Mystery Men Comics #5 - pt. 5

As much as I'm repulsed by this Captain Denny Scott story, I have to say this tiger is a really impressive fighter. How many bullets has it taken, and it keeps on fighting? I think I'm going to have to revisit my tiger stats and up the HD and lower the morale save.

Zanzibar came a long way to find out if a rumor he'd heard about walrus men in Antarctica was true. Walrus Men look like cavemen, but with tusks, and apparently are immune to cold. As common as the "frozen caveman thawed in modern times" cliche is, maybe I should have always made cavemen immune to cold.

Zanzibar seems to be temporarily unconscious after taking a single arrow, proving that magic-users are right to have the smallest hit die of all the classes.

Apparently, Antarctica is unusually warm...

Zanzibar has a spell identical to the Turn Gun on Bad Guy/Turn Missiles power.

The monster looks like a giant lizard to me.  An odd thing to find on Antarctica, but so are nearly naked cavemen. It makes me wonder if this issue was remembered years later when Stan Lee created the Savage Land.

It's unclear what spell Zanzibar is casting on the lizard and the caveman chief -- it could be as simple as Poof!, a new spell that teleports an opponent a short distance away.

It seems odd that Zanzibar, with all his spells, has to run from the walrus men, but he must feel vulnerable with his hit points still being so low.

My first thought was that the "snow avalanche" was an Ice Storm spell, but this is Antarctica -- he doesn't need to create snow there. Maybe he cast Stone Shape to start the snow avalanche.

Really, Zanzibar? She almost suffered a fate worse than death from a walrus man this same day, and you think it's appropriate to hit on her?  *sighs*

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum)

Mystery Men Comics #5 - pt. 4

I've always stressed how a Hero can only -- with specific exceptions -- get one attack per turn. So how do I explain Blue Beetle getting to attack four hoodlums at once with a ladder? Even the Multi-Attack power would only get him three attacks, and this sure doesn't look like Flurry of Blows. But, what if this isn't an attack, but a trap? Maybe BB has a chance of setting up a trap (with a skill roll). As a trap, it can be made to have an area of effect instead of a single target.

Serious, Inspector Bancroft? He just gave you the name of the hotel, the hotel room number, who to ask for, and when to ask for him -- that's about four times as much information as I give out in my clues. And you were waiting for a personalized invitation?

You can tell Bancroft is low-level because it says he's being overwhelmed by "superior numbers", but there's only two of them. Well, I guess two is more than one!

Note how easy it is for the bobby to shoot the knife out of the mobster's hand, despite the fact that the knife isn't far from Bancroft's face. That bobby wasn't too concerned about missing!  Also note that bobbies, traditionally, didn't carry guns.

Nope, nope -- calling shenanigans here!  There's no way Bancroft jumped 40' into the seat of a car and landed safely because the seats were so cushion-y. Take your falling damage and like it, Inspector!

Smashing a window should be easier than busting a door down, so I'd treat this as a skill check instead of wrecking things.

When you shoot inside a plane, I would reach for my copy of The Trophy Case v. 2 no. 8 for the plane mishap table. In fact, I keep referring to that so often on this blog that I need vehicle mishap tables for my 2d ed. basic book...

This is D-13, Secret Agent.  Recognizing fake accents is apparently an automatic skill, a skill that the Editor can ask the player to roll for, and not just when the Hero intentionally tries something.

I'm still not comfortable with searching being an automatic skill, though. I think players should have to announce they plan to use a skill in most cases, with a few exceptions.

5,000 nomads may seem like too much opposition for one scenario, but here the goal isn't to beat them; the Heroes win if they keep them out of the fort for the entire session.

Waaiiit...do I have to call shenanigans again already? If the fort is surrounded by 5,000 nomads, how do you sneak the entire regiment holding the fort out the front gate and into the same hills, without being seen? Is this some back door gate the nomads forgot to watch?  I would never let this work in one of my games.

This is from the next story of Denny Scott of the Bengal Lancers, and this is why I hate hunting stories. That tiger was just minding his own business, not bothering anyone, until he got shot and wounded. Then he goes into a mad attacking spree, hurting that poor elephant.

It took an hour of hunting to find the tiger, which is pretty quick for a wandering encounter -- though one of the hunters still griped about how long that took. The sudden appearance of the constrictor snake is unusual; it's way too soon for another wandering encounter roll, so the Editor would have had to plan for both animals to be encountered together.

The elephant failed its morale save and flees. That's as per the rules. The morale rules imply that the victim moves directly away from its attacker, but the implication here is that the elephant moves in a random compass direction, and can even move back towards its attacker. I'm not fond of that, as it seems like an extra punishment for failing a morale save, but I'll give it some thought.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum)

Mystery Men Comics #4 - pt. 3

Blue Beetle drops from a height of at least 15-20' onto the head of that hoodlum. So he's doing kick damage, plus transferring his falling damage, while the hoodlum is cushioning the fall for him so BB only takes half damage from the fall. Unless, of course, he's using a Leap I power here, but I think Blue Beetle is still a mysteryman, not a superhero, at this point.

It would appear that BB's flying tackle makes the gun miss, but the more accurate description, game mechanics-wise, is that they had simultaneous initiative, BB went for a grappling attack and hit, and the hoodlum shot and missed.

More specifically, Blue Beetle is tackling a gangster (now statted for 2nd edition) and a thug.

Although we don't see it happen, BB apparently lets the hoodlums go so they can return to their boss. Despite the fact that they failed, the master criminal still pays them. That's a good boss!

It's really unclear how BB got into the office and slipped his blue beetle calling card into each pay envelope, or why he would choose to do that and then leave the hoodlums for the police to deal with. Maybe BB was low on hit points after that jump from the roof...

This is Inspector Bancroft of Scotland Yard now. I'll be working on chase rules for Hideouts & Hoodlums as I get into part 3 of the 2nd ed. basic rules book. I'll have to remember to make them universally applicable -- for car chases, airplane races, and even swimming after each other.

And now we're on Secret Agent D-13. Note that your surprise action does not have to be attacking. Here, D-13 spends his surprise turn sneaking up into melee range.

Nice interior of a blimp. This is Bob Powell art, so I'm going to assume this was well-researched.

In Denny Scott of the Bengal Lancers, the civil war being referenced here might be the Second Waziristan Campaign. 

So, according to this, if you were the British in India in 1939, then drowning your enemies was a perfectly honorable military tactic. I'm almost concerned about how much TNT they have there -- is that 21 barrels of it? I would be afraid for the future of my campaign setting if some of my players got their hands on 21 barrels of TNT...

Most any hero can disguise himself, but Zanzibar uses a Phantasmal Image spell to make it appear that he's someone else's ghost.

Here, it seems Zanzibar uses an illusion spell, possibly another Phantasmal Image, to make Simone look like a skeleton, even to herself. Coupled with that, he might be using Hold Person to pin her to the chair so she can't move.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Mystery Men Comics #2 - pt. 3

This is from Hemlock Shomes and Dr. Potsam. Although a humor strip, the dressing in this castle -- bones on the floor, shields and crossed swords on the walls -- would work equally well in many hideouts. Also, I'm likely to add a new mobster to Hideouts & Hoodlums, the haunt. It's a harmless poltergeist most of the time, but if it can inhabit a free-standing suit of armor it becomes dangerous.

This is from The Waco Kid. I've heard of guard dogs barking when intruders approach, but guard horses who whinny...?

An example of a gun running empty (ammunition should not be limitless in the game), an example of a chair being more effective than a gun in stopping a fight, and an example of bad guy loot being concealed rather than left out in the open to be claimed.

This is from Inspector Bancroft, Ace Investigator of Scotland Yard, and another example of how you don't need a big bribe to get people to do things that could get them in a lot of trouble. Instead, you just need a good encounter reaction check. Now, if the inspector did have a poor encounter reaction check, he could have produced a much bigger bribe to try to get a bonus. The Editor will have to wing those numbers, based on the circumstances (and how much he wants to milk his players!).

The Inspector likes to keep his nails well-groomed. He also, probably, kept his nail file from being confiscated with a save vs. plot. He "painstakingly" toils at the lock, suggesting that it takes multiple tries. Since he has probably not been in this brig for a full day, I would guess that his Editor is letting him have a fresh try once every exploration turn (10 minutes).

This is the Blue Beetle's second outfit in just his second appearance, and the first to appear to be chainmail armor. Chainmail is treated as a trophy item in H&H, just because it wouldn't have been widely available for sale.

I don't plan to include any game mechanic for ducking and making your opponent hit another opponent behind you -- that seems like a giveaway from the Editor to me.

Long-time followers of H&H will remember when I had to read a whole lot of Blue Beetle for his write-up in Supplement IV and how much I disliked his stories then. I'm not liking them anymore this time around. I find it particularly hard to take him seriously in that last panel, where he's doing the bunny hop to the window.

Blue Beetle is still a mysteryman here, so he burns a stunt to leap into that moving car, but I would not let the stunt also absorb the falling damage from that height. So Blue Beetle -- still a 1st-level mysteryman at this point -- just took 2-12 points of falling damage. His Editor must have rolled snake eyes!

This is Captain Denny Scott of the Bengal Lancers (another long title!). Usually, "bandit" is a racist term for Mexican outlaws in the comics, but we've also seen nomadic warriors in the Middle East called bandits. Here, we get "bandit" being used as synonymous with "slaver" in India.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus)