All-American Comics #12 - pt. 2

In Popsicle Pete, the Typical American Boy, Pete and his pals go in search of a pot of gold and find, coincidentally, $10,000 in gold bullion hidden by mobsters in a hidden stewpot. That's good news for Pete, but an interesting challenge for Pete's Editor, who just gave away enough XP to level up four half-pint fighters between the ages of 3 and 10 (provided they are all classed, of course; Supporting Cast Members do not all have to have a class and are simply noncombatants if they don't).

In Gary Concord, the Ultra-Man, Gary and his sidekick Guppy are placed in a prison more villains should consider; a completely transparent one that his guards can constantly watch and hear him through. The weakness in this approach, of course, is the guards themselves, and Gary is able to convince one into switching sides with a lucky encounter reaction roll.

This feature has the unusual distinction of being the first time in comics history the term "bunghole" has been used in print. It's unclear if the term is being used in its original meaning, an aperture through which a cask can be filled or emptied, or its slang meaning. It does appears that Guppy is about to flip off his guards right afterwards, though.

A lot of downtime happens in the last few pages. During it, Tor's forces conquer one-quarter of the United States. Gary has been busy leading the effort to counterattack on two fronts: first, a wave of thousands of atomic-powered plastic stealth ships armed with anti-metal rays (they are not called plastic, but made of "synthetics") to take on Tor's air force directly, and then a series of intercontinental ballistic missiles filled with sleep-inducing foam to be aimed at Tor's home country. Next issue we'll find out if all that works. My question is, if they had the resources for all this, why was the initial defense of the country apparently limited to conventional anti-aircraft guns?

(Read at readcomiconline.to)

All-American Comics #9

Moving on to #9...

In Gary Concord the Ultra-Man, we see more of the future of the 22nd century, when Gary Sr. wakes up from suspended animation (remember that Gary Jr., reading all this, is still in 2239).  Cities in the future are domed, with bridges and subway tubes all situated well above the tree line. The environment surrounding Washington, D.C. is now heavily forested. The atmosphere is safe for trees, but poisonous for humans (too much carbon dioxide?). This condition is not natural, but induced by the warlords of Rebborizan as a sort of chemical warfare.

Their airships are "energized" by cosmic rays, allowing them to easily exceed 600 MPH. Despite their technological advances, no one in the future is prepared for Gary's invention of ...incendiary pellets.  Is this the big secret weapon that will bring peace he was bragging about last issue?? The incendiary weapons are unusual in that Gary can generate a Wall of Fire out of them.  Oh, and thinks get dark too...he marries the daughter of the Ming-like warlord Rebborizan (good luck figuring out what nationality that is), she gives birth to Gary Jr., but Reb kills her and then Gary Sr. strangles his father-in-law to death.

Reb's warlords come up with a defense against the incendiary pellets. We never see it; maybe it's water.  Later, Gary Sr. beats them by reversing the effects of the foam that made him big and strong and makes the warlords and all their people "weak, meek, and docile."

Red, White, and Blue's installment takes place at the Port of Dutch Harbor on Unalaska Island -- which sounds completely made-up, but is an actual place! But first, it begins at the Seattle office of G2. I believe the West Coast G2 HQ was in California in a previous issue; now there are two offices. Since Dutch Harbor and Unalaska Island are real, I had to check to see if Brent University is real too, but it does not appear to be. Red, White, and Blue have to travel 12 hours by plane to Unalaska, which also seemed incredulous to me, but I checked and Los Angeles to Unalaska is 10 1/2 hours by plane these days in jets, so 12 hours in a monoplane is actually not unreasonable.

The three of them are attacked in the night by four Japanese spies. Red just happens to be awake and spoils their ambush (save vs. plot to be awake, followed by a normal surprise roll?). The spies take advantage of the darkness, both being harder to hit, but also harder to identify later when half of them escape. The boys don't even bother interrogating their two prisoners, because they it's easy to figure out why they attacked given the scenario; this is a race against time between the two nations to lay claim to an island that has risen among the Aleutian Islands.

One of the spies who got away is much more interesting than your run-of-the-mill foreign spy. Shiroku is a giant of a Japanese man, standing almost 7' tall, and he uses a bow and arrow and claims to "never miss." I would definitely attach some levels in Fighter to this character. Shiroku is even an authentic Japanese name!  I love how much more research went into these Red, White, and Blue stories than in the average 1940 comic book. Sabotage (the running theme in this feature) causes one of the pontoons on their seaplane to leak, and three panels are spent on how they have to unbalance the plane to get the pontoon in the air so they can fix it (good problem-solving details for players who enjoy that sort of thing). No mention is made of how they fix the leak in the oil tank.

The scenario continues past them reaching the island first; now they have to hold it. A Japanese plane shows up and bombs their seaplane, then lands and the crew gets out to look for Red, White, and Blue, while leaving one guard behind at the plane. Blooey sneaks up and takes out the guard, who's rifle shot brings the others running. Red uses a tripwire trap and falling prone to lessen their numbers by one more, so they only have to take out four soldiers in melee combat.

Later, in an anti-climactic epilogue, the boys return to Dutch Harbor, encounter Shiroku, and Blooey takes him down with a lucky sucker punch. Boo!  Poor Shiroku!


(Read at fullcomic.pro)



 

All-American Comics #8 - pt. 1

On to #8...

Which starts out with new feature Gary Concord, the Ultra-Man. This is another one of those future adventure stories, this one taking place in 2239, but our first installment is largely flashback to Gary's father -- who was born in 1915!  Gary Concord Sr. (the son in 2239 is really Jr.) was considered a military tactics prodigy by 1936. But after WWII, he became a scientist and worked on an invention until 1950 -- when WWIII happened. The U.S. was invaded; it's not specified by whom.  The invention is confusing too; it creates a scrubbing bubbles-like foam that heals, clears the mind, increases size, strength, and intelligence, and makes you immune to fatigue, but also puts you to sleep ala Buck Rogers.

In Red, White, and Blue, Whitey is knocked unconscious with a vase over the back of the head, then kicked while he's down. According to the rules, if he took additional damage while unconscious, he would be dead. However, one way of interpreting the 2nd edition "zero hit points" rule is that if you are simply stunned while at 0 hp (you made your save vs. plot), then taking additional damage then makes you unconscious (as if you had failed your save).  But then, a third source of damage should then still be lethal.  All of this, by the way, is contradicted by the story, where Whitey is still only stunned, even after what seems to be multiple kicks.

Meanwhile, Red is able to make phone calls to the State Department, Naval Headquarters, and the State Police, and they all just do whatever he asks them to. Red should be a level 4 fighter by now, which makes him a lieutenant, which means his ability to boss people around automatically should be much more limited than this. Red is also able to wreck his way through the roof of a truck in this story.

In Hop Harrigan, we learn that he keeps his plane stocked with a pair of shotguns. When mobsters turn a plane loose on the tarmac to endanger other planes, Hop and his Supporting Cast manage to lasso the plane and pull it to a stop.That's interesting - and surprisingly difficult to moderate using Hideouts & Hoodlums, since it doesn't used opposed rolling. Ability score checks would work, if I had Hop and friends roll under their Strength or less, but I've been super-hesitant to bring that game mechanic into play. What I might do is assign a Hit Die to the plane so it can make a save vs. science each turn to see if it is stopped or not.

In an aerial duel, Hop and Gerry use the Stay in Blind Spot stunt  -- which can't be as hard as I always made stunts out to be, because Gerry, and not Hop, is the pilot here. In fact, maybe all piloting stunts should be basic skills, since non-aviators in comics are able to do them so easily.  Hop, meanwhile, gets a "lucky shot" against the wing-mounted fuel tank with his shotgun. The complication forces the smugglers' plane to land.