#dr. brainwave

[howtohero]

#269 Drones

Drones! They’re like robots, but you don’t have to worry about their feelings. But you really should worry about their feelings, non-sentient machines have been known to spontaneously develop feelings and revolt against their masters from time to time. Drones are one of the greatest things to come out of a Weird Factor induced sci-fi technological revolution. (It’s that and sliced sliced bread. Think of sliced bread, except its sliced. In the same way that sliced bread was an incredible innovation for being bread that’s sliced.) Drones can be programmed to assist with all manner of tasks, though as a superhero you’ll generally encounter three main types: Helper drones, spy drones, and attack drones. Today, you’re gonna listen to me drone on and on about each of them.

Helper Drones Drones are the ideal employees for a superhero. They can work round the clock, you don’t have to worry about maintaining your secret identity around them, and they don’t have that pesky “I’m only human” excuse. Because they’re not humans! They’re machines! And that’s better. Helper drones can do all sorts of stuff that superheroes need to have done, but don’t necessarily have the knowhow or technical expertise to do on their own. They can sequence DNA, run facial recognition software, check fingerprint records, make omelettes, tie shoes, dry clean uniforms, generate snappy one-liners. They’re everything and anything you could ever dream and hope for in a sidekick/assistant/omelette chef. One thing I should really point out though, is that you shouldn’t get too attached to your helper drones. I wouldn’t even name them. You see, drones can’t last forever; they’ll fall into a state of disrepair soon enough. Honestly, you’ll probably spill juice on them and cause them to short circuit. I mean really, how many times do I have to tell you not to drink juice in your hideout. (If you’re a vampire, this goes doubly for blood, which is the juice of the body.) Juice makes everything sticky and the stains are impossible to get out of your uniform. Juice is for civilians only. Not superheroes. Write that down I beg of you. So, since drones are prone to break down eventually, and since they cannot even reciprocate due to the fact that they have cold feelingless circuit boards in place of hearts, it really doesn’t make sense to get too attach- Ah, what am I saying. Of course you’re gonna fall in love with your funky android pal, and you know what? You should! Power to you! In fact, I’d say you should sooner grow attached to your drone companions than you should the people in your life. People die, or they change, they won’t necessarily be around forever. Drones will never leave you. And so what if they break down! You can just fix them! Or transfer their cpu into a newer, better drone! Your drone is gonna live forever! And they’re gonna love you forever! At least, until some villainous vandal gets their hands on them and reprograms them to feel otherwise...

Spy Drones Drones are also great for spying. They can sneak around where humans can’t. They can be small. They can be noiseless. They can be fitted with cameras. Spy drones are a favorite of much of the villain community. In fact, so many villains use them that at any given time, any superhero hideout, space base, or headquarters is probably crawling with dozens of spy drones. There was a time where there were hardly any superhero locations that weren’t thoroughly compromised. Those were dark times indeed, but we persevered! Superheroes got really good at communicating in code. They also got really good at spreading misinformation to the baddies. A skilled enough misinformer can convince, trick, or manipulate bad guys in to doing exactly what they want. Convince bad guys that you’ve located their hideouts in order to convince villains to come out of hiding. Make villains think their are valuables or weapons in places where you’ve set up ambushes. (Haha, remember when we noticed some of Dr. Brainwave’s spy drones in our workspace and we convinced him that the house was on fire and he ran outside in his underwear and then a squirrel bit his toe. Ha, good times... Oh god, I miss him so much.) Still, it became difficult to continuously talk in code or lies, and many superheroes found themselves accidentally leaking sensitive information to bad guys thanks to their spy drones. 

Luckily, the bad guys ended up solving that particular problem themselves. You see, there were so many spy drones everywhere, and all of them pretty much looked the same. They were designed to look as inconspicuous as possible, they’d often resemble things like dust or ants or pies. It got to a point where supervillains couldn’t keep track of which spy drones were theirs and which ones belonged to other villains. This caused a lot of issues when it came to crediting crimes and securing their villainous legacies. So a summit was called. A summit of evil. (Oh hey, I remember that. They were booked at the same hotel where we were holding our conference for parenthetical commenters. That was a wild weekend.) It was decided there that every supervillain needed to come up with their own original design for their spy drones, so that the world would know who was really spying on them, and fear or despair or whatever. This turned out to be great for us, the good guys, because now every villain was designing drones that could be easily spotted and identified. Most villains just designed drones that were “on theme” for their own personal villainous brand. So now, all heroes had to do was be on the lookout for flying skulls and crossbones or mechanical versions of their enemies’ insignias lying around their bases. It’s never been easier to avoid being spied on by a drone. 

Of course, you should also be checking your own helper drones every so often to make sure they haven’t been tampered with. Some villains can’t afford their own drones. (Because somebody keeps stopping them from doing their job.) So they just sneak into superhero bases and reprogram their helper drones to act as unwitting spies for them. I recommend doing a weekly check up and diagnostic test on all your drones. (Or more often, if you know your base has been broken into. Don’t just not check your drones if somebody breaks in but you’ve checked them yesterday.) When you find a spy drone though, it is best to disable it quickly and quietly. Take it out before it realizes its been made. Otherwise, you run the risk of activating any more hostile programming it might have...

Attack Drones Attack drones will really just mess up your whole day. They can’t be reasoned with. They can’t be tricked. They can’t be distracted. And they really want to kill you. In fact, it’s the only they’ve ever wanted and ever will want. However, they also are not really alive, and you need to use that to your advantage. When fighting attack drones you’re going to want to be as brutally violent as possible. You want your blows to be quick, precise, and powerful. Make every hit count, because the longer the drone is functioning, the smarter its getting. Attack drones are able to learn their enemies. They’ll analyze every move you make, extrapolate what moves you’re likely to make, and develop counterattacks that are sure to take you out. The best way to take an attack drone is with an electromagnetic pulse. That’s the best way to shut down any machine. However, it’s not a solution that comes without risk. If you’re fighting just one attack drone, then fine, a very localized EMP will take it out with minimal issue. But what kind of villain just sends one measly attack drone to take out their most hated enemies. (Only the poor ones.) You’re way more likely to find yourself facing down hordes of attack drones at one time. This makes things way more complicated. If you set off a large EMP you might be able to clear the field but you also run the risk of frying your own tech. Or your cyborg allies. Or someone’s pacemaker. 

When fighting large groups of attack drones, the best thing to do is confuse them. Trick them into firing on one another. Teleport around, or use clones, mirrors, or magic mist to confuse their targeting systems until they overload and explode. Convince them that they’ve already completed their mission objective by dousing yourself in ketchup and playing dead. (Or, if you’re a vampire, that human juice we talked about before.) Attack drones often don’t have the computational power of helper or spy drones and so they’re much dumber and single focused. If you can confuse them, you can beat them. Once you’ve defeated a legion of attack drones, you pretty much get to keep them. Reprogram them into security sentinels or, if you’re savvy enough, you can make them heavily armed helper drones and have them buttle for you! With drones, the possibilities are endless!

[howtohero]

#214 Forcefields

Whenever you’re a public personality it’s a given that whenever you do anything anywhere somebody is going to try to throw something at you. Sometimes it’s harmless: a compliment, a smile, a huge wad of hundred dollar bills (if you don’t specifically know that that large number of non-sequential unmarked hundred dollar bills was acquired illegally you’re allowed to keep it pass it on!). Other times it’s a bit rude but it’s still not really gonna affect your day since you are a superhero and you’re plenty powerful: an insult, a tomato, flaming garbage. But sometimes it’s really dangerous stuff that you do not want to hit you: a hex, a heat seeking missile, a really big rock that has your name scrawled on it in permanent marker. (For a brief period the villain The Defacer was going around scrawling the names of superhero’s on different large rocks in the hopes that a stronger villain would eventually come along and use their superior strength to hurl the rock at the designated superhero. She was quickly defeated but her legacy lives on! Many of her rocks are still out there and every so often they do get thrown at the named superheroes.) You may be thinking, “woe is me, am I forced to live a life where people can just throw things at me every time I go out to the field???” and the answer to that is a big fat KIND OF. We can’t stop people from throwing things at you but we can sure as heck stop those things from hitting you in the face and ruining your day! In fact, eagle eyed readers may already have noticed that the solution was actually carefully hidden within that question. (Bat-eyed readers may already have noticed that the solution is up top in very large letters). We’re referring of course, to forcefields.

Forcefields are a superhero’s best friend. A good one will protect you and your loved ones and your home from all manner of outside attacks and unwanted solicitors. Forcefields can be used to shut out all of life’s problems. Boss on your back about the quarterly financial reports? Forcefield! He can’t bother you now! Also your computer just flew into a wall so you couldn’t get that done anyway! Birds giving you anxiety because the fact that they’ll always be a little bit better at flying than you due to generations of inborn instincts? Forcefield! Birds can’t even get near you now. Also you’ll stop getting feathers in your teeth every time you accidentally fly into a bird at lightning fast speeds. Supervillains keep launching nuclear missiles at your hideout because you accidentally posted your location on social media? Forcefield! Which will also conveniently protect you from all the nuclear fallout that I guess is just gonna annihilate everything around your hideout. Er, don’t worry, they make big forcefields! You can just put one around the whole city!

City-wide forcefields are actually growing to be pretty popular in states or countries with a large super presence. You’d be surprised how many evil schemes could be foiled by just erecting a giant forcefield around a city. Superheroes have been able to retire just thanks to the presence of city-wide forcefields. Unfortunately though, supervillains are nothing if not creative. Some supervillains have used forcefields of their own invention to trap entire cities in impenetrable domes. It’s the ultimate hostage situation. (At least until somebody figures out how to make a large enough forcefield to hold the entire planet hostage.) <Say that gives me an idea!> Supervillains use these forcefields to cut off cities from the rest of the world often causing them to descend into chaos and anarchy within a matter of minutes. It’s a classic scenario with no clear and simple solution but don’t worry we’ve got a couple of absurd and complicated ones that’ll get you right out of that problem!

You’re a superhero, you should have no less than thirteen different secret passageways that can get you in and out of the city undetected, but if you don’t it’s time to make some. Fire up your Drills for Thrills drill tank and start heading down. If your supervillain is any good they’ll have thought of that and their forcefield will extend into the ground and you won’t be able to simply dig a tunnel underneath the forcefield. But who cares about, we’re not going under, we’re going to circumvent the problem entirely. Simply keeping on drilling downward until you get to the Earth’s core. Now, if you’ve splurged and paid for the Drills for Thrills deluxe package this won’t be a problem. Your drill will be 100% guaranteed heat resistant and you can just keep on drilling through to the opposite side of the Earth without any fear of being burned, melted, or convected to death. If you didn’t pay for the deluxe package, well, turn around I guess, this is not the option for you. 

No forcefield is perfect (generally this is unfortunate but in this case it’s quite handy!) they tend to have at least one weak spot somewhere. To exploit these weak points you need to contact a friend on the other side because the two of you need to exert an intense amount of force on either side of the weak spot in order to compromise the structural integrity of the entire forcefield. If the forcefield is blocking any signals from getting out, preventing you from contacting your allies on the outside through conventional means, worry not, your city has been trapped in an impenetrable city by a supervillain, there are going to be cameras. You see, one of the reasons supervillains take hostages is for a ransom, a city’s worth of hostages is probably worth a lot of money so you can be sure that they’re going to be making a ransom video. And if they’re not even doing it for the money they’re doing it for the bragging rights so they’re still going to want a recording of what happened. All you need to do is get your markers and your glitter glue and make a big poster and stand in the camera shot. If your friends are watching the news or follow the supervillain on social media they’ll see your message and the two of you can attack those weak spots and save the town together. 

Turn your entire city invisible. Get some industrial scale levels of invisible paint and just paint everything invisible. Or project a hologram of an empty field over the entire city. This will make the bad guy think that your city was a transdimensional city that simply blipped out of this plain of existence. Supervillains know better than to trifle with the unknowable forces that control transdimensional cities so they’ll probably just pack up their forcefield and call it an early day. 

Dress up like a different supervillain, one who the offending villain hates. This shouldn’t be too difficult, most supervillains wear masks so you don’t even have to horribly scar your face or paint your skin blue or anything. Then, once you’ve perfected your costume, go up to the forcefield and laugh maniacally. This is sure to catch the attention of the villain who has trapped you who will, at first, join in with your laughter. Maniacal laughter is quite contagious. There’s your medical fact for the day. Once the laughter dies down though, the villain will most likely ask what the heck you’re laughing about. Supervillains are a questioning and inquisitive lot. And also remember, he hates you, he does not want you laughing. Now this is the most important part, and you better be able to carry out with the utmost confidence. You need to convince the supervillain that you have trapped them within a forcefield. This is not going to be easy but it’s also not going to be as difficult as you might think. All you have to do is convince the villain that your master stroke was to trap the entire world except for your city, which is actually secerelt your supervillain headquarters, within a giant forcefield. It’s the ultimate scheme, remember, no villain yet has managed to trap the entire planet in a forcefield so the entire planet bar one city will be seen as quite the feat. The real villain isn’t about to let you take credit for doing something so amazing which you didn’t even do! They’ll bluster and rant and rave and accuse you of lying and repeatedly claim that you are mistaken and that they trapped you within a forcefield. This is where you have to make sure you stay your course and stay calm. Just shake your head and say something like “Oh Demolistructor you simple minded fool, can’t you see? You played right into my hands! Oh you poor thing, you don’t even realize how thoroughly I have bested you. I guess now there’s really no question of which of us is the greatest villain!” I guarantee you that’ll get their hackles raised. If you get them mad and flustered enough they’ll shut off the forcefield to prove to you that it’s theirs and then all you need to do is punch them in the face and steal their forcefield projector. 

If you’re using forcefields as a superhero in order to trap criminals, remember that this is not a permanent solution. Forcefields are useful to stop a villain in their tracks, or to isolate them from their weaponry or machinery, but they cannot be used as full-time prisons. For one, they’re (more or less, see above) impenetrable, which means you can’t give your prisoners things like food or a clean, less on fire set of clothes. There are also no bathrooms in forcefields. So make sure you get those villains to actual prisons before long. Also, if you’re creating a full forcefield bubble, you need to make sure that air can be circulated. You don’t to suffocate yourself or others by creating a full air-tight forcefield. Superhumans with the ability to create their own forcefields are often endowed with the secondary power of choosing their permeability. They can allow carbon dioxide and oxygen to pass in and out while shutting out harmful gasses or water or oxygen-sized shrunken assailants. But if you’re designing you’re own forcefield you’re not going to be able to be as exact, so keep that in mind when deciding to use forcefields in different scenarios. 

Forcefields can be a highly useful asset in any superhero’s arsenal. They can be used, to protect, repel, or even trap enemies, but they can also be used against heroes in the same ways. So know your forcefields, know their capabilities, their strengths, their weaknesses. And remember, regardless of which side of the forcefield you find yourself on, nothing is ever truly impenetrable, so be ready to get creative. 

[howtohero]

#126 Making an Entrance Like the Entire World is Watching

Thomas Jefferson once (probably) said “Every impression you make is a new first impression.” Meaning that every time you meet someone or arrive somewhere, you have a new chance to stick out and establish yourself in their hearts and minds forever. That’s (presumably) why Jefferson always carried a lot of glitter with him that he could throw into the air whenever he walked into a room. All of which is to say that every first impression you make counts. So let’s go over some basics on how to make a dope entrance.

The perfect superhero entrance all comes down to the three D’s, Daring, Dangerous, and Dazzling. Ideally your entrance will leave your colleagues rolling your eyes, your enemies seething with jealousy and rage, and the innocent civilians who really should’ve been evacuated from the area a while ago applauding like they’ve never applauded before. The perfect entrance will leave people wishing you’d just leave already because they can’t wait to see what you’ll do when you come back. The perfect entrance will cause small children on the internet to injure themselves as they try to imitate your inimitable glory.

For starters, you never want to do something that’s been done to death. The perfect entrance laughs in the face of clichés. It does a backflip whilst flipping double birds in the face of cliché. So that means you can say goodbye to doors. Walking into places through doors has been done. They’ve taken you as far as they can, you’ve outgrown them. Ideally you’d teleport into different places whilst striking a cool pose (more on that later but for a an in-depth study on poses see here) but if you don’t have access to a teleporter (or you’re still not over your horrible teleporter accident. Yes, we get it, you used to be Full-Face McGee, it’s been like six months, get over it!) then you’re going to have to get creative. Somersault through doggie-doors (yes, doggie-doors have been done too, but dogs are 23 times cooler than people so it’s still cool to use them). Cut a hole in the roof and then stand on the cutout as it falls into the building below. Dive through windows. Rappel down chimneys. Run straight through a brick wall leaving a cartoonish outline of your body! Really freak someone out by popping out of a drawer you logically shouldn’t have been able to fit into! Go the extra mile and remove all of the doors from your hideout so you’re forced to make cool entrances into your own home even when there’s nobody around to impress!

A minor issue with this method of making an entrance [aside from the unnecessary damage to yourself and tons of property?] is, as with all things, supervillains. Supervillains are, on average, 8 or 9 times more dramatic than superheroes (everybody needs to just trust our math always or get out). So they’ve dreamed up every conceivable way you could dramatically burst into their lair plus dozens more that you never would’ve thought of. (Our supervillain correspondent, Dr. Brainwave, told us he once electrified every surface in his lair in case a superhero came in so he could zap them. He had to putter around with a jetpack for weeks. Nobody ever showed up.) Wait our supervillain what? (Our supervillain correspondent, you know, he gives us the inside scoop on supervillains, and in return we let him live in our basement since his lair is one big bug-zapper.) What are you talking about? (Why did you think we had all those mutant alligators in the basement?) All those WHAT? (I feel like we’re losing focus.) You’re right, anyway, so they’ve thought up every dramatic way you could burst into a room and they’ve set traps on all of them. Which makes apprehending supervillains kind of chore. That’s why we usually just suggest you wait for them to come outside to throw them in jail or punch the evil out of them. But for the moments when time is of the essence and you absolute need to get into a lair your regular levels of daring, danger, and dazzle simply won’t do. You can dial it down, and just walk in through the front door -9 times out of 10 they’ll have dismissed the possibility that you’ll walk into a room like a person and leave it trap-free- but that’s a bit lame no? So you need to dial it all the way up! You’re gonna have dazzle coming out of your ear. Try slipping a tiny pocket-dimension generator on every bad guy you fight so if you ever need to break into the lair you can just activate your generator to the same dimension, and enter their lair through a giant portal while riding a majestic horse and playing the electric guitar while your jetpack choir flies in behind you singing your theme song. Tunnel into the lair using a diamond-studded luxury drill tank (*sigh* we’re still trying to get that Drills for Thrills sponsorship? {Oh sorry are we boring you?}). Or, my personal favorite, don’t even enter at all! That’s right! Fly over them with an airship, rappel down, attach a bunch of hooks or harpoons to the lair or the patch of land surrounding it and just rip it right out of the ground while you fly away. Then you can just drop the entire lair into a prison yard and let the correction officers sort it out from there. 

But an entrance isn’t just about bursting out of or through something the common folks wouldn’t. Sure it’s daring and dangerous, but is it dazzling? Is it dazzling enough? Trick question, there can always be more dazzle. We’ve already mentioned some ways to make your entrance more dazzling. There’s the Jeffersonian method of throwing glitter everywhere but glitter is gross and gets everywhere and that’s really more hassle than dazzle. Music is always a must. The louder the song, the phatter the beats, the cooler the choreographed dance, the better. You should start making a dazzling entrance playlist now. Even if you’re not a superhero. (Though I’m not quite sure why you’d be reading this blog. I’m sure there’s a blog that teaches you how to be a bland normal person somewhere.) Everyone can use a dazzling entrance playlist.

You also want to try to say something cool when you make your entrance. In general, I would suggest waiting outside until you hear someone drop the perfect set-up line. Don’t try to force something that isn’t there. Unless lives are at stake. Then I guess you’ve gotta do your job. Try saying something like “Didn’t you hear? They outlawed crime.” Or “Are you an evil doctor? Because it hurts when I do this,” and then punch Dr. Brainwave or whomever right in the sternum. (Hey Dr. Brainwave is part of the How To Hero family now!) We will discuss this later! If you can’t think of anything cool to say, you’re better off not saying anything at all. Just spin around, give a thumbs up and flash that beautiful smile of yours. Unless you’ve just gone a couple of rounds with Shimbob, Collector of Teeth, then two thumbs up will do. Or even double finger guns. Double finger guns are always cool.  

When it comes to grand entrances, nobody should ever be grander than you. I want you to hold to world record for grandest entrance. I want you to redefine the word. From now on when people make a grand entrance they’ll say that they’ve pulled a (I wanna say Sherwin? Your name is Sherwin right? Ah I’m terrible with names, sorry Sherwin).