Friday, July 21, 2017

Ideas in a superhero setting

There are some things that I keep coming back to in superhero settings. I don't know if they'll show up in the Strange City setting, but if one doesn't, it's because I've made a conscious effort to keep it out. You might have mental tics like this too, wells you keep returning to.

The underground complex. Whether it's mines or a forgotten city, I often have some kind of dungeon/subway complex/tunnel situation, complete with people or things living there.

Some journalists are scum. While I greatly appreciate the estate of journalism (having spent years on the school paper), I also recognize that some of the practitioners are, well, media whores. It's much easier to put this kind into a story than the good kind, though I try to have both.

The really stupid parody hero. I can't help it. I might be parodying something that's years out of date, but hell...I gotta.

Trying to justify certain superhero tropes with law or technology. A common superhero game, and one I won't stop with because I like certain superhero tropes, even if they fall apart when you think about them.

The missing heroes. I love legacy settings, but I want the players to be the important ones in the setting. Maybe not in the world of the setting, but in this area. Sometimes that means that everyone else is missing. (Or they're busy.)

The antagonistic base. An intelligent base that has an agenda different from the heroes? I'm all over that.

So I run into old Crimson Claw (he tried to kill me back in the day), and it turns out... Hey, both heroes and villains are still people. Some of them must give up and do something else.

I didn't comment because you didn't want me to. Sometimes, they know you're a superhero, but they're respecting your privacy. Kinda like when Ollie Queen was mayor, and the beard made it kinda obvious that the vigilante was the mayor.

Hey! My name is trademarked! For some reason, I just think that names should be trademarked. I don't believe there should be superhero schools or community colleges that teach heroism (though a weekend course that ended with you getting your Vigilante Certificate could be fun), but I keep going back to characters with the same names and trademarks. Villains would ignore the IP laws, though.

It's a secret ID, dammit. Look, if you want to have a secret ID, you can. I'm just gonna make it tough on you.

Hidden in plain sight. A lot of strangeness will have a perfectly ordinary appearance and be out in public, if you know where to look.

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