Making MHR Characters: Eric the Red (ANOHotMU #4)

Here we are, about a third of the way through the book, with another character I've read a couple of comics for! Woo hoo! Slightly familiarity!

Eric the Red is the alias of Davan Shakari, a Shi'ar secret agent secretly sent to secretly monitor humanity from his secret base. He eventually meets up with the X-Men, who somehow are not fooled my his remarkable incognitoness. I can't imagine why. I mean, look at that costume.

Seriously, the guy looks like he escape from from an S&M Carnivale float.

And, honestly, that's not the whole truth, there. He was assigned to spy on superpowerful people on Earth and "deal with" anyone who might be a threat to the Shi'ar empire and, believing the X-Men to be a threat, set out to kill them. Oh, and the name and the look of the costume? Yeah, that's from a time when Scott Summers had to infiltrate a group of supervillains.

Yes, this look was originally on the body of Scott Summers. I know. I know. Take a walk. Breathe into a paper bag. It's okay, you'll forget eventually.

Anyhow, yeah, he's shown up a few times since then. In addition to his superior Shi'ar physiology, his costume's actually an advanced weapon system, enhancing his strength, reflexes and stamina and giving him the ability to fire energy blasts. Not a bad deal, really.

Eric the Red

Affiliations

Solo 1d10

Buddy 1d6

Team 1d8

Distinctions

D’ken Loyalist

Loathes Humans

Shadowy Figure

Techno Armor

Energy Blast 1d10

Enhanced Reflexes 1d8

Mind Control 1d8

Superhuman Durability 1d10

Superhuman Stamina 1d10

Superhuman Strength 1d10

SFX: Focus - If a pool includes a Techno Armor power, you may replace two dice of equal size with one die +1 step larger

SFX: Versatile - Split Energy Blast into 2d8 or 2d6.

SFX: System Overclock - Shutdown a Techno Armor power to step another Techno Armor power by +1. Recover power by activating an opportunity.

Limit: Gear - Shutdown Techno Armor and add a die to the doom pool. Activate an opportunity to recover.

Shi’ar Physiology

Enhanced Durability 1d8

Enhanced Reflexes 1d8

Enhanced Stamina 1d8

Enhanced Strength 1d8

Limit: Bird Bones - Add a die to the doom pool to step up physical stress by +1 when due to crushing or similar damage.

Specialties

Combat Expert 1d8

Covert Expert 1d8

Tech Expert 1d8

Vehicle Expert 1d8

Making MHR Characters: Ereshkigal (ANOHotMU #4)

No, wait, wrong picture. Well, wrong Ereshkigal, really. In addition to being an actual Sumerian goddess, Ereshkigal is a character in the Marvel Universe. She is, specifically, a Deviant, one of the offshoots of humanity created by the Celestials back before giant islands started sinking and when Conan was out there doing his thing. (Will I get to stat up Conan for this project? Man, I hope so. I don't remember seeing him in any of the reference comics I'm using, though.)

Deviants are basically defined by their differences - no two Deviants have the same powers or even look terribly similar, and they're typically bad guys. Ereshkigal is no exception. At some point in her very, very long life, she decided that the problem with the universe was that there wasn't enough chaos in it and decided to do something about that. And I really, really should see her as a villain, I should, but look at that face. Seriously, that is a woman who just doesn't care how special and super you are, that's her magic marble and, no, you can't have it, you jerk. I kinda love her.

Anyhow, my first encounter with the character was in the pages of the '90s Quasar series where a man with hockey hair and a cosmic powered baby tried not to blow up the world too much. This series included Kayla Ballantine, who was so painfully 90s, and who had a friend who was really Ereshkigal in disguise. Ereshkigal snagged the Starbran, a semi-mystical doodad that gave her phenomenal cosmic power. She was eventually defeated, but she sassed the heroes, beat up Quasar and generally ruled while doing so.

The version of the character here is sans Starbrand - the Annihilation PDF has that, and I don't want to tread on too many toes here - but based on the other appearances she's had, various technology-related power sets would make sense as well. She's not exceptionally powerful, really, but this build makes her really manipulative and sneaky, as befits her.

Ereshkigal

Solo      1d10

Buddy   1d6

Team    1d8

Distinctions

Deceitful at Heart

Devotee of Chaos

Lust for Power

Deviant

Enhanced Stamina    1d8

Enhanced Strength    1d8

Flight                           1d8

Shapeshifting             1d8

SFX: Tricksome - When inflicting mental stress, step up or double a Deviant die against a single target. Remove the highest rolling die and use 3 dice for your roll.

Limit: Exhausted - Shut down a Deviant power and add a die to the doom pool. Activate an opportunity to activate a power

Specialties

Covert Master        1d10

Psych Master        1d10

Tech Expert           1d8

Making MHR Characters: Equinox (ANOHotMU #4)

Equinox (Terrance Sorenson) is kind of a complicated character. He was a normal kid born to two scientists. His dad had some crazy scientific theories and didn't handle rejection well, abusing his wife and kid in a twisted effort to cope. When Terrance and his mother went to leave, one of the machines in his father's lab exploded, killing his father and mutating Terrance into the Thermokinetic man, with both ice- and fire-based powers. Those same powers made it difficult for him to control his temper, though, and he went on a crime spree until he fought Spiderman, Human Torch and Iceman only to finally be contained by Yellowjacket and the Wasp.

Since then, his purpose as a character has shifted a lot. At times, he's the penitent ex-villain, sometimes the reluctant hero, sometimes the cackling villain. These changes happen as suddenly as the shifts in temperature that define his powers.

For the purposes of this build, I'm aiming for Equinox around the time when he was working with Falcon to get his temper under control and had been out of the supervillain business for a while, because I found that character the easiest to connect with. Yes, he was more than a little problematic, given that he's kind of given a pass - by the guy who'd go on to be Captain America - but he tries so hard, and has a pretty unique reason for his bad temper.

Equinox

Affilitations

Solo      1d10

Buddy   1d8

Team    1d6

Distinctions

Anything For Family

Fiery Temper

One-Year Medallion from Vil-Anon

Fire and Ice

Cold Control                      1d10

Elemental Blast                 1d10

Fire Control                       1d10

Ice Slide                            1d8

Superhuman Durability    1d8

Superhuman Strength      1d8

SFX: Area Effect - Add a 1d6 and keep an additional effect die for each additional target.

SFX: Driven By Anger - Add your mental stress to a dice pool, then step up your mental stress.

SFX: Either Will Suffice - Use two or more Fire and Ice powers in a single dice pool at -1 step for each additional power.

SFX: Immunity - Spend a die from the doom pool to ignore stress, trauma or complications from cold or fire.

Limit: Exhausted: Shut down any Fire and Ice power to add a die to the doom pool. Recover that power by activating an opportunity.

Specialties:

Crime Master       1d8

Menace Master    1d8

Science Master    1d8

Making MHR Characters: Epoch (ANOHotMU #4)

This is Epoch:

Yeah.

Guess which decade this chunk-of-tentacled-barf-swallowing-a-Cabbage-Patch-Kid came from? If you guessed the 90s, you get a No-Prize.

Anyhow, Epoch is the 90s version of Eon, who really isn't much better (he looks like someone combined the DNA of a cauliflower, an oak tree and a human being and then gave it a super-stretchy arm - arguably weirder - his pic is to the right), and took over her dad's duties as the guardian of cosmic awareness, which is a job in the Marvel Universe. No job application, no resume, just, "Hi, my dad was the previous guardian of cosmic awareness, so now I am too." Nepotism. That's the real villain of the Marvel Universe.

Anyhow, Eon is most strongly associated with Captain Marvel, the previous guardian of the universe, and when Wendell Vaughn (Quasar) took over the guardian of the universe role, Epoch when crazy and had to be killed because plot reasons and Epoch took over.

So, Epoch's a cosmic character, but a fairly weak one, comparatively. I have the PDF for MHR: Annihilation, so I worked off of some of the cosmic characters from there, intending to make something similar to that, but a fair bit weaker. Honestly, I've only read a couple of comics with Epoch in them, and she was kind of a side character - to the extent that I didn't know Epoch was a "she" until I started reading for this write-up, so I see this more as an effort to make a minor-level cosmic entity than anything else.

Also, I like the M-Body template. M-Bodies are how abstract universal concepts, like Eternity, Infinity, Oblivion, Love, Chaos and, well, Epoch, manifest in the physical universe. And, yes, they're pretty close to indestructible. That's the point.

Epoch

Affiliations

Solo    2d8

Buddy    3d10

Team    1d6

Distinctions

Eternally Curious

Cosmic Guardian

New Kid On the Block

Guardian of Cosmic Awareness

Cosmic Awareness    1d12

Mind Control        1d12

Psychic Resistance    1d12

Telepathy        1d12

Teleport        1d12

Transmutation        1d12

SFX: Cosmic Force - When a dice pool used to create an asset includes a Guardian power, step up the effect die by +1.

SFX: Phenomenal Power - When creating a stunt, if the effect die is 1d12 or greater, it can be used twice.

Limit: Nascent Power - Shut down a Guardian power and gain a PP when Epoch’s immaturity and inexperience is a problem.

M-Body

Cosmic Blast        1d12

Godlike Durability    1d12

Godlike Stamina    1d12

Godlike Strength    1d12

Shapeshifting        1d12

Warp Flight        1d12

SFX: Cosmic Form - Unless the source of stress includes a cosmic or extradimensional energy source, Epoch can ignore that stress.

SFX: Cosmic Resistance - Spend 1 PP to ignore a source of physical stress

SFX: Terrifying Aspect - When Epoch inflicts mental stress, include 3 dice in the total and step up the effect by 1.

Limit: New Form - Shut down M-Body and gain 1 PP when Epoch fails to achieve a goal or is otherwise frustrated. Activate an opportunity or recover in a Transition Scene to reactivate.

Making MHR Characters: Emplate (ANOHotMU #4)

Emplate is a mutant with fanged mouths in his palms who can turn invisible, teleport, absorb the strength of others, mimic other people's powers, read auras and form a gestalt with his two mutant sisters to form a more powerful mutant.

Screw you, 90s Marvel. Seriously. You and I are in a fight. You're terrible, and the reason no one likes you is because you're terrible.*

Anyhow, I think I've made a pretty cool character out of this dog's breakfast of an idea.**

* I know, not everything from 90s Marvel was terrible, but the terrible stuff was really terrible.
** Don't hate me if Emplate is your favourite Marvel character. He's just emblematic of everything I disliked about 90s Marvel.

Emplate

Affiliations

Solo 1d10

Buddy 1d6

Team 1d8

Distinctions

Natural-Born Parasite

Travelled Too Far

Amateur Mystic

Powers Sets

Energy Vampire

Hand-Mouths 1d6

Leech 1d10

Mimic 1d8

Transmutation 1d10

SFX: Afflict - Add a 1d6 and step up your effect die by 1 when inflicting a draining-related complication on a target.

SFX: Minion Creation - If an opponent is stress out of combat, they gain the Mini-Emplate template.

SFX: Transformation - On a successful action that includes Leech against a target with the Mutant Limit, inflected stress is stepped back by 1, but activate the Traveller Power set.

Limit: Bred in the Bone - Emplate can only use Mimic to duplicate powers of targets on whom he’s inflicted physical stress.

Travelling

Dimensional Teleport 1d10

Intangibility 1d10

Invisibility 1d10

Superhuman Durability 1d10

Limit: Mutant -  When affected by mutant-specific complications or tech, step up a dice in the doom pool or add 1d6 to the doom pool.

Limit: Not Of This Earth - Stress caused by effects related to breathing and respiration are stepped up by one.

Specialties

Covert Expert 1d8

Crime Expert 1d8

Menace Expert 1d8

Mystic Expert 1d8

Mini-Emplate

Enhanced Durability 1d8

Leech 1d8

SFX: Minion Creation - If an opponent is stress out of combat, they gain the Mini-Emplate template.

Limit: Not Of This Earth - Stress caused by effects related to breathing and respiration are stepped up by one.

I mean, seriously, look at this chucklenut. Could he be more 90s? Well, he does lack pouches.