused character, you’ll want to be protected against hostile mental attacks, so assign a shift to intelligence. You may want to use one shift for prodigy so you can grab a more powerful illusion ability, and perhaps put one into increased range for your main illusion ability so you don’t

Some illusions are just manipulating light, and some are projections into the minds of others. This is mostly a cosmetic difference, and it doesn’t affect how you build your character. Talk with your GM about how your illusions work.

Your illusion powers might be technological holograms, psychic tricks, or magical spells.

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Bolster Illusion, page 51

Instead of athletics being your thing, if you’re the best at using a weapon, try the weapon master archetype, page 38. If you’re the perfect hunter who can catch any beast or human, try the hunter archetype, page 22.

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have to be right in the middle of the action to use it. One of the biggest drawbacks of most illusions is they aren’t physical, so they can’t affect physical things, like breaking open a door or making effective attacks. Swapping out an ability to get Bolster Illusion lets you give your visual illusions a little bit of sensory “oomph” that can make them almost real. Other abilities that let you manipulate things around you, like Hedge Magic (149), Impetus (151), and Move Metal (164) from the environment (99) category, are also useful for this.

MASTER ATHLETE You’re the peak of human physical perfection, and the best at what you do. This type of hero usually isn’t overtly superpowered—instead of flight and energy blasts, they’re mostly about using conventional attacks (like punches, kicks, guns, and so on) and relying on physical skills like jumping, climbing, and tumbling. There are many focus options for this kind of hero, depending on what sort of physical activity you want to excel at. If you’re a master of unarmed combat, try Needs No Weapon (73). If you’ve developed amazing survival skills in the city or the wilds, choose Is Wanted by the Law (70) or Lives in the Wilderness (71). If you’ve developed your skills from a lifetime of being in fights, try Looks for Trouble (71) or Never Says Die (73). If you’ve perfected the use of a shield or armor, choose Masters Defense (72). If you’re naturally an agile or strong athlete, Moves Like a Cat (73) or Performs Feats of Strength (73) may be just what you’re looking for. You probably want Warrior or Explorer as your type, depending on whether your main interest is fighting or you want an even mix of fighting and other abilities. Almost any descriptor is suitable for this kind of character. If you’re aggressive and eager to show your fighting skills, try Brash or Impulsive. If you’ve learned how to take a lot of hits, choose Hardy, Resilient, or Tough. If you’ve honed your abilities from years spent fighting to survive, pick Exiled, Rugged, Sharp-Eyed, or Stealthy. If you’re more about speed than strength, choose Fast, Graceful, or Swift. You’ll want your power shifts to enhance the stuff that you’re good at, and that means choosing ones like accuracy, dexterity, and strength. Pretty much anything you’d need for your hero is covered in your type and focus abilities, but if it still feels like something’s missing, take a look at flavors like stealth (34), combat (36), or skills and knowledge (37) to fill in the blanks.

building a superhero MASTER MARTIAL ARTIST You have mastered—or even perfected— one or more martial arts. The best example of this archetype has the Needs No Weapon (73) focus. If you’re more of a street fighter or a boxer, try Fights Dirty (68) or Looks for Trouble (71) instead. If your fighting style relies on your incredible strength, choose Performs Feats of Strength (73). If you prefer a more passive or reactive martial art, Masters Defense (72) might be a better focus for you. For something unusual, especially if your archenemy uses robots, try Battles Robots (64). Choose Warrior as your type if your training is just about combat, or Explorer if you learned other skills like climbing, jumping, and sensing danger. If your mastery allows you to perform impossible or mystical feats like mind control, curing sickness, or levitation, pick Adept. Descriptors like Doomed, Exiled, and Mysterious work for most characters with this archetype. If your combat style relies more on speed than strength, choose Fast, Graceful, or Stealthy. If you’re more reliant on strength than speed, pick Hardy, Strong, or Tough. If you practice serenity or follow an enlightened path, try Beneficent, Calm, Empathic, Learned, or Mystical. If you or your tradition are a little silly or irreverent, like drunken boxing, choose Clumsy, Foolish, Lucky, or Naive. Put power shifts in accuracy or single attack, depending on whether you have one or multiple attack abilities. Put shifts into dexterity or strength to suit your combat style. (One way to create a martial artist character who has a powerful ability they can use only once a day—for example, a perfect punch—is to put power shifts into prodigy to get a high-tier ability that costs too many Pool points for you to use frequently.) Your unarmed attacks are your primary weapons, so if you haven’t chosen power shifts in strength or single attack to increase your unarmed damage from

the default 2 points for a light weapon, be sure to swap in something like Fists of Fury (140) or Quick Death (173) to increase your basic damage. Many heroes like you are known for having one or two unusual special abilities; these might be an attack like Concussive Blast (121) or Frost Touch (144), a defense like Flesh of Stone (141) or Wind Armor (199), or a utility ability like Phase Sprint (170) or See the Unseen (180).

If your martial art style relies on using a weapon like a sword or staff instead of kicks and punches, you might want to try the weapon master archetype, page 38.

MENTALIST You wield various mental powers—you’re a telepath, psychic, enchanter, or something like that. There are many different kinds of superheroes who have mental powers, and you have several interesting choices depending on what you want your hero to be able to do. If you’re a telepath who can read minds, transmit your thoughts to others, and generally dig around in other peoples’ heads, choose Commands Mental Powers (65) as your focus. If you are clairvoyant, observing remote locations and perceiving the wonders and dangers of the universe, pick Sees Beyond (75). If you can actually send your mind or soul outside of your body to wander around in astral form, choose Separates Mind From Body (75). If speaking with the dead is more your thing, try Shepherds Spirits (76). If you’re a technopath, able to link your mind to computers and other devices, choose Talks to Machines (77). If you have a psychic link to animals, pick Controls Beasts (65)—or Masters the Swarm (72) if bugs are more your thing. If you’re one of the smartest people on the planet, look at Fuses Mind and Machine (69). For additional mental abilities and useful skills for this kind of hero, you probably want the Adept or Speaker type. However, some mentalists might be better off with the Explorer type, like a beast empath who has animal friends, a gifted hacker who can break into a computer without even touching it, or a talented detective who

Some categories of mental abilities are explained elsewhere in this chapter as different archetypes like illusionist (page 23) and telekinetic (page 36).

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Abilities like Duplicate (page 132) can be used multiple times over several rounds, allowing a multiplier character to create a large number of reinforcements.

Ability categories, page 95

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pursues criminals into the underbelly of the city. You probably want a descriptor that suits your nature as a cerebral person with powerful mind powers, something like Calm, Inquisitive, Intelligent, Learned, or Strong-Willed. If you lean more toward the emotional side of things, try Appealing, Charming, Empathic, or Intuitive. If your power is more of a magical thing, choose Mysterious or Mystical. Put a power shift into power or single attack for one of your abilities (one that requires you to make rolls). Choose other power shifts like intelligence and savant. Each of the foci above gives you a group of related abilities, but it’s common for a mentalist superhero to dabble in other psychic fields. You can peek at the foci you didn’t choose to see if they have any abilities you want to swap for, and also check some of the ability categories like control (97), information (99), and senses (103) to see if there are any other mentalist-appropriate powers that work for you.

MULTIPLIER You can make copies of yourself. Creating a hero with this odd but versatile character concept is best done with the Exists in Two Places at Once (67) focus. Weirder ways to create a multiplier character include using foci like Builds Robots (65), Consorts With the Dead (65), Is Idolized by Millions (70), Keeps a Magic Ally (71), or even Wields Two Weapons at Once (78), though all of them require creative explanations for how your abilities create copies of “you” (robot duplicates, zombies, cosplaying fans, and so on). Maybe you’ve used your multiples to study various combat styles (or create a unique style of your own), in which case you should choose Warrior as your descriptor. If you’ve used your multiples to go many places and learn a lot of skills, select Explorer. If your experiences in having multiple bodies means you have incredible insight about how to interact with and influence other people, pick Speaker. If

building a superhero you can duplicate yourself because you’re twisting or breaking reality, you’ll find related abilities as an Adept. As a hero who frequently sees “yourself” in dangerous situations (and perhaps has experienced a duplicate’s death now and then), you need a certain mental fortitude to remember that you’re the prime version of yourself and the others are just copies. Descriptors that align with that strength of personality are Calm, Resilient, and Strong-Willed. However, being able to sacrifice yourself without serious repercussions might instead make you Brash, Chaotic, or Impulsive. Too many shared traumatic experiences in your past might mean Craven, Doomed, or Mad is a better descriptor for you. Most of the typical multiplier abilities aren’t improved with power shifts, so use your shifts to make yourself better at more general things with accuracy, dexterity, and resilience. Putting a power shift in healing is a good idea, especially if you can (or plan to be able to) transfer damage between yourself and the duplicates. If your focus doesn’t give you the Duplicate (132) ability, you probably should swap one of your abilities for that—it’s the most common way to create identical copies of your hero. Swapping out an ability for Resilient Duplicate (176) means all of your duplicates are tougher (and if you have Resilient Duplicate more than once, the extra health adds together).

NATURE MASTER You’re attuned with nature and the natural world—storms, plants, or both. If you have a supernatural connection to nature and the environment, choose Speaks for the Land (77) as your focus. If you control the air and weather, try Touches the Sky. If you can mentally manipulate plants to move at your command, pick Employs Magnetism (67) or Focuses Mind Over Matter (68) and redefine those powers

as something suitable for you. If your powers come from a bond with a specific mystical creature like a fairy or thorn elemental, choose Keeps a Magic Ally (71). If “nature” for you means the four classical elements (air, earth, fire, and water), start with an energy master archetype for suggestions about what focus to take for your fire and air powers, then come back to this concept for ideas on the rest of your abilities. If you embody the wrathful and destructive aspects of nature, pick Warrior as your type. Pick Explorer if you are familiar with living in remote natural parts of the world and want skills and abilities suitable for that. Choosing Adept gives you access to many abilities suitable for a nature hero, like protection from extreme environments and controlling the weather. If your role is more about being an advocate for plants and animals, Speaker is a good choice. If your personality matches the positive side of nature, choose Beneficent, Empathic, or Intuitive as your descriptor. If you personify the fury and vengeance of the storm, try Brash, Chaotic, Cruel, or Vicious. If your connection to the wilds makes you enigmatic and strange, pick Mysterious, Mystical, or Weird. If you’ve lived in the wilds for a long time, you might be Exiled, Resilient, Rugged, or Sharp-Eyed. You’ll want to be hardy like nature, so put a power shift in healing or resilience. Select increased range or power for one of your primary abilities. Because this archetype is a pretty broad category, you may need to swap in some abilities to suit your character, like Create Deadly Poison (123), Far Step (138), Hover (149), Resist the Elements (176), or Wind Armor (199). Make sure you have an attack ability that suits you, whether that’s an energy blast like Shock (183), something that manipulates the environment like Mist Cloud, or an ability like Concussive Blast (121) that you reflavor. The environment (99) and special attack (104) ability categories are good places

Energy master, page 17

If you have a stronger connection to animals than to plants, or actually have an animal who fights by your side, see the beastmaster archetype, page 12.

If your storm powers are more about lightning and thunder than clouds and rain, see the energy master archetype, page 17.

Touches the Sky, page 47 Mist Cloud, page 53

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PARAGON You’re tough and strong, and can fly.

Random superpowers, page 39

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Flight, strength, and bulletproof skin are often a package deal for superheroes. If you’re a typical example of this kind of hero, choose Flies Faster Than a Bullet (68) as your focus. If you’re especially strong, pick Performs Feats of Strength (73). If you’re especially hardy, try Never Says Die (73), or Stands Like a Bastion (77) if you wear armor. If your purpose is to fight injustice and protect the innocent, you’re probably a Warrior. If your goal is to inspire the people of the world to be good and help each other, choose Speaker. If you’re a mix of both, or something else, play an Explorer. If people look up to you as an example of what a true hero should be, try a descriptor like Appealing, Honorable, Kind, or Virtuous. If you’re a bit of a hothead, choose Impulsive, Lucky, or Risk-Taking. If you want to emphasize your toughness, pick Hardy, Resilient, or Tough. If you’re an enigma, or care more about getting the mission done than talking to reporters or entertaining crowds, pick Guarded or Mysterious. Put shifts in resilience and strength. Shifts in flight and healing are also strong choices. Many paragon heroes have one unusual ability that makes them stand out as unique. Examples of this power are eyes that shoot beams of force from Onslaught (167), immediate-range freezing breath from Frost Touch (144), sensing invisible creatures with See the Unseen (180), or a limited psychic ability like Premonition (171). Pick one that complements your abilities, or select one at random and use it as a creative spark for your character.

PHASE MASTER You can become intangible, allowing you to pass safely through solid matter. The typical example of this sort of hero, who can phase whether moving or standing still, has the Exists Partially Out of Phase (68) focus. If you can access this power only when moving (but your phasing is destructive to whatever you pass through), try Shreds the Walls of the World (76) instead. Your powers naturally make you suitable for the Explorer type, able to get in and out of places with ease. If you’d rather create a unique combat style using your ability to become intangible or solid, choose Warrior as your focus. If you’re more interested in learning additional strange abilities (perhaps from observing or visiting other dimensions in a phased state), choose Adept. Given the powers you have, odds are you’re a hero who is Graceful, Intelligent, or Lucky. If you mainly use your powers to hide or protect yourself, or bad things seem to follow you, maybe Craven, Doomed, or Mysterious suits you better. If you like to play up being a spooky ghost sort of character, try a descriptor like Hideous, Stealthy, or Weird. To emphasize your defensive abilities, put power shifts in dexterity and healing. If you have an ability that requires you to make attack or defense rolls, put a shift into power or single attack for that ability. There are a lot of suitable abilities in the stealth (34) and magic (36) flavors. Fun phasing options include picking up an energy attack like Frost Touch (144) or Shock (183), getting Hover (149) so you can walk on air, or using Vanish (196) to turn invisible as well as intangible. Some phasing heroes can also increase their density, swapping in abilities like Flesh of Stone (141) and putting power shifts into resilience and strength.

building a superhero PLANT You’re an intelligent, mobile plant. Whether you’re a swamp elemental, alien tree, or magical toadstool, you belong to the plant kingdom, unlike your meat-based humanoid friends. In many cases, you’ll need to reinterpret the imagery of your focus so it describes you as a plant, but the game mechanics will work just fine with these cosmetic changes. Versatile foci that work well for a plant hero are Lives in the Wilderness (71), Needs No Weapon (73), and Speaks for the Land (77). If you are sturdy and strong, you may prefer Abides in Stone (64) or Performs Feats of Strength (73). If you’re nearly indestructible or regrow quickly after being injured, Never Says Die (73) and Stretches are fun options. If you exist to avenge or guard the natural world, pick Warrior as your type. If you see yourself as blending in with other plants and emerging when it’s time to take action, try Explorer. If you literally speak for the trees, choose Speaker (although many people are hesitant to take advice from a talking plant). If you are as powerful as a mighty oak, pick a descriptor like Clumsy, Hardy, Strong, or Tough. If you are basically a gentle, positive being (unlike the kill-it-and-eat-it humans you hang out with), choose Beneficent, Honorable, or Kind. If your plant brain isn’t quite as fast as a human’s or puts you at a disadvantage in social situations, Foolish, Naive, or Tongue-Tied might be right for you. If being a plant creature means animal-people think you’re just a little strange, try Mysterious, Mystical, or Weird. Put shifts into resilience and strength to represent how much tougher and stronger your body is than flesh and bone. Put shifts in healing and increased range, as appropriate to your other abilities. Depending on what kind of plant creature you are, there are an incredible number of options for swapping in abilities to suit

your theme. For example, you could take Beast Companion (112) or Critter Companion (123) to get a friendly creature that lives in your branches, use spores to confuse an opponent with Cloud Personal Memories (119), make deadly fruiting bodies with Create Deadly Poison (123) or healing fruits with Healing Touch (149), bind opponents with Grasping Foliage (146), perceive the world with inhuman senses via See the Unseen (180), or become a really spooky tree with Terrifying Presence (190).

Yes, toadstools are fungi instead of plants, but they’re close enough as far as the superhero genre is concerned!

POWER REPLICATOR You can copy the superpowers of other creatures. Duplicating someone else’s abilities is a rare gift, and your best bet is to pick the Copies Superpowers focus—it’s such a specific talent that no other foci even come close to doing it. Although your choice of focus is very specific, you have many options for your type, depending on how you’d prefer to use your abilities. If you’re mostly a brawler who likes to copy other physical powers like crystalline skin or metal claws to make yourself even better in a fight, choose Warrior. If you prefer copying energy blasts, mental powers, and other abilities that don’t require physical effort, pick Adept or Speaker. If you want the flexibility to effectively take on physical or mental abilities as you need them, try an Explorer. Power replicator heroes are often wild cards in terms of personality, so descriptors like Chaotic, Impulsive, or Mad are appropriate options. If your abilities give you a sense of how other peoples’ minds work as well as their powers, pick Empathic or Intuitive. If copying powers inflicts lingering trauma on you, or you regret some misuse of your abilities in the past, try Doomed or Exiled. Put shifts into accuracy if you expect to copy a lot of attack powers. Shifts in dexterity and resilience help buy you time to pick the best power for the current

Stretches, page 47 Copies Superpowers, page 46

For a street-level hero alternative to the power replicator archetype, pick some other archetype like master athlete (page 24) or superspy (page 35) and swap in the Flex Skill (141) ability several times, so you can instantly pick up whatever skills you need to save the day. If you swap in one Flex Weapon Skill (page 53) as well, you can copy other heroes’ fighting styles.

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Instead of a mechanized suit, your armor might be a magical set of armor, a high-tech cloth outfit with embedded devices, or a symbiotic alien creature.

situation. If you want to be able to copy others’ abilities right away (instead of waiting until tier 2), put a shift in prodigy so you can pick up Copy Power early. Because you need other superpowered people around to be fully effective, it’s good to have other skills and abilities of your own as a backup, or let your power shifts do that work for you. (Of course, any other powers you have might be ones you somehow learned how to hold onto, or accidentally stole from someone else.) Pick up an offensive ability like Sculpt Flesh (180) or Stasis (186) and a defensive one like Danger Sense (124) or Flesh of Stone (141). Those abilities plus your power-copying provide an interesting hook to make your hero stand out.

VARIANT: FLEX POWER SHIFTS

GM may want For a power replicator hero, the than the normal to have the player assign fewer the others as number of power shifts, holding of each day, flex power shifts. At the beginning ign these flex the player chooses where to ass t day. The shifts, and they apply until the nex are limited by hero’s choices for the flex shifts gs are around what other superpowered bein ter has a that morning; if no nearby charac er replicator power shift in strength, the pow h. hero can’t assign a shift to strengt Chameleon, Red For example, Terry is playing paign where a power replicator hero in a cam The GM decides each PC gets five power shifts. shifts during that Terry can assign two power er three shifts character creation, and the oth Chameleon are flex shifts. Terry wants Red one shift to ign to be hard to hurt, so they ass the beginning healing and one to resilience. At session, Terry of the day of the current game ee shifts in decides to put their remaining thr pying shifts dexterity, flight, and strength (co den Eagle, and from teammates Jade Viper, Gol Chameleon’s Iron Wolf). The next morning, Red igned differently. flex shifts reset and can be ass

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POWERED ARMOR HERO You have a mechanized suit that covers most or all of your body. The go-to focus for this sort of hero is Wears Power Armor (78). If your armor is mainly defensive, try Stands Like a Bastion (77) instead. If your armor is a spacesuit and you’ll be having many adventures in space, pick Loves the Void (71). If the armor is primarily a war machine, either for offense or defense, choose Warrior as your type. If the armor is more of a vehicle and exploration tool, try Explorer. If the armor has a few weird and unexpected abilities (perhaps because it’s alien technology), pick Adept. If you’re the brilliant inventor who created your suit, pick a descriptor like Creative, Intelligent, Learned, or (the obvious choice) Mechanical. If you’re just the person who wears the armor because you have the training or talent for it, choose Hardy, Honorable, Sharp-Eyed, or Strong. Put shifts into resilience and strength. If your armor has a special attack, like a force blast, put a shift into single attack for that ability. If it has integrated medical technology, put a shift in healing. Put a shift in flight if it fits your theme. If you don’t want to rely on your suit-augmented punches and kicks in combat, swap in a special attack like Onslaught (167) or Thunder Beam (191). In case you’re caught without your armor, it’s smart to have a couple of useful skills from ability swaps or savant power shifts to keep you alive, like Courageous (122), Interaction Skills (155), Investigative Skills (155), Physical Skills (170), or Superb Explorer (188).

building a superhero RAGE MONSTER

ROBOT

When you get mad, you get strong.

You’re an intelligent machine with built-in components that does amazing things.

The obvious choice for your focus is Rages . If your strength is a little less tied to your emotional state, pick Performs Feats of Strength (73), or Never Says Die (73) if you’re more of a defender than an attacker. If you’re a person who literally turns into an uncontrollable monster, choose Howls at the Moon (69). Most rage monster heroes like this are Warriors or Explorers, using their strength to smash opponents and crash through obstacles. (You could play an Adept or Speaker with this archetype, but some of the foci suggestions prevent you from using Intellect-based abilities, which limits which of your powers you can use when really angry.) Easy descriptors to fit with the personality of this archetype are Brash, Chaotic, Clumsy, and Impulsive. If you want to focus on the physical aspects of this kind of hero, choose Hardy, Resilient, Strong, or Tough. If your powers are a burden to your calm self, pick Doomed or Exiled. Make yourself even more powerful and tough with power shifts in healing, resilience, and strength. You might want a shift in flight, describing it as long-distance leaping or climbing because of your great strength. If you need additional abilities for fighting, swap in something from the combat (36) flavor or the Warrior type abilities. As you’ll be the hero who gets attacked a lot, swapping in an ability like Flesh of Stone (141), Fortified Position (143), Resist the Elements (176), or something similar from the protection category (102) adds to your defenses. If you don’t have a power shift in flight, swapping for Amazing Leap lets you pseudo-fly a long distance. (74)

Technically any sort of superhero could be a robot, but your powers and story are all about being a creature who was built (rather than born) and the amazing things your artificial body can do. If you manipulate energy, try a focus like Rides the Lightning (74) or Siphons Power (76). If you were meant to be a war machine (even if you’ve chosen a different path for yourself), consider Stands Like a Bastion (77) or Wears Power Armor (78). If you can interact with and control other machines because you understand them, pick Talks to Machines (77). If you survive by salvaging parts from other machines, or you’re from an apocalyptic timeline where robots have triumphed over humans, try Scavenges (75).

If you’re a big, tough character who is obviously inhuman, you may prefer the friendly thing archetype, page 19.

If your superhero archetype is an artificial being made of metal and plastic, you might call yourself a robot, android, thinking machine, or automaton. If you’re made of synthetic flesh instead, you might call yourself a replicant, life model decoy, synthezoid, or clone. If your origin is magical rather than technological, you might call yourself a golem, homunculus, or construct.

Amazing Leap, page 48

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Some sensory adepts are blind or deaf, but their other senses compensate enough that they perceive their environment as well as or better than an average person.

Master athlete, page 24 Weapon master, page 38 Hunter, page 22

Technically, an android is a robot meant to resemble a human, at least superficially. It is assumed that robot PCs are generally humanoid in shape (bipedal, two arms, and so on), rather than something like a spider or vehicle.

Senses, page 103

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Most robot superheroes are Warriors or Explorers, as they were created for combat or exploration. If you’re an Adept, you might be a prototype model with unusual abilities your creator didn’t understand. Because robots have different intellectual and emotional parameters than humans, it’s unlikely that you are a Speaker unless you were specifically made to understand and emulate humans, perhaps as proof of your creator’s genius. If you were meant to be a ruthless killing machine (even if you’re now deviating from that intention), select a descriptor like Brash, Fast, Hardy, or Sharp-Eyed. If you’re concerned that living people might think you’re dangerous, try a descriptor like Beneficent, Charming, Inquisitive, or Kind. If you’re just trying to fit in, whether or not anyone knows you’re a robot, a descriptor like Clever, Guarded, or Naive would be a good choice. To play up your isolation and differences from living beings, try a descriptor like Doomed, Exiled, Mysterious, or Tongue-Tied. To emphasize your robot-ness, consider putting power shifts into intelligence, resilience, and strength. You may have been built with just about any special ability, whether that’s an energy attack like Onslaught (167), telescoping legs like Far Step (138), or a hypnosis beam like Enthrall (136). Just try to keep your abilities to a general theme—you wouldn’t want people to joke that your creator threw in everything but the kitchen sink! To represent the fact that you’re an artificial being, you may want to swap for an ability like Enhanced Body (134), or take Golem Body (145) and Golem Healing (145) as a pair of linked abilities. Of course, if you don’t want that sort of limitation, you can assume that your body has self-repair mechanisms, allowing you to heal as humans do.

SENSORY ADEPT Your senses are magnified, or you have powerful inhuman senses. Maybe your physical senses have been amplified, or your brain has been augmented so you can process more information than your senses provide you, or you have a mystical, psychic, or alien way of perceiving the world. Regardless of the mechanism, heroes like you tend to do one of two things: use their heightened senses to be awesome at combat (the “sensory fighter”), or use their heightened senses to know things about distant places (the “sensory traveler”). If you’re a sensory fighter, see the focus options for the master athlete, weapon master, and hunter archetypes, all of which are about excellence in combat. If you’re a sensory traveler, try a focus like Sees Beyond (75) or Separates Mind From Body (75). If you’re a sensory fighter, pick Warrior or Explorer as your type; Warrior is generally the best at combat, and Explorer has some abilities that fit really well with having incredible senses. If you’re a sensory traveler, choose Adept as your type (technically a Speaker would work for this as well, but travelers tend to be a little weird and off-putting to normal people). Descriptors like Empathic, Intuitive, Perceptive, and Sharp-Eyed are suitable for either kind of sensory adept. If you look unassuming and people tend to underestimate you, pick a descriptor like Calm, Guarded, or Lucky. Otherwise, if you’re a sensory fighter, try Brash, Fast, Graceful, or Tough. If you’re a sensory traveler, try Creative, Inquisitive, Mad, or Mysterious. If your main sensory ability can be improved by a power shift, put a power shift in that ability. Sensory fighters should put shifts in accuracy and dexterity. Sensory travelers should put shifts in increased range, intelligence, and savant. For sensory fighters, several abilities from the senses category are useful swap-ins, like Eyes Adjusted (138), Heads-Up

building a superhero Display (148) (reflavored so it doesn’t require wearing power armor), See the Unseen (180), and Sense Ambush (181), as well as attack powers like Misdirect (163) and Overwatch (168). Sensory travelers can make good use of swap-in abilities from the senses category like Link Senses (158), Third Eye (191), Closed Mind (119), Distant Interface (130), Eye for Detail (138), and See History (180).

SHAPECHANGER You can change your shape, either taking the form of an animal or assuming any human likeness. This hero concept is generally one of two types: a hero who can turn into an animal (or any animal), or a master of disguise who can look like any person. If you can transform into an animal, choose Takes Animal Shape as your focus. If you can copy the appearance of any person, pick Has a Thousand Faces. Animal shapechanger heroes are usually Warriors, who can fight like the animals they pretend to be, or Explorers, who have survival and combat skills that fit many animals. Human shapechanger heroes use their abilities to trick and confuse others, and tend to be Speakers or Explorers. Many animal shapechangers have a descriptor like Fast, Graceful, Sharp-Eyed, or Stealthy. If you prefer the company of animals to people, try Exiled, Naive, or Rugged. If your animal instincts negatively affect your personality, choose Cruel or Vicious. Typical human shapechangers are good at interacting with people, and have a descriptor like Appealing, Charming, or Intuitive. You might instead be Mysterious, Stealthy, or Strong-Willed. If changing your face and identity so often has left scars on your mind and body, try Hideous, Mad, or Weird. Put a shift into healing, representing your ability to reshape your flesh and quickly recover from wounds. Put a shift in savant if you don’t have all the skills you want from your type and focus. If the specific shapechanging ability you want

isn’t available at first tier, put shifts into prodigy to grab that ability. For animal shapechangers, a shift in dexterity or strength can enhance the effectiveness of most of your forms. For human shapechangers, put a shift into accuracy (since you can’t guarantee what weapons you’ll have available in a disguised form) or single attack (if you have a special attack you can use in any form). For shapechanger heroes, it’s good to have an unusual ability to get yourself out of trouble or catch an opponent off guard. For example, your foes might know you’re a shapechanger, but not know that you can shoot force bolts out of your eyes with Onslaught (167), move small objects at a distance with Impetus (151), or Walk Through Walls (196). Also, this trait might be a fun part of your backstory—maybe the shapechanging mutation often includes a secondary force bolts mutation, your alien shapechanger species is telekinetic, or the android chassis your creator used comes installed with a phasing module.

SORCERER You’re a master of the mystic arts.

For a different sort of shapechanging that doesn’t let you disguise yourself as something else (for example, when you fight you look like an anthropomorphic wolf-human), see the beastly hero archetype, page 12. If you turn into an uncontrollable creature, see the rage monster archetype, page 31.

Just because you’re a human shapechanger hero doesn’t mean you’re originally a human. You might be a mutant born of humans, a humanoid alien, an infiltration android, or a fey creature.

Takes Animal Shape, page 47 Has a Thousand Faces, page 46

Magic accomplishes things that should be impossible, in ways that even science doesn’t understand. In a superhero campaign, there are as many different kinds of sorcerers are there are branches of science. A typical sorcerer with a broad mix of different abilities probably has the Masters Spells (72) focus. If you’re more of a priest who uses the power of a godlike entity, try Channels Divine Blessings (65). If your magic is primarily for healing, choose Works Miracles (79). If your power comes from a spiritual connection to nature, pick Speaks for the Land (77). If you control a magical creature such as a genie, try Keeps a Magic Ally (71). If you’re a necromancer, choose Consorts With the Dead (65), or Shepherds Spirits (76) if you’re more about ghosts than skeletons and zombies. If none of those options really

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For a creative take on the speedster archetype, choose Wields Two Weapons at Once (78) as your focus and describe it as you actually being so fast that it seems like you’re wielding two weapons.

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describes you, understand that magic can do just about anything, so it’s okay to pick a different hero archetype and explain it as magic instead of science or a mutation— illusionist, shapechanger, energy master, mentalist, and others are all common sorcerer concepts. If you’re more of a bookish academic who enjoys researching weird spells, you’re probably an Adept. If you prefer more practical magic or have other useful skills, choose Explorer. If you’re a “people person” or enjoy magic that lets you influence people, play a Speaker. Many sorcerer heroes have the Mysterious or Mystical descriptor. If your mastery of magic stems from your studies or gifted intellect, choose Calm, Creative, Intelligent, or Learned. If your goal is to use your power to help others, pick Beneficent or Kind. If your interest is in swaying people to think the way you do, try Appealing, Charming, Empathic, or Intuitive. If your magical power is a curse you bear or it has drawbacks, you might be Doomed, Hideous, Mad, or Weird.

As most magic relies on Intellect and you’ll be facing attacks from enemy sorcerers, give yourself a strong foundation there with a power shift in intelligence. Put shifts in power or single attack for your main offensive spell. Put a shift in flight if you want to fly without having to spend Pool points. Magic can do anything, so pick a fun ability or two to swap in as one of your spells, and you’re ready for action. The magic flavor (36) list is a good place to find some starting ideas. And don’t forget Arcane Flare (110), which can be used as an attack or to increase the damage of any other attack spell.

SPEEDSTER You can run at superhuman speeds. Most speedster heroes run fast, have fast reactions, and potentially can attack multiple times per round—if that sounds like you, choose the Moves Like the Wind (73) focus. If you want to combine speed with phasing for some weird attack and defensive options, instead pick Shreds the Walls of the World (76) as your focus. Choose Warrior as your type if you want a strong emphasis on combat. Pick Explorer if you want to rely more on other physical skills and abilities. Obvious descriptor choices for a speedster are Fast, Graceful, Impulsive, and Swift. Other good options that play to a speedster’s strengths are Brash and Impulsive. For a darker or sneakier take on this kind of character (perhaps because of drawbacks from your powers), try Doomed or Exiled. Put a power shift into dexterity, and into accuracy or single attack (depending on whether your speed makes you better at hitting or hurting). If you want to have incredible speed right away, put a shift into prodigy to get Speed Burst (185) or Blink of an Eye (115). A shift in healing means you recover from injuries more quickly.

building a superhero

There are more speed-focused abilities you can swap for, especially in the movement (101) ability category, like Far Step (138), Get Away (145), and Walk Through Walls (196). Choosing a special attack like Entangling Force (136), Scramble Machine (179), or Shock (183) can put a unique spin on your powers and make you stand out from other speedsters.

SUPERSPY You can sneak, charm, and fight, and back up those skills with a little extra. You have the skills and training of a regular spy, and even more—something to give you an edge against supervillains, aliens, robots, and wizards. If you’re the scrappy secret agent who solves problems with violence, pick Fights Dirty (68), Is Licensed to Carry (70), or Needs No Weapon (73) as your focus. If you’re a smooth-talker who could walk right into a secure area, try Infiltrates (70) or Operates Undercover (73). If your emphasis is the sneaky aspects of spying, choose a focus like Explores

Dark Places (68) or Infiltrates (70). If you’re the remote operative who puts together all the data, try Solves Mysteries (77) or Works the System (79). If you have a dark past or are more of an antihero than a virtuous hero, a focus like Is Wanted by the Law (70), Murders (73), or Works the Back Alleys (79) is probably more your style. Your type is probably Explorer or Speaker, to give you a mix of useful physical and conversational skills, plus a dash of combat ability. Any sort of spy does well with a descriptor like Fast, Graceful, Perceptive, Sharp-Eyed, or Stealthy. If you’re a “face” character who charms, seduces, or misleads others, choose Appealing, Charming, Clever, Empathic, or Intuitive. If you’re brilliant or logical, try Calm or Intelligent. If you’re a lone wolf, a maverick, or running from a troubling event in your past, Doomed, Exiled, or Strong-Willed may suit you. To keep up with superheroes with flashier powers, you’ll need to be fast and

GM Tip: It’s often easier to treat a speedster like a teleporter if where they want to go is a shorter distance than how far they can move as an action. For example, if a speedster can move 200 feet per round, and they want to get on the roof of a nearby three-story building, handwave the details of them dodging pedestrians, opening doors, and climbing stairs—it’s more fun for the player and better for the story if they just zoom through and get to the roof.

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If you can’t wait until tier 2 to get Telekinesis (189), you could put a power shift in prodigy to swap out a tier 1 ability and get it early.

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good in a fight, so put power shifts into dexterity and either single attack (if you have one main attack form) or accuracy (if you have several). You probably have a gimmick that places you above and beyond the typical spy. Maybe it’s a gadget that lets you zap opponents (Shock [183]), a mutation that gives you increased speed (Fleet of Foot [141]), an experimental treatment that makes you ghostly (Defensive Phasing [127]), or cybernetics that let you teleport small items (Fetch [139]). This ability might even be the source of your code name, superhero name, or what your enemies call you.

TELEKINETIC You can move things with your mind. The obvious focus choices for this sort of hero are Focuses Mind Over Matter (68) or Throws With Deadly Accuracy (77), depending on whether you want to be a general telekinetic or if throwing things is more your theme. Foci like Controls Gravity (66) and Employs Magnetism (67) also work for this archetype if you reflavor their abilities as a specialized kind of telekinesis instead of gravity or magnetic manipulation. For your type, Adept is a natural fit, which also gives you access to thematically appropriate abilities like Onslaught (167), Push (173), and Ward (196). If you’d rather flex your mental muscles in other ways, Warrior and Explorer have many fun abilities that you can use as is or explain as another aspect of your telekinesis, like Block (115), Control the Field (121), Danger Sense (124), and even Physical Skills (170). If your hero is an introvert or their telekinesis reacts to their emotions, pick Cruel, Doomed, Guarded, or Tongue-Tied as your descriptor. If your hero is serene, serious, or meditative, a descriptor like Calm, Empathic, Intelligent, Intuitive, or Strong-Willed is probably more appropriate. If your powers have a magical or uncertain origin, Mysterious or Mystical may be a good choice. Depending on what abilities you have, you’ll want to put power shifts into single attack (for whatever your main telekinesis-based ability is) and maybe increased range. You could put a power shift in flight, using your mind to lift yourself to wherever you want to be. Choosing the magic (36) flavor gives you access to interesting mental or psychic abilities like Closed Mind (119), Entangling Force (136), Mental Link (161), and Premonition (171). The stealth (34) flavor lets you choose some neat pseudo-telekinetic abilities that might fit your theme, like Legerdemain (157) and Stealth Skills (186).

building a superhero TELEPORTER

TINY HERO

You can move instantly from one place to another.

You get really small, but still hit like a normal-sized person.

Although some heroes have the power to teleport, only a few have teleportation as their main flashy ability, incorporating it into their attacks and defenses. If you’re a superhero who relies on teleporting, take the Ignores Physical Distance focus. Warrior and Explorer are the best choices for your type, giving you strong combat abilities and access to useful skills. If you want to be a more showy superhero, appearing in front of crowds and dazzling them with speeches and stunts, Speaker is a workable alternative. If your powers make you confident (and perhaps prone to showing off), try a descriptor like Brash, Chaotic, Impulsive, or even Foolish. If you’re a swashbuckler at heart, choose Charming, Clever, Jovial, or Lucky. If you’re reserved or sneaky, something like Guarded, Mysterious, or Stealthy might be a better choice. Put power shifts into accuracy, dexterity, and maybe single attack. Putting a shift into increased range for your teleport ability is a nice advantage. Choosing healing for one of your shifts is useful because you can pop out of danger, have a quick rest, and come back when you’re ready. Your teleportation is useful in a fight and for sneaking around, so swapping abilities for something from the stealth (34) or combat (36) flavor is a natural fit. If you’re a magical hero, abilities from the magic (36) flavor can give you some unusual options when things get dangerous.

The core of this kind of superhero is the Shrinks to Minute Size focus, which starts off with letting you shrink to the size of a big bug, and you can get even better at shrinking with practice. As many shrinking heroes eventually develop the ability to grow to giant size, that’s also an option for you down the road. Are you a scientist who invented shrinking technology, and you augment your powers with other gizmos you create? If so, your type is probably an Adept. If you’re more about being a spy, secret agent, or thief, and your other abilities are about getting out of trouble and maybe a little bit of fighting, choose Explorer as your type. Being really small isn’t normally associated with being an inspiring leader or the best fighter around, so you’re probably not a Speaker or a Warrior. Your descriptor could be just about anything you want it to be, so pick one that suits your personality. Descriptors that go well with the powers of your focus are Clever, Fast, Graceful, Lucky, Stealthy, and Swift. Good power shift options for you are accuracy, dexterity, and flight. If you’re the sort of hero who talks to and commands bugs, talk to your GM about swapping an ability for Influence Swarm (153) and (at tier 2) Control Swarm (122). If you’d like to have a wicked sting or bite, swap out an ability for Concussive Blast (121), Onslaught (167), or Shock (183).

Shrinks to Minute Size, page 47

Ignores Physical Distance, page 46

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If you’re the perfect hunter who can catch any beast or human, and fast healing isn’t what you do, see the hunter archetype, page 22.

If your hero isn’t so much about using weapons and is more about being an amazing athlete, try the master athlete concept, page 24.

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Although superheroes in general often treat death like an inconvenience, your ability to heal—and therefore never actually die—is legendary. Couple this with an aggressive combat style and you’re the last person standing when the boss supervillain needs an attitude adjustment. If regeneration and overcoming injury is your main deal, choose Never Says Die (73) as your focus. If you love a good fight and the fast healing is just a side benefit, try Fights Dirty (68) or Looks for Trouble (71). If you use your powers to relentlessly pursue your opponents despite deadly obstacles, pick Hunts (69). If you’re a berserker who fights with ferocity and laughs at death, try Rages (74). You’re almost certainly a Warrior—one of the fun parts of being this kind of hero is cracking some bad-guy skulls. Explorers have some cool tricks, too, particularly for reacting to danger and surviving threats in general. (You definitely wouldn’t be a Speaker—people don’t keep you around for your looks or personality.) Being unkillable, or at least unbreakable, tends to make a person reckless, so go-to descriptors for this kind of hero are Brash, Chaotic, Impulsive, and Risk-Taking. If you want to double down on your survivability,

try a descriptor like Hardy, Lucky, Resilient, or Tough. If the never-ending cycle of injury and healing has left you bitter or scarred (mentally or physically), choose Doomed, Foolish, Hideous, or Vicious. Put power shifts into healing and resilience to make yourself better at shrugging off wounds. To improve your offensive capabilities, put shifts into accuracy, dexterity, single attack, or strength, as appropriate for your powers. If you don’t already have a signature move, swap for an ability like Aggression (109), Bloodlust (115), Find an Opening (139), Hemorrhage (149), Successive Attack (187), or Unarmed Fighting Style (194). An ability like Block (115), Closed Mind (119), Deflect Attacks (127), or Resist the Elements (176) can help keep you from getting hit in the first place or protect you from special damage that you can’t usually dodge.

WEAPON MASTER You’re amazing with your chosen weapon— maybe the best there is, or at least really impressive at using it. This archetype usually isn’t overtly superpowered. You’re this good because you spent your life training with one weapon, you have a once-in-a-generation knack for that weapon, or something like that. You have several interesting options for your focus, depending on what sort of hero you want to be. If you’re great with knives, shuriken, and other thrown objects, pick Throws With Deadly Accuracy (77). If you have one favorite kind of weapon, whether that’s axes, swords, or bows, try Masters Weaponry (72), or if guns are your thing, Is Licensed to Carry (70) might be more your style. If you’re more of a dashing swashbuckler than a fanatic about swords, choose Fights With Panache (68). If one weapon at a time isn’t enough, there’s Wields Two Weapons at Once (78). And if your interest is in killing, regardless of what weapon you’re using, consider being an antihero who Murders (73).

building a superhero You probably want your hero to be a Warrior or Explorer, depending on whether your main interest is fighting, or if you want an even mix of fighting and other abilities. Almost any descriptor is suitable for a weapon master hero. If you believe a strong offense is the best way to show you’re the best, choose Brash, Impulsive, or Strong. If you prefer speed and finesse over brute force, pick Fast, Stealthy, or Swift. If you’re willing and able to take a few hits in order to win a fight, try Hardy, Resilient, or Tough. Put a power shift in single attack for your chosen weapon, and maybe in increased range as well. Accuracy, dexterity, and strength are good for broadening your physical abilities. It’s very likely that any abilities you’d want for your hero are available through your type and focus, but if it still feels like something’s missing, take a look at flavors

like stealth (34), combat (36), or skills and knowledge (37) to fill in the blanks.

RANDOM SUPERPOWERS The following table has a broad selection of powers (or in some cases, sets of related powers). Players who are stuck for ideas about their superhero can roll once or twice on the table for inspiration; use the Example column for a suggested game example of that kind of power, whether that’s a power shift, a hero archetype, a focus, or a specific special ability (of course, these suggestions aren’t the only way to achieve that power). The GM can also use this table to come up with random abilities for supervillains. However, there is much more leeway in designing NPC abilities, so the Example column is more for suggesting game mechanics than abilities to choose.

d100

Power

Example

01–05

Agility

Power shift in dexterity

Animal shapechanger

Shapechanger (page 33)

07–09

Athletics

Master athlete (page 24)

10

Atlantean

Atlantean (page 11)

11–12

Beastly

Beastly hero (page 12)

13–14

Claws/fangs

Fists of Fury (140)

15–17

Cold attack

Frost Touch (144)

18

Cold immunity

Energy Resistance (134)

19

Companion creature

Beastmaster (page 12)

20

Control animals

Mentalist (page 25)

21

Control minds

Mentalist (page 25)

22–23

Control plants

Nature master (page 27)

24

Control wind

Nature master (page 27)

25

Copy superpower

Power replicator (page 29)

26

Create object

Dream Becomes Reality (132), Sculpt Light (180)

Cyborg

Cyborg (page 14)

29

Dark energy attack

Dark energy master (page 16)

30

Duplication

Multiplier (page 26)

31

Elastic

Elastic (page 16)

Electricity attack

Shock (183)

Electricity immunity

Energy Resistance (134)

06

27–28

32–34 35

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Enhanced senses

Sensory adept (page 32)

37

Entangling

Entangling Force (136)

38–40

Fire attack

Energy master (page 17)

Fire immunity

Energy Resistance (134)

Flight

Power shift in flight

44

Force field

Force field master (page 19)

45

Growing

Giant hero (page 21)

46–47

Healing

Power shift in healing

48

Human shapechanger

Shapechanger (page 33)

49

Illusion

Illusionist (page 23)

50–51

Intelligence

Power shift in intelligence

52–54

Invention

Builder (page 13)

55

Invisibility

Invisibility (155), Vanish (196)

56–57

Leaping

Amazing Leap (page 48), Far Step (138)

58–59

Lucky

Chaotic (40), Lucky (51), Dodge and Resist (131), Hard to Kill (148)

60–61

Magnetism

Telekinetic (page 36)

62–64

Martial arts

Master martial artist (page 25)

65

Paragon

Paragon (page 28)

66

Phasing

Phase master (page 28)

67

Plant

Plant (page 29)

68

Poison

Create Deadly Poison (123)

69–72

Powered armor

Powered armor hero (page 30)

73

Remote viewing

Sensory adept (page 32)

Resilience

Power shift in resilience

76

Robot minions

Builder (page 13)

77

Shield

Bearer of the item (page 11)

78

Shrinking

Tiny hero (page 37)

79–80

Sorcerer

Sorcerer (page 33)

81–82

Sound attack

Thunder Beam (191)

83–84

Speedster

Speedster (page 34)

85–89

Strength

Power shift in strength

90–91

Superspy

Superspy (page 35)

92–93

Telekinesis

Telekinetic (page 36)

94–95

Telepathy

Mentalist (page 25)

96

Teleportation

Teleporter (page 37)

97

Undead minions

Sorcerer (page 33)

98

Weapon

Bearer of the item (page 11)

Weapon master

Weapon master (page 38), power shift in single attack

41 42–43

74–75

99–00

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r e t c a r a Ch Options

CHAP T ER 2

NEW DESCRIPTORS Descriptor, page 38

This section presents new descriptors meant specifically for a superhero game. Unlike the descriptors in the Cypher System Rulebook, which usually describe your personality and outlook, these descriptors focus more on your nature as a superhero and how you fit into the world (or don’t fit). If you have a good idea of what your hero persona is but are still working on what the person under the mask is like, choosing one of these descriptors lets you focus on fighting crime while you figure out the rest of your character behind the scenes.

AMAZING

Free level of Effort, page 209

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You have a knack for surprising people— performing impossible athletic feats, sneaking up on someone who’s alert, or instantly reacting to an ambush. You like to make use of these talents to enhance (or rehabilitate) your reputation as a hero prone to spectacular rescues, defeating foes way above your league, and arriving just in time to save the day. Ironically, in your normal daily life, you’re a little awkward and overlooked. You gain the following characteristics: Exceptional: +2 to your Speed Pool, and 2 additional points to divide among your stat Pools. Skill: You’re trained in initiative and stealth tasks. Self-Hype: When you apply a level of Effort to a task, you get a free level of Effort. You can do this one time, although the ability is renewed each time you make a one-hour or ten-hour recovery roll.

Inability: Your sudden appearances are startling to regular people. Positive social reactions are hindered (villains and other superheroes aren’t affected by this). Initial Link to the Starting Adventure: From the following list of options, choose how you became involved in the first adventure. 1. You got in a bit over your head, but another PC’s coincidental arrival gave you just the distraction you needed. 2. You were tailing someone the other PCs were following and decided to drop in. 3. You saw that the other PCs were in a fight and chose to help them out. 4. You had a hunch that something big was about to go down.

INCREDIBLE You’re misunderstood, and you might not even think of yourself as a hero, but somehow you keep ending up in situations where your abilities are just what’s needed to prevent disaster. Maybe good luck cancels out just enough of being cursed to count as a win. You’ve saved innocent lives, defeated some really bad people, and perhaps even cheated death a couple of times. Half the time you don’t even know how you did it, but you succeeded at the impossible . . . often with a lot of collateral damage. When you hear police sirens, it’s time to leave, but you know that trouble will find you eventually—and you’ll be ready to smash it. Strong: +2 to your Might Pool, and 2 additional points to divide among your stat Pools.

Character Options Skill: You’re trained in breaking things. Skill: You’re trained in all jumping tasks. Inability: Your destructive reputation or some other reluctance to communicate makes people distrust you. Any task involving social interaction is hindered. Incredible Action: You can choose to automatically succeed on one task without rolling, as long as the task’s difficulty is no higher than 6. When you do so, however, you also trigger a GM intrusion as if you had rolled a 1. The intrusion doesn’t invalidate the success, but it probably qualifies it in some fashion. You can do this one time, although the ability renews each time you make a ten-hour recovery roll. Initial Link to the Starting Adventure: From the following list of options, choose how you became involved in the first adventure. 1. One of the other PCs sensed your decent heart and decided to befriend you. 2. You literally crashed through a wall and ended up in the middle of the other PCs. 3. One of the other PCs reminds you of someone from your past. 4. You were feeling lonely and took a risk talking to someone, and so far it’s paying off.

MIGHTY You have a very impressive physique. Your strength, power, and very importance are superior. Whether you’re truly the mightiest may be up for debate (and you may have a friendly rivalry about this with other superheroes), but there is no question that you are exceptional. These things make you confident, but you know that you have these physical gifts in order to perform heroic deeds, and unseemly conduct is beneath you. Very Powerful: +4 to your Might Pool. Skill: You’re trained in all actions involving lifting and throwing things. Skill: You’re trained in Might defense tasks. Healthy: Add 1 to the points you regain when you make a recovery roll. Initial Link to the Starting Adventure: From the following list of options, choose how you became involved in the first adventure. 1. You joined the other PCs because they would fail without your strength. 2. You believe this endeavor will earn you a lot of valor. 3. Another PC asked—rightly—for your help. 4. An authority figure told you to do this to show you the value of humility.

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If the superhero setting has a specific gene or genes responsible for mutant superpowers, Uncanny characters have that gene (perhaps even multiple copies) and can sense others who have it.

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The public and the press like you. Maybe you’re photogenic, or you’re inherently nice, or you have really good luck with journalists. Whatever the cause of it, you’re the darling of the media, and whenever you’re seen in public, you generate a lot of positive interest and excitement. (If you don’t have a secret identity, this attention probably also carries over to your day job, which is a mixed blessing.) People know that you’re a hero and that they can count on you to do the right thing—fighting crime, battling injustice, punching evil robots, that kind of stuff. Sometimes being in the public eye so much can be wearying or even a burden, but you know how to use your reputation to set a good example and make the world a better place. You gain the following characteristics: Versatile: You get 4 additional points to divide among your stat Pools. Skill: You’re trained in positive social interactions. Skill: You’re trained in one skill relating to your current or past career, such as computers, journalism, law, machinery, or medicine. Popular: The GM can introduce a GM intrusion on you, based on your fame and the public’s perception of you, without awarding you any XP (as if you had rolled a 1 on a d20 roll). However, if this happens, 50 percent of the time, your reputation works to your advantage. Rather than hurting you (much), it helps you, or it hurts your enemies. You get spotted by a guard, but they’re dumbstruck for a moment because you’re even more impressive in person than you are on TV. You attract a crowd of fans, but they slow down the fleeing villain you’re trying to catch. A photographer pesters you for a photo and a quote, but their camera catches something interesting in the background. You and the GM should work together to determine the details. If the GM wishes, they can use GM intrusions based on your fame normally (awarding XP).

Initial Link to the Starting Adventure: From the following list of options, choose how you became involved in the first adventure. 1. You’re related to one of the other superhero PCs, and decided to help out because of family. 2. The other PCs relied on your positive reputation to untangle them from a public relations problem, and they invited you along out of gratitude. 3. The media specifically called you out to fix this problem. 4. A supervillain chose to make a scene in the hopes of drawing you out.

UNCANNY There’s something unusual about you, and it makes other people a little uncomfortable. You know you’re exceptional—gifted, even—and being a bit odd doesn’t make you any less of a person. This uncanny element is a part of you, in your blood, in your DNA. You can’t help it, but you won’t apologize for it. You feel comfortable around other people with similar strangeness, people who’ve experienced the same prejudice that you have; these shared experiences mean they’re your family, perhaps the only family you’ve got. You gain the following characteristics: Exceptional: +2 to your Might Pool and +2 to your Speed Pool. Distinctive Physical Quirk: You have an unusual physical aspect. Depending on the setting, this can vary greatly; it might be something external and obvious, such as an odd smell or blue hair, or internal and hidden, like having blood type “omega.” Whatever it is, your quirk draws a lot of attention when it’s discovered. A Sense for the Weird: Sometimes—at the GM’s discretion—an event or person that seems related to your uncanny nature attracts your attention. You can sense it from afar, and if you get within long range of it, you can sense whether it is overtly dangerous or not.

Character Options

Skill: You’re trained in either perception tasks or stealth tasks. Skill: You’re trained in one kind of knowledge related to your quirk, such as olfactory science, mutations, or hematology. Inability: People find you unnerving. All tasks relating to pleasant social interaction are hindered. (Other people who are unusual like you aren’t affected by this.) Initial Link to the Starting Adventure: From the following list of options, choose how you became involved in the first adventure. 1. You felt the objective was someone like you, so you got involved. 2. Whether the other PCs realize it or not, their mission has to do with your field of knowledge, so you got involved. 3. As an expert in an unusual kind of knowledge, you were specifically recruited by the other PCs. 4. You believe one of the other PCs may be uncanny or is related to someone who is.

NEW FOCI This section presents new superhero foci that can be used as is in most superhero campaigns. The foci introduced here are as follows: Copies Superpowers: You can copy others’ skills, abilities, and superpowers. Has a Thousand Faces: You can change your appearance to look like anyone else. Ignores Physical Distance: You can teleport from one place to another by briefly passing through a parallel dimension. Sculpts Hard Light: You create physical objects out of hard light that you can use for offense and defense. Shrinks to Minute Size: You can shrink down to the size of a bug and, with enough experience, even smaller. Soars on Amazing Wings: Many superheroes can fly, and some even have wings. You can use your wings for movement, attacks, and defense. Stretches: Your body is elastic and rubbery, able to stretch to great lengths and compress when struck.

Foci, page 60

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Claim the Sky Takes Animal Shape: You can transform yourself into an animal. Touches the Sky: You can summon storms or break them apart. Wields an Enchanted Weapon: You have a weapon with strange abilities, and your knowledge of its powers has allowed you to create a unique style of combat with it. Wields Invisible Force: You bend light and manipulate beams of force for offense and defense. As with the foci in the Cypher System Rulebook, the numbers listed after the abilities for each tier are the rulebook pages where those abilities are described. If an ability doesn’t have a page number listed, it is new to this book and explained at the end of this chapter.

COPIES SUPERPOWERS You can copy others’ skills, abilities, and superpowers. 1 Tier 1: Flex Skill (141) 1 Tier 1: Flex Skill (141) 1 Tier 2: Copy Power 1 Tier 3: Steal Power or Wildcard Powers 1 Tier 4: Improved Copying 1 Tier 5: Power Memory 1 Tier 6: Amazing Copying or Multiple Copying GM Intrusions: A copied power ends unexpectedly or goes out of control. A copied power doesn’t bring secondary powers with it (like gaining superspeed without protection from air friction, or not being immune to the heat from your own fire bolts).

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HAS A THOUSAND FACES You can change your appearance to look like anyone else. 1 Tier 1: Face Morph (138) 1 Tier 1: Interaction Skills (155) 1 Tier 2: Body Morph 1 Tier 2: War Flesh 1 Tier 3: Disguise Other or Resilience (176) 1 Tier 4: Ageless 1 Tier 4: Think Your Way Out (191) 1 Tier 5: Memory Becomes Action (161) 1 Tier 6: Divide Your Mind (130) or Infer Thoughts (153) GM Intrusions: Part of the disguise slips. An NPC thinks the disguised character is someone they know very well.

IGNORES PHYSICAL DISTANCE You can teleport from one place to another by briefly passing through a parallel dimension. 1 Tier 1: Dimensional Squeeze 1 Tier 2: Opportunist (167) 1 Tier 3: Defensive Blinking or Teleportation Burst 1 Tier 4: Short Teleportation 1 Tier 5: Medium Teleportation 1 Tier 6: Teleportation (190) or Teleportive Wound GM Intrusions: A teleport goes awry, landing the character in a dangerous place. Inertia (such as from falling) continues through the teleport, injuring the character.

SCULPTS HARD LIGHT You create physical objects out of hard light that you can use for offense and defense. 1 Tier 1: Automatic Glow 1 Tier 1: Temporary Light 1 Tier 2: Entangling Force (136) 1 Tier 3: Harder Light or Sculpt Light (180) 1 Tier 4: Greater Enhanced Intellect (146) 1 Tier 5: Improved Sculpt Light (152) 1 Tier 6: Defensive Field (127) or Flight (141) GM Intrusions: A hard light object disappears early. A hard light object cannot affect a certain creature or color.

Character Options SHRINKS TO MINUTE SIZE

TAKES ANIMAL SHAPE

You can shrink down to the size of a bug and, with enough experience, even smaller. 1 Tier 1: Shrink 1 Tier 1: Beneath Notice 1 Tier 2: Smaller 1 Tier 2: Advantages of Being Small 1 Tier 3: Enlarge (135) or Quick Switch 1 Tier 4: Small Flight 1 Tier 5: Shrink Others 1 Tier 6: Bigger (113) or Tiny GM Intrusions: A creature thinks the small character is potential food. The small character gets trapped in a tiny space or under a falling object.

You can transform yourself into an animal. 1 Tier 1: Animal Shape 1 Tier 2: Communication (121) 1 Tier 2: Soothe the Savage (184) 1 Tier 3: Bigger Animal Shape or Greater Beast Form (146) 1 Tier 4: Animal Scrying 1 Tier 5: Hard to Kill (148) 1 Tier 6: Blurring Speed (115) or Lend Animal Shape GM Intrusions: The character unexpectedly changes form. An NPC is frightened by or aggressive toward the shapeshifter. The transformation takes longer than expected.

SOARS ON AMAZING WINGS Many superheroes can fly, and some even have wings. You can use your wings for movement, attacks, and defense. 1 Tier 1: Hover (149) 1 Tier 1: Flight Exertion 1 Tier 2: Wing Weapons 1 Tier 3: Acrobatic Attack (108) or Flying Companion 1 Tier 4: Hard to Hit (148) 1 Tier 5: Up to Speed (195) 1 Tier 6: Hard Target (148) or Defense Master (127) GM Intrusions: A wing gets hurt or restrained, causing the character to fall. Flying high makes the character an obvious target for an unexpected foe.

A character who Shrinks to Minute Size who chooses to learn abilities like Enlarge will never be quite as big as one who Grows to Towering Heights, but they can enjoy the advantages of being big or small as needed.

Greater Beast Form applies to using Animal Shape.

TOUCHES THE SKY You can summon storms or break them apart. 1 Tier 1: Hover (149) 1 Tier 2: Wind Armor (199) 1 Tier 3: Bolts of Power (115) or Storm Seed (187) 1 Tier 4: Windrider (199) 1 Tier 5: Cold Burst (119) 1 Tier 6: Control Weather (122) or Wind Chariot (199) GM Intrusions: An ally is accidentally struck by a fork of lightning. An unexpected grounding effect inflicts damage. The weather is seeded by a much smaller effect, and a storm grows out of control.

STRETCHES Your body is elastic and rubbery, able to stretch to great lengths and compress when struck. 1 Tier 1: Contortionist (121) 1 Tier 1: Far Step (138) 1 Tier 2: Elastic Grip 1 Tier 2: Safe Fall (179) 1 Tier 3: Bypass Barrier (116) or Misdirect (163) 1 Tier 4: Resilience (176) 1 Tier 5: Free to Move (143) 1 Tier 6: Break the Ranks (116) or Not Dead Yet (166) GM Intrusions: An attack or effect interferes with the character’s elasticity. A stretched limb becomes overstressed and weak.

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Always Tinkering is a fun ability for genius (page 20) and builder (page 13) heroes who are always coming up with gadgets and weird prototype items to test out.

Copy Power, page 51

When you use Amazing Copying, a copied ability must be low, medium, or high tier according to how it is listed in the ability categories (page 95). It doesn’t matter if a type or focus makes it available at a lower or higher tier.

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WIELDS AN ENCHANTED WEAPON

NEW ABILITIES

You have a weapon with strange abilities, and your knowledge of its powers has allowed you to create a unique style of combat with it. 1 Tier 1: Enchanted Weapon 1 Tier 1: Innate Power 1 Tier 1: Charge Weapon 1 Tier 2: Power Crash 1 Tier 3: Rapid Attack (174) or Throw Enchanted Weapon 1 Tier 4: Defending Weapon 1 Tier 5: Enchanted Movement 1 Tier 6: Deadly Strike (125) or Spin Attack (185) GM Intrusions: A weapon breaks or is dropped. The character loses their connection to the weapon until they use an action to reestablish the attunement. The weapon’s energy discharges in an unexpected way.

The following are new abilities for the Cypher System, most of which are associated with the new foci in this book. They are otherwise similar to the abilities in chapter 9 of the Cypher System Rulebook.

WIELDS INVISIBLE FORCE You bend light and manipulate beams of force for offense and defense. 1 Tier 1: Vanish (196) 1 Tier 2: Entangling Force (136) 1 Tier 2: Sharp Senses (182) 1 Tier 3: Force Field Barrier (143) or Multi-Vanish 1 Tier 4: Invisibility (155) 1 Tier 5: Defensive Field (127) 1 Tier 6: Concussion (121) or Generate Force Field (145) GM Intrusions: Invisibility partially fades, revealing the character’s presence. A force field is pierced by an unusual or unexpected attack.

1 Advantages of Being Small: You’ve learned

how to leverage your strength and accuracy in proportion to your size. Your damage is no longer halved when using Shrink, and climbing and jumping tasks are eased. Enabler. 1 Ageless: Your body and mind do not age.

Unless you are killed by violence (or some outside force such as poison or infection), you will never die. Enabler. 1 Always Tinkering: If you have any

tools and materials at all, and you are carrying fewer cyphers than your limit, you can create a manifest cypher if you have an hour of time to spend. The new cypher is random and always 2 levels lower than normal (minimum 1). It’s also temperamental and fragile. These are called temperamental cyphers. If you give one to anyone else to use, it falls apart immediately, useless. Action to initiate; one hour to complete. 1 Amazing Copying: You can use Copy

Power to copy more powerful abilities. In addition to the normal options for using Effort with Copy Power, if you apply two levels of Effort, the GM chooses a high-tier ability that most closely resembles that power (instead of a low-tier ability). Enabler. 1 Amazing Leap (2 Might points): You

leap through the air and land safely some distance away. You can jump up, down, or across to anywhere you choose within long range if you have a clear and unobstructed path to that location. If you have three or more power shifts in strength, your leaping range increases to very long. If you have five or more power shifts in strength, your leaping range increases to 1,000 feet (300 m). Action.

Character Options 1 Animal Scrying (4+ Intellect points):

If you know the general location of an animal that is friendly toward you and within 1 mile (1.5 km) of your location, you can sense through its senses for up to ten minutes. If you are not in animal form or not in a form similar to that animal, you must apply a level of Effort to use this ability. Action to establish. 1 Animal Shape (3+ Intellect points): You

change into an animal as small as a rat or up to your own size (such as a large dog or small bear) for ten minutes. Each time you transform, you can take a different animal shape. Your equipment becomes part of the transformation, rendering it unusable unless it has a passive effect, such as armor. In this form your stats remain the same as your normal form, but you can move and attack according to your animal shape (attacks from most animals this size are medium weapons, which you can use without penalty). Tasks requiring hands (such as using door handles or pushing buttons) are hindered when in animal form. You cannot speak but can still use abilities that don’t rely on human speech. You gain two minor abilities associated with the creature you become (see the Animal Form Minor Abilities table). For example, if you transform into a bat, you become trained in perception and can fly up to a long distance each round. If you transform into an octopus, you are trained in stealth and can breathe underwater. If you apply a level of Effort when you use this ability, you can either become a talking animal or take a hybrid shape. The talking animal shape looks exactly like a normal animal, but you can still talk and use any abilities that rely on human speech. The hybrid shape is like your normal form but with animalistic features, even if that animal is something much smaller than you (such as a bat or rat). In this hybrid form you can speak, use all of your abilities, make attacks like an animal,

and perform tasks using hands without being hindered. Anyone who sees you clearly in this hybrid form would never mistake you for a mere animal. Action to change or revert. 1 Automatic Glow: Hard light objects

you create with your type and focus abilities shed light, illuminating everything in immediate range. Whenever you want, your body (entirely or just part of it) sheds light, illuminating everything in short range. Enabler. 1 Beneath Notice: Your decreased size

makes it difficult to find you. While Shrink is active on you, all stealth tasks you attempt are eased. Enabler. 1 Bigger Animal Shape: When you use

Animal Shape, your animal form grows to about twice its normal size. Being so large, your beast form gains the following additional bonuses: +1 to Armor, +5 to your Might Pool, and you are trained in using your animal form’s natural attacks as heavy weapons (if you weren’t already). However, your Speed defense tasks are hindered. While bigger, you also gain an asset to tasks that are easier for a larger creature to perform, like climbing, intimidating, wading rivers, and so on. Enabler. 1 Body Morph (3+ Intellect points): You

alter your facial and bodily features and coloration for one hour, hiding your identity or impersonating someone. If you apply a level of Effort, you can imitate a specific person accurately enough to fool someone who knows them well or has observed them closely (including fingerprints and voice prints, but not their retina print or DNA). You have an asset in all tasks involving disguise (this is in addition to the asset from Face Morph). You must apply a separate level of Effort to be able to impersonate a different species (such as a human morphing into a humanoid alien). Action.

When using Animal Scrying, “similar” is a broad term. Lions are similar to tigers and leopards, hawks are similar to ravens and swans, dogs are similar to wolves and foxes, and so on. Even if your animal shape has multiple attack types (such as claws and bite), you can attack only once per round unless you have some other ability that lets you make additional attacks on your turn. Animal Form Minor Abilities table, page 50 A character might be able to take the shape of a creature that is similar to a common animal, such as a unicorn instead of a horse or a basilisk instead of a lizard, but doing so should require applying at least one level of Effort to the change, and the character wouldn’t gain any of the creature’s unusual abilities. Animal Shape variant: If your character concept is that you always take the same animal form instead of being able to choose from multiple kinds of animals, double the duration of the Animal Shape ability (to twenty minutes per use). The GM may allow characters with this restriction to learn additional animal forms by spending 4 XP as a long-term benefit.

Long-Term Benefits, page 239 Face Morph, page 138

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Claim the Sky ANIMAL FORM MINOR ABILITIES TABLE Use the following as examples or suggestions of what a character gains when in the shape of an animal. If an animal shape lists two skills, the character chooses which one they want each time they take that shape.

The GM can mix up the combinations of skills and other abilities for these animal shapes to create other Earth animals, or create animals in the campaign setting that are native to other planets.

Animal

Skill Training

Other Abilities

Ape

Climbing

Hands

Badger

Climbing

Scent

Bat

Perception

Flying

Bear

Climbing

Scent

Bird

Perception

Flying

Boar

Might defense

Scent

Cat

Climbing or stealth

Small

Constrictor snake

Climbing

Constrict

Crocodile

Stealth or swimming

Constrict

Deinonychus

Perception

Fast

Dolphin

Perception or swimming

Fast

Fish

Stealth or swimming

Aquatic

Frog

Jumping or stealth

Aquatic

Horse

Perception

Fast

Leopard

Climbing or stealth

Fast

Lizard

Climbing or stealth

Small

Octopus

Stealth

Aquatic

Shark

Swimming

Aquatic

Turtle

Might defense

Armor

Venomous snake

Climbing

Venom

Wolf

Perception

Scent

Aquatic: The animal either breathes water instead of air or is able to breathe water in addition to breathing air. Armor: The animal has a thick hide or shell, granting +1 to Armor. Constrict: The animal can grip its opponent fast after making a melee attack (usually with a bite or claw), easing attack rolls against that foe on later turns until it releases the foe. Fast: The animal can move a long distance on its turn instead of a short distance. Flying: The animal can fly, which (depending on the type of animal) may be up to a short or long distance on its turn. Hands: The animal has paws or hands that are nearly as agile as those of a human. Unlike with most animal shapes, the animal’s tasks that require hands are not hindered (although the GM may decide that some tasks requiring human agility, such as playing a flute, are still hindered). Scent: The animal has a strong sense of smell, gaining an asset on tracking and dealing with darkness or blindness. Small: The animal is considerably smaller than a human, easing its Speed defense tasks but hindering tasks to move heavy things. Venom: The animal is poisonous (usually through a bite), inflicting 1 additional point of damage.

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Character Options 1 Bolster Illusion (2+ Intellect points): You

give one of your visual illusions a limited physical reality that viewers can smell, taste, hear, and feel. This effect is bound to that illusion and acts appropriate to the illusion itself. For example, it can make the illusion of a brick wall feel like brick, the illusion of a person smell like perfume and able to open a door, and the illusion of a fireplace hot to the touch. The physical reality provided to your illusion is a level 1 effect with 3 health. If the illusion is used to make attacks, it inflicts only 1 point of damage (whether this is regular damage like an illusory punch or kick, or ambient damage like a falling brick wall or a fireplace’s flames). You can increase the level of the created effect by applying levels of Effort to this ability, each level of Effort increasing the effect’s level by 1. You can activate this ability as part of the action to create an illusion (using whatever ability it is that you use to create illusions, such as Minor Illusion), or use a separate action to apply it to one of your existing illusions. The effect ends if the illusion is destroyed, you let the illusion lapse, the effect’s health is reduced to 0, or ten minutes pass. Enabler. 1 Boost Manifest Cypher (2 Intellect

points): The manifest cypher you activate with your next action functions as if it were 2 levels higher. Action. 1 Boost Manifest Cypher Function (4

Intellect points): Add 3 to the functioning level of a manifest cypher that you activate with your next action, or change one aspect of its parameters (range, duration, area, etc.) by up to double or down to one tenth. Action. 1 Charge Weapon (2+ Intellect points):

As part of making an attack with your enchanted weapon, you charge it with magical power, inflicting 2 additional points of energy damage. If you make more than one attack on your turn, you choose

whether to spend the cost for this ability before you make each attack. Enabler. 1 Command Beast (3+ Intellect points):

You can command a nonhostile, nonhuman beast (such as one that you’ve made calm with Soothe the Savage) of up to level 3 within short range. If you are successful, for the next minute the beast follows your verbal commands to the best of its understanding and ability. The GM has final say over what counts as a nonhuman beast, but unless some kind of deception is at work, you should know whether you can affect a creature before you attempt to use this ability on it. Aliens, extradimensional entities, very intelligent creatures, and robots never count. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase the maximum level of the target. Thus, to command a level 5 beast (two levels above the normal limit), you must apply two levels of Effort. Action to initiate. 1 Copy Power (2+ Intellect points): You

can copy someone else’s superpower for an hour, performing it as if it were natural for you. Within the past hour you must have touched the creature whose power you want to copy (an attack roll) and must have seen that ability used by them. Choose the power you want to copy, and the GM chooses an appropriate low-tier ability that most closely resembles that power. For example, if you’re battling a supervillain who can create blasts of force, if you copy that ability, you gain a low-tier ability that creates a blast of force. In addition to the point cost of Copy Power, you must pay the Might, Speed, or Intellect cost (if any) of the equivalent ability that the GM chose. For example, if you want to copy a supervillain’s force blast, the GM will probably decide that’s equivalent to Onslaught (167), so you’d pay 2 Intellect points to activate Copy Power and 1 Intellect point to use Onslaught.

Soothe the Savage, page 184

Depending on how your powers work, the effects of Bolster Illusion might be due to a shaped force field, conjured helpful spirit, cloud of tiny drones, and so on.

Minor Illusion, page 162

If there’s any uncertainty about whether Copy Power could copy a specific ability, the GM is free to say yes and offer a GM intrusion to complicate the situation.

A copied ability must be low tier according to how it is listed in the ability categories (page 95). It doesn’t matter if a type or focus makes it available at a higher tier.

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Claim the Sky You can copy only one power at a time; copying another one ends any other power you’re copying with this ability. Copy Power doesn’t copy effects of a power that permanently adds points to your Pools, such as Enhanced Body (134). In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to copy an ability you saw longer than one hour ago; each level of Effort used in this way extends the time period by one hour. Action. 1 Defending Weapon: When using your

enchanted weapon, you are trained in Speed defense tasks. Enabler. 1 Defensive Blinking (4 Intellect points):

You enter a heightened reactive state so that when you are struck hard enough to take damage, you teleport an immediate distance in a random direction (not up or down) to help evade the brunt of the attack. Your Speed defense rolls are eased for one minute. Action. 1 Dimensional Squeeze (2+ Intellect

Transitional dimension: A dimension where distances are shorter compared to those in other dimensions, so travel through it is faster than normal movement.

You probably can’t use Disguise Other to disguise a kind of creature that is very different from you, such as a human disguising a robot, animal, or crystalline alien.

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points): You cram yourself into a transitional dimension, allowing you to instantaneously appear anywhere you choose within short range if you have a clear and unobstructed path to that location. You can pass through an intervening barrier if it has an open space that you could easily fit your head through—about 1 square foot (30 cm by 30 cm square). In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to pass through a smaller opening in a barrier; each level of Effort used in this way reduces the minimum opening size by one-fourth. You land safely when you use this ability. Action. 1 Disguise Other (4+ Intellect points):

You apply your shapechanging ability to another creature of your size or smaller, giving them a form that you are able to assume. This lasts for about ten minutes.

In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase the duration; one level of Effort increases it to an hour, two increases it to a day. A creature can revert to its normal form as an action, but it cannot then change back into the altered form. Action. 1 Elastic Grip (3 Might points): Your attack

with your stretchy limbs or body is eased. If you hit, you can grab the target, preventing it from moving on its next turn. While you hold the target, its attacks or attempts to break free are hindered. If the target attempts to break free instead of attacking, you must succeed at a Might-based task to maintain your grip. If the target fails to break free, you can continue to hold it each round as your subsequent actions, automatically inflicting 4 points of damage each round by squeezing. Enabler. 1 Enchanted Movement (4+ Intellect

points): You use your enchanted weapon to move yourself to any location within a long distance that you can see, as long as there are no obstacles or barriers in your way. The exact way this happens depends on your weapon; you might throw your magical hammer and be pulled along after it, shoot an arrow from your bow that pulls you forward like a grapple line, and so on. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase the distance traveled; each level of Effort used in this way increases the range by another 100 feet (30 m). If you have another ability (such as from your type) that allows you to cross a long distance, the range of that ability and this one increases to very long. Action. 1 Enchanted Weapon (1 Intellect point):

You attune yourself to a physical weapon, such as a sword, hammer, or bow. You know exactly where it is if it is within a short distance of you, and you know its general direction and distance if farther away. All of your other focus abilities require you to

Character Options be holding or wielding this weapon. You can be attuned to only one weapon at a time; attuning yourself to a second weapon loses the attunement to the first one. Action to initiate; ten minutes to complete. Enabler. 1 Flex Weapon Skill: At the beginning

of each day, choose one type of attack: light bashing, light bladed, light ranged, medium bashing, medium bladed, medium ranged, heavy bashing, heavy bladed, or heavy ranged. For the rest of that day, you are trained in attacks using that type of weapon. You can’t use this ability with an attack skill in which you’re already trained to become specialized. Enabler. 1 Flight Exertion (3 Might or 3 Speed

points): You can fly up to a short distance as your movement this round. If all you do is move on your turn, you can fly up to a long distance. Enabler. 1 Flying Companion: You gain a level 3

companion creature that can fly at the same speed as you; depending on other aspects of your character, this might be a trained bird, a machine drone, or a helpful strange creature such as a familiar. This creature accompanies you and acts as you direct. As a level 3 companion, it has a target number of 9 and 9 health, and it inflicts 3 points of damage. If it’s killed or destroyed, it takes you one month to find or create a suitable replacement. Enabler. 1 Harder Light: When you create an object

out of hard light, the object is one level higher than normal. Enabler. 1 Improved Copying: You can use Copy

Power to copy more powerful abilities. In addition to the normal options for using Effort with Copy Power, if you apply one level of Effort, the GM chooses a mid-tier ability that most closely resembles that power (instead of a low-tier ability). Enabler.

1 Innate Power: Choose either your Might

Pool or your Speed Pool. When spending points to activate your focus abilities, you can spend points from this Pool instead of your Intellect Pool (in which case you use your Might Edge or Speed Edge instead of your Intellect Edge, as appropriate). Enabler. 1 Lend Animal Shape (6+ Intellect points):

You change into an animal, and one willing creature within immediate range also transforms into an animal of that type (bear, tiger, wolf, and so on) for ten minutes, as if they were using your Animal Shape ability. For each level of Effort applied, you can affect one additional creature. All creatures transforming with you must be your size or smaller. A creature can revert to its normal form as an action, but it cannot then change back into the animal form. One creature (whether you or someone else) changing form does not affect any other creature affected with this ability. Action. 1 Medium Teleportation (5+ Intellect

points): You instantly teleport yourself to any location within a long distance that you can see. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase your range, teleport to a location you can’t see, or bring other people with you. Each additional long distance costs one level of Effort. Teleporting to a destination you can’t see costs one level of Effort. Each additional one or two targets brought with you costs one level of Effort (you must touch any additional targets). These levels of Effort are counted separately, so teleporting an additional long distance away to a location you can’t see with two passengers costs a total of three levels of Effort. Action. 1 Mist Cloud (1+ Intellect points): You

create an area of mist an immediate distance across. The cloud lingers for about a minute unless conditions (such as

Animal Shape, page 49 A creature that takes animal form with Lend Animal Shape counts as an animal for the use of Animal Scrying (page 49).

If you already have Short Teleportation (page 55) when you select Medium Teleportation or Teleportation, you may replace Short Teleportation with another tier 4 type ability.

Teleportation, page 190 Copy Power, page 51

When you use Improved Copying, a copied ability must be low, medium, or high tier according to how it is listed in the ability categories (page 95). It doesn’t matter if a type or focus makes it available at a lower or higher tier. Mist, page 221

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wind or freezing temperatures) dictate otherwise. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase the area (one level of Effort to fill a short area, two to fill a long area, or three to fill a very long area). Action. 1 Modify Cyphers: You can take any two

Always Tinkering, page 48

manifest cyphers and quickly jury-rig a new manifest cypher of the same level as the lowest-level cypher. You determine the function of the new cypher, but it must be that of a cypher you have used before (but not necessarily one you’ve ever built). The new cypher is a temperamental cypher, like those created with Always Tinkering. The original two cyphers are consumed in this process. This ability does not function if one or more of the original cyphers are temperamental cyphers. Action.

1 Multiple Copying: When you use Copy

Power, you can copy two of the creature’s abilities at the same time. In addition to the normal options for using Effort with Copy Power, you can apply levels of Effort to copy additional abilities, each level of Effort copying an additional ability beyond the initial two (three for one level of Effort, four for two levels, and so on). Enabler. 1 Multi-Vanish (4+ Intellect points): You

turn up to five human-sized creatures or objects invisible for a short amount of time. The targets you choose must be within an immediate area and within short range of you (if you are in the area, you can make yourself invisible and don’t count toward the limit of five invisible targets). Anything invisible has an asset on stealth and Speed defense tasks. Affected creatures can see each other in a limited way, and you can see them clearly. The invisibility ends at the end of your next turn. If one of the affected creatures does something to reveal their presence or position—attacking, using an ability, moving a large object, and so on—the invisibility ends early for that creature. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase the duration; each level of Effort used in this way increases the duration by one round (but creatures can still end it early for themselves). Action. 1 Power Crash (3+ Intellect points): You

strike your enchanted weapon against the ground (or a similar large surface), creating an explosion of energy that affects an area up to immediate range from that point. (If your enchanted weapon is a ranged weapon, you can instead target a point within close range to be the center of the explosion.) The blast inflicts 2 points of damage to all creatures or objects within the area (except for you). Because this is an area attack, adding Effort to increase your damage works differently than it does for single-target attacks. If

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Character Options you apply a level of Effort to increase the damage, add 2 points of damage for each target, and even if you fail your attack roll, all targets in the area still take 1 point of damage. Action. 1 Power Memory: When you use Copy

Power, you only need to have seen the ability used within the past day (instead of the past hour), and using Effort extends how long ago your copying can reach to one day per level of Effort (instead of one hour per level). Enabler. 1 Quick Switch: You can activate Shrink as

part of another action (the ability is now an enabler for you instead of an action). While the one-minute duration of Shrink is active, on your turn you can change size once before taking an action and once after taking an action. For example, on your turn you could change to small size, make an attack, and then return to your normal size, or you could change to your normal size, use your action to move a short distance, and then return to small size. Enabler. 1 Short Teleportation (4+ Intellect

points): You instantly teleport to any location within a short distance that you can see. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to increase your range, teleport to a location you can’t see, or bring other people with you. Each additional short distance costs one level of Effort. Teleporting to a destination you can’t see costs one level of Effort. Each additional target brought with you costs one level of Effort (you must touch any additional targets). These levels of Effort are counted separately, so teleporting an additional short distance away to a location you can’t see with one passenger costs a total of three levels of Effort. Action.

1 Shrink (1+ Might points): You (and your

clothing or suit) become much smaller than your normal size. You become 6 inches (15 cm) tall and stay that way for about a minute. During this time, you add 4 points to your Speed Pool and add +2 to your Speed Edge. While you are smaller than normal, your Speed defense rolls are eased, your movement speed is one-tenth normal, and your attacks inflict half the normal amount of damage (divide the total damage in half after all bonuses, Effort, and other damage modifiers). You can return to your normal size as part of another action. When the effects of Shrink end, your Speed Edge, movement speed, and damage return to normal, and you subtract a number of points from your Speed Pool equal to the number you gained (if this brings the Pool to 0, subtract the overflow first from your Might Pool and then, if necessary, from your Intellect Pool). Each additional time you use Shrink before your next ten-hour recovery roll, you must apply an additional level of Effort (one level of Effort for the second use, two levels of Effort for the third use, and so on). Action to initiate. 1 Shrink Others: You can use Shrink on

other willing creatures within an immediate distance. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to affect more targets; each level of Effort affects one additional target. Unless these creatures have an ability to change their size, they remain small until the one-minute duration of Shrink ends for them. Enabler.

The increased Effort cost for repeat uses of Shrink between ten-hour recovery rolls only applies to new activations of Shrink, not to multiple size changes within one use of Shrink enabled by Quick Switch.

If you already have Short Teleportation when you select Medium Teleportation (page 53) or Teleportation, you may replace Short Teleportation with another tier 4 type ability.

Teleportation, page 190

1 Small Flight (3+ Intellect points): For the

next hour, when using Shrink, you can fly through the air. You might accomplish this flight by growing wings from your body, extending wings from your suit, calling a tiny creature to carry you, or “surfing” air currents. When flying, you can move up to a short distance as part of another action or a long distance if all you do on your turn is move. Action to initiate.

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choose to shrink down to about half an inch (1 cm) high, and you add 3 more temporary points to your Speed Pool. Enabler. Copy Power, page 51 If you want to make it more difficult for someone to take back their stolen power, become skilled in the Steal Power ability, or put a power shift in power for it. Shrink, page 55 In campaigns where characters can travel to parallel dimensions, using Tiny to shrink to one-thousandth of your normal height may be a means of doing so.

1 Steal Power: When you use Copy Power

to copy an ability, the creature you copied it from loses access to that ability for about a minute. While you have their ability, any attempt by the creature to use their ability requires them to succeed at a task (Might, Speed, or Intellect, as appropriate to the stolen ability) opposed by your eased Intellect task. If they succeed, they regain the use of their ability and you lose it. Enabler. 1 Teleportation Burst (3 Intellect points):

You rapidly teleport multiple times in an immediate area, confusing your opponents and allowing you to make an additional melee attack this round. You can use this ability once per round. Enabler. 1 Teleportive Wound (7+ Intellect points):

Power Stunt, page 58

Free level of Effort, page 209 Practiced, page 207

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as part of another action. It is crude and can have no moving parts, so you can make a sword, a shield, a short ladder, and so on. The object has the approximate mass of the real object and is level 2. Action.

You touch a creature and, if your attack succeeds, you teleport away (up to your normal maximum teleportation distance) with a significant portion of their body. If the target is level 2 or lower, it dies. If the target is level 3 or higher, it takes 6 points of damage and is stunned on its next action. If the target is a PC of any tier, they move down one step on the damage track. In addition to the normal options for using Effort, you can choose to use Effort to affect a more powerful target (one level of Effort means a target of up to level 3 dies or a target of level 4 or higher takes damage and is stunned, and so on). Action. 1 Temporary Light (2 Intellect points):

You create an object of solid light in any shape you can imagine that is your size or smaller, and it persists for about a minute (or longer, if you concentrate on it after that time). The object appears in an area adjacent to you, but afterward you can move it up to a short distance each round

1 Throw Enchanted Weapon: You can

throw your enchanted weapon up to short range as a light ranged weapon. Whether it hits or misses, it immediately flies back to your hands, and you can automatically catch it or allow it to land at your feet. Enabler. 1 Tiny: When you use Shrink, you can

choose to shrink down to about one-sixteenth of an inch (.2 cm). When you do, you add 5 more temporary points to your Speed Pool (plus any from Smaller), and because your attacks are concentrated into a very small area, you deal an additional 2 points of damage. For each level of Effort you apply to shrink even more, you become one-tenth as tall (one one-hundredth for two levels of Effort, one one-thousandth for three, and so on) and you add 1 more point to your Speed Pool. Enabler. 1 War Flesh: You can instantly transform

your hands and feet into claws, and your human teeth into fangs, or revert to your normal human appearance. When you make attacks with your claws or fangs, they count as medium weapons instead of light weapons. Enabler. 1 Wildcard Powers: You have a gift with

using copied powers in unusual ways. Whenever you try a power stunt and use a level of Effort on the special roll to modify the ability, you get a free level of Effort on that roll. Enabler. 1 Wing Weapons: You can use your wings

to make melee attacks (even when flying), leaving your hands and feet free. Your wings are medium bashing or bladed weapons (your choice). You are practiced with this attack. Enabler.

3 CHAP TER

d e r e w o p r e p u S

Rules

T

his chapter provides GM advice and additional rules for making superhero games feel more “super.” It’s meant for GMs, but some aspects (such as power shifts, power stunts, and parameters for impossible tasks) will go more smoothly during games if the players understand how they work.

POWER SHIFTS Power shifts are an optional rule in the Cypher System Rulebook that represent many of the exceptional things that superheroes can do, like throwing cars, blasting through brick walls, leaping onto speeding trains, and cobbling together interdimensional gateway devices in a few hours. A typical superhero PC gets five power shifts. Power shifts are like permanent free levels of Effort that are always active. They don’t count toward a character’s maximum Effort use (nor do they count as skills or assets). They simply ease tasks that fall into specific categories, which include (but are not necessarily limited to) the following. Accuracy: All attack rolls. Dexterity: Movement, acrobatics, initiative, and Speed defense. Flight: The character can fly a short distance each round; each additional shift increases this speed (whether the flight comes from a power shift or a character ability) by one range category (long for two shifts, very long for three shifts). Healing: One extra (one-action) recovery roll per day.

Increased Range: Increases the range of one ability or attack. A touch-range ability (such as Shock) increases to short range, a short-range ability increases to long range, and a long-range ability increases to very long range. Intelligence: Intellect defense rolls and all knowledge, science, and crafting tasks. Power: Effects of one specific character ability, including damage for that ability (+3 points) if appropriate, but not attack rolls with that ability. Prodigy: Give up a lower-tier ability to get a higher-tier ability (see the Prodigy Power Shifts box on page 58). Resilience: Might defense rolls and Armor (+1). Savant: Two specific skills (other than attacks, defenses, or a special ability), such as history, perception, or persuasion. Single Attack: Attack rolls and damage (+3 points) for one specific kind of attack, such as pistols, kicks, or Thrust. Strength: All tasks involving strength, including jumping and dealing damage with melee or thrown attacks (+3 points), but not attack rolls. For power shifts that affect tasks, each shift eases the task. Applying two shifts eases the task by two steps, and applying three shifts eases the task by three steps. A character assigns their five power shifts as desired, but most characters should not be allowed to assign more than three to any one category. Once the shifts are assigned, they should not change (however, researching an experimental

Using the increased range power shift on a melee attack like Thrust probably means the character throws a suitable weapon or can extend their weapon or limb to reach farther than normal. When in doubt, the GM should always be generous with superhero PCs, particularly if it’s less a question of game balance and more a question of flavor. If a character can mystically summon their pegasus mount and they want to summon it in midair just as they leap off the roof of a building, that should just work. There’s no harm in creating a cool scene that would look great on a comic book page or in a movie. For your convenience, this book includes the descriptions of power shifts from the Cypher System Rulebook so all of these options are listed in one place.

Power shifts, page 292 Shock, page 183 Thrust, page 191

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Fleet of Foot, page 141 Graceful, page 46 Explorer, page 27 Fights With Panache, page 68

Short Teleportation, page 55

Instead of choosing prodigy to gain a higher-tier ability, you might see if the GM can create a limited, low-tier version of the ability you want.

Character arcs, page 238 Uncover a Secret, page 250

Some power boost cyphers (page 157) allow characters to modify their abilities in ways similar to power stunts.

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Some superhero character concepts are about breaking the normal power level for a hero. In most cases, you can do this using power shifts. For example, if you want your strong hero to be really strong, put one or more power shifts into strength. If you want your archer character to be really good at shooting arrows, put a power shift into single attack (bows). If you want your speedster hero to be really fast, put a power shift into power (Fleet of Foot). And so on. But what if you want your character to be a swashbuckling teleporter who blinks all over the battlefield? There’s no low-tier teleportation ability, so you can’t be a teleporter as a tier 1 character, and the character concept isn’t nearly as fun if you have to wait until tier 4 before you can learn a teleportation ability (like Short Teleportation). This is where you can (with the GM’s approval) use a power shift for the prodigy option. Prodigy lets you give up one of your lower-tier abilities for a higher-tier ability that matches your character concept. For example, if your swashbuckling teleporter is a Graceful Explorer who Fights With Panache, you could give up one of your tier 1 Explorer abilities (so you’d only have three instead of four) or give up your tier 1 focus ability, Fights With Panache, and instead select the tier 4 ability Short Teleportation. Choosing prodigy as a power shift is an interesting trade-off for your character; you end up with a powerful ability that you couldn’t get otherwise, but at the cost of a power shift (which the other characters are probably using to add to their skills, damage, or defenses). Keep in mind that higher-tier abilities tend to cost more Pool points (especially because your Edge as a low-tier character is less than that of a higher-tier character), so you’ll weaken yourself if you use that ability often—which might be a good reason to allocate more points to that stat Pool, or assign a power shift to healing so you have more opportunities per day to recover Pool points. Theoretically, you could put two power shifts in prodigy for the same ability, allowing you to select a high-tier ability. However, there are two reasons not to do this. First, those high-tier abilities usually have even higher costs, which limits how often you can use them. Second, if you start out with the best version of that ability, there’s no room to grow. It’s fun when your character impresses other superheroes by improving an ability, and it’s really handy when your nemesis supervillain underestimates you based on your old limitations. So unless the GM wants every superhero PC to start with one top-tier ability, give yourself room to grow and use prodigy only to get a mid-tier ability.

procedure to change a character’s power shifts could be the culmination of a character arc such as Uncover a Secret).

GAINING MORE POWER SHIFTS Some GMs will want to allow PCs to increase their power shifts. Having a character spend 10 XP to do so would probably be appropriate. Other GMs will want to run superhero games with PCs of greater or lesser power (cosmic-level heroes or street-level heroes, perhaps). In such cases, the GM should grant the PCs more or fewer power shifts at the game’s start.

POWER STUNTS A power stunt is pushing a superpower beyond its normal limits or using it to do something it normally can’t do. Examples: • A lightning-blaster hero shooting their electricity farther than normal • A fire-creating hero absorbing fire from a burning building • A telepathic hero communicating with or understanding a machine • A teleporter hero traveling to another dimension • An illusionist hero negating an opponent’s invisibility

Superpowered Rules

The Cypher System Rulebook explains modifying abilities on the fly, describing a method of altering the range, area, or other aspects of an Intellect-based ability by spending more Intellect points. In a superhero game, these modifications aren’t limited to Intellect-based abilities—it’s reasonable that a strong hero could affect a larger area with Golem Stomp or an agile hero could disarm more than one opponent using Advantage to Disadvantage. The cost for making these changes works just like modifying an Intellect-based ability. The additional cost uses the same Pool as the ability’s normal cost; if an ability doesn’t have a cost, the GM should choose an appropriate ability for the points to come from. • Increasing range costs 1 Pool point per range step increased (immediate to short, short to long, long to very long). • Increasing duration costs 1 Pool point for one step (one minute to ten minutes, ten minutes to an hour). Durations cannot be increased more than one step in this way. Abilities that last for

only an action or a round (such as an Onslaught attack) cannot have their duration increased. Modifying the area or other aspects of an ability is more difficult. Instead of increasing the Pool point cost, the character decides how they want to modify their ability, and the GM sets a difficulty of the task to successfully modify it, according to the following guidelines: Difficult (4): Something within the spirit and general idea of the ability, using a selfonly ability on another character, or using a single-target ability in a weakened form on two targets. Examples: Using a self-only ability like Hover to give another creature the power to fly. Using Teleportation to go to another dimension instead of somewhere in the same dimension. Splitting Frost Touch or Onslaught into hindered attacks against two opponents. Formidable (7): Something similar to the description or intent of the ability, but changing its nature, or having a

Modifying abilities on the fly, page 419 Golem Stomp, page 145 Advantage to Disadvantage, page 109 Onslaught, page 167 Hover, page 149 Teleportation, page 190 Frost Touch, page 144 Abilities that don’t have a Pool cost, like Eyes Adjusted, can be modified as well. If modifying the range or duration, the GM decides what Pool the point cost is paid from. However, most abilities like this don’t have ranges or durations, so modifying them requires a difficult, formidable, or impossible task roll.

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Power boost cyphers, page 157

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single-target ability affect an area. Examples: Using Hover to make an opponent crash into the ceiling. Using Shroud of Flame to absorb fire. Using Telepathic to talk to a machine or Machine Telepathy to talk to a living person. Using Minor Illusion to reveal an invisible opponent in the area. Using Frost Touch or Onslaught as a hindered attack against everything in an immediate area. Impossible (10): An effect that has nothing to do with the ability’s description or intent. Examples: Using Hover to blast an opponent with fire. Using Foil Danger to copy an opponent’s attack. Using an attack like Thunder Beam to heal someone. Of course, if the altered ability is an attack, the hero still needs to make a successful attack roll against their target— just because the character found a way to use Hover as an attack doesn’t mean the attack automatically hits. The attack task for the altered ability uses the normal difficulty for attacking that target. For example, if Hammermind wants to split her Onslaught so she can attack two level 2 robots, first she has to succeed at the difficulty 4 task to split the attack, then she can make the two (hindered) level 2 attack rolls against the robots. Just like in any aspect of the game, other factors might ease or hinder the hero’s attempt to perform the stunt. For example, if the hero Firelash is trying a stunt to use his Shroud of Flame to absorb a fire attack from his evil sister Swordblaze, the GM might decide that the similarities in their flame powers mean that Firelash’s attempt is eased. But if the illusionist hero Hologrim is trying a power stunt to reveal where his invisible archenemy Death Ghost is hiding, the GM might feel that the villain’s magical invisibility is especially difficult for Hologrim’s technology-based illusions to counter, so the hero’s task is hindered. The GM can also introduce power boost cyphers that ease the power stunt task, or present the heroes with temporary effects that ease

or hinder power stunt tasks, like a virus that erratically amplifies mutant genes, or a burst of energy from an alien artifact that reacts with a robot hero’s power core. If a hero tries a particular stunt in more than one session, the GM doesn’t need to give the task the same difficulty every time; the circumstances of each attempt are never quite the same. Perhaps this supervillain’s fire is a little hotter or cooler than the one the hero tried to absorb last time. Or the spaces between the dimensions are thinner or thicker right now, making it harder to teleport between them. The position of two opponents or the shape of a room might be different than the last time the hero tried splitting an attack power across multiple targets. In other words, the GM doesn’t have to remember that the last time the hero tried this stunt it was difficulty 7, so it has to be difficulty 7 this time; just look at the current circumstances and make a decision based on that. In fact, this is part of the reason why the difficulties are three levels apart; the GM is more likely to be consistent at rating something as difficult, formidable, or impossible than deciding whether it’s a level 6 or level 7 task.

PERMANENT POWER STUNTS Once a character has successfully performed the same difficult, formidable, or impossible power stunt a few times, they might want to make it a permanent part of their repertoire of abilities. By spending 2 XP, the character gains the ability to perform that power stunt whenever they want, with no need for a power stunt task. The GM decides how many times the character has to get the stunt right before they can spend XP to learn it. Three successful attempts over at least three separate sessions is a reasonable guideline, plus some downtime between game sessions to represent mastering this variant. For example, the hero Hammermind has used her Onslaught-splitting stunt on

Superpowered Rules several missions, and her player decides she’ll spend time practicing or training until she’s figured out how to do that stunt without failing. By spending 2 XP, she modifies her Onslaught ability so she has the option of using it to make two hindered attacks instead of one normal attack. Learning a power stunt does not count as a step in character advancement. Learning how to do a formidable or impossible power stunt might be the reason to take a character arc like New Discovery, Transformation, or Uncover a Secret.

REALLY IMPOSSIBLE TASKS The Cypher System Rulebook gives a few examples of how, in the superhero genre, having power shifts means that a difficulty 10 task is not impossible. Superheroes deal with planetary threats like giant robots, multidimensional sorcerers, and world-sized monsters, and for this sort of campaign, difficulties up to 15 are possible. This section presents more details and examples of tasks, threats, and creatures of difficulty 11 to 15.

Character advancement, page 240 Character arcs, page 238

FEATS OF STRENGTH Use the following table to estimate the difficulty of various incredible feats of physical strength. Difficulty

Lifting Task

4

Lift a 150-pound (68 kg) object

9

Lift a 400-pound (180 kg) object

10

Lift a 1-ton (1 tonne) car or traffic copter

11

Lift a 5-ton (4.5 tonne) ambulance, private jet, elephant, or Tyrannosaurus rex

12

Lift a 10-ton (9 tonne) school bus, combat helicopter, triceratops, or 5-foot boulder

13

Lift a 20-ton (18 tonne) fire truck, mobile home, fighter jet, Apatosaurus, or light military tank

14

Lift a 40-ton (36 tonne) humpback whale or loaded tractor-trailer

15

Lift an 80-ton (72 tonne) space shuttle, single-story house, passenger train car, or military tank

Task Circumstances

Difficulty

Lifting the object as high as the character can reach

+0

Lifting the object only partway off the ground

–1

Asset (lever, jack, etc.)

–1 or –2

Help from another character (asset)

–1 or –2

Large character (double human size)

–1*

Carrying an object an immediate distance

+0

Carrying an object a short distance

+1

Pushing or pulling (not lifting) an object an immediate distance

–1

Pushing or pulling (not lifting) an object a short distance

+0

Pushed or pulled object can roll or slide very easily

–1

Pushed or pulled object is buoyant and moving through water

–1

* Each additional doubling of the character’s size eases the task by another step.

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Move Mountains, page 164

For example, the superhero Crystalia needs to get an injured 10-ton triceratops named Spike to a docked barge 50 feet (15 m) away so he can be transported to a dinosaur veterinarian. She doesn’t want to drag him and risk injuring him more, so Crystalia decides to lift him, which is usually a difficulty 12 task. She doesn’t need to lift him above her head, only keep him a little bit off the ground (easing the task), so that’s difficulty 11. She’s in a hurry, so she wants to move him the entire short distance in one action, which hinders the task to difficulty 12. If instead of a triceratops she was trying to move a 10ton school bus a short distance (same base difficulty of 12), she could push it instead of lifting it (easing the task), and the bus could roll (easing the task), so it would require only one difficulty 10 task to succeed. If it were a 10-ton boulder blocking a road, she could just push it an immediate distance (easing the task), sliding it off the smooth

road (easing the task), which would only be a difficulty 10 task. Some character abilities are able to move heavy things, often more easily than brute physical strength can. If a superhero wants to push the limits of what those abilities can do, the GM can compare the baseline effects of those abilities to the Feats of Strength table to determine the comparable difficulty of the task, and modify the character’s roll to succeed. For example, Move Mountains lets a character push up to 10 tons (9 tonnes) up to 50 feet (15 m), which is basically like a strong hero pushing a 10-ton object a short distance, which is difficulty 12. If a character wants to use that ability to push an ambulance a short distance down a road, the GM can check the table and see that a strong hero trying that using muscles would face a difficulty 10 task (base difficulty 11 for a 5-ton

FEATS OF SPEED Power shifts in dexterity ease running tasks.

A character can move a short distance (50 feet [15 m]) as their entire action as a routine task (difficulty 0, no roll needed). This is basically a jog or a hustle, faster than a walk but not an all-out run. A character can try to run a long distance (100 feet [30 m]) as their entire action, but they must succeed at a difficulty 4 Speed task to complete the movement; failure means they trip, stumble, slip, or fall down at some point during the move and stop. Of course, superheroes aren’t normal people—they’re exceptional, and some can run as fast as Olympic athletes, or much faster. For a character trying to run more than a long distance as their entire action, use the following table to determine the difficulty for the task. Failing this roll is just like failing the basic running roll described above. Difficulty

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Running Distance

Notes

6

200 feet (60 m)

19 mph (30 kph)

8

250 feet (76 m)

24 mph (39 kph); bear, Olympic sprinter

9

340 feet (104 m)

33 mph (53 kph); cat, coyote, greyhound

10

400 feet (120 m)

49 mph (79 kph); horse, tiger

11

700 feet (210 m)

68 mph (110 kph); cheetah

12

1,400 feet (430 m)

136 mph (220 kph)

13

2,800 feet (850 m)

273 mph (440 kph)

14

1 mile (1.5 km)

545 mph (880 kph); Boeing 747

15

2 miles (3 km)

1,600 mph (2,575 kph); Mach 2

Superpowered Rules

ambulance, eased because it rolls easily, hindered for moving it a short distance, eased because it can roll). Because Move Mountains can handle a difficulty 12 task (which is harder than a difficulty 10 task), the GM decides that the character’s attempt is eased by two steps because the ability is two steps “stronger” than the task they’re attempting.

TREMENDOUS LEAPS Some—but not all—strong superheroes can easily leap dozens or hundreds of feet, well beyond what’s possible with the jumping rules (running a short distance and jumping 30 feet [9 m] is a difficulty 10 task). Characters who want to jump huge distances like that should take the Amazing Leap ability, allowing them to jump a long distance or more. All characters with at least one power shift in strength get the benefit of a free level of Effort for each strength shift. This effectively increases their standing

jump distance by 1 foot (30 cm) per shift and their running jump distance by 2 feet (60 cm) per shift, which is impressive compared to a normal person, but not phenomenal. To make superhero character jumps a bit more exciting, the GM can implement an optional rule in which strength shifts count double for free levels of Effort when jumping. For example, a character with five strength shifts would get ten free levels of Effort on jump tasks instead of five. This allows them to do a 15-foot (4.5 m) standing jump as a difficulty 1 task (base difficulty 11, eased by 5 × 2 steps) and a 40-foot (12 m) running jump as a difficulty 5 task (base difficulty 15, eased by 5 × 2 steps), which seems more appropriate for a character strong enough to lift a car over their head.

Jumping, page 228 Free level of Effort, page 209 Amazing Leap, page 48

POWERFUL CREATURES Superheroes don’t just stop bank robbers and fight supervillains—sometimes they face giant robots, alien space monsters, or

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Modification GM intrusions: The device gains a high depletion rate, needs to be recharged after each use, or develops a side effect such as overheating (inflicting damage to the user) or creating a thunderous noise.

Demigod, page 321

so-called gods. GMs can use the following examples to estimate the level and challenges for such threats. Level

Example

9

Demigod

10

Kaiju 300 feet (90 m) tall

11

Robot 1,000 feet (300 m) tall

12

Vampire blood god

13

Legendary monster*

14

Archangel, demon prince, typical god or goddess**, multidimensional sorcerer

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Moon-sized space monster, pantheon leader***

Kaiju, page 338 Innovator, page 154 Jury Rig, page 156 Modify Artifact Power, page 163 Modify Device, page 164 Quick Work, page 174

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* A primordial monster (such as Echidna or Typhon) or a powerful creature associated with the end of the world (such as Jörmungandr or Fenris). ** A powerful, perhaps immortal entity (such as Ares or Loki) that has been worshipped or feared as a god by humans or similar creatures. *** A god or goddess (such as Odin or Zeus) who is the ruler of a group of deities.

MODIFYING HIGH-TECH DEVICES It’s common for technically savvy superheroes to fiddle with machines to make them work better or do something different. Sometimes the object in question is their own gear, but it’s just as likely to be something they took from a defeated supervillain or found on an alien spaceship. A character who expects to modify many devices should consider learning abilities such as Innovator, Jury-Rig, Modify Artifact Power, Modify Device, and Quick Work. A character who only wants to dabble in this sort of activity can do so, but it takes longer and is less efficient. Small modifications are things like changing a device’s target, range, or duration. “Small” is subjective and up to the GM, but generally, it means adding another target (although for some high-level devices, adding a target isn’t a small change), increasing the range by one step (immediate to short, short to long, long to very long), or increasing the duration by one step (one minute to one hour, one hour to ten hours). The task difficulty for making a small modification is generally

Superpowered Rules equal to the device’s level minus 1, which also determines how much time it takes to complete the modifications. For example, if the superhero Dynamo wants to modify a level 6 alien laser weapon’s range from immediate to short, that’s a level 5 task and takes about a week. Big changes are modifying a laser rifle to shoot cold or electricity, turning a communication device into a telepathic shield, or turning a jetpack into a force field device. These modifications are like repairs; they use the device’s level for the difficulty and creation time, but take half as long as the time listed. For example, if Dynamo decides to modify the level 6 laser weapon so it fires bolts of electricity, that’s a level 6 task and takes half a month (two weeks). A character modifying their own device eases the task. This applies whether the character built the device themselves or they’ve been repairing and tinkering with it long enough that they fully understand its workings.

Regardless of whether the change is big or small, failing the modification task means the character wastes the full amount of time spent attempting the modification, and uses up materials equal to the device’s level minus 2, but they can try again. If they fail with a roll of a natural 1, it’s likely that the free GM intrusion means the device is ruined (but perhaps could be salvaged for materials).

FASTER CRAFTING IN A HIGH-TECH SETTING In some superhero campaigns, crafting technology is so advanced that objects are designed virtually, with holograms, or with a mind-machine interface, and they are constructed by advanced 3D printers or clouds of nanobots. Under these conditions, the GM should ease the assessed difficulty to determine the crafting time by three or four steps, with the crafter needing to be present for only about the first quarter of that time and the “helpers” taking care of the rest.

Crafting Difficulty and Time, page 228 Modifying a device is similar to using a power stunt to alter a character ability. If a character wants to make a permanent change to one of their technology-based abilities, the GM should treat that more like a permanent power stunt (page 60)—costing XP—than a modification. Modifying the appearance of an item is just a cosmetic change and should take only a few hours at most for a typical handheld or worn item like a weapon, helmet, or boots. Changing the appearance of a spacesuit or full-body mechanized armor might take eight to twenty hours of work, depending on the extent of the changes.

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Powers

This chapter is full of advice intended primarily for GMs but is spoiler-free, so it’s fine if players want to read it.

W

hen designing a setting for superheroes, there is a wide variety of options for things you might include in it. Weaving together a place where aliens, mutants, wizards, and high tech all intermingle requires a bit of thought. This chapter offers advice and ideas for creating a realistic setting, a comic-book style setting, and a far-future setting, and discusses all the choices involved with each.

CAMPAIGN BUILDING BLOCKS A superhero setting usually has multiple fantastic elements—things that explain the existence of superheroes, supervillains, and other weird events that are common in this genre. This section presents over a dozen of these elements, and prompts you with questions and ideas about how to incorporate them into your superhero campaign. In general, for all of these, it’s easier to decide how one or two of them are part of your campaign, and layer in the others as needed if you want them. For example, you could start the campaign with mutants and advanced technology being the only known sources of superpowers, then later reveal that aliens and magic are also part of the setting. This advice also applies to adding things from within a category. For example, you may decide to have only one alien species that visits Earth, and then later have a second alien species arrive, and the PCs won’t know if the first aliens consider these new arrivals allies, enemies, or a mystery.

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ALIENS Alien species are a staple of the superhero genre, whether they are intelligent civilizations interested in exploration and trade, or hostile powers intent on invasion and exploitation. Aggressive aliens can be smart threats for the PCs, or drop robots or giant monsters into populated areas to gauge how capable Earth is of defending itself. Unless Earth is near a hyperspace nexus or a bunch of wormholes, it’s likely that only one or two alien species are able to reach our planet, whether because our solar system is in an unexplored frontier or is within a section of space controlled by one species. Interesting questions to answer include: Are the aliens similar enough to humans that they can pass as us? Do they have unusual atmospheric or nutritional needs? Are they physically or mentally superior to humans in any way? What’s one kind of technology (such as battle armor, blaster weapons, robots, or cloning) that they’re especially good at? Are they at war with any other alien civilizations? Do they have superpowered individuals? How long have they been visiting Earth? Are they able to crossbreed with humans? If so, is being a human-alien hybrid a possible PC background?

BIZARRE DIMENSIONS Not every dimension (or “plane”) connected to your campaign world has to be a variant of Earth; vastly different laws of physics and inherently hostile matter are just some of the ways these strange

A World With Powers

dimensions can break human expectations. Examples include “hell dimensions” full of demons, prison dimensions that are harder to escape than enter, realities where antimatter rather than our positive matter is the norm, finite environments (demiplanes) that abruptly end or loop or fold upon themselves like Möbius strips or Klein bottles, realms where the time passes at a different rate depending on your location or orientation, and dimensions where “space” has breathable air and planets are only miles apart. What strange dimensions are connected to your campaign world? Are they linked to any PC superpowers, such as the place teleporters move through or the energy source for a character’s attack blast? What creatures are native to these places? Are they aware of Earth, and if so are they hostile toward it? How easy is it for creatures and objects to pass between the dimensions? Are there times or places where the barriers between dimensions are weaker or

nonexistent? Why would a PC want to journey to another dimension, and what would they need to survive there?

COSMIC ENTITIES More powerful than gods, cosmic beings serve mysterious functions for the universe or even the multiverse. This “family” might include sentient personifications of life and death, chaos and order, destiny and entropy, as well as primordial entities that seeded life on countless planets, the embodiment of all psychic energy, and even greater beings who exist only to keep the balance between all of these. Cosmic entities usually don’t have physical bodies unless they need to interact with lesser (usually mortal) beings, and they have an advanced, timeless outlook that humanlike creatures might consider amoral. Unless the PCs in your campaign meddle in forces that can change or threaten the universe itself, they’ll probably never interact with beings of

Some dimensions are so strange that they automatically inflict ambient Might, Speed, or Intellect damage every minute, hour, or day that a non-native creature spends there.

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Claim the Sky In general, it is in poor taste to incorporate characters from someone’s real-world religion into a game setting as false deities.

this power level—but if the campaign goes into space and the characters have to confront or bargain with cosmic powers, they’re sure to have a weird and memorable experience. Which beings of this type have a role in your campaign universe? What PC or NPC actions might draw the attention of these entities? Is there an upcoming cosmic event that will impact Earth or the PCs? As the entities are too powerful to confront directly, what challenges or arrangements can the PCs undertake to thwart or satisfy them?

GODS Gods in a superhero setting are usually very powerful immortals who have intervened at various points in human history, often by claiming to be actual deities who created or brought order to the world and its species, and usually grouped into pantheons based on shared (human) religion or tradition. Typical examples are the Olympian gods of ancient Greece (Zeus, Athena, Herakles, and so on) and the Norse or Asgardian gods of Scandinavia (Odin, Frigg, Thor, and so on). These gods may have fought and schemed to protect and manipulate humans for various reasons, with repercussions of these actions carrying forward to the modern day. Are there any gods active in your campaign? Where do they live—another dimension, another planet, or a hidden place on the Earth? Have they been idle between their past activities and the modern era of superheroes? What sorts of interactions do they have with members of their own pantheon and of other pantheons? What prevents them from taking overt actions on Earth? Do the stories or myths of these gods contain seeds of historical events (such as battles against invading aliens remembered as wars against demons or monsters)? Do the gods or their mythical heroes have any direct connection to modern superheroes (such as ancestry or investiture of power)? What relationship do the gods have with cosmic entities?

HEROES OF THE PAST Superpowers in your campaign might be a very recent thing, perhaps stemming from a specific event like a mysterious meteor shower or a gene-mutating virus, or they may have been around for decades (or longer), with some contemporary heroes being the children or grandchildren of previous greats. How long have superpowers been a thing in your world? If they’re not new, did superhumans take

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A World With Powers “But afterwards there occurred violent earthquakes and floods; and in a single day and night of misfortune all your warlike men in a body sank into the earth, and the island of Atlantis in like manner disappeared in the depths of the sea.” -Plato

part in major historical events (such as World War II)? Did the public know about them, or were they a well-kept secret (perhaps only revealed after they died)? Are there any significant historical figures in your campaign who secretly had superpowers? Can contemporary people (superhuman or otherwise) trace their ancestry back to these individuals, and is that a mark of pride or shame based on their past actions? Are any oldergeneration superpowered individuals still active in the world? Did their powers get stronger due to greater experience and practice, are they weakening like other human abilities do over time, or is the person’s control getting worse as their power grows stronger?

IMMORTALS Sometimes all it takes to be an interesting character in a story is to never die. Imagine a charismatic immortal changing their identity every generation and reinventing their cult time and again, a scientist immortal saving knowledge from past centuries as the world slips in and out of ignorance, or a bloodthirsty immortal honing their techniques for assassination under countless guises—all of them wielding phenomenal influence with one subtle superpower. What are the immortal’s goals and ambitions? Do various immortals know of each other? Do they have friends or family members who know of (or share) their secret? Do they have old grudges or rivalries? How do they feel about superheroes and supervillains in general?

How does their immortality work— phenomenal regeneration, psychically jumping bodies or feeding on their own descendants, a unique technological or magical item that rejuvenates them, or reincarnation with total awareness of their past lives? If the superhero PCs are immortals, how does that affect their outlook on the world and the actions of supervillains?

LOST CIVILIZATIONS Atlantis, Lemuria, and Mu are three examples of advanced civilizations on Earth that vanished into legends. In many superhero comics, the people of these “lost civilizations” survived whatever cut them off from the rest of the world, adapted to life under their changed circumstances, and from time to time may be ruled by a tyrant with a grudge against the “backward” people living all over the planet. Although some of these lost civilizations are underwater, they may also be tucked away in isolated valleys, on mountaintops, in Antarctica, on the moon, or inside an immense hollow area beneath the Earth’s surface. How did this civilization become lost? In what ways do its people excel compared to contemporary society? Are its citizens still human? Were they ever human at all? How easily can they access the rest of the world? Do they have the means to threaten, attack, or conquer other countries? What sort of interactions can the PCs have with its citizens or technology?

For a similar concept that doesn’t require a powerful human civilization, see Prehistoric Lands, page 70.

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Claim the Sky MAGIC In a superhero setting, magic is often just another kind of power source. An inventor, mutant, and sorcerer might all have the ability to fly and shoot bolts of fire, and the exact mechanism for it doesn’t really matter as far as regular people (and most other superheroes) are concerned. Is magic a lost art, or is it just overshadowed by more recent discoveries? How does a person learn magic? Does it need to be taught, or is practice and instinct enough? Are there different branches, traditions, orders, or paths of magic, and are there rivalries between them? Does magic corrupt its user or otherwise have some sort of significant cost? How do magic and other powers interact—for example, can someone be both a mutant and a sorcerer, and do technology and spells interfere with each other? Are there certain things that magic can’t do, like control minds or revive the dead? Are there things that only magic can do, like reach a specific dimension or break a curse? Is there another aspect of your setting that strongly relates to magic, like a specific alien species or a pantheon of gods? Does the public know that real magic exists? Is there a stigma associated with using magic, or opposition from religious groups?

MUTANTS Mutation is how evolution works, and the idea of a mutant gene or genes unlocking superhuman abilities is a core part of most superhero stories. Is the mutant gene dominant or recessive? Are there side effects from having the gene? Can a latent mutant gene be activated? Can an active one be suppressed? Do most mutant powers manifest at birth, at puberty, or in response to a specific kind of stimulus? Can a normal person’s DNA be rewritten so they gain mutations? Are specific powers hereditary, or is what you get a surprise for each generation? Is the gene more or less common for a certain gender or from

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a specific part of the world? Are there mutant plants and animals with powers? Do alien species have superpowered mutants? Can mutants be detected with technology, such as blood tests or medical scanners? Is there prejudice against mutants? Is there a city, state, or country that provides sanctuary for mutants?

PARALLEL EARTHS Parallel Earths are near-identical copies of Earth, usually with one significant change from the “real” version. Examples are Earths where technology stopped at 1950s levels, everyone is a different gender, everyone is a superhero, there was a zombie outbreak or a nuclear war, a major military conflict ended a different way, good people are evil and vice versa (often called a “mirror universe”), physicality is literally mirrored (left-handed people are right-handed), or everyone is an anthropomorphic animal. Traveling to one of these Earths gives the GM and PCs the opportunity to explore “what if” scenarios, as well as let players play alternative versions of their characters (with different personalities, powers, and so on). How many parallel Earths are there (a finite number or an infinite multitude)? How easy is it to travel between them? How common is the knowledge that multiple worlds exist? Are there worlds that have been lost, forgotten, or sealed off? Do PCs making major changes in one world affect the others? Are there counterparts to (or doppelgangers of) each PC in the destination world? Is there an entity or organization that monitors the alternates and tries to maintain balance between them?

PREHISTORIC LANDS Prehistoric lands (or “lost worlds”) are regions where long-extinct creatures such as dinosaurs roam freely as they did millions of years ago. Typically these are an uncharted island, a lush valley surrounded by impassible mountains, or a similar

A World With Powers isolated area that makes it difficult for the native creatures to escape or for humans to enter. These places might be fantastic zoos or preserves created by aliens, biological experiments created by gods or mad scientists, or merely geographical and evolutionary quirks that allowed ancient species to live on. The land might also be inhabited by pre-humanoids, remnants of ancient human peoples, or something even stranger like devolved lizard-people from a forgotten civilization. What environment does the place have? What animals live there? Do intelligent people live there, and have they ever seen humans (like the PCs) before? Why would the PCs find out about this place or go there?

PSYCHICS Reading thoughts, controlling minds, moving objects without touching them, hearing the voices of the dead, and sensing auras are all types of psychic powers. Although some of these things can be accomplished with magic, mutation, or advanced technology, psychics are able to do them based solely on a rare sensitivity or special training. Does your setting have actual psychics, or are people with these abilities using some other source (such as a mutation or magic)? How powerful are psychics compared to other kinds of heroes? Are psychic powers hindered by technology or skepticism? How do regular people feel about psychics as compared to mutants, aliens, and armored battle suits? Does the government use psychics to help solve crimes? Are there psychic special ops teams in the military?

SMALL WORLDS Shrink a person down to the size of an amoeba, and a regular-sized human seems to be the size of a planet. Shrink

a person to smaller than an atom and . . . things get really strange. The small worlds that shrinking heroes visit might be miniature universes existing between particles of matter in the normal universe, parallel dimensions accessed by changing quantum states through shrinking technology, or variable states of energy expressed as fantastic and impossible physical objects and terrain. Depending on what role you want the quantum realms to have in your campaign, any or all of these explanations might be correct. What is the nature of the quantum realm(s)? Are there long-term physical and mental hazards for being there? How does time flow there compared to time for full-sized people? Can messages be transmitted across these vast differences in scale? What species (or unique creatures) are native to that place? What

“Psychics” as a category is generally significant only in low-powered or realistic superhero campaigns where flashy abilities are rare or nonexistent. In a typical superhero campaign with all sorts of amazing powers, telepathy and other mental talents are no more unusual than flight or turning into a rock monster.

In some ways, a small world is technically a bizarre dimension (page 66).

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creatures (including superheroes and supervillains) can access a quantum realm with their powers, intentionally or accidentally?

SOULS The nature of the human soul is frequently discussed by priests and philosophers, but in a superhero universe (particularly one with supernatural elements such as ghosts and demons) the existence of souls might be a known fact—souls could be detected, counted, stolen, and sold. Are souls a real thing, an essence of a person that can exist outside of their body? Is a ghost a kind of soul? Do some creatures (such as demons) feed on souls, and if so, why? Can souls be used as a power source for magic or technology? How long after a person’s death does a soul retain knowledge of itself? Where do souls go when a person dies? Do animals have something like a soul? Do aliens have souls like humans, or does each alien species have its own kind of soul? Can intelligent robots develop or acquire souls? Does returning from the dead require a connection to a soul, and is the soul diminished in some way by returning?

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Ghosts, werewolves, vampires, fairies, mummies, and more—there are countless stories, movies, television shows, and books to draw upon for inspiration about how these creatures can walk unseen among humans. What kinds of these creatures exist or existed in the world? What sorts of interactions did they have with exceptional humans in the past, either as predators or prey? Are they universally “monsters,” or do they have the potential to be good or evil just like humans do? Are some superhuman characters actually related to these creatures, either as human-passing offshoots or as human-monster hybrids? Are supernatural PCs the black sheep of the family who associate with regular humans, or are they conflicted souls who use their abilities to hunt down their own kind?

SUPER-TECHNOLOGY The modern world has many technological marvels, but it doesn’t have mechanized suits of flying armor, wrist-mounted tasers, arrowheads that turn into nets to capture foes, intelligent androids, jet boots, fully functional prosthetic limbs, or countless other items that are part of various superheroes’ repertoire. Although a particular hero’s powers might work due to a mutation, magic, or a gadget, it’s the third category that has the greatest potential to change the world because it’s something that could potentially be duplicated. What kinds of technology (medical, power supplies, antigravity, and so on) in your campaign are better than what’s commonly available in the real world? Is a character’s super-technology patented? Is it possible for non-superpowered scientists to duplicate or reverse-engineer a character’s proprietary technology? Are there government or criminal agents who want to exploit this technology? Are there safeguards to prevent unauthorized users of a character’s technology? Is

A World With Powers some aspect of this technology licensed for use in toys, medical devices, or other merchandise? If a PC didn’t create the technology they’re using, who did, and who else has access to it?

TIME TRAVEL Time travel in a superhero setting could be a common part of the story (the PCs have a time-traveling vehicle and correct problems in the timeline), limited to a few fixed events (the murder of a politician leads to a dark future where mutants are outlawed and hunted), or anything in between. Is time travel possible in your campaign? How common is it? If PCs have access to time travel, can they set their destination or are they forced to a predetermined point? How do changes in the present affect the future? Is the “present” for the PCs actually the past, and the real present is in the future? If a timeline is changed, will the PCs remember it? Are any PCs from the future or an alternate timeline? For visitors from the future, do they know a lot about their past, or just the most probable events that led to their present? What’s to stop the PCs from trying to go back in time to fix an error, or to the future to find out what they’re supposed to do? Are there any supervillains from the future active in the present? Does the timeline tend to maintain its course (the “pebbles in a river” theory) so that most attempts at changing things don’t have any effect?

DESIGNING YOUR SUPERHERO SETTING In broad strokes, a superhero RPG setting fits into one of three categories: realistic, comic-book style, or far future. This section gives advice for developing a campaign using each of these types.

REALISTIC A realistic superhero setting is much like the real world, but with a few changes. Often in this sort of campaign, superpowers are brand new or were hidden from the public—perhaps even from the PCs themselves. The advantage of a setting like this is that you have a baseline that’s already familiar to you and your players—simply pick a city and a year, and most of the worldbuilding is just an internet search away. Choose one to three campaign building blocks to include in the setting, think about the questions presented for each of them, and come up with answers. Here are some easy examples of starting points for a realistic superhero setting: • A weird storm gave .01 percent of the population superpowers. • Weird devices from an alien spacecraft end up in the hands of the PCs. • An experimental drug unlocks mutant powers in some people. • Gods awaken after a long sleep and give powers to certain individuals. • A group of so-called psychics start experiencing actual telepathic events. • A sudden breakthrough in genetic research creates superhumans. • Superpowered individuals from somewhere else (the future, another planet, a parallel Earth) unexpectedly arrive.

Time travel is weird. It usually doesn’t make sense if you think about it too much. For superhero stories, it doesn’t have to make sense—paradoxes and time loops usually lead to divergent timelines, and disastrous results can be avoided by hopping to a different timeline. GMs should focus on the story, not the science, and let the PCs enjoy the ride.

Campaign building blocks, page 66

Holding back some of the building blocks you’ve chosen keeps the story exciting and full of surprises for the PCs, and gives you more time to decide how those elements fit into the ongoing story. For example, if you want gods and aliens to be the primary

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If you choose your own city or a nearby large city as the setting for your game, you and your players can easily picture where various events happen and what’s near the action (such as a hospital, empty lot, or gas station).

elements in the game, the first few sessions might be about the reemergence of the gods, and only later do you reveal that there’s a secret alien invasion happening. Depending on how the players and the PCs view these godly benefactors, you may decide that the gods are working against the aliens, are on the aliens’ side, or are too busy with their own petty squabbles to care about the aliens at all. You can limit the setting to this handful of changes, or allow it to grow and expand to include other revelations over time. Just as it’s all right to make a setting where powers come only from magic or mutation, it’s also fine if your setting starts out simple and slowly turns into a multifaceted comicbook-style world where anything goes.

COMIC-BOOK STYLE

If the setting has multiple groups of heroes, make sure the PCs get some news coverage about their own wins and losses— they’re the focus of the campaign, after all!

Boundless (part 2 of this book) is a comic-bookstyle superhero setting.

Post-apocalyptic campaigns, page 295

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If you love superhero stories and can’t decide whether to include mutants, time travelers, sorcerers, gods, psychics, powered armor, or whatever else seems fun this month, feel free to throw it all in. In terms of how the players use the game rules, it doesn’t usually matter if the characters’ powers come from technology, magic, a mutant gene, cosmic energy, or something else. A strong hero who wears a magical amulet and another one born on a high-gravity alien world work exactly the same way, and likewise there’s basically no difference between a mutant who can fly and an inventor with a jetpack. Allowing a lot of character options frees the players to create exactly the sort of PC they want to play, whether that’s a swashbuckling mutant, a timetraveling cyborg, a military super-soldier, or a student of the mystic arts. Having a broad base of comic-book elements lets you draw on many different genres when creating NPCs and plots. Mixing and matching also keeps players on their toes—a group of heroes who are used to gadgeteer villains will have some unexpected surprises if suddenly they’re dealing with magical foes or alien

monsters. Depending on how genre-aware the players are, having a wide variety of comic-book elements in the campaign means you can loot your favorite stories for ideas, and the players won’t know. For example, if none of the players read horror comics, use undead supervillains from your favorite comic about a half-vampire superhero. If they’re all mutants, the unexpected arrival of a reality-altering sorcerer will catch them off-guard. If the players aren’t familiar with an indie publisher or an obscure old comic, it’s easy to fill out a supervillain team or a hidden lair with NPCs from those sources. These sorts of tricks show that the world is bigger than whatever the PCs are doing. It doesn’t mean the PCs are unimportant, just that there are other plots and schemes bubbling underneath the surface. Keep in mind that in these sorts of worlds, there are usually multiple groups of superheroes active at the same time, each dealing with local problems and sometimes having to rise up against a global threat. Have the Los Angeles superhero PCs read an article online about what the Philadelphia heroes are up to. Have the Milwaukee superhero PCs see a news story about what the Denver superheroes just did. If multiple super-teams operate in the main city of your campaign, that’s an opportunity for one-session appearances by other players interested in your game, or a big alliance with members of multiple teams (either with additional players, or with the main players controlling a second set of PCs) taking on a challenge that’s too big for one group to handle alone.

FAR FUTURE A far-future superhero setting tends to blend heroes either with advanced science fiction or with post-apocalyptic elements. The Golden 30th Century: In a far-future sci fi superhero setting, hundreds or a thousand years from now, mainstream

A World With Powers team of superheroes might have their own space station or asteroid base, and individual members might all be equipped with unifying technology (such as a space ring).

Earth technology has advanced to the point where flying cars, interplanetary or even interstellar space travel, commerce with alien species, robot/AI citizens, and other features impossible in the modern day are commonplace. This civilization might have proceeded uninterrupted from the 21st century, or perhaps one or more global crises (such as a nuclear war, massive plague, or meteor impact) in the past caused major setbacks and eliminated much of the population and historical records. This future Earth might be a post-scarcity society, with essentially limitless power and resources at the people’s disposal (through renewable energy, mining asteroids for minerals, and so on), and there are few or no local threats that need intervention by superheroes. Instead, people with superpowers focus on planetary and galactic issues, such as warlike alien species, unstable stars endangering research satellites or less-advanced planets, and threats from other dimensions or timelines. As with a comic-book-style campaign, a far-future superhero campaign of this type can include mutants, aliens (especially alien PCs), super-technology, magic, and so on. A

The Age of Horrors: Thematically the opposite of the Golden 30th Century, the Age of Horrors is a future setting where past events have led (at best) to a dystopia or (at worst) to destruction, oppression, and genocide. This setting might only be a generation away from the present (so modern superheroes are aged but still around, and their offspring are the primary characters) or a century or more ahead (so modern superheroes are remembered only as stories, myths, or gods). Examples of this kind of setting include: • Sentient robots have killed or imprisoned all superhumans except for a few surviving holdouts. • A potent supervillain has taken power and enslaved or eliminated most of the regular human population. • A cataclysmic event (nuclear war, zombie outbreak, meteor, or the like) has destroyed civilization, and superpowered survivors protect the few remaining enclaves where people can live and grow food. • Corporations have replaced the government and regular people are used as expendable grist to create power and profit for a small group of elites (who may or may not be superpowered individuals). • A genetic bomb killed most of the population and turned the rest into mutants, who fight for control of the planet.

Space ring, page 158

PCs from a modern superhero setting might time-travel to a future setting for a series of adventures, perhaps with the goal of returning home to ensure or avert a timeline-changing event that causes or prevents that future.

Heroes in this kind of setting must find ways to salvage resources for survival, tear down the oppressive architects of the current power structure, and perhaps send a signal or travel to the past to prevent their horrible world from ever existing. It’s also possible that liberating or

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CHARACTER NAMES Another way to generate interesting names is to randomly pick a word from a dictionary and build a character around that word.

In the early decades of comics, superhero names often had titles that now seem quaint or perhaps a little condescending, like boy, damsel, girl, kid, lad, lady, and lass. If you want your setting to reflect the golden age of comics, or if your setting has a “golden age” of superheroes in its past, feel free to use these titles, especially if the hero names use alliteration, like Bird Boy or Liquid Lass.

Naming superhero characters takes practice, skill, and an awareness of the feel of the superhero genre you’re trying to emulate. Most supers have a name with one or two words, like Tiger, Laser, Red Siren, or Iron Skull. If you’re having trouble thinking up a character name, choose two of the following categories and pick a word from each to come up with some possibilities. Feel free to reject any combinations that don’t fit the tone of your campaign or that sound awkward (like Lizard Dragon and Captain Mask). Odds are you’ll luck into many that are fun and memorable, like Iron Stranger, Laser Wolf, or Baron Phoenix. Animal: It’s common for superhumans to have animal-themed abilities and costumes to match; just pick an interesting animal and decide what powers a superhero with that name would have. Obvious choices for animal names are ant, bat, bear, beetle, cat, crow, eagle, falcon, hawk, lion, lizard, octopus, panther, raven, rhino, scorpion, shark, snake, spider, squirrel, tiger, toad, vulture, wasp, and wolf. Rather than a general name for an animal, the character might use a specific name for an animal of that type, such as cobra, gecko, or jaguar. Color: Colors and other visually descriptive words are a staple of superhero names, leaning heavily on bold choices like black, blue, gold, green, grey, iron, metal, night, red, scarlet, silver, steel, stone, white, and yellow. Energy: It’s a natural fit to name a character with energy powers after that kind of energy, with words like beam, blast, fire, flame, ice, laser, lava, light, lightning,

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molten, power, radioactive, snow, sonic, and thunder. Evocative word: Sometimes a character can build a mood and reputation by using a code name with a word that carries a lot of emotional weight, like death, destroyer, doom, dream, living, omega, quicksilver, shadow, silhouette, stranger, valkyrie, witch, or warlock. Monster: Monsters from stories, myths, and legends are basically evocative words that suggest what powers and abilities the character has. Examples include angel, banshee, beast, chimera, cyclops, demon, devil, dragon, drake, gargoyle, ghost, goblin, gorgon, harpy, hobgoblin, kraken, medusa, minotaur, ogre, phoenix, siren, spectre, sphinx, thing, and wraith. Object: An object or symbol can be a memorable choice for a character name and costume, whether or not it has an obvious connection to the character’s powers. Examples of these words are blade, bolt, dagger, hand, mask, moon, nuke, shield, skull, sky, spear, star, storm, sword, and wing. Role: Similar to a title (see below), it’s common for a character’s name to include a role, such as champion, defender, guardian, hunter, knight, patriot, sentinel, smasher, or soldier. Title: The easiest way to name a superpowered character is to pick one aspect of their powers and add a title, like agent, captain, doctor, admiral, and professor, or “Man” or “Woman” to the end of it, creating basic, obvious names like Captain Lightning, Stone Man, Elastic Woman, or Professor Ultra. Other useful titles for superheroes and supervillains are baron, count, father, mister, and mother.

A World With Powers SUPERHERO VIGILANTES The truth is that having superpowers and a costume doesn’t give a person the legal authority to beat up burglars, bank robbers, and supervillains. Unless they have the approval of the government, superheroes are vigilantes operating outside the law—but then again, so are neighborhood watch groups. Of course, the local neighborhood watch doesn’t generally cause tens of thousands of dollars of damage to public and private property . . . but that’s because they’re not trying to stop supervillains who punch their foes through brick walls, blast things with bolts of fire and antimatter, or dangle buses full of innocent bystanders off a bridge. In other words, the legality of superhero actions is complicated. In a gritty superhero campaign, or one where the existence of superheroes is new or controversial, the PCs should be careful to avoid confrontations with officers of the law and try not to cause too much collateral damage. Flaunting their vigilante status is likely to result in warrants for their arrest, conflicts with law enforcement whenever they’re seen in public (including during battles with supervillains), criticism from the press, civil lawsuits over damage, and the passing of laws to restrict superhuman activity. Smart heroes under these circumstances keep a low profile, wrap up conflicts quickly, restrain their opponents, and leave before the authorities arrive. Superheroes who go out of their way to show that they are responsible citizens, take extraordinary efforts to protect innocent people in the line of fire, perform charitable works, and quickly deal with supervillains causing property damage are likely to have a positive reputation among regular people and the press, and may have a friendly relationship with law enforcement (or at least the equivalent of a superhero 911 number). Responsible superheroes may even be able to get

financial insurance against bodily injury and destruction of vehicles that happen during their heroic actions (the cost of this insurance might be excessive, but wealthy benefactors are likely to step up to support high-profile, popular heroes). Money-savvy heroes could even use a Build or Enterprise character arc to establish a charitable foundation that sponsors these insurance policies, provides a small stipend for low-income heroes, mentors at-risk youths, and connects superheroes with public works projects that could greatly benefit from their superpowers. Of course, a character’s reputation tends to plummet if they are found to have disturbing habits or history, or are caught committing a crime or in a compromising situation. Until the character redeems themselves (perhaps with a Growth, Redemption, or Restoration character arc), they may be wanted by the law, rejected by former fans, and pursued by litigious opportunists.

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DEFEATED VILLAINS Most superheroes get their start dealing with bank robbers, burglars, drug dealers, and other sorts of street criminals—people who, if captured by regular authorities, would be sent to jail, tried for their crimes, and sentenced to prison. Things are a little different when a hero’s foe is a supervillain releasing mind-control drugs into the city water supply or planning terrorist acts against an entire country or the world. These villains have the strength or superpowers to easily break out of prison, are inherently dangerous to others around them (such as a villain who constantly leaks radiation), are aliens that don’t fall under the jurisdiction of human government, or are literal monsters that can’t be kept in a normal prison. In any case, the players should know what their characters are expected to do once they defeat and/or capture the villains. Here are some options for the GM.

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Claim the Sky Bakislavia is a fictional, tiny European nation whose primary exports are apples and paper towels.

Regular Prison. Heroes can turn over a typical human criminal suspect to local law enforcement. This might be a direct handoff, like taking the suspect to an office of the law (such as city police, military police, or federal agents) or waiting until law enforcement representatives arrive at the scene of the crime or where the suspect was detained. If the government doesn’t support costumed vigilante justice, the heroes might instead restrain the suspect with the incriminating evidence (possession of stolen goods, surveillance footage, and so on) and send the authorities an anonymous tip as to where the suspect can be found. Assuming the evidence is compelling enough to incriminate the suspect, they’ll be charged for their crimes and follow the normal routine of a trial or plea bargain, sentencing, and penalties, but in many cases the hero’s involvement ends once the suspect is in law enforcement custody.

International Incidents: An incident with a foreign citizen committing a crime outside of their country (such as a supervillain from Bakislavia blowing up a building in Los Angeles) requires additional scrutiny from local law enforcement because of the potential for the investigation and trial to become an international incident. This is especially true if the suspect has authority or special protections in their home country, such as being a member of the royal family. The heroes might be called upon to testify to clarify the nature and circumstances of the suspect’s crimes so the nuances of the situation are fully understood. Resolving these international entanglements might include transporting the suspect to their home country to be tried for local crimes, or an exchange of convicted prisoners between the two countries, perhaps with the heroes on hand to make sure the detainee doesn’t escape. Once these issues are taken care of, the rest of the government’s actions take place as for normal local criminals. Super Prison: A supervillain who can bend steel and punch through stone won’t stick around long in a prison meant for regular humans. Likewise, someone who can teleport, control minds, or turn into smoke can easily escape conventional confinement. If the government is aware of the existence of individuals with superpowers, there’s certainly some part of it working on a way to contain and eliminate such threats. A benign government might create countermeasures for superhuman abilities, like power-dampening restraints, drugs that suppress mutant genes, or sedating captured supervillains so they don’t have the will or coherence to try to escape. A more ruthless government might design complicated prisons with electrified floors, magnet-proof cells, fireproof doors, and other harsh means that block escape attempts or turn a villain’s powers against them. An evil

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A World With Powers government might simply kill supervillains instead of imprisoning them, or brainwash them into becoming dutiful agents of the state or controllable super-soldiers. If the government isn’t aware of the threat or equipped to handle supervillains in custody, it may fall to a private organization or the heroes themselves to contain their captured foes. This of course brings up various dilemmas. On whose authority can they keep captives indefinitely imprisoned, perhaps even without a trial? What’s the safest place to house them? What are the right protocols for handling an escape attempt or jailbreak? Also, if the villains need to be nearby so the heroes can keep an eye on them, it means the foes are incredibly close to where the heroes meet, work, sleep, and train. Furthermore, these precautions and cells require time, money, support staff, and supplies, which eats into resources the heroes would rather use to stop supervillains who are still on the loose. Interplanetary Incidents: These situations are like international incidents, but even more complex. Earth law probably isn’t equipped to deal with the legal status of extraterrestrials, and alien cultures might not even recognize Earth law or accept that Earthlings are anything more than aggressive animals. For example, if the terrorist supervillain Stormcloud is actually an alien from the planet Korboros, do the people of Earth have the legal authority to detain him? The answer might depend on whether Earth authorities acknowledge the existence of Korboros, the difficulty of interplanetary communication and transportation, or if there are any treaties or other legal arrangements between the two planets. Earth governments might be better off declaring Stormcloud’s crimes to be acts of war, and detaining the alien indefinitely until formal relations with their species are established.

Dangerous Convicts: Detainees that are inherently a threat to other creatures around them pose an even more difficult problem. A radioactive supervillain can’t be kept near other prisoners, and requires additional shielding to protect neighboring inmates and whoever brings them food and cleans their cell. A telepathic robot whose dreams and nightmares cause brain damage to random people has to be kept far from anyone they might affect. A demon that warps the flesh of anyone who looks at it requires unique methods of surveillance to make sure it remains confined. These kinds of situations are interesting challenges for scientist and engineer superheroes, and discovering how to safely contain such convicts could be the resolution of a character arc like Build, Creation, New Discovery, or Uncover a Secret.

Similar to the problems of handling dangerous convicts, superheroes often have to deal with objects that are inherently dangerous, such as antimatter gems, psychic amulets, vampiric acorns, and radioactive alien artifacts. Fortunately, if these things can’t be destroyed, shooting them into space, burying them on the moon, or sealing them under layers of concrete and lead is usually enough to render them safe . . . at least for a few years.

Character arcs, page 238

Monsters: In an ideal world, prison for criminals leads to rehabilitation so they can peacefully reenter society as productive, law-abiding citizens. That path isn’t really an option for a subterranean rock monster with the mentality of a wolverine, a feral dragon the size of a house, or a G-spectrum entity from the Flame Dimension. These creatures might be dangerous beasts, or they may have a strange intelligence so different from that of humans that the two species aren’t able to communicate, but they can’t be allowed to run around loose and harm people. Maybe the heroes can find a way to send them home where they won’t be a threat anymore, or take them to a “monster island” nature preserve where they can live out their lives. But if there is no way to safely confine them, killing them might be the only solution—in which case the heroes better hope that a more powerful creature doesn’t show up later wondering where their spawn, pet, or living power source is.

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uperhero stories have their own feel, their own mood, and their own pacing. While this is true of superheroes in all their forms, it’s particularly true on their home turf, which is comic books. Comics have been around a long time, and thus have established their own storytelling techniques, but it’s worth noting that those techniques have evolved over time. While older comics can have pretty stilted dialog and fairly cliche plots, if you think that all comics are just a lot of fists pounding into faces and wanton destruction, perhaps you should check out some modern comics. Superhero comics can be funny, emotional, and moving, and can portray fantasy, science fiction, or detective stories—and all of that can be in the same title. You can do the same thing with your superhero campaign, effectively switching genres from story to story. If an ancient evil wizard appears on modern-day Earth and summons beings of myth to find a missing mystical amulet, it’s a fantasy story. Once the wizard is defeated, a strange being appears to snatch the amulet away, claiming it’s an alien artifact of great power. The PCs then have to board a faster-than-light starship to chase the thief, who wants to use the amulet to power a space platform from which he and his comrades can launch pirate raids on planets and ships in the surrounding systems. Now the genre is sci fi, but it’s still the same continuing storyline. In many ways, that’s the best part of superhero games. There are no limits

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or boundaries. You can do anything and everything with comic book stories. Most of this chapter assumes that the PCs have supernatural abilities and have decided to use them to help people—that is, perhaps, the most basic take on the concept of a superhero, and it is certainly the norm with comic book superheroes. Think of comic books like the X-Men, Birds of Prey, Astro City, or Black Hammer. If that’s the sort of thing you’re going for, you’ll want to think about the aspects of comic book storytelling, because they can make your campaign feel not just appropriate but unlike the other games you play. There are many aspects of comic book storytelling that can enhance your RPG campaign.

ORIGIN STORIES Every superhero character has an origin story, even if it’s shrouded in mystery. (“I don’t know how I got these powers” is itself an origin story.) Origin stories explain both how a character gained superpowers and why they became a hero. In many cases, those might be two completely different stories. The origin of special powers or abilities should fit with the overall campaign, so players and GMs should work together when developing them. If the campaign setting says that everyone with special abilities was born a mutant, the characters should fit into that and shouldn’t have an origin involving a chemical accident or alien intervention. There’s also the need

Comic Book Storytelling

for a level of verisimilitude. If the campaign is at least moderately grounded in reality or science, a character probably didn’t gain superpowers by being doused in toxic waste spilling out of the back of a truck or by being bitten by a radioactive turtle. There is no right or wrong answer, except that it needs to fit the setting and fit alongside everyone else’s story. Similarly, the story of how one started as a hero needs to fit in with the setting as well. For example, are superheroes rare or common? This factor alone likely guides this portion of the origin story. If, when someone gains powers, they naturally suit up and help people (or seek personal gain), then it’s acceptable to simply say that’s what any given PC did. But if that sort of path is rare or nonexistent, a PC might start with no concept of being a superhero, and certainly with no code name or costume. Instead, they spend their time trying to cope with their new abilities. Consider the aspects that might bring one into the role of hero. Perhaps a

momentous event, a heroic mentor or parent, a role model, or a terrible mistake that the character hopes to atone for turned them into a hero. Maybe they were recruited by an existing hero or team, or even a government agency. Maybe they just want the fame and prestige. Of course, since we’re talking about an RPG, and thus very likely a group of heroes, consider the power of an origin story that ties them together as a team with almost familial connections. Maybe they were all born mutants. Maybe they were all involved in the same archeological expedition to a strange temple in the desert. Maybe they are the few who escaped from a sinister experiment run by an evil corporation. A joint origin does a lot of work explaining not just how the characters got their powers, but why they do what they do, and why they do it together. The thing to discover is: does everyone around the table care about origin stories? At one point in our culture, we needed origin stories. We needed an explanation for how

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Claim the Sky and why someone could fly or lift a bus. Today, superheroes are so ingrained in the culture that we’re fine accepting the fact that a fictional character has supernatural abilities and are ready to move on with the story. Consider the movie The Incredibles. The origin stories of the superhero characters in that film are never mentioned, and even if you’ve seen the movie, it’s possible that you didn’t notice. That doesn’t mean the characters don’t have origins— just that they’re not pertinent to the story being told right now. They aren’t required. Your superhero campaign might be similar. Don’t force players to come up with origin stories if they don’t want them. Or perhaps origins are revealed as the campaign advances and they become relevant to the current story. Origin stories should enhance character development and background. Having no origin story is better than having a silly one that the player put three seconds of thought into. It’s often a decision made at character creation that sticks with the PC for the entirety of the campaign, so it’s worth making sure that everyone involved— players and GM—is happy with the result.

TEAM-UPS One hero is great for storytelling: the lone protector, fighting against evil all around them. However, your game group probably has more than one player, so you’re likely to have more than one character. That means multiple heroes, and more than in any other genre, with superheroes, the more really is the merrier. It’s fun to have superheroes work together because the characters are so dramatically different. If one PC can turn into diamond and pound her way through brick walls, another is an alien shapeshifter, and their mutual friend is a man with a magic amulet that affects gravity, well, where else can you get three characters like that together in one story if not in the superhero genre?

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Team-ups can be temporary. The heroes might all be independent heroes that operate in the same city. They come together when there’s trouble—and there’s always trouble. This setup lends itself well to different players bringing in different heroes all the time, so the team is hardly ever the same as it was last session. At some point, however, even loosely affiliated allies might decide to make things more permanent.

THE TEAM Often—particularly in an RPG—the team-up is a true superhero team. Usually, this means a group of disparate people with disparate abilities, unified by the desire to help people and use their talents to fight against evil and oppression. In your campaign, you can start the first session with the assumption that the group is already a team, or you can make the formation part of an early storyline. A team can be newly formed or it can have existed for a while, with an established reputation and roster of foes (and perhaps allies). Regardless of the age of the team, the first thing the group should probably do is choose a team name—something evocative and exciting, hopefully. Like so many aspects of the game, it needs to be something that everyone will be happy with. Everyone should get a say in the team name. Further, everyone should help determine how the team operates—the goals, the ethos, the mode of operation, and so on. Do they wait to be called upon, or do they go out on patrol? Do they work with the authorities, or are they outlaw heroes living on the lam? Sometimes super-teams have leaders, but that’s not vital and in an RPG often doesn’t work well. Making decisions through a more democratic process is probably a better way to avoid stress or conflict. (Although a team leader and a team outsider who resents the leader makes for good story fodder—just be sure that it’s the characters who butt heads, not the players.)

Comic Book Storytelling THE BASE Many times, a permanent, established team has a base from which to conduct their operations. Bases can range from a room behind a laundromat to a fortress in orbit around Earth. Designing a base can be an enjoyable group activity. If the players really want their characters to have a base, the GM should feel free to be generous in letting them decide what it’s like and what it contains. They can draw up a sketch or map, and detail some of the main rooms (assuming there’s more than one). Ultimately, the base should fit the team and the team’s story. A bunch of ragtag startups should have a rough “starter” base that’s probably small. The protectors of a whole city should have their own massive skyscraper. Outlaw heroes or those without much of a public persona should have a hidden base. Base equipment and facilities should empower the stories you want to create, not make them more difficult. The base computer shouldn’t answer all the PCs’ questions, but it should be equipped to alert them to information needed to undertake an adventure. In other words, if the point of the adventure is to find the villains’ lair, don’t let the base’s computer systems and high-tech sensors locate it. But if the point of the adventure is to rescue a kidnapped scientist from the villains’ lair and the PCs don’t know where it is, well, the technological wizardry in their base should tell them right where they need to go. Heroes with a great base are often wealthy or have a wealthy benefactor. Someone’s got to pay for all their stuff, not to mention what will probably be frequent damage repairs. A great base very likely assumes access to high technology. Alarms and automated defenses, communication and monitoring devices, advanced laboratories and medical facilities, and a training room that can cope with the characters’ powers are all staples of the genre. The base also can be a place to store dangerous retrieved items (the

unstable mystic gem that threatens the universe if touched) or simply trophies, like weapons from defeated foes. It might even have a holding cell for captured villains, although it’s probably best if the PCs don’t turn into full-time jailers. A base might require a staff beyond the PCs. Comic book teams often have a receptionist, a butler, a janitor, and so on. Of course, these duties could be performed by robots, conjured spirits, or whatever fits the team’s oeuvre. Lastly, a base might imply a vehicle, such as a supersonic jet, a hovercraft, or a spaceship for the team to use. Again, this isn’t meant to overpower the characters, but to facilitate adventures. If the heroes are needed in Buenos Aires, they don’t book economy seats on an airline and take their superhero gear through security (and customs!)—they hop on their stealth plane. That way, you can skip the travel part of the story and get right to the action. If the PCs don’t have a suitable vehicle, all (or almost all) of their adventures should be local.

Sample bases, page 102

SECRET IDENTITIES Not all superheroes have secret identities, but for those who do, that aspect of their character is vital to storytelling. There’s a lot of stress that comes from managing two identities—it’s difficult to perform at 100 percent in both, all the time. It’s hard to cover up why you need to leave at a moment’s notice to don your costume and deal with an emergency. On the other hand, if your nemesis knows where you live and who your friends are, that’s quite a liability. The problem with secret identities in an RPG is that, most likely, they are secret from the other players too. And even if they’re not, the PCs’ secret identities probably don’t interact—although it could be an interesting campaign hook if they did. If the heroes were friends in their secret identities as well and perhaps even worked together, maybe as part of a news crew, a sports team, or a group of emergency

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Claim the Sky workers, the game’s action and attention could rest equally on both. Regardless, you don’t want to stress one character’s secret identity life so much that it takes away significantly from the group. A PC might want to start a business in their secret identity, and that might be interesting and provide some story hooks, but if the other players have nothing to do while that player acts in their secret identity, the game very likely won’t work. Sometimes secret identity side stories can be handled away from the game table, through email or texts.

What’s most important about a hero’s secret identity is learning what really matters to the character—which often comes down to who really matters to the character. For characters living double lives, it’s not just about saving people and fighting villains. They’ve got goals and aspirations and relationships to think about too. If a PC is a super-genius scientist in their daily life, the success of that work is important, and putting it in jeopardy raises the stakes for that character. If a hero is married, putting the spouse in danger raises the stakes, but so does completing a mission in time for their anniversary dinner. Consider intermingling secret identities with hero identities. It’s a comic storytelling trope that the more we see the hero’s secret identity, the more it impacts what happens in their heroic endeavors. Their best friend in school is actually a psychotic villain. Their boss at work is behind the growing network of criminals in town. Their love interest is on the airplane that’s been taken over by terrorists. This can seem cliche, and it can be overdone, but it can also cause a lot of drama and allow your stories to exist on two levels at the same time. Characters without secret identities will be recognized wherever they go. They’ll be treated as celebrities or outcasts, depending on what they do. It’s possible that their families or loved ones will be targeted by their enemies. But it’s probably easier to get a bank loan or free drinks in the bar.

NEMESES Sometimes, a hero is defined more by their villain(s) than by their own power or personality. One could argue, for example, that Batman is defined as much by the Joker or the Riddler as he is by anything else—mostly because there’s such a fine line between them. • Normal person (in the sense of having no superpowers)? Check. • Wears a costume and strictly adheres to a theme? Check.

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Comic Book Storytelling • Travels throughout the city on a personal quest? Check. • No hesitation to use violence as well as clever use of intellect? Check. The only difference, really, is that the villains are murderous criminals and the hero tries to stop them. In other words, Batman can be defined by the line that he won’t cross, but that his villains will. A nemesis or archenemy might be a group rather than a single character. Glisten’s nemesis might be the entirety of the sinister Dark Legion, or a superhero team might have a supervillain team as their nemesis. Alternatively, you can flip it around and have a hero team with a single formidable villain as their nemesis. A hero’s nemesis should be difficult to deal with in a straightforward manner. If the hero is an excellent combatant, the villain uses speed to stay out of reach. If the hero is powerful, the nemesis uses trickery and deceit to avoid a direct confrontation. The nemesis should cause aggravation for the hero—each encounter should make the PC (and the player) hate the nemesis just a little more. It’s tempting to make the nemesis the polar opposite of the hero. If the hero has flame powers, the archenemy can create water or cold. And there’s nothing wrong with that. However, since the villain will appear over and over again. encounters may start to feel repetitive. And keep in mind that there’s no requirement that the nemesis must be the opposite of the hero. There’s nothing thematically opposing Spider-Man and the Green Goblin, for example. It’s just as tempting to make the archenemy very similar to the hero. The speedster’s nemesis is also a speedster. This can be fun, but again, it might also become tiresome. A good nemesis will provide a wide variety of challenges. For example, Cobalt’s nemesis, the Scream Queen, might enact an intricate plan to steal valuable jewelry in one story, and in the next she might

hold a contest among assassins and murderers to see who can kill Cobalt in the most ingenious fashion. Sometimes she’s straightforward, sometimes she uses minions, sometimes she tries to trick the hero into doing what she wants, and sometimes she takes him on in direct combat. Every storyline and encounter with her is different and interesting. GMs should consider consulting the players on the creation of their nemeses. Assuming that a nemesis will be around for a long time and encountered on multiple occasions (and if that’s not true, how is this person a nemesis?), it’s important that the players involved have a say in what they’re like. It might even be best to start the campaign with the hero having already encountered their archenemy, which establishes the villain and explains how the PC knows so much about them. One last thing to consider: instead of an archenemy, use an archrival—another hero! Or perhaps a rival superhero team. The two groups might have very different methods and means, or entirely different (or opposing) philosophies. Maybe the archrival kills their foes outright, or maybe they control their minds and reprogram them—whatever the PCs find most abhorrent. The idea is that the rivals might compete with the characters rather than treating them as enemies. The competition might be for public adoration, government sponsorship, or bragging rights about who truly is the strongest, the fastest, or whatever.

Unless it’s intentional that the villain’s code name or identity is a secret, villain code names—and other hero code names— should always be known. Maybe the megalomaniacal villain announces their name when they enter the scene, or you just want to assume the players all know the name, even to the point where you could imagine, in a comic, the villain’s name emblazoned like a logo above them when they arrive. Names are important in comics, and everyone’s superhero or villain name should be said aloud at the table multiple times in a session. Usually with an exclamation point after it.

GUEST STARS AND CROSSOVERS In comics and movies, superheroes constantly pop in and out of each others’ lives. A hero might join another to face a powerful enemy and then disappear just as quickly, their own missions to complete. This makes superhero campaigns among the best choices for groups where one or two players can only show up

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occasionally, or groups with a revolving door of players. The PC team could summon whomever is available when a new crisis arises, and the characters of the players who show up that week are those who heed the call. You can also have players sometimes play one-shot characters in the middle of a campaign. Say that you’ve got three players, and the characters are Miss Mind, the Fury, and Major Destruction. In one story, Miss Mind and the Fury face off against ninjas sent by an old foe looking for revenge, but Major Destruction doesn’t answer their call for backup (because he’s already been captured by the ninjas). That third player then gets to bring in a character they’ve just created, Affinity, who happens by during the attack. Affinity helps the other two heroes and then aids them as they go to the villains’ lair and rescue their kidnapped ally, Major Destruction. At the end of the story, Affinity goes off to do their own thing, but now the hero is out there, part of the ever-growing world, and the characters have just had an adventure with them. Plus, one player got to play a new character for a change of pace. As another option for a really interesting setup, the GM could run two different games set in the same general location (probably the same major city). The two different groups of heroes come together from time to time to join forces in a big crossover. At other times, one character from a group joins the other group for a single adventure as a guest star. Crossovers can also be adventures involving a lot of superhero NPCs in an epic story (the Undermen of Inner Earth are attacking all the major cities, for example). In this kind of story, focus on the PCs, and have them coordinate with NPC heroes. Or have one NPC hero join the PCs for a change of pace.

UNIQUE PACING IDEAS Comic storytelling has its own sort of pacing. It’s like a mix of soap opera and action films, with a little bit of video games thrown in. It’s generally fast-paced, but there’s time between the fights and the chases for some drama and character development. Consider setting up your superhero game the same way.

DIVIDE THE CAMPAIGN INTO ISSUES This may be the most cart-upsetting suggestion in this book, but it’s also probably the one that will really make your game stand out. Start talking about your game not in terms of stories and adventures but in terms of issues. An issue of a comic book is usually about 22 story pages (the other pages have ads, editorials, or other things). In that amount of time, using modern comic pacing, you can get in one or two dialog/conversation scenes, a big fight or other action scene, and probably another smaller, less-significant action scene or perhaps an investigation scene. Older comics were paced even faster, with far more scenes in the same small space. If you think about it, a couple of action scenes and a couple of interaction scenes, either among the PCs or between the PCs and some NPCs, pretty nicely maps to a typical RPG session. So you could consider a session to be a comic book issue. It doesn’t have to work that way, though. Maybe one session is two issues. Or half an issue. Or an issue and a half. The point is, structure your pacing like a comic book issue, regardless of how much game time it represents. What does that actually mean? Well, think of an issue as a journey the characters go on. By definition, they don’t end in the same place they began. The issue surrounds an important discovery. This could be a literal discovery; perhaps the heroes are looking for a missing person who disappeared in the middle of the city center, and they find them. It could also be a revelation; they discover who the

Comic Book Storytelling villain really is, or what their scheme or goal might be. The heroes fight a villain, who has an amazing new defense they can’t overcome, and now they need a new plan. These are all discoveries, and they’re the kind of thing that a single issue would be built around. With that in mind, the GM should consider giving each issue a title and telling the players the title beforehand. The title doesn’t reveal the plot, but it suggests a general idea. Comic book issue titles are often dramatic—sometimes to the point of being overblown, but that’s part of the fun. If you tell the players that the current issue is called “There Shall Come an Apocalypse!” or “Death Is My Calling Card,” or something similar, it’s intriguing and enticing, if a little campy. You could also tone it down with a shorter title like “The Blood King,” “Destiny,” or “Dread’s Revenge.” Go a step further and describe things in the game in terms of panels. Every comic book page is divided into panels, and you can think of your game this way too. You don’t have to do this in every scene or round, but when an NPC takes a significant action (or reaction), tell the players “The panel looks like this . . .” Encourage the players to do the same every once in a while. Rather than say, “I attack the warbot with my gravity powers,” the player says, “Okay, there’s a panel that shows the warbot advancing, and then a panel just like it except gravity has increased and now it’s crushed to the ground.” You can also bring the concept of splash pages into this, where a very significant scene is given one or even two full pages as a single panel to emphasize the importance, the drama, and the action. Give every issue at least one splash page. That’s a good rule of thumb because each issue should have at least one really big moment. When the villain has the PCs on the ropes and is lording it over them, when a character gathers their last bit of strength and courage and grabs the helicopter as it’s flying away, or when all the heroes

and all the villains clash for the big battle scene—these are all splash pages. Things like travel, searching, and exploration are often skipped over in a comic book, and that’s not a bad philosophy for pacing your session. Describe a caption above or below the panel that says, “Three hours later . . .” or something to that effect, and get right to the action. At no point in a superhero game should things ever seem boring, humdrum, or tedious. If things get frustrating, it should be because the heroes can’t get through their foe’s defenses or because the villain slips away at the last minute, not because they can’t find the hidden door to get into the bad guy’s base.

Most comic book issues don’t have a title anymore because the comics are packaged into collections of five or six issues, and the collection is given a title. You could do the same and give your “collection” a title, with each “issue” being part 1, part 2, and so on. Either way, you’ll accomplish the same thing.

START WITH ACTION Comic books often start with a big action scene—usually with one of the aforementioned splash pages. They’ll do this even if it requires a bit of backtracking, narratively, to explain the situation or how things got where they are. You can do the same with your game. Start every adventure (or maybe even every session—each issue) in medias res, with the action already in full swing. Then do a flashback scene to explain the premise and the setup as opposed to starting with those initial—and very likely less exciting—scenes. Or don’t do the flashback at all. Every comics fan has faced the dreaded “missed issue” where you’re reading a comic book but you didn’t read the one before it, and you have to catch up to understand the action taking place right now. That makes the discovery of what’s going on all the more frantic and exciting for the players. Players shouldn’t be outright confused, and should trust that things will be clear eventually, but you don’t want to start a game with a lot of exposition, debate among the players as they make a plan, or the PCs looking around for trouble. Start with the trouble.

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Claim the Sky CLIFFHANGERS Ending each session (each issue) with a cliffhanger will help with the goal of starting each session with action. The PCs defeat the Terrifying Trio, who now lie unconscious among the wreckage of the Walmart where the battle took place, when suddenly their evil alien masters, the Corrupted, descend in their orbital craft and threaten to destroy the whole city . . . and rather than playing that scene out further, the GM just says, “To be continued!” Not only does this end the session on a note of high energy, it ensures that when you reconvene for your next session, no one will say, “Now, what was going on again?” They’ll remember, and it will be with a mood of excitement and dread.

STORYTELLING THROUGH ACTION

BASTION, page 163

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In superhero comics and movies, the story gets told while things happen. Two characters work out their differences while they fight (or fight a foe together). Heroes learn a villain’s intentions while they cope with a flood from the dam she just shattered. We see a story of self-sacrifice play out as one character gives their life to save their friends (or perhaps the whole world). Superhero games should work the same way. If the PCs need information from an important government official, don’t have them just talk to her in her office. Have them talk to her while they protect her from an army of android assassins. If a PC needs to learn something from the villain’s lackeys, have them learn it while they take the foes down. Rather than setting things up so there’s a secret message to find or a prisoner to interrogate after the action, have one villain communicate the important information to another while they fight the PCs. “Keep these meddlers away from that touchscreen—that’s what maintains the president’s mind control!” If a prisoner does give up information,

it’s not a prolonged interrogation scene, it’s whispered with their last breath on the final round of combat before they fall unconscious. Imagine that the PCs fight their way onto the bridge of an alien mothership. Rather than knowing through exposition ahead of time that the aliens have a missile that can blow up the sun, they just know that the aliens are up to no good. They don’t learn about the missile until the alien commander gives the order to fire it and explains what it will do. The PCs have to stop it there and then (or fly after it in space before it reaches its target). Exposition delivered during an action scene makes the scene more dramatic and the exposition more exciting. It often means that the final revelation comes right at the end of an adventure and packs a surprise, but that’s a good thing. And, of course, storytelling and exposition don’t have to involve dialog at all. The villain is making their getaway in a helicopter, having stolen a massive amount of C4 explosive. The heroes give chase and see the helicopter flying straight for the nearby dam. That’s straightforward storytelling at its clearest—the villain is going to try to blow the dam, causing untold destruction to the area! But story isn’t just plot. It’s also character, and action can convey that as well. You could have a pre-mission briefing with the PCs involving a BASTION agent who explains that the mercenary Darkwave is fearless and arrogant, creating constructs of darkness to attack her foes, but her partner Amnesia is timid and hesitant, yet still dangerous because her touch robs people of their memories. Or the PCs could move straight into a confrontation with this deadly duo and observe directly that Darkwave charges at them with a giant hammer made of “anti-light” while Amnesia moves slowly and carefully into position to get an opportunity to touch a foe, yet seems ready to run at the slightest hint of danger. While both options are viable, the

Comic Book Storytelling latter is storytelling through action, and it probably carries more weight. “Show, don’t tell” is a pretty good bit of advice for fiction writers and just as good for GMs, particularly in the superhero genre.

REVERSALS The classic reversal is when it seems like the story is going one way and it suddenly goes in the opposite direction. In superhero stories, this often involves the disposition of a character. The mastermind villain runs for governor and wins the election. The trusted ally has a change of heart and turns on their friends. Classic examples of reversals in comic book storytelling also include: • A hero goes rogue after the death of their partner, becoming a murderous vigilante, or even a true villain. • A villain seeks redemption and wants to walk the straight and narrow. Or maybe they just retire after a number of defeats to spend time with their family and take a normal job (or do some really low-end criminal work). • A character is sent hurtling into another dimension or is imprisoned forever in a mystical monastery in the mountains, but they eventually find a way to get out and back home. The most famous reversal in comics is the character death. Both heroes and villains have a tendency to die and then come back. Sometimes, what appeared to be a death was just a close call. This often happens when there’s no body to recover. Falling into deep water works well for this, as does a huge explosion or being shot into space—the story of how they miraculously survived is usually a good one all on its own. But sometimes characters legitimately die and still somehow come back. Their personality is imprinted on the mind of another person or uploaded into a computer, so they can be given a new life in a new body. A mystical ritual returns their soul

from the dead. A cosmic alignment brings unknown powers into the story that return the character to life for their own ends. Reversals often reverse again. For example: • The billionaire industrialist who is funding multiple superheroes goes bankrupt. And then, a year later, she’s made a new fortune. • The PCs’ greatest foe inadvertently has their mind wiped, and they become a hero—a direct ally of the PCs. Eventually, however, their original memories and personality return. • A character without a headquarters gets a cool, high-tech, high-rise base, but it gets destroyed. Reversals are usually story based. They depend on the ever-turning wheel of fate. But they make for great stories with unexpected twists.

CHANGES (AND CHANGES BACK) Similar to the reversal, you can create changes that affect a character (PC or NPC). Changes are often character based rather than story based. New costumes, new team-ups, new powers—these are all changes where it’s the change that’s important, not the story around it. Even more than reversals, changes are usually short-lived. They add variety and a fresh take, but the characters and situations eventually return to a baseline. For example, a minor villain might obtain a mystic gem that makes them ten times more powerful (and practically a new adversary, offering new challenges for the PCs), but eventually circumstances alter and they return to their normal power level. Maybe after being exposed to strange radiation in the previous story, a PC gains new abilities, or loses control of the ones they had prior. This makes for some fun stories, but eventually they might revert to their classic incarnation.

For much more on character death, see pages 96–97.

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Claim the Sky of Speedburst. (They may or may not call themselves Speedburst II, Young Speedburst, the New Speedburst, or some other modification.) This can be a really interesting thing to do with a PC in the middle of a campaign, with the same player now playing a younger version of themselves, with a different personality and backstory and maybe even somewhat different powers.

PLAYER-DRIVEN CHANGES AND DEVELOPMENTS

Character arcs, page 238

Comics frequently do a sort of factory reset on their characters and settings, a tactic that you can steal to fearlessly make changes. A villain gets a suit of armor that enhances their powers, but the next time she shows up, she doesn’t have it anymore. Another villain’s cool and iconic orbital base is destroyed, but they eventually build a new one.

Encourage and reward players who spend time or XP (or both) to create interesting changes or developments for their characters. Players might want to establish a base, start a business in their hero identity, get married, join an existing hero group, and so on. Or maybe they want to do something that will alter their powers, perhaps giving them a new ability. A character might even change their focus or how they have assigned their power shifts. As long as the player puts in the time and effort to explain how this happens in the story being told, why not? This is comic book storytelling, after all. Stranger things have happened in the pages of comics. Character arcs as presented in the Cypher System Rulebook are a good baseline for how to reward PCs with XP for taking on stories that further develop their characters.

DEVELOPMENTS Developments are changes that never get undone. A character gets married or has a child. A character dies a noble death, and it seems clear that to bring them back would be to tarnish their sacrifice. An NPC hero hangs up the cape and goes into politics. A genius hero uses their great inventions to improve the quality of life for everyone. Or to make millions. Or both. Sometimes, a development can be the proverbial passing of the baton. The hero Speedburst decides to retire, but a new, younger hero takes up the mantle

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INTERWEAVING STORIES An ongoing comic book is a series of stories with the same character(s). But it’s not always as linear as it sounds. It doesn’t always go story A, then story B, then story C. Rather, we get story A, and within it we get the start of story B. Then, within story B, we get the first part of story C. Consider this extended example: Story A: Supervillain team tries to steal a crystal found in a meteor.

Comic Book Storytelling Story B: An old villain returns to get revenge on the PCs. Story C: PCs need to rescue scientists lost in another dimension. • Start with Story A. It’s straightforward, and the PCs move in to stop the bad guys’ plan. • While they’re dealing with this situation, they learn that an old foe of theirs has just broken out of prison. • By the time they recover the stolen crystal and finish story A, story B’s villain has already kidnapped a scientist friend important to them, and now the PCs need to deal with that. The foe has holed up in the scientist’s high-tech lab and set a trap for them with some kind of extradimensional device. • The trap sends the PCs and some scientists into a strange alien world. The PCs keep the scientists safe and return them home. • Back on Earth, the PCs deal with the villain and save their friend. • The other scientists reveal that, while in the other dimension, they were implanted with alien spores that now control them, so the PCs have to stop their actions and free them from the spores. In the end, it almost feels like one big story because all the threads have been woven into a cohesive whole. It feels less episodic and a bit more like life. This approach can be exhausting, though, so if you do this, be sure to leave some breathing room now and again for the characters to rest, carry on their lives, and so on.

STORIES GROW MORE INTERESTING OVER TIME Origin stories are all well and good, but arguably a hero is at their most interesting once they’ve established themselves. So too do the villains get more interesting after their initial appearance, because they are known. Consider a pair of alien would-be conquerors that come to Earth. They

show up, try to defeat Earth’s champions, and probably fail. That’s a pretty good story. But say one of the alien warlords is captured and imprisoned in stasis in a secret location. Now the other one returns to Earth on a quest to find and free their partner, destroying anyone or anything that gets in their way. Arguably, opposing that foe will be a more interesting story for the game. It’s got drama, an atypical villainous motivation (and perhaps one that is a bit more sympathetic or at least understandable), and still plenty of action. But you can’t have the second without the first. Or can you? You could set up your game so that some of that history has already happened. Alternatively, you could have the villains defeated by other NPC heroes the first time around, but it’s the PCs who have to deal with their return. Still, let’s go back to the idea that you’re starting your campaign, in comic parlance, not with issue 1, but, say, issue 28. The thing to do is get the players to help fill in the bulk of “issues 1 to 27.” As a group, in the first session of the campaign, the players determine how their characters came together and handle all the issues discussed earlier about team-ups. Then, have each player (with suggestions and help from the others) contribute a storyline from the group’s past. Get pertinent details—NPC names, place names, and so on. Determine a rough order of events, and make sure that you know how each plot line resolved, or if it didn’t fully, note that as well. Now you’ve got a wealth of information to build on. When you “bring back” an old foe the PCs have already encountered, the players will feel like they did encounter that foe previously, because they participated in the creation of the foe and their story.

Team-Ups, page 82

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Claim the Sky THEMES Like any good story, a comic book tale has a theme. While there are an endless number of themes to choose from, here are some big ones that have contributed to interesting superhero stories in the past. Justice Versus Revenge: There’s a fine line between the tormented hero with a tragic past who wants to fight for the innocent because of what happened to them in their own backstory, and the vicious vigilante who wants to put the hurt on those who wronged them or the ones they loved. What’s the real motivation here—justice or revenge? There’s not necessarily a right or wrong answer, but if one player is expecting their character to uphold justice and another’s character is just out for revenge, make sure they’re both on board for the eventual conflict. And make sure you’re on board with it too. The Nature of Heroism: It takes more than a superpower and a cape to be a hero. We all know that. But when it comes to superhumans, there’s a whole spectrum of characters, not just heroes and villains. What about a superhero who insists on getting paid? Or one who only saves certain people and not others? The most basic questions that arise from this theme should be the true nature of heroism and what it means to be a hero. Shades of Grey: Good guys versus bad guys. That’s the core of superhero tales, right? Well, not so fast. That might have been true forty or fifty years ago, but things have become a lot more nuanced since then. Heroes have to make hard decisions. The good or right choice isn’t always obvious. Maybe sometimes the most they can strive for is the lesser of two evils. Or maybe the “villain” isn’t such a villain after all, but meting out a form of justice that the heroes cannot see, at least at first. A freedom fighter is just a terrorist you agree with, according to some people. When it’s

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a clash of cultures, nations, or ideologies, who’s to say who is on the right side? When confronted with such difficult choices, the PCs—and the players—will have to put their own outlooks to the test, and do whatever they ultimately feel is best. But can they live with their decisions? Rehabilitation and Forgiveness: Can a leopard change its spots? Can a villain become a hero? There are many examples in comics of characters following that path. But can the other heroes ever truly trust such a character? And what does this redeemed character do with other villains? If the reformed villain-now-hero can rehabilitate and change, shouldn’t that opportunity be offered to others? Judge, Jury, and Executioner: Many superheroes, both in comics and movies, try hard to never take a life despite wielding dangerous powers. Most of them don’t just pick up a firearm and shoot the villain. There’s often a sort of code, either a personal one or one established by the larger superhuman community, that superheroes don’t have the right to carry out punishments—they just stop the bad guys from doing whatever they’re doing and turn them over to the proper authorities. But maybe one or more of the PCs eschews this code. Or maybe there’s no code at all. This makes it harder not to think of the PCs as simple vigilantes, taking justice into their own hands. Literally becoming judge, jury, and executioner all in one. Or perhaps the PCs keep the code, but other superheroes don’t, bringing heroes into conflict with other heroes over their methods of upholding justice. Power Versus Authority: Power is authority taken by force. Authority is power given freely. The PCs have great abilities. Do they have power or authority? In other words, do they do what they want, when they want, or do they work with the existing systems and structures?

Comic Book Storytelling Governments and other systems in place might not take well to the idea of individuals with superhuman abilities running freely with no oversight. They might try to restrict superhumans or force them to operate within government control. This can end up with the PCs being part of the military, a special service, or the United Nations. Alternatively, it might force the heroes underground, operating as outlaws if they don’t want to be controlled by outside forces that might have political or economic agendas that don’t mesh with what the characters see as heroism.

SPECIAL GM CONSIDERATIONS While you can get a lot out of the Running the Cypher System chapter in the Cypher System Rulebook, there are a few things specifically related to superheroes to consider before beginning your Claim the Sky game.

BALANCING POWER LEVELS The PCs will be incredibly powerful, likely with a variety of strange abilities at their disposal to deal with conventional challenges. Pitting one powerful opponent against them can be difficult. It’s often a good idea to have villains in pairs or groups if they will be facing a group of PCs. Alternatively, a bunch of lackeys, robots, demon soldiers, or something similar can be useful in creating a challenge for the whole group. If you want to increase a villain’s staying power, one of the best ways to do it is to increase their Armor and/or resistances, or give them the ability to recover their health quickly. Another thing to consider is balancing power with circumstance. The villain might be a challenge in a fight with one or two heroes, which is fine because the rest of the team has to disarm the bomb that’s about to go off, or repair the bridge the train is about to go over, or save the

civilians in immediate danger. Better yet, use all of those things in one encounter. On the other hand, what happens when a villain who gave the PCs a tough fight on their own now joins with a bunch of other villains? You might have to subtly tone down the NPC’s power a bit.

POWER VERSUS POWER LEVELS Challenging PC heroes doesn’t always mean pitting them against ultra-powerful foes. Sometimes a foe with the right ability can be just as difficult to deal with as a titan with lots of Armor and health. Consider these three examples: The Possessor: This NPC uses mind control to make other people do his bidding. Maybe even fight for him. How do you beat a foe who is using innocents to attack you? Suddenly, it’s not about strength or prowess, but creative solutions to keep the victims from being harmed while still catching the bad guy. And what if the Possessor controls one of the PCs? The Possessor himself might have very little in the way of health, defenses, or damage-dealing power. But if his mind control has significant range, just finding him while coping with his controlled subjects might be tricky.

Chapter 25: Running the Cypher System, page 402

Porter: Porter is a villain whose only ability is to teleport. She can’t deal much damage—maybe she has a pistol—and she can’t withstand more than one successful attack against her. Ah, but that’s the problem. How do you attack someone who’s not where she was a moment ago? Porter is tricky to deal with because she can teleport and take an action each round. So she can teleport in, grab the loot she’s after, and then teleport out next round— and still have an action when she arrives where she’s going. This allows only a very small window of opportunity to stop her. The Veil: This NPC is a normal person. No powers. No battle suit. No alien tech. But she’s smart and she’s rich, so she has a

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Claim the Sky veritable army of lieutenants, lackeys, and mercenaries. She doesn’t get her hands dirty—she doesn’t go out and commit crimes. She has others do that for her. She doesn’t fight heroes either—she pays other villains to do that for her as well. And if the heroes do reach her, it’s probably a body double she hired as a stand-in. Her identity is a secret, and she might very well be a person who is prominent in society or in the lives of the heroes’ secret identities.

MASTERMIND VILLAINS One of the most difficult aspects of running a superhero game is portraying a mastermind villain. By definition, this super-genius schemer who has plans within plans is smarter than you are, and smarter than anyone at the table. They’re supernaturally smart. Not just because they can build a giant machine that will absorb energy from the entire city to power their transdimensional gateway, but because they’ve already thought of all the ways their enemies (including the PCs) might try to stop them and have developed contingency plans. But you, the GM, can’t think of everything, so how can an NPC that you’re controlling do that? There’s a simple answer. Cheat. Use your metagame knowledge as the GM to replicate the mastermind’s incredible genius. The PCs make a plan and move to defeat their foe, but the mastermind is already a step (or five) ahead of them. The villain has moved the giant energy-absorbing machine the PCs were going to destroy and left an ambush for them instead. But how could the mastermind have known the heroes were coming? Because they’re just that smart. Obviously, there’s a line you have to draw, or the mastermind will be unbeatable and that really will seem like cheating. So instead of conceiving of all the things the villain might have thought of, think of the one thing that they didn’t consider. Come up with their one weakness. The one weak link in their plan. Maybe they’re too

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overconfident. Maybe they rely too much on one of their servitors. Maybe they didn’t count on the heroes being so utterly selfless. Regardless, the mastermind has every base covered except for one. And that’s how the heroes win—not by outsmarting the super-genius, but by finding their weakness or blind spot.

PCs SHOULD GET TO BE POWERFUL Frequently give the PCs a chance to be powerful and cool. Give them an obstacle that would be difficult for normal characters but that they can easily overcome. A house is on fire. A construction crane is teetering and about to collapse. A bunch of typical thieves are robbing a jewelry store. The superheroic characters should be able to deal with these situations fairly handily. There might be some die rolls involved and so on, and maybe one of the PCs will take a small bit of damage, but the odds are heavily in their favor. This makes them feel powerful, effective, and heroic—and that’s probably why they wanted to play superhero characters in the first place. Sure, they’ll be pushed to their limits by the main adventure later on, but for a moment, they get to be mighty. And, if it fits the campaign, make sure there are bystanders around who can ooh and aah and thank the heroes for their help.

PLAYERS SHOULD CONTRIBUTE TO SETTING THE SCENE Expect players to ask things like “Is there a parked car I can pick up and throw at him?” Even if you never described any cars on the street, you should answer that question with “Yes.” Or, at the very least, say “No, but . . .” as in, “No, you’re inside a shopping mall. There is a sunglasses kiosk, though.” Basically, the idea is to not just allow but encourage the players to contribute to the surroundings. Most of the time, if it’s something they could reasonably expect to be there, it should be there, like flagpoles, narrow alleyways, or a streetlamp in a city; a boulder, a cave, or a tree in the wilderness; a large control panel,

Comic Book Storytelling

a bunch of chemicals, or a big machine hanging from the ceiling in a high-tech lab; and so on. Even if it’s not something you initially planned for, allow the players’ imaginations to complement your own. It encourages ingenuity and imagination on their part and allows for fun interactions with the environment. Because while punching the bad guy is fine, swatting them with a street sign is even better.

AVOIDING THE TROPES OF OTHER GENRES AND GAMEPLAY Although comics offer fun ways to smash together all your favorite genres, some sensibilities from other genres and games often don’t apply to comic book storytelling. For example, superheroes don’t loot the bodies when a battle is done. The villain’s gear isn’t suddenly added to the heroes’ arsenal. If you want an explanation, say that the weapons and devices are keyed specifically to the NPC and only their biosignature will activate them. A supersmart hero might take the villain’s stuff not to use it, but to study it, or perhaps use the secrets

they discover to advance their own gear. Or maybe the heroes just take a trophy for their base. If nothing else, it’s evidence for the villain’s eventual trial. But it’s not “treasure.” At most, the heroes might have to use the alien’s starcraft to get back to Earth, or use the wizard’s scepter to undo the damage he’s wrought, but that’s about it. Similarly, superheroes don’t explore a villain’s base room by room like a dungeon crawl. Don’t bother making a careful map showing every corridor and restroom in the evildoer’s lair. The heroes bash their way right into the heart of the place to confront their foe. And if there is a lot of searching, exploring, or traveling to get to where the PCs need to go, cut to the chase with a “Three hours later . . .” caption on the metaphorical comic book panel and get to the action. Lastly, while a Claim the Sky campaign might be as violent as any other, keep in mind that in the Cypher System, PCs don’t have to kill unless they want to. When an NPC runs out of health, the player who dealt the damage can decide if they are dead or just unconscious or incapacitated.

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Claim the Sky COMING BACK FROM THE DEAD

Regenerate, page 175

Death for PCs and NPCs should probably be a fluid concept unless you want to go against type. Seemingly impossible events save characters at the last minute or bring them back from the brink. Players probably should not have to fear death much in this genre, which encourages heroic actions.

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Sometimes player characters die. But in a superhero setting, heroes are known for cheating death over and over. Something that would kill a regular person, like falling into a vat of boiling chemicals or getting caught in an antimatter explosion, is more likely to be just a setback for a superhuman. If a PC dies, the GM should talk to the player about what they’d like for their character. Do they want the hero to survive this deadly fate and come back in time for the next session? Do they want to play another character for a while and give their main hero time to recover? Do they want everyone to think their character is dead (perhaps taking a break from the campaign for a while or playing a new character), but secretly have a reason for why and when the hero will make a surprise comeback? Once the GM knows what the player wants, they can build the future of that hero into the campaign story. The following are just a few of the many ways that a hero might come back after an apparent or actual death. • The hero never actually died, and instead fell into a coma, hibernation, or suspended animation, perhaps due to an unexpected effect of their mutant DNA, mysterious chemicals in their blood or the environment, or alien physiology. • The hero died, but a clone, robot duplicate, parallel-Earth visitor, energy being needing a physical host, or other essentially identical copy returns with some or all of the memories of the original. • The “dead” hero was a clone, robot duplicate, or similar copy, and the original hero has been secretly imprisoned or away on a special mission this whole time. • The explosion or energy discharge that supposedly destroyed the hero actually sent them to another planet, dimension, or timeline.

• The dead hero’s soul becomes trapped in an object or another nearby character, and can be freed under the right circumstances. • A powerful being (such as a time warden, deity, reality warper, or personification of fate or death) intervened to prevent the hero’s death or restore them to life, because “it wasn’t their time” or they have a specific goal to accomplish in the future. • The hero has a special ability like Regenerate that allows them to recover from apparent death. (The GM may even allow a hero with 4 XP set aside for learning a new ability to spend that at the time of death to gain such a power.) • A supervillain uses magic, cybernetics, super-science, or other means to revive the dead hero as a brainwashed minion to use them (incognito or openly) against other heroes. • A mind swap, brain transfer, or psychic transmission puts the dying or dead hero’s identity in a new body—perhaps with the same powers, or perhaps not. • Actions by a time-traveling character (perhaps a version of the dead hero from another timeline) reverse or alter the circumstances of the hero’s death. • The death was an illusion, part of a shared nightmare or psychic attack, or a reality bleeding over from a parallel dimension, and it never actually happened, although everyone present perceived it as real. It’s possible to take the “heroes never die” concept to a silly level, where a dead superhero always comes back and is never the worse for wear. Unless you’re deliberately playing a lighthearted game (perhaps with child players) where no characters truly die, think about the consequences and reasons for a hero’s death, and decide if that character returning enhances the story or cheapens it.

Comic Book Storytelling Consequences for Returning: A hero who dies (or survives a deadly encounter due to extraordinary circumstances) isn’t always the same person once they’re back with their friends. They might be dealing with physical wounds or emotional trauma, or need time to adjust to their new home situation, especially if they’ve been gone awhile and their roommate or romantic partner has mourned them and moved on. They might even change their descriptor to match their new outlook on life. Depending on the nature of the character’s injuries, the GM may decide that the hero has lasting damage they need to heal. The secondary effect of this lasting damage might affect a skill such as jumping or perception, or hinder one or more of the character’s powers. For the PC, escaping or returning from death is a great opportunity to take on a character arc like Growth, Recover From a Wound (or Trauma), Repay a Debt, or (if they don’t know how they survived or returned) Solve a Mystery. A darker sort of hero might instead take an arc like Fall From Grace or Revenge. Coming back from the dead can be a catalyst for gaining or losing character abilities. An aquatic-themed hero who is killed by a lightning bolt might come back with electricity powers but no longer be able to communicate with fish. A dead telepathic hero revived by cybernetics might lose some of their mental powers but gain new machine abilities. A nature-themed hero might change their patron animal to represent wisdom or purpose they gained in the afterlife, leading to a new set of powers. Either the player or the GM can bring up this possibility, swapping out specific abilities or perhaps the character’s focus, whether temporarily or permanently. If this change and the mastering of the new powers takes awhile, the PC could take a character arc like Develop a Bond, Transformation, or Uncover a Secret.

Dead Supervillains: Heroes aren’t the only ones who come back from the dead. Any of the above examples can apply to a noteworthy supervillain. The GM should be careful about bringing back slain villains over and over again because it can make the players feel like they’re not accomplishing anything. Instead of yet another death and resurrection for a villain, consider a group GM intrusion where the villain escapes and lives to fight another day. Also, allowing supervillains to be captured and imprisoned for their crimes (or confined to a psychiatric ward, if appropriate) gives the GM opportunities for jailbreak scenarios that the heroes have to deal with, either by stopping the escape or by confronting the villains at a later time.

Group GM intrusion, page 410 Descriptor, page 38 Lasting damage, page 436 Character arcs, page 238

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6 CHAP TER

Stories

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hile the appeal of superhero comics and movies comes from the characters, gamemasters need to generate story ideas constantly so those characters have interesting things to do. Rather than fall back on “the villains are robbing a bank,” this chapter presents a variety of seeds a GM can use to grow into the stories of their campaign. One of the most important things a GM can do with these seeds is develop them to make the characters a part of the story rather than apart from the story. In other words, superhero tales often fall into the trap of being about someone else doing something interesting (and often dangerous) and the PC heroes reacting to it. That’s okay sometimes, but try to actually involve the characters in the story. When you’re coming up with your own story ideas, keep in mind that superhero stories are often future-focused in some fashion. A new discovery, invention, or idea often lies at the center of the action. (By contrast, fantasy stories are often about the past, with the exploration of an old ruined temple, the return of an ancient evil, or a prophecy from the early days.) This means that superhero stories often involve some kind of laboratory, cutting-edge tech development center, testing ground, or similar location. Scientists, explorers, builders, or trailblazers have gotten into real trouble, and the heroes need to help. Or a villain has hatched some new terror and must be stopped. Either way, something new is entering the world for good or ill, and the characters are right there to witness it firsthand.

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One of the best ways to create superhero stories is to think about the larger world. There are probably other heroes out there right now, and there were probably heroes in the past. And those heroes all have had adventures and faced villains and various challenges. The big comic book publishers and the big superhero “cinematic universes” get a lot of interesting stories out of the idea of heroes and villains crossing paths, affecting each others’ actions, and creating settings that are dynamic and ever-changing. This allows stories to become recursive, with characters returning with a new agenda based on something that happened previously. All that said, here are twenty basic ideas to use in your superhero campaign when you’re stuck: 1. An older hero is overcome by his archenemy. Beaten and broken, the hero comes to the PCs. He offers to share important secrets if they will help him. The hero doesn’t want anything for himself, but he wants the PCs to ensure that the people and institutions important to him (a newspaper, an orphanage, a mystical garden, or something similar) will be kept safe now that he can no longer fight on their behalf. He wants the PCs to protect the things he has always protected. The secrets appeal to whatever is important to the PCs: the creation of an interstellar starship, the nature of other dimensions, the real identity and weaknesses of a powerful villain, or something along those lines.

Superhero Stories 2. An old foe of the PCs, seeking sadistic revenge, has captured someone close to them. The villain puts their victim in a position of clear peril—an obvious trap, but with a catch. The villain has also placed a number of time bombs across the city. The heroes may have enough time to find and defuse all the bombs, but if they try to save their friend, at least one bomb will likely detonate, killing many innocents. 3. One of the PCs’ abilities begins to grow more and more unstable. They’re more powerful than normal one minute, and then powerless the next. It turns out that an alien force is tapping into the character’s powers, and the PCs must find the source of this tampering and get it to stop, either through persuasion or through combat. 4. The PCs accidentally end up in the future, and it’s a dark version of their own present where things have gone horribly wrong. Things are too grim and too far gone for

the heroes to fix in the future, but perhaps they can learn what went awry so they can return to their present and make changes to avoid this dark fate. As a fun alternative, only half the characters travel through time, and the other half of the group plays older and perhaps more haggard versions of their present-day characters. 5. The heroes receive an uncanny distress call from space. A powerful and important cosmic being is under assault by an alien queen and her legions of mighty warriors. The being explains that the heroes might not be able to defeat the aliens, but they can deliver a jewel that will enhance the entity’s power so it can defend itself. Of course, the jewel is on a planet teeming with its own dangers. Once the PCs have the jewel, they still have to make it through the cosmic battle to get to the being in need. 6. An impenetrable dome of energy suddenly appears over a large portion of the city.

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7. In one of the heroes’ secret identities, they meet someone and develop a close friendship or romantic interest, perhaps bonding over a common experience of caring for a sick family member or overcoming a similar difficult event. Over time, the hero begins to suspect that this new friend is actually a supervillain’s secret identity, and has to decide whether to trust them or confront them. 8. Villains are guarding a transport of stolen high-tech weaponry to sell to terrorists. The terrorists are not common evildoers—they have similar views as the superheroes, but they are willing to take violent action to bring about the changes in the world that they believe are important. 9. A close associate of the heroes reveals themselves to be a secret agent planted by a mastermind villain. The agent has used their position not only to reveal some of the heroes’ secrets but also to sabotage them so the villain can move against them, and they are severely hindered in trying to stop the attack.

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10. A villain’s supernatural attack has left one of the PCs unconventionally wounded. Seeking help, the PCs go to a scientist who has been an ally in the past. However, the scientist attempts to exploit the situation and drain the wounded character of all their powers. Worse, it appears that the scientist has already created a number of new superhumans in past experiments, and these creations are ready to defend the corrupt scientist and their lab. In the course of these events, surprising new information about the nature or origin of the hero’s powers is revealed. 11. A young man inherits a mystical device from his mother that made her a powerful, well-known hero of the past generation. However, right out of the gate he abuses and misuses the forces he now commands, putting innocents in danger through his carelessness. The PCs need to find and stop the man, and either take away the device or convince him to learn how to use the power responsibly.

Superhero Stories 12. An ordinary citizen who is an ally of the PCs wants to be a superhero so badly that they make a literal deal with a devil. This supernatural being grants the person powers of their own, but asks a heavy toll. The devil wants not just the ally, but the heroes as well, and uses these machinations to lure them all into an elaborate trap. The PCs must try to save their friend, but perhaps the individual has to pay a price for their own actions. 13. Two mobsters go to war over control of a portion of the criminal underworld. Employing small armies of brutes and assassins (and perhaps superpowered mercenaries), this war threatens the innocent people of the city. But finding a way to end the conflict is more difficult than just beating everyone up. The crime bosses have protected themselves from being linked directly to any wrongdoing, and their expert lawyers can get them back on the street in short order regardless. The PCs may have to delve deep into the problem to solve it. 14. A new superhero appears on the scene, claiming to be an actual god from mythology. She’s adored by fans and beloved by the authorities. But the PCs get a clue that she might not be what she claims, and there might be more going on. 15. A company is marketing a “vitamin serum” they claim can extend life and cure ailments. And, in fact, the elderly treated by it feel a real sense of renewed vigor, while people with cancer and other difficult-to-treat diseases benefit greatly from taking the serum. But what’s behind this miracle cure? 16. A superpowered friend of the PCs has the ability to produce music of special beauty. She sometimes performs here and there about the city. One night, her partner is killed in a hit-and-run car accident while she is performing.

All of her concerts are canceled. The perpetrator of the crime isn’t found. And the performer goes missing, too. 17. One of the PCs develops a rash on their arm, apparently unrelated to anything. Over time, the rash develops into a lesion, and shows every sign of continuing to worsen. Conventional medical interventions find no explanation. However, if the PCs can access unconventional science, they discover that the growing lesion has a strong temporal signature. 18. A popular augmented-reality phone game involving cartoonish versions of supervillains and superheroes makes news when several of its players across many different cities suddenly go missing. 19. An author announces the pending publication of a tell-all unauthorized biography of one of the PCs. The author claims that it will tell the “true” story of the character. 20. One or more superheroes from the future appear in the present to warn the PCs about an upcoming tragic event (such as an explosion or plane crash) where a large number of people survived only because the PCs intervened. The future heroes explain that one survivor (exact identity unknown, but narrowed down to three possible people) was so traumatized that they became a supervillain and committed many atrocities over the next several years. The future heroes beg the present heroes to either allow the tragic event to happen without interference (which would kill this future supervillain and prevent the suffering they cause), or figure out who the bad survivor is and steer them away from the event so they’re not affected by it (and therefore never become a supervillain).

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TER 7 CHAP

Bases

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Modest base: level 3 Impressive base: level 5 (see sample impressive base map on the next page) Amazing base: level 7 (see sample amazing base map on page 104)

o the PC heroes in your game live alone, or together in a location customized to their needs as a super team? Depending on their finances or patron support, the types of bases a super team has access to can span the gamut from modest to amazing. Bases are nice to have, but for PCs just starting out, they may be aspirational. Over time, they may find the funds or backing to build a base of their own, customize a base seized from a defeated villain, or (if they are especially lucky) be asked to join an established group with unmatched resources. In this latter case, they could find themselves moving from a rented storage space to an orbital facility in a few short weeks. The following three concepts can be used as inspiration or actual floor plans for PC superhero bases.

MODEST BASE: BEHIND THE LAUNDROMAT Whether behind a laundromat, above a fast-food restaurant, or in the basement of a tenement building, the modest base is more of a place to gather and plan than to live in

full time (though a couple of guest rooms—or at least spare rooms where someone can throw down a sleeping bag—are not out of the question). Many modest bases are secret, though if co-located with a regular business, the staff that works in the building know about and abet the heroes’ access and secrecy. Or perhaps one of the heroes works at the business as a day manager. Despite being modest, a working base needs several basic amenities, such as a garage for a vehicle, a place to tinker with strange devices, a communications hub, and an area for everyone to gather.

IMPRESSIVE BASE: TOP FLOORS OF A SKYSCRAPER If the heroes’ operations are expansive enough to rate an impressive base, they might own the top few floors of a skyscraper in a big city, own a manor, or use an expansive compound in the country. An impressive base is something only wealthy (or well-backed) heroes can afford. It offers a complete set of amenities for a large superhero team, including living spaces, recreation, and all sorts of equipment and vehicles to support the PCs’ never-ending vigilance against the forces poised to deprive regular people of their resources, freedom, and lives.

AMAZING BASE: ORBITAL SATELLITE Where do you go if upgrading from an impressive base? Many super teams opt to go up, literally, by housing themselves in an amazing base that orbits the planet. Whether the base is an orbiting satellite, a moon facility, or a stratoship hanging high above the clouds, an amazing base is far from prying eyes and enemy attack. It is also usually outfitted with fantastic technology that people normally only ever hear about in science fiction books, or when they turn on the news and hear about the heroes’ latest stunning exploits.

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, s e o r He Villains, N P r C e s h t O d An

CHAP T ER 8

Part 2: Boundless, page 159

Instead of Loot, the NPCs in this chapter have a similar entry called Other Equipment. However, PCs might still end up taking any leftover equipment from a defeated NPC as loot.

S

uperhero stories are character-driven stories, and this chapter offers a plethora of characters for the GM to use, including heroes, villains, aliens, robots, genetic monstrosities, and more. All the NPCs described here are part of the Boundless setting. However, any one of them could be used in any superhero campaign or, of course, any setting where extraordinarily powerful beings are active or suddenly appear.

UNDERSTANDING THE LISTINGS Really Impossible Tasks, page 293 Understanding the Listings, page 312

The most important element of each hero or villain is their level. You use the level to determine the target number a PC must reach to attack or defend against the opponent. In each entry, the target number

for the NPC is listed in parentheses after their level. The target number is three times the level. Note that levels for NPCs are capped at 15 instead of 10 because a superhero setting demands really impossible tasks. An NPC’s target number is also its health, unless noted otherwise. Health is the amount of damage the NPC can sustain before they are dead or incapacitated. For easy reference, each description always lists an NPC’s health, even when it’s the normal amount for an NPC of their level. For more detailed information on level, health, combat, and other elements, see Understanding the Listings in the Cypher System Rulebook.

HEROES, VILLAINS, AND OTHERS BY LEVEL

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Crimson Protector Dawnstar Entropy Free Reign The Grin Jabberwocky Ace Majestic Olive Majestic Malevolence Shrike Warp Whisper Worm Death Beam Defender Dirge Kaos Lord Ash Mana Manslaughter Midknight Rai Shift Tauseef Valor

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Hero Hero Villain Villain Villainous alien species Villain Hero Hero Villain Villain Hero Hero Villain Villain Hero Villain Villain Villain Villain Villain Villain Villain Hero Villain Hero

5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6

Vantablack Z Demdike The Elemental The Gentleman Ghostwalk Gravitas Highrise Jinsoku Lord Eswar Jack Majestic Minder Ruthless Voltage Edifice Singularity The Traveler Natalie Majestic Blackstar The Horror Baron Shadow Silver Sentinel Sorrow Cataclysm The One

Villain Villain Villain Villain Hero Hero Villain Villain Hero Villain Hero Villain Hero Villain Hero Villain Hero Hero Hero Loner Villain Hero Villain Villain Other

6 6 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 8 8 8 9 10 10 12 12 12 13 13

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s BARON SHADOW

MASTERMIND VILLAIN

12 (36)

No one knows how many hundreds of years Baron Shadow has lived, how many names he’s gone by, or how much mystic, mutant, and technological power he commands. Except that it’s a lot. Over the centuries he’s enhanced himself by magic, forced evolution, and the incorporation of fantastic technology. Baron Shadow surrounds himself with lackeys, including many that are superhuman in their own right. He has a talent for combining unlike forces to create twisted servitors, like demon-possessed cyborgs or, as was the case before he lost his ghost generator, robots that operated on the divide between the real and spirit world. Historians believe he’s a real baron, bequeathed the title by King Henry II, back when he went by the name Aubrey de Warenne. If so, he’s well over 800 years old, at minimum. Motive: Control this world and all others Environment: Almost anywhere on Earth or out in the galaxy Health: 60 Damage Inflicted: 15 points Armor: 12 Movement: Short; very long when flying via device or spell; limitless when stepping through spatial gates Modifications: Defense against mental attacks and mind-influencing effects as level 13 Combat: Baron Shadow leaves combat to a small army of servitors (usually level 5) and the two or three superhumans who have most recently pledged their allegiance (usually level 7). If forced to fight, his preferred opening salvo is his so-called Quintessence (a blast of raw power), which he focuses through a telluric amplifier to create a very long-range ray that seems to move like a thing alive to target up to ten creatures within range. The baron has an array of devices and weapons, plus mystic and mutant abilities, that can provide custom protection, attacks, or effects that best serve the situation. For instance, instead of deploying his Quintessence, he can freeze one or more targets in time to deal with later. Magically warded cellular pumps set in the baron’s spine augment his mutant healing ability, returning 15 points of health each round. Truly killing Baron Shadow requires their removal. Interaction: Utterly convinced of his own supremacy, Baron Shadow deals only with deferential supplicants. Use: A portal mouth spills an army of winged octopi into the small nation whose rulers resisted the baron’s more subtle attempts at taking control. Other Equipment: The baron carries three to six manifest cyphers (including an age taker, a banishing nodule, and a blackout) and two or three artifacts (including a telluric amplifier, which eases one of his abilities by two steps for one day).

One side effect of centuries of modification is that Baron Shadow’s height has increased. These days, he stands nearly 7 feet (2 m) tall.

Age taker, banishing, blackout, page 384 Telluric amplifier: level 12 artifact. Grants two more free power shifts for one super ability for one day. Depletion: 1 in 1d6. GM intrusion: Baron Shadow uses a spell that pulls the character’s shadow self from their body, creating a level 7 negative duplicate that tries to kill the original.

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ALIEN WARRIOR HERO WITH GRAVITY-BASED POWERS

In the Boundless setting, Blackstar operates mainly on the American West Coast.

GM intrusion: The character must succeed on a Might defense roll or be pinned helpless each round by immense gravity until they can escape.

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She looks human, but Blackstar is literally from another world. She first came to media attention after roundly trouncing an intelligent neutronic being that wanted to devour the Earth in the early 1980s. Reporters asked her where she was from. “I hail from a dead planet orbiting a black star,” was all she would say. It was enough to earn her a code name. Some surmise that her planet circles a black hole. Blackstar is concerned not only with Earth’s safety, but with the well-being of creatures on planets circling different suns, too. She disappears for months at a time, presumably saving the lives of aliens all across the galaxy. But she always returns, sometimes to take care of matters that seem miniscule for someone with her abilities. Other times, she uses her gravity-warping powers to put down threats that no other hero seems capable of handling. Blackstar spends more time on Earth than is generally realized. Looking human, she can pass as just another tourist. She warps gravity to “slide” between locations around the planet, apparently mostly interested in places with a rich archeological history. Motive: Safeguard others Environment: Almost anywhere on Earth or out in the galaxy Health: 50 Damage Inflicted: 15 points Armor: 9 Movement: Short; long when flying; interplanetary distances between two points when gravity warp “sliding” Modifications: Tasks related to using gravity-control powers as level 12 Combat: Blackstar’s gravity-warp power infuses her, granting her immense strength and durability. For instance, she can make two melee attacks as her action, or lift a bus—or a bridge—and throw it, affecting a small area within long range (and everyone else within short range of the target). However, when making ranged attacks, she usually fires two very long-range “gravity lances.” She can fly by directly manipulating gravity. Even more impressively, she can warp spacetime enough to “slide” between distant points around the world, or even between planets. The farther she goes when using this ability, the more time it takes her to recover before she can slide again, so it’s not her primary method of travel. However, if she wished to neutralize a target, she could make a melee attack against it, attempting to slide it out into the vacuum of space for safekeeping. Finally, Blackstar presumably has some kind of galactic awareness that trickles in through her gravity-warping powers, allowing her to learn about events at distant locations. Interaction: Curious and sympathetic, Blackstar is often in a hurry. When she wraps up one disaster, there is probably another threat looming elsewhere. If encountered while pretending to be human, most people never realize who she really is, and instead think they’ve met an academic or a tourist. Use: Reports of a planet-killing comet heading toward Earth continue to mount. Why hasn’t Blackstar noticed?

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s CATACLYSM

COSMIC ENTITY

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This 40-foot (12 m) tall alien predates many other living beings in the universe. Despite its long perspective, Cataclysm seems oddly angry with Earth and similar worlds in the universe that host a strong concentration of superpowered beings. Whether it takes such places as a potential threat or some kind of personal affront, Cataclysm periodically arrives at these planets and attempts to destroy them. Possessed of celestial power, it has successfully managed the feat many times on other worlds. In fact, it tried and failed to destroy Earth on at least one occasion decades ago, requiring many of the world’s heroes to engage in battle to defeat it. The International Space Station was destroyed in this conflict, but thankfully work has finished on a newer, even larger space station. Many people worry that Cataclysm will attack again. A few—Cataclysm cultists—think a visit can’t come soon enough. Motive: Destroy planets with superpowered beings Environment: Anywhere in the universe Health: 100 Damage Inflicted: 20 points Armor: 15 Movement: Long; interstellar distances between two points when calling on its celestial power of travel Combat: Cataclysm can attack every creature within long range with a detonation of energy composed of equal parts electricity, fire, and force. If it focuses on a single target with a very long-range beam of celestial energy, its attack is eased by two steps, the target takes double the normal damage on a hit, and on a failed Might defense roll, the target descends one step on the damage track (or some other effect determined by Cataclysm, such as being turned to glass, teleported to another location, or becoming enamored of Cataclysm’s goal). Interaction: Cataclysm can speak and understand almost any language. It generally ignores lesser beings. Getting its attention probably requires damaging it, at which point it may explain why it has selected a given world for “renewal.” Use: The Church of Renewal, a minor sect of evangelicals, is responsible for the theft of several multidimensional communication devices, and it turns out that they want to use the items to draw Cataclysm back to Earth. Other Equipment: Cataclysm carries several alien devices, including an artifact quite similar to sphere 23 and a stellarex crystal.

Sphere 23, page 282 Stellarex crystal, page 294

GM intrusion (group): Cataclysm uses its stellarex crystal artifact to regain all health plus a 30 percent bonus (130 health in total).

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MARTIAL ARTIST HERO WITH LUCK POWERS

In the Boundless setting, Crimson Protector is a member of the New York-based Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: When the character should have hit with their melee or ranged attack, they stumble and strike something or someone they didn’t intend.

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Tyler Demby has always been lucky. Back when he was a kid and enjoyed more than his share of tabletop roleplaying games, his first roll of the night was usually a 20. But his luck transcended mere games, translating into him finding stray cash just when he needed it, always getting to the bus stop just before the bus left, and, on a few occasions, avoiding an accident by standing in just the right place at the right time. However, Tyler’s luck ran out one day when his brother Dean was killed across town during a jewelry-store robbery that turned violent. The happy-go-lucky Tyler fell out of love with the world a little. He disappeared for three years. When he returned, it was in the public guise of Crimson Protector, a hero who helps people in difficult and dangerous situations. Motive: Protect the innocent Environment: Anywhere criminal activity is high Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 1 Movement: Short Modifications: All defenses, acrobatics, attacks, and “calling on his luck” tasks as level 8 Combat: Crimson Protector isn’t strong, fast, or invulnerable. However, he has refined his natural psychic luck into a super ability that is equal to most. Real martial arts training combines with his luck so that when he attacks, an element of the environment usually intrudes in some fashion— maybe a runaway semi, a perfectly placed jab, or a coincidentally timed blow by another hero—so that a probable miss instead hits. And what might be a glancing blow on his part instead staggers, blinds, or disorients a foe. The same is true when Crimson Protector attempts to evade enemy attacks. More than that, he can call on his luck as his action to change the situation in his favor. For instance, if facing a superfast or invisible villain, a successful use of this ability might cause the fast foe to stumble, the invisible foe to be splattered with paint from a dislodged paint can, and so on. Crimson Protector can call on his luck in this way no more than once each minute. Interaction: Crimson Protector is quiet, contemplative, and not especially excitable. However, he is usually open to hearing out those who want his help. Use: Crimson Protector shows up, wondering if the characters can help him nail down a lead having to do with his murdered brother.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s DAWNSTAR

ENERGY-WIELDING HERO

5 (15)

Dawnstar has the power to command “otherworldly energies” from the Worlds Between. As best as anyone can determine, the Worlds Between are alternate dimensions, or at least possible ones. Using this energy, she can pluck physical items from the Worlds Between for a brief time as she needs them or simply blast foes with reality-fraying power. When she uses her ability, she emits a strong glow reminiscent of the sunrise. Though it’s something she left behind long ago, Dawnstar had a normal childhood. That is, until the day her power manifested when she and her twin brother Luis were in a car accident. Just twelve years old, Dawnstar’s power manifested for the first time. She saved herself and her brother; however, in the process, he was lost somewhere in the Worlds Between. These days, she spends much of her time trying to locate him. Motive: Find her brother Environment: Almost anywhere multidimensional phenomena are unfolding Health: 15 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Movement: Short Modifications: Energy blast attacks and Speed defense as level 7 Combat: Dawnstar can blast foes with sunrise-colored power at long range, inflicting Speed damage (ignores Armor) with the transdimensional energy she is known for. If attacked in turn, objects flicker into existence— furniture, random debris, or even complete walls—just long enough to shield her, then fade. These are subconsciously called from the Worlds Between and account for her Speed defense modification. She can use the same ability to purposefully call a particular item from the Worlds Between that she needs at the moment, from something as mundane as a sandwich to as unusual as a poisonous snake, a bomb about to detonate, a magic sword, or a one-of-a-kind piece of art. These objects usually fade away after a few rounds, but Dawnstar can maintain them with a little concentration, or even fix them in place. Dawnstar can sometimes pass into alternate dimensions, but not always when she wants to. It’s an ability that she knows is dangerous, but one she keeps trying to master. Interaction: Distant and cold, Dawnstar is hard to engage. Unless someone has knowledge of or an ability related to alternate dimensions— or better yet, information on her missing brother—she doesn’t make an effort. However, if a disaster related to alternate dimensions occurs, she is likely to help out, if only to learn more about her own abilities. Use: Dawnstar approaches the PCs because they have a device, ability, or foe that she believes can lead her to her missing brother.

GM intrusion: The character attacking Dawnstar is pulled into a dimensional rift with an endpoint 100 feet (30 m) overhead. Essentially, the target is teleported 100 feet into the air and falls.

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Claim the Sky DEATH BEAM In the Boundless setting, Death Beam was created in Saudi Arabia and still calls that nation home.

Infiltrator, page 390 Knowledge enhancement, page 391 GM intrusion: The character who fails a Speed defense roll is grabbed by Death Beam and teleported out over the ocean.

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SYNTHEZOID ASSASSIN VILLAIN WITH LASER POWERS

6 (18)

The ability to teleport across the world and beyond it could aid humanity in all sorts of ways. Such a person could beam into difficult-to-reach areas and rescue trapped people. They could rush lifesaving organs or other medicines to those in need. They could help set up a moonbase by delivering habitat components directly to Luna’s surface. Or, if you’re Death Beam, you could kill for money. Virtually untouchable thanks to their ability to go elsewhere with a thought, Death Beam is an especially feared assassin and thief. Death Beam is actually a synthezoid that was upgraded with alien tech and escaped a military research lab. Their mind is imprinted with a personality matrix from a living soldier named Zahira Badawi, but the imprint was incomplete. Motive: Murder for hire Health: 36 Damage Inflicted: 6 points Armor: 3 Movement: Short; teleportation Modifications: Teleportation tasks as level 9 Combat: The synthezoid can emit two short-range laser attacks, or a single attack against one target as a level 8 attack that inflicts 12 points of damage. However, Death Beam’s true lethality is revealed when they teleport in and attack as part of the same action, often surprising the victim. Assuming the target isn’t killed outright, Death Beam can teleport to a new location each round as part of their attack(s), keeping the target off balance enough to hinder their defense tasks. Sometimes Death Beam uses weapons coated with a level 6 poison that moves victims who fail a Might defense roll one step down the damage track. Interaction: Death Beam is utterly amoral, adrift except for their desire to kill. If someone is able to dig up information about their past, especially as it relates to Zahira Badawi, the synthezoid could be distracted or even negotiated with; they are drawn to knowing why that name seems so familiar. Use: The PCs are asked to defend a politician from the threat of an assassination attempt by Death Beam. Other Equipment: Aside from their weapons and poisons, Death Beam often carries a couple of manifest cyphers, including an infiltrator and a knowledge enhancement.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s DEFENDER

ARMORED HERO

6 (18)

Elmore Chang’s contributions to robotic science aren’t well known, given that he’s one of several research scientists at Dynamic, Inc. But he’s considered a legend among industry peers. And even they don’t realize that in his home robotics lab, he crafted an armored flying suit designed with smart materials of his own creation. When he steps into it, he ceases to be Elmore Chang, and becomes Defender! Defender fears nothing, believing himself impervious to harm. No task is too desperate for him to attempt, if it means saving someone else’s life. Having lost his wife to a villain attack, he is focused on defeating those with amazing abilities who put greed above everything else. Motive: Protect the innocent Environment: Anywhere Health: 33 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 10 Movement: Short; very long when flying Modifications: Technical engineering tasks as level 9; Might defense tasks and tasks related to using his armor as level 8 Combat: Defender can hammer a foe in melee using armored fists, or fire physical rounds at a target within very long range from guns built into his suit’s arms (with ammunition synthesized at need using smart materials stored for that purpose) using a computerized targeting system. If any damage manages to penetrate his armor, automatic first aid systems allow Defender to regain 2 points of health each round while he is still alive. The armor provides its own internal atmosphere. Unless the suit is breached, Defender can venture unharmed underwater or into space, and ignore poisonous fumes or weaponized biological agents. The suit is priceless, at least for a group unscrupulous enough to take it by force and try to reverse-engineer it. Only someone Defender has authorized to use the suit can do so; otherwise the encryption is too sophisticated for most people to bypass. Interaction: Defender is enthusiastic, knowledgeable, and helpful, but can easily be distracted if innocents are in danger. Use: A notorious villain has taken over a skyscraper, taking hostages in the process. In addition to anyone else who shows up to help, Defender descends from the sky in his shining armor, determined to save everyone.

Dynamic, Inc., page 177 In the Boundless setting, Defender is a member of the New York-based Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: Defender deploys a gadget from his armor that helps him in a specific situation against another character, such as a tow cable, a strobing light, a shield, or something else.

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Ghost, page 331

GM intrusion: The character meets Demdike’s gaze just as she uses her Stare attack, which hinders their defense roll and inflicts an additional 2 points of Intellect damage (10 points total).

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MYSTICAL VILLAIN

7 (21)

Most people prefer never to say her name aloud, lest the “Pendle Witch” appear and steal their soul. Whether or not she possesses such omniscient hearing is beside the point; Demdike terrorizes the British Isles with conjured ghosts and demonic entities, using her powers to curse her enemies and control the minds of others. According to the history books, Demdike died in 1612, a victim of hysteria and witch trials. But unless she’s lying (as some believe), she survived because she was—and remains—a real witch, and one who leads a modern coven of mystical practitioners. Powerful and mostly devoid of empathy, Demdike’s schemes are designed to benefit herself, usually at someone else’s expense. She’s been known to travel throughout the EU and the USA as part of her centuries-long effort to track down mystical items related to witchcraft. While so engaged, she appears in her modern identity as Elizabeth Southerns, antiquities and rare book dealer. Motive: Personal power Environment: Mainly England Health: 27 Damage Inflicted: 9 points Armor: 5 (base spell protection) Movement: Short Modifications: Magic lore as level 10 Combat: The ghosts (level 5) of three witches, once part of her coven, invisibly accompany Demdike at all times. They respond violently to any attacks on her person (or when she commands it). She is also known for a powerful curse called Demdike’s Stare, an attack affecting up to three creatures she can see in long range. The attack causes auditory hallucinations, and those who fail an Intellect defense roll take 8 points of Intellect damage from the flood of discordant sounds and horrifying images. One of her rings is a magic portal artifact, which she can use either to call other members of her coven (level 5) or to transport herself directly to them. Each coven member that supports her cumulatively eases her tasks. Finally, she knows a variety of spells, including those that charm or disorient foes, cause them to fall into a deep slumber, become poisoned, or just die. Given the proper time and mystic materials, she can cast very powerful spells that summon demonic hordes or change the environment of a whole region. She also carries a few cyphers in the form of tiny clay figure charms that grant healing. Interaction: Articulate and knowledgeable, Demdike is a witty, if biting, conversationalist. She might negotiate in good faith with someone, but only if she clearly stands to benefit. Use: A group of three women just made off with a rare book from the collection of mystical tomes. Other Equipment: Demdike carries two or three magical items, including at least two level 7 cyphers that restore health.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s DIRGE

VILLAIN WITH SONIC POWERS

6 (18)

When Emily Sato came to the world’s attention, it was as a twelve-year-old musical prodigy. Equally adept at singing, piano, and flute, it seemed she was on track to become the latest breakout pop icon. Except she disappeared, and investigators discovered something terrible at her home. Her mother, father, and older brother and sister were found dead, victims of a grisly murder. Emily was never found at all. Fifteen years later, Dirge appeared on the criminal scene. She wields terrible sonic powers that disrupt living creatures on a cellular level. However, she can also sing, or play an instrument she calls the Red Flute with haunting beauty. Sometimes, she plays the same songs that little Emily Sato used to. Is it really Emily? No one knows. Motive: Hunger for violence Environment: Alone or with one or more members of Dread Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 9 points Movement: Short Armor: 2 Modifications: Speed defense as level 7 from sonic barrier Combat: Dirge is surrounded by an invisible, focused sonic barrier that improves her Speed defense, as noted in Modifications. Any creature that comes within immediate range of her that she chooses is immediately subject to a sonic attack that ignores Armor. Dirge doesn’t have to use an action to trigger this attack, but she does have to be aware of the target or targets. She can focus a beam of sonic energy at a target within long range, inflicting damage that ignores Armor and, on a failed Might defense roll, deafens the target for a few rounds. Sometimes she uses her Red Flute, which has several abilities. In addition to being able to produce music (she prefers minor chords), Dirge can use it to draw all sound within long range into her for up to one minute. Within the affected area, no sound can be heard. At the same time, she regains 3 points of health each round. Interaction: Dirge never takes off her mask, though sometimes she sings. She may be distracted for a round or two if someone brings up her past, or interests her in music she’s never heard before. She’s also fond of valuable instruments. However, she is most interested in disrupting living humans with deadly frequencies. Use: An auction where several valuable antique violins are to be sold is disrupted by Dirge.

In the Boundless setting, Dirge is a member of Dread (page 179).

GM intrusion: The sonic attack is at the character’s natural frequency, causing them to resonate on a failed Might defense roll. The resonating character takes 9 points of damage each round (ignores Armor) until they can disrupt the harmonic.

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EDIFICE Azaki, page 160 When Edifice shifts back to normal human size, he becomes a basic level 3 NPC, losing all increases to health, Armor, attacks, and so on.

In the Boundless setting, Edifice is a member of the New York-based Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: The character hit by Edifice must succeed on a Might defense roll or be swatted up to a long distance, taking another 10 points of damage.

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HERO WHO CAN GROW TO GREAT SIZE

8 (24)

Fenton Castillo never had it easy. A rough childhood was followed by an even more difficult young adulthood. Fenton was wrongfully imprisoned for a theft and battery committed by an unknown perpetrator, but pinned on him. This might have embittered another, but Fenton reacted differently. He decided that, once he served his time, he would devote himself to improving the justice system. He’d get a degree in law. He wanted to prevent what had happened to him from afflicting anyone else. Which was fortunate, because within a couple of weeks of his release, an alien Azaki device in the hands of a supervillain exploded, exposing Fenton to strange energies. Instead of killing him, it changed him. Now when he concentrates, he becomes the size of an office building, standing about 65 feet (20 m) tall with rocky, meteorite-like skin. Motive: Help those without the means to help themselves; right injustices Environment: Wherever people are being persecuted Health: 80 Damage Inflicted: 12 points Armor: 8 Movement: Long Modifications: Speed defense as level 2 due to size Combat: As his action, Edifice can grow to become gargantuan, with flesh composed of a rocklike substance (which these stats reflect). He can make two melee attacks at targets within short range, or throw something huge (like a van) at a target within very long range (which attacks not only the main target, but also everyone else within immediate range of the main target). He can remain in his enhanced, massive state for several hours at a time, though when he shifts back, he can’t change again for about an hour because he usually falls into an exhausted sleep. While he is enormous, Edifice enjoys a few other minor abilities, most notably the power to glow brightly enough to illuminate everything within a half mile (800 m). Interaction: Thanks to taking law classes while in human form, Edifice is a stickler for precise language. He enjoys a debate and pointing out when someone’s reasoning may be flawed. However, he doesn’t enjoy being a jerk, so he backs off if someone doesn’t appreciate his lawyerly manner. He always takes the side of the underdog, once he’s convinced the underdog is truly innocent. Use: Something as bright as the sun is flashing on the horizon, accompanied by massive booming thuds, like the sounds a building might make if it started walking.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s THE ELEMENTAL

NATURE-FOCUSED VILLAINOUS ENTITY

7 (21)

People think the Elemental is a manifestation of the planet itself, a force of nature, angry at humans for their continual degradation of the ecosystem. That’s incorrect. The truth is that the Elemental was once a regular person. Martín Perez fled the third state home in which he’d been placed, right in the middle of the storm of the century. In the jungle of Guatemala, he hid within an ancient ruin where Mayans had buried an alien Azaki device. When he emerged, he was no longer human; he—or rather they—were the Elemental. (Which goes a long way to explain their interest in mundane valuables, especially gems and rare-earth substances.) The Elemental can command air, earth, and everything in between. Rain, lightning, earthquakes, tsunamis, and even volcanos—if given enough time—are the weapons they employ. The Elemental usually won’t initiate an attack in a natural growth area. On the other hand, they have no such compunction against calling lightning storms down in cities, especially against roads, buildings, and cars. And against any people on or in them. Motive: Accumulate valuables; revenge Environment: Sometimes living alone in the wilderness, other times trying to destroy a city Health: 70 Damage Inflicted: 9 points Armor: 4 (20 against electricity, fire, and cold) Movement: Short; short when burrowing; long when flying Modifications: All tasks as level 8 during a storm Combat: The Elemental can make up to seven attacks on their turn against different targets within very long range, using lightning, shearing winds, shards of stone thrust from the ground, or other natural elements. If the Elemental focuses all their attacks on one target, treat it as a single attack eased by two steps that inflicts 20 points of damage. In addition, the target must succeed on a Might defense roll or descend one step on the damage track. It takes the Elemental about three rounds to call up a sleet storm, which hinders most creatures (but not the Elemental; in fact, it eases their tasks). In addition, while standing in a storm, the Elemental regains 10 health each round. If the Elemental is reduced to 0 health, they mineralize, taking on the appearance of a humanoid statue. Unless that statue is destroyed and the pieces separated, the Elemental will reform within a few days. Interaction: Though stoic, the Elemental can be engaged by especially persuasive people. Those able to dig up a little of Martín Perez’s history could even drive the Elemental away, as they recall their early life and the hardships they endured. Apparently. Those traumatic events are something the Elemental prefers to repress. Use: A series of small towns across Central America is hit by horrendous storms, one after the other, in a line heading east, despite weather conditions being otherwise mild.

In the Boundless setting, the Elemental still lives in Guatemala but can be found almost anywhere.

GM intrusion: The Elemental’s successful lightning attack causes the character’s cypher to explode as if it were a just-used detonation.

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VILLAIN WITH THE ABILITY TO TRANSFORM MATTER

Entropy’s ability doesn’t seem to allow him to transform a complex object into a less orderly unit of anything especially complex on the periodic table. For instance, gold is way beyond him. He can’t transmute metals other than iron, copper, nickel, and zinc. In the Boundless setting, Entropy is a member of Dread (page 179).

GM intrusion: The character’s weapon or important item is targeted by Entropy’s ability to transform objects.

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Research physicist Edgar Tao didn’t ask to be renormalized. But a series of minor mistakes and one ill-conceived prank by a coworker saw Edgar locked inside the quantum reaction chamber at the wrong moment. Most objects subjected to the entropic fields in the reaction chamber were reduced to dust. But Edgar Tao came out the same as before—except for his murderous rage at his coworker’s gaffe, and the ability to immediately act on that anger. He transformed the research building’s foundation to water, collapsing the structure. The prankster coworker, as well as most of Edgar’s other associates, died, and Entropy was born. Entropy can enter any vault or secure facility simply by transforming barriers into other less orderly (but still cohesive) objects—usually marbles. Motive: Hunger for wealth and status; revenge on the scientific community Environment: Alone or with one or more members of Dread Health: 25 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 2 Movement: Short Modifications: Transform objects as level 7 Combat: Entropy prefers to avoid a fight, but if forced to defend himself, he transforms objects within long range that he can see (or can sense with a sort of elemental radar, even through solid barriers up to 10 feet [3 m] thick) to distract, detain, or kill foes. For instance, he could transform all the guns on targets within immediate range of each other into marbles; turn the floor beneath the feet of all targets within immediate range of each other to dust, water, or wet cement; or do something to cause the ceiling or even the entire building to collapse. When he uses his power in this way to inflict damage, environmental considerations mean the damage total could be 10 points or higher, as the GM determines, depending on whether a target falls dozens or hundreds of feet, is crushed by the weight of an entire building, is smothered in cement, and so on. Interaction: Edgar tries to keep up with the latest scientific research into quantum theory and materials science. He can be engaged on these topics by a persuasive character. He is also quite vain, and jealous of the fame other scientists have gained at what he believes is his expense. Thus, flattery regarding his past scientific achievements may enhance negotiations. Use: A respected physics journal reports that several of its editors have been hospitalized in an attack by Entropy.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s FREE REIGN

MIND-CONTROLLING VILLAIN

5 (15)

Bernard Alvin Kane wasn’t always a bad man. He paid his taxes. He held down a white-collar job filing reports. He had a wife and two kids. Sometimes he even donated to charities, if it was easy. He was typical. Then he drove his car into the rear end of a truck on the freeway. Bernard should have died, but instead the trauma activated latent mutant abilities: he could control the minds of those who could hear and understand him. Over the course of about a year, the temptation to use his abilities overcame him more and more. At first it was just small things, like telling his kids to work harder for an upcoming test. Then he was asking for (and getting) promotions at work. In the end, he’d taken over his company, controlled the mayor and other local politicians, and was surrounded by a regalia of unusually attractive mind-controlled bodyguards and personal assistants, a few of which had super abilities of their own. Motive: Control others Environment: Almost anywhere, usually with a regalia of mind-controlled bodyguards Health: 22 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 1 Movement: Short Modifications: Mind-control attacks as level 7 Combat: Free Reign avoids combat by telling potential foes that they are instead his good friends who love and want to please him. Targets within long range who can hear and understand him and who fail an Intellect defense roll behave as he suggests. Each round, a target can attempt another defense roll to throw off the control. However, if a target fails three of these defense rolls, they must do as compelled for the next day, unless something else happens that provides another chance to escape the control. Free Reign usually renews his control over those he particularly values every day before it wears off completely. An affected character defending against this renewal is hindered by three steps. Interaction: Vain and shallow, Free Reign is terrified of anyone able to overcome his mental control, ordering his entourage to eradicate them. Use: Free Reign is a secret confederate of a corrupt public official, ruler, or other person of authority. Other Equipment: Free Reign wears the most expensive suits, designer watches, and shades available. He carries a couple of high-tech devices liberated from other superhumans, including a disguise module and an enduring shield.

In the Boundless setting, Free Reign lives in Seattle.

Characters blocking their hearing with earplugs or similar equipment are immune to Free Reign’s power.

GM intrusion: The character is surprised by a superpowered bodyguard (level 7) who attempts to rip their hearing protection away.

Disguise module, page 388 Enduring shield, page 388

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Claim the Sky THE GENTLEMAN In the Boundless setting, the Gentleman is based in London.

The Gentleman’s cane: level 7 artifact. Rewinds time as indicated. Depletion: 1 in 1d6. GM intrusion: What seemed like a telling blow landed on the Gentleman actually hits a magical façade that shatters, revealing the Gentleman standing a few paces away.

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MYSTIC HERO

7 (21)

Most people who try to learn magic from books fail, because most books on the topic are new-age mumbo jumbo, desperate treatises by someone who is suffering from mental illness, or, most often, outright frauds. However, Sir Edward Wright-Hatt had better luck than most. In 1719, already a baron in the British aristocracy, he came to possess a book scribed in Latin titled Magia est Pretium, which roughly translates to “Magic Is the Price.” A man of letters, Wright-Hatt studied the book and discovered powers he’d never previously dreamed of. These days, the Gentleman shows up in times of dire need. He has forgotten more spells than most people ever learn, and he’s always interested in learning more. Motive: Guard against the forces of mystical darkness Health: 33 Damage Inflicted: 10 points Armor: 5 (base spell protection) Movement: Short Modifications: Magic lore as level 9 Combat: The Gentleman knows so many spells that he can create essentially any effect required to address a given situation. For example, he can make long-range attacks that burn or freeze a foe, or put them to sleep. He can increase his Armor, turn himself invisible, fly or teleport, or learn secret things from strange entities. The Gentleman’s cane is actually an intelligent artifact in its own right (level 6) that can take its own actions, including easing the Gentleman’s tasks. When things are especially dire, the cane can rewind time by one round, but only once per day. The Gentleman usually carries a few cyphers in the form of rings, cards, and small candies, which typically provide healing, sustenance, or euphoria. Interaction: Polite to a fault, the Gentleman believes in treating everyone equitably. However, he doesn’t take kindly to cads, and someone who insults his friends could find themselves transformed into a small, mean thing that creeps upon the earth. Use: A question with a magical component comes up. Someone suggests that the Gentleman could probably provide an answer, if anyone can. Other Equipment: The Gentleman carries a few magical trinkets, as previously indicated, as well as his cane.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s GHOSTWALK

PHASING HERO

7 (21)

Molly Anne Tynan died March 11th, 2007, one of the fatalities of an attack by Dread. She stayed that way for a full seven minutes. When her heartbeat and brain function spontaneously restarted, doctors called it a miracle. From Molly’s point of view, it just took her awhile—upon finding herself floating above her body in the ER—to figure out how to get back in. It wasn’t long afterward that a new enemy of crime showed up. Able to pass through walls and other solid objects, and to ignore physical attacks and bullets, Ghostwalk scared criminals everywhere. Because in addition to being able to penetrate the deepest bunkers of evil masterminds, she also had the power to possess objects, such as the guns of said mastermind’s minions, turning them upon their former owners. Motive: Stand against evildoers Environment: Almost anywhere Health: 33 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Movement: Short; short when flying or when moving through solid objects Modifications: Stealth as level 8; interaction tasks with ghosts and spiritual creatures as level 9 Combat: Ghostwalk can phase as part of another action. In this state, she doesn’t take damage from mundane physical sources, though she takes 1 point of damage from spells and attacks that direct energy, and she takes full damage from weapons designed to affect spirits, psychic effects, and similar attacks. If Ghostwalk physically makes an attack herself, she selectively phases her hand to bypass most defenses and inflict 7 points of damage (ignores Armor). If she is being especially vicious, she also psychically attacks the target, and if the attack succeeds, the target takes an additional 4 points of Intellect damage (ignores Armor) and is stunned by fear for one round, losing their next turn as they witness visions of ghostly terror. As her action, she can possess an object she touches, animating it so that it acts as she desires. For instance, if she animates a gun, she can make it fire (or not fire, if someone else is holding it) or fly through the air a short distance each round, moving as Ghostwalk herself can. Alternatively, she can bodily possess an object for up to about ten hours at a time, during which period her body effectively is the object. Interaction: A character can ingratiate themselves with Ghostwalk merely by being able to discuss books they’ve recently read. Assuming the character isn’t a villain or otherwise up to no good, Ghostwalk is more than happy to spend time discussing the merits of books across a wide spectrum of genres. Use: The doll’s head turns and utters a dire warning. Luckily, it’s just Ghostwalk making an entrance.

Dread, page 179 When not facing down enemies, Ghostwalk sometimes possesses objects to prank her friends. Her friends are mostly not amused.

In the Boundless setting, Ghostwalk is a member of the New York-based Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: Ghostwalk unleashes a ghostly bolt at a character within long range. If the attack hits, the character takes 7 points of Intellect damage (ignores Armor) and is stunned from fear for one round.

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GRAVITAS

Voltage, page 152 GM intrusion: The character keeps falling up each round until they can succeed on a Speed defense roll. After just one round, a character has fallen nearly 600 feet (180 m) up.

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GRAVITY-POWERED VILLAIN

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Kaiden Karlsson liked to push his luck long before he tried to steal an experimental graviton-generating device from the university research lab. Or, as his siblings used to say, he wasn’t quite right in the head. His yards-long rap sheet described a series of petty thefts, simple assaults, cons gone wrong, and several stays in the county jail before his wealthy mother would inevitably bail him out and sic enough lawyers on the problem to make it go away. So when Kaiden was hired to steal intellectual property, it wasn’t too surprising that he decided to deviate from the job and grab the device itself. Which of course promptly exploded. The entire building came down on him—or would have, if his newly bequeathed gravity powers hadn’t kicked in just in time to save his life. Has Kaiden’s luck—make that Gravitas’s luck—finally changed? Motive: Acquire wealth and notoriety Environment: Anywhere Health: 53 Damage Inflicted: 12 points Armor: 5 Movement: Short; long when gravitationally levitating Modifications: Speed defense as level 9 due to gravitational deflection; gravity power as level 9; see through deception and flattery as level 3 Combat: Gravitas can make people fall into the sky or crush them using his ability to control gravity within very long range. He can usually affect only a couple of targets that are next to each other at one time, but since a target could be an entire train or other equally large vehicle or structure (which he can bring down like a massive hammer on a given area), he has the potential to attack several targets at once. Targets struck by a vehicle or small building are trapped underneath, crushed for 5 points of ambient damage each round until they escape or are rescued. Interaction: Gravitas is especially vulnerable to flattery, given that one of his main motivations is notoriety. A devious negotiator might be able to influence him to act as they wish, at least for a while. Whatever the situation, Gravitas has little sense of consequences and would risk much for little reward, as long as there was some media exposure involved. Use: Voltage has offered a reward for Gravitas, hoping that if she has the defeated man’s remains, she’ll be able to extract what she assumes is the gravity generator component that gives him his abilities, and use it for herself.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s THE GRIN

ALIEN CONQUERORS

5 (15)

The Grin are a warlike, colonizing alien race. Commanding high technology and faster-than-light starcraft, they have cut a line of conquest through the galaxy. Hundreds of worlds lie beneath their imperial boot, and many more are on the verge of succumbing. Earth itself nearly fell to the Grin in the 1980s, but the world’s superheroes of that period beat them back. That defeat was an insult to the Grin, and by extension their leader—an entity they call the Exultant—that they haven’t forgotten, and likely soon plan on redressing. The Grin are hierarchical, and those selected to join the ranks of the fanatic troopers are outfitted with high-tech weapons and armor that are more than a match for an average enemy. The Grin also have their own champions that far outmatch the average trooper, and even many of Earth’s most powerful heroes. Motive: Conquer and colonize Environment: Anywhere in the galaxy Health: 20 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 4 Movement: Short; long when flying with jet boots Combat: The average Grin trooper wields a long-range particle beam weapon that can target up to three creatures standing next to each other with one attack. Alternatively, a Grin can use a long-range pacification ray that paralyzes the target for about an hour on a failed Might defense roll. Most troopers’ battle suits include a psychic lure, which radiates an immediate-range telepathic urge to surrender to the Grin. Creatures who fail an Intellect defense roll can still choose not to surrender, but their thoughts become muddled, hindering all actions until they move away from the Grin. Grin champions are level 8 or higher, with 55 health, 8 Armor, and the ability to inflict 13 points of damage on three or more targets within very long range by using high-tech weaponry and powers derived from forced evolution. Interaction: Most members of the Grin feel privileged to be part of the troop, fanatically following orders. Fraternizing with non-Grin is considered a crime of the most heinous sort. Use: A spying spacecraft, monitoring the Earth, has just been picked up by deep-space scans. It belongs to the Grin. Other Equipment: A Grin trooper’s battle suit can be salvaged for at least one manifest cypher (usually a level 5 device that restores 1 Pool point or health point per round for five hours) and sometimes the particle beam rifle noted under Combat.

Particle beam rifle: level 5 artifact. Targets up to three creatures per long range attack. Depletion: 1 in 1d20. GM intrusion (group): A level 8 champion of the Grin arrives.

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Claim the Sky HIGHRISE

Voltage, page 152 Edifice, page 116 When Highrise shifts back to normal human size, he becomes a basic level 2 NPC, losing all increases to health, Armor, attacks, and so on.

In the Boundless setting, Highrise is a member of Dread (page 179).

GM intrusion: In the middle of a pitched battle, Highrise shrinks to normal size and his opponents lose him in the confusion.

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VILLAIN WHO CAN GROW VERY LARGE

7 (21)

When Rory Mac, a small-time hood in Boston, first discovered his mutant ability to grow extremely large, his grandfather (also a career criminal) told him stories of Irish giants in the distant past called the Fomhóire. Rory liked to think that he was related to these legendary beings, and planned to take a moniker appropriate to that background. But the crew that he ran with at the time started calling him Highrise, and when he gets big, Rory’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so to speak. So he accepted the rather simplistic name and, at the behest of his friends, used his ability to steal by carrying away ATMs or ripping the tops off armored cars. Then he was contacted by Dread’s leader, Voltage, who convinced him that he could do a lot more with his gift. Not surprisingly, he has run afoul of the hero Edifice more than once, and considers him his archenemy. So far Edifice has come out the victor in each confrontation, but Rory’s always looking for a chance to get his revenge. Motive: Greed Environment: Alone or with one or more members of Dread Health: 55 Damage Inflicted: 10 points Armor: 5 Movement: Short Modifications (in giant form): Strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 9; Speed defense as level 4 due to size; resists lies and trickery as level 1 Combat: Highrise can shift from regular size to a 50-foot (15 m) tall giant as part of another action. When giant-sized, he prefers to smash foes with his fists, possibly targeting three human-sized targets at once if they are all within immediate range of each other. If Highrise attacks a single target, he can choose to grab the victim on a successful hit, holding them helpless until they can escape. A helpless victim takes damage each round if Highrise chooses to squeeze. Alternatively, he can throw a helpless target a very long distance into the air or into the side of a building (inflicting damage and the target must succeed on a Might defense roll or descend one step on the damage track). Interaction: In his giant form, Highrise seems to lose some of his higher reasoning. Generally, however, if promised loot, he will consider nearly any offer. Use: According to social media, a man the size of a five-story building has grabbed an armored truck from in front of a grocery store and is trying to smash it open.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s THE HORROR

MONSTROUS RECLUSE

10 (30)

Experiments with creating a new form of exotic matter went tragically wrong, transforming Sullivan Morales into a hideous 10-foot (3 m) tall monstrosity. As if the Horror’s mere presence wasn’t enough, he has developed various telepathic abilities, including the psychological power to draw out the horrific part of a viewer’s own soul and show it back to them. This can be a life-changing or a life-ending event for the viewer. Dreadful, strong, and possibly immortal, the Horror just wants to be left alone by the society that hates and fears him. Currently, he lives in the sewers beneath Manhattan. Motive: To be left alone; to cure his condition Environment: In lonely, dark places, all alone Health: 100 Damage Inflicted: 15 points Armor: 10 Movement: Short; short when burrowing Modifications: Speed defense as level 7; knowledge tasks as level 8 Combat: The Horror’s two physical attacks each round are devastating, and targets who take damage must succeed on a Might defense roll or descend one step on the damage track. He can throw cars and large objects at targets within long range, attacking all creatures within immediate range of his primary target. If the Horror spends his action concentrating on a target within short range, the psychic attack causes them to objectively confront the horror of their own existence (heightened by an order of magnitude) on a failed Intellect defense roll. A target who succeeds is still dazed for one round, while a target who fails takes 15 points of Intellect damage, is stunned for one round, and (if the Horror wishes it) moves one step down the damage track. Afterward, the affected target is dazed until they mentally come to grips with what they saw, which takes at least a few days. The Horror’s healing factor is incredible. He regains 20 health per round, and even if at 0 health, he regains 1 point of health each minute. Interaction: The Horror tries to ignore contact, but if intruders persevere, he will telepathically respond. All such contact is tinged with a creeping sense of dread. The best way to motivate the Horror is to hold out a promise of a cure. Use: The international criminal known as Z has promised to return the Horror to normalcy if the monstrosity does his bidding during an upcoming crime spree.

Z, page 156 GM intrusion: The character within immediate range of the Horror must succeed on a Speed defense roll or be grasped by a mouth, tendril, or clawed hand. (This requires no action on the Horror’s part.) The grabbed character sustains 10 points of damage each round until they escape.

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Claim the Sky JABBERWOCKY In the Boundless setting, Jabberwocky lives in New York City.

GM intrusion: The confused character mistakes an ally for an enemy and attacks them.

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PSYCHIC VILLAIN

5 (15)

When Cynthia Fu was accepted into the apprenticeship program to begin training as an electrician, she was ecstatic. But just two weeks in, a supervisor failed her, asking her to perform a task on a live junction box that scrambled Cynthia’s mind, scarred her flesh, and activated the latent mutant power she possessed to sow confusion in others. Taking the name Jabberwocky, the fledgling villain made a name for herself by robbing a bank. She walked inside in full view of the security cameras, passing armed guards and tellers who could only babble incomprehensibly. Electronic countermeasures, including the bank vault, reacted like the people in Jabberwocky’s presence, becoming confused and failing to function. Since then, Jabberwocky has periodically robbed other institutions, only harming those who resist her influence and try to stop her. Motive: Amass a fortune, sow confusion Environment: Anywhere money or other valuables can be taken Health: 25 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 1 Movement: Short Modifications: Sowing confusion and Wild Stare tasks as level 7 Combat: Jabberwocky radiates a short-range psychic aura that confuses minds, computers, networks, and other electronic systems, preventing them from communicating with each other or themselves. She normally suppresses it, but can unleash her confusion-sowing aura as part of another action. Targets that fail an Intellect defense roll are effectively helpless, their minds unable to clearly perceive the real world. Victims can attempt a new defense roll each round. The effect persists while Jabberwocky is in range and for a minute or two thereafter. She can choose to target a troublesome victim with her Wild Stare attack, which inflicts Intellect damage (ignores Armor) in addition to the main confusion effect. Devices in range of her ability likewise fail to perform their function for the duration, transmitting only gibberish, failing to engage security systems, or, in the case of electronic locks, simply unlocking. Most of them recover after she leaves, just like the people. Interaction: Most people come away with a very surreal sense of Jabberwocky. If they hear her talk at all, it is seemingly the same babble they themselves produce. Use: When Jabberwocky steals valuable art from another villain, it sets off a war between various factions that causes a spike in casualties for civilians who get caught in the middle.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s JINSOKU

SPEEDSTER HERO

7 (21)

Michiko Nomura was always faster than her classmates. As she got older her speed only increased, but she hid her growing superhuman abilities. When she attended daigaku (“university” in Japanese), she studied entomology, not only fascinated with the world of insects, but also curious about her own powers. When she moves faster than normal, the ability is accompanied by the appearance of energy extrusions akin to wings and sharp pincers. When a kaiju attacked Tokyo, she and some of her daigaku classmates—who’d harbored secret abilities of their own—rose to the occasion and beat back the massive creature. Realizing that everything had changed, at least for her, she took the name Jinsoku (“swift”) and started a team of superheroes in Tokyo called Senshuken (“The Greatest”). Motive: Safeguard Tokyo and Japan Environment: Usually with at least a few other members of Senshuken (level 6 and 7) Health: 35 Damage Inflicted: 8 points Armor: 1 Movement: Long; very long when flying Modifications: Speed defense, initiative, and attacks as level 9 due to speedster ability Combat: Jinsoku’s speed means she can make four melee attacks each round on her action using her energy blades. In fact, she can split up her attacks as she moves up to a long distance during that round, dispensing each of the four attacks anywhere along the way. Alternatively, she can take up to four other actions as she moves, such as attempting to deflect bullets, steal an item from an NPC, or something similar. It’s difficult to land a hit on Jinsoku, but if an attack succeeds, her speedster metabolism grants her 3 points of health each round, and 1 point of health each minute if reduced to 0 health (unless her body is more than 70 percent destroyed, at which point regeneration falters). Interaction: As the head of a super team, Jinsoku has learned diplomacy and tact. She’s very capable and experienced, and that shows in any interaction with her. Though she’s not pompous, she can come across a bit rushed, as her thoughts are always racing ahead of everyone else’s. Use: A villain the PCs are chasing goes to ground in Tokyo, and the characters need Jinsoku’s help.

The extrusion of her wings and blades is, as best as anyone can determine, a manifestation of subatomic particles with temporal properties.

GM intrusion: Jinsoku moves so quickly this round that she can take another turn.

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Claim the Sky KAOS Blackstar, page 108 Valor, page 150 Whisper, page 154 No one is sure if Kaos’s probability-warping powers are inherently destructive, or if that result is due to their wielder’s outlook. In the Boundless setting, Kaos lives in Los Angeles. The Grin, page 123

GM intrusion: When Kaos releases their probability detonation, instead of dealing damage, something exceedingly improbable happens, usually bad, such as the character becoming stuck in a wall or turned to glass.

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PROBABILITY-MANIPULATING ANARCHIST VILLAIN

6 (18)

Probability-altering powers tug at the fundamental building blocks of the universe. Anyone employing them would have to be naive, or at least unconcerned that a thumb pushed down on reality’s balance in one place usually means an equal and opposite reaction occurs somewhere else, leading to disorder and, often enough, destruction. No one would describe Kaos as naive. They are a self-avowed nihilistic anarchist who thinks all the world is a cruel joke, one Kaos is forced to endure because their power prevents them from taking their own final exit. If they are denied a rest, then Kaos has decided that the world must be made to suffer. Kaos doesn’t seem to have a secret identity. When they go out into the world, it is always as Kaos, dragging havoc in their wake. As such, they are a foe of Blackstar as well as Valor and Whisper. Motive: Anarchy and destruction Environment: Wherever infrastructure can be destroyed Health: 22 Damage Inflicted: 9 points Armor: 1 Movement: Short Modifications: Speed defense as level 9 due to probability warp; probability-warping powers as level 9 Combat: Sometimes Kaos “finds” a powerful blaster dropped by a Grin trooper and uses it to blast particle beams at targets. Other times they happen to dodge just right, so an attack against Kaos hits the attacker’s ally or civilians. If Kaos deigns to punch a foe or throw a nearby object, they defy the odds and execute the attack perfectly (a level 9 attack inflicting damage that ignores Armor). Each round that Kaos is in combat and calls on their probability power, they build a growing charge of unresolved probability around them. (Some people say it’s like looking into the box where Schrodinger’s cat is trapped and seeing the quantum superposition with your naked eye.) At any point, Kaos can release the charge, creating a probability detonation that affects everything within short range; on a failed Might defense roll, victims take damage (ignores Armor) equal to twice the number of rounds Kaos spent building the charge. Interaction: Kaos is a difficult person to speak to, because if they tire of a conversation, they can get out of it in improbable ways, up to and including a city bus’s brakes failing, causing it to smash into whoever’s annoying the villain. Use: A plume of dust rises at the city center. It’s a bunch of teens and young adults dressed like Kaos trying to torch the shopping mall, hoping Kaos will come in person.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s LORD ASH

MASTERMIND VILLAIN WHO ABSORBS KINETIC ENERGY

6 (18)

Once a simple worker on a coffee plantation in Peru, Manco de la Vega was changed when he found one of seven stones sacred to the Incan god Inti. Touching it unlocked latent mutant powers, transforming him into someone stronger, faster, and smarter than before. Eyes burning like tiny suns, his greatest gift was the ability to absorb energy of any sort. Effectively immune to harm, when he is powered up, he can fly, perform incredible feats of strength, and unleash searing sun bolts. Now calling himself Lord Ash, Manco maintains a secret base within Sabancaya Volcano in Peru. An ever-changing roster of villains keeps him company. Lord Ash likes the volcano because he can wade out into a nearby magma tube and become so flush with energy that his entire body burns as bright as the sun. Motive: Accumulate wealth, find other sacred stones of Inti Environment: Often in his volcano base Health: 40 Damage Inflicted: 10 points (see Combat) Armor: 3 Movement: Short; flies a long distance each round if powered up Modifications: Can operate as level 12 if powered up by energy Combat: Even when not powered up, Lord Ash is impressive. However, if subject to effects or attacks that would normally inflict damage, such as the kinetic energy of a punch or the electrical energy of a lightning blast, Lord Ash instead absorbs it. He gains one additional effective level for each 10 points of damage he absorbs, up to a maximum level of 12. (Lord Ash is equally able to absorb psychic energy; his one vulnerability seems to be poison.) Lord Ash can make a number of attacks on his turn equal to his total level divided by 3 (round down). These are either brute force punches that inflict damage equal to his effective level + 4, or longrange sun bolts that inflict the same amount of damage. He can stay powered up for about an hour, or for about a minute if using his abilities normally in combat, assuming no one else attacks him or he doesn’t otherwise recharge himself. Lord Ash can always choose to release all his stored power at once as a directed solar flare at a single target within very long range, easing the attack by three steps and inflicting double normal damage. Interaction: Lord Ash believes he is an avatar of a god and treats others accordingly. Those who convince him that they take him seriously are at least accorded an audience. Use: A handful of villains targeted a museum hosting archeological displays from around the world. They

work for Lord Ash.

Lord Ash believes there are six other Inti statues lost in the world. He hopes to gather them all and thus unlock all the powers of Inti that he claims run in his bloodline, then usher in a new era on Earth.

GM intrusion: The energy behind the character’s melee attack against Lord Ash is drained out so suddenly that the character stumbles, dazed until the end of their next turn.

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Claim the Sky THE MAJESTIC FAMILY GLOBETROTTING FAMILY OF HEROES

Everyone in the Majestic Family has extraordinary abilities, and the world knows it. They don’t have secret identities; they go by their actual names. And yes, their last name really is Majestic. The core family is composed of Natalie Majestic and her husband Jack, their teenage son “Ace,” and Jack’s sister Olive. And thanks to Olive’s inventions, the Majestics routinely leave their compound in Virginia to travel the world—and beyond—in their M-jet, their space-faring M-shuttle, and even their faster-than-light M-craft that allows them to travel to other stars.

NATALIE MAJESTIC

Attractor and best tool, page 384 Comprehension, page 385

Lord Ash, page 129 GM intrusion: Natalie slaps both hands together, creating a shock wave (level 10) that attacks everything in a cone-shaped area up to a long distance from her.

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Natalie is a force of nature. As one of the strongest and toughest people on the planet and the unofficial head of the Majestics, she and her team are in high demand with law enforcement, governments, and other super teams. However, she and her family are more explorers than crimefighters, so she rarely answers such calls. Her impressive strength is often used to help out in her sister-in-law’s lab and sometimes to safeguard the other family members on their frequent outings to strange places. But of course, when true planetary threats loom, the Majestics help. Assuming they’re not on the far side of the galaxy. Motive: Explore the universe, safeguard her family Health: 80 Damage Inflicted: 15 points Armor: 15 Movement: Short; very long when jumping Combat: Natalie’s punch can demolish buildings, and with her Armor (which also protects her from things that regular armor can’t, like psychic and ambient damage), she can withstand debris should that building come down on her. She’s so tough, in fact, that she can brush off brutal pressures at the sea bottom and the vacuum of space with equal ease, apparently able to exist in an anoxic state indefinitely. Interaction: Bold but kind, decisive but willing to listen, Natalie usually speaks for the team. She certainly cares about the rest of the world, and is willing to offer aid, but her first priority is her family. Use: Natalie shows up in plain clothes asking about a particular artifact going up for sale. She wants to procure it for her sister-in-law Olive, but it turns out, so does Lord Ash. Other Equipment: Like everyone in the family, Natalie carries several devices created by Olive Majestic, including the following cyphers: attractor, best tool, and comprehension.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s JACK MAJESTIC

7 (21)

Jack met Natalie when they attended a semester abroad together in Ireland twenty years ago. Since then, they’ve been inseparable. They married, raised a child, and with the help of Jack’s sister Olive, made the Majestic family what it is today. In fact, it’s Jack’s infectious excitement about exploring that transformed the Family into celebrity explorers. Who can forget that momentous day when the Majestic Family traveled to Mars? They were the first Earth people to do so, and that’s all down to Jack and his passion for travel. Like his wife, Jack is powerful. In his case, it’s because he can command the fundamental force of gravity, granting him fine control over the environment. If his wife can demolish a building with a punch, he can lift it off its foundations by thinking about it. Motive: Explore the universe, safeguard his family Health: 40 Damage Inflicted: 12 points Armor: 4 Movement: Short; very long when flying Modifications: Gravity powers, gravity attacks, and Speed defense against physical attacks as level 9 Combat: Jack’s gravity-manipulation abilities give him the power of flight, improve his defenses (as already noted), allow him to pin up to three targets within long range to the ground or another hard surface (and crush them each round, if he chooses) until they escape, or send those same targets falling into the sky. He can also emit a very-long-range graviton beam at a single target that inflicts damage at the subatomic level (and thus ignores Armor). He can impart a gravitational field to objects or make them repel gravity (creating antigravity) for several hours. If he has minutes to concentrate, he can lift buildings from their foundations or cause them to collapse. If he has hours to concentrate, he can extend his influence for several miles into the surrounding ground, and then lift that chunk of earth into the sky. Interaction: Curiosity and a desire to explore with family and friends are Jack’s most endearing qualities. If interacting with a stranger, he usually wants to show them some weird keepsake he acquired on an earlier trip, or wants to know all about the strange places they’ve been. Use: Jack Majestic shows up and has questions about a villain the PCs recently faced, because he thinks they may know about a previously undiscovered hollow world far beneath the continents. Other Equipment: Like everyone in the family, Jack carries several devices created by Olive Majestic, including the following cyphers: blackout, darksight, and disguise module.

Blackout, page 384 Darksight, page 386 Disguise module, page 388

GM intrusion: Jack Majestic takes another action.

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Claim the Sky Duke: level 7; Armor 4; transforms into a component of the M-car customized to carry Ace

Best tool, page 384 Detonation (web), page 387 Disguise module, page 388 Stun pistol: level 8 artifact; long-range attack stuns target for one minute. Depletion: 1 in 1d20. GM intrusion: Ace touches the character, inflicting 10 points of Speed damage (ignores Armor). It’s his healing ability reversed, retarding biological function rather than supercharging it.

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ACE MAJESTIC

5 (15)

The nickname “Ace” was given to Bernard Majestic by his aunt Olive when he first demonstrated his amazing regeneration abilities. His wound-healing power was the only reason the Majestic Family continued its wide-ranging, explore-strange-new-worlds tradition after the kid was born. Without such resilience, no responsible parent would consider taking a child into harm’s way. Ace’s ability to heal others is also a plus. Ace loves everyone in his family, but his favorite “family” member is Duke, a companion and guardian machine Aunt Olive built for him when he was just two years old. Though everyone else thinks of Duke as a robot, Ace is sure that the mechanism is as deserving of love as anyone. In fact, inspired by Duke, he’s become Olive Majestic’s apprentice in all things robotic. Motive: Explore the universe, improve Duke Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 8 points Armor: 4 Movement: Short Modifications: Robotics tasks as level 7 Combat: Ace often uses a long-range stun pistol in combat provided to him by Aunt Olive. On a successful attack, the target is stunned and unable to take turns for a minute, or until it can succeed on a difficulty 8 Might defense roll. Ace regains 15 health every round, even if at 0 health. He can restore up to 10 points of health or Pool points to an ally within short distance, as long as the target and Ace are both standing on the same surface, touching the same wall, or the like. A given target can be affected by this only once per day. Though the Majestic Family doesn’t really want him to use his power this way, Ace’s touch can also be used in reverse, inflicting 10 points of Speed damage (ignores Armor). Ace normally keeps this power under wraps until a true emergency occurs. Luckily, in addition to his stun pistol, his robotic companion Duke is a powerful defender. Interaction: Ace is no sullen teen, but his interests are starting to diverge from those of his parents. He is happy to meet new people and learn about new opportunities, and he is especially responsive to people closer to his own age. Use: Ace goes missing from the Majestic Family compound in Virginia. A few hours later, he is sighted with a group of kids his own age touring a museum in D.C. Other Equipment: Like everyone in the family, Ace carries several devices created by Olive Majestic, including the stun pistol described above, and the following cyphers: best tool, detonation (web), and disguise module.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s OLIVE MAJESTIC

5 (15)

If Olive Majestic wanted to, she could be the richest multibillionaire on the planet. Her inventions outstrip most other advanced technology, very likely second only to Valerie Lincoln, and she’s always working on something new. If she were to release even a fraction of her designs into the world, the act would revolutionize a rainbow of industries, including transportation, communication, computation, and more. It’s a poorly kept secret that she built the Majestic Family a faster-than-light spacecraft, called the M-craft (of course). But Olive’s inventions are retained for her family. In a very real sense, her superpower is her genius with invention and engineering. Though others might scoff when she says it, most of her radical designs really are too advanced for the world to handle. Her minor “tame” patents are the source of most of the family’s finances. Motive: Invent, safeguard the Majestic Family Health: 35 Damage Inflicted: 8 points Armor: 8 Movement: Short; long when flying Modifications: Mechanical design, engineering, and gadgeteer tasks as level 9 Combat: Olive’s suit is outfitted with a protective force field, reactionless thrusters for flying, and an array of deployable laser, stun, plasma, and sonic weapons, allowing her to target a foe up to a very long distance away and inflict the damage of her choice. If Olive has time to prepare and has material from her lab or one of the M-vehicles on hand, she can create a device capable of almost anything the family needs, whether that’s a cryonic cell to keep a villain on ice, a one-use dimensional portal, a communicator to signal another star, and so on. Interaction: Even when talking with others, Olive is usually multitasking and checking a heads-up display in her goggles, so she is usually distracted. One can get her full attention by showing her a gadget of alien technology or something else technical she’s never seen before. Use: The lab of an evil genius was recently uncovered. It’s been unused since World War II but still contains objects and devices that only someone of Olive Majestic’s brilliance is likely to comprehend. Other Equipment: In addition to her suit (level 9; biometrically locked to Olive’s use) described above, she carries several devices, including the following manifest cyphers: information sensor, instant shelter, and lightning wall.

Valerie Lincoln, page 181

Information sensor, instant shelter, and lightning wall, page 391

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Claim the Sky MALEVOLENCE

MYSTIC VILLAIN THAT SUMMONS DEMONS

In the Boundless setting, Malevolence lives in Florida.

Demon, page 322

GM intrusion: Another demon appears to help Malevolence.

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Revon Rhodes is a well-known influencer. Her online musical performances have had hundreds of thousands of views. According to her fans, she reinterpreted the cultural current of house music by adding primitive rhythms and gothic folklore. Her fans might feel differently if they knew that her alter ego was Malevolence, the demon-summoning villain who appears in a blast of hellfire, often targeting places where scientists and researchers congregate. She views science as a paradigm-changing threat to her magic, which draws power from belief. She’s also highly vindictive, punishing those who go out of their way to criticize her music. Few people have made the connection between Revon Rhodes and Malevolence, and those who do are usually eaten by demons. Motive: Eliminate the scientific paradigm, revenge Environment: Anywhere Health: 44 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 6 Movement: Short Modifications: Demon lore as level 9 Combat: Malevolence relies on “demon vigor” (represented by her Armor and high health) to protect her. As her action, she can unleash a legion of up to five demons to attack her foes, possess them, or become a living curse that forever changes her enemies. She is hindered in all actions by one step for every two demons she releases from her person, until they are returned or a day passes. She can also force summoned demons to take on the shapes of useful objects, or do any number of other tasks for her, such as heal her, deliver messages, teleport her, answer questions of secret lore, and other duties. She need merely ask an already-summoned demon or call up one especially for the task at hand. Interaction: Malevolence is willing to bargain, but she requires that any deal reached clearly favor her. Use: A demonic effect is troubling someone the PCs know, and despite the bad blood between them, the PCs know of a certain someone with knowledge in that area that they could ask: Malevolence. Other Equipment: Malevolence carries a few manifest cyphers that are actually demons bound in the form of objects; they take a dim view of anyone other than their owner trying to use them.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s MANSLAUGHTER

TRANSFORMING VILLAIN WITH A FLAIR FOR WEAPONRY

6 (18)

Merle Dyson enjoyed a career as a military sharpshooter on an elite and covert joint special operations team. That abruptly ended when an operation was blown, resulting in the deaths of most of the team, while leaving the survivors permanently disabled, including Merle. During Merle’s military service, his personal network grew exponentially, including into some unsavory spaces—which is how he met Voltage, Dread’s leader. He promised her his not-inconsiderable services if she would “fix” him. She came through. The theft of smart materials from the private laboratory of a Faust Industries researcher, once refined and grafted directly into Merle’s body, gave him a new lease on life. Or perhaps more accurately, on other people’s deaths. Now known as Manslaughter, he can transform his body into weapons, even complex weapons like firearms. One of his favorite ways to go into action is with both arms transformed into autocannons or combat shotguns. Motive: Thirst for violence Environment: Alone or with one or more members of Dread Health: 40 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 5 Movement: Short Combat: Manslaughter can use his action to transform parts of his body into weapons, such as transforming both arms into autocannons or combat shotguns, allowing him to make two short-range attacks each round. If he takes two rounds to change himself, he can transform more radically, becoming something equivalent to a heavy-caliber turret (immobile) able to inflict 12 points of damage each round. He usually can’t maintain such a whole-body transformation for more than three rounds at a time. If damaged, Manslaughter can use his action to regain 10 health, or 20 health if he absorbs a small machine or firearm of some kind. It’s possible that Manslaughter could transform himself into machines or devices other than weapons, such as becoming a vehicle or a vending machine. However, given his love for violence, it would have to be a car with a ram designed for hitting people, or a very tippy vending machine. He once transformed into a gargantuan chain-sword weapon wielded by Highrise. Interaction: Manslaughter is a “shoot first, ask questions later” sort of guy. Use: The PCs hear gunfire.

Voltage, page 152 Faust Industries, page 177 In the Boundless setting, Manslaughter is a member of Dread (page 179).

Highrise, page 124 GM intrusion: Manslaughter creates a weapon pod that fires a very-long-range missile that inflicts 12 points of damage on all targets within immediate range of each other.

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Claim the Sky MIDKNIGHT Anton Wolf, page 187

In the Boundless setting, Midknight operates mainly in Europe.

GM intrusion: An attack that would have hit Midknight fails to connect because the armor releases a barrage of distracting flak at just the right moment.

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HIGH-TECH VILLAIN

6 (18)

Operating throughout Europe, terrorist and arch-criminal Midknight wears a suit of armor and wields a black blade. He claims his suit and sword are magical, but they are in fact high-tech artifacts created by Anton Wolf, the German weapons designer. Sometimes Midknight partners with or even—on rare occasions—works for other villains. Other times he works on his own projects, which include stealing valuables to finance the creation of a militia of nationalists interested in perpetrating terrorist attacks designed to inflame international distrust. Motive: Inspire fear, cash in on resulting strife Environment: Almost anywhere in Europe, alone or accompanied by one or two other villains Health: 28 Damage Inflicted: 10 points Armor: 8 Movement: Short; very long with jet-assisted jump from armor Modifications: Sword attacks as level 8; stealth tasks as level 8 due to armor camouflage Combat: Midknight can fire flechettes from his black blade at two targets within long range each round. On a failed Speed defense roll, a target takes damage and must succeed on a Might defense roll or be tranquilized (and unconscious) for up to an hour, or until they successfully rouse themselves. In melee, the powered blade’s attacks ignore up to 4 points of Armor. On a hit, it inflicts damage, and, on a failed Might defense roll, the target falls one step on the damage track from the grievous wound. The armor and blade possess various other lesser abilities. For instance, the armor has camouflage and jet-assisted jump functions, and the sword can render an area within short distance lightless (but Midknight can still see). Interaction: Midknight will debate if he doesn’t think it will interfere with his current mission. He’s reasonable on the surface, but dig in, and he is revealed as a fanatic. Use: An attack on the UN building is laid at the feet of a foreign power. But some people suspect it was Midknight.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s MINDER

PSYCHIC VILLAIN

7 (21)

Iminathi “Mina” Semenya helped save Earth from the Grin invasion of the 1980s as the superhero everyone knew as Minder. A young South African woman with mild telepathic abilities, Mina underwent a transformation thanks to a device created by Niles Lincoln during the desperate heart of the invasion designed to boost her powers. This psychic upgrade allowed Minder to coordinate all defenders of Earth against the Grin. But while it gave Minder overwatch capabilities that proved indispensable in defense of the planet, it also extracted a dire cost. Over the following decades, the device continued to boost her abilities, usually in ways she didn’t expect or want. The aid became an affliction, coloring Minder’s perceptions of reality so strongly that hero has gradually but effectively become a villain. Motive: Unpredictable Environment: Anywhere Health: 33 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 6 (from telekinetic shield) Movement: Short; long when telekinetically flying Modifications: Telepathic contact as level 10 Combat: Minder’s array of mental powers includes telekinesis, which she can use to grant herself flight, create a telekinetic shield, and shoot a force bolt at up to three foes at once within short range. This same ability allows her to manipulate or pick up objects and toss them about. Thanks to her mental powers, she’s such a strong telepath that she can telepathically communicate with anyone in the world who’s willing to talk to her. She can also read the surface thoughts of those within long range who fail an Intellect defense roll. Other abilities include weak precognition, which sometimes turns up useful knowledge of things that could happen within a few days, but which is most commonly used when she’s in combat (and thus already figured into her overall level). Interaction: At unexpected moments, Minder goes from sorrowful to full of rage, from sad to enthusiastic. Most people assume she suffers from a mental illness brought on by her amped-up powers. But she just laughs at such suggestions, insisting that she is acting according to insights gained by seeing into a higher reality. Use: A gadgeteer thinks they know of a way to safely remove the device amping up Minder’s abilities. Step one is capturing Minder, who no longer wishes for a remedy.

Niles Lincoln, page 170

Minder’s amped-up mental powers include some sort of psychometabolism ability that has dramatically slowed her natural aging process; she still appears young decades later. In the Boundless setting, Minder lives in California. When she was a hero in South Africa, she was partners with Vanish (page 195).

GM intrusion: Minder uses a psychometabolism power to regain all her lost health.

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Claim the Sky THE ONE

Mystery Earth, page 199

Psychic crystal, page 275 Kaiju, page 338 Silver Sentinel, page 146 GM intrusion (group): The One creates a kaiju to combat the PCs.

138

Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

NIGH-OMNIPOTENT COSMIC ENTITY

13 (39)

Little is known about this godlike entity. It probably hails from the early universe, and demonstrates a real animosity toward living things and objects that it didn’t create itself. With a mere thought, it can call skyscraper-sized objects into existence. In fact, over the course of billions of years, it has created entire worlds, and world-sized structures. Many of these are filled with life, though most of that life is blighted, sterile, or otherwise flawed. Despite aeons of trying, it never seems to get life exactly right. In the last few millennia, the One finally learned some humility. Sort of. Now it seeks to learn the secret of life from already-living things, in order to improve its own creations. In the past, it has used its powers to teleport groups of creatures across interstellar distances, where it can study and test them. For example, it has twice taken groups of heroes from Earth to a planet (likely of its creation) dubbed Mystery Earth. Motive: Impossible to ascertain Environment: Anywhere in the universe Health: 100 Damage Inflicted: 15 points Armor: 13 Movement: Long; interstellar distances between two points when calling on its celestial power of travel Combat: The One prefers to leave combat to the various servitor creatures it has already created or newly fashions. As its action, it can create simple but powerful brutes (level 6) two or three at a time, or a single more powerful entity (level 9). These creatures may somewhat resemble the foes they fight, or may simply be protoplasmic horrors. All age and die within a few days. Alternatively, the One can sweep away all its enemies at once by teleporting them to some distant location, such as one of its laboratory planets, which include stasis prisons (level 8) to keep newly arrived guests in line. Finally, the One, possessed of celestial power, can attack every creature within short range with a detonation of energy composed of equal parts electricity, fire, and force. Or use that power to restore 25 health to itself or its allies, or to create skyscraper-sized structures out of thin air (which, if used in combat, it could drop on large groups of foes). Interaction: The One can speak and understand almost any language. It generally ignores lesser beings. Getting the One’s attention probably requires damaging it, at which point it may decide that the attacker is an ideal candidate for experimentation, and teleport them (and any allies) to one of its facilities. Use: An entire apartment building in a large city has vanished. Residual celestial energy leads Silver Sentinel to the conclusion that it was kidnapped by the One. Other Equipment: The One carries several alien devices, including a psychic crystal.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s THE ROYAL HOUSE OF VIDESH

SUPERPOWERED ROYAL FAMILY WITH SELFISH GOALS All current members of the Royal House of Videsh—the ruling family of Villarama, a tiny but wealthy south Asian nation secluded in the mountains—wield superpowers. Whether this is the result of genetic engineering, secret technologies, or just happenstance, no one knows. In addition to individual powers, all members of the Royal House can fly a long distance each round, telepathically communicate with other family members in short range, and automatically regain at least 1 health each round.

LORD ESWAR (House of Videsh)

7 (21)

The head of the house is Lord Eswar, and while he can’t be lumped in with so-called villains or petty criminals, this is due in part to his status as the ruler of a sovereign nation. BASTION and other international law enforcement agencies recognize the entire family as a potential threat with great power. As the ruler of his own country, Lord Eswar enjoys wealth, the services of a small but well-trained army, and diplomatic immunity—not to mention his own superpowered family, although none of them entirely have his trust (for good reason). Although Villarama was virtually unknown decades ago, it has exploded onto the world stage, and that’s because of Eswar. As likely to be found exploring an Azaki ruin as at a diplomatic gala with his entire entourage, Eswar seeks knowledge that will increase his power even further. While not a mastermind to equal Baron Shadow or Z, he is cunning and ruthless. He doesn’t care who or what gets in his way, and has almost certainly committed serious crimes across the globe. Even if someone tries to confront him or prove his guilt, apprehending him is doubly difficult given that he can turn intangible with a thought. Motive: Gather power Environment: Usually Villarama, but potentially anywhere, often with a retinue of royal guards and sometimes with a family member or two Health: 40 Damage Inflicted: 8 points Movement: Short; long when flying Modifications: Intangibility power and attacks as level 8 Combat: Lord Eswar is rarely caught without at least a couple of royal guards (level 5) to assist him, should conflict arise. As part of another action, he can shift into an intangible form that allows him to pass through solid objects (and fly). When he phases through something solid, like a foe, he can choose to disrupt the object, inflicting damage (ignores Armor). Eswar’s physical touch can turn a foe intangible like himself, usually in an attempt to phase them halfway into the ground or wall. When he lets go, the target becomes tangible again, taking damage (ignores Armor) if released in a solid object, and is trapped until they can escape. While intangible, Lord Eswar takes no damage from mundane physical sources, and he takes only half damage from attacks that use energy (including magic). While intangible, he regains health at a rate of 4 points per round. Interaction: To be brought into Lord Eswar’s presence in the royal court can be a great honor, though it might be because he has a demand to make. He’s not used to being refused his requests, but on the other hand, he is not a cold-blooded killer. He prefers to imprison those who displease him. Use: A delegation from Villarama is suspected of spying on a nearby computer manufacturing facility. Other Equipment: Lord Eswar often wears expensive rings and clothing. One or more of these is likely to be a manifest cypher, such as an information sensor or an intelligence enhancement.

BASTION, page 163

Azaki, page 160 Baron Shadow, page 107 Z, page 156

Information sensor, page 391 Intelligence enhancement, page 391 GM intrusion: The character is phase-grabbed by Lord Eswar and dropped into a prison cell a short distance underground with no physical doors or exits.

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Claim the Sky MANA (House of Videsh)

Chronophage, page 317

GM intrusion: A future version of Mana appears, whispers in the present Mana’s ear, then blinks away. The remaining Mana’s tasks are eased for the rest of the combat.

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6 (18)

Mana is Eswar’s daughter. She spends about a third of her time in her homeland, and a third amid the young and beautiful celebrity dilettantes that seem to be constantly attending parties or events with a great many photographers. The rest of the time, she uses her time-jumping ability to exploit future occurrences in the present. For instance, simply by reading the next day’s news, Mana can make an absolute killing on various international stock markets, or get the scoop on a scandal that might affect wealthy socialites that she knows (and despises). Motive: Gather power Environment: Almost anywhere, always accompanied by a bodyguard, and sometimes with a family member or two Health: 35 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Movement: Short; long when flying; immediate when time-stepping Modifications: Speed defense as level 8 (due to seeing an instant into the future); time-jumping ability and chrono slap attacks as level 8 Combat: Mana is usually watched over by at least one bodyguard (level 5), who steps in to protect her if conflict arises. Usually, she’s happy to let others fight for her, and she steps through time a few hours early or later as her action to avoid conflict. If she has a full hour to concentrate, she can step through up to one year of time in one go. If she can’t escape conflict, she can make two chrono slaps as her action, aging each target’s extremities, which inflicts Speed damage (ignores Armor). Instead of dealing damage, she can send a foe she slaps up to a minute forward in time. She’s cautious about making too many fine temporal adjustments. For instance, although she could have her future self join her present self in a fight, it’s not safe. Any time she does this, she risks alerting chronophages. Against such creatures, she is hindered by three steps. Interaction: Willful and danger-seeking like many just entering their twenties, Mana’s ambition knows no bounds, and risks make her excited. She’s not evil, although she is petty and even cruel. She could be led into terrible situations by those with fewer morals or, conversely, inspired to do great works by those who make her stop and think about her actions. Use: One of the character’s relatives (child, niece, sibling) or the character themselves is befriended by Mana while attending university abroad.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s RAI (House of Videsh)

6 (18)

Half-brother of Lord Eswar, Rai will probably never rule his homeland. He accepts this limitation, for now. Rather than plot against his more powerful and popular brother, he’s secretly developed business interests around the world under a variety of assumed names and shell companies. Rai won’t hesitate to call upon his command of ice and cold to further his ends. He often makes personal strikes against cartels, pirates, and even superpowered individuals who cross him. Motive: Advance his business interests Environment: Anywhere Health: 37 Damage Inflicted: 6 points Armor: 5 (from ice shield) Movement: Short; long when flying Modifications: Cold generation and attacks as level 7 Combat: As part of another action, Rai can create a protective shield around himself by freezing the moisture in the air. He can create ice objects with a thought that allow him to skate around an area, create barriers, and fashion other needful things. Offensively, he can release a short-range cold blast that drains the heat of any creature standing along the line of the attack that fails a Might defense roll; affected targets take Speed damage (ignores Armor). Alternatively, he can attack every creature within immediate range with his “cold snap”—a detonation of needle-sharp ice shards that inflict 2 points of damage even on a successful Speed defense roll. Interaction: Rai enjoys a good joke. In fact, he appreciates humor so much that someone using it effectively can turn an initially contentious interaction into a true negotiation. Use: Rai’s interest in a series of illicit businesses in the city’s heart is challenged by a local criminal gang, leading to several open conflicts in the streets that have harmed innocent bystanders. Other Equipment: Though often covered by a sheath of ice, Rai enjoys wearing very expensive clothing, watches, and rings, including his royal signet ring (a very expensive item). He also has a couple of manifest cyphers, including a level 10 cypher that restores 10 health, a level 6 cypher that grants the ability to see in the dark for an hour, and a psychic communique.

The Royal House of Videsh (from left to right): Lord Eswar, Rai, Mana, Tauseef

Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

Psychic communique, page 395

GM intrusion: The character is trapped in a cube of ice, taking 6 points of Speed damage (ignores Armor) each round until they can break free.

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Claim the Sky TAUSEEF (House of Videsh) Though Tauseef’s matter-manipulation ability is mostly useful for creating illusions, in time the power could grow into something far more effective, letting him create something from nothing or transform extant objects (or even other people) into something else.

Azaki, page 160 GM intrusion: On a failed Intellect defense roll, the character’s shoes fuse with the ground, holding them fast until they can escape (or until Tau leaves the area).

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6 (18)

Of all the active members of the Royal House of Videsh, Tauseef (Tau) seems the least power-hungry. Instead, this twenty-something son of Eswar is focused on gathering lost knowledge and information, especially regarding his own royal family and the abilities that seem to be passed down patrilineally, but generally about anything related to the supernormal on Earth and beyond. You might think this passion would endear him to his father, but Tau is somewhat put off by Eswar’s focus on research for power’s sake, while his father is disappointed in Tau’s “lack of ambition.” Tau spends about half his time researching in the extensive Royal Archives in Villarama, and the other half working archeological and paleontological digs around the world. His matter-manipulation abilities allow him to recreate entire tablets, scrolls, and other relics with a touch. But he keeps his power secret. Motive: Gather knowledge, especially as related to paranormal ability origins Environment: Almost anywhere, often with at least one bodyguard Health: 35 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 5 Movement: Short; long when flying Modifications: Matter manipulation and illusion crafting as level 7 Combat: Even when at a dig site, Tau is usually watched over by at least one bodyguard (level 5), who steps in to protect him if conflict arises. Tau uses that distraction to change his clothing to armor. Tau’s matter manipulation can be used to create pseudo-real illusions within an area a short distance across, illusions with actual substance, but only while he maintains concentration (and for about one minute after). He has a difficult time directly affecting living tissue, so he usually creates weapons, creatures, or explosive events to attack foes. Or he might create an illusion that hides him or gives the impression that he’s been killed by a foe’s attack. Interaction: If one comes bearing the promise of knowledge relating to historical (or better yet, prehistorical) superhuman events, Tau is all ears, eager to talk. That is doubly true if the Azaki are mentioned. Otherwise, he can seem a bit absent-minded. Use: An archeological investigation into a previously obscure site in Antarctica is fully funded by Tau.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s

RUTHLESS

MISUNDERSTOOD OUTLAW HERO

7 (21)

It’s hard to be a hero when you look like a villain. The man dubbed “Ruthless” by the press has a nest of writhing tendrils barely concealed beneath his shirt. When he’s agitated, the tendrils burst forth with ferocious anger. Ruthless, whose real name is Malcolm Hughes, has been branded a monster, a menace, and a violent criminal despite the fact that he works hard to make sure that he never harms anyone. In fact, when possible, he strives to save people in danger and help those in need. But he must do it while always staying one step ahead of the authorities. He hates the name Ruthless. Mightier and quicker than an average human, the outlaw hero’s tendrils are stronger than steel but as flexible as octopus arms. He uses them to quickly move between locations, control his surroundings, and batter those attacking him. Motive: Clear his name, protect the innocent Environment: Anywhere Health: 40 Damage Inflicted: 10 points Armor: 1 Movement: Short; long when his tendrils are deployed Modifications: Speed defense as level 8 due to tendrils Combat: Ruthless can attack everyone within immediate range as his action with battering tendrils, which he can deploy as part of any other action. If he focuses on a single target and makes a successful attack, he can grab it and hold it physically helpless until it can escape with a successful Might defense roll. If he chooses, Ruthless can squeeze a held target for 10 points of damage each round. He can hold up to four targets at once in this fashion. Ruthless can use his tendrils to directly manipulate the area around him up to a short distance in all directions. Within this area, anything he could do with his hands he can also do with his tendrils. Given that his tendrils are much stronger and can affect a larger surface area than his hands, he can accomplish even greater feats, such as holding a collapsing bridge together, creating a net, or forming a shield that eases Speed defense tasks for dozens of people under or behind it. Interaction: Ruthless assumes that any heroes he meets are interested only in apprehending him. Likewise with the police or BASTION. If a superhero convinces Ruthless that they’re not out to get him, he can be made into a loyal ally—albeit one always on the run. Use: A fight between Ruthless and a villain who can fly (or at least stick to the sides of buildings, like Worm) has stopped downtown traffic as everyone watches.

Genetic mutation is the source of Ruthless’s powers, but it was likely an engineered mutation. By whom, not even Ruthless knows.

BASTION, page 163 Worm, page 155 GM intrusion: A mass of tendrils catches a character and inadvertently throws them into the path of a speeding car or at something else dangerous.

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Claim the Sky SHIFT Free Reign, page 119

In the Boundless setting, Shift is a member of the New York-based Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: Instead of being hindered, the character confused by Shift attacks an ally.

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SENSES-ALTERING HERO

6 (18)

Shift can induce sensory confusion in others, causing blindness, nausea, or hallucinations. She has some control over how her ability manifests in the criminals she targets, but her power isn’t direct psychic manipulation like that of Free Reign. She can’t make a criminal forget their name or believe a specifically suggested idea. However, she can effectively cripple baddies by inducing the spins, or disorient them to the point where their vivid hallucinations can pose a danger to their allies. In her secret identity as graduate student Magdalene Carmichael, Shift is part of her university’s chemistry department. Her main job (she grumps) is grading undergraduate papers. Her goal is to finish her dissertation, which explores how some superhumans obtain their abilities. Despite it having as bland a title as she could imagine, lately her thesis is drawing attention she’d rather avoid. Motive: Fight crime Environment: Anywhere Health: 25 Damage Inflicted: 8 points Armor: 3 Movement: Short Modifications: Defense tasks as level 8 due to sensory confusion induced in foes Combat: Shift breathes out an aerosol of biochemicals that immediately diffuse through the air to a short distance. Within that range, she can induce random sensory confusion in all targets in the area who fail a Might defense roll, hindering their tasks by three steps. Affected targets get another Might defense roll each round to eliminate the confusion. However, unless she’s working alone, Shift prefers to direct her ability against a single target with a touch that transfuses the chemicals, usually even through clothing or armor. The confusion effects of this attack are far more concentrated, and the touched target’s Might defense roll to resist is hindered by three steps. If the target is affected, they are effectively helpless until they succeed on a Might defense roll (hindered by three steps) to eliminate the confusion, or until about ten minutes have passed. Interaction: The quickest way to engage Magdalene (or “Maddie,” as her friends call her) is with pizza and/or some promising new data relating to her thesis. Part of the reason she is so interested is the unexpected development of her own ability after a lab accident. Use: PCs fighting a villain receive unexpected aid from Shift.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s SHRIKE

VILLAIN WITH SUPERSPEED

5 (15)

Dallas Kushner worked in IT at a large chemical manufacturer. One evening an alarm drew him to the office to investigate an unexplained server outage. He found thieves inside the building, attempting to steal an experimental device the company had purchased on the black market—an alien (Azaki) device. What began as an attempt to scare off the thieves ended with Dallas being accidentally doused in a combination of chemicals that should have proved lethal. Instead, they revealed a latent ability that granted him reflexes and speed far surpassing those of a normal human. His first act was foiling the thieves, which he did more out of a sense of outrage than moral duty. Then he proceeded to steal the chemicals himself, because as he is fond of saying, “Nice doesn’t pay the bills.” Motive: Accumulation of wealth Environment: Alone or with one or more members of Dread Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 1 Movement: Very long Modifications: Speed defense, acrobatics, and initiative as level 8; computer tasks as level 7 Combat: Shrike isn’t the strongest villain, but he is among the fastest. He can make three melee attacks each round on his action, or one “shrike strike” attack against a single target that is eased by three steps and inflicts 12 points of damage. As he moves up to a long distance in a round, he can split his normal attacks up anywhere along the way. Instead of attacking as he moves, he could take other actions (up to three), such as attempting to snatch knives or guns out of enemies’ hands, steal an item from their person, or something similar. Shrike’s enhanced dexterity means that it’s hard to land attacks on him. But if an attack succeeds, his boosted metabolism means that he regains 3 points of health each round, unless he is reduced to 0 health. When running full out, Shrike can run on or up vertical walls, as long as he begins and ends his movement on a flat surface. Interaction: Shrike is quick-witted and given to making wry commentary as he “does crime.” He is motivated first by wealth, but is willing to consider making deals that allow him access to computer systems. Despite being known for his speed, he’s also an accomplished illegal hacker. Use: The PCs need an IT consultant. By sheer coincidence, the consultant they hire—one Dallas Kushner—is not the safe choice he first appears.

Azaki, page 160

In the Boundless setting, Shrike is a member of Dread (page 179).

GM intrusion: When the character should have hit with their melee or ranged attack, Shrike evades, or maybe moves so quickly that he repositions the attack so it strikes elsewhere.

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Claim the Sky SILVER SENTINEL

LONER HERO WITH SUPERSPEED AND FORCE-MANIPULATION POWERS

On the dead version of Earth that was once his home, the Silver Sentinel was called Ravi Rad. He practiced the Muslim faith, and still does, on this newly adopted parallel world.

GM intrusion: Moving faster than the human eye can track, the Silver Sentinel simply isn’t where he seemed to be, foiling the attack.

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Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

12 (36)

Living alone on the moon in a miles-high tower of fused regolith, the Silver Sentinel watches over the Earth and beyond. Stronger and tougher than almost anything and able to command pure force, the Sentinel has little to fear from even the most powerful villains. His only weakness is that he cares for people. (He is also somewhat vulnerable to magic, though few know that.) In truth, the Silver Sentinel has endured unimaginable loss, beginning with seeing Earth destroyed during the event that bequeathed him his abilities. Bending spacetime by brute application of his command over pure force, he found this parallel dimension. Here, he forged new friendships and loves—most of which ended tragically at the hands of villains. Now he lives alone, safeguarding both his friends and himself from future harm and heartbreak. Motive: Safeguard others Environment: Almost anywhere on Earth or out in the galaxy Health: 70 Damage Inflicted: 20 points Armor: 12 (6 against magic) Movement: Short; very long when flying; interplanetary distances between two points using force to bend spacetime Modifications: Defenses against magic as level 6 Combat: The Silver Sentinel moves though spacetime more quickly than most creatures, so he has to consciously slow his movements and speech. But when he lets go, he can take three actions on each turn. This means he can make three melee attacks as his action, usually enough to shut down any fight before it gets started. Alternatively, he can emit three very-long-range force blasts, or a single force blast against one target as a level 14 attack that inflicts double normal damage on a hit. The Sentinel can project pure force in many different ways, which allows him to fly, see distant locations with the clarity of a space telescope, fashion short-lived silvery tools of bent spacetime, or create silvery fields of force to push, protect, or crush. For instance, his command over force is what allowed him to build his fused regolith tower on the moon. He regains 10 health each round except for damage from magical attacks. Interaction: Usually as cold and distant as his domicile, the Silver Sentinel is afraid of friendship. He’s lost too many friends, and not a few loves, to his enemies in the past. However, he shows up to help and protect people all the same. He feels like it’s his purpose; what else could his acquisition of his powers mean, given their apocalyptic cost on his home dimension? Use: A reflective slash across the sky means the Silver Sentinel has noticed something important enough to require his attention. Perhaps he could use the PCs’ help?

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s SINGULARITY

VILLAINOUS INTERDIMENSIONAL BEING

8 (24)

This energy being exists as a fold in spacetime with a humanoid shape. Though not human, its mind and goals are akin to that of a human hoarder. Given its power to easily move between dimensions, Singularity has amassed tons of assorted items from across the multiverse. Most of its collection seems like useless junk to anyone other than Singularity, but sometimes truly valuable and priceless items find their way into the hoard, including, in some cases, living things. It deposits this ever-growing collection into various rooms of a seemingly endless interdimensional house. The rooms of Singularity’s lair are dimensionally hijacked rooms from actual buildings, added piecemeal to its so-called Infinite Collection. Which is why some of the rooms—heaving with stacked dross as they are—are sometimes as prosaic as a kitchen circa the 1980s, and other times as esoteric as a starcraft’s airlock. Motive: Grow the Infinite Collection Environment: Anywhere in the multiverse Health: 50 (see Combat) Damage Inflicted: 10 points Movement: Short (see Combat) Modifications: Assessing value of objects as level 10 Combat: Given Singularity’s form, most ranged attacks against it are randomly refracted through the bent spacetime of its body, which doesn’t harm Singularity, or on a failed Intellect defense roll by the attacker, are redirected back at the attacker or their ally. A melee attack against Singularity requires that the attacker succeed on an Intellect defense roll, or they are shifted through a portal to some location within the Infinite Collection, or perhaps to another random dimension with dangerous properties. Usually, only attacks that inflict transdimensional energy harm Singularity; however, an attack (including a coordinated attack from different foes) that includes three or more types of energy can also damage it. If it starts taking damage, Singularity flees by stepping into another dimension, or uses its touch to attempt to transfer a target into another dimension. Interaction: Singularity can speak by vibrating dimensional boundaries, and it knows thousands of languages. It is not averse to negotiation, always wondering about nearby interesting articles it can add to its collection. It has few morals and believes acquisition is ownership. Use: An artifact required by the Gentleman to enact an important magical ritual is held in Singularity’s Infinite Collection, and he wants help retrieving it.

The Gentleman, page 120 GM intrusion: A portal opens directly beneath the character’s feet, plunging them into a dangerous alternate dimension on a failed Speed defense roll.

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Claim the Sky SORROW Trigger warning: This character entry includes mention of suicide. It is highly recommended the GM utilize player safety tools, like those within Consent in Gaming, prior to introducing this sensitive topic. Download the free Consent in Gaming PDF at myMCG.info/consent

Castle Desolate: level 9

GM intrusion (group): Castle Desolate appears out of nowhere, threatening to trap two or more PCs beneath its massive bulk.

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COSMIC—LIKELY INTERDIMENSIONAL—BEING OF GODLIKE STATUS AND POWER

12 (36)

This godlike entity is another being whose origins are obscured in the early universe, or some other universe entirely. In the modern era, she embodies sorrow, despair, and dismay and takes a female humanoid form. Merely to see her is to feel all the light go out of one’s soul. The galactic record contains many instances of a promising young civilization ending far before its prime. Many of those endings—including the ones where worlds went dark after an inconsolable native decided to end themselves and everyone else too—can be traced to a visit by Sorrow. Sorrow moves through the multiverse in Castle Desolate, a mobile construct of ancient alien technology containing chambers filled with relics of anguish and hopelessness. Motive: Spread despair throughout the cosmos, drowning all consciousness in unending desolation Environment: Anywhere in the universe Health: 100 Damage Inflicted: 12 points Armor: 10 Movement: Short Combat: Sorrow prefers to avoid fighting and instead lands Castle Desolate in an out-of-the way location on her target world (or on an airless moon of that world). From there, she generates psychic waves of despondency that build over months. At first, the effect is miniscule, detectable only as a feeling of growing fatigue, a barely discernable psychic hum, and weird echoes on certain radio frequencies. But if the gradually building psychic wave is not stopped, eventually the target world succumbs, all its higher life destroyed. If combat is forced on her, Sorrow’s mere presence is dangerous to her attackers. Each round, anyone who can see her—or who is within short range of her whether they can see her or not—must succeed on an Intellect defense roll or descend one step on the damage track. A creature that would be slain by this effect (by descending a final step on the damage track) takes their own life instead. This effect happens regardless of any other action Sorrow takes, such as using her “soul burn” glare, a long-range attack that inflicts psychic damage (ignores Armor) on a failed Intellect defense roll. If forced on the defensive, she usually retreats by having Castle Desolate move both her and itself to some other world, leaving her attackers behind. Interaction: Sorrow can speak and understand almost any language. If engaged, she is especially clever at invoking existential talking points. After all, what is all this striving really in aid of, given that all of us, without exception, will be dead and dust? Meaning is subjective. Strip it away, and what do you have? Use: A moon rover on the dark side of the moon sent back photos of a weird alien castle sitting on a lunar spire that wasn’t there before.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s THE TRAVELER

ENIGMATIC EXPLORER OF TIME AND SPACE

8 (24)

Born a mutant, the Traveler can explore any time and any place that exists. Where and when were they born? We know that they have lived in Hellenistic Greece, the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japan, the 1980s, and the far future, to name just a few times and places. But which of these—if any—was their starting point? We may never know. An enigmatic figure depicted on an ancient Greek frieze who looks very similar to a cloaked figure in the background of a black and white photo of several World War I soldiers? Could very well be the Traveler. Both extremely intelligent and knowledgeable, the Traveler seems to explore just for the joy of it. And yet, quite often they stumble upon an injustice they cannot tolerate, or worse, a wrong perpetrated by someone else who shouldn’t be in that time or place. The full extent of their travels and adventures will never be completely known. The heroes of the modern day have learned to see the Traveler as a resource for information, advice, and even, well, travel. On more than one occasion, the Traveler has aided heroes stranded in time or space, and has warned heroes of coming calamities in their future. (Although it’s not fully understood, the Traveler seems to be able to change the past, relatively speaking. People speculate that perhaps such a concept doesn’t even apply to the Traveler.) Motive: Explore all time and space Environment: Almost anywhere in space and time Health: 50 Damage Inflicted: 10 points Armor: 5 Movement: Short; infinite if stepping through space and time Modifications: Perception, historical knowledge, and defense against effects that would blind or influence their mind as level 12 Combat: The Traveler prefers to step away from fights using their ability to instantly move through space and time, almost without limitation. If somehow prevented from doing this, they can choose to send a foe within long range to another location in space and time on a failed Intellect defense roll. When they step into a new time and location, they automatically take on the context of that place and/or time, including gaining the ability to speak the local language, whether they travel to ancient Rome or to an alien planet in another galaxy. They can take up to six other people with them when they travel, but they do so very rarely, preferring to remain solitary most of the time. Interaction: The Traveler has learned an extraordinary amount in their journeys. No one knows for sure, but there’s every reason to believe that they’ve visited prehistory, the end of Earth, and all manner of interstellar or intergalactic worlds. They’re willing to share revelations with those who recognize them or seek them out, but the Traveler likes to keep certain bits of information secret for unknown reasons. Use: As the characters prepare to take up arms against a terrible threat, the Traveler appears, apparently intending to watch. Other Equipment: The Traveler usually carries a couple of manifest cyphers pulled from various historical ages (future and past), including a catholicon.

The Traveler cannot exist in the same time or place twice, so at least when it comes to time travel, they make only large moves.

GM intrusion: The character who lands a blow on the Traveler is immediately attacked by two or three chronophages.

Chronophage, page 317 Catholicon, page 385

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Claim the Sky VALOR

Valor is married to Whisper (page 154). In the Boundless setting, they live on the West Coast of the United States, although they also are members of the Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: The ranged attack is deflected back at the attacker by Valor’s spinning chain weapon defense.

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PHYSICALLY ENHANCED HERO

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Tough and brave, Rebekah Anne Power never backed down on the playground, as a middle- and high-school volleyball player, or during her military tour, where she earned a number of medals for bravery in combat. What only a few people knew was that Rebekah had reacted especially strongly to a cocktail of enhancement drugs that permanently boosted her strength, speed, and endurance as part of the military’s experimentation with bespoke superpowers. After her tour ended, she returned home to nurse her elderly grandmother through her last years of life. As she later said, that’s when she had to display true courage. When her grandmother finally passed, Rebekah was at a loss. As chance would have it, she found herself in a malfunctioning elevator not long after. If not for her, everyone aboard would have plunged to their deaths. That day, Valor was born. Motive: Save lives Environment: Almost anywhere, usually with Whisper Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 8 points Armor: 6 Movement: Long Modifications: Might defense as level 8 Combat: Valor attacks foes with a chain weapon, attacking up to three targets within immediate range at once, or a single target within short range. On a hit, she inflicts damage and can choose to entangle one target, who is held helpless on a failed Might defense roll until they escape. Valor can use her chain weapon (a level 6 item) in a variety of other ways, such as swinging it rapidly to create a shield for herself and others (hindering attacks by two steps), quickly swinging across cavities, retrieving objects up to a short distance away, and so on. Her enhanced abilities also grant Valor the power to see in the dark, and she heals wounds quickly (she regains 1 health each round while above 0 health). Interaction: Kind and just, Valor always has time—even if it has to be deferred until later—to talk to others of good will. She is open to team-ups, but usually only for the length of a single mission. Use: The PCs respond to a call, only to find that Valor has arrived before them.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s VANTABLACK

DARKNESS-CONTROLLING VILLAIN

6 (18)

Archeologist Ellen Kendall was working the Azaki ruin in the Australian Outback when she found something strange. Assuming it was contamination, she extracted a thin layer of metallic material. The substance flowed over her like a shadow, clothing her in a suit of ultimate darkness. Ellen decided she didn’t much care if the suit was ancient alien technology or some kind of solidified Dreamtime artifact, because she was keeping it. Adopting the moniker Vantablack, she launched a side hustle of theft, extortion, and, in a few cases, assassination. She strikes from the shadows, invisible even to those normally able to see in the dark. Motive: Wealth, excitement Environment: Anywhere valuables can be stolen Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 6 points Armor: 5 Movement: Short Modifications: Stealth as level 10 and Speed defense as level 7 due to suit of ultimate darkness Combat: Impossible to see in the dark, Vantablack often makes her first attacks with surprise. Her suit is deformable and regenerates itself, allowing her to attack two targets as her action with claws or short-range daggers. She can fill an area up to an immediate distance across with darkness as part of another action, or as her action fill an area up to a short distance across with darkness. If she keeps up with the latter, she can easily fill an entire shopping center with impenetrable darkness within a few minutes. Unless someone has another way of sensing their environment, those in the darkness are completely unable to see—which means that foes are unlikely to find Vantablack, let alone attack her in the dark. If a foe seems able to deal with the darkness in some fashion, Vantablack is smart enough to retreat immediately. Interaction: If she thinks she can escape, Vantablack may answer those who call out into the darkness she creates, gleefully identifying herself by her villainous code name. If she goes a few days without wearing the suit, she begins to act more and more like her old archeologist self. But it has an addictive hold over her. Use: “All units, please be apprised that the opera house has just gone completely dark. No lights, but a lot of frightened patrons, by the sound of it.”

Azaki, page 160 When not wearing her suit, Ellen Kendall is level 2, archeological tasks as level 5.

The darkness Vantablack creates in an area dissipates a few rounds after she stops concentrating on maintaining it.

GM intrusion: The character, blindly striking out at Vantablack, hits an allied character who also can’t see.

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Claim the Sky VOLTAGE Dread, page 179 Society of Seven, page 172

GM intrusion: The character’s device shorts out, inflicting 9 points of damage.

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ELECTRICALLY CHARGED MASTERMIND VILLAIN

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Voltage’s incredible intelligence and tactical brilliance are just as important to her as her ability to throw lightning bolts, disrupt electrical devices, and travel instantly along conductive wires or cables. As leader of the criminal cadre known as Dread, Voltage is behind a string of crimes and has clashed numerous times with superheroes, particularly the Society of Seven. She secures power by stealing wealth, technology, and the influence of prominent people by the threat of violence against them or their loved ones. Voltage doesn’t have a secret identity, at least not anymore. Her former identity—Jessica Akter—no longer has any meaning to her. She is always Voltage, and she vows that one day she will be the greatest of all supervillains. Motive: Accumulate power Environment: Usually with one or more members of Dread Health: 40 Damage Inflicted: 9 points Armor: 4 Movement: Short; light speed when traveling as electricity along conductive wires or surfaces Modifications: Tactics, deep reasoning, and resisting deception as level 9 Combat: Voltage is immune to electricity damage, and if subject to a strong electrical current, she regains 10 points of health that round. When physically manifest, she can toss two long-range lightning bolts that inflict damage and stun each target for up to a minute if they fail a Might defense roll. Each round, a stunned target can attempt another Might defense roll to regain their senses. She can also disrupt electrical devices within short range, including those being used by characters if they fail an Intellect defense roll to prevent her attempt. As living lightning (which she can become as an action), she must travel along conductive surfaces, though she can linger in place like ball lightning for a few rounds, simulating a buzzing sort of speech in nearby metallic items. As electricity, she is effectively immune to most damage except magnetic attacks. Interaction: Voltage’s intelligence is immediately obvious during any interaction. Because her goal is to accumulate power through any means, she is usually willing to negotiate in return for a favor. Use: Several members of Dread are causing a commotion on a heavily used city street. However, it’s just a distraction for Voltage, who zaps into a nearby CEO’s office to threaten her while all eyes are elsewhere.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s WARP

ENERGY-WIELDING CRIMEFIGHTING HERO

5 (15)

A case could be made that wisecracking is Warp’s true motivation for fighting crime. In what other situation could he just spout off with whatever comes into his head? Sometimes funny, and rarely profane, Warp provides a near-constant commentary as he stretches space to knock fleeing criminals off their feet, bounds the length of a football field, or delivers his signature double-fisted “warp punch.” This punch is powerful enough to smash through a brick wall if he really cuts loose. When he isn’t fighting crime, Jacob Blazar works shifts at a plant that manufactures parts for larger companies, specializing in pieces that require a patented magnetic clasp. Rather than the glamorous life he envisioned as a superhero, Jacob struggles to make ends meet and care for his ailing father in his civilian identity. But heroes come in many forms, and Jacob is a hero in any of his. Motive: Fight crime Environment: Anywhere Health: 25 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 2 Movement: Short; very long when warp jumping Modifications: Stealth as level 8 (when he activates his space-warping blind); Speed defense as level 7 Combat: Warp can jump a long distance and still punch a single target as his attack. Alternatively, he can punch two targets as his action. Finally, he can execute a double-fisted warp punch against a single target, easing the attack by two steps and inflicting up to 15 points of damage, and on a failed Might defense roll, the target descends one step on the damage track. (Warp usually pulls his punch a little so as not to outright kill regular criminals.) He can also throw a warp bolt that pushes a target off their feet, pulls a distant object to his hand, or provides a similar effect. He can create a space-warping curtain to hide himself. And he’s experimenting with other uses of his power, including a “big wallop” designed to knock everyone around him off their feet. Interaction: Warp is talkative and self-deprecating, but he’s not shy about disparaging someone he thinks is a criminal, possibly in an attempt to put them off balance, but also because he thinks it’s funny. Quips and one-liners, he’ll tell you, help alleviate stress (plus, had he had different opportunities in his civilian life, he would have liked to have been a standup comic). Use: A nightclub DJ loses all their equipment in a robbery. First on the scene to render assistance is Warp, who asks for details, and also a free ticket for the DJ’s next gig, if that’s not too much to ask.

In the Boundless setting, Warp lives in Chicago, where he is the Dagger’s most hated opponent.

GM intrusion: Warp makes an observation about the character that hits home, angering the character or otherwise putting them so off-balance that their tasks are hindered on their next turn.

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Claim the Sky WHISPER Whisper is married to Valor (page 150). In the Boundless setting, they live on the West Coast of the United States, although they also are members of the Society of Seven (page 172).

GM intrusion: The character who is trying to be stealthy or is obscured in some other fashion is pointed out by name by Whisper.

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PRECOGNITIVE HERO

5 (15)

Angela Tupuola had troubled dreams for years. Then one night, she decided to listen to the whispers the nighttime phantoms wanted to impart, rather than resisting them. Finally rubbing the nightmares from her eyes, she realized the phantoms were psychic manifestations of her own subconscious mind. The more she paid attention, the more she saw and understood. Now, Angela—in her Whisper guise—prefers to focus on stopping minor tragedies. Saving people from walking absentmindedly out in front of a bus, for instance. In fact, she has saved hundreds of pedestrian lives in a few short years. Despite everything, she’s troubled by a vision that won’t come to her clearly. She worries that it’s a future apocalyptic event so awful that it transcends her normally limited prognostication horizon. Fear, the color red, and screaming are all she can see . . . After all this time, nightmares once again trouble Angela’s sleep. Motive: Save lives Environment: Most anywhere, usually alongside Valor Health: 23 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 1 Movement: Short Modifications: Speed defense, Intellect defense, and tasks related to precognition as level 8 Combat: Whisper is psychic and can see the future. In combat, this benefit grants her the enhanced Speed defense noted, while the psychic ability itself is responsible for her enhanced Intellect defense. Because she can sense the immediate future, she tends not to be in locations about to be flushed with poison gas, standing on a bridge that is about to pitch everyone to their death, and so on. Except in the most extreme circumstances, Whisper doesn’t attack foes. Instead, she uses her abilities to help her allies. When she does, she can ease all of a single ally’s tasks by two steps. Whisper’s psychic abilities also allow her to sense associations in an object or location that may reveal past ownership or activity. If she spends a few rounds preparing, she can see distant locations if she’s been there before, has a picture of or an object from that location, or knows someone there. She can send a psychic message to anyone she knows. And she likely has other related abilities yet unexplored. Interaction: Even though she tries not to, Whisper has a way of completing other people’s sentences, for which she always profusely apologizes. She is willing to team up for an important mission, but prefers to return to her own street-level lifesaving soon thereafter. Use: A character is pulled from the sidewalk into an open coffee shop door, right before a car jumps the curb and plows through the space where they were just standing. The character’s savior is Whisper.

Heroes, Villains, And Other NPC NP C s WORM

OOZY VILLAIN WITH A DANGEROUS TOUCH

5 (15)

News anchor extraordinaire Tuck Maier was riding high on stellar ratings. For years, he callously encouraged division on topics both pressing and picayune. Outrage was his weapon of choice, and he wielded it like an Olympic fencer. Until, one day, he trash-talked the musical stylings of one Revon Rhodes. Unfortunately for Tuck, Revon Rhodes is the secret identity of Malevolence. And Malevolence cursed him. Tuck’s skin became an oozing grey expanse of wormy flesh. His career as a news anchor was over. The same seemed to be true for his freedom when his touch turned several bystanders into sagging piles of grey goo, except the authorities soon lost track of him. His touch also turns restraints, jail cell walls, and solid stone into grey goo, allowing him to worm his way out of—or into—nearly anything. Motive: Fear and loathing of anyone normal Environment: Alone or with one or more members of Dread Health: 30 Damage Inflicted: 5 points Armor: 2 Movement: Short; short when sliding along walls and ceilings like a slug; immediate when burrowing Modifications: Touch attacks as level 7 Combat: Worm’s mere touch inflicts Speed damage (ignores Armor), turning whatever he touches into grey goo. In addition, on a failed Might defense roll, a victim descends one step on the damage track. Worm’s touch can also turn objects or a portion of a larger object into grey goo. Worm can hold his action until a foe attacks with a melee weapon. The foe must make a Speed defense roll to avoid having the weapon turned to grey goo, destroying it. If the attack is with a body part (such as a punch or kick), the foe takes 5 points of damage (ignores Armor). This negates the attack regardless of whether the Speed defense roll is successful. Interaction: Though his speech sounds a bit mushy, few are as adept at conversation—or, at least, commentator-style analysis of the situation—as Worm. To really engage him, one need only bring up Malevolence. Worm would do anything to get back at her, even turn on his fellow Dreadmates. Use: Several murders in the area recently left puzzling remains—just so much grey goo.

Malevolence, page 134 Worm is currently a member of Dread (page 179).

GM intrusion: Worm makes a “snowball” of goo and throws it, turning his melee attack into a short-range attack on the character.

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Claim the Sky Personal enforcer: level 4; Armor 2; long-range energy pistol attack inflicts 6 points of damage Some people hypothesize that a series of villains has adopted the guise of Z, presumably with the blessing of the previous Z. When Z is not wearing his armor, he has basic level 3 NPC stats. However, he still is the head of the Dagger, retains command of his enforcers, and can deceive, persuade, and command as level 7. Dagger, page 163 GM intrusion (group): Just when the characters believe they have Z right where they want him, circumstances turn, and it becomes clear that everything that’s happened was his plan all along, and the characters are the ones who are captured.

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Z

MASTERMIND VILLAIN

6 (18)

Everyone’s heard of Z. In the 1960s, Z was one of the founders of the vast international crime syndicate called the Dagger. And he’s the only founder that remains. That’s about the limit of what’s generally known about him. If Z is anything, he’s mysterious. As a worldwide organization, the Dagger offers Z virtually limitless resources, and he puts them to excellent use. Z is a true mastermind. He’s never without a small army of guards and enforcers, and he occasionally employs superhuman muscle as well. Headquartered on a retrofitted Golden-class container ship able to sink beneath the waves to evade detection, Z and his personal enforcers move around the world as needed to support the Dagger’s lawless aims. Motive: Grow and support the crime syndicate called the Dagger Environment: Usually aboard his floating base accompanied by dozens of personal enforcers, and possibly one or two other villains Health: 38 Damage Inflicted: 7 points Armor: 6 Movement: Short Modifications: Resists mental attacks and deception as level 8; deception, persuasion, and commands as level 7 Combat: It’s very, very rare that Z finds himself in a combat situation. When his enemies think they’ve cornered him, they soon discover that a force field keeps them at bay and he’s got a hoverjet waiting to whisk him away. He’s always two steps ahead of his enemies. He knows that some of the people who might try to confront him wield amazing powers, and he didn’t get to where he is by engaging in fights he cannot win. Z’s offensive and defensive capabilities are mainly for stalling his opponents until he can get away. His high-tech armor houses a variety of offensive options, including the ability to fire a barrage of long-range micro-missiles each round that can attack up to six targets at once, or attack a single target as a level 9 attack that inflicts 15 points of damage. He can use the micro-missiles about once per minute, so between barrages, he relies on a long-range laser attack, or two electrified batons that appear out of his arms for melee attacks. The electrified batons also stun a target who fails a Might defense roll. He always carries a tiny device that can render him invisible for up to a minute, and he sometimes carries an emergency teleportation device (one of several manifest cyphers cached in his armor) to get away. Interaction: Z prefers to let his flunkies speak for him; he’s not one for monologuing. He values his mysterious image almost as much as the Dagger itself. If he is ever captured, someone else soon takes up the name of Z, denouncing whoever was captured as a fraud. Use: A massive ship was sighted in the bay, right before it sank mysteriously beneath the waves. Other Equipment: In addition to his suit (biometrically locked to its current owner), Z carries several cutting-edge tech devices (high-level cyphers), including one that can teleport him to a safehouse anywhere on the planet (level 8), one that will restore 10 health (level 10), and one that will render him invisible for about a minute (level 4).

D N A S R E H P Y C ARTIFACTS

CHA P TER 9

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n a superhero campaign, there’s a fine line between cyphers (one-use items or abilities awarded by the GM), artifacts, character abilities (which may cost Pool points to use), and other equipment (which has none of those criteria). The GM should keep in mind that it’s good from a story point of view to let characters have equipment they need to deal more effectively with foes that might otherwise be too potent.

POWER BOOST CYPHERS This section introduces two new power boost cyphers, and consolidates the two efficacy boost cyphers in the Cypher System Rulebook into one cypher with variable effects based on cypher level.

POWER BOOST CYPHERS 01–10

Area boost

11–20

Burst boost

21–30

Damage boost

31–40

Efficacy boost

41–50

Energy boost

51–60

Range boost

61–80

Shift boost

81–90

Stunt boost

91–00

Target boost

SPECIAL EQUIPMENT Sometimes a group of superheroes needs special equipment so they can participate in an encounter or advance the story. For example, characters who must get to an underwater base will need air tanks or a water-breathing device, and those going on a short trip into space will need a vehicle and spacesuits. This sort of item doesn’t have to be a cypher (which counts against a character’s cypher limit) or an artifact (which has a depletion chance)—it can just be equipment. If a player suggests a suitable piece of equipment they can buy (such as scuba gear), or a gadgeteer or inventor character offers to build something to do the job, the GM should let them do it and handwave most of the details because they’re being creative and overcoming obstacles to move the story forward. In other words, don’t assume that every piece of weird equipment needs to be a cypher or artifact; things that allow the adventure to happen shouldn’t cost the characters much, or maybe not anything at all. And if the players take too much advantage of this leeway, the GM always has the option to use an intrusion to complicate an encounter, such as by having a breathing device malfunction . . .

EFFICACY BOOST Level: 1d6 + 1 Effect: This cypher boosts an ability that requires a skill roll. The use of the ability is eased (eased by two steps if the cypher is level 5 or higher).

Power boost cyphers, page 401 Depending on the character who has it, a power boost cypher can be a subtle cypher (page 378) or a manifest cypher (page 379).

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Claim the Sky SHIFT BOOST Level: 1d6 + 2 Effect: This cypher boosts one power shift that the user already has, granting them an additional power shift in that category that lasts for one round. For example, if the user has a shift in resilience, they can use this cypher to gain an additional shift in resilience for one round. If the user has more than one kind of power shift (such as dexterity and strength), they choose which kind of power shift to boost.

STUNT BOOST Power stunts, page 58 A benchmark for setting an omni orb’s limits is to compare it to a cypher of the orb’s level—if there is a cypher that can do what the PC wants, and that cypher is equal to or less than the orb’s level, it works. For example, if a team of superheroes tries to use a level 5 orb to teleport to their base 100 miles away, the GM can look at the list of cyphers and see that a teleporter (traveler) cypher can transport one character up to 100 miles per cypher level, so transporting a group of PCs 100 miles is probably within the orb’s power.

Fantasy artifacts, page 294 Fantastic Cypher table, page 382

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Level: 1d6 + 2 Effect: This cypher eases the user’s next difficult, formidable, or impossible power stunt task by four steps (eased by five steps if the cypher is level 7 or higher). It has no effect on power stunts that don’t require a successful power stunt task.

ARTIFACTS The following are additional examples of superhero artifacts.

DARKEST BOOK Level: 10 Form: Large, metal-bound book Effect: Fashioned by the primordial entity who created evil magic, the Darkest Book is a record of every vile incantation, curse, and ritual ever performed. It is known to include spells that create werewolves, raise an army of zombies, revive a dead body as a vampire, conjure demons and devils, and release profane energy for various effects. It eases by three steps any task related to magical lore. Even someone unskilled at magic can open it to a random page and read the spell there (the GM randomly determines the spell by rolling on the Fantastic Cypher table), which takes effect at level 10. The Darkest Book is somewhat sentient and can hide its words from anyone it doesn’t want reading it. It might require a person casting a spell from it to succeed at a

difficulty 6 Intellect defense roll or take 6 points of Intellect damage and move one step down the damage track. The book is technically indestructible; anything strong enough to destroy an object of its level merely destroys one of its pages, and the book can’t be destroyed as long as at least one page remains. Depletion: —

OMNI ORB Level: 1d6 + 4 Form: Glowing, orb-shaped technological device Effect: The user holding the orb imagines what they want to happen (similar to using a magical wish), and it happens, within limits. The level of the effect granted is no greater than the level of the orb, as determined by the GM, who can modify the effect accordingly. (The larger the desired effect, the more likely the GM will limit it.) Activating the omni orb automatically moves the character using it one step down the damage track. Depletion: 1 in 1d6 (instead of depleting, a roll of 1 means the user experiences a GM intrusion related to the effect they created)

SPACE RING Level: 1d6 + 1 Form: Metal ring with a star insignia Effect: The wearer is able to fly as effortlessly as walking, moving up to a short distance each round in any direction. In space, if the wearer does nothing but move for three actions in a row, they accelerate greatly and can move up to 200 miles (320 km) per hour, or about 2,000 feet (600 m) each round. The ring also provides the wearer with breathable air while in space or underwater (although this doesn’t provide protection against poison gas or other air-based hazards). The wearer can verbally communicate with other ring-wearers within 1 mile (1.5 km), and verbally request information (relayed to them with a synthesized voice) from the internet or a local equivalent. Depletion: 1 in 1d100 (check each day of flying)

Part 2

boundless

Chapter 10: BOUNDLESS OVERVIEW. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Chapter 11: HISTORY OF THE WORLD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .165 Chapter 12: SUPERPOWERED SURVEY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175 Chapter 13: DEATH, THY NAME IS GRAVITAS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202 Chapter 14: TALONS OF DOOM. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207 Chapter 15: BENEATH A RED SUN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214

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e l s d s n u Bo verview O

Silver Sentinel, page 146 Majestic Family, page 130

Society of Seven, page 172 Baron Shadow, page 107 BASTION, page 163

Humonger, page 199 Warp, page 153

Typically, in the Boundless setting, if someone gets their powers from some kind of accident—being exposed to weird chemicals, being hit by lightning, and so on—the accident is almost certainly triggering latent genetic mutations already present in that person.

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ilver Sentinel watches over the Earth—and the stars above—from his Lunar Watchtower. The Majestic Family flies down the eastern seaboard of the United States in their trio of flying M-cars to help cope with a powerful hurricane. The Society of Seven moves to intercept the cyborg demons of Baron Shadow as they try to steal a nuclear warhead in Germany. Agents of BASTION use high-tech weaponry designed by Natalia Lodge in an attempt to drive off the monster known as Humonger from downtown Los Angeles. The mysterious figure known only as Warp rounds up a bunch of enforcers of one of the Chicago mobs. This is the world of Boundless, where it’s possible for a person to soar across the sky, lift a city bus, or move at the speed of sound. The only question is: what will they do with that power? Boundless is intended to evoke (but not replicate) the superhero settings from comics and movies that we all love. Boundless is Earth as we know it, but wondrous powers, aliens, high technology, and magic all exist. Heroes here deal not just with criminals, but with megalomaniacal conquerors and terrorists, as well as threats and challenges from other planets, from mystic realms, or even from beyond time.

ALIENS AT THE BEGINNING OF TIME A people called the Azaki colonized the Earth in its earliest days. These aliens came from far beyond our planet, although where, exactly, we still don’t know. They possessed great knowledge. The Azaki understood science beyond even our most cutting-edge technologies, and they worked with still stranger powers out there as well, which we might call mysticism or magic (to the Azaki, it may well have been just another science—we don’t know). These aliens built great structures and complexes, and carried out extensive experiments on the living creatures native to this world, including the proto-humans who would become us. They dwelled upon the Earth for tens of thousands of years, and then one day—long before recorded human history—they left. Azaki complexes are now ruins worn by time, and some are well hidden in remote areas. However, despite the aliens’ absence, their influence still affects daily life on Earth. This influence can be summed up in two ways: First, over time, humans have discovered and sometimes even understood Azaki technology. In our earliest days, we might have thought them magic or miracles, but people learned early on that if you could get into one of the strange ruins that were located here and there, you might find power. Later, as our own understanding of science advanced, we pushed it farther and more quickly because we had a handful of Azaki secrets left behind to study.

Boundless Overview

Second, Azaki experimentation on a genetic level changed humans (and other species as well). Today more than ever, people are born with latent or overt superhuman abilities, many of which we can’t fully explain with our understanding of science. People fly, teleport, and shoot lightning from their fingertips. What this means is that, if we imagine a universe where the Azaki never came to Earth, we would have a mundane world where superhuman abilities and wildly advanced technology would be absurd fictions confined to comic books and perhaps extremely successful movies.

LIVING AMONG WONDERS From our earliest days, we knew that intelligent beings other than humans existed in the universe. We watched as people flew or controlled the weather. It was rare, but we knew it was real. Just like lightning striking a tree near you, seeing someone wielding superpowers didn’t happen very often, but we knew it could

happen. We’d seen it firsthand or heard about it. We saw it on the nightly news, on the internet, on videos captured on friends’ smartphones. In addition, the Azaki presence here seems to have drawn attention to our world. Aliens like the Grin or terrible beings like the Demonix attempt to invade, attack, or conquer the Earth. Thankfully, we’re well defended, in part because we have heroes with powers, and in part because we have experience with the weird and unexpected. We know that kind of threat is real. BASTION (Bulwark Against Supernatural Threats of an Illicit or Ominous Nature) was created as a response to such dangers and to other Earth-bound threats, such as people who have powers and use them for selfish reasons, violently, against those of us who don’t. In other words, supervillains. So it’s a world of superheroes and supervillains. Of threats we can’t entirely explain but we know to be wary of. It’s a dangerous world, but we’ve found ways to survive, and even thrive.

Grin, page 123 Demonix, page 200

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Olive Majestic, page 133 Natalia Lodge, page 160

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Scientific understanding is well beyond where it would be were it not for the Azaki. Vehicles, communication devices, medical procedures, and so much more have benefitted from knowledge gleaned from what they left behind. That said, the influence of Azaki tech has also made technological advancements even more asymmetrical. The Majestic Family flies about in hovercraft called M-cars that move at phenomenal speeds, but the typical American family still drives a conventional automobile (although they are far more efficient, safe, and ecologically friendly than they would be without developments that arose from Azaki technology or understanding inspired by it). The majority of Azaki technology has gone toward individual applications. These include weaponry, armor, augmentation, and so on. This is likely due to the concurrent growth of people with innate superpowers, as a way to compensate for or replicate them. Of course, with great power comes great destruction—at least, at times. Encounters between heroes and villains all too often occur within population centers, disrupting and risking innocent lives and causing extensive property damage. Thankfully, brilliant inventors such as Olive Majestic and Natalia Lodge have created devices and processes that make rebuilding somewhat faster and easier. And as a helpful side effect, thanks to their efforts, all the buildings in every major city in the United States—and in many places throughout the world—are prepared for earthquakes and other natural disasters. While the most advanced tech remains in the hands of a relative few, some has been made more widely available. In addition to efficient cars, lifesaving medical breakthroughs, and so on, the biggest impact has been on military and security forces, prioritized because they have to deal with superhuman and supernatural threats.

It’s not uncommon for military forces to employ sophisticated body armor and energy weapons, although such things are typically used only by elite soldiers due to the cost. Most metropolitan police departments have access to high-tech weapons and armor, but these are usually mandated for use only in cases involving superpowered threats. Of course, such equipment can fall into the hands of criminals through illegal smuggling and black market operations. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that a person such as a president or a pope might have a personal force field device, or that BASTION might have access to a teleporter, but these quantum leaps in tech are outliers. Part of the issue is that so few people understand (or at this point, comprehend) this technology that, just as it’s difficult to produce, it’s also difficult to maintain, operate, and repair.

MUTANTS As stated earlier, there are people out there with powers well beyond that of normal folks due to genetic modifications that can be traced back to Azaki experimentation with the mammals that would one day evolve into humans. (It could be that even human intelligence or consciousness itself is the result of this manipulation, which would make all humans “mutants” in that sense.) Everyone is aware that such individuals exist. A few governments attempt to catalog or control them, but no one has yet developed the means to detect or identify mutants unless they display their powers. People who do reveal themselves to have special abilities, particularly if they are dramatic, powerful, or unique, take on celebrity status. Which means that some individuals reveal themselves eagerly and some are just as eager to keep their abilities under wraps. The culture has developed such that most people with powers adopt a new identity and often wear a mask. This makes it fairly easy for them to lead a double life if they want to.

Boundless Overview SUPERHEROES Whether through mutation or something else, people with powers who dedicate themselves to protecting and helping others are collectively called superheroes. (Technically, there are superheroes who don’t have powers, just extreme skills, but they are rare. Running out in a mask and a costume without some kind of special advantage is a surefire way to get hurt or killed.) Most governments, including the United States, do not grant official sanction to any heroes, and thus they are technically vigilantes. This is, however, almost always overlooked, which may have something to do with lobbying from BASTION, which recognizes the necessity of superpowered protectors. In fact, the US government grants superheroes a great amount of latitude in terms of keeping to the strict letter of the law, property destruction, airspace violations, and so on. Superheroes with excellent reputations tend to get access to the most advanced technology, prime real estate for bases, and more. Most other governments follow suit. The world loves its superheroes.

BASTION AND THE DAGGER Founded in the 1950s, BASTION exists to curb superhuman threats. They operate across the globe, answerable to no one nation. Their funding sources are unclear, but at least some of it comes from the United Nations. BASTION has access to some of the most advanced technology available, and it calls upon superheroes with good reputations for giving assistance from time to time to aid in crises. (This behooves many such heroes to have a way for BASTION to contact them, even while keeping their true identities secret.)

BASTION REPORT 0056

8: FREEFIRE

The Original Freefir e (1966–1980) Zero: Identity unknow n. His abilities includ e invisibility and intangi Presumed deceased bility. Power level 4. (1980). Genesis: Thomas Cra wford. His abilities inc lude the creation of Power level 8. Missin matter and energy. g (1981). Solar Flare: Nancy Kin sman. Her abilities inc lude flight, laser and Power level 7. Retired heat generation. (1979). The Eagle: Kenneth Stanley. His abilities include flight, enhanc Power level 5. Deceas ed speed and reflexe ed (1979). s. The New Freefire (19 80–1993) Orion: Evan Bakker. His abilities include enh anced strength and Deceased (1992). stamina. Power

level 3.

Quantum: Identity unk nown. Her abilities inc lude reshaping matter Power level 9. Missin on an atomic level. g (1989). Fireflyte: Julie Showa lter. Her abilities inc lude flight, flame gen Power level 3. Semi-re eration and control. tired (1995). Godspeed: Nicolas Fre ed. His abilities includ e supersonic speed 5. Deceased (1993). and agility. Pow

er level

Amp: Gerry Stein. His abilities include increa sing and decreasing machines and humans energy levels in , including superhum ans. Power level 5. Ret ired (1993). Nanomage: Identity unknown. Their abilitie s include reshaping means of nanobots. matter and energy by Power level 8. Curren tly wanted for multip le crimes and at larg e. Page 1 of 3

The Dagger is in some ways the opposite side of the coin. Also around since the mid-twentieth century, the Dagger is a secret, worldwide criminal organization founded in part by supervillains, at least one of which, Z, remains alive and at large. It operates as a criminal syndicate engaged in illegal activities of all kinds and all levels. However, at its heart, the Dagger desires more, up to and including world domination (whether covert or overt). Both BASTION and the Dagger have agents and bases across the world, and even in orbit.

The European Union is an exception to the sanctioning of superheroes, as the Golden Shield team operates with EU funding and official status. Z, page 156 See page 174 for a BASTION overview of the Dagger.

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FICTION AMONG THE FACTS

Warp, page 153 Dawnstar, page 111 Blackstar, page 108 Whisper, page 154 Valor, page 150 Freefire, page 163 Society of Seven, page 172

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In the Boundless setting, comic books and other superhero media are not fiction, they’re fact—or at least embellished fact. Superheroes have their own comics and sometimes films. These are typically created under license, but if a publisher or a filmmaker can’t get the rights, they will frequently create a fictional character that is a thinly veiled version of an actual hero. Supervillains rarely get to license themselves and are used liberally in the stories. The stories themselves are part accounts of events and part fiction, mainly because the writers don’t know many of the facts and usually don’t know the heroes’ true identities. Similarly, superhero celebrity culture is strong. Magazines, websites, documentaries, and more are devoted to the latest superhero sightings, confrontations with villains, and personal drama. In the past, journalists have even attempted to embed themselves with teams like Freefire or the Society of Seven, but that didn’t always work out so well and some of the reporters ended up injured or endangered.

CREATING A PC IN THE BOUNDLESS SETTING Almost any superhero character a player creates can fit into the Boundless setting. The only decisions to be made beyond character creation are where the hero is located and whether they are affiliated with existing NPC heroes or organizations. The PCs could be: • A new adjunct team tied to the Society of Seven, located in a city other than New York. • A strike team of superpowered BASTION agents (BASTION doesn’t often use superheroes directly this way, but the PCs could be part of a new initiative). • Heroes joining with one or more independent NPC heroes to form a new team (Warp, Dawnstar, or Blackstar would be good choices. Even Whisper and Valor, rumor has it, are interested in leaving the Society of Seven and thus would also be good choices). • Heroes attempting to start a new team on their own.

f O y r o t s i H

CHAP T ER 11

THE WORLD

T

his chapter presents the history of the Boundless setting. For the most part, the history of the setting is the history of Earth as you know it. This chapter simply notes the differences, almost all of which have to do with the presence of superhumans. These details help to ground the setting. Of course, for a roleplaying game, history doesn’t matter—only what’s going on at the table right now matters. So use the material presented here to spark adventures. The pharaoh Tutankhamun comes back to life. Vampir resurfaces and begins a reign of terror in the modern day. The PCs hurtle backward in time due to some calamity and find themselves in ancient China.

PREHISTORY The history of the world starts not with humanity, but with alien beings. The Azaki colonization of Earth occurred approximately four million to two million years ago. During this time, they spread across the planet (and Earth’s moon, as well as Mars and some of the Jovian moons). They built relatively small but dense enclaves using materials mostly unknown to modern humans, evidenced by the fact that hidden citadels and complexes still stand today.

ANTIQUITY In ancient Egypt, the pharaoh Tutankhamun inherited the solar powers of his father, Akhenaten, granting him a very long life in which he expanded the New Kingdom and established the greatest of all Egyptian kingdoms in terms of power and prosperity. It is thought likely that at least some of the mythological beings reported upon during this time were in fact superhumans or the result of superhuman activity. For example, there is growing evidence that the Greek hero Herakles was a real person with supernatural strength and endurance. Even some of the ancient gods from across the globe might have been based on mortal humans with fantastic abilities. The Soushen Ji and other records of the Han Dynasty in China indicate that there were likely multiple superhumans at that time, including Zhou Buwei, who commanded “tidal waves and earthquakes,” and the “shaman” Chen Jinggu, who wielded a variety of powers. Likewise, the Middle Kingdoms of India reveal similar indications of superpowered individuals that would be dismissed as myth if they did not ring true with our modern understanding. The being known as “the Corrupted One” originated in this time period, and turned out to be an Azaki android that was thought destroyed by Chandragupta Maurya, ruler of the Mauryan Empire, also blessed with superhuman strength and stamina. When the Corrupted One reassembled and attacked the city of Patna in modern times, the sorcerer Aaditya Singh—known

Tutankhamun: level 7, command and strategy as level 8; health 48; Armor 2; absorbs solar energy so that while in the sun, his level is +2 and he regenerates 5 health each round, creates blinding attacks in a medium area, or makes solar blast attacks for 12 damage at very long range

Vampir, page 167 Stats for still-active characters are always given here or in chapter 8. Dead, missing, or retired characters mentioned here are sometimes given brief stats in this chapter, because in this setting, PCs can potentially encounter heroes or villains from the past thanks to time travel or other strangeness.

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Claim the Sky The Mystic: level 6, mystical knowledge and Intellect defense as level 8; Armor 3 (magical ward); commands a wide variety of magical powers Demonix, page 200 The Vermillion, page 200 Quetzalcoatl: level 8; movement, acrobatics, initiative, Might defense, and Speed defense as level 9; health 60; Armor 5; melee attack inflicts 14 points of damage; flies, sees through solid matter Mana Videsh, page 140 The Traveler, page 149 Inner Earth, page 197 Hyn: level 9, Speed defense as level 7 (due to size), Intellect defense as level 10; health 150; Armor 8; telepathy, psychic attacks, and mind control with a planetary range, able to affect at least dozens of targets at once

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sometimes as the Mystic—conjured Chandragupta’s power to defeat it. The Roman General Scipio Africanus could conjure fire and used this ability to drive Hannibal’s forces back to Carthage, ending the First Punic War. Most historians believe that this was thanks to a device (likely based on Azaki technology) crafted by his friend Gaius Laelius. The device’s eventual disposition is unknown, as is whether Laelius developed anything else. Ancient eras have been visited by modern superhumans a number of times, such as when Mana of the Royal Family of Videsh traveled back in time to India’s Vedic period to establish a secret base of operations, but was driven out by superpowered beings called the Nine. The superhuman known as the Traveler spent a great deal of time in Hellenistic Greece in an assumed identity, studying with various philosophers and scholars. There are many other examples.

THE MIDDLE AGES In the Asuka period of Japan, Prince Shotoku established a special protected class for superhumans. As a result, over the decades of his rule, people with abilities from all over southeastern Asia gathered in Japan. Known collectively as the Wind’s Disciples, these heroes operated through the region, aiding all people and combating criminals, petty warlords, and villainous superpowered threats. In Europe during this time, it is likely that superhuman abilities were seen as the work of the devil. And, in some cases, this was perhaps close to the truth. The mystic known as the Magus, hailing originally from Persia, created a vast network of fiendish criminals and murderers, each accompanied by one of the Magus’s demonic conjured companions. The Anglo-Saxon King Edmund II was called Ironside because of his ability to transform his body into iron. His prowess in battle was legendary.

The Ottoman Empire, around 1350 CE, was gripped by a war with the Demonix from the Vermillion, bringing many of the warring peoples of the region together against this inhuman foe. United, at least for a time, beneath Orhan Ghazi, the Ottoman forces were victorious. Some historians believe that it was in fact Orhan’s brother Alaeddin who was responsible for the victory, thanks to his organizing of superhuman Janissaries for the final battle. In Mesoamerica, the Aztec hero Quetzalcoatl used a variety of Azaki devices to aid people in the region and defeat his foes. This is known to be factual because Quetzalcoatl accidentally traveled to the twentieth century via a malfunctioning Azaki machine, and it seems possible that he may travel to the present at some point as well.

MODERN HISTORY In modern times, records become clearer and more easily verified. The presence and growing influence of superhumans and related events in history become even more obvious and too numerous to cover in their entirety. Records from the Umayyad Caliphate in North Africa indicate the first encounters with the Undermen from Inner Earth. Local armies drove off the invaders from below, and the tunnels they used to access the surface were collapsed by a man who would go on to become the governor of Iraq named Ziyad ibn Abihi, who possessed some sort of Azaki strength-enhancing device. During the Tokugawa Shogunate, a union of nine samurai simply calling themselves the Nine seemed poised to spread the control of their emperor throughout the entire Pacific, but they fell under the mental control of an alien being called Hyn. The Traveler arrived in the time period and ended Hyn’s schemes, but the Nine still disbanded in disgrace. Hyn retreated to the stars, vowing to return.

History of The world During the American Civil War, a woman referred to as Old Pearl fought for the Confederacy. She was fueled by rage at the death of her two sons, and aided the soldiers of the southern forces (although reportedly her actions were not coordinated with the leadership, who seemed embarrassed by her at the time). Old Pearl could hurl cannonballs and other heavy objects great distances. She disappeared mysteriously before the end of the war.

THE TWENTIETH CENTURY Superhuman activities throughout much of the first half (or more) of the twentieth century consisted of wartime efforts. There were those during that time who had powers but did not participate in any of the international conflicts, such as Magro the Magnificent, a French Canadian with superhuman strength and resilience who toured North America and Europe in the 1920s and ’30s, performing demonstrations of his abilities in ever-more-elaborate shows. A woman named Cecily Day healed those afflicted with the Spanish Flu during the pandemic and likely saved thousands of lives. In Ethiopia, a group called the Erbena ´ working for Emperor Haile Selassie used Azaki technology to maintain peace in their country throughout this time, and reportedly intimidated Mussolini out of attempting an invasion in the 1930s.

THE FIRST WORLD WAR The British were the first to employ a superhuman in the twentieth century for military purposes. Codenamed Spike, the Scottish telekinetic agent infiltrated enemy lines and disrupted transportation, collapsed trenches and fortifications, and otherwise caused difficulties for the German troops, but in truth probably managed only minor accomplishments at best. Spike, however, was a boon for the British and their allies in terms of morale.

Reports of her activities were relayed throughout Europe and elsewhere, in events that were far more widespread than could possibly be factual. The Germans seemingly retaliated with a being known as Vampir, who was either a mutant with mind-control powers and a penchant for stealth, or an actual supernatural vampire (official and unofficial accounts vary). Regardless, Vampir struck terror in the hearts of his enemies, both as a lone infiltrator and when leading nighttime assaults in trench warfare. Vampir saw action in both world wars, his long life serving as more evidence for those who believed him to be a real vampire.

THE SECOND WORLD WAR Spike and Vampir, as far as is known, never met. The same cannot be said of the superhumans in World War II. Both the Axis and the Allies came into the war with superhumans as part of their forces from the outset. Before the United States entered the war, a number of superhumans banded together and called themselves the Spy Smashers, combating not only fifth columnists but also criminal syndicates, mainly on the Eastern Seaboard. Paragon, leader of the Spy Smashers and likely the most powerful superhuman of the time, took on the patriotic name Old Glory when he officially joined the army, but after the war returned to the Paragon moniker. The British military adopted the term “metasoldier,” while the U.S. forces employed “super agents” or the more informal “super troopers.” Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Third Reich called its superhumans “ubermensch” and employed a special unit of twenty-three individuals called Das Schwarze Korps, operating out of Castle Wewelsburg and answering directly to Heinrich Himmler. By the time of the Normandy Invasion, the Allies grouped all available superhuman soldiers into a unit called Strikeforce

Old Pearl: level 5, throws objects and Might defense as level 7; health 32; Armor 2; throws heavy objects up to very long range, inflicting 11 points of damage Vampir: in World War I, use vampire stats with health 40; in World War II, add +3 to all levels, +30 to health, and +6 to damage

Vampire, page 362

Magro the Magnificent: level 3, strength-related tasks as level 6; health 40; Armor 6; melee attack inflicts 12 points of damage Cecily Day: level 4; touch heals wounds and cures disease Paragon/Old Glory: level 11; health 90; Armor 15 (force field); manipulates kinetic energy to fly, form force fields, make long-range energy attacks for 18 points of damage, and create other effects Erbena ´ member: level 4; Armor 3; various powers, mostly involving attacking at range or enhanced melee capabilities Spike: level 4, telekinetic effects as level 7, Speed defense and stealth as level 6; Armor 1; telekinesis can move up to 1,000 pounds (450 kg) Typical Das Schwarze Korps member: level 5, Might defense as level 7, Speed defense and strength-related tasks as level 6; health 20; Armor 2; melee attack inflicts 8 points of damage

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Steel Wolf: level 6; stealth, perception, Might defense, and Speed defense as level 9; health 50; Armor 8 Star: level 5, Speed defense and acrobatics as level 6; flies, hurls radiant star bolts up to long range for 10 points of damage Polarity: level 6, Might defense as level 7; health 25; Armor 1; controls electricity to make long-range attacks for 12 points of damage; disrupts electrical systems in machines within long range Sending modern PCs back to World War II is a great chance to give them the satisfaction of punching Nazis. And there is nothing more satisfying for a hero than punching Nazis. Nothing.

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Victory, led by Old Glory, an American. Other notable members included the British Steel Wolf, France’s Star, and the Canadian Polarity, although there were others. Confrontations between individuals and groups of these powered soldiers and agents occurred with great frequency until early 1945, when Strikeforce Victory attacked Adolf Hitler’s bunker and destroyed it in a massive battle. Hitler did not survive the confrontation, nor did Vampir.

THE COLD WAR If the Soviet Union employed superhumans during World War II, any records of such have been lost to history. Secretive about their superhuman population and paranormal discoveries, the Soviets nevertheless watched their population closely for those with special abilities, and worked tirelessly to develop or steal technology that would either aid or create superhumans. They were successful, but only at the cost of what might have been thousands of lives.

Although one of the most lauded heroes of World War II, Paragon’s greatest legacy is perhaps that of racial justice and equality. As an African American, he singlehandedly changed the attitudes of many white Americans both during and after the war, and that feeling persisted well after his death in 1982. A number of the superhumans who served during the war continued using their powers to help their countries, the planet, and innocent people in general. Involvement in the war effort had cemented the idea that if a person developed powers, they should use them in service to humanity in some way. Thus, the idea of the independent superpowered hero was born, and the term “superhero” became commonplace. Of course, those uninterested in such selfless work either hid their abilities or used them for personal gain. Superheroes took it as their particular responsibility to deal with criminals who had abilities beyond the norm. Soon after the “superhero” was born, the “supervillain” followed. Dangerous confrontations

History of The world

between the two became more and more common. Not surprisingly, superheroes quickly became celebrities, and that has remained true to the present day. In the early 1950s, a secretive organization with unknown funding sources formed to deal with superpowered criminals, paranormal dangers, technological challenges, and threats from beyond Earth (from space, other dimensions, below the surface, or elsewhere). The organization eventually gained the name Bulwark Against Supernatural Threats of an Illicit or Ominous Nature, or BASTION. It’s worth noting that BASTION is not an American organization and has no direct ties to the US government. It is primarily a Western institution, in that it was turned away from the Soviet Union and its satellite nations, as well as China. (Later, as BASTION became a more public organization and the Soviet Union fell, it would operate even in Russia and other lands that had rejected its help.) Ostensibly, BASTION believed that it would replace so-called superheroes. The

founders (and secret funding sources) worried that it was dangerous to leave the solutions to big, paranormal problems to the actions of unorganized, unregulated, and independent citizens, each with their own national affiliations. To this end, by 1955, BASTION recruited its own superpowered agents, who did not use flashy code names but instead took standard agent designations. Thus, Agent 77, a telekinetic, and Agent 81, with his supernatural strength and agility (as well as a wide arsenal of weaponry), soon began to serve along with BASTION’s other nonpowered (but well-equipped) agents. Unbeknownst to many, Agent 77 was the granddaughter of the Scottish World War I agent Spike. In 1962, Agent 77 was killed during the first invasion of the demonic servitors of Sorrow, a powerful interdimensional entity. Further, Agent 81’s mind was corrupted by his encounter with Sorrow. Even though she and her forces were repelled from Earth with the help of Paragon and a few

Agent 77: level 4, telekinetic effects as level 7, Speed defense and stealth as level 6; Armor 1; telekinesis can move up to 1,000 pounds (450 kg)

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Mister Savage: level 6; attacks, strengthrelated tasks, and Might defense as level 8; health 48; Armor 3; melee attack inflicts 12 points of damage Coldhand: level 5, Speed defense as level 6; Armor 5 (ice); blasts of cold inflict 14 points of damage at long range or 8 points of damage in a medium area; can freeze anything she touches, creates ice shields and walls Z, page 156 Blackstar, page 108 Orion: level 3; strength-related tasks, defense tasks, perception, and initiative as level 5; health 30; Armor 3; melee attack inflicts 9 points of damage

Freefire, page 163

The Traveler, page 149

Valerie Lincoln, page 181 Mystery Earth, page 199

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other heroes, Agent 81 went rogue, called himself Mister Savage, and began working as a powered criminal. As a result of these events, BASTION’s leadership admitted that independent heroes should not be replaced. (This, however, did not stop the organization from continuing to recruit and make use of superhuman agents.) Soon after, Mister Savage combined forces with Dagger associates Coldhand and the mysterious entity known only as Z, and joined with a handful of leaders of criminal syndicates in the United States, China, Europe, and South Africa. This cabal would become the shadowy leadership of the equally shadowy organization called the Dagger. (The full details of this were not known outside the organization for years, and in fact there may be revelations about the early days of the Dagger still to be learned.) Operating throughout the world, the Dagger seemed primarily interested in stealing and using technological secrets. Within a decade of its formation, however, it operated on every continent and even in space, and launched its first bid at global domination through the use of a powerful mind-control drug on a number of world leaders. Their efforts, including this first attempt at taking control of the world, were thwarted by BASTION as well as various heroes, including Paragon, the teleporter Sidestep, and a team calling itself Freefire. Throughout the Cold War, heroes from the West clashed with enemy agents, and, likewise, Soviet superhumans helped defend their homeland from foreign spies. Occasionally, this brought superhumans from both sides into direct conflict. These confrontations were typically covered up by both sides. By the 1960s, the Cold War also involved the so-called space race, and with the help of superpowered individuals, these efforts in both the US and the USSR were accelerated and protected. Thanks to Azaki technology and the genius of scientist Valerie Lincoln, the United States landed three astronauts on the moon in 1963.

When they arrived, they found a pair of superhumans from China already there in a permanent moonbase. These unknown superhumans disappeared soon thereafter in a strange and still-unexplained flash of energy that turned the moon violet for about three months that year. As mentioned earlier, the Dagger also got involved in early space exploration, and by 1975 had a secret orbital base of their own called Raptor’s Perch. They stole the knowledge from others, but by this point they also had their own science teams developing Azaki technology.

THE 1980s Many new superhumans burst onto the scene in the 1980s. Blackstar arrived on Earth and quickly began using her powers to defend the innocent. The superpowered crimefighter Orion started operations in New York (he was murdered in 1992). Heroes calling themselves Wizard and Warrior responded to issues all across North America, with Wizard being a super-genius technological expert and Warrior being an armored superhero with tech created by Wizard. As it turns out, both were actually Niles Lincoln, the son of Valerie Lincoln, which explains why the two heroes were never seen together. The various members of Freefire had all retired or passed away, but new heroes took up the mantle and operated into the early 1990s. The new Freefire saw action across the globe. The Traveler, a time-traveling being, was first seen in modern times in 1980. Three particularly significant events involving superheroes occurred in the ’80s. The first happened in 1981, when Freefire, Paragon, Blackstar, and Wizard/Warrior disappeared mysteriously for a period of almost six months. Later, when they returned, they revealed that they had been kidnapped and transported to a planet orbiting another star similar to our own sun but on the other side of the galaxy. This world, which they named

History of The world Mystery Earth, was similar to our own world in many ways, but significantly different in others. The cosmic entity named the One was ultimately discovered to be responsible for kidnapping the heroes, and eventually was tricked into sending them back to Earth. The second major event came in 1982 with the funeral of Paragon. Lauded as the first superhero and perhaps the greatest of them all, Paragon died at the age of 71 of complications from an injury sustained during the second world war. A huge statue was erected in front of the United Nations building in New York City honoring the hero. The third major event of the decade was the attempted invasion by the alien species known as the Grin in 1986. Their main attacks were centered in the cities of Washington, Sao Paulo, Paris, Baghdad, Tokyo, and Johannesburg. They were opposed by BASTION, virtually all of the world’s superhumans, and of course the military forces of the nations involved (as well as a joint NATO operation).

A young telepath calling herself Minder proved instrumental to the defeat of the Grin. Using a device created by Niles Lincoln (Wizard/Warrior) that greatly boosted her powers temporarily, she was able to communicate with and coordinate the actions of all of Earth’s defenders at once. The battles raged for three months, but eventually, the Grin left the planet, defeated.

THE 1990s The ’90s saw a proliferation of violent vigilantes in the United States. Thanks to the precedents set by heroes like Paragon fifty years earlier, most superheroes (virtually all of whom are, technically, vigilantes) abided by an unspoken code of nonlethal tactics. But the new “heroes” such as Pulsator, Revenge, and T-Rex had no such qualms. While a few existing heroes were influenced by this behavior, becoming less averse to dealing death to criminals who seemed deserving, most found the new vigilantes and their lethal

Minder, page 137 The One, page 138 Grin, page 123 Pulsator: level 5; perception as level 9; Speed defense, initiative, and acrobatics as level 7; Armor 4; battle suit can cause vibrations that stun foes or shatter objects up to a long distance away; uses vibrations as sonar up to a long distance Revenge: level 6, attacks as level 8, Might defense as level 7; Armor 4; primarily uses military weaponry and body armor T-Rex: level 5; Might defense, strength tasks, and melee attacks as level 7; health 40; Armor 3; bite with huge, pointed teeth inflicts 10 points of damage

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The Gentleman, page 120 Anagog: level 9, Might and Intellect defense as level 7, Speed defense as level 7 due to size; health 120; magically transforms matter and energy in a mile radius, telepathy, mind control (with hundreds of targets), and more Majestic Family, page 130 Whisper, page 154 Valor, page 150

Crimson Protector, page 110 Ghostwalk, page 121 Shift, page 144 Defender, page 113 Edifice, page 116 Mystery Earth, page 199 The One, page 138 Sorrow, page 148

tactics to be abhorrent. This led to clashes between self-proclaimed heroes, often pitting the young against the older. The 1990s also saw the debut of the Gentleman, a mage trained in the mystic arts, when he attempted to stop the otherworldly entity Anagog from transforming London into a hellishly horrific alternate version of the city. The Gentleman would later travel the world combating mystical entities, including the return of Sorrow in 1997 and the Demonix invasion on New Year’s Eve in 1999. The sonic-based superhuman Whisper first appeared in 1999. She quickly became partners with another new hero, Valor. At first, the duo dealt primarily with simple crimes in Los Angeles, but they soon ran afoul of Minder, whose own powers had rendered her mentally unstable. Now a villain, Minder opposes the two as they try to keep LA safe. Investigating an inventor in Dallas who had somehow obtained Azaki technology, both Whisper and Valor were transported across the galaxy to Mystery Earth. Unlike the abduction of heroes in 1981, this time they were not brought there by the One. However, once there, the duo found themselves opposing Sorrow’s actions and thwarting her plans, and in so doing, they got the One’s attention. That being sent the two of them home.

THE NEW MILLENNIUM Silver Sentinel, page 146 Lord Eswar, page 139

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Silver Sentinel arrived on the scene in 2001, stopping terrorists from crashing planes into the World Trade Center. Although the terrorists were Muslim extremists, Silver Sentinel’s Muslim American heritage helped to curb the ensuing Islamophobia, which could have been more rampant and lasting. In 2004, the heroes Whisper and Valor got married and invited a vast array of superhumans to the ceremony, on a private yacht in the Pacific Ocean. It seemed almost inevitable that the wedding would be interrupted by trouble, and sure

enough, Dagger assassins attacked the gathered heroes in the hopes of killing a large number at once. The Gentleman used a spell to prevent the detonation of a bomb in the ship’s hold, and the other superhumans dealt with the assassins in a melee that ended with the happy couple completing their vows while fighting their foes, only to be then flown off by Silver Sentinel to enjoy their honeymoon on Numinous Island. The Majestic Family launched its first private mission into space in 2006. They traveled to Mars in their M-shuttle and, amid the Azaki ruins there, found the technology to build a faster-than-light hyperdrive. In 2010, the Society of Seven formed. Although Silver Sentinel was a founding member, he left the group soon thereafter and was replaced by Crimson Protector. The other members of the Seven were Ghostwalk, Shift, Defender, Edifice, Whisper, and Valor. In 2012, another attempted attack by the alien Grin was thwarted by Silver Sentinel and the Majestic Family. The heroes disabled the Grin attack craft before they entered the inner solar system, although the aliens were able to safely land on Jupiter’s moon Europa. The Grin are presumably still there. In 2015, when the Society of Seven captured the so-called Ghost Generator created by the villainous Baron Shadow, Lord Eswar of the Royal House of Videsh stole it from them. The Ghost Generator created “ethereal robots” that resembled ghosts and operated at the command of their creator. Lord Eswar’s own supernatural ability to become insubstantial somehow allowed him to absorb the robots to make himself more powerful. The Society attempted to recover the machine from Eswar’s palace, where they encountered a number of his children, all wielding supernatural powers. The machine was ultimately destroyed, but the Royal House of Videsh, a previously

History of The world reclusive family of superhumans with incredible wealth, had made itself known to the world.

THE PRESENT In 2016, a new, young hero named Warp made himself known in Chicago. His activities have focused almost entirely on dealing with crime in the city—specifically organized crime—and he has revealed the Dagger’s presence there, clashing frequently with Dagger enforcers Wreck and Ruin. In 2020, the spread of a coronavirus in China was prevented by the quick actions of microbiologist Dr. Li Daiyu, who rapidly developed a cure that eradicated the virus. Doctor Li also secretly operates as Daiyu (Black Jade), a hero who uses a suit of organic armor as sophisticated as any mechanical battle suit on the planet. Many people believe that were it not for her intervention, the virus would have become a global pandemic unlike anything seen since the Spanish Flu. The mysterious man known as Ruthless has been encountered in various locations across the United States, and his body-morphing powers seem to make him as much a danger as a potential hero. Just last year, the gravity-controlling Gravitas attempted to steal a powerful Azaki artifact that could have increased his powers at the expense of most of the Eastern Seaboard. He’s now on his way to prison. Baron Shadow continues to be enemy number 1 when it comes to supervillains, recently clashing with the Society of Seven on the West Coast. The Society and the Majestic Family remain the premier super-teams, but Europe’s Golden Shield and Japan’s Senshukan are also formidable and respected. Silver Sentinel remains perhaps the most powerful, but also the most aloof, of all the heroes. Blackstar continues to make appearances from time to time when she’s needed, looking no older than she did in the 1980s.

The Society of Seven, sent hurtling into an extradimensional realm by the villainous Singularity, an entity with command over the fabric of space itself, encountered a superhuman originally from twentieth century Atlanta who called herself Dawnstar. She was using her amazing control of otherworldly energies to search for her sister, who possessed similar powers but was now lost in the Worlds Between. Dawnstar helped return the Society to their rightful world, and now presumably continues her search.

THE FUTURE The Traveler warns of a time in the late twenty-first century when a climate crisis threatens the world and global war is breaking out. For some reason, there don’t seem to be any superhumans active at the time. Beings from the twenty-eighth century have used a time machine to visit the past at least twice. Mondruid, a man with a suit of armor both technological and mystical, singlehandedly challenged the entire Freefire team in 1986, although they managed to send him back to the future, defeated. Mondruid later appeared in 2012 with a cybernetic organism who self-identifies as female and calls herself called OZ (pronounced oh-zee). Mondruid and OZ seem to come from a time where technology is extremely advanced and supernatural abilities are even more commonplace. They are criminals in their own era, and believe that the past would offer less resistance to their attempts at domination. These two (or others) could return at any time to once again pose a threat.

Singularity, page 147 Warp, page 153 Dawnstar, page 111 Daiyu, page 191 Ruthless, page 143 Mondruid: level 8, technological knowledge as level 10; health 50; Armor 8; flies or teleports up to a mile, projects energy blasts up to long range that inflict 15 points of damage to one target or 10 points of damage to up to three targets, restores 10 health as an action, and other abilities seemingly as needed Gravitas, page 122 Baron Shadow, page 107 Freefire, page 163 OZ: level 7, technological knowledge as level 9, strength tasks as level 8, twenty-first-century knowledge as level 1; health 40; Armor 3; melee attack inflicts 10 points of damage; changes shape to fit into any space; releases dozens of tiny minibots under her control that inflict 3 points of damage to foes in a medium area each round Golden Shield, page 188 Senshukan, page 191

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E DAGGER (OVERVIEW) BASTION REPORT 00014: TH Section 1 inchild of rogue BASTION ly 1960s, the Dagger was the bra Founded at some point in the ear named Coldhand, and Savage), a ruthless superhuman ter Mis self him ling (cal 81 nt age a worldwide se three served as a cabal heading The Z. as wn kno re figu ous teri the mys ons and criminal ed a number of local illegal operati dat soli con y retl sec t tha te dica crime syn nd disappeared in a Savage died in 1984 and Coldha organizations. Although Mister e and in command y in 1987, Z is still ver much aliv tem sys r sola the of out ded spacecraft hea the original Z, but another eve, however, that they are not of the Dagger. Some analysts beli modus operandi. person using the same name and enterprise known to s in virtually every sort of criminal Activities: The Dagger participate trafficking, weapons gs, gambling, prostitution, human dru , ling ugg sm n, rtio exto : ans hum ing, counterfeiting, tion racketeering, money launder tec pro ing, fick traf and ure act manuf inal activities, see rder, and arson. (For more on crim mu n, latio nipu ma l tica poli e, cybercrim section 2.3.) e different kinds of agents. Agents: The Dagger employs thre skilled in stealth, disguise, as assassins and spies. They are • The first are infiltrators, used ons. and the use of all manner of pois tine, and openly wear orcers. Enforcers are not clandes enf are nts • The second sort of age and are typically skilled in They carry advanced weaponry the Dagger’s symbol (a dagger). s. g archaic swords of various type close combat weapons, includin abilities or technology. al orm ern ized, usually with sup cial spe are nts age of t sor d • The thir in Africa, but also a the cybernetic Executors found as h suc nts age e tim fullude These incl owered criminal rcenaries drawn from the superp me and s ker wor t trac con of wide variety section 5.) illains). (For more on agents, see element (colloquially called superv umulation of wealth and anization appears to be the acc Goals: While the goal of the org d analysts suggest that findings of our most experience influence across the globe, the (Analysis Department files lofty as total world domination. as be ht mig l goa ate ultim ir the genta.) 5689B-5689J, classification Ma TION personnel t. In 2002, no fewer than 193 BAS Threat Level to BASTION: Highes a thorough of end d to be Dagger agents at the throughout the world were reveale mised security and pro com for years afterward about our own the Dagger, investigation, raising concerns from ors trat ation that revealed only two infil rnal inte activities. Despite a 2018 investig on rmation ain hypervigilant. (For more info Dagger, see the all personnel are instructed to rem rt conflict with and 8.2. For information on ove investigations, see sections 6.5 section 7.)

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e r d e w o p r e p u S

CHAP TER 12

Survey

T

his chapter details the important locations of the Boundless setting as they pertain to superhumans and related phenomena. While there are more locations of interest than those presented here, you can assume the rest of the world resembles Earth as you know it. If the campaign you want to run in this setting will stay mainly in one area rather than involve a lot of globetrotting, feel free to pull whatever material you want from this chapter into that area. For example, if your game will stay mostly around Chicago, pull Dynamic, Inc., a BASTION headquarters, an entrance to Inner Earth, and so on into the greater Chicago area. Maybe even take Poland’s Ravenmaster or Australia’s Kiln facility and put it closer to your characters. It’s all up to you. The Boundless setting focuses primarily on the United States, where a great many superhumans live and operate. However, this chapter gives a few insights into other countries as well. It is by no means a comprehensive list.

NORTH AMERICA A higher than average (per capita) number of superhumans live in the United States. Perhaps like breeds like. Superhumans do live in Canada and Mexico, of course, just not as many. (It is also not uncommon for superhumans from other countries to come to the US, and many who operate all over the world seem to call the United States “home.”)

NEW YORK New York City, the largest city in the United States, has a large number of superhumans—perhaps more than anywhere else on Earth based on area (not population). In New York, many businesses and homeowners take out special superhuman insurance policies due to the damage they can sustain. It’s rare enough to be profitable for companies to offer it, but devastating enough to make it a wise expenditure on the part of a property owner. Although superhumans end up causing destruction everywhere, rarely does it occur so often that people outside of New York would pay for special insurance. Manhattan is home to Claim the Sky magazine, which covers news, gossip, rumors, and speculation about superheroes and supervillains. Published biweekly with daily online updates, it has one of the largest circulations in the country, and the largest online presence of any periodical or web-based news service. Heroes (and even villains) sometimes find their coverage to be spotty, inconsistent, error-ridden, or just outright fabrications, but it doesn’t seem to matter. While other news sources carry more accurate stories, Claim the Sky always has the latest scoop, and the most sensational and entertaining coverage. Perhaps not surprisingly, the magazine (which often refers to itself as a “superzine”) employs a journalist with supernatural abilities. Carter Connover doesn’t wear a costume or use a code name. But his ability to turn into wind

Carter Connover: level 2; movement, acrobatics, initiative, Speed defense, and stealth as level 5; transforms into moving air that cannot be seen (but can be felt); flies up to 30 miles (48 km) per hour, ignoring most obstacles

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Claim the Sky NEWS COVERAGE OF PLAYER CHARACTERS While not everyone is interested in fame, public attention is virtually unavoidable for a superhero. Everyone is captivated by the idea of performing impossible deeds and wielding powers beyond the norm. Even people who hate superheroes for the damage they cause to infrastructure, buildings, and innocent bystanders follow them closely in the news. Everyone has strong opinions about superhumans. The first time a new hero is mentioned online or in the newspapers might be a very big deal—a thrilling moment, most likely. Eventually, though, the PCs might grow tired of reporters getting in the way, or—particularly in the case of Claim the Sky magazine—getting a story wrong. Consider the awkward situation where two heroes are suddenly suspected of dating or, just the opposite, hating each other. That’s the kind of stuff the gossip magazines and websites thrive on, and the PCs invariably will be caught in that web. The press might be quick to turn on a hero who makes a mistake or appears to have committed a crime. This is a useful tactic of villains: frame their heroic archenemy to turn the public (and probably the authorities) against them. News sources, and of course social media, are only too willing to make this even worse for the PCs. Heroes without secret identities will also have to deal with paparazzi. Reporters will camp outside their homes, especially when they’re in the middle of a big mission. On the other hand, PCs can make money on the side by selling insider stories and photos to eager news (and “news”) sources.

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Superpowered Survey means that he can get to the stories faster than anyone else and can get in close invisibly. If Carter was a better reporter, Claim the Sky might have a better reputation for accuracy, but it seems you can’t have everything. Also in Manhattan, near the United Nations building, stands a massive statue of Paragon, labeled “Our Hero.” A relatively new superhuman criminal going by the name Jabberwocky has been robbing midtown banks and similar establishments recently. She has not yet run afoul of the Society of Seven or any other superheroes.

DYNAMIC, INC. Manhattan is where you will find the head office of Dynamic Inc., the technology company founded and ostensibly run by Valerie Lincoln. Dynamic is the main supplier of hardware and technology to BASTION as well as various (wealthy) superheroes and teams. Valerie’s son Niles (who once operated as the hero alternatively known as both Wizard and Warrior) is soon to take control of the company from his aged mother, but likely won’t change much of the way it’s run, as he already oversees the day-to-day operations. While Niles is a genius in his own right in the fields of electrical and mechanical engineering, he spends most of his time in the business world rather than the scientific one, and never as a costumed hero nowadays. Dynamic has manufacturing facilities throughout the world, and Valerie has a secret base in the mountains of Washington state where she spends most of her time. Dynamic’s rivals are many, but none more insidious than Faust Industries, a multinational corporation based in Germany. While Dynamic doesn’t openly employ any full-time superhumans, they do have a private force of security guards clad in high-tech armor and a wide range of robotic wardroids. The corporate

espionage that has escalated between the two companies over the decades has been larger (and far more expensive) than some actual wars fought among nations. In very short order, Dynamic could produce a variety of high-tech manifest cyphers or artifacts and provide them to trusted allies, or those working for them.

SEVENTH HEAVEN New York is the home city of the Society of Seven. Their headquarters is publicly known, atop the One Vanderbuilt building in downtown Manhattan. It’s known as Seventh Heaven. Within their base, the Society keeps a vertical take-off and landing vehicle called the Archangel. This vehicle frequently soars with hushed engines over the city. The Society of Seven employs a staff of thirty-five people, about

Jabberwocky, page 126

Society of Seven, page 172 Dynamic security guard: level 3, Speed defense and perception as level 4; Armor 3; armed with ranged energy weapons that inflict 5 points of damage at very long range

Wardroid, page 365

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Claim the Sky Darkling: use ghoul stats, page 332 The Horror, page 125 Karma Master: level 3, all defenses as level 5; health 15; Armor 2 (from spell); short-range magical aura hinders foes’ actions by two steps; short-range magical bolts inflict 5 points of damage and ensnare target with level 3 chains of force Lunatic Fringe: level 7; movement, acrobatics, initiative, and Speed defense as level 9; health 30; Armor 2; throws bombs to medium range that inflict 7 points of damage in a small radius or create a cloud of lunacy gas in a small radius that inflicts 10 points of Intellect damage Corrosion: level 4, Speed defense and touch attack as level 5; touch inflicts 10 points of damage; objects or flesh that touch her suffer 6 points of damage; regenerates 3 health each round unless submerged in water or other liquid Darkwave: level 6; Armor 6 (energy field); energy blasts up to long range inflict 9 points of damage; creates solid objects of energy that fit into an immediate area Amnesia: level 3, touch attack as level 4, mental attack as level 7 (power shifts); touch deals 10 points of Intellect damage, or drains memory of the last ten minutes, or causes victim to lose next action Saint Nothing: level 5, all defenses as level 7; makes any inanimate object or portion of an object that can fit into an immediate area and that he can see within long range cease to exist for one minute (about five rounds) Avenging Angel: level 5, Might defense as level 8, sword attack and perception as level 7; health 40; Armor 7; flies at twice normal speed; energy sword inflicts 11 points of damage

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half of whom are security, and the other half are technical support, maintenance, custodial, administrative, and medical. They also have a full-time chef, physical trainer, and massage therapist. The Society of Seven does not keep captured foes or confiscated items in their base because of the danger either might pose to the nearby population. Instead, they entrust all such confinement and storage to BASTION, usually in their upstate laboratory complex called simply The Project.

up to the surface at night, often to hunt and steal. Darkling enclaves, hidden in the darkest reaches of the realms beneath the city, are filled with pilfered human goods, much of which is just trash. In the past, various villains like Demdike and Baron Shadow have used the darklings as pawns. The creature known as the Horror also dwells within the sewers beneath Manhattan. It attempts to keep to itself, feared and hated by both the humans above and the darklings below.

BENEATH THE CITY

ELSEWHERE IN THE CITY

The sewers and subway tunnels beneath the city are home to a group of creatures known as the darklings. The origin of these beings is not fully known, and speculation ranges from evolved (or uplifted) rats and other such creatures to devolved humans to demonic refugees from an otherwise unknown dark dimension. Regardless, these stealthy, diminutive carnivores eat any meat they can get their hands on, including human flesh. The darklings sometimes grow bold enough to come

A hero named Karma Master operates mainly in Brooklyn, using mystic powers to protect the community. Many superhumans in New York don’t confine their operations to one borough. A few of the many known superpowered criminals in the city include Lunatic Fringe, a mass murderer and terrorist; Corrosion, who can cause the chemical decay of matter she touches; and Darkwave, a mercenary who uses a mysterious energy she calls “anti-light” to create solid forms. Sometimes Darkwave partners with a telepath named Amnesia who can erase people’s memories with her touch. Saint Nothing runs a violent gang of nihilist extremists out of an abandoned church in Staten Island. He has the ability to cause matter to disappear for sixty seconds, and then reappear. When used on something like the underside of a city bus or the supports of a water tower, this power can be devastating. At least once in the recent past, all of these villains have teamed up, led by Lunatic Fringe, to cause chaos throughout the city, but their alliance didn’t last long. Falling somewhere in the grey area between hero and villain, the Avenging Angel metes out justice as they see fit. The Avenging Angel is the archenemy of Saint Nothing and his gang, clashing with them frequently.

Superpowered Survey THE PROJECT As previously mentioned, the main BASTION facility in the United States is in upstate New York and is called The Project. (It soon might be outshone by the newer BASTION facility in the American Southwest called Solar One.) More than 800 people work at The Project, and the vast majority of them live there as well. These include security personnel, research scientists, technicians, administrators, and field agents. The Project’s main focus is research. Scientists study alien technology and other discoveries or recovered items of a paranormal nature. For many years, The Project served as a secure containment facility for dangerous materials, objects, and individuals. Eventually, however, it was ruled unconstitutional in the United States (and very likely illegal in most countries) to store people indefinitely just because they had powers that made them a danger. Since then, BASTION has created a prison especially for superpowered criminals who have been duly convicted in the country where their crimes were committed. This prison, Station Zero, lies deep beneath the Atlantic. That said, sometimes prisoners from Station Zero are shipped to The Project for study. Inmates who agree to this often gain a reduced sentence.

NEW YORK ADVENTURE IDEAS • No one has heard from The Project in 48 hours. No radio contact, no emails, nothing. Investigators have not returned—a whole unit of agents sent in to check on the base has ceased communications. Satellite photos show a strange mist covering the area. Are the PCs willing to check on it? • Saint Nothing and his followers dig up the body of a dead hero named Orion and steal away with it, believing they have found a way to draw the superstrength and resilience from his remains. Someone has to put a stop to this horrific crime—and, just in case the villains really do have the means to carry out their plan, before they succeed. Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

• Lunatic Fringe has developed a mindcontrol gas and uses it to control a number of the darklings below the city streets. But he gets more than he bargained for when the gas also controls the mind of the Horror. A new villain called Infiltrator catches wind of this and suggests that Lunatic Fringe send his new subjects to attack the headquarters of Dynamic, Inc. But Infiltrator just wants the distraction so he can get inside the facility and steal secrets to sell to Faust Industries.

AMERICAN EAST COAST Operating throughout the Eastern Seaboard is a group of criminals calling themselves Dread. Dread has seven members, and they turn up individually or in small groups in New York, Philadelphia, New Jersey, Boston, and Washington, DC. As a whole, they are powerful enough to take on the Society of Seven (and it was for that purpose that they originally formed). • Dirge possesses terrible sonic powers that disrupt living creatures on a cellular level. • Entropy has the strange ability to transform any inanimate object into other objects, as long as the result is a less orderly, less cohesive unit. So he can turn a bank vault door into mist or an opponent’s gun into a handful of marbles. • Highrise is a bruiser who can grow to gargantuan size. • Manslaughter can transform his body into weapons, even complex weapons like firearms. One of his favorite ways to go into action is with both arms transformed into autocannons or combat shotguns. • Shrike is blindingly fast and just as lethal. • Worm is a man with the ability to turn almost anything he touches into grey goo—even living flesh. • Voltage is the leader of Dread. She commands electricity and can wield it as a weapon, disrupt electrical devices, and travel instantly along conductive wires or cables. She is incredibly intelligent and a brilliant tactician.

Solar One, page 182 Infiltrator: level 5; stealth as level 8 (from armored stealth suit); Speed defense, acrobatics, disguise, deception, and persuasion as level 7; Armor 3 (from suit); silent energy pistol inflicts 8 points of damage at long range; has a wide arsenal of smoke and conventional mini-grenades BASTION standard security: level 3 BASTION elite security: level 5 Society of Seven, page 172 Dirge, page 115 Station Zero, page 196 Entropy, page 118

Highrise, page 124 Manslaughter, page 135

Shrike, page 145 Worm, page 155

Voltage, page 152

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Claim the Sky Bureau of Superhuman Affairs field agent: level 3; perception, investigation, and Intellect defense as level 4 HTHRT agent: level 4, attack and defense as level 5; Armor 2 Space defense armored trooper: level 4, attack and defense as level 5; Armor 3; flies via a jetpack; suit can go into the vacuum of space Malevolence, page 134 The Flame: level 6; flies; hurls fireballs that inflict 8 points of damage in an immediate area; flaming aura inflicts 5 points of damage to anyone touching him; absorbs heat and flame to instantly restore his health to full Snag: level 5, stealth and Might defense as level 6; health 50; Armor 3; bite or tail inflicts 8 points of damage Vortex: level 6, acrobatics and Speed defense as level 7; traps victims in portals to a subdimension, “absorbs” incoming ranged attacks in portals, and enters/ exits her portals as she wishes Livewire: level 5; computer skills, electrical engineering, and Might defense as level 7; Armor 3; controls all electrical devices within medium range, including causing them to explode, inflicting 5 points of damage to anyone touching them B’dlu inhabitant: level 3, scientific knowledge as level 5; Armor 1; breathes underwater, telepathy at very long range, can join together with others of their species to increase range to 500 miles (800 km)

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SUPERHUMANS AND THE US GOVERNMENT The Bureau of Superhuman Affairs has its headquarters in Washington, and word among the political pundits is that its director, Samuel Heyes, is trying to get a Secretary of Superhuman Affairs in the next president’s cabinet. The bureau has about 150 agents, most of whom are field agents who travel the country, dealing with superhuman crimes, superhuman rights, and other issues. Within their narrow purview, they have some policing authority similar to the FBI, although the FBI also has its own unit devoted to superhumans and supernatural events. The unit in the FBI is sometimes jokingly known as the Supergroup, or the S-Files, but its actual name is the Superhuman Response Group, and it is within the Criminal, Cyber, Response, and Services Branch. This section has its own HTHRT (High Threat Hazard Response Team) agents, equipped with some of the latest technology to combat or cope with superhuman criminals. Superhumans and related issues always fall under federal jurisdiction. The CIA has a small group of what they call “Ultra Agents” who use their superhuman abilities in field missions abroad. Lastly, the Pentagon operates a very secretive program to study and train (and possibly create) superhumans for the various branches of the military. The Air Force also has a wing devoted entirely to space defense after the Grin invasion in the 1980s, with high-altitude warplanes, elite armored troopers, black ops laser satellites, and at least two military space planes.

WASHINGTON, DC

FLORIDA

The US capital has a single prominent superhero named the Flame, who has helped protect national monuments, foreign dignitaries, and government personnel enough times that he has a high-security clearance and is afforded the status of a government agent, although this is all apparently quite unofficial. Just as well known as the Flame are the terrorist mercenaries known as Vortex and Livewire. Vortex can create small portals into what would seem to be her own personal subdimension. People or objects can be drawn into this dimension and likewise ejected as she desires. Livewire controls electrical devices of all kinds and is particularly fond of computer crime. Vortex and Livewire have worked together on a number of occasions, but recently had a falling out. Unfortunately, this falling out took place on the National Mall and damaged the Lincoln Memorial before the Flame and federal agents showed up.

The sorcerer Malevolence lives in southern Florida, where she is wanted for murder and other crimes. Authorities have also seen her in Texas, where she clashed with the mystic Ella Brodach. Multiple reports of a mutant alligator of great size and ferocity dubbed “Snag” have been filed throughout Florida, but what no one has yet realized is that Snag is not an individual, but an entirely new species. These dangerous predators typically hunt alone and are comfortable roaming on land for extensive periods of time.

CHICAGO As the largest city in the American Midwest, Chicago is no stranger to superhumans or paranormal activities. Deep within the cold, dark waters of Lake Michigan lies the submerged city of B’dlu, which is actually a colony starship from the planet of the same name; its people attempted to found a settlement there in the eighteenth century. The remaining inhabitants of the aquatic race of humanoids are very few in number, having found Earth generally

Superpowered Survey inhospitable. While the general AZAKI MYSTICISM public does not know of B’dlu’s While the Azaki are known for their extremely existence, in the 1990s, the villain advanced technology, careful scholars of Coriolis discovered it and stole both the Azaki and the mystic arts can tell some technology. The inhabitants you that they also tapped into power sources, managed to telepathically contact extradimensional realms, and mysterious the armored hero Centurion, who entities that most people on modern Earth captured Coriolis but failed to consider to be within the purview of magic and recover what she stole. Crudely the occult. Unlike most humans who practice reverse-engineered B’dlu tech such arts, the Azaki combined these facets of has made its way around the knowledge and sources of power with their Chicago underworld ever since. other forms of technology and science. Although the Dagger’s influence Nevertheless, although superhumans that and presence can be felt claim powers from magical sources or mystical throughout America’s criminal training are by far the rarest of all, we once underworld, the organization again see that the Azaki presence on prehistoric is more active in Chicago than Earth gave rise to almost all paranormal activity in any other US city. Defending seen today. the streets of Chicago is the crimefighter Warp. Although a fairly recent arrival on the THE NORTHWESTERN UNITED STATES superhuman stage, Warp has made Dynamic Inc.’s main research facility a name for himself not just by fighting against the local criminal organizations, but is located in the Cascade Mountains in Washington state. Valerie Lincoln, thanks to his antics and sense of humor. The Dagger hates Warp, and supposedly despite being in her eighties, still develops has placed a very large bounty on his head. cutting-edge technology and conducts The group has employed the villains Wreck experiments far beyond most of the rest of the world. In her mountain retreat, she and Ruin multiple times to try to kill him. has several working time machines, a The Maestro is an infamous cold fusion reactor, a sentient artificial mind-controlling villain in Chicago. He’s intelligence named EON, and the plans for always surrounded by a cadre of mentally various innovations including warp drives enslaved guards, servants, and lackeys of and force fields. She is the only human in all sorts, and he uses his powers to steal the facility. All other inhabitants are robots, from the very rich. He particularly loves some obviously so, while others appear art and rare objects, so Chicago museums fully human. have fallen victim to his activities as well. Portland is home to one of the greatest Although she has partnered with the practitioners of the mystical arts, Ella Maestro in the past, Lady Silence usually Brodach. Her archnemesis, Runic, despite works alone. She has the ability to stifle originally hailing from Denmark, seems sound and is an expert martial combatant, to spend a great deal of time in the Pacific but her truly significant power is to Northwest now. “silence” the superpowers of others. The mind-controlling villain known as Free Reign lives in Seattle, although he has been encountered throughout the United States.

Coriolis: level 5, Speed defense as level 9; flies; telekinetic control of any and all objects up to 100 pounds (45 kg) in immediate range but only in a swirling motion around her, which adds to Speed defense and inflicts 8 points of damage on anyone in the area if she wishes Centurion: level 4; scientific knowledge, perception, and all strength-related tasks as level 6; health 25; Armor 4; flies; melee attack inflicts 6 points of damage; launches missiles up to very long range that turn into sticky nets that negate target’s next action and hinder actions afterward Dagger, page 163 Warp, page 153 Wreck and Ruin: level 5, strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 8; health 50; Armor 5; melee attack inflicts 10 points of damage The Maestro: level 5, resisting mental attacks as level 7, knowledge of fine art and high society as level 7; controls the minds of all within short range or a single target within very long range; immune to telepathy and resistant to other mental powers Maestro and Free Reign have similar abilities and attitudes, and they’re aware of each other. Free Reign thinks Maestro is an elitist snob, and Maestro thinks Free Reign is a narcissist hipster. They’re both wary about seeing how their powers interact. Lady Silence: level 6, stealth as level 8, attacks and Speed defense as level 7; selectively suppresses sound within short range; selectively negates a power possessed by a target within short range Valerie Lincoln: level 6, science as level 10; Armor 4 (personal force field); super-genius with the ability to create almost any device in short order Ella Brodach: level 8, mystical knowledge and Intellect defense as level 10, most physical actions as level 6; Armor 5 (mystical wards); conjures all manner of energy effects, illusions, and physical objects; heals wounds, summons entities from other realms, flies, and teleports Runic: level 7, strengthrelated tasks and all defense tasks as level 8; health 35; Armor 3; uses runic tattoos to absorb strength from objects or creatures touched, inflicting 8 points of damage and either restoring 10 health or granting him an asset to his next action; has a wide variety of mystical objects that grant different powers Free Reign, page 119

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Red Wolf: level 4; anything involving speed, strength, stealth, or perception as level 8 Caterwaul: level 3, stealth and perception as level 6; sonic attack either makes all within short range lose their next action or inflicts 6 points of damage to one target and makes them lose their next action Breakneck: level 4, Speed defense and initiative as level 7, Might defense and strength-related tasks as level 5; health 28; takes two actions in a round; melee attack inflicts 10 points of damage, or 12 points if not standing still Debris: level 5, stealth as level 6; makes any inanimate object (or part of an object) lower than level 6 within short range crumble or explode, inflicting 6 points of damage to anyone in immediate range The Hook: level 5, Might defense and hook attacks as level 7; health 20; Armor 3; hook attack deals 7 points of damage to a target within short range or 5 points of damage to all targets in immediate range; uses chain to bind a target (level 7 task to escape) Kaos, page 128 Blackstar, page 108

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THE SOUTHWESTERN UNITED STATES A skilled thief calling herself Red Wolf operates throughout the Southwest. She appears to have animal-like speed, strength, stealth, and senses. She occasionally partners with a man called Caterwaul who has horrific sonic abilities. They might seem like a strange pair, but Caterwaul is also very stealthy—until he decidedly is not. When they are together, Red Wolf has earplugs that make her temporarily immune to Caterwaul’s sonic cry. Solar One is one of BASTION’s newest facilities, entirely powered by solar energy. It is a research facility in the middle of the Arizona desert. The staff consists of more than 500 people, including security personnel, research scientists, technicians, administrators, and field agents. Solar One’s main focus is research, and even more specifically energy research. Their ultimate goal is the discovery of a clean energy source not only efficient enough to replace fossil fuels, but potent enough to power experimental projects including

teleportation, faster-than-light travel, force fields, energy weapons, and so on.

CALIFORNIA The most infamous villain in LA is very likely Kaos. This maverique has powers that affect probability, but always seem to end in destruction. While they sometimes commit crimes for money or personal gain, it seems that other times Kaos acts purely for the chaos they sow. An occasional ally of Kaos calls himself Breakneck, and he is both fantastically strong and fast, making for a deadly combination. Meanwhile, Debris and the Hook are a pair of superhuman thieves who use their abilities to break into very secure places (bank vaults, for example). Debris can cause any matter to crumble— with explosive force if she wishes—while the Hook is a homicidal fiend with body armor and a long hooked chain. Fortunately, LA is under the protection of the alien Blackstar, with her various powers and abilities.

Superpowered Survey Valor and Whisper, married heroes beloved by all, have operated on the West Coast for more than twenty years, although you would never guess it from looking at them, as they could both still pass for women in their mid-twenties. Mount Shasta in California was once a colony of the Azaki. Deep within the mountain is a complex that holds sophisticated technologies, including interstellar capabilities, but getting inside is very difficult. Only a few resourceful (or lucky) individuals have done so.

CANADA A fair number of Canadian superhumans eventually come to the United States. Still, based solely on population, Canada has a higher than normal average of people born with mutant abilities. The theories explaining this are many, but none are conclusive.

Valor, page 150 Whisper, page 154

The hero-turned-villain Minder (page 137) also lives in California.

TORONTO Spectrum is very likely the best-known Canadian superhero. She can manipulate electromagnetic energy on almost every level and frequency. She is beloved by the city. A criminal notorious for his strength and destructive power (but not his intelligence) calls himself Piledriver. His natural strength is enhanced further by a powered suit

OTHER UNITED STATES ADVENTURE IDEAS • The members of Dread are in Atlanta, GA, where a huge comic book convention (Dragon*Con) is in full swing. One of the attendees is the daughter of a scientist who works at Solar One, and the villains are going to try to use the confusion (and proliferation of people in costumes) to kidnap her. They want to use her as leverage to gain access to some of the facility’s secrets from her mother. The PCs hopefully intervene, but they have to find a young woman dressed as a colorful character amid a convention of 50,000 other costumed people, being held in a hotel room by villains, who are also in costume. • Kaos and Breakneck have engineered a variety of disturbances in Southern California to occupy Blackstar and the other local heroes. Meanwhile, the villains attempt to hijack a military convoy transporting pieces of the now-destroyed International Space Station that still has some of Cataclysm’s potent energy absorbed in its solar panels. The PCs can move to stop them, but must first deal with Debris and the Hook, who are serving as decoys to further prevent unwanted interference from superheroes. If Kaos gets their hands on Cataclysm’s residual energies, the villain could use them to cause a huge calamity. • In Washington, DC, Vortex and Livewire have gathered—through deceitful websites and social media—a large number of politically disenfranchised and generally misinformed militia-supporting citizens that are armed and angry. They’re directing the mob to attack the Capitol, so that in the ensuing riot and confusion, they can kidnap a particular senator with powerful enemies in the Dagger. The whole event draws national news. Will the PCs investigate and learn of the true forces at play? • The Maestro in Chicago believes he has learned how to transmit his mind-control powers via conventional radio signals. His controlled servants take over a popular radio station in the Chicago area, and he tries to enslave much of the city’s population. However, all goes haywire, as his powers don’t control people’s minds when transmitted this way; instead, they drive the people into a crazed panic. The PCs need to intervene to stop the chaos that threatens to shut down the city and result in high casualties, and hopefully capture the Maestro before he slips away.

Spectrum: level 7; Armor 4 (force field); energy blasts up to very long range inflict 10 points of damage; creates force fields and blinding bursts of light, sends messages via radio waves, moves metallic objects up to 500 pounds (230 kg) via magnetism, and so on Piledriver: level 4, strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 7, Intellect defense as level 3; health 25; Armor 4; piledriver punch inflicts 12 points of damage in melee, but only every other action; normal melee attack deals 6 points of damage

The thought of New York’s Lunatic Fringe teaming up with Kaos is the sort of thing that keeps heroes up at night.

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equipped with a “piledriver” mechanism on one arm. Piledriver hates Seachange, a villain with the ability to transform into water, after the latter betrayed him and allowed him to be captured by Spectrum more than a year ago.

VANCOUVER Moonlight fights crime in this large city with her decidedly pacifist abilities, which function only at night. Mountain, or Smámelet, is an indigenous man with great strength and stamina. He champions the cause of the First Nations, but has come to the aid of all Canadians multiple times and is a friend of Moonlight. Hyungnim is a Korean-born criminal with a large organization in Vancouver. He sometimes relies upon superhuman enforcers or mercenaries. Rather than joining the Dagger, he sees them as his enemies, and the intergang violence between the two groups has become an issue for the city.

VICTORIA Canada’s Ministry of Mutant Studies has its office in this capital city in British Columbia. This government-run, academic-focused department conducts independent genetic research and attempts to keep a catalog of all known superhumans in Canada (and, in fact, the rest of the world too).

MEXICO CITY El Campeón (the Champion) leads a team of heroes that call themselves Defensor. Other members include the telekinetic Azura, a teleporter named Desaparecer, and Absorber, who can take on the qualities of the material he touches. Defensor has taken great strides toward making Mexico City safe, and thus the group is very beloved, although there is some resentment that they don’t help people outside the capital. (El Campeón says, perhaps understandably, that they are a small team and it’s a large country.)

Superpowered Survey THE DAGGER AND THE DRUG CARTELS

NORTH AMERICAN ADVENTURE IDEAS

One way or another, the Dagger controls the majority of the infamous Mexican drug cartels, either directly or indirectly. As a result, BASTION has become involved with combating these criminal empires using its highly sophisticated operations, including satellite tracking, high-tech weaponry, and advanced detection equipment. The Mexican government cooperates with BASTION fully, seeing them as perhaps the only solution to the growing power of the syndicates. The Dagger supplies the drug lords with its own channels of high-tech weaponry and equipment. There are a few superhuman agents on both sides of this escalating conflict. Cartel enforcers include Chanate, a man with cybernetic enhancements, and Grenada, an assassin who can turn anything he touches into an energized bomb. La Cuebra works for the Mexican special forces, spreading terror among the cartels with her ability to transform into a giant serpent.

• The Wendigo is particularly active in Northern Canada, attacking remote villages and camps. Mountain calls upon the heroes for help, because it’s not the Wendigo, it’s a wendigo—there are many of them, and they are gathering. The PCs and Mountain may learn that the creatures are coming together due to a celestial event that occurs once every 200 years. And wendigos have to eat . . . • A group of drug cartel soldiers accidentally wandered into the Silent Zone and passed into another dimension. Serenity contacts the PCs through their dreams to ask for help, because the cartel is sending more people in to find the missing members, and meanwhile the soldiers—desperate to get back to Earth—are causing trouble in an otherwise peaceful and harmonious world.

THE SILENT ZONE

CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICA

Near Ceballos in Durango, Mexico, lies a strange locale called the Silent Zone, among other names. This area is a natural crossover point with many other dimensions, and thus it is here that one can access the Worlds Between. Not surprisingly, this region is known for mysterious disappearances as well as strange sightings of unearthly beasts and objects. A woman known simply as Serenity watches over the interdimensional junction. She is very likely not from this world, but no one knows for certain. She does possess a wide knowledge of other worlds. In the past, she has contacted powerful allies in their dreams to help her contain a dangerous breach or a particularly threatening entity that has crossed over or threatens to.

El Incendio is a criminal and a mercenary operating throughout Central America and some of South America. What almost no one realizes is that El Incendio is the public identity of three men—triplets, all born with the same flame powers. They rarely allow themselves to be seen together, but if they are, no one who witnesses the three of them all wreathed in fire at once lives to tell the tale. Throughout much of the region, mysterious entities called Agentes del Ceilo (Agents of Heaven) roam and perform acts of kindness, altruism, and rescue. The name is merely what the legends and eventually the media calls them. No one knows enough about them to know what they call themselves. They appear as glowing beings of blue-white light.

Wendigo, page 366 Chanate: level 4; perception and all physical actions (including Might and Speed defense rolls) as level 6; health 28; Armor 3; inflicts 7 points of damage in melee; built-in auto-cannon inflicts 8 points of damage in an immediate area within very long range Grenada: level 3, Speed defense as level 4; Armor 2; uses an action to charge any handheld object to explode in an immediate area, inflicting 9 points of damage, and throws the object on next action La Cuebra: in human form, level 5; in serpent form, level 5, initiative and Speed defense as level 7; health 24; Armor 2; bite deals 7 points of damage, with poison that deals an additional 7 points of Speed damage on a failed Might defense roll; constricts to immobilize foe and inflict 5 points of damage each round until they get free Serenity: level 6, interdimensional knowledge as level 10, perception as level 8; Armor 1; telepathy at a worldwide range, but only to people dreaming; creates level 8 energy shields and blasts energy bolts at very long range for 12 points of damage El Incendio: level 7; flies, wreathes themselves in flame that inflicts 5 points of damage to anyone touched or who touches them, projects blasts of flame up to a short distance that inflict 10 points of damage Agentes del Ceilo: level 6, defenses as level 8; can become invisible and intangible (along with one other person touched), heals wounds

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The Numinous: level 10, strength and power use as level 12; health 100; Armor 10; reshapes matter within very long range, potentially affecting all targets within that area

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GUATEMALA The powerful entity known as the Elemental now spends much of their time in Guatemala, hiding out in the remote jungle between their attacks against cities and people. They travel the world in their deadly crusade, but they call Guatemala home.

BRAZIL Site 351 is an Azaki ruin in the Amazon jungle. Of all Azaki sites, it proved to be one of the most dangerous to Earth, because it housed ancient beings called the Numinous

PERU Lord Ash maintains his secret base within Sabancaya Volcano in Peru. A Peruvian native, this mutant absorbs energy and uses it to power impressive abilities. He has long operated as a mastermind villain behind a variety of criminal operations throughout the world. Within his volcano base, he employs an army of soldiers and technicians, as well as at least two or three superpowered mercenaries he has hired. The base is a well-kept secret, but should it ever be discovered, the arrogant Ash would likely enjoy fighting his foes on his own territory.

CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICAN ADVENTURE IDEAS • BASTION calls the PCs for help when it appears that the Numinous have begun to stir. However, it is Lord Ash who is attempting to awaken them for his own ends. He’s currently employing the Elemental to try to create havoc over their tombs. The PCs need to stop this just in case his insane plan might work. • Industrialists are investigating the Swarming Island off the coast of Chile to look for resources. This stirs the Kresh into a frenzy, and the PCs must intervene before the insects destroy a good deal of the Chilean coast, and—if they’re feeling generous— rescue any corporate fools who might still be alive on the island. • The Agentes del Ceilo are acting with greater frequency, but not all their actions are helpful, and some are outright hostile. The Majestic Family goes to El Salvador to investigate, but they mysteriously disappear. The PCs must find and rescue the Majestics and learn what is causing this odd behavior in the Agentes del Ceilo. In truth, an alien virus has infected these ethereal beings, and they’ve taken the Majestic Family captive. Worst of all, the virus was unleashed by Baron Shadow as part of a larger plot.

Superpowered Survey CHILE The Swarming Island is a little-known island off the coast of Chile. It is the domain of the Kresh, a species of intelligent, human-sized insects. As long as they are left alone, the Kresh are usually peaceful. Disturbed, they can be a threat to everyone along the Chilean coast.

EUROPE The European Union has an officially sanctioned super-team called the Golden Shield, headquartered in Spain.

by Justus Faust. The corporation has its own private army of security personnel and operatives throughout the world, often opposing their main rival, Dynamic, Inc. in the United States. Faust’s main headquarters is in Berlin, but it has facilities throughout Germany and the world. Faust has worked with the Dagger in the past, but it has also opposed them in certain operations, so the situation is complicated. Winged Justice is a German hero with wings and psychic abilities. She operates throughout the country, but is most often seen in Berlin.

GERMANY

NORWAY

Operating throughout Europe, terrorist and archcriminal Midknight wears a suit of armor and a powered black blade. He claims them to be magical, but they are in fact high-tech devices created by Anton Wolf, the German weapons designer. Wolf has created many high-tech devices, armors, and weapons, mostly for criminals. He was aligned with the Dagger for many years, but has since gone freelance. He has secret laboratories in Munich and Hamburg. Wolf has also worked with Germany’s Faust Industries, a multinational firm led

Two well-known supervillains operate within Norway. Mayhem and Tyrant work both individually and together. Mayhem has a wide variety of energy-based powers and seems interested in disrupting the status quo any way he can. Tyrant is an alien being from a distant dimension interested in creating a personal empire on Earth. Both are opposed by Cyberwolf, who was a hero with wolflike speed and senses called Lupine until she was seriously injured and saved by a cyberneticist named Kristoffer Poulsen using experimental procedures. Now as

Kresh: Use the xenoparasite stats, although they are a bit more intelligent and a bit less aggressive.

Xenoparasite stats, page 369 Faust corporate spy: level 4, stealth as level 5; Armor 1; uses a variety of cutting-edge tech equipment as well as poisoned weapons Winged Justice: level 6; Speed defense, acrobatics, and initiative as level 8; flies; speaks telepathically in very long range, reads unwilling minds forcefully in short range, and creates mental illusions including obscuring her own presence (essentially invisibility) Midknight, page 136 Anton Wolf: level 5, technological understanding and crafting as level 9 Mayhem: level 5; Armor 3 (force field); creates energy blasts in long range that inflict 10 points of damage Tyrant: level 7, imposing his mental will as level 9, strength-based tasks and Might defense as level 8; health 30; Armor 1; melee attacks inflict 8 points of damage; controls up to six minds at a time up to long distance, with each controlled mind giving him +5 health, +1 Armor, and +1 damage in melee attacks Cyberwolf: level 5, perception and all physical actions (including Speed and Might defense) as level 7; health 28; Armor 2; claws inflict 8 points of damage in melee Kristoffer Poulsen: level 4, Intellect-based actions as level 6, cybernetics as level 9

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Director Odette Cane: level 7, world affairs and administration as level 9; Armor 3 (personal force field); equipped with the latest equipment available, very likely concealed

Golden Shield typical member: level 5, either Might or Speed defense as level 6; health 20; Armor 2; creates an energy attack that inflicts 8 points of damage in melee or up to short range

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Cyberwolf, she has even more enhanced strength and speed as well as armor. Meanwhile, rumors suggest that Dr. Poulsen continues to experiment with cybernetics and has likely created other superhumans doing so.

FRANCE BASTION’s main headquarters is located in Paris, although they have offices all across the globe. This sprawling complex has its own airfield and space launch platform, its own defense force (including a squadron of fighter jets and a unit of tanks), and helicopters, miscellaneous aircraft, and other similar resources. The headquarters has a staff of almost 1,000 agents, technicians, support personnel, security, and administrators. From here, the organization can access communications and surveillance systems across the globe, including its own array of satellites. The head of BASTION, Director Odette Cane, maintains her office here.

SPAIN The European Union presented Europe’s premier superhero team, the Golden Shield, with a base on Spain’s Costa del Sol, near the city of Málaga. Shield Tower, as it is known, is a tall, glimmering structure with a variety of technological developments, including defenses, monitoring systems, and a teleporter. Golden Shield’s membership is large and includes members from Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Greece, and Belgium. Golden Shield is different from other superhero teams in the world because most of the members have similar powers, and when complemented with standard issue equipment and armor, the members are more alike than different.

ITALY In northern Italy, a castle called Castello Mistero lies hidden in a remote mountain valley. Once used by the Dark Ages sorcerer Caduto to summon the

extradimensional demonic entity the Corpselord, it remains a place of mystic power and significance. Baron Shadow used it as a personal lair in the 1990s, but now it is the hidden home of a coven of evil witches called the Streghe. The Streghe seek to transform the country (and in fact, the whole continent and even the world) back to La Vecchia Religione (“the Old Religion”) by conjuring the ghost of an ancient witch of great power called Erodiade. To this end, their agents scour the region for the infamous book called The Witches’ True Gospels. Farther south, in Rome, the Italian crimefighter Combattente uses a variety of technological gadgets and what would seem to be superhuman strength and agility to deal with various threats.

GREECE Earth’s Army is a terrorist organization seeking to stop climate change at any cost. They murder polluters and the heads of corporations that cause environmental damage. They have a secret base on a Greek island. To fund their activities, they stage heists, usually targeting corporations that are not environmentally friendly. They have helicopters, ships, and a variety of other vehicles as well as powerful weapons at their disposal.

POLAND Deep in a dark forest of western Poland lies the Waystation, a sort of crossroads of time created by beings from the far future. The Waystation appears to be an empty glade in the woods, but from time to time strange entities and sometimes fabulous machines appear there, remain for a short while, and then disappear again. Although these future beings avoid contact with people in the present, content to go about their own mysterious business, there have been exceptions. For example, one such being contacted the hero Paragon in the 1980s to warn of the coming Grin invasion before leaving again.

Superpowered Survey Ravenmaster is a man with the ability to communicate with and control ravens in great numbers. He uses them to commit crimes of various kinds and runs afoul of heroes like Sunrise, who wears a high-tech suit that produces intense light and heat at her command. Recently, Ravenmaster used something he calls “genetic sorcery” to give intelligence, size, and vaguely humanoid form to his raven servitors, which he calls the Starodawny because he believes that raven folk such as these dwelled in the area long before humanity.

ROMANIA Home to Vampir, the infamous figure from both world wars, Romania is the birthplace of all vampires. Almost every mystic hero has run afoul of these horrific products of dark sorcery, but thankfully they seem to be very few in number. Of course, Romania is known for more than such creatures. In Bucharest, a woman called Putere uses personally generated energy blasts and force fields to wage war against organized crime and political corruption. (When talking to English speakers, she calls herself “Energon.”)

UKRAINE The Replicator is a scientific genius in the field of experimental biology, and also a villain who wears Azaki armbands that allow him to create duplicates of himself. He has created advanced clones of both living and dead people. Some of these he has used for various schemes, such as replacing influential people with clones under his control for his own gain. Most recently, however, he simply offers his services on the dark web to those that can afford the exorbitant price tags. Many of his clients are powerful criminals who have had him create clone duplicates of themselves or—more commonly—had deceased loved ones cloned to effectively return them from the dead. At least one known deceased superhuman, Mindhunter, is once again active thanks to the Replicator. The Replicator has a secret lab in Odessa, but he probably has others as well.

GREAT BRITAIN In Britain, a Lancastrian named Elizabeth Southerns claims to be the infamous Demdike of the Pendle Witch Trials of 1612. True or not, she is a powerful superhuman with powers of a mystical

Ravenmaster: level 4, handling ravens as level 6; mentally controls a large murder of ravens to do his bidding within 1 mile (1.5 km) Murder of ravens: level 5 (individual ravens as level 2) The Replicator: level 4, biological knowledge as level 8; creates up to six duplicates of himself under his control; the duplicates must remain within very long distance and never last more than 24 hours; he suffers no ill effects if a duplicate is killed Sunrise: level 5; Armor 3; produces blinding light and/or blistering heat, inflicting blindness and 5 points of damage in a medium area or as a long-range blast that inflicts 8 points of damage Starodawny: level 3, perception and stealth as level 4

Vampire, page 362

EUROPEAN ADVENTURE IDEAS • Faust Industries hires Midknight, Talon, and Icefire to accompany some of their operatives to Romania to try to find Vampir and see if he was actually destroyed. The superpowered mercs are there in case the vampire proves to be dangerous, but their presence alerts BASTION, who calls the PCs in to investigate. Once the PCs learn what the villains are up to, they can try to find them by following the same investigative path toward Vampir. Of course, the undead don’t stay dead forever, but Vampir has no interest in allying himself once again with a group of humans, particularly German humans. A three-way confrontation seems likely. • An overland shipment transporting experimental solar crystals through Poland is attacked and robbed, apparently by the Dagger. The PCs are asked by the developers of this new technology to find the crystals, which are not just valuable, but dangerous. However, the thieves weren’t the Dagger at all, but Ravenmaster and his minions. The PCs need to find them before the unstable crystals cause a major catastrophe. • The PCs are contacted by Ella Brodach, the powerful American mystic, to help her track down Demdike, who has stolen a sorcerous relic. It turns out that it’s not Ella at all, but instead Demdike herself, who lures the PCs into a trap with her coven in England, where she needs sacrifices to complete a dark ritual.

Vampir, page 167 Putere (Energon): level 4; Armor 4 (force field); creates energy blasts that inflict 7 points of damage at long range

Demdike, page 114 Talon, page 190 Icefire, page 190

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origin. She terrorizes the British Isles with conjured demons and ghosts, using her abilities to curse her enemies and control the minds of others, always for her own gain. Demdike has undertaken schemes that have led her to mainland Europe and America numerous times. She commands a coven of lesser witches as well. In London, the mystic hero the Gentleman dwells within a strange old house that is far larger on the inside than the outside, its interior filled with all manner of magical creatures and artifacts. Whenever someone learns that the house is his, a mystic spell erases that knowledge from their memory. On a less mystical front, London hero Solitaire wields a variety of card-based gimmicks to flavor his high-tech devices. He routinely deals with superhuman opponents such as Talon, an assassin and

thief who can change her skin to metal and her hands to metallic claws, and Icefire, a criminal enforcer who can generate fire and ice at the same time. The Irish psychic vampire known as Mindhunter, perhaps the best psychic tracker in the world, was killed in a confrontation with BASTION agents in 2009, but recently the Replicator in Ukraine created his clone for the Dagger, who needed him to find a rogue agent who had vital secrets. Mindhunter is now once again active in Ireland and throughout Europe.

ASIA Asia has a long history of superhumans and paranormal occurrences. Although long unwelcome in much of the continent, BASTION has always had a clandestine presence there, and today that presence is much more overt (and much more welcome) in many countries.

CHINA Mindhunter: level 8, telepathic tracking as level 10; finds and tracks living people with unlimited range; touch inflicts 10 points of Intellect damage, which also restores 5 health for him or eases his next action Gonggong: level 7, Intellect defense as level 9; health 30; telekinesis within long range, affecting objects up to 1,000 pounds (450 kg); telekinetically strikes or rends, inflicting 12 points of damage Huandou: level 8; health 30; immune to fire; hurls fire within long range, inflicting 12 points of damage; creates a conflagration filling a medium area, inflicting 5 points of damage; sheathes himself in flame (those who touch him suffer 5 points of damage)

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Officially, China has no superhumans, and superhumans are not allowed. In actual fact, there are many. Why the Chinese government refuses to admit their existence is unclear, but they have their own secretive bureau for dealing with supernatural threats called the Èzhì, a word that implies “containment.” Perhaps the most infamous Chinese superhumans are the Four Perils, patterned after the mythological figures of the same name described in the Book of Documents. These men claim to be the mythological figures, but that seems unlikely (and they appear to be human). They use their abilities to gain wealth and power however they can, sometimes taking over entire towns. • Gonggong has powerful telekinetic powers that he uses primarily to destroy objects and tear apart matter. • Huandou wields fiery powers and can start fires at a distance, surround himself with flame, and hurl bolts of pure fire.

Superpowered Survey • Gun is Huandou’s opposite, in many ways, with control over water. • Sanmiao creates energy weapons and armor that he uses. Typically, he girds himself in traditional Chinese armor and wields a sword. Microbiologist Dr. Li Daiyu secretly operates as Daiyu (Black Jade), a hero who uses a suit of organic armor as sophisticated as any mechanical battle suit on the planet.

JAPAN Japanese culture revels in superhero fascination and celebrity. In Tokyo, a speedster calling herself Jinsoku (“Swift”) founded a team of superheroes called Senshukan (“The Greatest”). The membership is fluid. The team operates throughout East Asia, particularly in South Korea, the Philippines, and Indonesia, as well as Japan.

RUSSIA Yohontov Technologies, based in Moscow, is probably the world leader in robotics development. The Russian government as well as private groups have commissioned them to create utterly lifelike androids for various—usually clandestine—purposes. Sometimes these androids are used as body doubles for important figures, and the organization known as Blood Moon has more than once attempted to assassinate and replace important world leaders with Yohontov android replicants. Blood Moon is a criminal organization that seeks nothing less than world domination. Initially comprised of disaffected Dagger members, after the fall of the Soviet Union, Blood Moon was essentially coopted by ex-Soviet military and Russian organized crime with visions of grandeur. For a time, Baron Shadow usurped the leadership and directed the group from his asteroid base known as the Crucible, but after a few failed endeavors, he abandoned Blood Moon to its own devices.

Blood Moon employs more than 100 scientists (some against their will) to advance exploitable technologies. Currently, their projects focus on mind control, teleportation, and energy weapons research. The group has hidden bases worldwide, but the largest by far is in Saint Petersburg. They also have a mobile underwater base in the Atlantic. Opposing Blood Moon and other powered threats is the hero Vega, a superhuman with an extremely malleable body. He can stretch his body up to ten times its normal length, and he can mimic the features of other people or even inanimate objects. He claims to have gained this power when he was abducted by aliens from Vega, but his story is somewhat suspect. The mysterious Russian city of Luchshe dates back to the Soviet era when it was formed as a place to study, train, and create superhumans, often through cruel and sometimes deadly experimentation. Russia has officially denied the hidden city’s existence, but this was made more difficult when it was taken over by the Inheritors. The Inheritors are a political extremist group fighting for the rights of superhumans, particularly in a country that has mostly exploited them. Each individual in the group has some kind of superhuman ability, but many are fairly inconsequential or even debilitating, such as heightened skin sensitivity, extra digits, or wings instead of arms. The group’s leader is the charismatic Demetrius, who has the power to paralyze creatures with a touch. Demetrius seeks to reveal the existence and horrific history of Luchshe, and wants to make it a safe haven for all superhumans that wish to come.

SOUTH KOREA Feedback is a supervillain who operates out of South Korea. A criminal and a mercenary, she can redirect any force used against her.

Gun: level 8, Might defense as level 9; health 35; generates blast of water inflicting 11 points of damage at medium range; telekinesis affecting only water, up to 12,000 gallons (about 50 tons or 1,600 cubic feet) Sanmiao: level 7, energy weapon attacks as level 8; health 30; Armor 4 (energy); inflicts 10 points of damage with energy weapons Daiyu: level 6, biology as level 9, Speed defense and Intellect defense as level 7; Armor 9; flies a long distance each round with wings from organic armor; regenerates 1 health per round while wearing organic armor Vega: level 7, disguise as level 10, Speed defense as level 8; health 40; stretches up to 50 feet (15 m) long (medium range), flies a long distance each round by making “wings,” and impersonates other creatures and objects Jinsoku, page 127

Replicant, page 351 Demetrius: level 6, interactions as level 10; health 31; touch inflicts 10 points of Speed damage and the target loses their next action

Feedback: level 5, stealth and lockpicking as level 6; physical and energy attacks do not affect her, and instead rebound against the attacker, unless she uses her action to redirect them to a different target

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Brhatkāya: at º normal size: level 3; at gargantuan size: level 6, strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 9, Speed defense as level 2 due to size; health 90; Armor 3; melee attacks inflict 13 points of damage Royal House of Videsh, page 139 Villarama does not exist on our Earth—only in the Boundless setting.

Death Beam, page 112 Mutant gorilla: level 4, strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 7; health 38 Mutant chimpanzee: level 3, strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 4; health 18 Aichee: level 7, perception and organization as level 8; health 25; telepathy with a range of 100 miles (160 km); telekinesis up to 1,000 pounds (450 kg) up to a long distance away

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INDIA

AFRICA

Vishesh is a hero who seemingly cannot fail. His actions always appear to succeed, and attacks against him miss their mark. Probability around him seems to bend, always in his favor. A popular hero of the people, he fights crime and injustice wherever he finds it with humor and glee. The superpowered Brhatkāya can grow º to gargantuan size, using this ability to work as a criminal enforcer.

Beneath the Sahara Desert lies one of the many caverns of Inner Earth, and buried in the desert are ancient ruins that mark multiple entrances to that realm. Like all of Inner Earth, the cavern was likely created or altered by the Azaki, but the region beneath the Sahara seems to contain a great many creatures, ruins, and lost civilizations that deal in sorcery. Creatures and entities from Inner Earth threaten all of north Africa, making sudden and unexpected appearances. They attack humans—usually at night—and pose a significant danger, particularly to small groups of travelers. More than once, heroes have had to follow these raiders down into the subterranean world to retrieve kidnapped victims or to try to prevent a large-scale invasion.

VILLARAMA Nestled in the Himalayas, the remote kingdom of Villarama lies within a broad and fertile valley. This tiny kingdom’s royal family, like the rest of their land, has been isolated from the rest of the world. Every member of the family has some kind of superhuman ability.

SAUDI ARABIA

CONGO

Death Beam was created by the Saudi military as an experimental weapon, but the synthezoid escaped and now operates as a thief and assassin for hire throughout the world. Their secret lair is still in Saudi Arabia, within an abandoned military facility.

Within the Itombwe Massif in the Democratic Republic of the Congo lies a hidden enclave of intelligent mutant gorillas and chimpanzees. They have their own language that uses sounds and gestures, but some are able to communicate with humans using devices of their own creation. The matriarch of this mysterious group of animals is a chimpanzee named Aichee, who is a powerful telekinetic and telepath. She is not particularly friendly

ASIA ADVENTURE IDEAS • Death Beam and Brhatkāya team up to attack the entourage of an Indian governor. º The governor narrowly manages to escape, but the villains are certain to strike again. Vishesh comes to help but recognizes that even with his luck, he might be in over his head. He calls upon the PCs for help in not only protecting the governor, but determining who hired superpowered assassins to kill him. • The Inheritors in Russia kidnap a number of prominent superhumans, some of them allies of the PCs. When the PCs travel to Luchshe to intervene, Demetrius insists that the “victims” aren’t being held against their will, but instead have joined the Inheritors. He brings out one of the superhumans, who agrees that everything is fine. But something seems strange. In truth, the people taken are being indoctrinated. The superhuman who assured the heroes that all is well is an Inheritor shapechanger. The Inheritors do believe the indoctrination is for the superhumans’ best interests, but they are not there willingly—at least, not until Demetrius convinces them otherwise.

Superpowered Survey

BASTION MISSION 445B

, Report 5: Inner Ea

rth Beneath the planet’s surface lies a netwo rk of tun ne vast caverns, known ls and caves, including collectively as Inner an unknown number Earth. While officially of extremely his expedition, Inner discovered in 1833 Earth has in fact bee by Sir Ashton Wellin n kno wn to much older civ gton and Caliphate in North Afr ilizations, perhaps sta ica (661–750 CE). (Fo rting with the Umayy r more on historical see sections 2.3–2.8.) ad encounters with Inner Earth or its inhabitants , Inhabitants: Surprisin gly, a wide variety of animal life and intelli • Undermen are sho gent life make their rt, humanoid beings homes in Inner Earth. with rocky skin and var subject of the bulk of ying degrees of intelli this report. gence. They are the • At least one of the large caverns (Gran d Cavern 4, also kno variety of extinct anima wn as the Timelost Ca l life that was found vern) is home to a wid on the surface in far creatures. (For more e distant eras, including on Grand Cavern 4, dinosaurs and similar see Mission 445B, Re • A small nation-stat port 8, section 5.9.) e of humans lives in what is called the Mi surface-dwellers tha st Cavern (Grand Ca t migrated undergro vern 8). Descendants und at least a millen of abnormal (perhaps my nium ago, these peo stical?) abilities and ple are hostile and pos technology. (For more Report 8, section 6. sess on Grand Cavern 8, For more on the pos see Mission 445B, sible existence of my Magic.) stical powers and sor cery, see Report 01 84: Azaki connection: Th eorists and on-staff analysts speculate tha was another creation t Inner Earth, clearly of the ancient alien col not a natural phenom onists classified as the contain Azaki ruins, enon, Azaki. Cavern 334 an and it is likely there are d Grand Cavern 4 mo re. (Analysis Departm Azure.) ent files 4401A–44 04F, classification Mission 445B: In 19 95, BASTION task for ce Gamma set upon first expedition, 445A an extensive explorati , disappeared and wa on of Inner Earth. Th s never recovered. Mi explored some of Gr e ssion 445B lasted alm and Cavern 1 (home ost three months, an to the Undermen) and a foray into Grand Ca d the relatively empty vern 4 before missio Grand Cavern 2, and n lead Captain Torge by a carnivorous rep ma de rso n (Ag ent 445B-001) was tile. This turn of events killed and eaten brought Mission 44 suffered serious losses 5B to an end, as the prior to the death of expedition had alread the ir commander. Repor geological surveys con y ts 1–4, previously file ducted. This report det d, detail the maps an ails information gathe of Grand Cavern 1 reg d red fro m the expedition’s ste arding the sociology and political structure althy exploration Undermen’s military of the inhabitants. Re capabilities and threat port 6 will detail the assessment thereof. Within Grand Caver n 1, the Undermen dw ell in a series of small reaches 100,000 or communities. Their tot more. “Undermen” is al population likely a crude translation of thrill-seeking explorers their own name for the in the 1920s who des mselves, coined by cended into Inner Ear multiple occasions, ult th and apparently en imately paying with the raged the inhabitants ir lives in many cases. this commonly under on Throughout this rep stood term for these ort, we will continue humanoids. to use Undermen: While the standard individual ap pears to be slightly mo into the human range re intelligent than a of intellect. They are chimpanzee, others ruled by a single mo by human standards fall narch and, despite rem in many ways, occasi aining at a primitive onally use technology anything we possess. level far superior to, and This contradiction ha considerably different s never been fully exp Agent 445B-088 an from, lained, although specul d the findings of Agen ation by team memb ts 445B-023 and 44 related to the alien vis er 5B -07 5 sug itors known as the Aza gests that perhaps thi ki, corroborating the s technology is multiple civilian histor ories put forth by BA ians. STION analysts as we ll as Page 1 of 2

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Claim the Sky Third Claw members: level 6, Might- and Speed-related tasks as level 8; health 28; melee attacks inflict 12 points of damage The Corvid: level 5, stealth as level 8, Speed-related tasks as level 7; Armor 2; has a wide variety of gadgets and weapons Sellala: level 7, stealth as level 8; health 40; drain victim of blood/ essence through bite, inflicting 10 points of damage and either restoring 5 health or granting her an asset on her next action. She can also do so at up to long range, but only inflicts 5 damage and restores 3 health. The Gentleman, page 120 Sahir: level 5, mystic knowledge and Intellect defense as level 6; Armor 1; mystic blasts inflict 8 points of damage to whatever Pool she chooses; levitates, heals 5 health with a touch, and sends one-way telepathic messages anywhere on Earth Quake: level 5, Might defense as level 6; health 30; moves or reshapes earth and stone within a short distance, including mentally hurling stone to inflict 10 points of damage Executor: level 4, perception as level 6, attacks and strengthrelated tasks as level 5; health 20; Armor 4

to humans. Locals in the area say that the apes are building a massive structure or device, but no one has been able to get close enough to learn what it is.

GABON The Corvid is a sophisticated and skilled thief with supernatural powers and gadgets who operates out of Gabon, but she is wanted throughout much of the continent.

KENYA In Nairobi, a trio of superhumans calling themselves the Third Claw operate as mercenaries. While they often work for organized crime in the country, they are sometimes employed by the government

for the extrajudicial murders of other criminals. Third Claw members do not have individual code names, but use their real names: Aasir, Obuya, and Wasaki. Each is superhumanly fast and strong, and all are proficient with a variety of weapons.

MAURITANIA An entity called Sellala causes grief in the cities and towns of Mauritania, feeding on blood like a vampire. Unlike the vampire legends of Europe, however, Sellala can tolerate sunlight (although she prefers to operate at night) and can even drain a victim at a distance using sorcery. She appears not to age and may be immortal. It is very likely that Sellala originates from Inner Earth and traveled to the surface via the Saharan entrances into that realm. She has clashed with other superhumans, primarily those also practicing mystic arts such as the Gentleman and especially Sahir (and her partner, Quake) from Morocco.

MOROCCO An interesting duo of superhumans operates in Morocco. Sahir has mystical powers that she gained after her disappearance into Inner Earth as a young woman. Quake (sometimes called Zilzal, which is Arabic for “quake”) wields extraordinary influence over earth and stone. Together they deal with local threats as well as those across much of northern Africa. Their foes range from criminals and militants to superpowered threats, including creatures and entities from Inner Earth.

NIGERIA The Dagger operates throughout Africa, but its headquarters on the continent appears to be in Nigeria. There, they deploy the cybernetic enforcers called the Executors to carry out missions of all types (and frequently hire them out to other criminals or branches of the Dagger).

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Superpowered Survey AFRICAN ADVENTURE IDEAS • The PCs, in attempting to find Baron Shadow, learn of his Rwandan base. While the Baron is not there, his superpowered underlings in the base have kidnapped Aichee, the leader of the mutant apes in the nearby Democratic Republic of the Congo. They hope to study her to learn how to gain control of her people or create their own mutant apes and gorillas. • A Grin scout team has established a secret station in Namibia to spy on Earth from a remote location. When BASTION discovered this and attempted to destroy it, they encountered one of the aliens’ new superpowered agents, a Grin warrior that can grow to gigantic proportion. BASTION puts out a desperate call for heroes to help. The Dagger’s chief opponent in Nigeria is a crimefighter named Redshift, who has the ability to move at incredible speeds. Redshift is well liked by the populace, who hail her as a hero wherever she goes. She has been known to work hand in hand with BASTION agents in coordinating their efforts against the vast criminal syndicate.

summoning/meditation chambers, but none of the underlings use or even go into these rooms. The base has a hangar with two helicopters and a large antigrav vehicle that can carry up to twenty passengers. In the dark of night, the Baron’s lackeys use it to abduct locals needed for the dire experiments that occur here.

NAMIBIA

SOUTH AFRICA

In Namibia, the True Pride is a literal pride of intelligent mutant lions. They remain extremely suspicious of humanity and just want to be left in peace.

Vanish is a South African superhero who helped in the original Grin invasion. Older now but still active, the invisible hero was once partners with Minder, who was crucial in the fight against the Grin, but has since become a villain. The city of Johannesburg hosts the main BASTION base in Africa.

RWANDA Baron Shadow maintains one of his bases hidden deep in the Virunga Mountains of Rwanda. Within this base, three of his superhuman underlings oversee a variety of projects and experiments. Razor, a mechanical genius, wears a powered suit of retractable blades and spikes. His assistants are Umbra, who controls shadow and darkness, even making it solid, and Rampart, a giant of stone with great strength. All are Rwandan except Umbra, who is from Uganda. Rumors say that she is secretly Baron Shadow’s daughter, but if that is true, neither he nor she is willing to make it public. The base is further staffed by a variety of robots. The base is mostly a maze of laboratories and workshops, used by Razor full time and by the Baron when he is present. Due to the Baron’s proclivities, the base also has occult libraries and

AUSTRALIA Australia’s premier superhero goes by the name of Breach, and he is both crimefighter and media sensation. His identity as Michael Allenburg is known to the public, and he is an actor, a singer, and an influencer as well as being superstrong and resilient, exceedingly charming and handsome, and on top of everything else, he can fly. Far into the Outback lies at least one Azaki ruin. The villain Vantablack found the technology for her suit there while working as an archeologist. Doctor Emil Tarot operates a secret facility near Melbourne called the Kiln where he uses various means to give

Grin warrior: use giant stats, page 333 Redshift: level 6, Speed tasks as level 9; can move a very long distance and take an action; can attack all foes in short range with a punch; moves at one hundred times normal speed if she only moves as her action Vanish: level 5, stealth as level 8; turns invisible Mutant lion: level 4; Speed tasks, Might defense, and perception as level 5; health 22 Minder, page 137 Baron Shadow, page 107 Razor: level 6, Intellect tasks as level 8; Armor 5; inflicts 8 points of damage with razors, in melee or up to long range Umbra: level 4, Speed defense and acrobatics as level 5; Armor 2 (shadows); forms solid shapes from darkness; dims or extinguishes light within long range Rampart: level 4, strength tasks as level 7; health 25; Armor 4; melee attack inflicts 10 points of damage Robot staff: level 2 Breach: level 6, strength-based tasks and Might defense as level 8; health 30; Armor 4; melee attack inflicts 8 points of damage; flies a long distance each round Vantablack, page 151 Dr. Emil Tarot: level 3, science knowledge as level 6

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people superpowers. The process is quite unstable, and many volunteers have died or been horribly disfigured.

PACIFIC OCEAN Numinous Island: level 12

Elite BASTION agent, page 179 Wardroid, page 365

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Numinous Island is a little-known location, an artificial island created by Pacific Islanders in ages past using Azaki technology. Although it looks like a normal island at first, all of the plants and even some of the minerals on the island are unique. Many have supernatural qualities such as healing, energy production, or the ability to grant special powers. Only certain people are allowed to visit the island— usually, those who have aided the island in some way (famously, the Silver Sentinel is such an ally, as are the descendants of those who created it, although they come sparingly and only for brief, respectful visits). Numinous Island itself is intelligent and can teleport anyone on it anywhere else on the planet. Most likely, it has other powers as well.

ATLANTIC OCEAN Deep beneath the surface of the ocean, hundreds of miles from dry land in any direction, BASTION maintains its most secure holding, known as Station Zero. Station Zero serves as a prison for superpowered criminals and threats that cannot safely be contained anywhere else. The cells can be configured with different environments and safeguards, usually to outright negate the abilities of the inmates. Station Zero is guarded by a mix of elite BASTION agents and hyper-advanced wardroids designed by Valerie Lincoln. It can hold 100 prisoners and is usually at about half capacity. A special section also holds dangerous materials and objects, such as alien artifacts that emit harmful radiation, poisonous gases, and so on.

Superpowered Survey INNER EARTH Inner Earth is a mysterious subterranean realm consisting of a number of vast caverns, illuminated by bioluminescent fungi that float in the air and look a little like jellyfish. It has multiple access points to the surface; the most well-known one lies in the Sahara Desert. A few portions of Inner Earth have been explored by surface dwellers, who categorized contiguous series of large caves as single caverns. These regions are sometimes hundreds of miles across, and all the known, named caverns contain Azaki ruins. The Kingdom Cavern is the realm of the Undermen. There are likely 100,000 members of this humanoid species living down in the dark, with their own language and culture. Their leader is the militaristic tyrant King Uigi, who craves the resources of the surface world. He enforces his will upon his people, who may just want to be left in peace. The Undermen are a strange mix of technology and advancement. Most of their warriors use simple weapons, and the people live very simply, but the rulers and commanders occasionally

have strikingly advanced (but often odd) technology. For example, a strike force armed with swords and clubs might accompany a large, heavily armored tanklike vehicle. Or a leader of such a group might carry a metallic staff that controls strange Inner Earth monsters. The Timelost Cavern is filled with jungle flora and fauna, including animals that should be long extinct, such as dinosaurs. The Undermen steer well clear of this area, but some adventurous surface dwellers have explored parts of it, and even taken up permanent residence there. Three massive glowing crystals produce illumination similar to sunlight throughout the cavern for twelve hours each day. The Mist Cavern is home to a group of humans who fled the surface long ago. These people, sometimes called the Inward, capture Undermen and enslave them through magic and Azaki technology. The Inward have no regular contact with the surface and remain willfully ignorant of events that transpire there. They are not welcoming of outsiders.

Undermen: use goblin stats, page 335

King Uigi: level 4; Armor 4 (from hammer artifact)

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EARTH ORBIT BASTION, the Dagger, and even Baron Shadow have their own satellites in orbit around the planet. Thanks to advances in technology, astronauts from a number of countries frequent Earth orbit in shuttles, usually to and from the International Space Station II, as well as other locations.

RAPTOR’S PERCH The Dagger’s station is the longest-lasting continually occupied orbiting habitat in space. They use it to monitor events on Earth and to conduct scientific experiments too dangerous or inconvenient for the surface. Raptor’s Perch usually has a staff of about thirty, with half being scientists and technicians and the other half being security and support.

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION II Cataclysm, page 109 Society of Seven, page 172

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After the first International Space Station was destroyed by the entity known as Cataclysm in a battle with Silver Sentinel, the Majestic Family, and the Society of Seven, a new—larger and more sophisticated—station was built. Traffic to and from the station is quite regular from many nations.

Superpowered Survey BASTION SKYWATCH BASES

THE SOLAR SYSTEM

BASTION maintains four bases that monitor space traffic, in particular looking for threats approaching Earth, including asteroids and alien beings. Each has a rotating staff of five individuals. The BASTION headquarters in Paris has its own launchpad and orbital shuttle to transport crew and supplies.

Among the Jovian moons, Azaki ruins are found on both Europa and Titan. While Titan is likely devoid of current life or activity, Europa bears native life in its subsurface ocean, and after their landing years ago, a number of Grin live amid the submerged Azaki ruins. Mars also has Azaki ruins, and it is there that the Majestic Family—the first known Earth people to visit the red planet— discovered the secrets of their faster-than-light drive in 2006. It is possible that others have since visited these ruins and uncovered secrets of their own. For a time, Baron Shadow operated out of a base within a near-Earth asteroid he called the Crucible. From there, he directed the organization known as Blood Moon for a time, and later used sorcery and science to create the monstrous Humonger that terrorized the west coast of the United States.

FREEFIRE’S ORBITAL BASE (ABANDONED) In the 1970s, the super-team known as Freefire had its own space station that it used as a base after they twarted an attack on Earth from an alien warlord. (The base is built around the warlord’s derelict battlecruiser, although it has been so heavily modified that this fact is not obvious from the outside.) Freefire abandoned the base when its membership changed in 1980 and the new team wanted to remain earthbound. The station’s defense systems are still operational.

THE MOON Silver Sentinel maintains a lunar base to monitor both the Earth and the cosmos. Although it is a fairly expansive structure, he lives there alone. It is filled with trophies from his adventures, but it also includes training facilities, an extensive library (including data on planets and civilizations far beyond the solar system), and monitoring equipment unlike anything ever seen on Earth. Some people speculate that advanced aliens he once helped in an off-world mission supplied him with useful devices to communicate with distant planets. The entity known as Singularity first appeared on Earth’s moon. When it is not menacing the humans on Earth, it retreats to the entrance of its lair on the dark side, presumably hidden even from Silver Sentinel.

Grin, page 123

Freefire, page 163

Humonger: use kaiju stats, page 338

GRIN HOMEWORLD The Grin homeworld lies hundreds of light years away, at the center of a sweeping, militaristic empire spanning dozens of systems. The Grin leader, the Exultant, dwells on the homeworld, directing her fleets and ruling over her interstellar dominion. After their defeat on Earth decades ago, the Grin began experiments to create their own superpowered soldiers and agents, and have had some successes recently that they are eager to test—on Earth.

MYSTERY EARTH The name “Mystery Earth” was coined by the first Earth people to visit—the heroes kidnapped by the One and brought there for almost six months in 1981. Presumably created by the One, an almost godlike entity, Mystery Earth at first appears to be an exact duplicate of our planet. However, there are strange differences,

Silver Sentinel, page 146

Singularity, page 147

The One, page 138

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Dawnstar, page 111 The Gentleman, page 120 Blackstar, page 108

Demonix: use devil stats, page 323

including shadowy, ghostlike creatures that skulk about behind the scenes, weird space warps, and odd duplicates of actual people and places on Earth that seem like parodies. For example, while Mystery Earth’s Manhattan appears mostly normal, Central Park is a walled refuge containing dinosaurs and primitive “cavemen.” Mystery Earth lies on the other side of our own galaxy, a fact confirmed by Blackstar, one of the heroes initially taken there.

WORLDS BETWEEN There are numerous other dimensions and universes, and many of them have their own laws of physics very different from our own. The Worlds Between are a labyrinth of such universes connected by portals and other means less understood. The inhabitants of some of these realms seem analogous to beings we might identify as angels or demons, but only very loosely. Many other natives of these worlds are nothing of the sort, but rather strange,

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almost incomprehensible beings. Still others appear as human as anyone you would meet on Earth. The Worlds Between are a confusing, disorienting place, dangerous to visit without someone who can offer guidance such as Dawnstar or the Gentleman.

THE VERMILLION A hellish universe far beyond our own is referred to by mystics and others as the Vermillion. The Demonix are a species of fiendish, interdimensional humanoids that dwell there and have twice tried to invade and conquer the Earth. First in 1350 CE and again in 1999, the Demonix were repelled only because of Earth’s superhumans. They believe that the Earth holds secrets and power unlike any other world—an idea given credence by the original interest the Azaki had in it so long ago. The Demonix are likely to one day return, better prepared for the superpowered defenders of our world.

Superpowered Survey

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DEATH, NAME IS Y H T A T I S V A R G CHAP TER 13

“D

Skill boost, page 397 Stim, page 398 Power Boost Cyphers, page 157

eath, Thy Name Is Gravitas” is an adventure that begins in Chicago (though you can change that to any large city you wish). The adventure is suitable for mid-tier characters. It can be adjusted for low-tier characters by making sure they begin play with cyphers such as skill boost, stim, and the various power boost cyphers. The adventure can be adjusted for high-tier characters by increasing the specific numbers of foes that appear, and providing a few more GM intrusions that aid the villains along the way. Regardless of their tier, PCs who get into real trouble may also be aided by an NPC superhero or two.

SYNOPSIS Voltage, page 152 Gravitas, page 122

The extremely dangerous megalomaniac Gravitas wields the power of gravity itself and seeks to work out his anger issues—on an entire city. Gravity Storm. The PCs first learn of the threat when they feel a shaking like an earthquake. Sections of downtown are collapsing or, alternatively, flying off into the sky. A major disaster is unfolding, as any news source quickly reveals, though details are sketchy. By the time the PCs arrive, the active threat has already departed; all the characters can do is save civilians from further fallout from the disaster. And learn that it was actually an attack by Gravitas, who demands to see the city’s mayor.

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Where’s the Mayor? Investigation reveals that the mayor has been sending out all sorts of antagonizing social media posts targeting Gravitas. What were they thinking? But when the PCs finally locate the mayor in a panic room at their residence, they explain that it’s not them; their phone and computer have been hacked. Before the PCs resolve the problem, it becomes academic; Gravitas finds the panic room, pulling it up out of the ground into the open. Fighting Gravity. This is a big fight, and Gravitas is tough. Hopefully, the team of PC superheroes is tougher and wins the day. Or do they? Before the PCs can take their victory lap, a wrinkle emerges, in the person of Voltage. Thanks for Your Help. It turns out that Voltage hacked the mayor’s electronics, knowing it would precipitate a violent public spectacle from thin-skinned Gravitas. This would, in turn, draw a response from a super-team strong enough to defeat Gravitas, or at least weaken him sufficiently so Voltage and a couple of her allies can snatch him and escape. Voltage, it seems, has a long-standing bounty on the gravity controller (she wants him captured, not dead). If the PCs want to stop her, they have one more fight ahead of them before the day is done.

DEATH, THY NAME IS GRAVITAS GRAVITY STORM This adventure is set in Chicago in the United States, or whichever large city you choose. If the city already has a well-known super presence, such as Warp in Chicago, let the PCs know that that hero or heroes have been called away to deal with a secret mission on BASTION’s behalf. As far as the PCs know, it’s up to them to handle things in the meantime.

EARTHQUAKE OR SOMETHING ELSE? One Sunday morning, the city begins to shake. It doesn’t take super-senses for the PCs to detect the shaking ground and swaying structures, possibly one they’re inside. The idea that it might be an earthquake is an easy conclusion to make. If PCs check local news or social media, or one of them has a way to detect the release of copious amounts of energy or a graviton flux, they learn that the epicenter of the ongoing shaking is downtown. “Shaky-cam” shots on the news or online show a chaotic scene of leaning buildings and one collapsing, though weirdly, in some places, cars, pedestrians, and even parts of buildings are falling up into the sky.

REACHING GROUND ZERO By the time the PCs reach the epicenter, the shaking has stopped. But the danger is not over.

READ ALOUD Cars that look as if they’ve been picked up and dropped litter the streets. A couple of buildings lean precariously, one is collapsed, and one is missing entirely except for ragged foundations. Water pools from a broken hydrant across the road, except for a portion that flows up into the sky like a reverse waterfall. Characters on the scene identify the following urgent situations that require their attention. Superhuman PCs could attempt to deal with each indicated situation in a couple of different—but

impressive—ways. If the PCs try different strategies to deal with the same threat, each of their separate tasks is eased. A few ideas are presented as possible options for the PCs, though they are likely to think of other solutions. (Of course, a PC might have the exact right power to deal with a problem, such as the ability to phase trapped civilians to freedom.)

Warp, page 153

LEANING BUILDING THREATENS TO COLLAPSE Civilians are exiting this ten-story office building, but a couple of warning shrieks from overstressed interior supports suggest that the building is on the verge of collapse. About twelve people remain within. Free Trapped People (difficulty 9): A speedster could attempt to rapidly collect everyone remaining inside and bring them out over the course of a few rounds. Prop up Building (difficulty 9): A superstrong character, one who can grow to towering heights, or a PC who can create objects out of nothing (or out of ice) could attempt to prop up the building long enough to get folks out.

GM intrusion: Part of the building falls off the main structure, threatening to crush bystanders.

Alternate Use of Super Ability (difficulty 10): A character could use their power in a new way to keep the building upright, such as a PC shooting an exactly balanced force bolt, using their magnetic abilities to bend the interior structural units back into place, or doing something similar to keep the building from collapsing.

PEOPLE TRAPPED IN A COLLAPSED BUILDING The yells for help from the collapsed building indicate that civilians are trapped inside. There are about six. Shift Structural Element (difficulty 9): A superstrong character could attempt to lift a large structural element high enough and long enough for trapped people to emerge (or for someone to go in and get them).

GM intrusion: Part of the building collapses further, and a few people still trapped inside risk being crushed in the next few rounds.

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BUS TOO CLOSE TO ANTIGRAVITY

Station Zero, page 196 GM intrusion: Gravity in the area suddenly goes back to normal without warning, and the bus comes crashing down unless somehow caught.

Melinda Mayweather: level 2, persuasion and civic planning as level 4

Introduce this complication as a group GM intrusion. A bus filled with civilians, previously spared, leaves the scene but strays into a lingering area of antigravity, and begins to fall up. It snags on a building overhang, hanging upward over a void of sky. About thirteen passengers are inside, and one is too close to the bus window. Grab Bus (difficulty 9): A superstrong or large character could try to hold the bus in place until everyone escapes. Fly the Bus (difficulty 10): A flying character could exert themselves to hold the bus in place until everyone escapes.

WHAT GOES UP… If an investigating PC succeeds on a difficulty 5 task to learn more about the mayor, either by traditional methods or by a relevant use of a superpower, they discover an old high school yearbook photo of the mayor and Kaiden Karlsson— who would one day become Gravitas—in an affectionate embrace. Were they once involved? GM intrusion: A character who fails a difficulty 8 Speed defense roll is struck by a falling car for 12 points of damage.

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Introduce this complication as a group GM intrusion. The missing building—a warehouse—and a few parked cars that fell upward before the PCs arrived begin to fall like meteorites. About four bystanders are endangered. Fast Evacuate (difficulty 8): A speedster could attempt to rapidly collect everyone and move them out of the area. Snipe Falling Debris (difficulty 8): A character who can fire bolts could attempt to target enough objects as they fall to keep bystanders safe. Shield Bystanders (difficulty 8): A character who can grow or create force fields could attempt to shield bystanders.

GRAVITAS WAS HERE After things settle down, one of the PCs notices something odd—an area of antigravity perfectly crafted to float blocky debris in the air, spelling out the message:

Bring me the mayor, or ELSE! —Gravitas

WHERE’S THE MAYOR? The PCs have certainly heard of Gravitas, a supervillain who can control gravity. (In fact, they may know or can easily learn that he recently escaped from a BASTION prison transport on his way to Station Zero.) Characters also know the mayor’s name, or can soon find it out; use the actual name of the mayor of Chicago (or the city where you’ve set this adventure), or, if you prefer, use a mayor specific to your campaign, such as Melinda Mayweather. After that, it only takes a moment of checking—or an NPC drawing the PCs’ attention to it—to discover that the mayor’s social media is full of antagonistic ad hominem attacks directed at Gravitas. It seems inevitable that the villain would respond exactly as he did. This should seem strange to the PCs. Everyone knows that elected officials usually don’t draw targets on themselves so directly. Thus, PCs might rightly suspect that something is up with the mayor. Their next question is likely to be: where is the mayor?

MAYOR IN HIDING The office of the mayor, according to publicly available information, is located in one of the leaning buildings. However, it being a weekend, no one except for a skeleton crew was inside at the time of the attack. The mayor’s actual residence isn’t exactly a secret, but then again it’s not widely advertised (unless you’re running this adventure in a city with a mayoral mansion, such as New York, LA, or Detroit).

DEATH, THY NAME IS GRAVITAS

A successful difficulty 6 investigation task (or a use of a superpower that provides insight) allows the PCs to learn the location of the mayor’s private residence in the city.

FINDING THE MAYOR PCs who make their way to the mayor’s domicile discover that it is apparently empty, and there are signs of a rushed exit. A successful difficulty 7 perception task within the house reveals the outline of a secret door in the library: a clandestine panic room hiding in plain sight. PCs may try to knock or otherwise get the attention of the panic room’s occupants. If they do, the intercom allows the PCs to speak with the rattled and very frightened mayor, who says she was alone in the room and unable to call for help because her phone and laptop have been hacked! The PCs can get the mayor to let them in through the massive vault-like door with two successful difficulty 5 interaction tasks. These tasks are eased if the PCs are

well known in the city, or if they promise to fix her hacked electronics. Because it’s true: the mayor did not start insulting Gravitas. (If the PCs bring up the old high-school photo of the mayor and Gravitas, she admits that yes, they once had a relationship. But she truthfully insists that it was over decades earlier.)

BRIEF INTERLUDE IN THE PANIC ROOM If the PCs get into the panic room, they have a few rounds to determine that, indeed, the mayor’s personal electronics have been hacked. Except for occasionally spamming the mayor’s social media with insults directed at Gravitas, it’s impossible to use the devices to send email, text, call, or otherwise perform any normal functions. The perpetrator’s identity isn’t easy to determine, because Voltage hired the work out to a mercenary cracking group known as Digital Dragonfly. Regardless of whether the PCs convince the mayor to let them in, only a handful of rounds pass before the entire panic

Mayor: level 2; persuasion, deception, and tasks related to running the city as level 5

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FIGHTING GRAVITY Gravitas, page 122

Flunky: level 3

GM intrusions: The floating panic room containing the mayor loses its antigravity charge and begins to fall. Crushing gravity ruins the character’s amazing attack against their foe.

Voltage, page 152 Entropy, page 118 Worm, page 155

Gravitas has come to kill the mayor, but not immediately. He wants to yell at her a little, scare her, and show her that he isn’t to be trifled with. He even mentions their old relationship, only to add that it was one of his life’s biggest mistakes. The villain isn’t interested in listening to reason. However, PCs could try to persuade him that it’s all a setup (or flatter him, or trick him in some other way to stop fighting, perhaps by suggesting that the mayor has renewed feelings for him). But even as they attempt to do so—requiring three successful difficulty 8 persuasion or deception tasks before two failures—Gravitas does his level best to kill the characters, using all the powers of gravity that are his to control. (It’s normally much easier to fool him. But in this case, he’s already been bamboozled and has fully bought into the lie that the mayor has demeaned him.) Whether the PCs succeed in trouncing Gravitas or talking him down, or it’s Gravitas that seems to be winning the day, the end of the fight is interrupted by Voltage (and, depending on how tough she judges the PCs to be, one or two other members of Dread such as Entropy and/or Worm).

THANKS FOR YOUR HELP Voltage announces her presence by blasting Gravitas with lightning (if he’s still conscious), and/or blasting the PCs if they’re in the process of preparing a defeated Gravitas to be delivered into BASTION’s hands. She is too smart to monologue, but she is satisfied that her plan to soften up Gravitas by drawing heroes into a conflict with him has succeeded, allowing her to take him

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down with little risk to herself. The PCs should also be weakened enough by their clash that they can’t effectively stop her. She believes (rightly or wrongly) that Gravitas’s power is something she can seize for herself. If Voltage addresses the PCs, it is to cryptically remark, “Everything has gone exactly as I planned. Thanks for your help.” If the PCs want to stop Voltage—and potentially one or two other members of Dread—from making off with Gravitas in an innocuous-looking delivery van driven by a flunky, they have one more fight on their hands. If the PCs resist well enough to put Voltage at risk, she turns to lightning and escapes.

WRAP-UP The PCs each earn 2 XP if they effectively dealt with the aftermath of Gravitas’s attack on the city, 1 XP if they saved the mayor’s life, and 1 XP if they defeated Gravitas and prevented Voltage from taking him away.

CHAP TER 14

f o s n o l a T

D OO m

“T

alons of Doom” is an adventure that can begin in any large city, though Chicago is the city presented here. If the PCs have a superhero base of their own, it’s the setting for much of the adventure. If you’re running this as a one-shot adventure, it’s easy enough to simply provide the characters with a base. Alternatively, you could set the adventure in the base of another established group of heroes, such as the Society of Seven. In this case, the heroes respond to a request for aid from the Seven, only to find the base overrun as described under From Inside Your Base. The adventure is suitable for mid-tier characters. It can be adjusted for low-tier characters by making sure they begin play with cyphers such as skill boost, stim, and the various power boost cyphers. The adventure can be adjusted for high-tier characters by increasing the specific numbers of foes that appear, and providing a few more GM intrusions that aid the villains along the way. Regardless of their tier, PCs who get into real trouble may also be aided by an NPC superhero or two. That said, if the PCs truly are defeated, it sets up an interesting situation that could be played out over the course of a larger campaign.

SYNOPSIS A confederacy of criminals and villains join forces to systematically eliminate as many heroes as they can so they can operate unchecked. The PCs must stand against them, or simply become their next victims.

Saving the Singing Stone. The PCs foil Demdike’s scheme to steal a Neolithic monolith in this optional prequel encounter. This sets the stage for the rest of this adventure, in which Demdike seeks to exact her revenge.

Demdike, page 114

Who’s Your Friend? Issues with the Singing Stone lead to the PCs looking for help. They find Elizabeth Southerns, an antiquities and rare book dealer consulting with the university that had acquired the stone. Southerns has some suggestions on how to make the stone “settle down.” Afterward, she may maintain a friendly relationship with the PCs. (Southerns, as it turns out, is actually Demdike’s secret identity.)

Chapter 7: Superhero Bases, page 102

Internal Conflict. The small irritations of being on a team begin to weigh on the PCs, potentially leading to arguments, bad feelings, or even physical conflict. (Actually, the reason is a subtle spell cast by Demdike. The PCs might not even realize they are under attack.) This effect begins to play into the adventure right away, interweaving among the other parts.

Power Boost Cyphers, page 157

Society of Seven, page 172

Skill boost, page 397 Stim, page 398

Unprovoked Attack. Seemingly out of the blue, the PCs are attacked by a villain they’ve never heard of before who calls himself Breakneck. Tough and strong, he’s a challenge, but because he’s alone, the PCs can probably put him down. (In fact, Breakneck was dispatched by Demdike to probe the PCs’ response to attacks.)

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Ghost, page 331 Warp, page 153

Divide and Conquer. A PC who leaves the base alone on a routine matter—or because they’ve just got to get away from their annoying teammates—is attacked by Demdike’s cohorts. When the PC fails to return (or returns bloodied and on the run), the characters finally learn that they are all in the crosshairs. From Inside Your Base. Even as the PCs prepare for an assault, a secretly engineered back door into their base is exploited, and various villains allied with Demdike attack the characters from the rear. In a final betrayal, Elizabeth Southerns reveals herself as Demdike. Is this the end for our heroes?

SAVING THE SINGING STONE This initial part sets the stage for the later parts of the adventure. It’s optional, because once the PCs realize that Demdike is the source of their troubles, you could merely tell them that they’ve met and defeated her once before. However, if you’d prefer to show rather than tell, use this opening encounter.

ROOFTOP BATTLE The PCs receive word of an attack by ghosts on the campus of the nearby college. If they respond, they find a pitched battle on the archeology building’s roof in which Demdike and two ghosts fight against the heroic defense of Warp. However, Warp falls in battle just as the heroes arrive on the scene.

STONE THIEVES

Singing Stone: level 7; traps a mysterious concentration of magical energy within

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If the PCs don’t intervene, Demdike and her ghosts continue the task that Warp interrupted, which is theft. Something the newspapers call the Singing Stone recently came into the university’s possession. So dubbed because of what some people believe to be Neolithic musical notation carved into the old monolith, it was set to go on display later in the day. Demdike believes the stone may contain clues pointing to ancient magical secrets, or even be one itself. Her plan was to lurk in hiding, wait until the stone was delivered in front of the building, then simply steal the vehicle and drive off. (She knew the delivery schedule because she’d already infiltrated the university as her alter ego in a consulting role.) Warp screwed up that plan. However, a flatbed truck pulls up even as Warp falls. A 10-ton monolith bundled under weatherproof tarps is firmly strapped into the truck’s flat trailer.

Talons of DOOm WHO’S YOUR FRIEND? About a month after the fight over the Singing Stone, and possibly after the PCs have had an unrelated adventure, one of them makes a new acquaintance. You can set this up a few different ways. If the PCs Have the Singing Stone. If the PCs have the stone at their base, they notice that it grows unsettlingly active over the subsequent weeks. At night, it sometimes spawns dangerous points of brilliant light (treat as killing white lights) outside its enclosure for no reason the PCs can determine. Meet Elizbeth Southerns. If the PCs do any sort of research on the Singing Stone, they discover the name of Elizabeth Southerns, an expert consultant hired by the university— brought all the way over from London, in fact, to help them deal with their new acquisition. If they reach out to her, they find a kind, accommodating, and pleasant expert who is more than happy to take a look at the problem. It was the reason the university was consulting with her, after all. After some time studying the stone, she suggests bathing the relic in brilliant white light at all times, as a stopgap. That actually solves the problem. If possible, keep Southerns in the picture as a recurring NPC. Perhaps she becomes a friend of one of the PCs or continues to prove a valuable source of knowledge regarding antiquities related to other missions. Clandestinely, Southerns (the secret alias of Demdike) uses this access to further refine her plan of revenge. At this point, she doesn’t even care about the stone anymore. She just wants her pound of flesh.

Killing white light, page 340

Elizabeth Southerns: level 2, historical and magical knowledge as level 5. Demdike always has a level 9 disguise spell active when interacting as Southerns, which also thwarts attempts to learn her true identity, read her thoughts, or find her. The spell is invested in an artifact brass bracelet she wears.

If the PCs Don’t Have the Singing Stone. If BASTION has the stone, the same dangerous killing white light manifestations start up for them in the nearby satellite facility where they are temporarily storing it. They ask the PCs for help. In this case, the PCs have a chance to be befriended by Southerns as described above.

FIGHTING DEMDIKE

INTERNAL CONFLICT

If the PCs intervene, Demdike flies into a rage. She makes a show of attacking the characters, but she wasn’t prepared to fight a superpowered battle, let alone two. You don’t live for so many centuries without learning caution. So at the first sign of the PCs getting the upper hand, she flees.

Another plank of Demdike’s revenge plan involves attempting to turn one or more of the characters against each other, or at least raise tensions. Warning: This is a potentially powerful tactic in the fiction of the world, but it might not be something you want to try in your game. Characters getting mad at each other sometimes translates to players getting angry, too. And no GM wants to encourage real-world strife. You know your group. If you don’t think this will fly, skip it and move on to the next part of the adventure, Unprovoked Attack.

SINGING STONE WRAP-UP The Singing Stone is revealed as something potentially more important than a historical curiosity. If the PCs prevent Demdike from stealing it, they could attempt to convince the university to take the stone in their safekeeping. Otherwise, BASTION will come and claim it. Either way, Demdike swears vengeance. But she doesn’t try to take it immediately. Instead, she begins to plot and plan.

Group GM intrusion: Demdike is revealed as an illusion, which melts away. The real Demdike is already long gone.

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Heroes are constantly being courted by large companies to serve as goodwill ambassadors in return for a stipend. For their part, heroes have to be truly convinced of a company’s sincerity before agreeing to work together in that capacity. This is why most heroes settle on helping out charities and donating their time freely, rather than taking a check from a profitoriented corporation for promotional appearances.

Breakneck: level 4, Speed defense and initiative as level 7, Might defense and strengthrelated tasks as level 5; health 28; can take two actions in a round; melee attack inflicts 10 points of damage, or 12 points if not standing still

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EFFECTS OF CONFLICT If Demdike successfully fosters internal conflict, it might lead to an obvious negative outcome, like a PC taking a break from the team, weakening the group’s total strength. That’s great by Demdike’s standards. Alternatively, each time an instance of internal conflict occurs (see options that follow), the PCs end up with one “strike” against the smooth functioning of their team. At any later point, you can cash those strikes in during clutch situations as GM intrusions. Effectively, this is just flavor; the GM intrusions you later employ could specifically relate to the ragged team dynamics getting in the way of a goal. For example, if two characters are coordinating their attack, you could intrude by mentioning that a lingering bit of resentment hinders the attempt or otherwise causes a complication. (These are not free intrusions; the PC you intrude upon should still get 2 XP, one of which they will give to another player.)

A SPELL OF DISCONTENT One way Demdike fosters internal conflict is by casting a general but extremely subtle spell of discontent among the PCs. The spell doesn’t do any one thing; instead, it exacerbates small incidents into something much larger in the minds of those affected. The kind of interactions this spell works on are usually the things that RPG sessions skip because they’re so mundane. For the purposes of this effect, choose from among the handful of situations described hereafter (or make up a few of your own), which you can call out over the course of the adventure, starting from the moment Elizabeth Southerns first shows up (or if she’s not in the picture, about a week after the PCs initially defeat Demdike). Select a player, present a situation to them (possibly as a private message, if you wish), and ask them to make an Intellect defense roll (against a level 7 effect). If they fail, tell them that their character gets hot under the collar about

the situation, and feels a flash of real anger at whoever is responsible. • Someone has left dishes and trash out in a common area. • Someone has spent money out of the team fund and failed to record it. • A PC claims credit for work done by another. • The plants are all dead. Who forgot their watering duties? • Whose turn is it to clean this place? It’s starting to look like a frat house in here. • Who stole my damn sandwich out of the refrigerator?

DETECTING THE FRACTIOUS SPELL Players may grow suspicious, and that may be enough to get their characters to wonder if the team is being manipulated. Everything that applies after Breakneck attacks the PCs’ base applies to them trying to figure out what’s going on and who is responsible. That includes the possibility of asking Elizabeth Southerns to add it to her list of magical threats to look into. If the PCs do figure out that they’ve been affected by a spell and they ask Southerns to deal with it, she actually complies in order to maintain her own deep cover as their friend.

UNPROVOKED ATTACK When the PCs least expect it, they are attacked while they are all together. This could be at their base or perhaps when the characters are gathered for a promotional outing. Whatever the case, the heroes are confronted by a fantastically strong and fast assailant. Bulging with an unlikely amount of muscle under a dark blue and red suit, he crashes into them, or through a brand-new hole in their base. The attacker is Breakneck, which he immediately announces to the PCs. “Witness the terrible might of Breakneck!” screams the newcomer into the hole created by his entry.

Talons of DOOm BREAKNECK’S TACTICS, SUCH AS THEY ARE If Southerns happens to be at the base, she is menaced by Breakneck, since she seems like a soft target that can be dispatched quickly. (Southerns doesn’t reveal herself as Demdike, and even takes some fairly serious damage from the bruiser to maintain the illusion of her alter ego.) However, once the PCs land some telling hits on him, he rightly switches his attention to them. After all, he’s here to kick their asses. Breakneck is aggressive and superstrong as well as fast, making him tough to hit. If attacking the PCs at their base, he probably ends up putting a few cracks in the foundation, which will later require repairs. He also takes delight in destroying any valuable equipment the PCs have, such as vehicles and computers. But mainly, he wants to put a smackdown on the heroes. Given that he is alone, the PCs are likely to defeat him in the end. (If Breakneck is victorious, knocking the PCs out or causing them to flee, the events in the final part of this adventure—From Inside Your Base—begin immediately. Which pretty much means that Demdike mops up, as described hereafter under Defeat?)

QUESTIONING BREAKNECK If defeated and PCs question him, Breakneck isn’t shy about answering. He explains that he attacked them as his “coming out” party. By defeating them, he hoped to cement himself as a true menace in the public’s mind, upping his value to various criminal masterminds who might be willing to hire him later. And that’s mostly true. However, Breakneck was pushed toward the PCs by a subtle magical spell crafted by Demdike. If the PCs have a way to detect this whiff of occult energy (level 7), the only other thing they can determine is that the magic has a bit of compulsion about it.

If Southerns is present, she may be the one who makes the pronouncement, “revealing” to the PCs that she has a knack for mystical things after years of studying rare books and antiquities, some of which proved to be magical in their own right. Given how she shut down the Singing Stone, the PCs are probably not too surprised. Maybe they’re even happy to have a friend with a bit of magical skill if none of them have explored such arts. But when all is said and done, Breakneck is probably bound for the BASTION prison facility of Station Zero. That may be the last the PCs ever see of him.

GM intrusion: An energy, ray, or firearm attack on Breakneck ricochets off his tough hide and attacks the character or an ally.

Station Zero, page 196

WHO CAST THE COMPULSORY SPELL? If the PCs discover that Breakneck was affected by compulsory magic, they may recall an earlier conflict they had with the magic-using witch Demdike. Should the PCs make this connection and deduce that the supervillain is angry at them, they may decide to try to track her down before she strikes again. To do so, they might ask their friendly magical expert, Elizabeth Southerns, to look into it. If so asked, she takes her time. She goes about the business of trying various “workings” to locate Demdike, but it’s mostly a sham. She is just running out the clock until she makes her final move against the heroes. If PCs attempt to find Demdike on their own, they’ll have to overcome a magical anti-detection spell (level 9) that the witch has woven about herself, invested in an artifact brass bracelet she wears. If the PCs succeed, the bracelet warms on her wrist, warning Elizabeth Southerns that the gig may be up, unless she plays things very carefully.

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Claim the Sky • A PC learns they are to be featured in a reputable publication, and they are asked to meet a well-known journalist in an out-of-the-way café for an interview. • A character with an NPC partner, spouse, child, parent, or pet is contacted by a caretaker who indicates that something bad has happened, and the PC should come immediately.

ATTACK THE LONER Regardless of the reason, if a PC leaves the base alone, they are attacked at an inopportune time by three villains hired by Demdike: Wreck and Ruin (superpowered bruisers) and Jabberwocky. This attack is the signal for the larger attack on the base described hereafter.

FROM INSIDE YOUR BASE Wreck and Ruin: level 5, strength-related tasks and Might defense as level 8; health 50; Armor 5; melee attack inflicts 10 points of damage Jabberwocky, page 126

DIVIDE AND CONQUER Only one PC is chosen as the target of this attack, first requiring that the PC leave the base and their team.

SEPARATING THE PC If one of the characters leaves the base after having had enough of their fellow teammates, even if just for a few hours or to take a short trip, they become the target of Demdike’s next attack. If no PC decides on their own to leave the company of the other characters, Demdike works on creating a pretext to get one of them out of the base alone. Possibilities include the following. In most cases, Demdike has magically charmed an intermediary to lure the PC to a location of her choice, which means whoever is reaching out believes they are doing so legitimately; for them, it’s not a deception. • A tipster says they have important information about someone else in the base; come alone!

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Does the lone PC in the previous section prevail, get away, or at least get a message back about being in trouble? If so, they may return to their base only to find that their friends are busy defending themselves from a surprise attack. The attack on the separated character serves as the signal for the surprise attack using the base’s secret back door. Jabberwocky and Wreck and Ruin were hired only to attack the lone PC. After that battle, they’ve done as their contract demanded, so they don’t join the general attack at the base. However, if the lone PC they attacked gets away from them, they may follow. In this case, keep them in reserve if you need to increase the tension for the final surprise attack. If the PCs are already overwhelmed by the attack, consider their contract fulfilled.

SECRET BACK DOOR There are a few plausible ways that a secret back door into the PCs’ base might be created. • If the base was damaged by Breakneck’s attack, the PCs presumably got contractors to fix it. If

Talons of DOOm so, Demdike corrupted that effort by magically compelling the contractors to build a door or weak spot that the characters won’t notice. • If the PCs have befriended Elizabeth Southerns, and especially if they’ve asked her to investigate magically related issues they’re having, it’s easy enough for her to set a secret magical portal somewhere. • If no situation can reasonably lead to a secret entrance, introduce the attack from a newly drilled or magically placed portal as a group GM intrusion.

SURPRISE ATTACK The surprise attack team Demdike put together from villains around the US is led by Shrike and includes by Lady Silence (who can “silence” others’ superpowers), the Hook (a homicidal fiend with body armor and a long hooked chain), and Caterwaul (a stealthy thief with horrific sonic abilities). Demdike doesn’t immediately reveal herself.

TACTICS Overwhelming numbers and surprise are the primary tactics, so the villains try to stay together as they move through the base. (All the invaders are fitted with high-tech earbuds that make them temporarily immune to Caterwaul’s sonic cry, and allow them to communicate with each other.) Elizabeth Southerns is visiting the base (if she’s friendly with the heroes) when the attack occurs. That way, if the attack begins to fail, she can change to Demdike to turn the tide back in her favor, or if the assault is a smashing success, she can revel in the heroes’ defeat. If possible, she keeps her secret identity under wraps to keep her options open for later. (If Southerns was never an ally, Demdike is part of the surprise attack itself.) Is this the end for our heroes?

DEFEAT? What does it mean if the PCs are defeated? Demdike doesn’t want them killed. She wants to turn them into pawns for her own future schemes. So if any PC would otherwise die, they are instead held in a spell of preservation, pending a future use by Demdike. Probably to be returned to their former status as heroes, but secretly controlled by the witch!

WRAP-UP The PCs each earn 2 XP if they defeated Demdike and saved the Singing Stone in the first encounter. They each gain 1 XP if they befriended Southerns (some lessons are difficult, but useful nonetheless). They each earn 1 XP if they defeated Breakneck. The PC who was singled out and attacked by Wreck and Ruin and Jabberwocky earns 1 XP. And finally, each PC earns 1 XP if they survived the surprise attack on their base, even if they were defeated.

Shrike, page 145 Lady Silence: level 6, stealth as level 8, attacks and Speed defense as level 7; selectively suppresses sound within short range; selectively negates a power possessed by a target within short range Caterwaul: level 3, stealth and perception as level 6; sonic attack either makes all within short range lose their next action or inflicts 6 points of damage to one target and makes them lose their next action The Hook: level 5, Might defense and hook attacks as level 7; health 20; Armor 3; hook attack deals 7 points of damage to a target within short range or 5 points of damage to all targets in immediate range; uses chain to bind a target (level 7 task to escape) Demdike, page 114

If you don’t have a map of the PCs’ base to use during the attack, it’s simple enough to say that the attack occurs when they’re all in the common room. Alternatively, you could use one of the bases described in Chapter 7: Superhero Bases (page 102).

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CHAP TER 1 5

U N S D E R

Power Boost Cyphers, page 157

If you don’t want to have interplanetary stories at this point in your superhero campaign, this adventure could take place on Earth, preferably starting in a remote area with a limited population and slow communication with the rest of the world, such as an isolated village in Alaska. Adjusting the location like this means the local aliens would instead be small-town humans.

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“B

eneath a Red Sun” is an adventure that takes place on and above an alien planet. It assumes that the heroes have the means or connections to travel to another planet (see the Space Travel and Aliens box). The adventure is suitable for mid-tier characters, although low-tier characters might be able to handle the high-level threats with smart tactics and good use of power boost cyphers. The adventure can be adjusted for high-tier characters by increasing the number of opponents and using more GM intrusions that complicate encounters against the PCs.

SYNOPSIS The superheroes answer an emergency message from planet Korboros, and find that their task is much more strange and dangerous than expected. Distress Call. The PCs receive a transmission from the gaseous inhabitants of the distant planet Korboros. A series of meteor impacts are causing terrible destruction, and the PCs are asked to use their powers to intervene. Ecological Impacts. The Korborites welcome the superheroes, direct them to one of the meteor impacts, and give the PCs time to examine the site.

BENEATH A RED SUN SPACE TRAVEL AND ALIENS Becoming space travelers is a big step for earthbound superheroes, perhaps opening the door to an entire solar system or galaxy of new, weird adventures. PCs planning to head into space may want to do some research about how to travel between planets or solar systems, as well as what alien species are out there and which ones are dangerous. Obviously, heroes who have their own spaceship can easily make the leap into spaceborne adventures. Those without may need to rely on a vehicle from another superhero or team, such as the Silver Sentinel or the Majestic Family, or perhaps even Blackstar could find one they can use. An inventor PC could feasibly create a planetary ship or starship, given enough resources—perhaps a side mission to investigate an Azaki ruin with some reactor technology, or dismantling a crashed Grin spacecraft to see how its engine works. (BASTION has a small presence in space and uses shuttles to resupply their satellites, but travel to other worlds is beyond their capability.) Instead of using vehicle technology, the heroes might build or look for a portal, or use mystical or interdimensional methods to bypass the vast distances between Earth and another planet. Notable NPC heroes such as the Traveler might be willing to take them somewhere, or a magical hero such as the Gentleman or Ella Brodach could create a gateway directly to their destination. Of course, the PCs would need to find some other way back to Earth . . . The most obvious intelligent threat in space is the alien species known as the Grin. Earth’s heroes have a reasonable knowledge of the Grin based on their failed (televised) invasions in recent history. NPC heroes such as Blackstar and the Traveler can provide more specific information, assuming that the PCs have a reliable way to contact them. BASTION also has an archive of information about the Grin culled from news reports, firsthand statements by superheroes and agents, and their research on salvaged Grin devices.

Silver Sentinel, page 146 Majestic Family, page 130 Blackstar, page 108 Grin, page 123 BASTION, page 163

The Traveler, page 149 The Gentleman, page 120 Ella Brodach, page 181

Bug Soldiers. While the PCs are investigating, a strange creature bursts from the ground near the first meteor impact site and attacks. Similar events happen at the other impact sites, with each creature more dangerous than the last. The PCs figure out that these meteors are being launched from somewhere in space, and backtrack their trajectories to estimate the location of their source—a Grin starcraft. Orbiting Threat. The PCs travel to the Grin vessel (which has been testing prototype monster-weapons that can be dropped onto planets from a very safe distance) and bring the fight directly to the aliens before they can complete their weapons tests and use this new technology against other planets.

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Claim the Sky DISTRESS CALL If the superheroes don’t have the means to travel to another star system, the message could also include directions to a buried Azaki spacecraft on Earth, or instructions on how to build an interstellar ship or teleporter using Azaki technology, which a tech-savvy PC could do in a couple of days. The resulting device will be fragile, but it’ll get the job done.

The hook for this adventure is the superhero PCs receiving a message from an alien species called the Korborites. Depending on the heroes’ abilities and equipment, this might be a hyperspace wave broadcast at their receiver (or even a television or computer screen), a hologram appearing in their secret base, a psychic message beamed directly into their minds, or something else. The visual aspect of the message is a blurry, multicolored image of a starfish-like creature at a very close distance to the camera (perhaps even partially on the camera lens). The message says, in a low-volume breathy whisper:

that an enemy might be using the tech to lure them into a trap, the message isn’t a direct attack—it’s not a mind-control beam, there is no virus embedded in the transmission, and so on. If the superheroes are familiar with other alien civilizations, they may know (or can easily learn) general information about Korborites, and can verify that the creature shown in the message is a Korborite in its physical form. If not, the PCs will have to go in blind and learn about the aliens as they go along. When the PCs reach the planet (which ideally should take three to six days at most, despite the distance), go to the next section of the adventure, Ecological Impacts.

READ ALOUD

Korboros’s star system seems to be much older than Earth’s.

“Attention, attention. An unexpected meteor shower is dropping burning stones on our planet, Korboros. We are unable to prevent this phenomenon and it is causing great ecological harm. Please help. Message will repeat.” Following the verbal message are directions to planet Korboros using whatever travel methods the PCs can access, such as hyperspace coordinates or a teleportation codec. Any PC familiar with Azaki devices can easily figure out (no roll needed) that the message is using Azaki transmission technology. Although this doesn’t rule out

ECOLOGICAL IMPACTS Korboros orbits a small red star at a much closer distance than from Earth to Sol, so when viewed from the planet’s surface, its sun looks as large as Earth’s moon. The only other significant features of this star system are an asteroid belt (which is narrower and made of smaller rocks than Earth’s) and a Neptune-sized gas giant in a distant orbit. Korboros is smaller than Earth but more dense, so its gravity is very slightly higher than Earth’s (but not enough to affect the heroes’ actions). Its surface is about 80 percent water, with a slightly cooler temperature and large ice caps.

KORBORITES Korborite: level 2, manipulate physical objects as level 1, Speed defense as level 5 due to gas body; immediaterange poisonous cloud inflicts 2 points of Speed damage (ignores Armor); as an action, transforms into or out of a solid starfish form that cannot attack but can manipulate objects as level 2

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Korborites are the only intelligent species of their homeworld, Korboros. Their natural form is a translucent cloud approximately 5 feet (1.5 m) in diameter, but with effort they can compress themselves into a solid starfish-like shape about 6 inches (15 cm) across that weighs about 4 pounds (2 kg). They are generally peaceful beings and lack the means to create advanced technology, but they have been able to activate a few Azaki devices found on their world, including an interstellar communicator. They have no permanent settlements and prefer to drift alone or in groups, discussing philosophy, religion, and the natural landscape. In their cloud form, they are slightly poisonous (at least to Earth-biology creatures), which they find alternatively amusing and embarrassing. They have no natural predators, and consensus among most of their religions is that the gods (perhaps the Azaki) altered them to be creatures of coherent fumes rather than typical solid lifeforms.

BENEATH A RED SUN If the PCs teleport to Korboros, they arrive in an open area near an Azaki ruin, matching what they saw in the transmission. If they arrive from space, they can detect a planetary-range beacon on the surface, which is where the message was transmitted from. Once the PCs arrive at the transmission site, a group of Korborites gathers to meet them, and an outgoing individual named Clear Water Falling identifies itself (in the whispering manner of speaking its kind uses with humanoids) and serves as the main contact for the group.

TALKING WITH THE LOCALS On its own or in response to questions from the superheroes, Clear Water Falling explains that its people are planet-bound because they do not react well to space travel, but are content to explore and observe their beautiful homeworld and (though telescope-like remnants of Azaki technology) their solar system. Their planet experiences many meteor showers due to the asteroid field, almost all of which burn up harmlessly in the sky because they are so small. However, a few days before they sent their distress message, a large meteorite fell at a steep angle and hit the ground, blasting a large area. The impact, heat, and shock wave killed dozens of Korborites, and a couple of days later another happened, and a third on the day they sent the message. The third meteor is what prompted them to use the Azaki transmitter to call for help, because they don’t know how many more of these unusually large meteorites—none of which they were able to predict—will hit their planet. Since sending the message, another meteor impact has occurred every day to day and a half (a total of six meteorites). Individually, the impacts are destructive, but cumulatively the Korborites fear they could permanently affect the planet’s climate due to sending dust high into the atmosphere, releasing harmful volcanic

gases, or altering its (relatively calm) plate tectonics. There is no pattern to the timing of the meteors (there’s a variable amount of time between each of them) or the locations of the impacts (nothing significant about the sites, they haven’t landed in a line, and so on). Other than the size of these meteorites, and the fact that the meteors fell at a steeper angle than the common harmless ones, the Korborites haven’t observed anything unusual about them. Other than searching for survivors (a difficult proposition), they haven’t explored the impact areas due to fear and ongoing fires. If the PCs decide to examine one or more of the places where a meteor struck the planet, go to The Strike Zone. If they suspect this is some kind of attack (whether or not they’ve had to fight a Grinzarg) or otherwise direct their attention toward space, go to Orbiting Threat.

Clear Water Falling’s name could also be translated as “Rain,” but it prefers the longer form.

THE STRIKE ZONE The closest impact site to the Azaki transmitter is the first one, about 60 miles (95 km) away, in an open plain. The blast area is a rough circle about 10 miles (16 km) across. All the vegetation in the area has been knocked flat in a radial pattern. The middle third of the area has intermittent smoke from fires, although much of the area is currently flooded with shallow water. If asked, Clear Water Falling or another Korborite explains that normally a river passes through this region, and perhaps the water has been moved around and the riverbed flattened to create a flood plain. The wind shifts about rapidly due to different temperature regions, making it difficult for any gas-bodied Korborites to remain with the PCs. If the superheroes have a way to search the environment for trace elements (such as with an ability like Scan), they find an unusually high concentration of iron particles in the area. This is consistent with a meteorite, except that the material

Scan, page 179

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Claim the Sky If the PCs need to build something to get them back into space, or need time to calculate the likely position of the source of the meteors, spread out each Grinzarg encounter by a day or so. Perhaps the creatures need time to fully awaken before they emerge from their meteor cocoons. A good time to award the characters more cyphers is when they head into space to find the alien ship.

Lava, page 217

Finding the spacecraft: level 7 Intellect task; skills such as navigation, piloting, mathematics, physics, and computers apply to this task Grin trooper: level 5; health 20; Armor 4; long-range particle beam weapon inflicts 7 points of damage to three adjacent targets; flies a long distance each round with jet boots Grin scientist (4): level 4; health 15; Armor 2; long-range particle beam weapon inflicts 7 points of damage Grinzarg: level 8, Speed defense as level 5 due to size; health 60; Armor 4 (including cold and electricity, 10 against fire); bite attack inflicts 12 points of damage, two hooked forelimbs inflict 8 points of damage each; burrows a short distance each round GM intrusion: The Grinzarg rolls into an armored ball and charges up to a long distance in a straight line, attacking all creatures in its path and inflicting 12 points of damage. Even if the heroes haven’t faced off against the Grin before, they’ve certainly seen photos or video footage of them. The Grinzarg looks vaguely Grin-ish, but not so much that they automatically recognize it as one.

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is metallic iron (melted and cooled by the heat) rather than iron ores, suggesting that the meteorite was artificial. If the PCs go to the center of the blast site, they find a hemispherical crater about 100 feet (30 m) across, surrounded by a human-height lip of heat-fused rock. At the center of this crater is a 30-foot (9 m) wide pool of lava that has welled up from deeper in the earth—whatever hit here had enough velocity and strength to punch a hole deeper into the ground.

BUG SOLDIERS At some point while the PCs are exploring the blast area (even if they only approach the edge), a rumbling vibration shakes the ground, and after a round or two the ground bursts upward, revealing a 20-foot (6 m) tall bug-like creature with multiple limbs, an armored carapace on its back, and a huge grinning mouth filled with teeth decidedly unlike an insect’s. This creature was once a regular Grin trooper, but has been genetically spliced with genes from other organisms to turn it into a Grinzarg, a near-feral giant monster that can survive impacting a planet’s surface from orbit and still have enough fight left in it to wreak havoc among the unsuspecting population. It immediately attacks the superheroes. During the fight, any Korborites scatter to get away from the Grinzarg (any attack by the creature would kill them), leaving the superheroes to deal with the problem. Once the Grinzarg is defeated, it’s easy to figure out that it is not a natural creature— it has metal armor bonded to parts of its carapace, markings that are probably tattoos of some kind, and so on. If the PCs haven’t yet figured out that the Grin are involved, there’s enough evidence here to make the connection clear. The PCs should realize that the source of these attacks must be something in space, and that there must be other Grinzargs roaming around (one for each of the other meteor strikes), ready to

attack the Korborites at any time. The PCs need to eliminate the other Grinzargs that are already on the planet and deal with whatever spacecraft is dropping them from orbit (a Grin ship called the Fires of Discord; see Orbiting Threat). Finding and defeating the other Grinzargs is a matter of time and patience (perhaps hastened by PC abilities or a tracker/scanner slapped together by a gadget-minded character). Finding the spacecraft that’s been dropping the Grinzargs is a challenge, but computing the trajectories and locations of the known meteor strikes eases the task by two steps.

ORBITING THREAT The Fires of Discord is a medium-sized spacecraft, with a linear set of interior compartments (much like a passenger train car) with a Grin trooper as its captain and a crew of Grin scientists. Its large rear compartment is the cargo area, which can hold up to seven containment units for Grinzargs; how many remain on the ship depends on how long it took the PCs to get to Korboros after receiving the distress call (minimum of one remaining). The Discord is a cargo ship, not a warship; their mission is to drop Grinzargs on unsuspecting planets so the scientists can study the creatures’ effectiveness as planetary siege weapons. As much as the captain (a combat veteran on a boring assignment) would enjoy a good fight, she knows that protecting the scientists’ data is paramount, and she can’t risk the ship getting captured or destroyed before they relay their full findings back to the Grin empire. Plus, she knows her crewmates aren’t warriors, just weakling scientists, and she doesn’t enjoy the idea of battling superheroes with a bunch of nerds on her side. The rest of this adventure depends on how the PCs attempt to reach the alien ship: teleportation or flight.

BENEATH A RED SUN

TELEPORTATION If the PCs can instantaneously move from the planet to the ship, they probably catch the aliens off guard and have a chance to secure the cargo hold, take the bridge, and stop the Grin from going into hyperspace with their Grinzarg data. This plan requires speed, stealth, or both, and almost certainly going room by room through the ship to make sure none of the aliens can escape, release the Grinzargs, or activate the hyperdrive. Alternatively, the PCs may just decide to blow up the ship using explosives or superpowers and not bother trying to capture the aliens at all, which is fine (if a bit bloodthirsty). As long as they prevent the ship from getting away, they’ll have completed their mission. If the Grin captain realizes that the PCs are on her ship, she prepares to defend the bridge and directs the scientists to prepare for a hyperspace jump. If the PCs seem like a significant threat, she orders one of the scientists to launch the

remaining Grinzarg containment capsules at the planet, aiming at least one of them at the Azaki beacon that the Korborites used to send their message. Her goal is to give the superheroes a reason to break off their pursuit and chase down the falling Grinzargs, giving the Discord time to jump away. Any PCs on the ship can feel the motion of the containment capsules being deployed, and any hero who looks out the window at the falling cube(s) can tell that one is heading toward the general location of the Azaki ruin containing the transmitter device. There are usually dozens of Korborites within a few miles of the ruin at any time, and a Grinzarg impacting there means certain death for them. To save the lives of the friendly little gasbags, the heroes will need to divert the falling Grinzarg as much as possible— preferably toward an ocean. Fortunately, it’ll take about five minutes for the capsule to reach the ground, giving the heroes time to move the capsule sideways toward

If this adventure is the first time the PCs encounter the Grin, it can set the stage for later conflicts when the Grin attempt to invade Earth again, or if the superheroes decide to take the fight to the alien attackers.

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Feats of strength, page 61

Grinzarg capsule: level 7

a safe crash location. Unfortunately, the capsule requires only a few rounds to reach its maximum speed, which is more than 100 miles (160 km) per hour, so if the heroes don’t act fast, they’ll need to move very quickly to catch up with it. Furthermore, for the last two or three minutes of the fall, air friction heats up the capsule—as well as any hero traveling at that speed—inflicting 5 points of ambient fire damage every round. A falling capsule weighs a ton (1 tonne), but moving it is easier than trying to lift it off the ground. It moves sideways pretty freely through the air, and the hero needs to move it only an immediate distance each turn to give it horizontal inertia, so maneuvering it to a safer crash location requires only four or five successful pushes over the several minutes the thing is falling. Instead, the hero could try to break open the capsule shell so it splits into pieces that will safely burn up before they hit the ground. This causes the Grinzarg inside to fall unprotected, dying with a loud splat when it hits the ground—and not creating a destructive blast crater and ground-penetrating impact.

FLIGHT

Vehicular Combat, page 230

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If the Grin captain realizes that the PCs are approaching her ship, she attempts to speed away, giving her crew a few rounds to warm up the hyperdrive and jump to safety. If it seems that the PCs’ ship will catch up to them before that happens, things proceed basically as described earlier: she orders one of the scientists to launch the remaining Grinzargs at the planet, aiming at least one of them at the Azaki beacon, hoping to distract the heroes so she and the ship can escape. If the heroes’ ship has weapons and can directly attack the Fires of Discord, or if the heroes use their powers to attack the ship (such as trying to disable its controls or engine), use the vehicular combat rules to resolve the conflict. (The specifics of this combat depend on the stats of the heroes’ ship,

and the GM should give the Discord similar stats so it’s an even fight.) If the PCs try to board the ship, the rest of the scenario plays out similar to the teleportation option described earlier.

DEFEAT? If the PCs fail to stop the Grinzarg bombardment, the Grin on the Fires of Discord finish conducting their weapons tests and transmit their results to the Grin homeworld, which relays them throughout the Grin empire—including to secret Grin bases in Earth’s solar system (such as on Jupiter’s moon Europa). That means it is very likely that the Grin will deploy these augmented soldiers directly against Earth in the future. If the PCs are captured by the Grin on the scientific vessel, they’ll be taken to a prison/research facility where their abilities will be analyzed and their equipment and bodies will be dissected to advance the Grins’ own methods of producing superpowered soldiers. The PCs’ best bet is to break out of the holding cells on the Fires of Discord, take over the ship, and use it to return to Earth. Failing that, their best chance at survival is when they’re being taken from the Discord to another ship or the prison itself—in other words, before they are fully sedated, restrained, and doomed to vivisection.

WRAP-UP The PCs each earn 3 XP if they defeated all of the Grinzargs that reached Korboros, 1 XP if they destroyed the research data on the Fires of Discord (destroying the entire ship counts), and 1 XP if they diverted or destroyed the falling Grinzarg capsule so it doesn’t strike the Azaki ruin.

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DESCRIPTOR

POOL

Combat roll of 17-20 deals only +1 damage

Ignore minor and major effect results on rolls

+1 Effort per level

IMPAIRED

EDGE

Pool

PS T S

...isn’t always dead

DEAD

Cannot move if Speed Pool is 0

Can move only an immediate distance

I

DEBILITATED

DAMAGE TRACK

EDGE

PS = power shift, T = trained, S = specialized, I = inability

10 HOURS

10 MINS

SKILLS

1 HOUR

1d6+

POOL

1 ACTION

RECOVERY

EDGE

INTELLECT

SPEED

MIGHT

POOL

XP

EFFORT

TYPE

WHO

TIER

TYPE, FLAVOR, OR OTHER

FOCUS

IS A

NAME +1 to the Edge of your choice

MOVE TOWARD PERFECTION

ATTACKS

SPECIAL ABILITIES

+4 points into stat Pools

INCREASE CAPABILITIES

ADVANCEMENT EXTRA EFFORT

+1 into Effort

SKILL

MOD DAMAGE

OTHER

TRAINING Refer to the Train in a skill or specialize Cypher System Rulebook, page 240 in a trained skill

ARMOR

EQUIPMENT

Strength

Single Attack

Savant

Resilience

Prodigy

Power

Intelligence

Increased Range

Healing

Flight,

Dexterity

Accuracy

POWER SHIFTS

CYPHERS

per round

MONEY

LIMIT

BACKGROUND NOTES PORTRAIT

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Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

index abilities 48 Ace Majestic (hero)

132

Africa (Boundless setting)

Death, Thy Name Is Gravitas (adventure) 202

Ignores Physical Distance (focus)

46

illusionist (archetype)

23

192

defeated villains

77

immortals 69

aliens 66

Defender (hero)

113

increased range (power shift)

Amazing (descriptor)

42

Demdike (villain)

114

Incredible (descriptor)

42

Animal Form minor abilities

50

descriptors 42

Inner Earth (Boundless setting)

197

archetypes 10

designing your superhero setting

73

interweaving stories (story concept)

90

artifacts 158

developments (story concept)

90

inventor (character concept)

Asia (Boundless setting)

difficulties above 10

61

Jabberwocky (villain)

126

Dirge (villain)

115

Jack Majestic (hero)

131

Atlantean (archetype)

190 11

57

15

Atlantic Ocean (Boundless setting)

196

Dread (supervillain team)

179

Jinsoku (hero)

127

Atlantis (lost civilization)

69

Duke (Majestic robot)

132

Kaos (villain)

128

Australia (Boundless setting)

195

Earth orbit (Boundless setting)

198

laundromat (superhero base)

102

Azaki (Boundless setting aliens)

160

Edifice (hero)

116

leaping 63

balancing power levels

93

elastic (archetype)

16

Lemuria (lost civilization)

69

Baron Shadow (villain)

107

Elemental, the (villain)

117

Lord Ash (villain)

129

17

organization) 163 bearer of the item (archetype)

Lord Eswar (villain)

139

Entropy (villain)

118

lost civilizations

69

Europe (Boundless setting)

187

magic 70

energy master (archetype)

BASTION (Boundless setting 11

beastly hero (archetype)

12

extra limbs (archetype)

18

Majestic Family (heroes)

beastmaster (archetype)

12

far-future superhero setting

74

Malevolence (villain)

134

214

feats of speed

62

Mana (villain)

140

bizarre dimensions

66

feats of strength

61

Manslaughter (villain)

135

Blackstar (hero)

108

flex power shifts (variant rule)

30

master athlete (archetype)

24

57

master martial artist (archetype)

25 94

Beneath a Red Sun (adventure)

bug hero (archetype)

13

flight (power shift)

builder (archetype)

13

foci 45

mastermind villains

130

campaign building blocks

66

force field master (archetype)

19

mentalist (archetype)

25

Canada (Boundless setting)

183

Free Reign (villain)

119

Mexico (Boundless setting)

184

Cataclysm (cosmic entity)

109

Freefire 163

Midknight (villain)

136

friendly thing (archetype)

19

Mighty (descriptor)

43

15

Minder (villain)

137

Central and South America (Boundless setting)

185

gadgeteer (character concept)

changes (story concept)

89

genius (archetype)

20

modifying high-tech devices

64

character names

76

Gentleman, the (hero)

120

Moon, the (Boundless setting)

199

character sheet

221

Ghostwalk (hero)

121

Mu (lost civilization)

69

21

multiplier (archetype)

26

comic-book style superhero setting

74

giant hero (archetype)

Copies Superpowers (focus)

46

gods 68

mutants 70

cosmic entities

67

Gravitas (villain)

122

mutants (Boundless setting)

162

crafting in a high-tech setting

65

Grin, the (alien species)

123

Mystery Earth (Boundless setting)

199

Crimson Protector (hero)

110

Grin homeworld (Boundless setting)

199

names 76

crossovers 85

guest stars and crossovers

85

Natalie Majestic (hero)

cyborg (archetype)

half-vampire (archetype)

14

nature master (archetype)

130 27

22

nemeses 84

Has a Thousand Faces (focus)

46

North America (Boundless setting)

heroes of the past

68

NPCs 106

cyphers 157

hard light master (archetype)

Dagger, the (Boundless setting organization) 163

21

175

dark energy master (archetype)

16

Highrise (villain)

124

Olive Majestic (hero)

133

Dawnstar (hero)

111

history (Boundless setting)

165

One, the (cosmic entity)

138

death (and coming back)

96

Horror, the (monstrous recluse)

125

origin stories

80

Death Beam (villain)

112

hunter (archetype)

22

Pacific Ocean (Boundless setting)

196

223 Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

223

Claim the Sky pacing the campaign

86

satellite (superhero base)

102

(Boundless setting)

175

paragon (archetype)

28

savant (power shift)

57

superspy (archetype)

35

parallel Earths

70

Sculpts Hard Light (focus)

46

Takes Animal Shape (focus)

47

phase master (archetype)

28

secret identities

83

Talons of Doom (adventure)

207

plant (archetype)

29

Sensational (descriptor)

44

tasks above level 10

player-driven changes (story concept) 90

sensory adept (archetype)

32

Tauseef (villain)

players setting the scene

shapechanger (archetype)

33

team-ups 82

Shift (hero)

144

technology (Boundless setting)

162

Shrike (villain)

145

telekinetic (archetype)

36

47

teleporter (archetype)

37

94

popular heroes in the Cypher System power boost cyphers Power Origin table

157 9

Shrinks to Minute Size (focus)

power replicator (archetype)

29

Silver Sentinel (hero)

146

themes 92

power shifts

57

Singularity (villain)

147

time travel

73

power shifts, gaining more

58

skyscraper (superhero base)

102

tiny hero (archetype)

37

small worlds

71

Touches the Sky (focus)

47

58

Soars on Amazing Wings (focus)

47

Traveler, the (explorer)

149

60

Society of Seven (superhero team)

172

tropes 95

power versus power levels

93

Solar System (Boundless setting)

199

Uncanny (descriptor)

44

powered armor hero (archetype)

30

sorcerer (archetype)

33

unkillable beast (archetype)

38

powerful creatures

63

Sorrow (cosmic entity)

148

Valor (hero)

150

prehistoric lands

70

souls 72

Vantablack (villain)

prison 78

special equipment

157

Vermillion, the (Boundless setting)

prodigy (power shift)

speedster (archetype)

34

vigilantes 77

psychics 71

starting just past tier 1

9

rage monster (archetype)

stories growing over time

power source

8

power stunts power stunts, permanent

57–58 31

151 200

Voltage (villain)

152

Warp (hero)

153

Rai (villain)

141

(story concept)

91

weapon master (archetype)

38

random superpowers

39

Stretches (focus)

47

Whisper (hero)

154

realistic superhero setting

73

super-technology 72

Wields an Enchanted Weapon (focus)

48

really impossible tasks

61

superhero bases

102

Wields Invisible Force (focus)

48

superhero story ideas

98

Worlds Between (Boundless setting) 200

superheroes (Boundless setting)

163

Worm (villain)

155

Z (villain)

156

reversals (story concept) robot (archetype)

224

7

61 142

89 31

Royal House of Videsh (villains)

139

supernatural creatures

Ruthless (hero)

143

superpowered survey

Jon Smith (Order #33409311)

72