Blue Ribbon Comics #3 - pt. 4

I still can't take a character named Bob Phantom seriously, but he is legitimately a superhero, and one of the earliest. Here, Bob is buffing himself defensively, probably with Nigh-Invulnerable Skin, and then grappling and punching normally (unless also buffed with Get Tough, maybe).

I'm not sure about this smoke cloud that manifests when Bob appears. Is it magic, as in the spell Poof!?  Does he toss a smokebomb as a distraction to help him gain surprise? It's really hard to justify what game mechanic advantage it gives him, since he doesn't seem to be even trying to be sneaky when he shouts "You've gone far enough!" before attacking.

Today, Bob has the Flurry of Blows power prepared.  Although, since Flurry of Blows is a second level spell, he could still have Nigh-Invulnerable Skin, and even Get Tough prepared or even activated already.

This is from Jack Cole's Crime on the Run. I include it here because we get to see what a California auto registration card looks like. Well...I don't know if it looked just like this, but it's probably close enough to authentic for our purposes. Also note the size of it; it is either not drawn to scale, or someone would need to fold that in half before putting it in a pocket.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Blue Ribbon Comics #3 - pt. 3

And we continue with Scoop Cody, what could have been a dry and boring crime reporter strip, but is livened by the energetic artwork of Charles Biro.

Here, we get to see a jewel case being used as a throwing weapon (improvised weapons do the same damage as fists, 1-3) with another example of disarming. Scoop follows up with a grappling move, a throw that would leave the Count prone for the following turn. But there seems to be a turn of fighting missing between panels, because the Count is back up on his feet to get punched already in panel 4. Now the Count is prone again in panel 5 (as if they were out of order...), but is still able to kick at a -1 penalty to hit. We may have missed another turn of action between panels 5 and 6, or maybe the Count got to draw his knife at the beginning of the turn, but has to wait until the end of the turn to use it. It does seem strange to grapple a prone opponent to make him lose his knife instead of just kicking it out of his hand, though.

I guess chewing gum sticking to a dress could happen, but I'm skeptical he could slip it around her back like that without anyone noticing. A sleight of hand skill check, as an expert skill?

The Marvel is Biro's first "superhero." His power might be levitation...as I'm wondering what he's standing on while looking through that porthole from the outside...

The first time we met Corporal Collins was during our landmark 500th post. I had conjectured that Collins was statted as an alien superhero because of what all he could do, so let's take another look and see if that bears up.

Initially, I wrote off the fabri-steel flexible repeller as flavor text for some Armor Class-buffing power like Nigh-Invulnerable Skin, but an awful lot is made of the "science" behind the repeller, and maybe it really is a trophy item (one that gives the wielder the Turn Guns on Bad Guys power, no less!).

It's also worth noting that, since the U.S. is still not at war with anyone, Collins has to be fighting with the French.

I almost have nightmares about this happening in one of my games. "Oh look, guys, we just captured an enemy fighter plane! Let's be unstoppable for awhile!"

That said, I'm REALLY skeptical that you could take off in a plane like that. Maybe that's an expert skill check, with a penalty of having to take a higher die (so 1 in 8 instead of 1 in 6).

I'm sure that munitions dump was worth a lot of XP!

Now, here's where the story differs from what players would really do. Instead of ditching the plane to stay in the combat, players would look at the longterm benefits of keeping the plane, bail from the fight, and go refuel.  You could put every fuel depot under heavy guard, but that's not too big a deterrent when you can strafe the depots with machine gun fire from above.

Now, Collins landing on the balloon would be an attack roll, but against AC 9 since it's a big target. I would require a basic skill check for climbing around the balloon like that.

There is absolutely no explanation for the corkscrew tank that Collins steals after he reaches the ground. What purpose does it serve? Does it wreck through walls faster? I would think that tanks wreck through walls pretty well already. Maybe it opens giant champagne bottles.

That is one super-powerful grenade. I might give one a chance to wreck a tank or a bridge, but a grenade that can wreck both at once? I do have a high-level power called Mass Wrecking. Is Collins a superhero of that high a level?

This is a new series called Devils in the Deep. I really want to stat that monster, but I don't know what to call it -- killer lobster-tiger shark-barracuda-man? 

And how big was that barracuda to have a heart that size?

The monster is pretty smart, since it understands what dynamite is. It's also cagey enough to pretend to kill Dr. Carbo, even though it must know it can't.

Later, the killer lobster-tiger shark-barracuda-man kills a giant octopus, so we know it's at least that strong.

This is from a series called Secret Assignments. Jack only has to overpower two guards to free the prisoners. You might think they would have bum-rushed the guards themselves, having superior numbers. Perhaps even stranger is that Jack leaps all that way down to reach the guard -- maybe sustaining 1-6 points of damage from the fall? -- and then punches the guard. Of course, what happened was that Jack rolled poorly and missed falling on the guard!

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Blue Ribbon Comics #3 - pt. 2

Stuart Logan not only knows to look for clues, but knows that how a trail of blood moves around furniture can itself be a clue.

I'm not convinced this is a good way to murder someone, but it would make a good trap for injuring someone.

This filler page explains what most comic book robots of the time are based on, Elektro being the real life robot from the World's Fair.

This is Silver Fox, another detective. He wisely points out a problem with fingerprinting -- having one set of fingerprints does  you no good without another set of fingerprints to compare it too (which is why he's pretending he wants to buy the vase).

Personally, I feel like this is a bit of a cheat in an investigation scenario, but sometimes, if your player just isn't picking up on the right clues, you have to let his Hero overhear a confession. Or you can prearrange for there to be a confession, but the Hero has to be in the right place at the right time to hear it.

I'm pretty sure the police can't do this now, and probably not then either.

I have never been a fan of this guy, who's art graced all the early Centaur comics. Dick Ryan's "The Master Plan of Billy Wolf" ends in Billy being placed in a deathtrap and hurled off a cliff -- so, that's right, kids -- Billy is lying there dead at the end.

Note how quickly the reporter is deputized, just for being a played character who shows up at the crime scene.

Classic -- this is the 20th century version of hiding a gem in the head of a cane. Players often don't think of the versatile uses of chewing gum. Now that I think of it, I think I'll buy a pack for my own Hero!

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Blue Ribbon Comics #3 - pt. 1

Back now to early MLJ and, remarkably, another reason to visit with Rang a Tang the Wonder Dog. And it's not for anything that Rang has done yet, but for this interesting transition of the term bandit. Long-time readers here (if there is such a thing) will recall that bandit was long used as a racist term for non-white or Latino criminals. But lately I've been seeing "bandit" used much more as it's used here, as synonymous with bank robbers. I wonder what changed in 1939 to make that happen?

A dropped hat is a good clue circa 1940, as hats could still be purchased then at specialty stores and might be more easily traced back to their owners.

Instead, Speed must be hungry because he decides to go have lunch first. This is the first use of the terms "lunchroom" and "luncheonette" in comics, terms that have been cast aside in favor of "diners" today.

Bandits are now also synonymous with gangsters. Cut it out, guys, or you're going to take away all my mobstertypes!

Still unresolved is, is Rang a playable Hero, or Speed's supporting cast?

You wouldn't think this page would present such a game mechanics problem, but what causes Speed's crash, game mechanics-wise? Is his inability to see where he's going a randomly generated complication or obstacle to overcome during the car chase? Or is the complication triggered by the car taking damage during the chase? Could Speed's hit points apply to both himself and his car during a chase scene (the answer is a weak yes -- yes, hit points are highly abstract, but on the other hand there is no precedent for treating them so broadly)?

We also see that bodies of water do not necessarily stop tracking (at least not for dogs).

This first issue is older than RPGs and goes back to war games -- do you let the players know exact measurements, so they know where missile ranges end, or make them guess? There is no definitive way to rule on this and Hideouts & Hoodlums Editors could go either way.

Very unusual for a RPG scenario, Hy (our hero "Speed") finds the boss villain outside the hideout, rather than after exploring much of it. The gang's chief and at least one other are thugs, making them tougher than bandit/robber/gangsters. Because Hy is low level, two thugs are more than a match for him.

Now this is a little crazy, and why I find it hard to believe Rang is an ordinary dog. This is the second time he's leapt through an upstairs window, making me think Rang should be statted as an alien instead of a real dog.

Hy, now I know you don't really care about this dog at all anymore. We know those mobsters have at least two guns between them. And you're making your dog run towards them, with dynamite in his mouth? How about dropping the dynamite out a window on the other side of the house, where he won't get shot at?

Okay, as crazy random as this page seems to be, it actually could play out this way in Hideouts & Hoodlums. Even though Rang cannot get to the boat without running past the three men on the dock, there's still a chance of the dog getting surprise. Maybe all their backs were turned for three seconds.

The mobsters are not "paralyzed," but stunned by the explosion (because they made their saves to avoid being unconscious longer when reduced to zero hp). They are all stunned for a random amount of time, but it is possible to roll the same recovery time for all three of them. Since they recover hp after recovering from a stun, it's possible for them to be winning this fight.

And...yeah, I'm not really sure what to make of this page. The local police force has planes, and elite squad of parachutists, and extra parachutes for rescue dogs? What do they even need low-level Heroes for around here?

This page is from the next feature, Stuart Logan. The artist is unknown, and Stuart Logan never appeared again, which is doubly tragic because this looks really good.  I've also never considered searching a scabbard for dust before to find out when the blade was drawn.

(Scans courtesy of Digital Comic Museum.)

Action Comics #20 - pt. 2

In Tex Thompson, racist caricature Gargantua T. Potts misses a morale save when he sees five zombies and faints. Text discovers that swallowing salt not only protects them from becoming zombies, but can reverse the zombification process (though this may be only true of "fresh" zombies; it is unclear if being a zombie longer makes it permanent).

After freeing the zombies, Tex forgoes fighting the whole tribe of natives by rushing straight to their chief and challenging him in single combat. Now, normally, the cliche is that this works and the Hero gets to win the scenario with just one fight -- but this time it doesn't work and Tex gets knocked out and put in a deathtrap (tied on a spit over a roaring fire) -- so maybe he tried to save vs. plot to make that happen and failed?

Likewise, the story makes use of the cliche of the chase over the rickety bridge spanning a deep chasm, and this time the natives do pursue across, like in the cliches, even when they see Tex cutting the ropes on the other side. Maybe they missed their saves vs. plot too.

The Three Aces are in the Koyukuk "Valley" in Alaska, which is a real place. Golden Age writers always seem more comfortable using real places if it's in Alaska. Gunner uses semaphore to communicate with the other two aces in their plane -- a rare instance of a language being used that not every Hero necessarily knows.

Gunner rescues a stranded father and daughter. The father is hurt, but Gunner gives him hot broth to "bring a stir of life to him." It is not the first time I have considered allowing healing after eating -- though I'm not there yet.

We learn that Gunner Bill is an orphan, possibly being the closest we ever get to an origin story for one of the Three Aces.

Gunner, the father, and daughter Tony are trapped in a blizzard for an entire week. Only after the week ends do they finally meet a wandering encounter, a pack of at least seven wolves. Very unusual for an adventure strip, the thugs who attacked Tony and her dad and left them stranded are caught and arrested behind the scenes, without the Heroes involved at all (which is what happens when you don't want to continue the scenario next time).

The Zatara story, curiously, takes place earlier in the summer of 1939. The "mist death" strikes in Africa, Asia, and Europe, killing hundreds every time the mist appears. It is not a choking hazard, but burns the skin like acid. The Prime Minister of England (if you squint really hard, it even looks like Neville Chamberlain a little) recruits Zatara to investigate.

Zatara is visited by a moon woman. Moon women are like full-sized Tinkerbells. This one is crazy; she thinks moon people came to Earth thousands of years ago and wiped out most human life. Zatara casts a "Fly" spell so he can accompany her from England to India in a matter of hours. The Fly spell does not allow transportation that fast, so they are more likely teleporting slowly -- unless some more powerful version of the Fly spell exists.

Instead of attacking from the Moon, the moon men are attacking from underwater caves off the coast of India. Unlike moon women, moon men look like 5' tall goblins, with green skin, big, orange, saucer eyes, and lower jaw tusks. It is unclear if the moon men have horns, if they just wear horns attached to the chainmail coifs they all appear to be wearing.

Zatara casts some kind of a spell that turns rays from the moon man's raygun into firecrackers. It seems overly-powerful that Zatara uses a spell powerful enough to transform energy into matter (that's a high-level polymorph spell -- at least 6th level!) to overcome a lone sentry, so perhaps it is a simpler weapon that makes weapons misfire (I could see that as a 4th level spell). Then -- because this is Zatara and he always burns his most powerful spells right away -- he also casts Wall of Stone (another 4th level spell) in front of the moon man as he's running away.  When he meets the moon men's dictator, he uses Telekinesis -- a third 4th level spell! -- to tip his throne over on him.

Zatara is attacked by nitons -- winged snakes (with sail-shaped wings) that have magic resistance and are immune to mind-affecting spells. Very unusual for Zatara, he has to flee from the nitons and uses Wizard Lock on their three remaining cages (maybe Wizard Lock should affect more than one portal?) so more nitons cannot be released. And then he casts Hold Person on the nitons' keeper (though the spell makes it appear that chains have wrapped around him).

The next two spells are confusing. To save Nala, the moon woman, when he finds she's been captured (the moon men view her as a different race, by the way), he casts a spell that makes a glass wall (Wall of Glass -- 2nd level spell?) appear around her. That keeps the moon men from harming her, but it does not explain how it gets her away from them by the next panel. Then Zatara casts a spell that teleports every net (nets are used for catching nitons) located in the moon men's sunken city into one big pile. This has got to be some advanced version of Teleport called Collect, and I would put it at 8th level (it can collect every example of one type of item found within a certain radius, so if you cast it to collect doors, every door in the hideout within a 1,000' radius, or something like that, would appear in a pile by you). Then he tosses a Fireball on the pile of nets, because the nets go up in a cloud of smoke. 

Next, Zatara casts Polymorph Any Object three times to turn the cages of nitons into pearls. He uses Polymorph Self to appear to be a moon man. He uses Charm Person -- a very rare 1st level spell! -- to make one of the moon men scientists his best friend and tell him their whole master plan.

Moon women can turn invisible. Nala claims moon women lived on Earth millions of years ago before migrating to the Moon. Although, bear in mind, she's a fruitcake. Zatara indulges her because he likes how she looks in a bikini.

Earlier, Zatara claimed the moon men were a thousand years more advanced than Earth men. Little bears that out, though the moon men do have a monorail, and they can turn radium into gaseous form (that accounts for the death mist). Zatara plans to kill all the moon men with a combination of the radium gas and the nitons -- though, to be fair, the moon men also plan to end all life on Earth, so it's kind of a kill or be-killed situation.

Zatara either owns a Cloak of Invisibility, or casts an Invisibility spell in the form of a cloak.

Zarara must have some spell cast on himself that protects him from radiation, as he withstands a lot of exposure to it while moving through the mist-filled city, more so than can be explained by his amount of hit points.

In a rare instance of Zatara claiming a trophy item, he takes a moon ray gun, which can wreck at short range.

Moon men and moon women were both statted in Supplement I: National.

(Read at fullcomic.pro.)

Action Comics #20 - pt. 1

And we're back to Superman! This is the first Superman story of 1940 and the last Superman story in DC's Action Comics Archives vol. 1.

Superman starts it off with the Raise Bridge power, then becomes Clark Kent for the main plot. As Clark, he lassos an assassin and pulls him off a high ledge (for 1-6 falling damage). This is the plot hook to get Superman to meet actress Dolores Winters. When he next meets Dolores and she does not recognize him, there is no game mechanic involved in that -- it is a purely role-played situation.

Then something very unusual happens for Superman -- he misses a plot hook. When he sees that Dolores is having a big party on a yacht, he decides not to go. Most players would see that as a plot hook. By passing it up, Superman misses an easy chance to stop the Ultra-Humanite early.

When Superman says Ultra's request for $5 million is the "greatest mass kidnapping ever attempted," I can't find any evidence to prove him wrong.

Superman does a minor leap, wall-climbs up to a high window, and "X-ray visions" a piece of paper inside (though I'm not sure how he would read using X-rays, maybe he is actually using his telescopic vision, which would fall under the Super-Senses power in 2nd edition).

It was never explained how Ultra made the paper materialize in the room. Or why an invention that could do that would not itself be worth $5 million.

Superman is able to stay underwater for over 2 hours. This is the Hold Breath power.

Ultra has a submarine that can fire magnetic ray beams. This invention is also, apparently, not worth $5 million. When assigning $ values to trophy items in 2nd edition, I did hesitate to set them too low, but comics bear out that mad science is never as valuable as crime.

Superman stops Ultra by using the Wreck at Range power to smash a generator at a distance. Then he uses Gust of Wind to blow out Ultra's torch.

Ultra manages to elude Superman by simply jumping into the water. You would think that this would not be much of a stumbling block for someone who can move at super-speed, use telescopic vision, and hold his breath for hours, but clearly Superman's power durations had ended already and he was all out of prepared powers that would help.

And that's the Superman installment.

In Pep Morgan, Pep not only saves the life of racing pilot Jimmy Dee but, recognizing him as a plot hook character, invites him to stay at his house. Jimmy uses some slang, such as the common "crate" for plane, and the uncommon "cop" to mean win (as in "cop that race"). Pep has to climb out onto a plane in flight, later, and climb up to the pilot's seat. In 1st edition, this would have been an aviator stunt called Wing Walking. Now, it's an expert skill check. We know Pep is not a mysteryman (or at best a low-level mysteryman) because he does not have a stunt to burn for an automatic skill check at the end, and he has to wake up Jimmy to get him to land the plane.

Speaking of slang, "Chuck" Dawson uses the phrase "fade out" to refer to his horse not wanting to approach something (so "fade out" must mean "back off" or "back away"). Another cowboy refers to Chuck's gun as his "hardware."

Next is "Clip" Carson, Soldier-of-Fortune. Summarizing his recent adventures, we see he has dealt with a wild lioness, hostile natives, and a "gigantic" serpent (though it does not look like a particularly large constrictor snake). The narrator claims Carson keeps his native porters loyal through "iron will," but actually he threatens to shoot them like a cold-blooded killer any time they talk about deserting him. Carson somehow escapes the stabbing he kinda deserves by "luckily" rolling over in his sleep just in time. It seems like a generous Editor to even require an attack roll in such a situation; I would personally rule it as an automatic hit for maximum damage. Carson gets away with the "last request" stalling tactic when about to be killed by making a successful encounter reaction roll. Carson's trip during the final battle is dramatic, but unsupported by the rules, since it looks like he fumbled (and Hideouts & Hoodlums uses no fumble charts for combat).

(Superman read in Action Comics Archive v. 1; the rest read at fullcomic.pro.)





 

Feature Comics #28

Phew! Some of the copy of this issue from Quality is of, well, poor quality!

From this page of Joe Palooka that I can read, I see some prices listed. Now, I am highly skeptical of the $3 offer for a used camper -- I suspect Ham Fisher had a really bad experience with campers -- but more interesting to me is Knobby's accepted offer of $10 for car repairs. So much cheaper than today!

I started out thinking that Porto Bello was a joke about mushrooms, but it turns out that Porto Bello is/was a real place in Panama. Panama was controlled by Spain when this took place, but note how not only does everyone there talk in English, but even the signs are written in English.

The phrase "pike ye the dandy" is an unusual one, as I've never seen "pike" used to mean trip before, but it clearly does here.

Ripping right through this issue, we're on Rance Keane already. And speaking of tripping....Even braced, I have trouble believing that Rance could trip a horse like that; surely, the horse's strength and mass would just pull Rance off the roof. In this instance, I would treat it as an opposed grappling attack, even though Rance is not in melee range. If the horse wins, Rance gets pulled off the roof and lands for 1-6 points of damage; if Rance wins, the horse gets pulled over and is prone. I might even give the horse a +2 situational modifier.

I haven't featured The Bungle Family in a while. Here we see George Bungle taking two good smacks to the kisser, each of which should be doing 1-3 points of damage, and walking away from them. He must be a bit of a scrapper; possibly a 1st level fighter with max (or near-max) hit points.

The ineffectiveness of bare knuckle punching in Hideouts & Hoodlums' current edition bothers me. It's realistic, but leads to no one wanting to fight without weapons. I've been thinking about introducing graduated punching damage, so that they do 1-4 points of damage starting at 2nd level, 1-6 points starting at 4th level, 1-8 points starting at 6th level, and so on.

This is The Clock.  We've seen Heroes be able to boss around beat cops before, but never with an excuse this flimsy -- based purely on having been Captain Kane's driver, The Clock is able to wander around the crime scene and pocket evidence.

With little confidence in their new feature Dollman, we find this installment pushed towards the back of the book. The "monsterous machine" is an aquatic tank.

This is why I don't like rats -- you never know when they might have dynamite strapped to them. This would also make for a really dangerous encounter!

This is Reynolds of the Mountains. The bright light blinds them during a surprise attack. Then they lose initiative and receive lucky head blows. Had they won initiative, they could have still tried to attack first, but would have done so at a penalty.

Most of this checks out. The floor board is an improvised club, so that does 1-3 points of damage, but that's enough to trigger a disarm check. More curious is how Reynolds misses Sam. Even assuming Sam is at medium range (that's -2), Sam is wearing no armor, has no cover, and isn't moving fast enough in an accelerating speedboat to get more bonuses -- that gives Sam only slightly worse than 50/50 chances of hitting, better if he's higher level already. I guess he just really got an unlucky die roll!

(Scans courtesy of Comic Book Plus.)