More Fun #12

As we roll into August 1936, we are reminded that the Planet Saro is an awfully dangerous place, and how eventful any Hideouts & Hoodlums campaign would be if creatures from Saro wound up in an Earth-based campaign.  Here is the latest monstrosity Don Drake has to fight, boringly called the Land Monster. What it appears to be is a cross between a rhinoceros and a dragon, with greenish gray hide, a double horn, double tusks, and fire breath that roars out of its nostrils. I would probably use red dragon stats for this monster, though next issue will tell us how tough it is (since Don has a disentegrator in his hands, I'm guessing not very).

Buckskin Jim presents an interesting problem for a H&H Editor. When the trapper shoots into a melee, he's breaking a combat rule. But how tightly do you want to enforce that rule when Buckskin Jim is about to get killed?  An Editor might be forgiven for treating "no shooting into melee" as a loose guideline, or coming up with a compromise mechanic. An unofficial suggestion would be making a second attack roll against a different melee combatant (determined at random, if more than two combatants) if the initial attack misses by half or more.

Brad Hardy meets a Magic-User with an interesting new spell here. Ball of Fire is a sphere 7' in diameter that surrounds the caster and moves with him. Any combustibles touching the sphere catch fire and anyone trying to melee the Magic-User within the sphere takes 1-10 points of damage.  Further, the Magic-User enjoys a +2 bonus to saving throws vs. missiles made of wood, like arrows. I see this as being a 2nd level spell.



In the Doctor Occult feature, we learn that werewolves cast a wolf reflection in mirrors, even when in human form.

Wing Brady graces this blog again for this deathtrap he's placed in.  After being weakened by whipping, he's dangled by weak rope over a pit of poisonous reptiles. If he struggles too much, the ropes are supposed to break and drop him into the pit.  Of course, taking damage doesn't actually make you weaker in H&H, but being low in hit points will make him more likely to be killed by either the fall or the reptile bites.

In the Wake of the Wander is just one of several stories I've read (or re-read) recently that have made me question my original assumption that languages don't matter in H&H.  Yes, everyone speaks English in comic books (even aliens!), but sometimes you do need to send a coded message that not everyone around you will understand, like Morse code. Expect to see some revision here in the next edition.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus)

More Fun #8 - pt. 1

This issue starts out with a doozy of a trap -- or a doozy of a name for a trap.  Welcome to the Dungeon Well and the Balcony of Doom!  The trap is actually very simple.  A one-way door opens onto a balcony overlooking a vertical shaft with water at the bottom.  However, the level of the water in the shaft can be controlled by a levers at the top of the shaft, and the water can be raised all the way to the top of the shaft.  Shortly, anyone on the balcony drowns, floats off, and is flushed out to sea when the water level is dropped back down. Of course, one-way doors are no match for a Superhero's wrecking things ability, but Sandra of the Secret Service and her pals don't have that luxury...

A goat again!  Yes, I'm glad I statted goats already.  For some reason (mabe because it's funny), goats seem to be treated as fearsome antagonists. Maybe I should make them 1-1 Hit Dice!  This page also illustrates how useful they are for goat milk.

Things look grim here for Captain Grim!  Natives are statted in Book II: Mobsters & Trophies and I've already talked about jumping and falling as game mechanics, but here we have the added danger of a roof on fire!  Should Capt. Grim be taking damage each turn?

The flames certainly seem to be crowding right around Capt. Grim, though perhaps that is just artistic license. If the fire was in the same 10' square as Grim, then yes, Grim should be taking some damage each turn, from heat and smoke inhalation, if not the flames themselves.  I would recommend 1d6 damage, though a generous Editor could allow a saving throw vs. science each turn to avoid the damage. Of course, perhaps Grim is taking damage every turn, but he's just got so many hit points that it isn't bothering him yet!

"Non-Superhero wrecking things" at work, a mechanic squirreled away at the back of Book II.  An Editor could easily give a penalty to the item saving throw if a battering ram is used.

Aw, the apparitions we encountered last time with Slim Pickens turned out to be men in disguise.  Shades of Scooby Doo!  This time, Slim surprises us again by solving an encounter with a dangerous ape (statted in Book II as having 3 Hit Dice), not with combat, but by recruiting it as a Supporting Cast Member!  The original SCM rules were unclear on this, but a later clarification in a Q&A column of The Trophy Case ruled that, yes, you could recruit animal Supporting Case Members.

Mountain lions were statted in Supplement III: Better Quality, only called cougars.

Aboard the yacht, Barry O'Neill and Legrand encounter a trap combined with a trophy -- the statuette not only contains a radio transmitter that allows Fang Gow to talk to them, but the statuette is also a disguised raygun that combines the effects of a paralysis ray with hypnotism!  To be fair, I would allow one saving throw for both effects, rather than force the player to make two successful ones.

Note that the secret door the Yellow Peril Hoodlums (statted in Book II) use is a simple sliding panel.  Secret doors do not need to be complicated.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus at  http://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=11622&b=i)

New Fun #5 - pt. 1

Although lacking access to New Fun #3-4, I have read #5 and can comment at length on its applicability to the Hideouts & Hoodlums roleplaying game, starting with the cover story.



Jack Woods here demonstrates the Cowboy stunt of tracking. One could argue that he also demonstrates the Mysteryman skill of climbing, although that roof is pretty low and we don't actually know that he didn't just step up on a rain barrel to reach the roof.  One could also make an argument for keen hearing being a stunt from this page.  Normally, all Heroes have the same chance to hear noise, though.

I have had players who meticulously keep track of their number of shots fired, and other players who would just like to wing it. Personally, I feel I have enough things to keep track of during combat besides keeping track of ammo, so I came up with the optional rule that ammo only lasts a random number of combat turns. Either way you play it, it doesn't affect Jack, who can't act on that knowledge until the following turn anyway.

This has got to break a speed record for fastest pacing on a comic book page.  Don Drake is kept awful busy here, killing the Hideous Thing, which saves the Midget-Men of Zetruria and the Women Riders of the Winged Death, turning them both into his allies, only to get plucked up by a Giant!

The Winged Death is a peculiar-looking creature, worthy of a mobster entry in H&H.  It appears to be part giant insect and part giant bird. Other than that, there is little to go on in providing them with stats here. No doubt the installment in New Fun #4 would have yielded more clues, if I had access to it.

Too soon to say what kind of stats that Giant should have.

Trophy-wise, Barry O'Neill is surrounded by a treasure trove, if he survives long enough to start collecting loot. Since we last saw him, he's traded up from a patrol boat to a seaplane. Now he's being attacked by a fighter plane with two machine guns and a motor launch with a machine gun. And, assuming that top panel is honest and Fang Gow is really in China, then there is a very powerful radio receiver waiting for Barry to pick up in Paris.

Machine guns are fearsome weapons, but in the hands of a 1st-level Fighter they have only a 50% chance of hitting the average AC 9 target, and given the rules for vehicular combat they should be suffering a penalty to hit depending on how fast the vehicles are going. As originally statted in Book II: Mobsters & Trophies, machine guns give four attacks per turn, which does make the odds of a hit on Barry's plane substantially higher. More likely, the Editor here is using the revised artillery rules from The Trophy Case v. 1 no. 5, which allows a machine gun to hit up to 8-10 different targets, but only 1 hit vs. each target. While neither version may be entirely accurate to reality, the later revision at least keeps the weapon from becoming an instant kill vs. mid-level Heroes, while playing up its usefulness in mass combat.

A misthrown stone knocking out an Indian           makes much more sense using the original weapon damage for H&H, where every non-trophy weapon does the same 1d6 points of damage.  Using later revisions to weapon damage, the stone would probably be downgraded to 1-3 points of damage -- which still makes this scene possible, if the Indian happened to have low hit points.

There is no game mechanic that would account for a tomahawk falling on a gun and setting it off; this would clearly be a freebie thrown to the player by a generous Editor.

The Indians are unlikely to be surprised in the game mechanic sense of surprising an opponent, since they must know the campers are there. Rather, "surprise" is probably indicative of their emotion when they fail their morale saves during the first turn of combat.

Humor strip Slim Pickens seemed an unlikely source for any H&H goodness, but here Slim is, exploring a haunted house in true H&H fashion. I have a sneaky suspicion that the Screeching Thing will turn out to be a man in disguise in the following issue, but the way its bony hands go for his throat reminds me of the Apparition from AD&D's Fiend Folio. Hmm...


(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus)                                              

New Fun #2 - pt. 2

"Don Drake on the Planet Saro" already has some history with Hideouts & Hoodlums; quarterly zine The Trophy Case (v. 2 no. 4) had statted some of the mobsters of Saro, including the midget-men and the bandars pictured here.  The H&H rules, until then, included nothing specific about grappling with nets, so this was the first time anything was written up on the subject. The next edition will likely not include those rules for just anyone to use, but may be noted under specific mobster entries who are likely to use nets.

There was already strong precedent for mobsters to be able to wreck things like Superheroes. Mobsters in Book II: Mobsters and Trophies with as little as 3 Hit Dice, like cavemen, could wreck things. This might be toned down for weaker mobsters (like 3-5 HD ones).

It is, of course, not recommended that Editors give atomic energy guns to 1st level Heroes, though this seems to be a particularly weak one. I would think that an atomic energy gun would at least disintegrate a target, but this one only damages a target and pushes it back. A particularly nice feature of this gun is that it's mounted behind a shield, so the shooter already has light cover.

Jack Andrews is an example of the sports genre in comics. How does the Editor determine if Jack managed to regain his balance or not?  This short selection demonstrates the need for a skill system in a roleplaying game -- and this brief paragraph will explain how H&H skirts having one. Instead, H&H uses the saving throw game mechanic very broadly.  A strong argument could be made that Jack's player would have to save vs. science (gravity and inertia, in this case) to right himself before hitting the ground (a weaker argument could be made that Jack's player should save vs. plot, because if he doesn't land safely, he can't fight the mobster at the bottom of the slope).

The fleeing saboteur is not doing anything particularly sneaky to get away; he was just hoping for a beneficial surprise roll from the Editor. Before an encounter, the Editor rolls for each side to see if it is surprised (usually a 2 in 6 chance).  In this case, Jack surprised the saboteur.

Sooner or later this blog would have to deal with the issue of the blatant racism found in Golden Age Comic Books. Rather than ignore it, H&H has taken the riskier route of staying truer to the source material and tries to incorporate some aspects of this into game play, as inoffensively as possible. These Indians would be statted as the mobster type called Natives in an H&H scenario (in some earlier drafts of Book II circulating, they were still called Savages).  Some players of H&H have had issues with any incorporation of this aspect of the comics and -- in total honesty -- this author has lost some players because of it.  Each individual Editor is, of course, free to use or not use as much of it he and his players are comfortable with.

H&H, as written, assumes a time frame of 1935-1941, but remains abstract enough to be applicable to a broad range of historical simulation, including future scenarios -- particularly the future as it was envisioned in the early 20th century.

In 2023, the Super-Police have planes that are propelled forward at terrific speed with the questionable technology of creating a tubular vacuum in front of the ship with cosmic rays and pulling the ship forward through it.  Their planes are equipped with cosmic ray guns, torpedo detectors, and inertia absorbers -- and completely stattable in H&H.  For a cosmic ray gun, just up the damage (maybe 3-6 Hit Dice, with a chance of wrecking things).  A torpedo detector could be like a Detect Magic spell with a higher range. Inertia Asborbers might function like the Superhero buffing power of Imperviousness. And, while intended for a time just eight years in our future, it is not hard to imagine such a vehicle in the hands of an Ultra Mad Scientist in a high-level campaign set in 1940.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus)