Famous Funnies #67 - pt. 1

We rejoin Roy Powers, Eagle Scout today after a long time separated. Here, we see how easy traps are in the modern age of Hideouts & Hoodlums. A simple oil flask hanging from a string in D&D would be of little threat to anyone, but substitute it with nitroglycerine and suddenly you've got a trap that can be deadly for even mid-level Heroes.

We also see some nice tactics from Roy, using role-playing to his advantage against the mad scientist.

Just a couple pages later, Roy is already jumping into his next scenario.

Editors may be tempted to roll randomly for mobsters to see which target they choose; I've done this many times, and it does present an element of fairness that keeps players from feeling picked on. And yet, if there are common sense reasons to attack one target over another, the Editor should follow his common sense.

I'll be honest; Skyroads is such a generic aviator feature that I have no idea who this guy is!

Whoever he is, he comes up with a good rationale for getting a +1 modifier to his wrecking things roll. He probably asked if there was a hoisting tackle lying around and the Editor, unprepared for that tactic, had him make a save vs. plot to determine if there was or not.

Hairbreadth Harry leaps back and forth between being a credible source for H&H inspiration and outlandishness too zany to emulate with any seriousness game mechanics. Here, Harry swings towards the latter, as he claims to have used the pushing mechanic to push his melee combat with Rudolph 3,000 miles, or the equivalent of 15,840,000 points of damage, by H&H's current rules.

When I see panels of villains trying to bribe heroes, and I remember that taking money is a huge motivation in H&H, I wonder if we need to have different mechanics, even if only optional. Or would a saving throw vs. plot cover this? Yes, I think it might, at least for Lawful Heroes to take a bribe. But would that just deter players from playing Lawful Heroes...?

Sergeant Stoney Craig, even without his U.S. Marines, really (ahem) mops up with an improvised weapon in this combat. The spears are uncommonly short, and are maybe harpoons instead of spears. A harpoon would not count as an improvised weapon.

The knife is thrown by an assassin. There's a considerable amount of racism here, with the half-Asian man being called a "breed," but this actually plays well in the story, with the locals' racism explaining how quickly they accept this scapegoating.

Near Island is a real place, in Alaska. It seems strange that anyone in Alaska would hear "They had Jeremy Blade at near" and not think of Near Island...but this would make sense at a game session; players never get clues.

Dickie Dare is relegated to cheerleader in this month's installment, as these pages focus on the gorilla-lion battle. I'll have to add a note to the lion entry that, even when grappling, lions still get raking attacks.

I'm not even sure what's going on here, so it's even harder to figure out how this might apply to game mechanics. I guess...hearing Miss Karson's voice reminds Tiny that someone loves him, and gives him the will to keep fighting, even as his body tells him to quit...?

Yeah, that's really hard to quantify into crunchy rules. I suppose you could include a rule that supporting cast can rally you once per day to give you a +1 bonus to something -- and that would give players more impetus to bring supporting cast along besides the meager XP award.

Or, this is all flavor text and Miss Karson's rallying cries didn't influence Tiny's dice rolls at all.



(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)