Smash Comics #8 - pt. 3

Panels like this first one are so useful for figuring out how fast Heroes move. He's flying from New York City to Washington, D.C. -- about 220 miles as the crow flies -- and makes it in 22 minutes. That makes it really easy to figure out Bozo can fly at a staggering 600 MPH -- that's the 3rd-level Race the Bullet power.

Lifting the car is the 1st-level Raise Car power. Coupling that with a flying power makes it even more deadly. Since Bozo seems to have reached cloud altitiude, that puts him at approximately 16,000'.  Now, the Fly powers, as written, have no maximum altitude, so the only distinction is how long it takes to reach cloud level. Even at Fly I, this would only take about 4 1/2 minutes. At Fly II, this would take just over 2 minutes.

Taking no damage from a car exploding probably requires the 4th-level Invulnerability power.

If Bozo has returned to New York City, there is no Bird Airport there, nor even a name close to that.

Traps are usually ineffective if the Heroes have to touch something they have no reason to touch. I can't imagine what Hugh is hoping to accomplish by having Bozo lift the cable. Adolph is clearly inside the shack, not behind the cable!

20,000 volts is not going to melt Bozo, guys. That's a fairly standard amount of volts; your car's spark plug can take it. Now, interestingly, in a more hi-tech setting, Bozo would be full of electronics and 20,000 volts might mess with his systems. But in 1940, robots are chiefly mechanical contrivances, like clockwork automatons. So this trap isn't really doing anything but giving him electrified lariats to kill people with.

Let's jump ahead into Chic Carter. Chic's adventures in Moldavia are finally over and he's back in New York City trying to catch murderers.  Now, by all rights, this scenario should be over before it begins. Chic decides to beat up someone acting like a security guard of the professor he needs to talk to. Now, had Brenda screamed first, Chic could be trying to get in faster to save her, but since she screams after, Chic is just punching anyone who touches his arm.

More seriously, Hideouts & Hoodlums currently has no mechanic for making an attack roll miss against someone else. It doesn't seem like we can ascribe this to flavor text, since saving Lansing's life is vital to the story and why Lansing trusts Chic to take over the investigation. It's possible we could use the parry rules to slightly modify someone else's Armor Class from missile attacks.

Now, this is not a tactic I recommend most players using. Chic has a hunch thieves will come for the valuables in the safe room that night, so he remains locked in the safe room to ambush them. Is that safe room air tight? That's something Chic's player should ask first, in case he's wrong and the thieves wait another night. 

Redundancies are a good way to slow Heroes down, if not discourage them from getting to where they want to get into (players tend to be stubborn like that). Here, we have a wall safe, inside a safe room, each with its own combination.

Dousing the lights gives everyone a penalty to hit, but the open window means positioning is very important in this combat.

That is one amazing hunch Kent gets. Based only on Jenkins' testimony that he didn't know why he pulled the lever, Kent decides he must have been controlled by a VOODOO MASTER!! Instead of a garden-variety hypnotism. Or, you know, lying and being bribed to pull the lever. Somehow, looking at blueprints helped Kent reach this conclusion too, though I suspect the Editor fed this hint to Kent's player during setting up the scenario.

The Invisible Hood remembers to bring a rope and grappling hook on jobs where he thinks he'll need them...though if he's invisible, and the gate is open, I don't know why he takes the time to scale the wall...

I like the trap of the crystal ball next to the throne that casts blinding light at the flip of a switch. But, how does this make him visible? If bright light foils his invisibility, then he's not really invisible so much as camouflaged.

How stupid does a villain have to be to, in the middle of monologing, point out the very switch that can blow up his hideout?

The battle axe is a good choice to help with wrecking things. I might be inclined to give him a +1 bonus with the axe. Though, maybe that should come with a 2 in 6 chance of taking 1-4 points of damage when smashing something electrical...

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)