Popular Comics #47 - pt. 3

This is The Hurricane Kids, though you're only seeing one of the kids here with his new caveman supporting cast member. And we also see some weirdly drawn giant bats -- giant bats being surprisingly rare in early comics (though ordinary bats, not so much).

This is also a good depiction of what the "underworld" would look like in a Hideouts & Hoodlums world -- like it was part of a natural cave system. They got lost -- guess no one was mapping!

Partially flooding hideouts make for an added level of challenge in them.

1,000' tall waterfalls look dangerous and should be dangerous, despite the cliche of heroes always surviving them. The first time I talked about waterfalls, I suggested a save vs. science at +1 for half damage -- but that would still be 50d6 damage. We need something even safer, like save for no damage, and 1 point per 10' if you fail the save (so, 100 points of damage, almost surely automatic unconsciousness).

Should there be a chance of dropping items while climbing? It particularly makes sense if you're trying to hold something in your hands while climbing.

A rare sighting of a cave bear in comics.

How much falling damage gets added to the big rock? I would not add more than 1d6 for that. If you allowed full falling damage to be added, Heroes would be chomping at the bit to fly over every combat (the fallacy of the lethal falling coin long ago infected a D&D campaign I played in).

Here we see cavemen encountered in groups as large as nine.

A rare adventure in the North Sea, this begins a new serial.

I had to look up what the elevation record was by 1940 and these planes are nowhere near it; a record of 56,000' was set in 1939.

 Here we see two old aviator stunts, Power Dive and Hide in Clouds. When I get to the Advanced Hideouts & Hoodlums Heroes Handbook, I'll include many more examples of specific stunts Heroes can try.

This is Penguin Pete and His Pal Pudgie, and this is an unusual wrinkle on the "help, I'm sick" ruse for getting out of jail.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Speed Comics #4 - pt. 4

This is Smoke Carter, and here is some interesting evidence that helmets should count as armor for Armor Class.

Police were apparently already doing psychological profiling in 1940, so best to head to the police department and read up on those rogues galleries!

This story did a lot to inform my write-up of the arsonist for the Mobster Manual. The arsonist write-up first appeared in Supplement V: Big Bang, but I've since lowered his morale save ("I'll burn before I'll let you take me!") and added a passage about using 1-6 cigarettes to start a fire.

Poor New York City. Before getting famously razed by the Sub-Mariner, NYC was razed by ...a bunch of guys in asbestos suits using flamethrowers? Here, we see his killers have suits that are both fireproof and bulletproof (combining the function of two different trophy items). Those seem to be especially effective flamethrowers with increased range.

This looks a lot like the vampiric robots from Mercury that debuted in The Trophy Case v. 1 #2. Not sure why the brain needs a window.

When I add this robot variant to the Mobster Manual, I'll have to include a note about how fire can make the robot run amok. It needs the Raise Car power too.

Texas Tyler may think this town is unfriendly, but they sure are equal opportunity employers! I can't think of another example of an Hispanic female bartender in all of 20th century fiction.

I also don't think recognizing unfriendliness would be a skill check; things like this are best observed through roleplaying.

We haven't seen one of these filler pages in a while. They're handy for plane trivia that could affect statting them later.

This is Spike Marlin, as the mug tells us. Sometimes I see evidence for allowing critical successes in the game. In this instance, the mug not only identifies Spike Marlin, but know his secret profession too -- sounds like he rolled a 20 on his save vs. plot!

On the prior page, Spike had an automatic pistol in hand, but was disarmed by being grappled from behind. I include this page instead to illustrate that an entire brawl ensues afterwards, and not one person goes for the gun, which must still be laying there on the deck. There has to be a reason, like maybe it takes a full melee turn to pick up a dropped weapon and leaves the picker-upper effectively prone for that turn.

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)