Masks: A New Generation of Heroes

Game Master Cwethan

If it were to be Go at the museum there could he a nice "Wait, THAT'S your mom??!"

Loving the start. And definitely thinking Alexandra's going to get Kaoru's "You keep trying to impress _ _ _ _ _ _ _ with your antics" relationship.

BTW, correct me if I say anything inccorect in one of Alexandra's Sherlock scans.

Well I'm currently not wearing the kilt for one. I'm wearing pants, but the kilt is in the KIT I brought with me. :)

I was wondering about that -- how you'd ever be able to keep a secret identity as a hero called the Kilt while going around in your mundane life also wearing one.

"Hey! I recognize those knees!!!"

Well I'm also definitely not trying to keep a secret identity. I actually wear LESS clothing in hero mode, so...

"So, we've been scoping out the newest students. There's been several this morning," Portia gets around to explaining about their current location. "Emo goth. Might be cute if he didn't look like he was trying to look like the Cure or something. Plain Jane, boring look, like she was trying to be invisible? Pass. Then a beefcake, but like, he might be a lumberjack or something? Lots of plaid.

I. AM. DYING. XD

I want to be clear that I'm not trying to cut anything short or race us ahead, but since we had a scene that at least tangentially touched on every single character, that makes it very easy for it to gallop past someone who's active at a different time of day.

My sense is that it'll be a little easier to have multiple scenes running with smaller groups if they're going to be primarily interaction based. That way everyone gets to have their say and stick their character moments. And ideally we'll keep going together for a while, so all the combinations will get plenty of time :-)

(Like, I'm loving the whole Shayera and Shaun tracking Alexis through the school thing. It's a good time for other shenanigans too)

Yeah, no need to set a breakneck pace. Maybe even have the field trip in a day or two? Just to set a normal baseline? I'm not saying play things out period by period or hour by hour, but leave a little breathing space (plus I find it hard to believe a field trip would be on the first day back from break).

Well that's why I set it as an emergency stopgap "Oh crap, 1/2 the kids have nothing to do, but we can't run classes with just 1/2 the kids" kind of thing. :-p

But agreed, day one does seem fast.

Oh! That reminds me, Silver. It's been 3 months. Would you enjoy having Alexandra figure out that Bronwyn is 'one of Bran's acolytes' on panel, or should that have just happened already?

For some reason I didn't consciously realize I was giving Herman a last name already in use. I can still change it if it's weird.

Heh. That may be okay except for the fact that you're sharing the last name with another legacy.

(Like, I'm loving the whole Shayera and Shaun tracking Alexis through the school thing. It's a good time for other shenanigans too)

I think it's fun too, but personally I was hoping to also get a scene with Herman, since (I feel like) he hasn't got as much time to interact as the rest of us, and I'm interested to see how he reacts to Shaun going fanboy.

@Herman: I personally thought it was kinda incidentally cool, like the two of you were actually distantly related somehow, and both branches of the family tree just happened to become heroes. But, not my character, so not my call.

For sure! Split off and do that!

Oh, wow. That's neat.

I'm just going to retcon the name. Herman and Alexandra are going to have a tangled enough cohistory as it is.

Proposal, Re: our legacie's tangled histories

proposal: at one point, not super long ago (5 years, maybe 7, enough that we were all old enough to remember) Go, Whip, and The Silver Shadow were all on a team (think the proto-defenders), which splintered after they had finally defeated Spire, A powerful villain who had escaped confinement many times previously. in light of this fact, The Shadow, ever the pragmatist, suggested simply putting a bullet between his eyes and being done with it. Go is horrified (Judging by what you have so far, correct me if I'm wrong. Also, Wingblade, where would Whip come down on that). Go gets her way, but the argument from it and the feelings around it break up the team.

unless there's timeline conflicts (though I'm pretty sure timeline conflicts prove were in the comics-verse), I think that might be a fun bit of interconnection.

Go isn't opposed to killing altogether. Her husband went to battle with guns and swords and such. Now, if there was evidence the Spire suffered from mental illness? She'd not want anyone killed for a condition they can't control, no matter how dangerous.

Hmm... well, honestly, tSS-II would probably argue it didn't matter, he was dangerous either way, and we couldn't contain him. Any other big Moral lines Go would balk at crossing, that aren't puppy-kickingly evil?

Hmmm. What if this occurred before Go felt ok with such measures? Early on and idealistic...before she met DaDamerican. Don't want to force Shadow into the role of Wrongo McWrongerton. And it broke the group up, but Go later would come to realize she was wrong.

So outside of the school, where are places your characters would go or hang out that's not home? Just thinking of places elsewhere that Alexis might run into them. Either panhandling on the main walkway in the area, or maybe when she's staring in the window of a boutique looking at the nice clothes, or even just the library where she's trying to lose herself in a children's story book.

Man, I really maximized Alexis' woobieness, huh?

Well... 1.) the exercise is to have a little tension between us. and 2.) Stephen Walker is a vice-ridden a###$*$, and a deep-eseated pragmatist.

maybe an unsavory alliance... an enemy mine type thing? or would Go agree to that too?

Depends on the case. I'm also more and more into a young Go being more conservative ...still very Catholic. She could have done something to protect or let go Spire, but it bit her in the ass as he eventually killed lots of people in Brooklyn.

Could be interesting for the a*!*&@& to have been right and the princess to be wrong. But he's SUCH a jerk she's never admitted it to him.

As for hangouts, Herman would love to find a skate park. DIY punk and hip hop venues, political rallies, maybe a secret comics and/or gaming obsession.

Proposal, Re: our legacie's tangled histories

proposal: at one point, not super long ago (5 years, maybe 7, enough that we were all old enough to remember) Go, Whip, and The Silver Shadow were all on a team (think the proto-defenders), which splintered after they had finally defeated Spire, A powerful villain who had escaped confinement many times previously. in light of this fact, The Shadow, ever the pragmatist, suggested simply putting a bullet between his eyes and being done with it. Go is horrified (Judging by what you have so far, correct me if I'm wrong. Also, Wingblade, where would Whip come down on that). Go gets her way, but the argument from it and the feelings around it break up the team.

unless there's timeline conflicts (though I'm pretty sure timeline conflicts prove were in the comics-verse), I think that might be a fun bit of interconnection.

Whippoorwill has a very strict "no kill, save everyone" policy. She's done a pretty good job instilling that into Wingblade as well -- especially hard since Wingblade's weapons are quite deadly. Killing bad guys, in her book, is strictly verboten.

Imagine in the very first fight was about to kill someone who had been hurt, and the whole team/game kind of freaked out. We've all decided to scale that back, and it's been pretty consistent ever since.

Oh. Catholic... I think Stephen Walker was in the habit of breaking 7/10 commandments, and being a bit proud of it. probably wasn't one big incident, rather a lot of little ones that caused friction.

The Silver Shadow is, like I've said, an a&&*!*#, and convinced he's the smartest in any room (not that he's often wrong, but you can be right and a prick). And he probably still remembers Go as a young idealist, or worse, is kinda smug about how she "came around to the side of the sensible"

As for hangouts, Alexandra frequents a bunch of places in Oldtown, A s%!%ty diner, an abandoned building a buncha youths congregate to drink and smoke.

Alexandra E. Walker wrote:

Proposal, Re: our legacie's tangled histories

proposal: at one point, not super long ago (5 years, maybe 7, enough that we were all old enough to remember) Go, Whip, and The Silver Shadow were all on a team (think the proto-defenders), which splintered after they had finally defeated Spire, A powerful villain who had escaped confinement many times previously. in light of this fact, The Shadow, ever the pragmatist, suggested simply putting a bullet between his eyes and being done with it. Go is horrified (Judging by what you have so far, correct me if I'm wrong. Also, Wingblade, where would Whip come down on that). Go gets her way, but the argument from it and the feelings around it break up the team.

unless there's timeline conflicts (though I'm pretty sure timeline conflicts prove were in the comics-verse), I think that might be a fun bit of interconnection.

Whippoorwill has a very strict "no kill, save everyone" policy. She's done a pretty good job instilling that into Wingblade as well -- especially hard since Wingblade's weapons are quite deadly. Killing bad guys, in her book, is strictly verboten.

Imagine in the very first fight was about to kill someone who had been hurt, and the whole team/game kind of freaked out. We've all decided to scale that back, and it's been pretty consistent ever since.

oh, okay. I'll back off that angle.

Kaoru would probably stick to relatively safe parts of town (though her situational awareness also isn't great, so it wouldn't be that hard to have her accidentally wander into a sketchy area if that's helpful). She's probably going to be generally exploring the city since she's from a relatively small town and wants to see what kind of things she now has access to, but I would guess one place she's likely to gravitate to is less crowded parts of the park. Maybe also the MakeSpace Bronwyn mentioned.

Bronwyn can be found all over the city on one of her runs - the later at night the more likely she's in a sketchy area. She's at her church (St. Ambrose) at least once a week on Sunday. Shayera's still probably making a point of dragging her to boutiques (which she mostly enjoys). Something Bronwyn's finished up in the 3 month interlude is a practice/workspace she's carved out of a junkyard in Rustside for when she needs a bit more privacy - though she's mostly there in the wee hours.

Generally speaking though, she's usually got some kind of project in the fire, and if it's mystic, she could be off trying to find just about anything :-)

Due to her flight, patrols with Whippoorwill, and her downtown-located highrise apartment, Wingblade is the least likely to be found in some alley. She still loves flying through the buildings of Old Town, and she's taken lately to patrolling the forgotten borough of Switchbank, an area of the city plat that due to some poor urban planning hasn't seen the gentrification of most of Northside.

Because of her bird's eye view and super senses, she'll more than likely find you.

Where you can find Shaun depends on the time. During the day, he’s either “at” school using the gym, looking for a swordplay practice space that he hasn’t been kicked out of yet (who would’ve guess that house was being lived in?), repairing his gear at the MakeSpace (whatever that is), or just walking Halcyon, taking everything in, window shopping, and hoping that he’ll get to witness one of the greats in action. (Maybe even join in!)

At night though, he’s in hero mode and looking for trouble. His usual “patrol routes” take him into just about every alleyway Halcyon’s got. He particularly keeps an eye on popular homeless hangouts and around seedier bars and pubs, since he’s (at least) learned that criminals tend to pick on people weaker than them.

Post-hero mode, he grabs something to eat (he’s made a habit of trying a different kind of food every night), comes home via the backyard and drain pipe (to avoid his dad as much as possible), patches himself up, then drinks till he passes out.

Cassie spends most of her time in the relatively low-end area she lives in... 'helping out' in the shop below Miss Teak's appartment. Occasionally, however, she heads to whatever street is best known for fashionable clothing shops, where she secretly window shops for things she can't afford.

There's definitely some fuzz involved there, but generally I use What Here Can I Use to either justify introducing something helpful I've already thought of, or whenever I'm going "Well that person's impossible to beat!" or "None of my powers work here!" an Assess roll is a good way to get back on the same page as the GM.

But since we're definitely going to establish the animatronic dinosaurs, you probably won't need to Assess to think of hacking them.

I was thinking about that move, Kaoru, and Bran's right about the move being there to help prompt the GM to bring the players into the fight if they're not just the punching types.

Since we've got a rotating GM I would say we could use that move and question to open up the floor and let anyone make a suggestion. Just like, if Bran was the GM for the museum fight, Kaoru assesses (What here can I use to help fight the bone dinosaurs?), and I make the suggestion (what about hackable animatronic dinos?).

Thoughts?

Well I'm generally in favor of anyone who's got a fun idea for the GM's resolution of a move tossing their two cents into the discussion thread :-)

Also, I just realized I maybe trampled on the Go reveal? Sorry AD! I was working from the assumption that Bronwyn would closely track the public doings of a famous Latina superhero, and forgot you'd talked about that maybe coming out later. Hope I didn't foil any plans...

No, not at all! I like how it's working out!

Glad to hear it :-)

Haha, at the rate Alexis keeps running away from everybody, she and Kaoru are never going to meet. Especially if that's her reaction to being noticed. Though maybe Alexis is less likely to run if the other person isn't particularly trying to be nice to her a la Shaun or Shayera?

Hope that's an acceptable explanation. it seemed kinda funny, but also lets us have a cool takedown scene to flashback to, if we wanted.

Herman's dad: John (not walker). 6 foot 1, once in peak shape now with sizable beer belly. Graying hair, bit of a bald spot. Grey longish beard. First while at school likely collared shirts of wildish patterns under a houndstooth sports coat. Definitely would bring in ancient weapons to class hahaha

Works for me - the existence of a Magic School had been mentioned in-thread a while ago, and it certainly fits the clues we'd gotten to start with.

So, re: secret identities and things. Does Bran/Bron know that Silver Shadow is Alexandra? (Wingblade does, so my take is that she'd probably share unless specifically asked not to). Also, Shadow doesn't know Bronwyn is Bran, but does she know that Bronwyn works with Bran?

Any thoughts on how to have the boys catch up with some others?

Shadow didn't say not to. I think Apex's clue has had her work out that Bron has powers (like her scan on Herman), but she hasn't confronted her yet.

On the subject of Secret identities, and trying to interweave the newbies, I kinda want some low-grade super-trouble to happen on their "maybe a date, maybe just getting food" thing.

Edit: I think this might work wonderfully with what Herman just posted.

Since a couple of characters had commented on the wrist breaking thing, figured I'd toss this up:

Well, since you failed your attack roll, maybe Shaun trips and falls on the uneven rubble? If might slow him down enough to de-escalate the situation to talking/cause him to notice Alexis has given up. Or maybe finally noticing she's given up causes him to trip and fall? Personally, I find it amusing to think of Shaun getting too excited about the upcoming fight and not really noticing certain details of the situation has changed (which seems pretty reasonable if he just fell through multiple floors of a building).

Alternatively, you could all just keep punching each other. XD

JUST tripping seems anticlimactic. I do want the fighting to stop, but I also think you’re right about Shaun being a bit shook at the moment. Maybe Wingblade jumps in and knocks him on his ass before he does anything stupid?

Yep, that seems like the best course.

Trying to think of how to involve Cassie, but its tricky, since her whole thing is trying to stay undercover.... Will probably leave the reveal until the museum (we're still doing that?) and drop a couple of hints for now.

Yeah, we need to get you paired up or something!

Something for your magical abilities to notice, Shayera is wearing a pretty potent magical glamour.

I think we're going to have to call this opening arc:

"Welcome to Halcyon, Kilt, hope you survive the experience!"