New Lunds Adventures! [Closed]

[Cold Heritage]

Edit 20/03/2023: Sorry, game's closed. :)

Thanks for reading!



Hello fellow members of Elliquiy.

Super-Power Guidelines and Lore:
- Unduly broad and poorly defined powers are not permitted. Examples of such things are 'I control quantum' or 'I control gravity.'
- Messing with time is not permitted.
- Powers involving other dimensions and timelines in some way are not permitted.
- Powers that are kink fulfillment are not permitted.
- Characters are presumed to be normal outside of their super powers.
- Characters possess leeway in the use of their powers and may enjoy the use of their powers without 'logical' or 'scientific' negative consequences. E.g. a super-fast character may employ their super-speed without worrying about friction or sonic booms causing collateral damage or self-harm from physical strain, and not require insane caloric intake to fuel their super-speed.
- Countermeasures are possible. E.g. a super-fast character could be foiled/tripped up by someone spilling oil or ball bearings in their path; someone who shoots electricity from their hands could be thwarted by their target taking cover by a ground.
- I am not going to put a hard numeric value on powers. As a general outline the more powers a character has the weaker these powers will be. <- This is the most important guideline. The power level of the game is intended to be low, and characters who have many powers that easily render other characters redundant are not desirable. There's already some very obvious power creep that I have allowed but deeply regret and do not wish to continue the trend.
- Ghosts and spirits are not a real thing in the game world, and powers that suppose their existence are not permitted.
- Powers that are like 'magic' or have trappings of fantasy are likely not appropriate. Please kindly do not quote Arthur C. Clarke to me.
- I do not wish to see gadgeteer characters or those make powered armour.
- No characters get to be invincible or immune to harm.

Character Guidelines:
- The source of superpowers is the exposure to one of several alien viruses suffered by the parents of player characters. If your character's parents were not present in the fictional small town where the crash happened when it happened, then they cannot have children who are affected by this tenuous and nonsensical explanation for why teenagers have super powers. Bear that in mind when making characters.
- Super villains and truly dark irredeemable monsters are not what we want. At this point, if you want to make an antagonist, they should still have redeeming qualities and some better angels to their nature. This is the start of their story, the part where they might still be friends with the hero, not the third block buster where they are firmly and forever Professor Evilperson.
- Be cognizant and considerate of existing characters. I consider it unsporting if one person creates a character, and another person comes along and creates a character with the same power and several more besides or the same power but better. There are some powers that are more fair game than others for overlap, such as super strength, super durability, or flight, but other powers are more niche and less friendly to overlap. Please peruse the approved characters here. Cato Bishop, Cassie Hoffman, and Niko Gryphon are just a few characters that I would point to as examples of what I really like to see.

Deepest Lore:
- Alien wreckage crash landed on Earth ~20 years ago.
- The town of New Lund was the site of several large and intact pieces of wreckage.
- Alien viruses affected the townsfolk. These viruses were not detected and asymptomatic.
- Those infected were not harmed, and the infection passed on to their children, who were affected.
- The affected children live a normal life until they are ~18, when they manifest super powers.
- The Earth of this game is basically normal until the player characters manifest super powers. <- This is very important to be mindful of. Please do bear it in mind and consult with me before making assumptions about what may be acceptable if they have strong setting implications.

Secret Lore:
- DARPA has functional laser and directed energy weaponry.
- The wreckage at New Lund contained intact alien corpses and specimens of technology.
- The U.S. government believes the samples collected from New Lund represent the most complete samples collected. This is correct but unsubstantiated, and there are more samples in the world than they think.
- Most consumer electronics released within the last ~2 years represent advances gleaned from alien wreckage.

Basic Lore:
- Confirmation of alien life sparked renewed interest in space exploration, leading to greater funding for NASA and space programs across the world. Science Fiction is much more popular and STEM fields relating to aero-space pursuits carry greater prestige and funding as a result.
- New Lund is a small, rural town in the American mid-west. There are a lot of farms.
- The site of alien wreckage impact is a tourist trap akin to the World's Largest Ball of Yarn by the time the game takes place.
- There is a small Air Force base to the East of New Lund.
- New Lund High has a football team named the Varangians. They are a running team. They have a rivalry with the Honeyguides, a passing team from New Emmen.
- The Varangians' uniform colors are maroon with gold trim. The Honeyguides' are teal with blue trim.
- Football is a big deal in New Lund.
- At the Southernmost periphery of New Lund there is a trailer park. Those who reside there are, in the main, of low socio-economic means. This trailer park is home to Marcus Teuling. Marcus grows marijuana illegally and is the head of most if not all illicit activities in town.

Some rules, to be formal:

1) Be cool to each other. We are all here to have fun. It is okay to have differences of opinion, but it is not okay to attack someone over them. Remember to express yourself thoughtfully and with respect to your fellow writers.

2) Respect everyone's ownership of their character. Ask for their permission if you want to have their character do something or react a certain way.

3) Respect other player's Ons and Offs, limits, and boundaries. Discuss such interactions and respect the other player's decisions.

4) Sell the story. If your character sees something weird - like another person using a super power - play it up somehow. Reacting to it with all of the wonder of seeing grass and thinking 'gosh, I'd like a hot dog' undermines everything. Even if your character decides 'whoa I saw some dude shoot lightning out of his hands . . . I'm going to pretend I didn't see that' then you can explore why they feel that way and play out their denial.

5) Your characters do not have to be friends, or even like each other, but they should not be the type who are completely antagonistic to others. Please consider carefully before you make a lone wolf character - I have fallen into that pitfall myself numerous times and it is not always a fun place to be. With that said, if you do aim to make a lone wolf character, please consider making it a story arc that they become less of a loner - reach out to other writers and try to find some common ground to work on, but do not place the whole burden on other writers to be the ones to get your character out of their shell.

6) I do not know if more rules are needed. I hope not, but just in case: rules subject to change.

Please feel free to ask questions and consult about elements you may wish to include in the game.

Here's the CS code. I copied this from a DC-based superhero game I did in the past and I think I edited it to make sense but some remnants may remain.

Code Select Expand

[float=right][img height=350 padding=5]image here[/img][/float]
[b]Name:[/b]
[b]Age:[/b] Characters should generally fall within the 18 to 19 year age range; the characters are intended to be high school seniors on the cusp of graduation
[b]Sex:[/b] (or whatever you want/need this field to be to best express your character's identity)
[b]Gender:[/b] (or whatever you want/need this field to be to best express your character's identity)
[b]Sexual Orientation:[/b]

[b]Appearance:[/b] Pictures, text, whatever you like. Be mindful of site rules regarding images.
[b]Faceclaim:[/b]

[b]History:[/b]

[b]Personality:[/b]

[b]Powers:[/b] This is for super powers. Stuff like being faster than a speeding bullet, stronger than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound and so forth.
[b]Abilities:[/b] Cool stuff you know how to do. Can your character pick a lock hanging upside down? Goes here. Also, mundane stuff, like being fluent in multiple languages, driving a standard transmission.

[b]Limitations/Weaknesses:[/b] Optional field. Only put something here if you are interested in playing such things out.

[b]Ons:[/b] Your choice on how to do this. You can link to an existing O/O thread you have, refer someone to your roleplay preferences if those are set up, write them here.
[b]Offs:[/b] Your choice on how to do this. You can link to an existing O/O thread you have, refer someone to your roleplay preferences if those are set up, write them here.

[b]Character Theme:[/b] Purely, highly optional.
[b]Plot Seeds:[/b] Also purely, highly optional, but if you have things you want to do, throw them here for me and other writers to see! It is easier for us all to work together if we have somewhere to start from!
[b]Character Connections:[/b] For connections devised with other characters.


OOC, whose first post has links to the other game threads.

Initial Post

I want to put out an idea for a game about a group of high school seniors in a small American mid-western town who suddenly have superpowers. It's a type of game and story that's very near and dear to my heart. It's been done a lot. One of my favourite examples is the CW show Smallville.

In this game, the characters we write and some NPCs are the first to have genuine super powers in the setting. The game would be set basically in a 2022 that's mostly like our own. But there might've been some flourishes of superheroics in the past - in the game setting, there were actually figures like Zorro, the Lone Ranger, the Phantom, or the Shadow who operated prior to the 1940s. But after they 1950s these type of masked heroes went away and they exist as a peculiar footnote in history.

The precipitating event that gives rise to super powers among humans in this game's setting is debris of an extraterrestrial craft falling to Earth 18 to 20 years prior to the game starting. There were multiple instances of debris landing on various parts of Earth. One of the more significant impacts is near the small town the game takes place in. In most cases, the debris burned up in atmosphere, or what fell to Earth were hull fragments or incredibly damaged pieces of larger components. In some, like what happened near the small town, more substantial pieces fell. A pair of escape pods crashed near the small town. Its occupants were dead on impact. The military came in, quarantined the area and anyone in a large radius. The official story held that studying the alien bodies led to the conclusion that their biologies were too dissimilar from anything on Earth for diseases to be a concern. Ultimately, despite widespread fears an alien disease ravaging the world failed to materialize, the alien wreckage was taken away, and some people in DARPA and other alphabet organizations got to play around with alien stuff. The study of the debris led to some innovations in metallurgy and certain medical breakthroughs but it wasn't a golden ticket to the stars. The biggest things to come out of it were the confirmation of other life in the galaxy and a renewed in interest in space leading to renewed space missions by NASA, more funding for the international space station, and things of that nature. There was a lot of speculation about where the craft originated, with several strong possibilities, but nothing for certain. One of the life pods contained an artifact thought to be very much like the Voyager Golden Record, but it defied analysis and many experts believe damage during the crash compromised its data.

Of course, for to be a game, the official story has to be not entirely correct. There were enough similarities in biology for alien viruses to affect humans. They were largely asymptomatic, and not destructive to the humans they affected. Children of the individuals affected by these alien viruses were changed, however. Not in harmful ways, generally, or in ways that were particularly noteworthy at birth or early childhood. At the end of puberty these children showed signs as the extra genetic material the viruses put into their bodies expressed themselves. This is when the characters begin to develop super powers and express the physical changes that could come along with them.

This isn't diamond hard dong rocket sci-fi, so don't think about it too hard. The point is characters have a fairly normal life trajectory in a fairly normal world until they get to be 18, then they get super powers, and hopefully we get to have fun. A lot of it'd be player-driven/sandboxy stuff but I'd like to run some GM-driven scenes. These wouldn't be mandatory for people to participate in.

And maybe people at DARPA did manage to make laser guns. Actually I'm not gonna lie - they totally did. And they're awesome. But they kept it a secret. The last few iPhones, though, were made possibly by alien secrets, just like in Michael Bay's Transformers - more or less - but they don't let on and let people at Apple take all the credit.

As far as sexual content goes I don't intend for it to be a focus. The game would go in a Light section, and there'd be a dedicated thread for sexual content.

Anyway. Thanks for reading.

[Bowen]

Absolutely interested in this. Loved Smallville, and its a great feeling for a supers game. I'm in.

[Callie Del Noire]

Interesting.  I would like to hear more.

[Cold Heritage]

Absolutely interested in this. Loved Smallville, and its a great feeling for a supers game. I'm in.

Glad to see you. Happy to have you.

Interesting.  I would like to hear more.

Is there anything specifically on your mind that you'd like to know about?

[Valerian]

Well, I'm always on the lookout for a good supers game.  I don't really know Smallville in particular, but I'm a comic fan from way back, and from what I've heard I think that would be a good feel for a game.  :)

[Cold Heritage]

Well, I'm always on the lookout for a good supers game.  I don't really know Smallville in particular, but I'm a comic fan from way back, and from what I've heard I think that would be a good feel for a game.  :)

Thanks for the interest. :)

The feel is more important than anything particular to the show. Ideally I'd want the game to focus primarily on relationships between characters and melodrama - who's going to the prom with who is equally or perhaps more important than who can shoot laser beams out their eyes, and Timmy experiencing uncontrollable episodes where he blacks out, turns into a wolfman, and kills some cows is big deal because he missed a big test, didn't get his homework done, and now his parents've grounded him so he'll miss a date with his love interest.

[Valerian]

Yes, I particularly like settings that have both mundane and super problems to solve.  It seems to me to make them both more interesting.

[virtualblue]

It sounds intriguing.

[Bowen]

So are we thinking they have all just graduated High School and are starting at the local college/university? I'm guessing if we are going for Smallville vibes most of the characters know each other or have heard of one another.

Just working out ideas for my guy right now and trying to get a feel for  him. Going with the idea that he comes from a long line of military service.

[Cold Heritage]

My thinking was to have the characters be in their final year of high school. Maybe in the last half of the school year with graduation and prom on the horizon. And that everyone would know of or have heard of one another.

Hopefully that helps. I'm sure whatever you decide will be cool, Bowen.

[Bowen]

Yeah that helps. I just wanted to start thinking about things like if he would belong to any teams and such. Now I'm thinking definitely JROTC and very likely football.

[Cold Heritage]

Football is a sport I had in mind as being important to the small town and high school. I had in mind that my character would be involved in football - probably as part of the defensive line.

My basic thoughts about the local high school team are that the team has a long tradition of being a running team; the team is named 'the Varangians;' the uniform is maroon with gold trim; and they have a long standing rivalry with a team in a neighboring city that is a passing team named 'the Honeyguides.'

[ShadowFox89]

Color me interested, I have an idea for a power that I never got to use. Character would be able to control the density of their molecules, becoming degrees of intangible or denser with drawbacks and benefits to either direction- so less dense would mean lighter, can jump higher but also gets hurt easier and flies further when hit while denser means they would hit harder and be more resilient but also slower and sink in water. The original idea for the character was the daughter of Colossus and Shadowcat.

[Valerian]

Hm, well, sounds like that will make my character (who will be far more interested in books than in football) the nerdy outcast.     I'm not sure yet about powers, though I do have a teleporter idea I've been hoping to find a home for.

[Callie Del Noire]

I’m split between a couple ideas.

A ‘multibody’/hive mind type nerd with slow progressing ‘budding’ bodies and slow shape changing powers.

A empathic shapechanger type.

[ShadowFox89]

I'm leaning towards a goth gal who is gonna be very confused about her powers.

[Callie Del Noire]

I’m thinking trans leaning nerd dude.

[ShadowFox89]

I just find the idea of this glum and dour goth girl suddenly finding herself able to alternate between being able to phase through walls or crumple a car crashing into her funny.

[Callie Del Noire]

I just find the idea of this glum and dour goth girl suddenly finding herself able to alternate between being able to phase through walls or crumple a car crashing into her funny.

See her doing a “bored now” comment as she crushes something in her fist.

[ShadowFox89]

Or dramatically sighing as bullets just whizz through her.

[Bowen]

My guy is going to come from a military family. I see him as an awkward sort of jock. Good on the field but usually goes home and does chores/homework.

As far as powers go, thinking pretty straight forward energy blast, and maybe a reflective forcefield...depending on how many we can get aura sight where he can see if people are 'special'

[Callie Del Noire]

I’m leaning towards an empathetic shapeshifter.  Who can unconsciously change in response to hazards and powerful emotions. 

[Writersblockade]

Heheh, this feels more like an expanded Chronicle than a Smallville, but I like it. Just trying to see if I've got an angle. Farmer's son realizes he can toss bales of hay like paperweights could be interesting

[Hatless]

Sounds fun.

Any sort of guidelines on powers? Like strength levels that are acceptable, powers that might be off the table, etc.? Or is the superhero stuff so secondary that it doesn't really matter?

My first instinct was to grab up invisibility and make it fairly uncontrollable. All of a sudden, the straight-A student aiming for valedictorian is having to explain to the counselor and her very strict parents why she's 'missing' classes. Maybe a dash of telekinesis?

[Bowen]

I think we are at the interest stage right now. No rules for character creation have been written.