Long Time DC Colorist Adrienne Roy Passes Away

Adrienne Roy, who created color designs for most of DC Comics' top comic books for more than two decades, lost a year-long battle with cancer on December 14. She was 57 years old.

A native of Verona, New Jersey and a Magna Cum Laude fine art graduate of William Patterson University, Adrienne was active in science-fiction and Star Trek fandom before she became one of the first female comic fans to break into the ranks of New York comics professionals. She initially assisted her then-husband, DC Comics staffer Anthony Tollin, with his freelance color work before she moved (rapidly) to working on her own. Before long, her work was seen on Superman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Warlord, The New Teen Titans, House of Mystery and many other titles but she was most often associated with the DC books featuring Batman. Amazingly prolific — and often specifically requested by artists — she was at one point the only DC freelancer with her own desk in the company's Manhattan offices. She was also the first colorist signed by the firm to an exclusive, multi-year contract.

Her long tenure on Batman (more than 600 issues of various comics featuring the character) meant that her credit appeared on more tales of the Caped Crusader than anyone else except for Bob Kane. "Adrienne made it easy to take her for granted because she was quiet, pleasant, reliable — never any fuss with her — and her work was always exemplary," former Batman editor Dennis O'Neil recalls. "It's only in retrospect that I realize what a blessing she was to my editing."

She lived her final years in Austin, TX, and is survived by her daughter Katrina Tollin, her brother Normand Roy and her former husband and art partner, Anthony Tollin. She is also survived by more than 50,000 pages of colorful comic book storytelling featuring the World's Greatest Super-Heroes. I always liked Adrienne and am saddened (but given her recent health, not surprised) by this news.

DJ Earworm “Working Feverishly” to Complete United State of Pop 2010

I'm wondering if this year's might be a little scary, due to the selections available.

Following the publication of the Billboard 100 for 2010 (USA music chart), DJ Earworm has been 'working feverishly' to complete his famed 'United State of Pop' mashup track, which seamlessly blends the top 25 tracks of the year.

Edit: If you want to keep your own watch, you can find DJ Earworm's website here.

Play This Blog

Change To Comments

I've made a change to how people are able to comment on my blog. Since the great number of anonymous comments that I receive on this blog (which is why comments have been on moderated status) are spam, I have made it so that people can no longer post anonymously on the blog. From now on, posting will require some form of logging on. Since I have taken away the ability to post anonymously, I have also taken away the moderated status for comments, and have activated the word verification instead. However, if spamming continues at the rate that it has (I receive at least five spam comments per day) I will reactivate moderation. Hopefully that won't be necessary.

Spirit of the Four Colors Update

Just a note to those who followed my start on the "Spirit of the Four Colors" FATE build. I want you to know that they project hasn't died. I've just got paying jobs in the queue before it. Look for a big update in the new year. I already have some changes I want to make to the part I've posted and I've been thinking a lot about character creation. This is definitely not a dead project.

The 50 Dirtiest Comic Book Sex Scenes

So comic books have grown beyond spandex do-gooders punching jaywalkers in the breadbasket - now they're fit to depict the full range of human experience. And that includes sex.

Captain Britain And MI:13 - 25 Comics Cancelled Too Soon

In the old days, even the dumbest comics got a chance to thrive - hell, Dazzler lasted thirty-eight issues! Unfortunately, in the post-everything America, stuff gets cancelled right and left. Here's 25 comics that should have lived longer.

It Aint Girl Talk… It's Better

I'm reposting a link to the Radioclash website (click the title above) for a series of compilations entitled "It Ain't Girl Talk, it's BETTER" put together by Tim of Radioclash (and mashup producer Instamatic), for those people who are under the misguided impression that Girl Talk does good mashups. These, my friends, are much better. Click and download. Click and download.

Well if you've been hanging around Pitchfork exclusively for the last 8 years you'd have missed all of the mixes (usually released free) by people who haven't had the handy PR-handup like Gregg Gillis has. And they can do it FAR better than he - and in most cases have been doing it longer

Superman decorations to cover Christmas tree at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport

The daughter of Jerry Siegel, the co-creator of Superman, said her father loved Cleveland because it was the first city to embrace a character who would one day be one of the most recognizable icons in the world.

While in town visiting relatives, Laura Siegel Larson attended a meeting of the Siegel and Shuster Society and said her father would be proud of the work the group is doing to promote Cleveland as the home of Superman creators Siegel and Joe Shuster.

Lou Ferrigno Joins Controversial Arizona "Posse"

Colleen Doran: The "real" victims of online piracy

For more than 20 years, I’ve written and drawn comics for a variety of major publishers: Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, Image and Disney. Like many artists, I’ve seen my sales figures chipped away as the print market shrinks due, in no small part, to rampant online piracy.

I tried to count the number of pirate sites that had my work available for free download, but when I hit 145, I was too depressed to go on. Pirates and impecunious fans inform me that pirating my work is great publicity, for piracy isn’t nearly as dangerous to an artist as obscurity.

Tokyo to Resubmit Bill on Sexual Depictions of Youths

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government has decided to re-introduce a revised bill to restrict manga and anime with explicit sexual depictions of children during the parliamentary session that begins at the end of this month. The bill would amend the Youth Healthy Development Ordinance to add these materials to the existing 'harmful publications' classification, and thus restrict their sales and renting.

Six x-rated comics you can read without shame

Good list, except that I've never been a fan of Birdland (which I believe is the only Eros Comics publication I own). I picked up the book on the strength of being a huge Love and Rockets fan and loving the work of Los Bros Hernandez (singly and together). This list has added to comics that I want to track down with Niplez n Tum Tum and Small Favors.

Dirty comics have been around almost as long as the medium itself. No doubt a few years after the Yellow Kid first appeared, some wiseacre created a Tijuana Bible of him getting busy with Buster Brown’s mom.

Yen Press To Adapt The "Parasol Protectorate"

For those of you who fancy vampires and werewolves, parasols and tea, then you simply must meet Alexia Tarabotti. Some of you may remember reading a sample of Miss Tarabotti’s adventures in the pages of Yen Plus. In an alternate Victorian London in which vampires and werewolves have taken their place in high society, Alexia Tarabotti is soulless. That is, whenever she comes into contact with one of the aforementioned supernaturals, his powers temporarily vanish and he becomes mortal. This makes her quite a threat to the immortal set, and Alexia’s life of tea and biscuits is constantly being interrupted by all sorts of trouble. Yen Press is pleased to announce we will be adapting the "Parasol Protectorate" novels into graphic novel form. Keep your eyes peeled for an artist announcement soon!

Open Core is Dead, Long Live Open Core

Open Core was my first public attempt at a role-playing game system. In some places it rocks as a game, but there are also some places where the seems show with the welds that I did between the various open content systems that formed my Open Core rules. There are things that I would do different today, and there are things that I could probably do better today (some may argue against that!) but, all in all, for a first try it was a good little game. I got a lot of fun hours of play out of it (as have many others around the world now) and that is all that anyone can ask out of a game.

After some thought, and a brief conversation with my cohort in crime and publishing, Jonathan Thompson, I decided that it is time to close the book on this version of the Open Core system. Mind you, it isn't going to go away completely. The Open Anime game put out by Jonathan and I, and featuring the great genre advice and rules tweaks of Ewen Cluney isn't going to go away. If will live, as an ongoing testament to the capabilities of the system that started when I asked myself why a game system I was using at my gaming table didn't have the powers or magic that I really needed for a game. It is always great to see someone take what you came up with and run with it in ways you might not have expected.

Now, Open Core isn't going away, not completely. As some of you may know, I also designed a lighter version of the Open Core rules called Open Core Quick. Quick (as we've always called it internally) came about for a few reasons (one of which has always been kept a secret in public). I had been experimenting with streamlining the rules of Open Core for my personal games. The long that I'm a gamer, the less rules I seem to want at the table, so for my own play I pared and trimmed and boiled things down to their essence over time. And then we started negotiating for a licensed property and I said "Hey, I have a system I've been playing that could work for that." The license was Robotech, and ultimately there was a parting of the ways during the licensing process and you all probably know who ended up with the license (again). That left us with a perfectly good system sitting around. A few rounds of playtesting and we decided to release Open Core Quick to the world. People have liked it, too. Usually different people than those who liked Open Core, which is perfectly cool. Since parting ways with Seraphim Guard two of the primary things on my plate have been relaunching Open Core and Open Core Quick, since both of these are my game design babies. I've been puttering around with both systems trying to get them to a point where I can release them on to an unsuspecting public. Then Open Anime came out and I decided that I was pretty happy with what we had done with the Open Core system build for it, but it wasn't what I was interested in as a designer or a publisher any more. It will still live in Open Anime, and from talks that Jonathan and I have had it will get revisited by other hands.

The future of Open Core, however, is going to be Quick. For a summer 2011 release (provided further playtesting goes well when I start that up) the second edition of Open Core will be an update of what had previously been the Open Core Quick system. Open Core will continue in a new direction and with a new design imperative behind it. Will this make all of the fans of the first edition of Open Core happy? No, probably not, but change happens and I hope that once the second edition of Open Core is release the old fans of both versions of the system will find a happy place for the new game and we will be able to gather together some new fans for it as well. Open Core is Dead, Long Live Open Core.

Jerry Robinson Interviewed by Chris Mautner

Even if Jerry Robinson had initially left comics for a career in journalism as he had originally intended, he’d still be fondly remembered for his work on Batman, particularly in creating the arch-villain the Joker.

I Want A Cookie

DJ Schmolli - Ghosts And Fear For Halloween

Thinking About AD&D

I've been thinking about AD&D the last few days, since a couple of the panels at Necronomicon and the discussions we had on them. When I say AD&D I mean first edition because I never played or followed AD&D 2e. I don't think I've played AD&D since 1986 or so. My last game in the "old school" of (A)D&D was a Rules Cyclopedia game of D&D in '88 or so. But I've been thinking about it again.

Yes, the game was a mess compared to "modern" rulesets, but I don't care. I'm not going to rationalize or justify the messiness of the rules. I liked them. That's part of what made them fun.

I'm not going to analyze them either. For me, personally, that defeats the purpose of the games when I was younger. They just were. We played and had fun.

But I do now want to pull the books off the shelf and play them again. :)

Wallace Shouts "Shazam!" In 2011

Captain Marvel and the rest of the Marvel Family haven't been featured in their own, in DCU continuity, ongoing series for more than a decade, dating back to the 'Power of Shazam' series, which ran 48 issues from 1995 to 1999.

But Eric Wallace is doing everything within his power to keep Shazam! alive, first delivering the one-shot 'Blackest Night: Power of Shazam' #48 last January and then featuring Osiris – brother of Isis and brother-in-law of Black Adam – in his current run on 'Titans.' Next up, the veteran television writer ('Eureka') is telling a story featuring Freddy Freeman, Billy Batson and Mary Marvel in a 'Shazam' one-shot scheduled for January 2011.

Spirit of the Four Colors: Introduction

This post is going to be a bit of a text dump because I am going to start playing with the SotC SRD and molding it into Spirit of the Four Colors. Sometime these changes may seem minimal, while others will see more more extensive. One of the big changes you are going to see in this post deals with gaining Fate points, making them more "super-heroic" in my opinion. This is one of the places where I am looking at Eddy Webb's Marvelous Superheroes rules, not to mention my many years of super-heroic gaming. Assume these specific Spirit of the Four Colors posts are being released under the OGL (and only them). I will make a post with the specific section 15 designations once I know what I will, and will not, be drawing open content from. Spirit of the Four Colors is very much a work in progress, so keep that in mind when using material from these posts. Only Spirit of the Four Colors posts are considered to be open content.

One thing to keep in mind, that I won't be getting to just yet, is that I want to break actions down in more "comic book" way. That means a move to panels, pages, books as units of time measurement. If you've ever played the great super-hero game Golden Heroes (currently back in print as Squadron UK) you'll know the direction that I want to take.

Comments are appreciated, and I do moderate my comments because of heavy spamming. Don't fear, I get to approving comments pretty quickly.

All right, here's part one of Spirit of the Four Colors:

The Basics

Things You Should Have

You’ll need a few supplies along with these rules to play the game. Here’s a list of mandatory items, as well as some recommended ones.

You’ll need:

• Four Fudge Dice for each player and the GM. If you don’t have Fudge dice, see Grey Ghost Games (www .fudgerpg .com) or your local RPG dice supplier for a pack, or just substitute regular six sided dice.
• Some copies of character sheets or at least blank paper to record characters.
• Writing implements.
• Friends. (For running a game, the sweet spot’s somewhere between two and six. For creating characters, the more the better – the more folks you have with characters, the easier it will be to put together a game whenever you feel like it.)

You’ll find useful:

• A set of poker chips or glass beads (to use as fate points).
• Index cards to pass notes and to make notes on things that come up in play.
• Snacks.

The Ladder

Most things in the system are rated according to the ladder below (when we say “the ladder” throughout the text, this is what we mean). Usually, the adjectives are used to describe things – someone might be a Good Pilot or Poor at Academics. The adjectives and numbers are interchangeable, so if a player or GM is more comfortable with numbers, it is equally valid to say Pilot: +3 or Academics: -1. The best compromise is often to use both, as in a Pilot: Good (+3) or a Academics: Poor (-1). On this scale, Average represents the level of capability that someone who does something regularly and possibly professionally, but not exceptionally.

(Right now the ladder isn't set in stone. I need to get some playtesting to see if and expanded ladder is needed for this, or if we can work around with the standard SotC ladder. I really want to keep this as close to SotC as I possibly can. Either tomorrow or later today I plan on posting my thoughts on an expanded ladder.)

+8:	Legendary
+7:	Epic
+6:	Fantastic
+5:	Superb
+4:	Great
+3:	Good
+2:	Fair
+1:	Average
0:	Mediocre
-1:	Poor
-2:	Terrible

Most people are Average at the things they do for a living, like Science for a scientist, and are Mediocre or Poor at most other things. It is only when they are driven to excel that they surpass those limits.
Pulp heroes push the very boundaries of what “normal” people are capable of, and as such, they tend to be Superb at whatever their central passion is. This means that pulp heroes are genuinely exceptional individuals, and are frequently recognized as such.

Rolling the Dice

Whenever a player rolls dice, he rolls four Fudge dice (abbreviated as 4dF) to generate a result between -4 and 4. When reading the dice, a + equals +1, a - equals -1 and a 0 equals 0. Some example dice totals are shown to the right.

Sample Dice Totals

• - + - - = -2
• +0 0 0 = +1
• 0 + 0 - = 0

The total of the dice is then added to an appropriate skill to get a result. This result can be referred to as the effort made, but sometimes, it’s just "the result."

If you find yourself without Fudge dice, then roll 4 six-sided dice. Any die showing a 1 or 2 is treated as -, and any die showing a 5 or 6 is treated as +.

Difficulty

When a character rolls for a result, he is trying to meet or exceed a target value, which is the difficulty for the roll. The difficulty indicates how hard it is to do something. Difficulties are measured on the same ladder as everything else. For instance, it might be a Mediocre (+0) difficulty to jumpstart a car, but a Good (+3) difficulty to repair that same car after a serious breakdown. Guidelines for setting difficulties are found in the GM’s section of these rules.

The difference between the difficulty and the result of the roll (the effort) is the magnitude of the effect, which is measured in shifts. Shifts are used, primarily by the GM, to determine the potency of a character’s efforts and to govern the resolution of complex actions. We’ll talk about shifts more in upcoming posts.

Skills

Characters have skills, like Drive and Guns, which are rated on the ladder (see above). Considered on the most basic level, skills represent what your character can do. When a character rolls the dice, he usually is rolling based on his skill.

Nearly every action that the character might undertake is covered by his skills. If he doesn’t have a skill on his sheet, either because he didn’t take it or the skill itself doesn’t exist, it is assumed to default to Mediocre.
Skills are covered in greater detail in their own post.

Aspects

Characters also have a set of attributes called aspects. Aspects cover a wide range of elements and should collectively paint a picture of who the character is, what he’s connected to, and what’s important to him (in contrast to the "what can he do" of skills). For super-heroes, this part of the rules is going to be the real meat and potatoes of things. Modern super-heroes, whether in the modern world of Marvel mutants or in the post-Watchman realms as the super-hero story as psycho-drama, are "built" as much off of who they are and what motivates and drives them as they are their super-powers. One of the things that we are going to try to do in Spirit of the Four Colors is integrate these two things into one super-hero game. Being a long time super-hero gamer, I can say that any game can be turned into a super-hero game, but what I want to do with Spirit of the Four Colors is make an integrated super-heroes game, not just a game with super powers that can be used as a super-heroes game. Will I succeed? I don't know, but I hope so.

Aspects can be relationships, beliefs, catchphrases, descriptors, items or pretty much anything else that paints a picture of the character. Some possible aspects are shown here.

Sample Aspects

• Quick Witted
• Lone Survivor of a Lost Civilization
• Without Fear!
• Living on Borrowed Time
• Stubborn Like a Mule

For many, many more examples see the aspects post. An aspect can be used to give you a bonus when it applies to a situation. Doing this requires spending a fate point (see below). In this capacity, called invoking an aspect, it makes the character better at whatever it is he’s doing, because the aspect in some way applies to the situation (such as “Dapper” when trying to charm a lady).

An aspect can also allow you to gain more fate points, by bringing complications and troubling circumstances into the character’s life. Whenever you end up in a situation where your aspect could cause you trouble (such as “Stubborn” when trying to be diplomatic), you can mention it to the GM in the same way you mention an aspect that might help you. Alternately, the GM may initiate this event if one of your aspects seems particularly apt. In either of these two cases, this is called compelling an aspect, and its effect is that your character’s choices are limited in some way. If the GM initiates or agrees to compel the aspect, you may get one or more fate points, depending on how it plays out.
We’ll talk more about fate points shortly.

Stunts

Stunts are those things that a character can do which stretch or break the rules. They are the special tricks the character has up his sleeves. Stunts have very specific uses and rules, and are detailed extensively in their own post. Starting characters will have ten stunts. (Yes, right now the number of stunts for starting characters is arbitrary. I think that a starting super-hero could have twice as many stunts as a starting pulp hero. Eventually I am going to write up a table with a sliding scale....the number of starting stunts and aspects per phase according to rough super-heroic power levels for characters.)

Fate Points

Every player begins the first session of the game with a number of fate points (FP) equal to how many aspects he has, usually ten. Fate points give players the ability to take a little bit of control over the game, either by giving their character bonuses when they feel they need them, or by taking over a small part of the story. Fate points are best represented by some non-edible token, such as glass beads or poker chips. (Previous experiments with small edible candies have left players strapped for points!)
Characters may, at any point, spend a fate point to gain a bonus, invoke an aspect, tag an aspect, make a declaration, or fuel a stunt.

Gain a Bonus

 

A fate point can be spent to add 1 to any roll of the dice, or improve any effort (such as an attack or defense) by 1. In practice, this is the least potent way to use a fate point – you’re usually much better off using one of the other applications, below. (Most games get rid of this rule once their players get comfortable using aspects; you can, too .)

Invoke an Aspect

 

Aspects (see above) are those things that really describe a character and his place in the story. When you have an aspect that’s applicable to a situation, it can be invoked to grant a bonus. After you have rolled the dice, you may pick one of your aspects and describe how it applies to this situation. If the GM agrees that it’s appropriate, you may spend a fate point and do one of the following:

1. Reroll all the dice, using the new result, or
2. Add two to the final die roll (after any rerolls have been done).

You may do this multiple times for a single situation as long as you have multiple aspects that are applicable. You cannot use the same aspect more than once on the same skill use, though you may use the same aspect on several different rolls throughout a scene, at the cost of one fate point per use.

Tag an Aspect

Scenes, other characters, locations, and other things of dramatic importance can have aspects. Sometimes they’re obvious, and sometimes they’re less so. Players can spend a fate point to invoke an aspect which is not on their own character sheet, if they know what the aspect is. This is referred to as tagging an aspect, and is covered in greater detail in the Aspects chapter, on page XX.

As a rule of thumb, tagging someone or something else’s aspects requires a little more justification than invoking one of your own aspects. For scene aspects, it should be some way to really bring in the visual or theme that the aspect suggests. For aspects on opponents, the player needs to know about the aspect in the first place, and then play to it.

Power a Stunt

Some stunts have particularly potent effects, and require spending a fate point when used. This is a sort of "meta-game" activation fee for your character's abilities. In a system like FATE, it is important to think of how you use Stunts and abilities as a story element rather than just "turning it on," as it works in a lot of other games. Using a Fate point to Power a Stunt is as much adding the impact of that ability to the story as it is anything else. If a stunt requires a fate point to be spent, it will be made clear in the description. See the section on stunts for more.

Make a Declaration

You may simply lay down a fate point and declare something. If the GM accepts it, it will be true. This gives the player the ability to do small things in a story that would usually be something only the GM could do.

Usually, these things can’t be used to drastically change the plot or win a scene. Declaring “Doctor Herborn drops dead of a heart attack” is not only likely to be rejected by the GM, it wouldn’t even be that much fun to begin with. What this can be very useful for is convenient coincidences. Does your character need a lighter (but doesn’t smoke)? Spend a fate point and you’ve got one! Is there an interesting scene happening over there that your character might miss? Spend a fate point to declare you arrive at a dramatically appropriate moment! Your GM has veto power over this use, but it has one dirty little secret. If you use it to do something to make the game cooler for everyone, the GM will usually grant far more leeway than she will for something boring or, worse, selfish.

As a general rule, you’ll get a lot more leniency from the GM if you make a declaration that is in keeping with one or more of your aspects. For example, the GM will usually balk at letting a character spend a fate point to have a weapon after he’s been searched. However, if you can point to your “Always Armed” aspect, or describe how your “Distracting Beauty” aspect kept the guard’s attention on inappropriate areas, the GM is likely to give you more leeway. In a way, this is much like invoking an aspect, but without a die roll.

Refreshing Fate Points

Players usually regain fate points between sessions when a refresh occurs. If the GM left things at a cliffhanger, she is entitled to say that no refresh has occurred between sessions. By the same token, if the GM feels that a substantial (i.e., dramatically appropriate) amount of downtime and rest occurs in play, the GM may allow a refresh to occur mid-session.

The amount of fate points a player gets at a refresh is called his refresh rate and it is usually equal to the number of aspects the player has. When a refresh occurs, players bring their number of fate points up to their refresh rate. If they have more, their total does not change.

Earning New Fate Points

Players earn fate points when their aspects create problems for them. When this occurs, it’s said that the aspect compels the character. When the player ends up in a situation where his compelled aspect suggests a problematic course of action, the GM should offer the player a choice: He can spend a fate point to ignore the aspect, or he can act in accordance with the aspect and earn a fate point. Sometimes, the GM may also simply award a fate point to a player without explanation, indicating that an aspect is going to complicate an upcoming situation. Players can refuse that point and spend one of their own to avoid the complication, but it’s not a good idea, as that probably means the GM will use things that aren’t tied to you.

This isn’t just the GM’s show; players can trigger compels as well either by explicitly indicating that an aspect may be complicating things, or by playing to their aspects from the get-go and reminding the GM after the fact that they already behaved as if compelled. The GM isn’t always obligated to agree that a compel is appropriate, but it’s important that players participate here. See the upcoming Aspects post for a more detailed treatment of compels.

Another, important, way to gain addition Fate points during play is for your character to act like a super-hero.

As the story unfolds, the hero may earn more Fate points during the course of the issue:

• If the GM uses one of the hero's subplots to further the story. For example, the Flame's weakness is water. If the Octopus tricks the Flame into submerging himself in water, the Flame's player gets a point of Fortune if the plan is successful. If the Magician from Mars rushes across town after fighting Hood to make a lunch date with her boyfriend or visit her a sick relative in the hospital, she gets a Fate point. Subplots are a way of dealing with Aspects that we are going to talk about in another post.
• If a player goes along with the GM to further the plot. For example, if the Great Question mesmerizes Amazing Man and the player allows Amazing Man to have his mind controlled instead of trying to resist, then Amazing Man gets a Fate point.
• If the hero is defeated in some way. This includes being knocked unconscious, being captured, or allowing a villain to escape. The GM may choose to automatically capture or knock out a hero through an ambush or inescapable trap – in such cases, the hero at least gets a Fate point out of the deal.

You'll notice that some of these look (and are!) similar to compels. Is that intentional? Well, yes. One thing that I have found in running and playing many, many years of super-hero games is that many players want to continue their behavior from other games (i.e. kill them and take their stuff) into their super-hero games. That might be fun for some, but to me really, that isn't role-playing a super-hero. So, because of that we have to reward players for having their characters act like heroes. This isn't a bad thing by any stretch of the imagination, and the Fate point system in these rules already encourages that sort of meta-game player rewards.

All Fate points earned during a game session are temporary, and disappear at the end of an issue (game session).

Edit: Cleaned up a couple of copy references, changing things from old system to new.

Halloween Haunt Megamix

HALLOWEEN HAUNT MEGAMIX by cheekyboy

And if you want to download it yourself, click here.

Spirit of the Four Colors

For a little experiment I'm going to start hacking the Spirit  of the Century rules into something suitable for big screen, four color, super-heroic games. I'm looking probably hacking in the power skills from Legends of Angelerre along with some material from Icons and Eddy Webb's Marvelous Super-Heroes Fudge hack.

Watch this space for more.

Edit: I forgot to mention throwing Phil Reed's 4C rules into that blender too. :)

Edit 2:

Legion of Super-Heroes: Election

By the order of the LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES CONSTITUTION, a Legion leader will be chosen in a manner determined by its membership. Please review the following list of active members for the Legionnaire that you feel embodies the traits and skills of a strong leader. Remember Legion Constitutional Amendment to Section 8.0: Anyone attempting to use their superpowers to influence the election may be exiled to Shanghalla and their votes discarded!

Computo will tally the votes between the polling period of OCTOBER 20 and NOVEMBER 10.

Coroner rules that Harvey Pekar's death due to 'natural causes'

American Splendor comic writer and Cleveland native Harvey Pekar died July 12th of an accidental overdose of two anti-depressant medicines, according to the Cuyahoga County Coroner's Office.

The 70-year-old Cleveland Heights resident was found dead by his wife, Joyce Brabner, in their home. His death was not a suicide, said coroner spokesman Powell Caesar, and Coroner Frank Miller ruled his death by natural causes on Pekar's death certificate Sept. 27th.

'He did not take his own life,' Caesar said. 'His death came as a result of accidental ingestion of fluoxetine and bupropion.'