Superpowered Population and Demographics

On reading the threads, you look at Image Comics, they have all types,
including engineered clone super heroes(I.E. supreme 1-4 with that
morphing guy who was created in a lab). Realistically 1 in 1000 would
be a safe assumption going on a world population as a whole, but you
adjust down and up depending on overall power. say one in 10 people
are slightly psychic like empathy or even a minor danger-sense so to
speak, then the numbers might be higher, but they are so minor that
it's not even worth considering them in the total. realistic numbers
can't accurately be determined, but for super-powered people like any
of the marvel or dc freakazoids that are mutants wich considerably
more power than the others, and yes the greatest super-power is $$$,
look at bruce wayne and kingpin money to do almost anything. anyway,
just consider super=powered beings like spiderman and magneto and the
lot extremely rare for the amount of power they have and go down from
there!

On Sat, 16 Jul 2005 01:10:42 GMT, rgorman.RemoveThis@telusplanet.net (David
Johnston) wrote:

>On Sat, 16 Jul 2005 11:58:52 +1200, Rupert Boleyn
><rboleyn.RemoveThis@paradise.net.nz> wrote:
>
>>On 14 Jul 2005 21:56:50 -0700, lewis.RemoveThis@lwb.org carved upon a tablet of
>>ether:
>>
>>> All,
>>>
>>> I'm wondering what kinds of superpowered demographics you use in your
>>> campaigns? Has anyone broken down their world into percentages just to
>>> give them ideas on what they feel is reasonable? What about known comic
>>> book worlds? What would you say the percentages are in the DC universe?
>>> Marvel? The "Powers" universe? Etc?
>>>
>>> I'm about to start a new campaign with a couple of friends, and I'm
>>> trying to decide about the "Feel" of the world. Do we want 10 super
>>> beings of some kind in New York? 100? What percentage of beings with
>>> some level of power actually become criminals or heroes, and what
>>> percentage use their powers for unusual employment opportunities?
>>>
>>> I'm just curious about any thoughts you might have on any aspect of
>>> this subject.
>>
>>Here's a link to what I think is an interesting way of working out
>>supers demographics, by William Stoddard:
>><http://www.livejournal.com/users/whswhs/6899.html>
>
>Yes, that's a thought that occured to me when I read the Dragon
>article that richer, more advanced nations would likely have
>proportionately more supers than poorer ones because they have more
>dangerously cutting edge research and development and just plain more
>money to find, build and buy power investing objects.
>
>One thing I noticed though was that he specifically calculated the
>number of "superheroes" separate from "supervillains", and I'm not
>sure I see the point to that. It's a line that can be so very
>blurry, after all.
 >> Stay informed about: Superpowered Population and Demographics 

"Michael D'Auben" <mdauben DeleteThis @charter.net> wrote in message
news:XwqUe.8263$tc7.3211@fe03.lga...
> "David Meadows" <david DeleteThis @no.spam.here.uk> wrote in message
> news:4321e584$0$22918$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader01.plus.net...
>
> > Ten weeks into the campaign, you've got through 50 villains. For a year
of
> > play, you'll need a couple of hundred.
>
> That's a good point. I may have underestimated the percentage of villians
> among the supers needed to sustain a campaign? I would like my campaing
to
> be something more than a superhero version of D&D hack and slash. In
other
> words I don't want every session to be: supervillians do some thing evil
=>
> superheroes kick their butts=> supervillians to to jail=> superheroes
> collect experience points. So, I don't expect to "use up" five villians
per
> session. Sometimes yes, but other times the same story arc and same
> villians may be good for several battles and several session. This is
> certainly consistent with the genre.

Yes, of course, a game shouldn't be so formulaic and I was probably
over-exaggerating to make my point

You can sustain a pretty long run based around a couple of persistent
threats with intertwining story arcs and a small handful of minor villains
thrown in to provide non-arc "filler stories".

But my supers game is still running after 18 years so I tend to take a
long-term view of what a campaign will need. When I started I had a tiny set
of NPCs, and it was only when I realised the campaign was an unstoppable
monster that I had to add more and more. After my naive one-page player
hand-out entitled "dossier of all known superhumans", I was constantly
retconning to add new villains who *must* have been around for a long time.
If I had been aware of the campaign's scope right from the start, I could
have planned the world a lot better.


--
David Meadows
"Dear Grandfather, I know I haven't written for a while but
it's difficult when we are being chased by alien werewolf
soldiers." -- Chi-Yun, Heroes #27
http://www.heroes.force9.co.uk/scripts
 >> Stay informed about: Superpowered Population and Demographics 

sebree.RemoveThis@infionline.net wrote:

> Not often, but then, that does not make for a good story. "Joe gets
> up in the morning, and goes to work at the construction site, where he
> uses his super strength (relative to a normal person) to help with the
> construction of skyscrapers. After work, he heads out to a bar with
> his buddies, home to his wife and kids, and then does the same things
> the next day." That would not even last one issue.

"God's given me a gift. I shovel well. I shovel very well."

- The Shoveller, "Mystery Men"


--
>;k
 >> Stay informed about: Superpowered Population and Demographics 

Michael D'Auben wrote:
> I think there has to be some mechanism in a campaign to control this sort of
> "gadget proliferation." Perhaps all the really good gadgets requre some
> sort of "unobtainium" to build, making most of them unique, superexpensive
> or otherwise one-off items? Or perhaps gadget making needs to be almost a
> superpower in itself, so that *only* Dr. Goodgadget can make that
> antigravity harness.
>

I like the idea in "Wild Cards", that gadgeteering is actually a form
of psionic power. So, the mad scientists can build all kinds of whacky
things, but these things tend to be irreproducible results. In fact,
they
often cease working if they're away from the gadgeteer too long.

Thus, things developed by Real Science (TM) take from months
to decades to design, and are limited by the laws of physics, but
are mass-producible. Things produced by Mad Science (TM) can be
whomped together very quickly (months at the *most*, sometimes
it only takes *minutes*); can do pretty much anything; but are
nearly impossible to reproduce. Real Science gadgets have
reasonably predictable fuel and maintenance requirements; Mad Science
gadgets might suddenly up and open up a portal to the Negative Zone
one day for no particular reason. Or they might run forever on
the same D-Cell battery. You never know. Real Science gadgets
may have bugs or strange side effects, but these can in principle
be dealt with by engineering. Mad Science gadgets are far more likely
to have side effects, which are likely to be much stranger, and
often cannot be alleviated.

In real life, Thomas Edison is a good example of a really good
Real Scientist (including things like his attempts to make a
phone to speak with the dead, which just never worked). Nikola Tesla
comes surprisingly close to a comic-book Mad Scientist--even though he
made a machine that caused an earthquake in Manhattan, somehow
nobody is mass-producing Earthquake Machines a century later. In
fiction,
MacGyver is a (barely) plausible Real Science gadgeteer.
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Michael D'Auben wrote:
> "David Meadows" <david.DeleteThis@no.spam.here.uk> wrote in message
> news:4321e584$0$22918$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader01.plus.net...
>
> > Ten weeks into the campaign, you've got through 50 villains. For a year of
> > play, you'll need a couple of hundred.
>
> That's a good point. I may have underestimated the percentage of villians
> among the supers needed to sustain a campaign? I would like my campaing to
> be something more than a superhero version of D&D hack and slash. In other
> words I don't want every session to be: supervillians do some thing evil =>
> superheroes kick their butts=> supervillians to to jail=> superheroes
> collect experience points.

I know I'm a little late coming to the party, but I wanted to
point out that jail isn't the only genre-supported outcome for
a supervillain's defeat. There are a lot of "villain runs like
hell" scenario endings that still garner XP (and entertainment)
for the heroes, especially if the GM plays up the "you beat him"
aspect a lot more than the "you let him get away".

Reference most of Spider-Man's fights with Green Goblin,
for example.

--
Walt Smith
Firelock on DALNet
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David Johnston wrote:
> On 27 Sep 2005 11:59:31 -0700, firelock_ny DeleteThis @hotmail.com wrote:
> >I know I'm a little late coming to the party, but I wanted to
> >point out that jail isn't the only genre-supported outcome for
> >a supervillain's defeat. There are a lot of "villain runs like
> >hell" scenario endings that still garner XP (and entertainment)
> >for the heroes, especially if the GM plays up the "you beat him"
> >aspect a lot more than the "you let him get away".
>
> Yeah. My players never went for that. A game where the villain got
> away was one they chocked up in the loss column. And I don't think
> they were really wrong.

Makes me think of my old pulps campaign - if there's one genre
that only works if everyone is willing to help you enforce it,
it's pulp. Pulps had "main bad guy gets away to return in
the sequel" almost hard-coded into the physical laws.

--
Walt Smith
Firelock on DALNet
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On 27 Sep 2005 11:59:31 -0700, firelock_ny DeleteThis @hotmail.com wrote:

>Michael D'Auben wrote:
>> "David Meadows" <david DeleteThis @no.spam.here.uk> wrote in message
>> news:4321e584$0$22918$ed2619ec@ptn-nntp-reader01.plus.net...
>>
>> > Ten weeks into the campaign, you've got through 50 villains. For a year of
>> > play, you'll need a couple of hundred.
>>
>> That's a good point. I may have underestimated the percentage of villians
>> among the supers needed to sustain a campaign? I would like my campaing to
>> be something more than a superhero version of D&D hack and slash. In other
>> words I don't want every session to be: supervillians do some thing evil =>
>> superheroes kick their butts=> supervillians to to jail=> superheroes
>> collect experience points.
>
>I know I'm a little late coming to the party, but I wanted to
>point out that jail isn't the only genre-supported outcome for
>a supervillain's defeat. There are a lot of "villain runs like
>hell" scenario endings that still garner XP (and entertainment)
>for the heroes, especially if the GM plays up the "you beat him"
>aspect a lot more than the "you let him get away".

Yeah. My players never went for that. A game where the villain got
away was one they chocked up in the loss column. And I don't think
they were really wrong.
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