This is not the 616 Marvel Comics continuity. It is not the 199999 MCU. It isn't the 1610 Ultimates universe.

We're going to decide what the deal is, exactly. Campaign permutations. These fall into two categories:

1. Setting. I'm most familiar with older Marvel comics so I'd like to start investigations near the dawn of the Silver Age... but when does that happen? In 616 it was 1961, when the Fantastic Four shot off into space. In the MCU it was 2008, when Iron Man revealed himself to the public. In the Ultimates it was when Nick Fury formed... The Ultimates.

What about us? What era would you like the game set during? The 80s? 2021? Earlier? Later?

2. Structure. You're investigators and fact checkers. For whom? A biographical comics company? A True Supercrime podcast? A YouTube channel?

Let's figure this out.

The beginning of the Silver Age is fine with me! There's a lot of stuff I haven't read, and I'm happy to go where you want to with this. I'd prefer to begin in the modern day with heroes breaking in now but with a history of heroes as well (the Golden Age WWII stuff but handled similarly to how The Ultimates handled the past).

If you start with the Fantastic Four, it would be easy to start with a space launch that went wrong. Then Spider-Man, the Hulk, and Thor, and then Iron Man and the X-Men. The Avengers are formed. Captain America is rediscovered.

A biographical comics company would be interesting, and the players could be writers and artists. However, if heroes are just now appearing, what kind of comics would they have done before? I suppose westerns, war comics, funny animal comics, that sort of thing. Perhaps Captain America and Defenders comics are still around? Or maybe they're considered relics of the past, and this marks a huge revival in superhero comics? The idea of superheroes being retro could be fun to play around with.

However, when you first floated this idea, I thought about this being a YouTube channel. It's pretty easy to set one up, and the creators wouldn't be limited to just artists or writers. The drawback of doing a YouTube channel might be that it feels too current, and it wouldn't be connected to a larger tradition that a comics publisher would have.

Would the setting be New York City? I'm assuming so, what with all the heroes operating out of NYC, at least in the first part of the Silver Age.

Yeah, I'm thinking that the Timeline of Weird Stuff might look like this:

1. Antedeluvian Eternals and Deviants and Atlantis. Unrecorded history.
2. Hyborean Age. Conan is canonically Marvel. Fall of Atlantis on.
3. Various historical weirdness. Apocalypse. Dracula. Etc. All the pre-modern stuff that Marvel allows for. Maybe extra surprises. Untaught history.
4. Mystery Men in the 20s and 30s. The Shadow. The Phantom. Etc.
5. Golden Age Heroes in the 30s and 40s. First "Superheroes." Namor, Human Torch, Captain America, the Defenders, etc. This is when the biographical comics start taking off.
6. Late 40s to 60s are full of giant monsters and alien invasions leading into the Cold War; we can add stuff like James Bond, the (British) Avengers, the Prisoner, etc. The Spy stuff is heavily redacted and Top Secret for the most part but the comics cover the monsters and stuff.
7. 70s on we can say that some of the action TV shows of the era were occurring... like Airwolf and Knight Rider. Maybe Tim Burton's Batman happened. Darkman. Anything on theme but not directly connected to Marvel.

As far as comics vs youtube go... these media evolve. Maybe Marvel (the company) isn't just comics, but a media empire. Sure, the comics exist... but they've got podcasts and you tube channels and everything else, too.

Most of that isn't directly relevant to your job; you bring in the stories, the producers decide how best to present it. You could ALSO be a writer/artist/podcast host/vlogger/etc, but you could just be a fact-checker/field reporter.

The players could work directly for a company, have their own outlet, or be stringers selling stories to whatever outlet buys them.

The timeline looks great!

I like the idea of being some kind of freelancer. We dig up the dit and try to sell the stories to different outlets. That way, you could do comics companies, TV shows, YouTube channels, or anything else. The PCs focus on the investigative bits, write the stories, and sell them.

Now I'm thinking of Spider Jerusalem from Transmetropolitan, some kind of gonzo comics journalists.

I like that idea. Transmetropolitan was a great series.

Okay, the players will be stringers specializing in Tales to Astonish, Journeys into Mystery, Strange Tales, etc.

Go ahead and come up with a character. Consult with me as you see fit.

Hey there!

Full disclosure, I'm not a huge comic book guy, however I love writing and GURPS and character development. If anything I figure this would be a great chance to learn more about the Marvel universe and to provide a "layman" character that can help to draw out explanations and viewpoints from the more seasoned players.

The timeline looks great to me, did not know Conan was marvel but I'm a fan.

I did not come in with any preconceptions on character types, but if we are already talking about concepts, I can throw out Rich as a potential wildlife photographer turned aspiring videographer. If he pans out on paper, I might even be able to make him a novice bush pilot, might give the group a way to get around quickly as stories or leads break loose.

Happy to tweak that by the way, to help make it work with the rest of the group.

Do you guys want to be partners or rivals? It can evolve over the course of the game, of course, and as (if) more players join in.

We can work together, sure! That way we can cover more skills. If Rich is covering video and photography, Nate can specialize more in the writing side of things.

Just keep in mind that investigative skills are going to be more important than creative skills. I'll work in better rewards for better writing/electronics operation (media) and photography rolls, but actually finding the information is key.

In reply to Nathaniel Rockwell (msg # 8):

This sounds great to me. And yeah, good call GM. They will obviously need to ha e the basics in order to dig into things by the very premise of the game.

Welcome Charlotta to the game.

With three of you, you can be a bit more specialized as members of a firm. Feel free to hash out the details.

Welcome Charlotta!

As I see him now, Rich grew up "up state" in the northern part of New York where his father worked as a high end hunting guide, mostly for wealthy business sorts who did that sort of thing as a hobby or networking opportunity.

Rich never took an interest in hunting, but he did really love to watch the animals. He majored in Wildlife Biology, went broke and wandered for a few years before he starting submitting some of his wildlife photography at the recommendation of a friend. Turns out Rich was a way better photographer than a biologist, and he became a regular contributor to publications like National Geographic and Discovery. His "bread and butter" during his twenties was footage that was used in lower end nature documentaries.

A few years ago, Rich was down in the city meeting with an employer when something major broke loose. Not sure which event, not sure which hero's or villains yet, but Rich was near enough to get some killer footage, it went viral, and Rich decided that trying to get footage of Hero's in action was the next step in his career. At first it was about the money, that first big hit really set him up for awhile, but over the last few years he has become personally interested, he enjoys the challenge, it's fresh and interesting after years of waiting in hides taking thousands of photos and hundred of hours of footage waiting for the perfect shot of an eagle, or a bear or what not.

Mechanically I see him as being really good at photography, hiding in places to get good shots (stealth, observation, camouflage) , and in being able to access those places like climb, drive, pilot, etc . He likely also has some skills in Electronic Operations for things like Media and Surveillance, game cams come to mind, He is probably less inclined towards influencing people and in doing the heavy research although I do plan to pad his investigative skills a bit.

It's the dawn of the silver age so none of the contemporary 616 heroes or villains have made their appearance yet. This doesn't mean that there haven't been any at all - just none of the Marvel characters.

So basically feel free to pick a sci fi movie from the last few years and decide that that was what you got footage of... just nothing that changes the world too much, and nothing that was totally unknown by the general public.

Thanks for the welcome and Hi! to everyone!



I was looking to make Charlotta a more socially-inclined character, but before I start doing actual rules work on her, I have to ask:

Have we settled on a time frame for "our" Silver Age? 60's, Modern or sometime in between?


(I'll freely admit that I'm less interested in a modern setting, but if "the boys" prefer that ... ;) )
This message was last edited by the player at 19:09, Sat 20 Nov 2021.

So far we're defaulting to "the silver age but it starts in 2021" but if you guys want to tweak that I'm fine with it. I'd be fine with setting the game in just about any decade.

Just keep in mind that Marvel's timeline slides; those 60 years of comics only takes 15-20 years to play out.

I'm good with some sixties era shenanigan's.

We can have all of the aforementioned fun with some period appropriate alterations.

That would put us back solidly in TL7 for most of the developed world.

60s it is.

How do you guys want your freelancing to work?

I think I am going to go with the aforementioned pilot route.

If we already have that much invested in transportation, I figure we might as well have the freedom of being poor, plucky independents. Open to other options though.

We've mostly settled on setting the game in the 1960s, but one final thought on the matter.

Marvel operates on a sliding timescale. Spider-Man is in his 30s, not his 70s. The silver age kicked off 16 years ago in universe, not 61. We compress 61 years of comics into 15-16 years of events.

What this means is that for every 4 years that pass in the real world, 1 year passes in the Marvel Universe. So our "year one" of 1961 will cover comics that were published between 1961 and 1964. "year two" covers comics published 1965 to 1968. And so forth.

The interesting implication here is that by starting in the 60s, we reverse the sliding time-scale. The comics that came out in the 80s? We'll encounter them in the mid to late 60s. We'll hit Civil War (out in 2006) in the 70s.

(I mean, if we manage to keep the game going that long!)

The point is we'll see slower technological and social growth than what storylines assume, and we'll have to interpret them that way.

I'm cool with trying this, but it'll give the game a very specific feel. If you guys want to change your minds and have the game set in a more modern era, we can.