Jab’s Builds! (Beaker! Sam Eagle! Miss Piggy! The Swedish Chef!)

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Jabroniville
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Jabroniville »

And now I gotta get to it... the “Jurgens Era” Titans. Really no other way to do it than post them all in succession.
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H’San Natall

Post by Jabroniville »

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THE H'SAN NATALL
Created By:
Dan Jurgens & George Perez
First Appearance: The Teen Titans #1 (Oct. 1996)
Role: Conquering Alien Race

-Okay, so this was just guaranteed to failure right from the beggining. Hey, future writers? You want to have your Big Mean Conquering Alien Race seem bad-ass? Don't name them THE H'SAN NATALL. Who in hell is gonna be intimidated by THAT?

-The H'San Natall are an alien race with a specialty in bio-genetics- they invade worlds by "seeding" future mothers, resulting in super-powered children, which they seek to control. It was this means that created the second incarnation of the Teen Titans, with Dan Jurgens writing and drawing a squad of newbies. When the aliens abducted three Hybrid Teens for mental programming, they were sprung by The Atom (who was accidentally sent along for the ride) and allied with Prysm (another hybrid). Finally, they are defeated by the intervention of Captain Marvel Jr., Changeling, and Superman- Superman convinces them to cease hostilities (by threatening their mothership), and they are never seen again.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Fri Jun 24, 2022 1:22 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Sidious
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Re: Cyborg

Post by Sidious »

Jabroniville wrote: Sun Jan 20, 2019 2:14 pm Victor Returns:
-Cyborg would return for the JLA/Titans Story, having given over his mind completely to the Technis, who tried to make him happy by reuniting him with his friends. However, their methods for doing so led to the abduction of every single living past Titan, whether or not Vic knew them personally. An act that led to a planet-size amalgamation of machines ENCIRCLING THE MOON and causing a huge fight between the “let’s go kick some ass” JLA and the protective Titans. Eventually, the original five Titans would talk him down (though annoyingly, this included Tempest and Arsenal, who barely knew him), along with stowaway Changeling, who knew him best and of course saved the day. Victor willingly let the Technis go, then had Raven attach his soul to the shapeshifting war vessel the Omegadrone.
The absolute best part of JLA/Titans, and the one that underscored Gar and Vic's relationship. Was near the end, the moon was getting eaten by the Technis and Gar just yells at the now inhuman Vic "Yo! Rust Bucket! Leggo of the freakin moon already!" and it snaps him back to himself. End of story. It was beautiful.

Raven:
I liked her when she was the villain for a while "Dark Raven" infecting the people around the Titans with the souls of the other seeds of Trigon. It's when she infected Deathwing with one of them, who I for sure thought was a backdoor way of bringing Jason Todd back to life. Sad that he and the whole Team Titans were dropped with Zero Hour.
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Re: H’San Natall

Post by Bladewind »

Jabroniville wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 12:26 am Okay, so this was just guaranteed to failure right from the beggining. Hey, future writers? You want to have your Big Mean Conquering Alien Race seem bad-ass? Don't name them THE H'SAN NATALL? Who in hell is gonna be intimidated by THAT?
Could’ve been worse. Remember the Gil Dishan... and the actual in panel reference to a typo where they were called the Gil Dishpan!
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The Atom (Ray Palmer)

Post by Jabroniville »

Image
Image

THE ATOM II (Ray Palmer)
Created By:
Gardner Fox & Gil Kane
First Appearance: Showcase #34 (Sept. 1961)
Role: Adventuring Scientist, Shrinking Hero
PL 10 (156)
STRENGTH
1 STAMINA 3 AGILITY 4
FIGHTING 7 DEXTERITY 4
INTELLIGENCE 8 AWARENESS 3 PRESENCE 2

Skills:
Athletics 6 (+7)
Deception 2 (+4)
Expertise (Science) 10 (+18)
Insight 3 (+6)
Perception 7 (+10)
Persuasion 3 (+5)
Stealth 0 (+4, +20 Tiny Size)
Technology 10 (+18)
Treatment 1 (+8)
Vehicles 2 (+4)

Advantages:
Beginner's Luck, Close Attack 2, Fast Grab, Equipment (Scientist Stuff), Inventor, Ranged Attack 4, Ultimate Science Skill, Uncanny Dodge

Powers:
"Size-Changing Belt" (Flaws: Removable) [50]
"Tiny Size"
Shrinking 20 (+10 Dodge/Parry, +20 Stealth, -10 Intimidation) (Feats: Atomic) (Extras: Normal Strength) (61)
"Tiny Sized Fighting" Enhanced Advantages 2: Close Attack 2 (Flaws: Limited to Smaller Sizes) (1)

Teleport 20 (Flaws: Limited to While Shrunk, Medium- Electronic Lines) (10) -- (12)
  • AE: "Ride Air Currents" Flight 4 (30 mph) (Flaws: Gliding, Limited to While Shrunk) (2)
  • AE: "White Dwarf Punch" Strength-Damage +8 (Extras: Move Action) (Flaws: Must Go From Shrunken to Full Size) (8)
  • AE: "Inner-Ear Jump-Around" Affliction 9 (Fort; Dazed/Stunned/Incapacitated) (Flaws: Must Make Hit With Unarmed Attack First) (9)
-- (75 points)

Features 1: Puts on Costume as a Free Action During Shrinking [1]

Offense:
Unarmed +11 (+1 Damage, DC 16)
White Swarf Punch +11 (+8 Damage, DC 23)
Initiative +4

Defenses:
Dodge +7 (+17 Size, DC 27), Parry +7 (+17 Size, DC 27), Toughness +3, Fortitude +5, Will +8

Complications:
Motivation (Science)- Ray occasionally gets distracted when he sees spiffy high-tech stuff.
Relationship (Jean Loring)- Jean was a pretty typically-boring "Silver Age Female Aquaintance", and eventually married Ray. However, they divorced around the time he got de-aged. Then she went insane and killed Sue Dibny. Then became a supervillain.
Relationship (Hawkman)- The two are Hetero-Lifemates.

Total: Abilities: 64 / Skills: 44--22 / Advantages: 12 / Powers: 51 / Defenses: 7 (156)

The Hank Pym of DC Comics:
-Looking at his entire history, I think it's safe to say that The Atom is the "Daredevil"/"Hank Pym" of 1960s DC Comics. ie. he has a top-tier creative team working on him, but they were all busy doing other, more important books at the same time, resulting in poor Ray Palmer being stuck with the dregs of their ideas- after all, why use your best stuff for THE ATOM? To be honest, Ray Palmer is the kind of bland, unimpressive-powered Science Guys who's REALLY best-off being the Tech Guy on an established team- not being the star of his own feature.

-The Atom... well, he's just kind of a failure as a character. Never very interesting, a very dull power-set, and he's just bland overall. As a character, Ray Palmer (named for a Science Fiction writer) was one of the first Science Age guys to come out, but never really got his time to shine. Nobody ever remembers his run in the '60s aside from JLA stories, he has no major recurring villains whatsoever (the top tier is CHRONOS THE TIME BANDIT, along with The Floronic Man & Bug-Eyed Bandit- basically the kind of guys Daredevil fought in the '60s), and he hasn't regularly appeared in a book that lasted more than 20-some issues in 40 years. DC would be wise to some day just say "F it" and put him on the JLA on a permanent basis, but they seem insistent on screwing with the character to try and make people actually care about him. Because introducing new minority characters to replace him just isn't going to cut it, when the VERY IDEA of The Atom is rather boring for comic book stories- "Journey Into The Human Body" stories are quite cool at times, but usually only for a one-shot movie or TV episode- not an entire series... though I always liked Owl Magazine and Owl TV with their Mighty Mites adventures. But really, it makes the hero look very unimpressive, and it's a nightmare for the artist (who has to draw EXTREME perspective on almost every panel, and then draw mundane objects at giant sizes). Oh well.

Ray Palmer Debuts; No One Buys His Book:
-Ray debuted in 1961, written by some of DC's top creators, but given a pretty lame assortment of baddies. He nonetheless got added on to the JLA as its seventh member, owing to both he & Hawkman having the same editor (Julius Schwartz) as the JLA title. However, this couldn't make him interesting. His & Hawkman's shared-book was cancelled after not-too-many issues, and he pretty much vanished. As a "Scientific Adventurer", he's one of those guys our own BatgirlIII mentioned as being part of a genre nobody wants to read anymore (alongside Ka-Zar, Adam Strange and others). One time, DC came up with Sword of the Atom, making him a guy in a small world (thus taking away his one power), and turned it into a Sword & Sorcery Comic... which of course is ANOTHER genre nobody is reading anymore! This book didn't last long, and soon we got The Power of The Atom, which also died quickly.

-And yes, the Atom was once a member of the Titans. He led that terrible mid-'90s "Okay, we've burned the Titans' name to the ground- let's try to make a whole new team to bring it back" team. The line-up? Prysm, Fringe, Argent, Joto & Risk- led by the Atom as a teenager, de-aged by Zero Hour. That pretty much tells you how that went, doesn't it? It was cancelled within a couple years, and Atom was re-aged. His run was so bad he even joked about it alongside Kyle Rayner (another blink-and-you'll-miss-it Titan) in the Technis Imperative storyline, and took the JLA's side in the big Issue #2 battle between teams. He'd wait another TEN YEARS between big story-arcs, joining the hunt for Sue Dibny's killer in Identity Crisis. And hilariously, Ray Palmer is SO FREAKING BORING that despite HIS WIFE being the friggin' killer in that mega-imprortant story, his major contribution to the follow-up was to basically DISAPPEAR while more-interesting characters took over! He also took part in the horrible Countdown maxi-series, but was chosen as a "Compassion"-based Lantern during Blackest Night. This really just adds up to make clear the fact that The Atom is a D-League character who plays at being on the A-Team- his books never last, and he's been through a lot of stupid stuff. I think it says a lot that the Nu52 didn't even BOTHER to reintroduce him as The Atom, and just stuck him a some background science guy.

The Atom Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks:
-Ray was a controversial addition to my "Worst Characters in Comics" list, and I get that some people like Captain Bland here. Which is why I was so happy to see him done in a rather funny, dry-humor sort of way by Dr. Cox from Scrubs on his Justice League focus-episode. His sarcastic remarks to his assistant ("naturally Katie, I blame YOU"), his nerdy descriptions of the inside of that killer Alien Replicating Spore thingie, etc., it was all good. He was even decent in that episode where he helped Lex Luthor fight Amazo. Altogether those were some of the only times we saw him do anything, but it appears he had at least one fan on the show's writing staff.

The Atom's Stats:
-Ray is PL 10 by virtue of being damn near impossible to hit, but makes PL 9.5 with his White Dwarf Punch (which I've never seen in action). He's also sometimes shown using an Affects Others Extra with his Shrinking, with the limit that they'll explode after 1 minute to an hour later. This is practically an extra POWER rather than a Flaw, though. I'm pretty sure the entire thing should be listed under a Device, though for some reason, the DCA build puts only the Shrinking in there.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Fri Jun 24, 2022 1:23 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The Atom (Ray Palmer)

Post by Ken »

Jabroniville wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 2:40 am Ray Palmer Debuts; No One Buys His Book:
-Ray debuted in 1961, written by some of DC's top creators, but given a pretty lame assortment of baddies. He nonetheless got added on to the JLA as its seventh member, owing to both he & Hawkman having the same editor (Julius Schwartz) as the JLA title. However, this couldn't make him interesting. His & Hawkman's shared-book was cancelled after not-too-many issues, and he pretty much vanished. As a "Scientific Adventurer", he's one of those guys our own BatgirlIII mentioned as being part of a genre nobody wants to read anymore (alongside Ka-Zar, Adam Strange and others). One time, DC came up with Sword of the Atom, making him a guy in a small world (thus taking away his one power), and turned it into a Sword & Sorcery Comic... which of course is ANOTHER genre nobody is reading anymore! This book didn't last long, and soon we got The Power of The Atom, which also died quickly.
Julie Schwartz had a rule, back in the day, one had to have his (or her) own regular feature to be eligible for the League. And the Atom's magazine ran for 6 years before it became Atom & Hawkman. It was a bi-monthly book. People forget that for a long time, many comics weren't published monthly. Hawkman was also a bi-monthly. In fact, I believe it came out in the months when Atom didn't. And Hawkman, vol. 1 only lasted 27 issues of 4 years. It took the Hawks longer to get a regular feature.

The Atom, despite his name, was a revival of the Quality Comics character Doll Man. And Doll Man had been one of Quality's best sellers (pretty much only Blackhawk and Plastic Man did better.) But the types of stories, the style of covers, the presence of real world things appearing enormous. Ray Palmer was really the counterpart to Darrell Dane, NOT Al Pratt.

The other thing was that in the late '60s, into the early '70s, most of DC's super-hero books were in trouble. Hawkman was cancelled in with the September 1968 issue. Atom became Atom and Hawkman 11/68. Atom and Hawkman cancelled after 11/69 issue. Green Lantern was in trouble around that time. It became Green lantern and Green Arrow with the April 1970 issue and was cancelled 2 years (and 13 issues, it was bi-monthly) later in 4/72 (it would be revived 4 year later). Aquaman cancelled in 4/71 after 56 issues and 9 years (another bi-monthly). Teen Titans actually made it to 2/73, and issue #43. 10/68 was the issue of Wonder Woman where Diana Prince gave up the costume and just became a non-powered adventurer named Diana Prince. Doom Patrol ended 10/68. The Metal Men ended 1/70. Metamorpho ended 4/68. I don't know what criteria you're using when you call a character an A-lister, or B-lister, etc. but pretty much any DC book that didn't have Superman, Batman, or Flash in it was in trouble. The Atom wasn't a D-lister. He certainly was no A-lister either. But if you look at the DC line at the time, he was fairly average.

The "White Dwarf Punch" was a product of the late '80s in Power of the Atom.
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Joto

Post by Jabroniville »

Image
Image
Image

JOTO (Isaiah Crockett, aka Hotspot, Slagger)
Created By:
Dan Jurgens
First Appearance: The Teen Titans #1 (Oct. 1996)
Role: Blaster
Group Affiliations: The Teen Titans
PL 8 (124)
STRENGTH
2 STAMINA 3 AGILITY 3
FIGHTING 6 DEXTERITY 2
INTELLIGENCE 4 AWARENESS 1 PRESENCE 2

Skills:
Close Combat (Unarmed) 2 (+8)
Deception 4 (+6)
Expertise (Computers) 3 (+7)
Persuasion 4 (+6)
Perception 4 (+5)
Insight 4 (+5)
Ranged Combat (Fire) 4 (+8)
Stealth 3 (+6)

Advantages:
Ranged Attack 2, Teamwork

Powers:
"Heat Powers"
Senses 1 (Infravision) [1]
"Projectile Blast" Blast 8 (Feats: Split) (17) -- [18]
  • AE: "Ignition Touch" Damage 8 (8)
Flight 5 (60 mph) [10]
Heat Aura 5 [20]

Offense:
Unarmed +8 (+2 Damage, DC 17)
Ignition Touch +8 (+8 Damage, DC 23)
Projectiles +8 (+8 Ranged Damage, DC 23)
Initiative +3

Defenses:
Dodge +10 (DC 20), Parry +9 (DC 19), Toughness +3, Fortitude +5, Will +5

Complications:
Enemy (The H'San Natall)

Total: Abilities: 46 / Skills: 24--12 / Advantages: 3 / Powers: 49 / Defenses: 14 (124)

-Joto was one of the best of the "Jurgens Titans", at least in terms of getting later play (he even showed up in the Cartoon and One Year Later as "Hot Spot"!). As I've said before, the deal with these mid-90s Titans was that, with the main series dead, there was this alien race called the H'san Natall (yeah, how'd this series fail to take off with THAT as the big bad?...) and they impregnated a bunch of humans, and their super-powered children were supposed to help them take over the world. Because every hero in Earth was trembling at the thought of Joto, Prysm and Fringe coming their way. Joto died, but was reborn after sending a heat pulse with his soul in it into Prysm- though he was initially reborn as a killing machine.

-With the aliens defeated, Joto (who changed his name after it came out that "Joto"- Swahili for "heat"- is an anti-gay slur in Spanish) entered Comic Book Limbo, reappearing much later with more powers. His existence after this is basically “background extra”, standing out because of his race. He joined off-panel in the “One Year Later” bit, then got passed over for membership one time. He was one of three heroes killed in a story I’ve never heard of called Heroes in Crisis, which was released in 2018 by a former CIA counterterrorism expert who wanted to write a comic that showcased how he dealt with trauma through the eyes of some superheroes. So he’s Yet Another Dead Titan.

-Most of the mid-90s Titans were pretty low-end by design, being fairly weak superhumans with little experience. Joto reflects this, being an under-pointed PL 8 back in his original form, though he's a very smart kid (he was in college despite being 16). Few Skills or Advantages to his name, and his powers were pretty weak: a touch-range power that could burn things, infra-red vision, and a projectile blast that could fire his own super-heated projectiles (providing he wore a special Wrist-Launcher Device). For Joto's later appearance, he's probably still PL 8, but added a Flame Aura and Flight giving him a full PL 8 build with a couple points over the recommended Points-Per-PL.
Last edited by Jabroniville on Fri Jun 24, 2022 1:24 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Woodclaw »

Another bit of my DC/Marvel merge universe: I always thought that the reason Vic's father never tried to use the sam tech to help other people is that he actually retro-engineered from the original Deathlock (Luther Manning), before Michael Collins's mind was uploaded into it. In a Terminator-esque twist, this actually ensured that there would be a Deathlock one day, since the entire project would be an attempt to militarize Vic.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by KorokoMystia »

Also, man, I just found out about the upcoming animated movie, Justice League vs. The Fatal Five, which uses the original JLU artstyle and voices! The Fatal Five are cool, but the Fatality Flaw is always a problem, but hey, it's quite a surprise to see the Legion getting love.
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Re: H’San Natall

Post by HalloweenJack »

Jabroniville wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 12:26 am Image

THE H'SAN NATALL
Created By:
Dan Jurgens & George Perez
First Appearance: The Teen Titans #1 (Oct. 1996)
Role: Conquering Alien Race

-Okay, so this was just guaranteed to failure right from the beggining. Hey, future writers? You want to have your Big Mean Conquering Alien Race seem bad-ass? Don't name them THE H'SAN NATALL? Who in hell is gonna be intimidated by THAT?

-The H'San Natall are an alien race with a specialty in bio-genetics- they invade worlds by "seeding" future mothers, resulting in super-powered children, which they seek to control. It was this means that created the second incarnation of the Teen Titans, with Dan Jurgens writing and drawing a squad of newbies. When the aliens abducted three Hybrid Teens for mental programming, they were sprung by The Atom (who was accidentally sent along for the ride) and allied with Prysm (another hybrid). Finally, they are defeated by the intervention of Captain Marvel Jr., Changeling, and Superman- Superman convinces them to cease hostilities (by threatening their mothership), and they are never seen again.

THE H'SAN NATALL?!! Why even Darkseid avoids those creatures!!!!
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by HalloweenJack »

also worth noting that Joto was originally going to be called 'Slag' though they may have scrapped the idea because that too is some what of a slur....also, who named their hero 'Slag'? That's MUCH more of a name for a villain.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by KorokoMystia »

HalloweenJack wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 7:18 pm also worth noting that Joto was originally going to be called 'Slag' though they may have scrapped the idea because that too is some what of a slur....also, who named their hero 'Slag'? That's MUCH more of a name for a villain.
Yeah, it's a slur in some places, especially the UK. There is a dinobot named Slag (and of course "slag" was a common curse word equivelant in the Transformers-verse), though I dunno if he's had his name changed by this point.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by HalloweenJack »

KorokoMystia wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 7:33 pm
HalloweenJack wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 7:18 pm also worth noting that Joto was originally going to be called 'Slag' though they may have scrapped the idea because that too is some what of a slur....also, who named their hero 'Slag'? That's MUCH more of a name for a villain.
Yeah, it's a slur in some places, especially the UK. There is a dinobot named Slag (and of course "slag" was a common curse word equivelant in the Transformers-verse), though I dunno if he's had his name changed by this point.
considering he's an angry, destructive, stubborn type, I can get behind him being named Slag
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by Ares »

What's funny is that the Transformers setting eventually used words like "slag!" In place of curse words. So Slag is basically like being named "Shit" in Cybertronian.
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Re: Jab’s Builds (Raven! Danny Chase! Red Star! Changeling! Cyborg!)

Post by KorokoMystia »

Ares wrote: Mon Jan 21, 2019 7:51 pm What's funny is that the Transformers setting eventually used words like "slag!" In place of curse words. So Slag is basically like being named "Shit" in Cybertronian.
Yeah, it's pretty hillarious. I mean, I'm pretty sure nobody's ever going to name a super-character Guano. (though there is that Acolyte named Spoor..)
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