Post/Author/DateTime	Post
SilvercatMoonpaw 11-21-06, 05:28 PM	Eberron is inspired by the pulp genre. The pulp magazines eventually birthed the superhero comics. I think you can see where I'm going. On another site there was preposed that Sharn would make a great place to put superheroes. While I don't think the world is advanced enough in terms of technology and society to really work for superheroes, advancing the timeline several hundred years could do it. My question is, in a world where magic and fantastic things exist, what sort of reaction would there be to "superheroes" as we sort of know them: individuals in costumes running around fighting crime and villains probably without any sort of backing by an authority? Does Eberron have too much magic for super-powered individuals to make an interesting dent on it (obviously not the same dent they'd make on a world that didn't have such common magic)?
Just another user 11-21-06, 05:37 PM	Partly related thread. http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=282532
Eled_the_Worm_Tamer 11-21-06, 05:43 PM	Well the origonal Phantom comics were set in the 1920s, an era that I use for Ebberon, and Ebberons goal of the Pcs being the strongest good guys works with it. Supper hero is a style not a job description in any case. Theres nothing to stop a group of adventurers dressing in over the top outfits and fighting crime. Batman is a good example of what works well, and indeed sharn is a great city for the Vigilante type of hero.
SilvercatMoonpaw 11-21-06, 05:49 PM	Thanks. That's interesting for how far people can stretch already existing comic-book characters. But for anyone thinking that's the end of it, I don't think it answers my question of how the people react to these supers.
Eled_the_Worm_Tamer 11-21-06, 05:58 PM	How do people of ebberon react to any powerfull people working there will on the world? To be honest an advebturing babd in my eye is pretty close to a superhero team in ebberon by the time toy hit Prcs in any case, its just a stylistic mater, unless you start giving supers some common origon like X-men did.
SilvercatMoonpaw 11-21-06, 06:42 PM	Yeah, okay, forget it, bad question. Edit: New question: about how high a level would a PC have to be to match an iconic superpowered superhero (as opposed to Batman, who's only failing is how fast skill points increase)?
yossarius 11-21-06, 08:28 PM	I suppose that depends on what super-hero you are trying to duplicate, or at least a relative power level. Spider-man might be an equivilent 14th lvl or so (I'm only guessing here, so don't ask me to justify this with any calculations), whereas Thor or Dr Strange would probably be epic level characters. The question is, how far above the average joe do you want the characters to be? If your definition of super-hero is that no reasonable amount of normal people (in our terms, 1st-3rd lvl NPC classed characters) could ever hope to defeat them without outside help, then you probably talking at least 15th level. Personally, I'm against the idea of super-heroes in Eberron (one B, two Rs). The ultimate concept of most super-heroes is that they are powerful enough to "clean up" Gothom (or where ever). That to me would ruin the settings flavor (as I interpret it). Also, with super-powerful characters, each adventure has to be a save-the-world senario to be worthy of the PCs interest. Stopping Merrix or bringing the Lord of Blades to justice is at most three sessions, than that's ony if you make them hard to find. Before you know it, you'll have them reversing the Mourning or defeating the Dreaming Dark for good, simply because not much else presents a challenge. I suppose you could rewrite the major NPCs of the setting to make them more challenging, but if you do that, what's the difference from that and the setting as written with lower level PCs? All you've done is inflated the power level just for the sake of doing so. Don't get me wrong; it's your Eberron. Do what you want with it. I just don't see my game taking this path. If I wanna play that style of game, I'll just break out my old Marvel RPG material.
SilvercatMoonpaw 11-21-06, 08:40 PM	Don't get me wrong; it's your Eberron. Do what you want with it. I just don't see my game taking this path. If I wanna play that style of game, I'll just break out my old Marvel RPG material. I wasn't thinking of playing D&D rules. The idea just sort of popped into my head after seeing the proposition thread on that other site and thinking I wanted an already established setting that wasn't Earth. I actually think that Eberron would be perfect because it seems to suffer from a "way too much evil or things to kill you" mindset, with only about 1/8 the world having civilization the PCs can walk around with only mild fear of something bad happening. Eberron needs superheroes!
Kaizer_Ryu 11-21-06, 09:08 PM	Eberron needs superheroes!Who says they need to be "heros"? Maybe they're just a bunch of screwups, psychos, and wannabe pirates that inadvertantly save the world a half dozen times a day? Oh, wait. We already have that in The Forgotten Freedom (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=690191)! :D
SilvercatMoonpaw 11-21-06, 09:13 PM	Ramen, [insert preferred gender here], ramen!
DarkWarriorKarg 11-21-06, 10:07 PM	Who says they need to be "heros"? Maybe they're just a bunch of screwups, psychos, and wannabe pirates that inadvertantly save the world a half dozen times a day? Oh, wait. We already have that in The Forgotten Freedom (http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=690191)! :D You mean.... Ultimate Eberron!
Kaizer_Ryu 11-22-06, 03:02 AM	Ramen, [insert preferred gender here], ramen!Indeed, I have been touched by His Noodly Appendage. :D Ramen. On a related note: How would the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster fit into Eberron?
Salla 11-22-06, 11:43 AM	Indeed, I have been touched by His Noodly Appendage. :D Ramen. On a related note: How would the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster fit into Eberron? They'd be totally getting their noodly butts stomped by the Invisible Pink Unicorn. :D