Speed Comics #7 - pt. 2

We're back to Shock Gibson out West and the hoodlums he hid amongst last time, who have upped their game from hustling ranchers to attacking oil fields. This story has been a lot about escalation of threat level, whether it's targets or transportation (they've now also gone from riding horses to having planes). An Editor needs to up his game like this on the fly if he begins a scenario that turns out to be too much of a cakewalk for the Heroes. 

Though Shock is probably buffed here with the power Fire Resistance, I like how nothing else on this page requires his powers, and lifting and twisting that valve is probably something any Hero could have done. 

It is strange, though, that Shock let them start the fire and waited until the hoodlums were gone to put it out, rather than stop them here in the act. I'm hoping an explanation for that is forthcoming and it's not just a plot hole. 

Okay, I think it's clear at this point that Shock is just toying with the bad guys. There's really no reason to trick the leader after getting him alone in the plane instead of just taking him prisoner now. 

This is, though, the kind of playing I expected to see more in H&H and never have -- good guys vastly outclassing the bad guys, but then taking it easy and trying to make it fun. Players always seem to want to end things as quickly and efficiently as possible. I have wondered before if H&H needed a game mechanic that would encourage this better, like bad guys being worth more XP if you spend longer defeating them than you need to.

Given Shock's powers, you'd think he could have just wrecked the hangars on their own, but there's a poetic justice in using their own bombs against them. Speaking of which...I love that second panel and the fun sense of overkill. I suppose I would give those hoodlums a penalty to their morale saves in that situation. 

The next page is the last page that wraps things up. There's no big reveal of the head hoodlum ("Gasp -- you were Joe the Ranch Hand all along!" or something like that) and it's only implied that the hoodlums knew about the gold and that's why they wanted the land...though the oil would have been just as valuable, so...

Lastly, Shock stops by and gives the old prospector a strange admonishment (and I won't bother showing you the whole page just for it), to "remember the unemployed" when he's rich. The unemployment rate was at 17% and dropping by the end of 

1939, better than its peak in 1933, but still high enough that wealth distribution should be a serious issue for superheroes. 

Now we're in the middle of the next story, Crash, Cork, and the Baron, as they deliver explosives to Argentina. Why, and who hired them? Eh, these guys are Neutral and don't really care about that. Oddly, they flew west to get to Argentina, so...the scenario started in Uruguay? But what I wanted to discuss here was gauchos. Gaucho was a lifestyle, not an ethnicity, but since gauchos were cowboys and not bandits, it's not hard to read some racism into this. Were they ever extinct? No, but their numbers did severely dwindle by the end of the 19th century. 

But this page also gives us more questions. Is Cork not dead after the bolo wraps around his neck (yes, game mechanics-wise, he's likely only unconscious at best, but realistically...)? Is Crash really such a bad pilot that he can't outmanuever an inexperienced pilot (very bad dice rolls, I suppose)? Who is

saying "The blitherin' idiot!"? Did the gauchos change Cork's jacket from a brown one to a green one?

It seems like Crash is using the Out of the Sun stunt from the old aviator's class here, and even though the old version of stunts is gone from 2nd edition Hideouts & Hoodlums, there's no reason why we couldn't keep the concept as a combat modifier, -2 to be hit from below, just like how Crash should be at +1 to hit for attacking from above.

I'm pretty sure this is what only doing 1 point of damage with a bolo looks like. 

We also get one of those rare examples of a hero's gun running out of bullets. While seemingly unlimited bullets is a common trope in fiction, I love it when the heroes can't rely on guns and have to think up another solution instead.  I'm sure they'll put their heads together and come up with some nonviolent solution and...

...oh. A couple o' loads o' dynamite. Well, that escalated quickly.

I have serious reservations about this. I would need the Mythbusters team back together to resolve if you could detonate an explosion big enough to create a colossal wave. I suspect the waves would just make the water choppy, but not enough to capsize the boat. And I have to wonder if it wouldn't have just been better to let the bad guy get away than to destroy an entire coastline.

In-game, I suppose you have to look at these ideas in terms of what will make the story more exciting for the players. Maybe your players like blowing up cliffs. My players probably would have just thrown the dynamite at the boat...

We'll just glance ahead at the third story in the book, this feature being Ted Parrish, the Man of 1,000 Faces. Here, we learn that if you have a steel-lined cap, it protects you from head blows. We also see a clever trick, disguising yourself as one of the bad guys and escaping with them to see where their lair is -- but then Ted goes the easy route and leaves a note on the door for the police. Boo, Ted! What kind of action hero does that (you'd think his player doesn't want XP or something!)?

Also note one of my pet peeves about golden age comics -- colorists who just don't care and get wrong obvious things, like the constantly changing suit jackets. 

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)