((Character sheet and setting info after the break))
Logan awoke, bound to the ground, hearing a series of memories played out on monitors around the room, and confusingly, smells from across his lifetime.
“Where, at forty, I attributed my looks to my mother, and my liver to my father,” Logan paused for the tepid laughter, “At sixty, I am forced to admit there were other forces at play.”
1992, when he’d come out as a mutant. Not as Dark Claw, just a billionaire who’d inherited even more luck than most people. He tried to play it off as though his power was just his health. As with all mutants then, he was banned from blood and tissue donations, making it easier to stave off his aging rivals from pestering him on a day to day basis. It made occasional extra work for Dark Claw, however.
Sentinels crashing down onto New Gotham streets, assaulting Wayne Tower and the Thompkins School for Mutant Education and Outreach. Shots of the Friends of Humanity storming DC.
93, he noted as he tested his bindings. They’d snap, but not soon.
Talia, wailing as he shot down Ra’s al-Pocalypse with a rocket launcher.
“Ninety-five,” he said, methodically pulling and relaxing, “What do you need to prove?”
The Joker laughing at a shrieking pitch, almost as if to cover up Sparrow’s screams.
“Bastards,” he growled. His head should have cleared, but there was something else buried into the scents they vented into the room. He blinked. How were they even witness to that?
Seeing Jubilee dying again started up the adrenaline, though. He cursed and spat, trying to slip out the way he knew he had to. Before the next parts.
Jean da Costa, the Dark Phoenix, caught off guard and killed by Erik Magnus via magnetokinetic stroke.
Logan saw red. Killing mad. There was grief in his scream. The mystery behind the Ravens might give way to the immediate need to end them, a quiet but resolute voice tried saying over the din in his mind.
The obituary of Thomas and Elizabeth Wayne, interspersed with grainy footage of the three of them, together.
One of the leg binds snapped as he did, and one of the odd, synthetic looking ropes had stretched just enough for a hand to slip free, allowing his left hand to cut away his remaining binds. flipping to his feet, still shouting. And then the lights went out.
They knew he tracked by scent, which was still confusing due to the manufactured nostalgia in the air, but they did not consider how well he heard. It was a good posture, to always sniff whenever he noticed something out of sight, in case someone was watching.
They were quiet, but not enough. He slashed out with his right hand, raking two someones across their torsos, while feeling blades sink into his left forearm, which had risen to block the assailants he knew were on that side. He growled and plunged his free claws into someone’s face.
Death cries at least drowned out the sounds of his past on the walls. There was enough light from the panels that he noted more arriving, which suited him well. He needed to get something out before he could work properly.
The Malevolence of Ravens was resourceful, even these assassins knew more of what they were doing than the typical street goon. Archival footage of most of this was plentiful. But how the hell were they there for the Joker?
He was losing blood faster than he liked, meaning if he didn’t speed this up, he’d be captured again, or worse. A lot of self defense worked differently with knife hands, but that just made forearm strikes less predictable than a punch or and elbow. It really only worked because of the adamantium, most peoples forearms would have fractured doing what he did, but it made openings for smaller jabs and sideways swipes with extended claws.
The last one stood well into the gloom of televised history. He was not afraid, but based on their rote fighting form, he was not prepared either. The assassin went for an overhead knife strike, which Dark Claw caught in between two blades and twisted sideways, so as to spare his knuckles some grief, and he drove his right fist into the man’s gut. The adamantium claws slid in effortlessly.
“How’s that work for ya, bub?” Dark Claw drew in close.
No response except a gasp and a gurgle behind a black bird mask. They could have been plague-doctor themed if the beaks were longer. Dark Claw dropped him and strode out of the room. Violence sated, for now. Just had to find the bigwig.
********************
The Amalgam Universe
Back in the day, Marvel and DC used to do cross promotion in Versus titles, and a couple of years, the Amalgam Universe, a big ole cross-company mishmash of heroes and villains and plots. The one character they co-owned was Axel Asher, whose power was to traverse between the two multiverses, and across timelines as well. He also had the power to smoosh heroes together, which tended to happen on accident if he stayed on one or the other side too long.
He, however, was not the only character who knew what was going on. Dr Strangefate, the amalgamation of Dr Strange, Dr Fate, and Charles Xavier, knew much too well what was happening, and was Axel’s main antagonist. See, the conflict was, Axel’s job was to keep the multiverses separate, and Dr Strangefate, being a product of the merged multiverse, wanted them to stay so he could live, alongside all of his loved ones native to the Amalgam Universe.
It didn’t stick, and they never collaborated like this again.
THIS Amalgam Universe
So in at least one instance the Amalgam Universe survived in smaller forms, waiting to reborn. Mostly, Strangefate rebuilt it for a return in 1997, but he is depicted as dying at the end of it all.
With the multiverses constantly expanding and contracting, there is always space for something weird. Even if it’s a pocket dimension, Axel Asher is swanning about in both properties and it could, fictionally speaking, always happen again, so right now, it is!
But it’s not the same one. Some of Access’ (that’s Axel’s superhero name) amalgamations were incredibly different depending on who was around, so my version of the Amalgam Universe has different stuff according to taste. Maybe it’s a cast off from the Queen of Nevers.
Dark Claw
Starting with Logan Wayne! I owned the two Dark Claw comics as a kid, because Batman and Wolverine were my favorites, and the Dark Claw Adventures looked like the Timmverse.
Logan Wayne was born in 1932, and orphaned at 8 years old after seeing the Gray Ghost. He would live in his parents’ estate until he was 18, attending New Gotham University. He’d go on to spend his summers travelling, and eventually, did so full time after graduating.
The 50s were a good time to learn how to drop off the grid. Besides postwar Europe, the Pacific saw continued conflicts in Korea and Vietnam. Japan was his last official known location from 1954 until 1970.
A man matching Logan’s description was found wandering in British Columbia. He wouldn’t claim his name or his birthright until 1973 after regaining enough of his fractured memories to give anyone his social security number.
Wayne Enterprises did not take this resurrection well. While the family’s estates had been held by the family butler, Edwin Pennyworth, the company fought any ownership claims or attempts at involvement for the next several years. It was during this time he had, back in New Gotham, full of skills and instincts he couldn’t quite place the origins of, that he took on the mantle of Dark Claw.
Street crime was at a fever pitch, and organized criminals ran rampant. With only a base of operations, a set of mutant powers, and an adamantium clad skeleton he still couldn’t account for, he set about clearing out New Gotham’s underworld.
The year after toppling the Silvermane regime, Logan Wayne finally accrued enough stock for control over Wayne Enterprises, rooting out the men that kept him locked out of his family’s company and installing a new board of directors. 1978 was looking up for Logan Wayne. And then the Joker appeared.
The Joker (an amalgam of the original, Sabretooth, and Whiteface) introduced to both mutant and costumed villainy. A series of gruesome killings, victims all stuck in a rictus grin, led Logan on a trail that ended with the Joker’s debut-- a plot to kill everyone in New Gotham with the Whiteface Poison.
The Joker in this case is a little more clowny than the green backhaired Hyena. In this case, to represent the Sabretooth side, he’s got a healing factor, Sabretooth’s claws, keen senses (though played less animal than Logan or Creed would, more comedic), and a green fur trimmed coat instead. To add a little Whiteface (he’s from Supreme and is basically just an homage to Mr J), add the little red painted on dimples and vertical eyelines to the Joker’s normal face.
The Joker would become a consistent foe for decades to come, similarly living longer than he ought to and surviving things like adamantium claws.
The 80′s took Logan to Japan, where he would fight the League of Assassins for the first time, and have a romance or two. The 90′s, coming with an influx of mutants that society could no longer ignore, had him come out as a mutant too, in order to immediately establish the Leslie Kafka Institute for Mutant Education and Outreach, drawing an immediate line in the sand against the reactionary Friends of Humanity and other paramilitary orgs that preyed on mutantkind.
It was also a time that brought him his first sidekick, Jubilee, codename Sparrow. She would assist him for several years until the Joker killed her Jason Todd style. Logan tried to murder him then, though at that point, he hadn’t figured out how to kill anyone with a healing factor.
The standing rule from then on was “no sidekicks; no one else dies,” which would last from 1999 to 2010.
The year of this fluff is 2005, and Logan was puzzled and annoyed at the idea that any organization could have been ruling New Gotham they way the Court of Ravens claimed to without his knowing. It plays out mostly like Court of Owls, with added exposition for my setting’s benefit, and Wolverine style violence mixed in.
2009 brought the Near Apocalypse, perpetrated by Ra’s al-Pocalypse, risen again. Ra’s’ reasoning was that humans needed to end en masse, giving way to the true stewards of the planet, mutantkind. Logan heartily disagreed, as did an assortment of other heroes, and that’s why it became the Near Apocalypse.
2010 brought the second Sparrow in the form of Kitty Grayson, a phasing metamutant that had lost her family in a circus accident. She convinced a grudging Logan to take her on, the reasoning being that her phasing ability made her effectively untouchable, unkidnappable, and that he wouldn’t be able to stop her from visiting the Claw Cave anyway.
Ra’s’ back up plan came to light as well. The lead agent of the League of Assassins, Talon, came into her own. Initially mute, save for growling, Cassandra Kinney came at Dark Claw with everything she had, “everything” being an exact duplication of his powers and adamantium claws. She proved too resourceful for Dark Claw alone, but as mentioned, he was not alone. Sparrow provided him backup, and Logan ended up offering Talon help in the form of extensive therapy from Leslie Kafka and a spot in the Dark Claw Family.
Jubilee hadn’t stayed dead. She rose again on a full moon in 2000, becoming the independent hero Moonwing, and moving to Bludhaven to strike out on her own.
There’s a lot more, and an entire decade to explore for just a few characters since, but this is already long
The Marvel Universe RPG
The MURPG is a diceless system from 2003. It uses an energy resource pool and is entirely effort based, which I think is super cool!
One of the biggest problems is the “death spiral.” Your effort is diminished when you take damage, which sounds like a good idea until you realize that epic comic book style fights don’t tend to peak at the first punch and go entirely downhill from there. There are two ways around this that sound reasonable enough--
Second Wind
Taking one turn in which your character does not spend any energy (red stones), that character gets double energy regeneration the following turn.
I like this one because it can represent down time, like if you get beat up and the villain is monologuing. How often has a hero been hoisted by their shirt, blood on their lips, only to smirk and point out exactly what the villain has missed? I think even with energy regen tied to Durability, accruing additional energy while you’re beat up and climbing to a standing position (for instance) is very thematic.
Energy Independence
A lot of homebrew fixes just divorce red stone regen from health altogether, which works to form a more “whole-hearted” combat experience. This feels more like what you’d be playing like in other tabletop rpgs, where you can take plenty of damage and still swing for the fences.
In either case, it’s not called “the death spiral” because it was a walk in the park. Using any method to make player characters more survivable and feel like superheroes is encouraged, but don’t neglect a sense of danger.
"Well now you know-- I’m a Hulk!” (MURPG Staggerverse setting)
Avery stood staring at the man sitting at the edge of a familiar lake. She knew she was dreaming, but as far as she knew, this was the first time she’d been cognizant for one.
“Oh, there you are,” he broke his gaze.
“Do I know you?” she asked cautiously.
“Uh, well, technically, I’m Robert,” he smiled, “But no, we’ve never met.”
The wind whipped across the lake, like it had both the times she’d taken a canoe out and gotten stranded at the other end. Her hair caught in the wind, blonde like it used to be, and she wondered again what was happening.
“Okay, ‘Robert,’“ she said, “You wanna tell me what’s going on?”
“Eh, I’m not exactly sure,” he shrugged, “I’m still convinced I’m having hallucinations, because the same things tend to happen.”
“Sorry, but this is my dream,” she replied, “And because you all the made the mistake of making me lucid? I’m pretty sure you’re an interrogation program or something. That’s kind of a problem when you pick someone who’s got any sense of sci fi genre savvy, you fucks.”
“Woah, alright, let’s start at step one, eh?” Robert looked confused, “Are you not a gamma-powered human?”
“Mutant,” she answered.
“Wait, did they initiate the X gene via gamma radiation?”
“Nope, all me.”
Robert ran a hand through his hair as the scene changed weather and time of day, in accelerated cycles.
“That’s a first for these, I guess,” he looked thoughtful, “Used to be accidents, a result of experiments, but in the last year or so, a couple have been successful. At least, according to whomever or whatever I’m actually speaking to.”
“Fifteen year old girl in this case,” she frowned, “But you know that, because you’re prying into my brain.”
“I’m really not,” he held his hands up in protest, “Last thing I knew I was saving the world from a rogue machine in orbit, and then I... well, maybe I woke up a couple times, but I can’t make sense of it.”
He pointed to the sky, which played out a zoomed in version of events. Something about an orbital nuclear weapon, capable of insane nuclear capabilities, but unable to match... The Hulk? It switched to a seizure inducing flash, red and yellow, with some globule-like energy crackles or shadows in between.
“What part of Bruce Banner did you derive Robert from, exactly?” she crossed her arms.
“Bruce is my middle name,” he watched the crackling energy, then turned back to her, “Turns out magic is real, and I didn’t really want to give my full, actual name to a demon or wizard or anything that might be lurking, but everyone, everyone I’ve run into while doing whatever this is, knows exactly who the Hulk is already. Don’t know why I keep trying. But I keep seeing people like you, people like me really, and I don’t know where I am.”
Avery felt a little self-conscious. If this was really him, she’d been stand-offish really quick. But given the history governments had with mutants and other super-powered freaks, she didn’t feel wrong to be skeptical. They always kept the weird super science to themselves, so who knew what they could or couldn’t do. Mind probes were not an impractical assumption. She still didn’t want to move closer.
“Well okay, I dunno when that all happened, but there’s another wave of mutants now,” she explained.
“So it’s like, what, 2020?”
“Close, 2018.”
“Jesus, twelve years,” he sighed deeply, “I wonder how much longer I’ll be here.”
“I dunno where I am either,” she admitted, “I think I even regained consciousness a couple times.”
“Do you get stronger as you get angrier?”
“I dunno.”
“Well I’m not doing anything else,” he sat down on the beach, “Do you wanna see if you can?”
“Even though I’m apparently a figment of a gamma irradiated dream?”
“On the chance you’re not,” he smiled, “We’ll call it a spiritual retreat. For Hulks.”
************
Avery Birch aka Virid
Intelligence 3
Strength 9
Agility 2
Speed 3
Durability 6
Actions
Close Combat 1 (Specialty: Kickboxing)
Ranged Combat 1 (Specialty: Thrown Objects)
Social Skills 2 (Specialties: High school culture, Mutant culture)
Modifiers
Mutant
Healing Factor, Enhanced
Toughness +7, Nullifies AP, No x2 Damage
Virid is a mutant that just became a Hulkling, no experiments or accidents involved. Baseline, she’s stronger and heals faster than She-Hulk, and heals faster than most Banner forms, though her toughness mod is a shade lower than the Hulk’s. She costs about 52w, given the mutant challenge and the “looks non-human” for 1w additionally, 56w without those challenges.
What do you think of resource management games (like the old Marvel Universe RPG) where there is no randomizer?
I really like the concept.
I’ve never played MURPG unfortunately, so I can’t comment on that specifically. In fact, I’ve never played any game that is entirely resource management without a randomizer.
But conceptually, I truly believe that it empowers players to make decisions in the ways that random chance does not. Whether or not this makes for a better game is entirely up to the game, and even then up for debate.
In design, I’m all about it. In practice, I’d like to really look at it before forming a real opinion.
As much as I love the diceless system, that was not the reason I picked this game up. The reason I picked it up is that the three books had Spider-man, Wolverine, and the Hulk on them. To quote my favorite clawed Canadian: "Nuff said."
9.) Strategic combat or dramatic plotlines?Oh definitely dramatic plotlines. I’m pretty mediocre at combat strategy. I mean, I can make a particular encounter challenging, but largely that’s because we’re playing Star Wars right now and Storm Troopers are cheaper by the dozen. If a particular combat seems to be getting too one-sided I can just throw more Storm Troopers at them. And forget aerial combat. I’m awful at that, and one of my players primarily plays Star Wars BECAUSE of aerial combat, so he knows all the options, rules, tricks, and minutiae around it. For that I just have to hope that two more tie fighters won’t cause them to be blown out of the sky.
But dramatic plotlines? Oh I’m all over that… taking the character’s motivations and using that to assess what is really important to the player… then taking that and challenging them over it. Building up NPCs that they like and trust, then revealing them to be a traitor, or taking the PCs’ assumptions and biases, and forcing them to overcome those to be able to accomplish the group’s goals. Yeah that I can do.
19.) Your most memorable in-character moment.Previous answer
29.) The best / worst character concept you’ve ever heard.Worst: Without a doubt, when I was running my 17-player Marvel Universe Roleplaying Game (MURPG) campaign, I had one guy that wanted to play an “elementalist.” In MURPG there was a family of powers that would make you the master of some particular element…. fire, ice, water, wind, etc. Except, he really really really really wanted to play as a … Hair Elementalist. And at the time I was considering it because I was thinking prehensile hair that he could control like Madusa of the Inhumans.
No, that wasn’t it. He wanted to be able to manipulate OTHER people’s hair. He wanted to cause their eyebrows to get so bushy they couldn’t see, or call forth beards onto their faces to make it hard to breathe…. weird stuff like that. I know GMs aren’t supposed to say “no” but… I didn’t want a “Great Lakes Avengers” vibe to the campaign, so I asked him to come up with another character. I can’t remember the specifics of the character he did end up playing (again, there were 17 people in that campaign), but I do remember that his combat specialty, rather than kung-fu or boxing or something like that, was roshambo.
Best: I’m going be super egotistical and mention to of mine, because I still think they’re brilliant. Either Tanq, the Shadowrun Troll that I’ve previously mentioned, or Key another Shadowrun character I played that was a hacker. Key was a human that was obsessed with playing video games. He played any/all video games, racing games, first-person shooters, MMOs, whatever. He actually learned how to hack so he could get access to unreleased video games & alpha testing. He was so good at it however, and his addiction was so bad, that he could no longer tell what was reality and was a video game.
So he would sit in meetings with fixers and Johnsons telling the other players how he hated block text, whether he thought the voice actor for this NPC was lousy, he would ask if anyone knew what the XP rewards were like for this quest chain, etc. It was totally meta and super fun (especially because the GM and I knew what was going on, but the other players just thought I couldn’t stay in character. Eventually they figured it out). He also absolutely no sense of self-preservation since he thought everything was a video game. He actually had to take a considerable amount of damage before figuring out that he wasn’t just playing an FPS, but was ACTUALLY getting shot at. It was super fun.
Honestly I really love everything about this rp. The plot is so cute, and the theme is like perfect. Monsters U was an amazing movie, and I am glad a well put together rp came out of it. The admins seem like they are really respectful and have a good hold on things. I actually applied for this rp. I hope it is a rp that lasts because it seems like it’s executed so nicely.
I think I'm going to spam marvel rpg tag with real marvel (tabletop) rpg stuff. Like blips about the book, my current campaign with friends, my past characters and their bios. All that good stuff that shows you can play marvel without the marvel universe as a back story. In fact the majority of the time the marvel universe is comics. We make our own history for the world. If we want mutants the majority and wildly accepted... we do it.
