The Supervillainy Saga thread

[TheStray7]

Zul-Barbas: The most personable of the Great Beasts, Zul-Barbas manifests as a variety of human deities of strange as well as surreal images ranging from giant squid dragons to sexualized goat monsters.

wat.

[Davies]

Zul-Barbas: The most personable of the Great Beasts, Zul-Barbas manifests as a variety of human deities of strange as well as surreal images ranging from giant squid dragons to sexualized goat monsters.

wat.

There's a certain Lovecraftian deity, whose name I choose not to repeat, known as the Black Goat of the Woods With a Thousand Young.

[TheStray7]

There's a certain Lovecraftian deity, whose name I choose not to repeat, known as the Black Goat of the Woods With a Thousand Young.

Ah. Shub-N***urath isn't actually described as a goat, though? Like, at all? I think Shubby is described as being more like "a giant cloud-like entity," and The Black Goat is a separate being associated with her?

Though The Black Goat is sometimes thought to be like Pan, and if we're talking Pan, then it starts to make more sense.

[CTPhipps]

It's a reference to Baphomet. The RL slander used to frame the Knights Templar.



Shula-Zheng is closer to Shub-Niggurath.

[TheStray7]

It's a reference to Baphomut. The RL slander used to frame the Knights Templar.

Ah, Okay. I'm not that familiar with Baphomet (mostly familiar with his D&D incarnation) and while I knew the Templars were slandered, I didn't realize "sexy goat demon" was the specific baddy used.

[CTPhipps]

It's a reference to Baphomet. The RL slander used to frame the Knights Templar.

Ah, Okay. I'm not that familiar with Baphomet (mostly familiar with his D&D incarnation) and while I knew the Templars were slandered, I didn't realize "sexy goat demon" was the specific baddy used.

Well, he was a lot cooler looking with wings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baphomet

[CTPhipps]

Random Factoids #3

1. How has popular media changed since the appearance of superhumans? This doesn't need to be directly related to superhero media -- are there any significant alterations that happened butterfly-effect style (like the appearance of actual costumed adventurers meaning pirate and horror comics continued to gain popularity in the Watchmen universe, or Stephen Spielberg making a well-regarded drama about New York rather than making Schindler's List?)

Superheroes are largely self-funded and part of this is due to merchandising, "historical comics", and social media output. Superheroes never take money for being heroes but they do often either draw a salary or accept donations for their effort through the Society of Superheroes foundation and other charities to continue their work. This has led to HINOS and Faux Heroes who do a lot of social media presence but very little actual heroism. It's also led to a few heroes who have been caught in corruption or other scandals. Washed up ex-heroes showing up on the equivalent of "Behind the Music" and "Where are they now?" are common.

Superheroes, aware of image, notably often use illusions and other magic to maintain their appearance as well as physical skill.

2. What is one major technology that is different because of the rise of superhumans?

Space Travel has been dramatically changed due to the nature of superheroes with the human race owning numerous faster-than-light craft but all of them having been acquired from other sources. In-system travel is pretty easily done and has been monetized to a certain extent with civilian space stations and a moon base. Colonization of Mars has been planned by interrupted by the Venusians (who are actually Tsavong colonists) who have their own historical claim on the area.

Cloning is something that is capable of being done but genuinely illegal. It's biggest benefit has been to the fact that organ donation is no longer necessary in this world as cloned organs are something that can be done up in a month for those on a waiting list. Clones can be made with memories but it is not generally a tool of immortality as the uploaded memories are spotty and largely unstable, leading to the "evil clone" stereotype. More compassionate people note they just are severely mentally ill versus evil and fast-grown clones tend to have short life spans.

Fusion technology is also notable to have replaced regular nuclear power and is more or less necessary for most superpowers to work. Micro-fusion devices are also fairly common for super-devices. Another notable improvement is that technology has advanced to be able to absorb the energy directly so that it no longer relies on turbines to generate power, which makes science far more energy efficient. Sadly, this has not eliminated all energy needs or global warming due to disasters like the PHANTOM Island disaster.

3. What is at least one major world event that has been altered/never happened that doesn't involve a war?

The last President of the United States similar to previous ones was George H.W. Bush with Android Join being the replacement for Bill Clinton, followed by former FBI director John Tolliver who served during the War on Terror (being the equivalent of Henry Peter Gyrich, it wasn't an improvement), Marcus Jones who was the son of the Black Bomber, and then Charles Omega before his Presidency was annulled.
Richard Nixon was, in fact, impeached and forced to serve six months of time due to being briefly replaced by Scaremonger.

Chernobyl is expected to be cleaned up in twenty years due to Battle Czar taking the majority of the damage (but leaving him with brain damage).

Hurricane Katrina a successful evacuation within a few days due to the help of heroes.

Similarly, the Deepwater Oil Spill and Fukishima Disaster were prevented form being worse than they could have been.

An infamous space shuttle accident also didn't occur in this world, saved by Ultragod.

All of history from the War on Terror past has been influenced by the arrival of heroes as well. Covid-19 being the obvious one as the advances in super-science prevented it from being nearly as devastating but a smaller yet still-lethal outbreak of Nanoplague killed over a hundred thousand people in the USA (still far better than in RL).

4. What's a notable counterculture trend that's been influenced by the appearance of superheroes/supervillains/superhumans/specific character?

A lot of Civil Rights movements have adopted superheroes as spokesmen. This has influenced their popularity both positively and negatively as black, gay, Jewish, and other superheroes have been subject to immense backlashes when they attempt to leverage their popularity for progress. This has also led to a number of reactionary "superheroes" teams that have often ended up becoming supervillains.

Supervillain counter-culture is also a thing with Supervillain Rap, fandoms, Innocence projects, posters, and people who tend to view them as awesome. A lot of supervillains have been adopted by political movements and as symbols too. There's as many movies about supervillain lives as there are heroes and often very flattering retellings that present them as tortured antiheroes instead of genuine villains. Basically, as much as the mafia is lionized in video games and street gangs, so are supervillains. There's even Grand Theft Auto game about a struggling supervillain in a thinly-disguised New Amsterdam.

5. What is a notable meme that exists because of the alterations to the world?

The antihero Shoot-Em-Up is a popular police icon for police. It's also very common for people to wear the PHANTOM skull and crossbones "ironically."

[CTPhipps]

Ultragoddess



Gabrielle Anders is the "teen star" of the majority of Earth's heroines even though she's in her early forties (and admittedly looks much younger). This is an eternal source of frustration as the heroine finds herself perpetually regulated to being the daughter of Ultragod. When your father is immortal and the world's greatest superhero, no sooner do you make accomplishments than he makes more to overshadow them.

This fundamental dissatisfaction combined with her simmering anger from dealing with horrific evils that have tried to get at her father through her or at her through her friends since before she could legally drink has left Gabrielle with a weakness in her character. It is a small weakness, barely an inconvenience, but one that has been exploited by mind-controllers as well as supernatural entities in the past.

In game terms, Gabrielle suffers a -2 penalty to her will save when dealing with mind-control, emotion control, and attempts to corrupt her with supernatural forces. It is an embarrassment for the heroine because it has become common enough to make her aware of it but there seems to be very little she can do about it without completely changing her personality

Gabrielle was basically born into superheroism as the daughter of Ultragod and his beloved, Polly Perkins. Her birth was celebrated on multiple planets and even die-hard bigots against Supers were swept up in the pageantry. Unfortunately, due to the nature of Ultragod's history, she was forced to be raised in The Observatory as well as places like Atlantis, Avalon, or the Society's headquarters.

Gabrielle did not so much long for a "normal" life as she became defensive and judgemental about the fact she was denied one. Whereas other heroes romanticized the common man and their carefree lives, Gabrielle devoted herself to believing that "normal" people lived awful lives that it was her obligation to improve. By the time she was fourteen, she was already fairly radical in her politics and by the time she was eighteen, she was already leader of the Texas Guardians.

Everyone was aware of Gabrielle's aggressiveness and outspoken nature but they assumed the Texas Guardians would temper her nature or that she was all talk. So, it was pretty surprising when they overthrew the government of a sovereign nation. In 1998, Zulan was long one of the most brutal and oppressive regimes in the Middle East, ruled by the insane General Amn Batani and a puppet state of PHANTOM killing all Supers in their hands like Londonium. Ultragoddess and the Texas Guardians stopped a genocide and broke the back of the regime in a day.

And, unlike how such stories usually work out in the world, it worked.

Unknown to the Society of Superheroes, Gabrielle had actually been working for the Foundation for World Harmony's Colt Colson that had prepared for a new regime to be propped up afterward that was not the democratic feminist secular utopia that Ultragoddess envisioned but certainly a damn sight better than the previous one.

Gabrielle was prepared to take the punishment she expected and to face the international consequences of breaking multiple treaties as well as intervening in the affairs of a sovereign nation. She had a whole speech prepared about the laziness of the United Government and the need to intervene when humanitarian crises like this were made. So, it was the straw that broke the camel's back when she was grounded.

Sadly, Zulan has since gone through multiple civil wars since then as the War on Terror resulted in the overthrow of the previous West-friendly regime and a dividing of the country among feuding groups.

Ultragod and the Society burned every favor they had (and probably more than they needed to) in order to protect their former sidekicks and the whole thing blew over with the only consequences that Gabrielle was kicked out of the Society--and not even permanently. Her license to practice heroics would simply be suspended until the time that she attended college and lived a civil life. She would actually enjoy this period of her life and only a few horrific consequences would emerge from it, including brainwashing her boyfriend into forgetting her secret identity after a failed engagement.

Ultragoddess would never return to the Society of Superheroes, though, and instead has become a ful-fledged spy managing Shadow Squad for the Foundation for World Harmony. Gabrielle is far more comfortable in the dirty business of nation-building, behind the scenes wetwork, and trying to "redeem" supervillains than she is as a public hero--even though she still attends most of the "Crisis" events that require all hands on deck. It's weird having one of the most famous women on Earth as a special operative but the fact she has multiple Ultragoddess Robots to handle her appearances helps matters. She has four of them usually active at a time and claims to use time travel or meeting with alternative selves when they're spotted together.

Powers: Ultragoddess has all of the powers of her father and is slightly better at Light construct manipulation even if she's physically less powerful (to a proportionate level to their bodies). Ultragoddess also has "Ultra-Hypnotism" which allows her to manipulate unsuspecting minds. Sadly, this is an ability she's very loathe to use these days because it can destroy the sanity of the strong-willed. She is a PL 14 character while the Ultragoddess Robots are all PL 10 and have their own distinct identities despite their shared origins.

Personality: Ultragoddess is in a perpetual state of being angry all the time but the reason she is due to the fact she's the most powerful woman on Earth but can't fix everything. It's interesting to note she's a sullen, cynical, and tempermental woman since her public persona is ridiculously happy bordering on twee. This is due to her publicist and her clones all having the personality of her cartoon character adaptation growing up. Despite this attitude, she genuinely loves helping people and rescuing people or fighting evil is the only time she really feels unreseveredly happy.

Gabrielle is not a cold-blooded executioner but has the practical view of killing that her father does (and he's kept a lid on) that she's willing to do so in order to save innocent lives. This fact would be almost as devastating to her public image were it to come out as the fact she used to in love with the world's wackiest supervillain.

[CTPhipps]

New Amsterdam

America's largest city by capita is also one that tends to be cordoned off from larger events and sticks to its own business. That's because New Amsterdam isn't actually a part of America's history as is. It exists entirely as a result of The Big Ass Time Disaster (as named by Gary Karkofsky) that the vast majority of people in Earth do not remember happening. Simply put, one day people woke up and there was a sister city beside New York. It's people only unconsciously realize they are someplace they should not be as the magic spells preserving them from realizing the horrifying destruction of their own universe is something that is holding well (for now).

The Big Ass Time Disaster was a massive battle across multiple Earths that was orchestrated by a brainwashed Diabloman and numerous other supervillains gathered together by Entropicus while the other Great Beasts empowered him. It was designed to collapse the local Multiverse Node and bring an end to uncounted trillions. In a rare case of superheroic failure, the plan succeeded but the Ultra-Force gathered all of the heroism of the universe together to rebirth reality.

The consequences of this reality shift are still being felt throughout the multiverse and are still being shaken out. On the positive side, Orkus has seemingly been destroyed for all time with only his avatars existing on other worlds. There was also the fact that most of Earth's divine pantheons were shaken out of their inactivity to actually begin defending reality against extra-dimensional incursions again. Earth-Nazi was also destroyed and rebuilt as a reality where Hitler was defeated much as he is in most realities.

However, New Amsterdam is a relic of the living wounds that still crisscross the timestream as a result of the attack. It is a place where the barriers between time and space are "thin" and it is the easiest place for incursions from Hell dimensions, the Twisted Realm, or attempting time travel or multiversal travel. Naturally occurring "soft places" occur as well, producing alternate-universe dopplegangers or shifting of reality that goes unnoticed by most of the people within. Superpowers are a common occurrence due to laboratory experiments or even mundane events like being struck by lightning or blasted with chemicals.

It is, overall, a very STRANGE town.

The city's local heroes, The Patriots, are known for sitting out virtually every major crisis of their adopted Earth as well as being individuals who are deeply secretive about their endeavors. This is because they're terrified that if the truth came out, that there would be no end of individuals who would attempt to exploit New Amsterdam's dimensional instability or turn against its people for being "invaders." Earth-Supervillainy exists on a razor's edge between adoration and persecution for its Supers. Worse, the city's heroes are constantly overworked trying to deal with constant outbreaks of ghosts or invasions from zombie worlds.

Perhaps most troubling is the fact that a decent chunk of the city's wealthiest and most powerful citizens are, well, Nazis. Not using that as a rhertorical device or as a well-deserved insult to authoritarians or internet trolls but in the sense that they're the dopplegangers of influential New Amsterdam citizens from Earth-Nazi. They have kept their repellent beliefs but formed a Secret Order that is supported by PHANTOM but they find to be far too mild for their tastes. Yes, you heard that correctly.

Indeed, ALL of New Amsterdam's population is made of refugees from the destroyed worlds that managed to survive the Big Ass Time Disaster. The people are left with a strange sense of malaise and fragments memories as they struggle to fit together despite their often incredibly different sociological attitudes as well as expected behaviors. People who visit New Amsterdam often say it is a schizophrenic sort of city with people acting like it's the 1940s, 1960s, 1980s, and present day with architecture that is equally strange.

New Amsterdam is the perfect place for heroes and villains from Freedom City or other settings to be able to interact with other heroes. It is the perfect invasion point for interstellar horrors and eldritch abominations. It is also a ticking time bomb of people struggling against a disaster they don't even know has happened.

[CTPhipps]

Hey folks, today is the day for my big Bookbub sale for THE SUPERVILLAINY SAGA 1-6 in honor of THE FALL OF SUPERVILLAINY and they're all available for 99c (all six for 99c, not just each individually). It's only this weekend and if you want to catch up on the series, it's a great bargain.

US Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Supervillainy-Sa ... 0CD7P6YYT/

UK Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Supervillainy- ... 0CD7P6YYT/

[greycrusader]

For those not yet acquainted with Charles through his extensive fiction or his previous superhero RPG work (particularly the Halt Evil Doer! campaign), one of his most impressive talents is his penchant for world-building. The history and culture of the fictional settings he creates are not just thought-out, but planned-out, with multiple interconnecting events and cause-and-effect scenarios that give a real weight to the stories his character move through. This doesn't mean falling into the trap of overthinking details that end up breaking suspension of disbelief ("hey, maybe we need to explain how Batman got that robot T-rex into the Batcave"-uh, no you don't, just let it be a cool thing). Instead, Charles simply doesn't ignore the important questions ("Who's in Batman's circle of trust, and to what extent?" or "What's public policy regarding the Bat-Family?), giving enough to make readers understand the changes in the world.

Along with that, a good bit of Mr. Phipp's work is a deconstruction-reconstruction of the superhero genre; rather than casting a more negative, even nihilistic version as "more realistic" that historically idealistic depictions (when it may just be equally unrealistic in the opposite direction), the works explore multiple ways of deconstructing a particular trope, sometimes finding humor, other times justifying comic book traditions. And smartly, the history and culture isn't static given the existence of super-powers, magic, aliens, or other fantastic fare, because in the "real world" such things couldn't remain the same if miracles and nightmares were taking place on a routine basis.

All my best.

[CTPhipps]

Thanks for the high praise, greycrusader!

It means a lot.