Famous Funnies #68 - pt. 2

Just a few pages left I want to share from this issue. This shooting contest demonstrates that, if you get more than one attack per turn, and you win initiative, you still get all your attacks before the other side goes. 

These gags are from "Life's Like That," which I often enjoy. The one on the left I found particularly funny, while the right reinforces my own distrust of the stock market, all these decades later.

This page, apparently from way back in 1935 (according to comics.org), demonstrates that monkeys are naturally skilled pick pockets no matter what size the monkey (maybe a 2 in 6 chance?). 

What kind of monkey is this? As cartoonishly as it's drawn it is hard to say. It is clearly not a mandrill or a proboscis monkey. Since howler monkeys can grow to 4' tall, I'm thinking that's what this is meant to be, though a langur or a macaque are also not outside the realm of possibility.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)

 

Famous Funnies #68 - pt. 1

We haven't seen Roy Powers in a while! Here he's on a cruise to Africa (the previous page smartly talked about how much school he was going to miss because of this, but he has a tutor on the trip) where there's going to be some big game hunting (booo!). More interestingly, here's the beginning of some mystery on the ship. What do they want in Roy's room? When laying clues, remember to leave olfactory ones too.

Uashin? I think this is referring to Uasin Gishu County, and it is located on a plateau, in Kenya. Interestingly, "Jambo Bwana" is a Kenyan pop song that will come out 42 years later. 
  

Skyroads surprises me occasionally; there is some interesting chemistry between these two characters, and I laughed out loud at "I was born quite young." Also, salt horse is slang for salted beef. 

Sure, we could talk here about how "fagged out" means exhausted, or how "I feel as though I'd been spanked by a trip hammer" reads like innuendo, but what really grabs me on this page is -- how is that record player working? Is it hand-cranked? Battery powered? I know they had the former back then, but I'm not sure about the latter.

Also note the "Wing Tip" about how 1st-level aviators would need to certify their transport rating, in addition to carrying a transport license.

Senor and senorita? That's interesting because, while Spain in its prime was one of the first countries to have U-boats in their navies, by 1940 Spain's military was in tatters from its civil war and did not have many submarines left. This is a good time to remind ourselves, though, that these are all reprints from earlier comic strips, these ones specifically from 1937 (according to comics.org), and -- according to this Wikipedia page -- Spain still had eight U-boats at that time. 

This page is a reminder, if mystery bad guys have been shooting at you, to search the ground for spent cartridges. With a skill check, you can identify which kinds of guns were being used to shoot at you, which could help you plan for your next encounter with them.

It might be easy to overlook this word through all that heavy dialect, but a yawl is that boat; a yawl is a two-masted fore-and-aft-rigged sailboat with the mizzenmast stepped far aft so that the mizzen boom overhangs the stern.

Oaky Doaks has stumbled across a wizard who lived in a cave for 20 years perfecting this flying carpet (giving us some indication for how long we can expect magic item creation to take?). The flying carpet has an incredible weight allowance, probably carrying 1,750 lbs. as it is here. Being able to reach cumulonimbus clouds suggests a ceiling height over 2,000 feet, and possibly much higher than that. There's no sense of how fast it is from this page.

How would you tell if someone is faking delirium? Perhaps a skill check at first aid. Or a Wisdom check. Or both, so characters with high WIS have a good chance of seeing through the deception, but mysterymen can also cash in a stunt for an automatic success on that skill check.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)

Famous Funnies #67 - pt. 2

Just a few pages left to share from this issue...

Jack Kirby isn't doing the art anymore on Lightnin' and the Lone Rider at this point, but it's still an interesting set-up with some unusual additions to the cowboy genre -- a Dragon Lady-like femme fatale, and "advanced" technology, like television, in the villains' lair.

This is from Mescal Ike, and while I think the top strip is pretty funny, I'm including this for the interesting turn of phrase in the middle tier. "Head of the class" is still a common term in use today, but if there's a head it stands to reason there's also a "foot of the class," with the bottom scores. Today's school system would not emphasize this fact and humiliate the student, but in 1940...?

This is from the one-page gag filler, Life's Like That. I'm partial to librarians, even though the "Squeaky" panels aren't as funny. What I found really funny was the baby panel.

We're checking in on Homer Hoopee again for the first time in awhile for several reasons. One, even though the chase sequence is over, it alludes to two important factors -- attack penalties for hitting a target moving at great speed (found in 1st edition Hideouts & Hoodlums' vehicular combat rules, but should also apply to attacking movement-buffed speedsters), and ranges on missile attacks. Further, Homer's prize is an example of how generous monetary rewards can be at the end of a long adventure ($50,000 -- in 1940 no less!).

If you can ignore the racism in this page of Spunky Dory, you'll see perhaps the first critical hit to the groin in comic books, and delivered by a goat no less (longtime readers of this blog are aware of the importance of goats in golden age comics)!

The question then is, is this evidence of the need for a critical hit mechanic in H&H, or does the headbutt to the groin simply explain how it did maximum damage on the damage die? I lean towards the latter.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Famous Funnies #66 - pt. 2

A bubble genies is... an unusual, modern spin on a classic. The Bubble Pipe of Genie Summoning is not something your players would be expecting, that's for sure!

Sifting through the racism, we get to the bottom and the image of a man swinging a bull around by its horns -- gruesome, if it wasn't so cartoony. At issue here is, did Wahoo have to activate the Raise Car power to do this, and would he have to? What is going on is clearly combat, so whether the bull is airborne or not seems irrelevant and is merely flavor text. Two exceptions I can think of would require Wahoo to activate the power for this: 1) he plans on throwing the bull next, which does require him to be able to lift it into the air, and 2) he is doing this to intimidate the bull and force a morale save, without hurting it any further. Flavor text cannot activate morale saves, so a power would have to be used for that.

 

Scorchy is doing everything right to find the kidnapper -- using aerial reconnaissance, checking maps, watching escape routes, and contacting the authorities.

Krag, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be as smart at setting up traps as Scorchy is. Why would he step on the starter if he thinks the motor is busted? And wouldn't his chief priority still be finding the girl?

The Lone Rider's true identity is revealed in this story -- and soon thereafter he is easily subdued in combat once the mystique of his mask was removed. 1st edition Hideouts & Hoodlums had a rule for superheroes that they could only use their powers in costume...but I'm wondering if that rule was not misplaced and a better fit for the mysteryman class all along. Perhaps the mysteryman should be denied his signature move when not wearing some kind of mask.

It seems a small point, but I thought I would explain that saving a dog from a burning building is still a good deed, and worth just as much XP as saving a person.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)

Famous Funnies #63

Roy Powers and his eagle scout troop might be onto something here. If you have a wild animal to capture and you don't want to fight it, try penning it in with lots of chicken wire. But how to handle this with an in-game mechanic? I would probably make an encounter reaction roll for the lion. If it was positive, he would stay put while being hemmed in. If it was negative, he'd jump the fence as it was being erected. And, of course, if it was hostile, he would maul the eagle scouts.

Here's an interesting trap -- the stairs fall away into a slide. Harry slides down the slide, head-first, into the stocks with a guillotine set up above them. I guess, had he gone down feet first, there would have been a chance of his leg going into the stocks and getting cut off, which is still pretty bad.

Maybe I'd roll randomly for what direction he was facing when he hit the bottom of the slide, then make him save vs. plot to avoid whatever part was at the bottom going through the hole and getting stuck. The long delay on the guillotine blade drop seems like it makes it too easy to escape, but a quick drop would make this a nasty encounter.

I'm torn on whether this qualifies as a trap or a deathtrap. On one hand, Harry falls into the trap and isn't placed directly into it. On the other hand, his nemesis is present and clearly expects Harry to die. If it's a trap, I would have the blade only do 1-10 points of damage. If it was a deathtrap, I would make it potentially lethal, or at least limb-cut-off-able.

From the gag filler Life's Like That, here's a corner panel that made me chuckle out loud.

This is Jack Kirby's Lightnin' and the Lone Rider, one of the only cowboy features to give title billing to the horse. Which is extra appropriate today because, in this installment, the Lone Rider would be dead if it wasn't for Lightnin' sensing his trouble, kicking a door in, and coming inside to get mixed up in the fight. Hideouts & Hoodlums has rules for Supporting Cast Members, and even accommodates animal SCMs -- but how do you summon a SCM when you need one?

Right now, in H&H, the Editor always decided when and if a SCM shows up, unless the Hero has a means of directly contacting him/her/it. I was reading the Cortex game system recently for the Smallville RPG. In that game, a player can spend a plot point to make a featured character (SCM) show up. It merits consideration.

I had to look up what a yawl is. Apparently it's like a schooner. One or the other will likely be a trophy transport item.  But freighters? We'll see on that one, as I might stop smaller on sea-going trophy vessels.

This is why Heroes seldom take food or drink offered by suspicious people.

We haven't visited Scorchy Smith in awhile!

I'm working on the treasure section of the H&H basic book right now and here are three examples of treasures -- $200 in cash, a ring (we can assume it's worth roughly $200; if it was a lot more, the stolen cash wouldn't be as relevant), and the deed to a gold mine.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Famous Funnies #62

Opening with a joke...

Jack Kirby's Lightning and the Lone Rider reminds us that silencers existed for guns in the 1930s, though here it is called a "muffler". I would think everyone in a hideout would want a silencer, because gun shots echo so loud.

$2 for an airplane ride.

Dickie Dare's Editor needs to stop having his supporting cast do all the hard work for him, or he's going to get over-reliant on them. If Joe had missed a loyalty check, they would have been done for.

And here's a good lesson about smoking. If you smoke, you'll eventually discard a match in a pile of wood shavings and almost burn down the boat you need to get off a deserted island.

I have a write-up for nobles ready for 2nd edition, because evil counts show up so often in comics...but I can't help but wonder if this guy isn't an evil mysteryman, or even just a really capable slick hoodlum...

Oaky Doaks is a great example of Lawful Alignment. I admire his convictions.

From Babe Bunting -- a map!

From Connie -- a good size comparison of a yacht, a sloop, and a rowboat.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum)