Hero Games Press Release - New Product: Larger Than Life

From the Hero Games Website

Hero Games is proud to present a supplement for Pulp Hero, Champions, and Dark Champions by Blackwyrm Publishing that is... Larger Than Life!

Heroes, villains, legends … the folklore of America features all of this and more. In this volume you can find pirates and soldiers, lumberjacks and steel drivers, mountain men and lawmen, cowboys, Indians, inventors, and eccentrics. All of whom are just waiting to be included in your campaign! And don’t let the time period fool you, just because these characters existed in the 18th and 19th Centuries, doesn’t mean you can’t use them in your Pulp Hero, Champions, Dark Champions, or even Star Hero campaigns! After all, these characters are Larger Than Life!

Hero Games Press Release - New Product: Shared Origins: Sky-Q PDF

From the Hero Games Website

Hero Games is proud to present a supplement for Champions by Dean Shomshak 

There's a thin line between genius and EVIL! 

Sky-Q is such a good "smart drug," it's a shame it's illegal. Users gain an hour of better memory and concentration -- followed by fatigue, irritability, and other unpleasant side effects. A few steady users gain much more: They master exotic sciences and invent radical new technologies. On the other hand, they develop bizarre, megalomaniac obsessions and become supervillains! Some of them are loopy "theme gadget" criminals. Others are rather less funny.

Hero Games Press Release - Villain Codex Vol I – Mutant Conflict [PDF] now available

From the Hero Games Website

Hero Games is proud to present a supplement for Champions by G Elkins Hero System Products: Villain Codex Vol I – Mutant Conflict.

The war has begun pitting Homo Sapien against Homo Superior. The hatred was inevitable, the destruction will be inevitable. Will the world survive, will anyone survive, can you hope to survive the Mutant Conflict.

Hero Games Press Release - New Product: Spells of the Devachan PDF

From the Hero Games Website

SUPER SORCERY GOES GALACTIC
 
Earth is not the only world with mystics and magic. Spells of the Devachan reveals a wider cosmos of spirits and sorcery:

• More than 30 spells of thaumaturgy, the light-show magic used by comic-book super-mages. Most are new. A few spells from past HERO System publications are revised for 6^th Edition.

Hero Games Press Release - Blackwyrm Update: Fistful of Fu Being Written

From the Hero Games Website

As the name suggests, this upcoming book by Michael Surbrook will be a collection of martial artists. They will be divided by power level (Real World, Cinematic, and so on), and will represent a wide range of cultures and fighting styles. Although most meant for Ninja Hero campaigns, the characters in FOF can also be used in other genres as well, such as Fantasy Hero, Pulp Hero, Dark Champions, Champions, and Galactic Champions. And if that’s not enough, the book will also contain write ups of various fictional fighting styles.

Hook, Line & Sinker – The Darker Side of Being a Superhero

This time in Hook, Line and sinker we will do some more vigilante hero plot lines.  These are ideally suited for Dark Champions, GURPS: Hero, and Mutants & Masterminds campaigns with a darker edge to them but can be used in most other games with a modern setting.

Hook #1

Hook – Museums and private collections are being broken into.

Line – It appears nothing is being stolen in the break into but it appears that the areas that hold items that have occult value are being ransacked.

Sinker – The break-ins are being committed by a cult that is looking for a specific object of power.  Their research has led them to believe that the object is located somewhere in the city but not exactly where.  The object of power is used in rituals to summon a powerful demon.  The cult hopes to force the demon to make them more powerful.  Will the heroes stop them before they can get the object?  If they do not, will they be able to prevent the demon for escaping into the world to cause untold pain and suffering?

Hook #2

Hook – A number of children have disappeared from poor neighborhoods in the city.

Line – The police are baffled by the disappearances and assume the children are runaways until the body of one of them shows up.  He was badly beaten before his death.  To make matters worse an at risk youth that the heroes know (a DNPC if possible) has just disappeared.

Sinker – The children are being taken by a Jekyll and Hyde type villain who believes that he is helping them.  All of the children that have been taken are from broken home or have abusive parents.  Both personalities want to help the children but hate the system that is in place to help the children so they have taken things into their own hands. 

Unfortunately, the conditions that they have created are much worse than anything the children would have found in the system.  The children are being held in cages until they are brainwashed into believing that the villain is working in their best interests.  Add to that the volatile personality of the Hyde side which has already beaten one of the children to death and you have a recipe for disaster.  How will the heroes react when some of the children try to harm them for taking them from their new parent?

Hook #3

Hook – There is a new vigilante in town that has been taking on organized crime.

Line – The vigilante has been taking down drug dealers and prostitution rings but most of the time the evidence that would keep those that lets live off the street goes missing. Also there does not seem to be a drop in the amount of drugs on the streets to match what this new vigilante has taken.

Sinker – The vigilante is actually a super villain looking to start his own organized crime empire. He figures the best way to do that is to take down the competition with the help of the city’s hero and police community and finance his new empire form the old organized crime families.  This will get him an inside track on how the heroes and police fight organized crime and provide him an advantage when he finally changes sides.  Will the heroes figure this out before that or will they inadvertently create their own worst enemy?

Hook, Line, & Sinker – Superhero Games

Games in the superhero genre can come in many different flavors.  They range from the four color high power romps where the heroes always wins to the dark and gritty tales where it can be hard to distinguish the heroes from the villains.

I have put together three story ideas for you that can be adapted to any game system for the superhero genre.  I have suggested the campaign type that they would be most appropriate for, but they can be used in any campaign they, they will just need to be lightened up or darkened down depending on which type of campaign you run.

Idea #1 – Four Color Campaign

Hook – The heroes notified that there is a break in at a research laboratory.

Line – When the heroes show up at the laboratory just after the perpetrators escape into the local body of water.  The heroes find out that research into a new high efficient but highly volatile power source has been stolen.  This could be very dangerous in it fell into the wrong hands.  What would the Atlanteans want with that technology after peacefully co-existing with the surface dwellers for so long?

Sinker – It was not the Atlanteans that stole the technology but another villain who is looking to frame the Atlanteans for the theft.  This can be just to get the heat off of him or to get the Atlanteans and surface dwellers fighting so he can complete his plans to build a super weapon that uses the experimental power source.

Idea # 2 – Standard Campaign

Hook – One the heroes’ nemesis has been released from prison.  They swear that they have given up their evil ways and are looking to use their powers to help people.

Line – Crimes that fit the villain’s modus operandi start to happen.  It would appear that the villain is up to their old tricks again except for the fact that during a number of these crimes the villain is seen by members of the public in another part of town.

Sinker – The villain’s turn to good is all a ruse.  They are setting up a new gang of villains that have similar powers and abilities to the villains.  The gang is committing the crimes while the villain does good deeds in another part of town.  The heroes may not be able to prove of the villain’s involvement in the crimes unless they cut a deal with the gang after they are captured.

Idea #3 – Dark Campaign

Hook – There is a new designer drug on the market called Zoom.  Its effects are similar to methamphetamines but much more powerful.

Line – One of the side effects of Zoom is that it can increase user’s strength and dexterity for short amount of time. (For example, a short combat scene)  The problem is if the user overexerts themselves they will have a heart attack and die.  The worst of it is one of groups NPC’s has gotten hooked to the drug.

Sinker – One of the gangs that the heroes have target is giving the drug liberally to their members to use in the event of a raid by the cops or the heroes in order to give them a better chance to win a fight.  The heroes have to find the source, a chemist that has no idea what is discovery is being used for and put an end  to the distribution of the drug one way or another.