Funny Pages #8

Not much to report from this month's Funny Pages...

Just like the aviation genre was really all about the planes, some creators tried to invent a nautical genre that was all about the boats, and the jargon of sailors. Jerry Frost here teaches us exactly what a sloop is, which turns out to be a useful trophy item.

Not technically a goat joke, but again -- we have goats.

Skipper Ham Shanks and his pals learn about the wow bird -- part mobster/part trophy item. The wow bird is like a living lie detector.

And, being a Centaur comic book, there's rampant racism. Remember their motto:  if it's Centaur, it's racist.

And here's the bird itself.  As a non-combatant animal, it probably wouldn't get statted at all, but would either be considered a living trophy or a Supporting Cast Member, if the Editor wanted to ever roleplay a flightless bird that shouts "wow".

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum)

Comics Magazine #4

According to Poss, all lieutenants have mustaches. Keep that in mind, Fighters, when you reach 4th level (level title: lieutenant)!

Yes, it's hard to take a feature as goofy as Age of Stone seriously, but this idea of fishing for electric eels and using them as weapons might have some merit, particularly if the Heroes have to bypass a guardian in a pit or a tunnel too small for the Heroes to get into.

Giant eels appear in Supplement II: All-American, but they are giant conger eels and not electric eels. Making the change should be easy, maybe dropping the Hit Dice to 2+1 and adding 1d6 of electricity damage when they hit.

Despite what Freddie Bell, He Means Well would have you believe, popping balloons should not cause damage. Spankings, maybe, depending on how hard someone is hitting (1-3 points maximum).

A 1' long tarantula sure would scare me, but it wouldn't even rate a single hit point in how Hideouts & Hoodlums works (in case you're wondering, an animal needs to weigh around 30 lbs. to warrant a hp).

It's interesting, though, how the spider seems to be making them dance. In a certain edition of That Other Game (Frank Mentzer would know which one I'm referring to) is a pun-laden monster called the tarantella spider.

This page of Natural History talks about moose. As funny as moose are, they never seem to get the love that goats get in these early comic books.

Now, according to Wikipedia, moose are more dangerous than bears and wolves, so it looks like we have another herbivore that needs statting for equal representation. Moose I would give 4+1 HD and allow to trample for 2-8 points of damage.

This page of Klondike Gold almost cries out for a brutal fumbles chart added to the combat mechanics, but I am loathe to add such a thing to H&H.  I think we have to chalk this up to Doc actually hitting, but the switch of weapons for irony being mere flavor text.

This is not the first Dickie Duck; the first "star" anthropomorphic animal created for comic books to rate a cover appearance had been slinking through the back pages of at least two publishers already. I include him here only to demonstrate how, in a certain type of campaign, funny animal characters and humans could live together.



(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum)

Comics Magazine #2

We're up to June 1936 now, two years before Superman and what is normally considered the beginning of the Golden Age of Comics. We'd get there faster, but there's just so much good stuff to look at first!

Of course, by "good", we're looking for material useful for applying to the Hideouts & Hoodlums roleplaying game. Good, in terms of quality, is sparse in this next issue, the second one to come out of what will become known as Centaur, but is at this time only the Comics Magazine Company.

First of all, what is it with goats?  This is at least the fourth comic book in just the first six weeks of this blog project where I've seen a goat. People must have thought goats were hilarious in the '30s.

Even half-pints can go hideout delving!  Something for novice Editors to keep in mind is illumination in the hideout, and remembering to treat it as a limited resource. A lantern only sheds light in a small (30' radius) and even flashlights are only good for so far, and in only one direction at a time.

Bart Regan, Federal Agent, is another character that was somehow borrowed from National. Here, Bart demonstrates how to use Supporting Cast Members to help solve a case.  An engraver was a new one on me, not even included in Book III: Underworld & Metropolis Adventures.  The other SCM works for a newspaper, a vital source for information.

Like Dan Dunn yesterday, Bart Regan doesn't like to show up at a hideout empty-handed. He and his men will be showing up with riot guns (shot guns, absent from the starting equipment list in earlier versions), machine guns (not immediately available to Heroes for game balance issues), and tear gas (also treated as a trophy item that must be acquired in-game).

I include this page as a dual history lesson/lesson in not always trusting Wikipedia. According to the Wikipedia page, the Mexican Expeditionary (Air) Force was not formed until 1944 -- but here it is in a 1936 story!

When your Hero needs access to a skill set his class and/or race would not normally have, the best resource is Supporting Cast Members (SCMs).  Here, we see the value of the assayer for appraising things.

Here are the now familiar tropes of the antique diving suit and a giant octopus. But, attacking it with a knife?  Hoo-hum, after seeing Captain Easy fight one with a saw, how is this going to impress?

A knife in both hands!  That's how!

Skipper Ham Shanks may be the star of this Popeye rip-off, but Corky (the Bluto stand-in) is the half-beast Superhero, wrecking things with his bare hands/claws, in their midst. Note how Patterson takes a familiar cast, shakes up relationships, and renders it into something that can pass for new.

And lastly, Spunk Hazard talks about iron nerves.  What is that?  Could it be a stunt non-Heroes could use to temporarily suppress their morale saves?  I think it sure could!

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum at http://www.digitalcomicmuseum.com/index.php?dlid=13445)

The Comics Magazine #1

We're now up to May 1936 and this was the very first comic book from Centaur Publishing. And yet, some of the contents of this first issue also look familiar, as several properties that had been freelanced to National (DC) found new (or temporarily new) homes at Centaur.

Chikko Chakko is not the sort of strip that's going to show up here a lot. No, it's not included here as an example of early comic book racism, but for that rooster.

One of the first new mobsters invented wholly for Hideouts & Hoodlums was the giant carnivorous rooster. I had long thought this creature would have no precedence in comic books, but I thought it was funny and wanted one.  Now, this rooster is not giant and not necessarily carnivorous -- but, man, is it one tough little rooster!  Pecking a hole in a tire? I'd have to give this little fierce rooster at least 1/3 a Hit Die, and maybe have it peck for 1-3 points of damage!

The history of Doctor Occult and how he briefly became Dr. Mystic for Centaur is a story told in other places (perhaps most notably in the book  SUPERMEN: THE FIRST WAVE OF COMIC BOOK HEROES; 1936-1941, reviewed in The Trophy Case v. 1 no. 3).  What I'm interested in here is the magic.

Because this is only the first known adventure of Dr. Mystic -- second, if you consider him to be the same character as Dr. Occult.  If we keep with the notion that all published characters are actually H&H Heroes, earning Experience Points during each published story and slowly advancing in level, then Dr. Mystic should still be low level Magic-User -- probably 1st level -- and still casting 1st level spells.

That makes it pretty unlikely that Dr. Mystic and Zator can grow to such colossal size as to dwarf skyscrapers. Yes, the next edition should have an Enlargement spell, but I would not make it this powerful.

What else could be going on here?  Well, perhaps neither Magic-User has actually grown at all; perhaps they are using illusions to lure each other out.  They would be illusions on a grand scale, covering a much larger area of effect than I am comfortable allowing low-level spells to cover, but it still a possibility.  When they actually confront each other, face-to-face, in panels 4 and 5, there is no longer any background to suggest scale.

That brings us to the question of how they are journeying through the spirit world to reach India from the United States. Some sort of teleport spell?  Again, more powerful than I would feel comfortable allowing low-level Magic-Users to have.

Perhaps a magic trophy, then? Some, oh, perhaps oil that can be rubbed on more than one person and allow them to enter an ethereal state?

There is only one mention of an Ethereal Plane in all of H&H -- the seldom-used (never-used?) psionics section of Supplement III: Better Quality.  This page certainly looks like how I imagine the Ethereal Plane. The monsters that follow and cannot touch Dr. Mystic and Zator must be able to see into the ethereal, but are not on that plane to interact with them -- at least not until Koth brings the monsters there.

Another possibility is that these are examples of some new mobster-type.  Nether creatures?  Gaseous beings that cannot harm you unless you touch them first?

On the lighter side, Captain Bill of the Rangers is the source for the Foil Tracking stunt given to the Cowboy class in Supplement III.

No, your computer isn't messing up -- this is how bad the coloring was on some pages of the early Centaur comics. If you squint and look past the colors, there are some ideas worth sharing here.

One is the idea of a homing horse -- the trope is that if you're injured, your horse always knows to go back home and, in this case, you can pin a note to it telling everyone where you are.  I'm not sure if horses have really been known to do this and, more importantly, I don't know if it should be treated as a new mobster or a Cowboy stunt.

Another possible Cowboy stunt would be Know the West. Using it, you could encounter a note that says you have to find a place called Antelope Gap and, using your stunt, you would happen to know exactly where that's at.

T'aint So! is a joke strip not meant to be taken literally as a story, so I'm hesitant to include it here, but a monstrous rattlesnake the size of a mountain range would make a really tough encounter in a high-level H&H game! Okay, that's a bit extreme, but a 30' long giant rattlesnake would still be tough and, I figure, about 5+2 Hit Dice.



Skipper Ham Shanks is a poor man's Popeye, but here he runs into a half man, half beast.  A half-man was offered as a Player Hero race in The Trophy Case v. 2 no. 4.  I never had a good example of one from comic books at the time -- this is my first!

We previously saw this character, but just called The Professor.  Here, Prof. Nertz demonstrates a hi-tech trophy, the Pill of Growth.  Or perhaps it's a specialized Pill of Poultry Growth that is more effective against chickens.  Maybe this is the source for all giant carnivorous roosters.  Or maybe that entry should be for giant poultry in general?

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus at  http://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=23379&b=i)