Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Locked thread
DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
(OOC: Sorry, the OOC thread fell off my first page of bookmarks so I missed the announcement that the thread was live. I am a schmuck.)

Nightwitch

There is one other who has not spoken up, a sullen-looking extra from Beetlejuice teenaged girl. Her 'costume,' so to speak, doesn't look entirely improvised; a set of loose black robes embroidered with Spooky Arcane Patterns(tm) in silver and red, and a deep red scarf wrapped around the lower half of her face. Her messy (and poorly-dyed) hair is visible, as are her eyes, which are, naturally, rolling.

"This is going to be a massive cluster, isn't it?" she opines, shrugging. "Yeah. Nightwitch. I fight demons."

From a small pouch (don't call it a purse) she produces a pack of cigarettes, which look oddly fragile in her gauntleted hands - but before she can pull one out and light up she is interrupted by a soft whining from the Tibetan Mastiff that's sitting by her feet. She looks down at the dog, who pointedly looks over at the No Smoking sign on the wall. "Oh come on!" The dog does not look moved. "They're, like, herbal, even." The dog stares at her.

She puts the cigarettes away with a huff. Since glaring at the dog isn't working, she glares at everyone else instead.

quote:

Stella St. Claire

Strength: 10 (likely not very strong, but probably not too scrawny, what with all the yoga and healthy vegan eats)
Endurance: 12 (doing busywork for a mean wizard takes at least a modicum of stamina)
Agility: 13 (the benefits of being forced to do yoga, raised to 15 due to low weight)
Intelligence: 16 (45 from powers)
Charisma: 6 (she's, like, SOOOOO in touch with the darkness)

Weight (actually important, sorry): 120 (I'm assuming she's not especially tall)

Basic Hits (weight/50, round up): 3

Hit Points (Basic Hits times a number derived from all non-Charisma stats): 12

Healing Rate (how much you get per night of sleep, it's a factor derived from Endurance times Basic Hits): 1

Damage Modifier: 7 (+1 from Agility, +6 from Intelligence)

Accuracy: +2 (from Agility)

Chance to detect hidden objects (Intelligence-based): 32% (this stat is used passively when first entering an area where something is hidden, and can be attempted actively a number of times equal to Intelligence until the hidden stuff is found or you run out of tries)

Chance to detect danger (same): 36% (used passively when danger is about to happen)

Reaction modifier: -2 with Good characters, +2 with Evil (note: The reaction modifiers are actually reversed for Evil characters, so basically low Charisma means you give off vibes of being the opposite alignment)

Carrying capacity (strength, endurance, and weight contribute): 132 lbs.

Basic Hand-to-Hand Damage (derived from, I poo poo you not, carrying capacity): 1d4

Movement rate (sum of your strength, agility, and endurance equals number of five-foot squares you can move, I'm just converting it to feet): 37 points or 185 ft/round (note: If you get multiple actions in an initiative round, your movement is divided by number of actions, and that's how much you move for each action, that number is the total you can move in the time a round takes to complete, though if you're spending Movement to use powers, you can use all of it at once)

Power (consumed by using Powers and also where damage goes when you run out of HP, hit zero Power while at zero HP and you die, it's the sum of your non-Charisma attributes): 82 (ice costs 5 per ranged attack for 1d12 damage+cumulative icing*, armor** can be generated at 1 point of armor per movement spent up to a maximum of 100 and costs 1 Power Point per round to keep from melting at a rate of 2 points per round, and masses of ice work like the armor, except you make two cubic feet per movement point spent)

Items/Devices (I'll have both be independently-powered, for symmetry, as that's how all Devices work): Ice Gauntlet has 46 Power Points that may be used for Ice Powers (ice blast has a range of 19) and provides Ice Power as a defense while any power is active, Fire Gauntlet produces a sword of flame with +2 to-hit that deals Basic Hand-to-Hand damage +1d12 (costs 5 Power to generate, and 1 point/round to maintain) or a fire shield with 50 Armor Rating (5 points to create, lasts until depleted), counts as having Flame Power for defending against enemy attacks while either ability is active, and the sword counts as both Hand-to-Hand and Flame Power, whichever is better for penetrating enemy defenses. Fire gauntlet has 45 Power Points.

Doge: He'll be statted up later and basically he's a top-quality dog, well-trained and very helpful. He can do everything a dog can do, including having inherent bonuses to Detect percentages (though, Stella's Intelligence means she won't be outclassed by very much in that regard).

Costume/Secret Identity: You get one free costume, free of charge. You can manifest/don it in a manner you find logical, and it's immune to damage from your own powers (Unstable Molecules or something). You don't need to have a secret identity, but you probably want one so you don't need to always be ready for supervillain attacks.

Inventing Points (Used to invent gizmos, in your case minor magical items, or for immediate bonuses to puzzle-solving or creating one-use items to solve a specific villain's powers or whatever, recall that you get back any points spent for transient bonuses at the end of a given adventure): 4.5/level (fractions are saved until they add up to whole points), currently 4

Chance to invent successfully: 135% (this stat is also used for any attempt to mess around with technology or high magic within your fields of knowledge, and can be affected by modifiers from a variety of sources, unsuccessful inventions do not cost Invention Points, but they do still cost the other resources needed to build them)

Knowledge Areas (these represent what your character knows the most about, meaning bonuses to Intelligence rolls to know stuff about them, and they're what you'll be drawing on when Inventing, this part is a bit of ad hoc houseruling I picked up playing the game at a con): Religion/Mysticism (Occult, too), Scholar (History/Philosophy/etc.), Performing Art, Fine Art

*Ice is one cubic foot per point of damage dealt, each cubic foot weighs 100 pounds, if it exceeds the target's carrying capacity, they can't move, but aside from that they can attack the ice as normal to break it.

**For each point of Armor you have, that's a 1% chance that attacks will be absorbed by the armor instead of your face. Each point of damage absorbed reduces the Armor rating by 1. So, each round you can make 37 points of Armor Defense Rating.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Yes, yes, yes. She's gloomy and angry and stereotypical. But upon hearing the news of their new hand-me-down base, Nightwitch perks up visibly. "The Bogus Heroes? Those guys were killer. Did a great cover of 'Police Truck,' that musta made 'em popular around here..." She leans back, humming the chorus to one of the Bogus Heroes' songs with an impish gleam in her eye. Something about squatting in the home of punk rock superheroes appeals to her.

Plus, she heard Johnny Karma collected old punk memorabilia, and she's been meaning to figure out how the whole 'contact the dead' thing works...

(The dog looks up at her, and while canine faces aren't expressive in the same way human ones are, one might swear he looks nervous.)

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Fireproof is good," the Teenager With Attitude(tm) agrees, nodding sagely. "Prof... the guy who made my robes for me fireproof'ed 'em up and that's come in handy a bunch of times. 'Course, he said something about fireproofing and Hellfireproofing being not quite the same thing, but whatever. Point is I don't think any of us wanna have to worry about getting in a fight and ending up giving the tabloids a front-page photo, is the thing. Like, if I gotta make a big-rear end wall of fire to stop bullets or something, it ends up being, you know, a big-rear end wall of fire, so fireproof is good." There's a two-beat pause. "Yeah, you know what, I'm gonna second that question about the collateral thingy."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Nah, he's just a regular dog," the girl tells Prototype, as the aforementioned dog promptly gets up and walks over for pettings. He would like some pettings, please. "I mean, basically. He belonged to a wizard and I'm not sure but he mighta been something else once for all I know, but he doesn't, like, breathe fire or anything. At least, he hasn't yet." Nightwitch sort of glares at the dog. "He didn't come with an owner's manual. I just got stuck with him when the guy vanished without teaching me any of the crap he'd promised to teach me 'oh don't worry about it kid it's just a quick jaunt off to the etheric realms make sure you don't let my dinner get cold or it's the Curse Of The Drunken Wombat again' screw you wherever you are, jackass. So, yeah. Regular dog."

The dog does not care about being glared at, and looks up at Prototype hopefully. Perhaps there will even be ear-scritches. Those are awesome.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"I've got a costume," the robed girl notes, "so how about we kill two birds with one shotgun. Me and anyone else that doesn't need new threads goes to the museum to reconnoiter the artifacts - if there is anything genuinely magical there, I'll stand a good chance of finding it - while those who need the makeover go to the costume place. Then we meet up at the Graystone when we're done to compare notes and form a, what do you call it, a plan of action and like that."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

She'd thought about switching to civilian clothes for this visit, but in the end Nightwitch decided that it was more valuable to show the flag, as it were; people need reassurance, and 'kid in a costume' is, somehow, reassuring to people. They need to know there are superheroes out there still.

Besides, she doesn't want to broadcast her secret ID to people she's just met.

"Good to meet you, Mr. Park. Is it Mr.? Or Doctor? Anyways, I'm just going to look around for a minute. I'll try to stay out of everyone's way. Also, I passed through part of the exhibit hall on the way in and you've got a plinth out there with a sign saying it's from around 700 BC but it's engraved with markings from around 500 BC - the priests of Ptah didn't start using those markings until after the High Priest survived an assassination attempt by the Cult of Typhon."

Stella keeps herself busy looking at the artifacts - and the equipment the researchers are using, to see if there's anything she can use to put together a quick ritual to detect any magical energies. Not having access to a huge repository of magical supplies is kind of a pain in the butt. She should check with that Captain Whatshisname to see if the cops have anything in the evidence lockup from that time they raided the Madcap Magician's hideout after that time he turned the Mayor into a carnivorous rabbit.

If I CAN find some usable resources, let's use a Gizmo Point to make life simple and see if any of the artifact actually ARE magical. If they are, we know what we've got to guard most carefully.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Hah! I like you, Professor Park. You're just the right degree of smug. Comes with the diploma, right? Hey, I'm gonna swipe some of this graphite dust here, it looks sufficiently pure. I don't know squat about Phoenician laser tech, but magic I can check for - at least any artifacts sufficiently enchanted enough that the etheric matrix hasn't dissipated."

Heedless of the spectacle she's making, Nightwitch promptly sits down in the middle of the room, crossing her legs and using a few pinches of powder to inscribe a small circle on the floor, the purloined graphite sitting in a small pile in the center. Various letters in John Dee's 'angelic script' are added as she hums tunelessly. To the Professor she explains in an aside - unable to resist showing off that, yes, she's got some chops on this particular topic - that the ritual she's using is actually adapted from a Golden Dawn ritual that was in use before Crowley joined up, that some of the sacred geometry involved stems originally from Pythagoras' discoveries after his exposure to the Elusinian Mysteries. "Crowley's obsession with Tibetan mysticism influenced basically everyone that came after him, but the jackass that taught me hated the stuff. I think he had some kind of beef with the Dalai Lama, or something." The circle seems to pulse faintly with a soft silvery light, and nightwitch reaches down to grab a pinch of graphite. "This is the part that sucks," she confides, "but the thing about magic is, ain't nothing free, right?"

She tilts her head back, covering her mouth and nose with her scarf while sprinkling the powder over her open eyes, trying hard not to blink, and holds that position for a few seconds before dropping her head and muttering something along the lines of "ow ow ow gently caress ow that stings ow." Tears fall as her body tries cleaning out her eyes, and then Nightwitch draws a deep breath, wipes away the ritual circle with a cloth, and stands. "Ow. If you ever wondered why so many magicians wear glasses it's 'cause of crap like that. Ow. Okay, now lemme take a look here..."

http://orokos.com/roll/336682: 1d100 28

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"I saw the Mystic Maestro in action once," Nightwitch muses. "He seemed like a good sort. Better'n the jackass I had teaching me, anyway." As Park mentions something about her being well-versed, the teenager visibly winces; "Man, I hope not. We're all in a lot of trouble if I'm the expert. Listen, Professor - if anything comes up, you know who to call, right? Our liason is Captain Houlihan; once we get settled we oughta be able to get you a direct line. Drop us a line if you need anything, and if you come across any hints about where the Maestro's old headquarters is, give me a heads-up, okay? Never met a magical superhero yet that didn't have a bunch of nasty junk locked up behind wards and such, but wards need refreshing every once in a while, you know? Besides, if I'm it for magical defenses I'm gonna need a lot more study time. Take care."

She wipes the last bit of mystically-charged powder from her eyes and heads over to Firewall, muttering, "Hey, strong silent type. Can we get the hell out of here? 'Most well-versed magician on Earth,' yeah, like I need that kinda pressure..."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"If anyone tries stealing this," Nightwitch says, pointing to a poster of the album art for the Dead Kennedys' Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables, "I will be very cross. Just sayin'." When your family spends most of their time listening to Zamfir and Enya, you learn to appreciate punk. "Anyways, I wouldn't stress too much about their effects if there's no next of kin to be found. These guys were punks. 'Stuff' isn't really the highest priority for folks like that. Me, I think they'd be laughing like hell to know there's someone squatting in their pad."

Having said that, she goes to make a start on cleaning out Sally's room. No matter what she says, she's not just going to sit back and let one of the dudes start pawing through the girl's room. It would be rude.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Well, poo poo," Nightwitch mutters, "may as well bum myself out. Everyone else is doing it." Besides, there might be useful intel of some kind.

She selects the final tape from Sally's collection and pops it in the VCR, and presses Play.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Nightwitch is pinching the bridge of her nose, trying not to sniffle. Sniffling would be bad for her image as a Hard-Nosed Defender Of Humanity and like that. Besides, everyone expects the young girl to cry. She's so focused on Not Crying that Prototype's arrival goes unnoticed until she speaks, and the younger girl jumps a little.

"The guy at the museum said I might be the most knowledgeable magical hero left on Earth," she answers in a very small voice. "If that's true, you know we're all pretty much hosed, right? That's gonna be us before long." She gestures at the screen, shaking her head and drawing a shaky breath. "So no, not really, but don't tell no one, huh? No sense bumming everyone out." She leans down, starts scritching The Dog, who seems not to mind the fact that no one's given him a name yet. "And I don't give a poo poo what she said, this stuff ain't going on eBay. I'll light people on fire if I gotta. Just for the record."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Yeah, someone's gotta do it, right?" The girl shrugs, adding, "If not us, who? Just, you know, sorta wish I was old enough to drink, is all." She gives a bitter little laugh, then starts organizing Sally's things. "I'll be out in a sec; I just want to pack some of this stuff up for her folks. Hey, could you tell whoever's clearing out Tom's old room that I'd like to go through some of his things in a while and see if there're any magical reagents or anything that we might be able to salvage? I don't think he'd want his gear to go to waste, and I'm short on supplies - and it's not like manticore blood or the ashes from a ritual fire or anything like that is going to have sentimental value to his folks. Could be stuff there we don't want getting out into the world at large unsupervised anyways."

***

She can only focus on cleaning up the effects of a dead person for so long, however, so before too much longer she's back out in the common area, having salvaged a hot pot and a french press from someplace and using them to make a few cups of coffee. "There was one urn that looked like it was pretty juiced up," she tells Space Man - she actually kind of likes that name, not that she'd admit it - "and it's being moved into secure storage. There were some minorly enchanted objects too, but nothing worth stealing except for, you know, priceless antiquity's sake. I don't know if there was any sort of advanced tech or anything, that's not my field. The guy in charge, Professor Park? He seemed like a decent sort, I'm betting he'll keep us apprised if he finds anything worth worrying about." She's trying to push back the malaise that's settled on her, on all of them; Sally's words from the tape, 'What kind of chickenshit losers would we be to quit now, when we're needed the most?' ringing in her ears. She's a lot of things, but damned if she's going to be a chickenshit.

Which is probably why, when the alert pops, she's among the first to stand and start looking for the teleport pad. "You know what'll make today suck less? Beating the crap out of some bad guys. Let's go do that."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Nightwitch snorts. "The Island of Misfit Superheroes?"

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"I'm less worried about scaring the bad guys," Nightwitch notes, "than I am about scaring the regular people. All the heroes're dead, remember? We ain't had a press conference or anything; most people aren't gonna realize we're not another group of villains. A name that's a little less militant than the usual super-team's could help us in the long run." Stepping on the teleporter pad, she adds, "Think the big-rear end fancy computer woulda flagged the report if it didn't include words like 'explosions' or 'robbery' or something? I wouldn't put money on it."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"You guys are such dorks, you know that? 'Hey, all the capes are gone! Let's break stuff!' You're like frat bros with worse hygiene, it's just sad." The cloaked teenager raises both hands, clad in scaled gauntlets that glow with an unearthly power; one bursts into flame, while the other rimes with frost. "It's no wonder I hear none of you can get a girl."

The gauntlets flare, hellish energy streaking forth.

Let's see if I can do this correctly.

Initiative: 1d10+15 21 Two actions, whoo! Since DOG has no stats yet I'm just going to assume he has only one action.


Action One: Since all of these three named dudes have a great defense against my Ice Power, let's hit one of the pistol-packing mooks.

Ice Power vs. Default has a target of 14, +2 for my Agility makes it 16. Ice Power: 1d20 8 is a hit!

So that's 1d12 damage plus a damage modifier of 7 plus the cumulative icing... Ice Power Damage: 1d12+7 18 means a bad day for a gun mook. That's, what, 1800 pounds of ice surrounding him? Hope his head's sticking out. Ice Gauntlet now has 41 Power (46 less 5 for the blast). I will not be spending Power to maintain that ice, since if this fight lasts long enough for it to melt away then something has gone seriously wrong.

Action Two: use the other gauntlet's Flame Power to create a 50 point Armor Value shield, as well as giving me the effect of Flame Power for defense. Fire Gauntlet is at 40 Power, and I don't have to pay for maintenance of the shield.

Dog Action: Dog will be running and trying to herd civilians out of the battle area, dragging any wounded civilians if he has to.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Aww, did I scare you, little boys?" Nightwitch's mouth may not be visible behind the concealing scarf of her outfit, but her Cheshire Cat grin is evident in her eyes. "I would have cut him some air-holes. Eventually. Probably. If I felt like it."

Seeing the others starting to head over to help out with the mooks, Nightwitch laughs again, raising one gauntleted finger and pointing at the Outsiders. "Don't think of it as the team coming to beat you up, boys. Think of it as being saved from the Nightwitch." Look, she's got supernatural powers and anger management issues. She knows she's kinda scary. It would be silly not to take advantage of that. If it can get the gangbangers to surrender, she's willing to play the Dangerous Loose Cannon role. Every superteam has one. She bursts into motion, cackling like a banshee.

Initiative: 1d10+15 21

Okay, so two actions again. I'm thinking that Pharma is the big danger right now, what with the whole 'I can detect your weaknesses and also I'm a walking asbestos factory' thing, and besides, Flashpoint is out of range for me anyways.

So - Action One is to run and slide over the hood of the car so I can get into attack range on Pharma. I don't know if that's beyond my effective 'move-and-attack' range, so I'll assume that getting over the cover is an action, but hopefully it'll also give me a flanking bonus.

Action Two, manifest the Flame Sword and attack Pharma. As it lets me use either Flame Powers of Hand-to-Hand to hit with, Hand-to-Hand is more advantageous against Pharma's Chemical Powers, so we'll use that. Base is 2, -1 to hit because we're the same level, +2 for attacking from the side, +2 for Accuracy gives me a base of 5; I will spend 14 Power to raise my target to 19 (no point in raising it to 20, as a 20 always misses anyways). This leaves me with 68 Power remaining, and the Flame Gauntlet will drop to 35 Power. I believe this will drop the Fire Shield, sadly, but I'll still have Fire Powers for purposes of defense, which is good.

Flame Sword Attack: 1d20 5 Pfffft coulda gotten away with not spending Power. Ah well! Better safe than sorry.

Damage is basic (1d4) plus 1d12, plus the 7 from my stats - which I won't be pulling, it's not cumulative and besides it's not like this guy can't make himself some morphine if he's in pain. Flame Sword Damage: 1d4+1d12 11 for a total of 18 points of damage. Oh, how I hope this KOs him. Luckily the wound will be cauterized!


EDIT: Dog is still on civilian patrol. I'm assuming he's well-trained enough at this point to do that, EclecticTastes, and I'll train him out for the rest of the tricks I'll want him to learn as the game goes on?

DivineCoffeeBinge fucked around with this message at 12:01 on Nov 2, 2015

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Saving throw: 1d20 8 - so close. It had to be a Charisma save, didn't it?

Initiative ONLY CORRECTLY ROLLED THIS TIME: 1d10+15 23

"'Little girl.'" Nightwitch's voice is quiet, ominous. "Do you have any idea how tired I am of hearing that crap? How tired I am of being talked down to?" Her left gauntlet flashes, flares, an unearthly chill filling the air as she fires ice at the smug little prick who just dosed her with Rage Drugs. "'Go wash the dishes.' 'You have to try harder in school.' 'I only left that scrying orb in the shower because I wanted to see if you could detect it.' 'You take too long to learn dead languages so I'm going to have to tattoo Arcane Sigils Of Intellect into your friggin' scalp hold still and stop crying the demon blood ink will stop stinging eventually and your hair will grow back' gently caress you gently caress YOU RIGHT IN THE loving EAR"

Ice. Fire. Hurting. Remember when you were a teenager and every scrap of emotional pain you felt was the worst feeling in the entire world? Nightwitch is taking all that pain and trying to share it. All at once. All at once in the form of a big-rear end sword made out of Literal Hellfire.

In the corner of her eye she catches movement. Someone might try to stop her from giving this jackass the hellishly agonizing death he so richly deserves. This cannot be! She thinks about creating a barrier, an enclosure to keep others out while she torments Pharma - but she doesn't have the time. She's too busy listening for the screams.



[i]Gonna try pulling some Neat Tricks (tm) here. She's angry, but she's still got a friggin' 45 Intelligence. Also she's mad enough that "not spending Power like water" seems like a silly idea.

Action One: an Ice Power Special Attack. Okay, so he's antifreeze. Freezing him directly won't work. You know what will? Surrounding him in an airtight shell of ice. Oh, look, he's not frozen, good for him, he still ain't getting out. Ice Power vs. Chemical Power gives me a TN of 0, +2 for Accuracy, -1 because we're the same level for a total of 1. Let's spend 14 Power to bump that up to 15 (I want a reasonable chance of failing my Murder Other roll):

Ice Power Special Attack: 2#1d20 14 9

Action Two: a Fire Power (gauntlet, flame sword) Special Attack. Jam that bad boy in there and start pumping in enough hellfire and heat that he starts to boil over. With enough ice surrounding him, he'll start turning into vapor faster than the ice starts to melt - which will make him expand. Only he can't expand, he's surrounded by ice. It should feel a lot like being cooked to death and crushed to death at the same time. Same basic TN of 1, spending another 14 Power.

I will note that Nightwitch isn't just trying to kill this dude; she's trying to do it slowly.

Fire Power Special Attack: 2#1d20 13 11

Pharma may in the future wish to reconsider the whole 'trigger a berserk rage' attack when the berserk person is looking right at him and already doesn't like him. That ain't what you might call a long-term survival strategy.

Assuming that we spend Power only once instead of twice for Special Attacks, Ice Gauntlet has 36 Power remaining (31 if double-spend is a thing), Flame Gauntlet has 30 Power (25 with double-spend), and Stella has 40 remaining (12 with double-spend).

(P.S. sorry this took so long, was dealing with (non-emergency, thankfully) Family Medical poo poo today. I hate being the one the whole thread is waiting on, sorry about that.)

P.P.S. I hosed up my Initiative roll I am a dummy. Edited out the third action and made a slight alteration to my post. I am an idiot sorry about that

DivineCoffeeBinge fucked around with this message at 01:20 on Nov 6, 2015

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company

EclecticTastes posted:

(When attacking materials, every material has a Structural Rating, which represents the HP per cubic foot of material, though your damage must also exceed the base Structural Rating to destroy any of it at all. For ice, the Structural Rating is 2, so, if you deal 1 damage, it won't do anything, but otherwise for every two damage your attack deals, it destroys one cubic foot of material. DCB, determine how many cubic feet of ice you made, we'll use the "creating masses of ice" rule, so you can make as much ice as you have movement points. Also, remember that it will lose a cubic foot each turn on its own if you don't pay the upkeep. Also you only spend once for special attacks.)

37 Movement Points, right? So 37 cubic feet of ice. I did some quick back-of-the-envelope math and I think that's roughly a foot of thickness emanating from his body in all directions. Maybe a shade over. That's thick enough to be mean and thin enough for the flame sword to be able to penetrate and dump heat into Antifreeze Lad.

EDIT: I would also suggest that the ice should melt at an accelerated speed since she's dumping in heat, but that's up to you.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Nightwitch lies there bleeding. It is, at the moment, her most marketable skill.

If/when Stormcrow or anyone else starts fiddling with her gauntlets, they may be surprised to see that Nightwitch's dog has returned - and, ears flat, starts growling at them. Leave the gauntlet alone? No growl. Gauntlet? Growl. Otherwise the animal is content to sit beside the unconscious Nightwitch, but he doesn't lick her face, since he can smell Rage Drugs on her and no one wants to deal with berserker dog.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

EDIT: Consciousness Check: 1d100 6 Okay, passed it. I forgot to make this roll, for I am a dumb.

Saving throw: 1d20 20 welp

Nightwitch stirs... and can't move her arms. This is, in the end, for the best; she's still really really angry. Turning her head, she sees Pharma's unconscious form on the ground and glares at it, hoping to spontaneously develop the power to murder people with her mind. She does not succeed.

So after a few minutes of glaring she turns her attention to one of the gang members - not the one who'd spoken earlier, a different one. "You!" she hollers. "How the hell are you gonna run out and terrorize innocent people without even bothering to stop at a gym? Look at you! Where the gently caress is your chin, you sack of crap? And that haircut! Did you do that poo poo yourself? At least go back to letting your mother dress you or something, you look like an idiot!" Look, if she can't hurt anyone physically she can at least try to hurt people emotionally. She keeps this up for a bit until Dog pads over and promptly sits on her chest; she scowls at the canine and makes angry little squeaking noises at him while he licks her face, grinning a great big doggy grin.

DivineCoffeeBinge fucked around with this message at 22:06 on Nov 7, 2015

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Nightwitch mumbles slurred imprecations at the EMTs about how much she hates them and also some more of that morphine would be nice please.

Dog, assuming he wasn't allowed into the ambulance with Nightwitch, is going to go to the hospital. Yes, he is a dog and thus bad with directions but he's not going to let that stop him! He's smarter than the average dog! He will find his way to OH LOOK A STRAY CAT RUN RUN RUN CHASE CHASE CHASE okay, now back to finding Nightwitch, she must be around here somewhere. This lasts for several minutes before Dog wisely decides that this isn't the optimal course of action. Luckily there's someone he can ask for help! Someone who clearly likes him and thinks he's awesome, because she gave him pettings and scritches!

So Dog pads up to Prototype and bumps up against her leg before sitting and looking up at her and whining piteously.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

It has been a bad day for Stella. Her head still hurts from all the drugs - Pharma's and the sedatives - and now Houlihan's bitching at them? Yeah, like she needs this. Plus the urn got stolen from the museum - the museum that Professor Park had said was 'the most magically-secure location in the midwest.' That's just friggin' great.

During the officer's tirade, she's been sitting in the corner, scowling silently and hating everything; it's only when Stormcrow asks who she wants to go with her that she speaks, sighing. "If Intercrime broke into the museum past all their magical wards - an' I saw those wards, they were badass - I'm betting they had to use some sort of tech, not spells. So I need some tech knowledge. Plus someone that understands how to talk to Feds without getting thrown in jail, and someone who might know more about Phoenician artifacts'n I do. John Doe, Prototype, an' Groo. That means Spaceman, Firewall, n' Stormcrow can go find the Wall. Sound good?"

She's so out of sorts that she even finds herself petting Dog rather than just glaring at him; Dog seems quite okay with this.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Nightwitch nods to Groo, telling the caveman, "I can understand that. If you've gotta go after him, go after him. Gotta admit, though... I was sort of hoping you'd be around in case I lose my poo poo again."

The girl looks down at her gauntlets, sighing. "I should probably explain that, huh? These things... they're made out of the hands of a demon, is the thing, an' there's some... residual nastiness that comes along with that. I can usually keep it at bay, mostly - I'm not this much of a bitch out of costume, honest - but it's tough, an' I have to work at it basically all the time. So when jackasses shoot drugs at me..." She shrugs, sighs again. "Anyways. Not like I can take 'em off; they're too dangerous for that, an' there's no place good to put 'em. I know the Prof had an Etheric Vault he kept nasty magic in, an' I hear other magic heroes had similar setups, but I don't have access to any of those, so... yeah. Doesn't matter, man, do what you've gotta."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Otherworldly materials and terrestrial technology tend... not to mix well," Nightwitch informs John Doe, not entirely unkindly. "The way it was explained to me, there's a kind of energy that infuses most otherdimensional objects, and it's... sticky. Which isn't really the right way to describe it but it'll do for a metaphor. The energy can't be destroyed - energy never can, right? - so it has a tendency to cling to and infuse the technology that's used to destroy the material that it's contained in. In other words, asking you to destroy the gauntlets would be a good way to make it really likely that you get possessed by demons. Which, you know. Would be bad."

She shrugs, and while her mouth is, as ever, hidden behind her scarves, she seems to be smiling. "I appreciate the offer, though."

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Can't be citywide," Nightwitch murmurs, pinching the bridge of her nose; she looks like she didn't get a lot of sleep last night. Which is only fair, since she didn't. "The spells on me and my stuff would have broken in that case. Plus I watched Professor Esoteric close at least three dimensional breaches and ward them closed, and if they were open again we'd be overrun by demons. Has to be more localized."

The girl starts pacing, her frown of concentration hidden by the scarves of her costume. "Overloading a ward of this sort of strength by pumping in raw, unshaped magical energy is pretty simple in theory but really, really freakin' hard in practice. The act of just telling the energy 'hey, go over there' reshapes it to the point where it has a harder time interfacing with the ward. Since no new ley line spontaneously erupted downstairs or anything," (OOC: I assume, at least; it strikes me that that's the sort of thing Stella could probably notice without a roll) "then either someone's found a way to put raw magic into a bucket and carry it around - and to overpower a ward of the strength I saw yesterday it'd have to be a really freakin' big bucket - or possibly a spatial distortion. Strikes me that if someone used the right kind of portal or something and opened one end right in a ley line and the other end right on top of the wards, that could do it. That, or some kind of new spell innovation I haven't heard of...

"Hey." She turns, points to the two CHESS agents. "Where's Professor Park? He and his team might know more about the urn that got swiped; all I could figure was 'it's an urn' and 'it's from Phoenicia' and 'it's really flippin' powerful. More info on it might tell us who took it. Also I'm assuming you knew in advance you were looking at a magic-related crime, so you brought gear, right? Break it out so we can see if we can learn more. I could tell if there'd been any teleportation or spatial distortion and either confirm it or rule it out in like twenty minutes but I haven't had time to harvest lavender water made from the tears of a grieving mother. Even the basic cantrips I know have ingredient lists that look like a trickster god's scavenger hunt, it's a pain in the rear end. You... did come prepared for magic stuff, right? Or are you going to say 'oh, well, good thing we can pass the responsibility for all the magical problems on to the teenager so that we don't have to sweat it' like everyone else? I need another cup of coffee. Groo, Prototype, I'mma run to that cafe on the corner."

She's not quite at the nervous breakdown stage, but it's pretty clear Nightwitch is feeling the pressure. It's one thing to be a novice superhero - at least there are other novice superheroes to help out with that. As far as she knows right now, though, she's the only person on the side of the proverbial angels that actually does magic, so it's entirely possible that the responsibility for things like 'making sure we're not invaded from a Hell Dimension' rests entirely on her shoulders. It's stressing her right the hell out.

Luckily for her, Dog notices this, and stops sniffing at the two government agents to come over and lean against her leg, which seems to stabilize her a bit.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Congratulations, Agent Tully," Nightwitch calls over her shoulder. "You figured that out quicker than the Detroit PD did. The press, too. Gold star." The teen heads out of the museum for a moment, but rather than heading to the cafe like she'd mentioned earlier, she fishes out a pack of cigarettes and lights up, not caring if any passers-by notice the newly-minted superhero leaning against a wall and smoking.

Deep breaths, Stella. Stay calm. Stay focused. Try not to get overwhelmed by the amount of raw power it must have taken to fry those wards. Calm. It's okay, we're gonna find whoever did this and then I'm going to punch them in their face with fire. Easy now.

A long, slow drag on the cig. She lied to Houlihan, of course; they're straight tobacco. But then, tobacco was pretty important in certain American shamanistic practices, so she justifies it to herself by saying that she can always unroll them and use them for rituals. I'm going to have to get back to practicing actual magic; she muses, frowning to herself. As it is now, those ritual mages on the government payroll can probably do more than she can, and that isn't going to fly. She'll be damned if she's going to get outclassed by some Fed in an off-the-rack suit. It would be a lot harder to develop those skills without a teacher, of course, but someone's going to have to do it and no one else seems to be stepping up to take the job.

Dog, meanwhile, is sniffing around the room. Hey, look, he's a dog; he's probably not going to "sniff out any clues." But, hell, he might, right?

It's while pondering her rather brief tutelage under Professor Esoteric that Stella blinks, frowns, and spins around to head back inside, gesturing with her lit cigarette. "How'd they know what to grab? Behind those wards, they shouldn't have been able to scry for it. Either they were aware of the urn before I noticed it, or they were tipped off. You told Park and his team to stay home," this to the two CHESS agents; "was there anyone you couldn't reach? And how long would it take you to get a look at their financials, see if any of them got a nice cash bonus lately?"

Nightwitch is not a detective, but she's watched TV. She knows the cardinal rule of any investigation - namely, "follow the money."

OOC: I have no earthly idea whether Dog can successfully investigate a crime scene, or what I would roll for him if he tried, but look, when Owning A Dog is a superpower you drat well use it.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Dog looks expectantly at Nightwitch, who looks back at the canine for a bit before sighing theatrically. "All right, all right, fine, you did good." From a pocket in her robes she produces a small dog biscuit, tossing it at him almost dismissively; Dog catches the treat, scarfs it down, and wags his tail happily. Nightwitch rolls her eyes. Dog does not seem to mind.

To Agent Tully, the teen shrugs. "The Port of Detroit has terminals in the city; they handle a couple million tons of cargo a year. Lotta ships. Port Authority's got a public wharf on Atwater that's probably the better bet. USS Milwaukee docked there just before Thanksgiving. Saw it on the news. If a Navy Wait a second, cannonballs, boats... holy crap, are we gonna fight a pirate?" Oddly enough, this notion seems to brighten her day quite a bit. Who doesn't want to fight a pirate?

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

"Wait a second. Her name is Lorelei Cavalier and she goes by 'Marie'? That's... incredibly stupid! Lorelei is a way cooler name than Red Marie. We need to beat the crap out of this lady just for terrible name choices. I mean, all credit for the girl power pirate motif, good for her, but seriously, 'Marie?' Pfft. Anyways, let's see if we can, like, sneak on to the ship; cannons won't help 'em much if we're already on board, right?"

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Snapping her fingers, Nightwitch's face lights up, and though her broad smile is hidden behind her scarves, it couldn't be any more obvious. "Now I get why she changed her name," she calls over to Prototype, cheerfully enough. Turning to the Pirate Queen Of Lake Michigan, she hollers, "You got tired of everyone remembering you as the chubby kid in school, huh? Seriously, look at you people! There are anorexia support groups, you know."

Marie can say what she likes, but if there's one thing that a 'Hot Topic reject' is good at, it's sneering at the skinny entitled people.

Then the fighting is starting, and there's not so much time for snark. Does Nightwitch take the bait and attack Marie directly? Don't be silly, of course she does. "Come on, Lorelei," show me whatcha got! Still remember your cheer drills?" Okay, there's some time for snark.

Initiative: 1d10+15 22

Okay, so Marie's easily got the jump on me. That's okay! I'll take a shot or two before I get my own licks in, it happens. I will try "rolling with the punch" to take as much damage to Power as I can - I have 82 Power and can take up to 1/10th of my Power in damage, so 8 points on the first attack, then presumably 7 for follow-on attacks she might make. If I'm still conscious, then:

Action One: Activate the right gauntlet's Flame Shield; 50 point Armor Value, Flame Power for defensive purposes. No maintenance required.

Action Two: Ice Blast on Marie. Using the Default Defense value gives me a target of 14, but I'm at -3 for Marie's level and +2 for my Agility for a net of 13. I'll spend 5 Power to raise my target to 18.
Ice Power: 1d20 14
Phew! Okay, so damage is 1d12+7, plus ice accumulation:
Ice Power Damage: 1d12+7 9
So that's 900 pounds of ice surrounding Marie. As for the actual damage, let's see if it penetrates her armor:
Armor Breach: 1d100 69
Yep! Seems it did. So Marie may or may not be encased in ice (I don't know how strong she is, but she is pretty scrawny). IF she's having trouble moving, I'll spend Power from the ice gauntlet turn-by-turn to maintain it, unless she successfully attacks it into nothingness in which case I'll just start over.

FIRE GAUNTLET: 40 Power left
ICE GAUNTLET: 41 Power left (possible 1 point per round maintenance on the ice block)
NIGHTWITCH'S POWER: 77 (less any Power damage taken in defense)

Dog's actions will be to go back up the CHESS agents, since they are probably going to need it the most; they have no cool superpowers, after all.

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Welp, let's see here; Nightwitch has 12 HP. She takes 18 damage from the first attack; she can roll with the punch and take 8 points to Power, giving her 74 Power and 2 HP remaining. Then after Nightwitch's round 1 attacks her Power drops to 69.

Since I cannot mathematically get anywhere close to an Initiative of 40, assuming Marie is attacking Nightwitch again, do you want to roll her attacks so I know whether or not I'll be unconscious by the time my turn comes around? Since any successful blow of 8 or more damage will drop me to 0 HP, I figure it's an open question.

Let's see if I end my second of two combats in an ambulance. :rolleyes:

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company

EclecticTastes posted:

Huh, I thought you had more than that in HP. Welp. Just do your action, it's unlikely she'll land many more hits, she can't afford to spend too much power on her attacks for the same reason you can't.

Don't look at me, man, you're the one built my stats!

Nightwitch

All of the following is assuming that Nightwitch stays upright, which is of course dependent upon the dice.

Initiative: 1d10+15 19

It's not that Stella can't fight. She can; she has a flame blade of her own, after all, and has been shown to be able to use it pretty well. It's just... how does talk like that not throw you off your game? "You have a what?" She rolls with Marie's cutlass strike as best she can, but when she straightens she's got a pretty nasty gash on her shoulder... which doesn't stop her from reaching into the folds of her cloak and pulling out a cell phone. Holding it up she asks through gritted teeth, "Can you say that again? YouTube is gonna love this!"

It's a distraction, of course, or an attempt at one; she's trying to get Marie to focus on the phone and not the motions of her left hand. While her left gauntlet can create ice blasts just by pointing and willing it, what she has in mind is a little more intricate. When she attacks, then, it's not to simply throw a burst of ice Marie's way - it's to generate ice crystals inside Marie's exo-suit. If she can damage it, she might actually stand a chance of surviving this fight.

So, Action One is an Ice Blast Special Attack, attempting to damage or disable Marie's suit. Target is still 13, I need to succeed twice. I wish I could afford to spend Power on this attack, but alas, I may need it to not die, so -

Ice Power Special Attack: 2#1d20 3 1

gently caress yeah! I have no idea how much damage it'll take to damage/destroy the suit so let's hope it's fragile.

Ice Power Damage: 1d12+7 16

I don't know if I have to account for Marie's defense since I'm attacking her suit rather than her; I'll let you roll that, EclecticTastes, if it's necessary.

Action Two is to Evade, so that on the off-chance that Nightwitch makes it through the round I'll have a shot at surviving to take advantage of the suit's damage.

Dog continues to help out the CHESS agents. He is a good Dog.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

DivineCoffeeBinge
Mar 3, 2011

Spider-Man's Amazing Construction Company
Nightwitch

Initiative: 1d10+15 21 - again, treat all of the following as 'assuming I don't get KO'ed, which given my current health is a possibility. Does my last turn's Evade carry through to the top of this round until my next action? I really hope so!

"Like, I think your accent is, like, slipping, swabbie!" Nightwitch affects an exaggerated Valley Girl accent, jeering at Marie; she's doing her best to remain aware of the fight as a whole, and seeing the two CHESS agents take down their opponents, plus the fallen Sweetie, she's figuring that the heroes are winning - and that's usually a sign for someone like Marie to hit the emergency escape button and make everyone vanish with ninja smoke bombs or some poo poo. In order to keep that from happening, she needs to keep the 'pirate' focused on fighting, not seeing the big picture.

That sword is a flipping nuisance, though. Freezing worked on the suit; why not for the sword? A burst of ice directed at Marie's blade should render it a lot less scary.

Gonna spend Power on this attack, because it's sort of do-or-die at this point; if I don't drop this gal soon I'm just going to get worn down. Besides, I should be able to spend it from my gauntlet's reserve rather than my personal reserve, I think. Target is 13 still, I presume; spending 6 points per attack to raise my target to 19 (that's a total of 12 points spent plus the cost of the ice blast - I might have to switch away from the shield into the Flame Sword at this rate). I'd raise it to 20 for an auto-success but 20 always misses, so there's no point.

Ice Power Special Attack: 2#1d20 19 9

Yay for caution! Okay, so the damage (again, I don't know what kind of damage is necessary for a Disarm attack, so I'm just rolling and hoping):

Ice Power Damage: 1d12+7 14


Pressing her (presumed) advantage - and throwing caution to the wind - Stella gestures with her right hand, and the sheath of flame surrounding her coalesces into a fiery blade, and the girl lunges forward to attack the faux-pirate. "Oh, I'm sorry, is that too cold? Let me take care of that for you!" She whistles shrilly, for some reason, before slashing at Marie.

Dropping the Flame Shield and bringing the Flame Sword instead. Again, do-or-die. The sword allows me to use Hand to Hand or Flame Power for the attack, depending on which is better; I'll be choosing Flame Power, which should make my target number 14, 16 after the flame sword's +2 to hit. Spending 3 Power from the flame gauntlet to make that a 19.

Flame Sword Attack: 1d20 3

Flame Sword Damage: 1d4+1d12 11

I don't know if her shield is still up with her suit out of action; I'm assuming (hoping?) not, but if I'm wrong just met me know and I'll roll the armor penetration roll (or you can, whichever).


Dog!

Pettin's! Dog is happy. He was helpful! But wait - what is that whistle?

The Girl! The Girl is fighting! Dog will help the Girl!

Dog is gonna run over and flank Marie and attack from behind. Bad Marie!

Dog Initiative: 1d10+12 13

Not 100% sure on Dog's attack roll - Hand to Hand versus Default, I guess? That's what I'll roll. So that's a base target of 5, less one for Marie's level makes it 4. Dog isn't gonna be as profligate with his Power as Stella, so he'll spend 6 to make it a target of 10.

Dog Attack: 1d20 6

Who's a good boy? Who's a good boy?

Dog Damage: 1d8 4

Also Dog gets his own section because :shittydog:

  • Locked thread