Remembering Celery, 2010-2024

I started 2024 with -- relative to my usual blogging output -- a bit of a bang.  And then I fell off...for a variety of reasons, one of which I'm about to mention...but I'd like to get rolling again.  There's one item I absolutely need to talk about first, however.

Celery and her custom blanket (thanks Joan!)

I've involved our girl Celery in my geek stuff on this blog before.  HERE she is statted out as a Super-Pet for Light City (as Princess Celery), for example...and HERE she is with her siblings and couple of my 'mons.  And depending on how you're reading this, there may be a picture of her, with a cap on backwards, over to the right as my profile pic.

Princess Celery

On Wednesday, 2/28/24, we had to let Celery go...crossing the rainbow bridge, as they say...to a well-deserved peaceful final rest.  Not knowing exactly where this little tribute is going to go, I'm assuming I'm going to ramble...so I want to lay out my thesis:  The world is a better place because Celery was in it.  The world is a worse place without Celery in it.  Celery did more for the happiness of the universe than most humans; when my end comes, if I can feel like I brought half the goodness to the beings of the world that Celery did, it will be a life well spent.

I have never seen an animal have the impact Celery had.  I realize, of course, that I'm biased...she was part of our family for about 13 years and during that time became arguably the "flagship" dog of the Linneman household.  Our love for Celery is unbounded.  It's been especially hard on Laura, who truly was Celery's primary partner in almost every adventure.  But...Celery's impact went way beyond that.

And now, I guess I'll just brag about my dog for a bit.  But where to start?

Okay...see that picture at the top of this post, with the Celery blanket?  About five years ago, when Laura and I worked at the ASPCA's Behavioral Rehabilitation Center in North Carolina, a highly fearful dog who came through the program (a little Chihuahua-thing named Helen) got away from her new family and was lost in New Jersey.  Because Laura was Helen's favorite person in NC and Celery was one of her favorite dogs, the two of them made a trip to Jersey to help secure her return.  They stayed with a very kind person connected to the animal rescue that Helen was adopted from.

A little while after returning to NC (with Helen eventually recovered safely not long after they returned!), a package arrived at work addressed to Celery Linneman.

As you might imagine, this was unusual.  Inside was the blanket above, sent by her wonderful new NJ friend that they stayed with.  Our girl had such an impact that she had a blanket made especially for her by someone she only met for a few days!

(Also, know how many pieces of mail came to me at the Behavior Rehab Center?  Zero.)

With Ruffles, who was absolutely obsessed with Celery...

The Behavior Rehab Center (or BRC, as I'll call it now that I realize I'm going to be typing it out repeatedly) was truly a place for Celery's gifts to shine.  She came to work with us often and served as a "helper dog" in treatments for others who were profoundly frightened of humans.  It's amazing how much scared dogs can learn from situations where they're with a dog that they love who also happens to love all the big scary people around.  Sometimes, it was determined that these extremely fearful animals had little opportunity for a reasonable and happy life in this world built for humans (or would potentially be a danger to people or other animals).  While they were certainly the saddest parts of her job (for us), there were a number of times that Celery's companionship was enlisted to make the euthanasia process as comfortable as possible, by providing support in the dogs' final hours or minutes.  I mean...that's angel stuff.

Celery with goodest boy Goliath at the BRC

There are plenty of really happy stories of Celery's good deeds at the BRC, however.  Her friend and extended Linneman family member Lily Jane, for example, was highlighted by the ASPCA's media team for an article and video about her story.  They had Celery tag along for the photo shoot to support Lily Jane (you can catch her at the end of the video in that link).  And Ruffles, pictured a couple of images up, was a fairly tough nut to crack with her fear.  She eventually had a very happy ending with a foster mom who adopted her and gave her a great life.  And while she was learning to trust people, I'm sure you can guess who her favorite friend and greatest source of comfort was.

Celery with my sweet Tulip (left) and BRC graduate/Tulip's biological mom Lily Jane (middle)

Looking back through some of our pictures of Cel-Bell (did I mention that we often called her Cel-Bell?), I'm realizing that I could talk ad nauseam about Cel's impact (and of course we called her Cel) on other dogs.  So...here's a sampler...

I think maybe we were in NC in this pic...?

I've also mentioned our girl Sunny...who had some profound behavioral issues of her own and needed a good friend such as Celery...before here on Monstrous Matters.  Sunny and Laura took part in nosework competitions.  Celery was her tournament companion and equipment manager.  (I was junior eqipment manager.)

And...oh yeah(!)...Cel also qualified for competitions by passing her odor recognition test for birch!  She truly was a Renaissance dog.  We actually have a video of her passing the test.  (I love how it gets cut short because Laura is so happy for us while filming...)

The Celery/Sunny relationship was a really interesting one to get to observe.  Sunny wasn't a dog who could get along with everyone, canine or (especially) human.  For Celery, meanwhile, a defining feature was the ability to get along with anyone and everyone...canine, human, feline, lupine, musteline, you name it.  She wasn't always a fan...but she was always respectful, a real live and let live type of girl with a tendency to bring her own idea of fun to just about any interaction.

Cel was Sunny's best canine friend (and probably best friend other than Laura)...but over time, Sunny's internal struggles cast a longer and longer shadow over their relationship.  They almost became "frenemies"...Sunny clearly loved her but was also easily tipped into jealousy.  Celery did all she could to defuse the tension and always had 100% trust from us that she wouldn't escalate a situation.  Just...an angel.

A quick look at a few more of her friendships:

With Murray, another behavioral oddball who found some stress relief in nosework

With previous Linneman flagship dog Angel, whose need for a playful friend was the reason we brought baby Celery home in the first place

With Suki, another sometimes-unpredictable dog picking up life skills at the shelter.  Celery often didn't completely trust her, and I like how in this picture, you can see a tiny bit of concern in Cel's mannerisms, but she was still the kindest girl imaginable.

I guess I could go on forever about what a dog's dog Cel-Bell was, and how much she helped so many other canines, and how amazing it was to watch such a beautiful being's innate gifts move the world in a positive direction.  At some point, though, I have to mention just how great Cel was with humans.  And she was really great with humans!

Celery was a bona fide love from the moment we met her, but as her confidence grew over the years, she reached a whole other level of friendliness.  It's hard to describe what made Celery Celery...she loved attention but was just a cool dog who was willing to let everyone else do their own thing, without judgment.  To the extent that she judged, she usually tried very hard to keep it to herself.

Celery was a certified pet-assisted therapy dog.  In Atlanta, I got to be her handler for most visits we made with the group Happy Tails Pet Therapy.  Here we are on a happy Saturday in September 2011, after both Laura and I qualified with her:

Fall Saturday in the South...so of course that also meant college football...

We would visit a local behavioral health and rehab facility, typically me with Cel and Laura with our girl Dishy (who was certified with Laura but not with me...).  Those are truly some of my best memories with her.  I enjoyed watching her change from a curious-but-kinda-nervous puppy (she was around a year old when we took her home) into a confident working dog ready to take on the tough job of having people tell her how cute she is.  She developed a method of swinging her butt around into a new person's legs when she was introduced to them.  She knew she was there to be petted.

So, a couple of the best memories from her therapy work...the first was once as we were leaving, when she got to meet an extra resident outside as we headed to the car.  She stole a sandwich out of his pocket and ate it.  So much about that memory...that the guy randomly had a sandwich in the pocket of his scrub pants...that she sniffed it out and ate it with no hesitation...and that the dude took it so well...I love it.

The other best memory doesn't even directly involve Cel.  In NC, only Laura was qualified to handle Celery for therapy visits.  One day we were at one of the little touristy sort of stores in downtown Asheville, and the woman behind the counter looked at Laura and said, "You're Celery's mom!"  Having been a resident at the behavioral/rehab facility where Laura and Cel would visit, she happily remembered Laura from her interaction with Celery...maybe months before...even though Cel wasn't even around at the time.  The fact that our girl made that sort of impression...well, of course that made us pretty happy.

Oh, we also discovered pretty early on that Celery was really good at wearing costumes (especially headwear), so we took every opportunity we could to dress her (and Dishy) up.  I know some people hate this...but I don't care, it was adorable, people freakin loved it, and Cel loved the attention.  Here are a few pics from those days:

For Easter

For Halloween, with Dishy

For the potentially problematic celebration that traditionally starts the Holiday Season

From an Atlanta Christmas parade we took part in each year with Happy Tails

Yeah, we were often amazed at how willingly she wore this stuff, too.

At this point, I've paused and restarted the writing process for this blog post so many times that I'm not even sure I've left a coherent thread to be followed from beginning to end.  If you're looking for one that I haven't succeeded in writing...the best I can say is to just take a look at that precious little yellow Labby girl shown in these pictures, and try to imagine a world where we all live up to her standards.  Always happy to see you.  No judgment.  Up for anything.  And just a very, very fun girl.

I know it'll never come as naturally to me as it did for Celery...and that I'm so lucky I got to see it all firsthand.  Man, do we miss this dog.

Being the bestest girl on a train ride

Posing in front of her own advertising photo...maybe Celery's most baller move ever

And here's that photo...the profile pic for "Lydia" as she was shown on the Atlanta Pet Rescue and Adoption website back in 2011.  On the ride home from the shelter, she ducked her head whenever we went under an overpass.  What a gift to get to see this girl grow...

My favorite comic book scientists

 It's becoming clear to me that my posting here will slow a bit now that I've finally started a new job here in Jersey.  But first, to celebrate the fact that I'm back in a lab doing SCIENCE! again, I was thinking of statting out Reed Richards for Light City, to fill out the FF a little more and focus on a pillar of comic book scientific grandeur.

And that got me thinking...is Mr. Fantastic actually my favorite comic book scientist?  Hmm...he actually might be...!  Obviously, comics are filled with folks who do literally fantastic things with their hypotheses and experiments.  I've almost always been more of a DC guy in general, but I realized that if I start to list out my favorite four color science nerds in my head, the DC reps, while probably outnumbering those from elsewhere, fit into some specific niches.  Reed, though...well, I'm not sure I can think of another character who has the ability to carry the weight of ridiculous comic book superscience quite like him.  I guess Ray Palmer would probably come the closest...

For the record...kind of off the top of my head and in no particular order...I'd list my top 10 comic book scientists something like...

1.  Reed Richards
2.  Ray Palmer
3.  Kirk Langstrom
4.  Bruce Banner
5.  Barry Allen
6.  Tina McGee
7.  Hank McCoy
8.  Leo Quintum
9.  Lex Luthor
10.  Jon Osterman

If TV universes held the most weight, I'd put Cisco Ramon in there somewhere.  I guess it's a decent list overall, although the publishers and I should both probably look into expanding representation in the character type a bit.  Lots of nerdy white guys there.  Of course, I'm a nerdy white guy myself, so that aspect of the character type's common form really hasn't been so obvious to me until right now.

Also...I know, I know...Bruce Wayne should probably be there.  He's just also too much of everything else to fit the bill for some reason...

Oh yeah!  And here's Reed for Light City:

Huh.  Okay, here's Reed for Light City using a class that hasn't been built yet, but which will maybe support a Mr. Fantastic that looks something like this...

Mr. Fantastic

Real name:  Reed Richards

Level 4 Rubber Band

AC 6[13]    HD 3d6 (10 HP)

Saving throw: 13, +2 to rolls to dodge objects

Move 12 ft.

STR 12    DEX 19(+1)   CON 12    INT 20(+2)    WIS 14    CHA 12

Attack:  Punch with a bigass fist (1d6 damage, reach 96 ft.)

Flexi-powers:  Gliding, Absorb Explosion (2d6 damage)

"I'm here live...I'm not a cat." Okay, yeah, this is funny...

 If you've been on the internet in the past day, you probably haven't been able to avoid seeing this video.  But really...why would you want to avoid it?

It could be an innocent mistake from a Texas attorney.  Or it COULD be an early sign of the cats' upcoming cultural infiltration.  I'll see if my contacts know anything.

If it is a feline Secret Invasion, I'll bet this cat is something like this...

Whiskers, Attorney Undercover

Level 3 Super-Pet

STR 4     DEX 16 (+1)    CON 8     INT 12     WIS 10     CHA 15(+1)

2+1 HD (8 HP)     Saving Throw 12    Move 12 ft. (climb 12 ft.)

AC 8[11]

Attack:  Bite or Claws, +2 to hit, 1d6 damage

Super-Pet Tricks:
Speech (obv)
Too Cute (Charm 1x/day)
Climb
Tool Use (+2 to saving throws to use human technology)

(I used Justin Isaac's Super-Pet class once again for Whiskers...)

This is Tulip

Tulip came from a hoarding situation in which around 80 dogs were living together trapped in a barn.  Laura and I worked with a number of these kids in a program to rehabilitate highly fearful dogs, and they are some of the most amazing beings you could ever hope to meet.

We adopted Tulip in 2019.  For the last year and a half, she's been my unofficial emotional support animal.  She deserves everything good that comes to her in life.  She has unicorns on her collar and tag because she is our barnicorn.

Like her sister Celery, Tulip deserves to be made into an RPG character.  Here she is using Justin Isaac's awesome Super-Pet class for Light City.  (I'm not sure that I've noted it on the blog, but as I've looked back over this class, I've come to love it even more than when I first read it.  It's solid and modular, and the "Tricks" are such a nice approach!)

Level 5 Super-Pet
First appearance:  Tales From the Barn (limited series) #1
STR 8     DEX 11     CON 15(+1)     INT 8     WIS 6     CHA 14
4+4 HD (18 HP)     Saving Throw 10    Move 12 ft. (flight 24 ft.)
AC 9[10]

Attack:  Bite or Horn, +3 to hit, 1d6 damage

Super-Pet Tricks:
Speech (yeah, why not, we seem to assume that all of our pets have this...)
Those Eyes (Too Cute) (Charm 1x/day)
Hero Support x2 (Cure Wounds I 2x/day)
Flight (again...why not?  she's got the horn for it...)
Getting the Hang of This (Tool Use) (+2 to saving throws to use human technology)

With one magic canine word, Tulip is transformed into even more of a Wonder Dog.  She has a horn.

(A note:  I realize that playing up the "barn" thing with Tulip may seem like a weird celebration of something terrible in her past, but with all of the precious kids we worked with from her case, "barn dog" has practically become a synonym for an amazing dog for some of us.  It is almost a badge of perfection.)

So, why am I just rambling about Tulip?  Well, besides the fact that she absolutely deserves to be rambled about, she's especially on my mind these days because of this girl:

This is Helen.  Laura and I fostered her around the end of 2018.  She is from the same fearful dog program as Tulip, and is another survivor of a hoarding situation.

One thing that has become clear over our time connected to these exceptional pups is that when they are separated from their families, they often don't react like you might expect a typical "lost dog" to react.  The fear kicks into overdrive at times.  Heck, we saw it with Tulip during our move, when we walked her at a rest area.  The interstate traffic was in her head, and she tugged on her leash with a look in her eyes that made me worry that if she were to get free, she might run for a while before even taking stock of where her loved ones were.

We found out about two weeks ago that Helen went missing from her home due to an unfortunate but understandably human mistake on the part of her family.  After at least one initial sighting, things went quiet for over a week before she was finally spotted again, more than once, and hope picked up.  Then...right when a major breakthrough seemed almost inevitable...we got this insane winter storm, and the effort has become more difficult.

I'm not the sort that questions the seemingly absurd unfairness of reality, but for some reason, this just doesn't fit the way I need the world to work.

If you are the sort that goes in for any sort of thoughts, prayers, or positive vibes for others...or even if you're not, actually...I would ask that you keep Helen in mind.  I know that we live in a world that's filled with pain, cruelty, and injustice, and it might be offensive that I ignore so much of that but take the time to fret over a lost dog.  If you feel that's the case, I'm sorry.

I just think Helen deserves a happy ending to her story, and I wanted to share it.  Thank you for reading.

Stacking up Bricks: The Thing

Here's another straightforward Brick.  Really, he's just about the brickiest Brick of all, I guess...

The Thing

Real name:  Benjamin Grimm

Level 4 Brick

AC 6[13]    HD 5d6+10 (28 HP)

Saving throw: 13

Move 12 ft. (leap 12 ft.)

STR 30(+4)    DEX 12    CON 23(+2)    INT 10    WIS 8    CHA 11

Attacks:  Melee - Punch +2 (1d6+4 damage)

Brick bonus: Enhanced CON x1.

----------

And while I'm at it, here's a slightly toned down build of his good buddy Johnny...

The Human Torch

Real name:  Jonathan Storm

Level 4 Elemental

AC 6[13]    HD 3d6 (10 HP)

Saving throw: 12

Move 12 ft. (flight 24 ft.)

STR 14    DEX 15(+1)    CON 13    INT 11    WIS 8    CHA 16(+1)

Attack:  Fire Blast, +3 to hit, 1d6 fire damage, range 60 ft.
Elemental Powers (4x/day):  Flame Missile, Radial Blast (all medium-sized creatures and unattached objects within 30 feet are moved 1d6 feet away from Johnny)

A note:  For my table, I'm making the "Learning to fly" ability of The Elemental a little easier to satisfy going forward...probably a d6 roll under [level + DEX mod + 2] to successfully fly, so that it becomes second nature a bit sooner in the advancement of a character...

Stacking up Bricks: Bane

Taking another tiny step in examining builds that I'd like to see possible with the Brick class for Light City...here's Bane...

My expertly rebased Bane mini in that classic supervillain pose, standing in a puddle of gray marshmallow goo.

Bane

Real name:  Unknown

Level 4 Brick

AC 4[15]    HD 5d6+10 (27 HP)

Saving throw: 13

Move 12 ft. (leap 12 ft.)

STR 26(+3)    DEX 21(+2)    CON 22(+2)    INT 18    WIS 12    CHA 8

(All stats under the influence of Venom.)

Attacks:  Melee - Punch +2 (1d6+3 damage)

Hindrance:  Addiction (Venom)

Brick bonuses: Enhanced DEX x1, Enhanced CON x1.

Stacking up Bricks: The Hulk

Continuing my experimentation with the Brick class for Light City...here's another important one to take into consideration that also matches one of my haphazardly rebased HeroClix that will (hopefully) soon find a place on my tabletop.

The Hulk is really one of the most classic of all superheroic Bricks, I think.  He's also fairly straightforward as far as Bricks go; he's big, strong, and tough.  I'm thinking his accelerated healing should maybe be taken into account.  He can also jump really high and far, but that's covered at least slightly in the base Brick class.  And while I don't follow Hulk comics very closely, he's apparently immortal these days.  I won't worry about that one.

As for drawbacks?  I don't know that a transformation into superheroic form is a drawback in itself; I should probably do a little survey of other supers RPGs to see how that's treated in general.

The uncontrollable rage, though...that's probably a hindrance.  Let's see...

The Hulk

Real name:  Bruce Banner

Level 5 Brick

AC 6[13]    HD 6d6+12 (34 HP)

Saving throw: 12

Move 12 ft. (leap 12 ft.)

STR 36(+5)    DEX 12    CON 24(+2)    INT 10    WIS 4    CHA 10

(All stats in Hulk form.)

Attacks:  Melee - Punch +2 (1d6+5 damage)

Special:  Regeneration 1 (heal 1 at the beginning of each round); 5 in 6 chance for a Feat of Strength

Hindrance:  Rage 1 (Before taking an action, roll 1d6; on a roll of 1, the action is lost to blind rage.)

Brick bonuses: Enhanced STR x1, Enhanced CON x1, Regeneration 1.

Musical Monday: Superman's Best Songs (Part III) + Sunshine Superman for Light City

There are a lot of Superman songs out there.  Here's another one I like.

Well...I'm pretty sure I like it. It has a certain resonance with me.  I had a phase long ago in which I listened to a lot of popular music from the '60s, and this eventually became a familiar tune that had the added bonus of name-dropping not only Superman, but also Green Lantern...!

Whatever your take on it, I think it's hard to deny that this one sounds very Sixties...

Sunshine Superman is also the name of the Man of Steel hailing from Earth 47 (or, in his earliest appearance, Dreamworld), the psychedelic superhero universe that can owe its groovy existence to Grant Morrison and Chaz Truog.

He's in a pretty happenin' version of the Justice League, too...

Without any evidence to the contrary, I'm going to assume Sunshine Superman has access to all of the standard Supes powers...and I'll take this opportunity to stat him up for Light City in such a way that I can use the basics for any old Superman in a tabletop superhero skirmish.  Maybe I can even figure out a way to reconcile these numbers and abilities with a rational way of having the Brick class play out over several levels...

Sunshine Superman

Level 5 Brick

AC 6[13]    HD 6d6+6 (28 HP)

Saving throw: 12

Move 24 ft. (flight 24 ft.)

STR 30(+4)    DEX 12    CON 18(+1)    INT 14    WIS 12    CHA 14

Attacks:  Melee - Punch +2 (1d6+4 damage); Ranged - Heat Vision +2 (1d6 damage), medium range

Vulnerability:  Kryptonite

Brick bonuses: Super Speed x1, Flight, Energy Blast.  Thanks to Justin Isaac and his Super-Pet class for helping me visualize this method of building a hero in a Light City context, and to soner du for confirmation that "exaltations" to build a hero isn't a terrible idea...

Because it just seems like a good week to think about Captain America

So much division.  At least we have this guy that I think most of us can get behind in one way or another.

Captain America
Real name:  Steve Rogers

Level 5 Supersoldier

AC 3[16] (light body armor, shield)    HD 5d6+10 (28 HP)

Saving throw: 11

STR 20(+2)    DEX 20(+2)    CON 20(+2)    INT 12    WIS 15(+1)    CHA 16(+1)

Attacks:  Melee - Shield +6 (1d6+2 damage); Ranged - Shield +6 (1d6+2 damage), medium range

(A few notes:  1. The Supersoldier class is found in The Assembly and expanded upon in L'Assemblee.  2. Justin previously posted Sam Wilson as Captain America for Light City over at the Halls of the Nephilim...I definitely used that to cheat and check my work over here. And, who doesn't love Falcon?  3. There's a big argument to be made that Steve Rogers should make it past level 5 pretty early in his avenging career, but I'm scaling back some of these Light/White Box characters in order to stat them out for a miniatures skirmish, where I want to keep their numbers a little more under control.  4. Be kind to each other out there, please.)

Musical Monday: Superman's Best Songs (Part II)...and more on Light City's Brick

There are a lot of Superman songs out there.  Here's another one I like.

I remember first hearing this when it was the "B-side" (both songs were actually on both sides) of the cassette single of the Crash Test Dummies' remarkably popular song "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm."

Not my copy, although I guess it'd be kinda cool if I still had it.  Hmm...

Yep.  The cassette single.

I would go on to pick up the entire God Shuffled His Feet album, and I really enjoyed it at the time.  It's also worth noting that I've gone back and listened to it quite a bit over the last year, and I have to say, as a record, it's not only held up, but it's even better now that I'm older and have a little more life experience with which to frame the lyrics.  It touches on existentialism, maybe even Gnosticism...really it's just brilliant stuff that 16-year-old me couldn't comprehend.  Not that I can really comprehend it now...but that's kind of the album's point, I think...

That little aside...aside..."Superman's Song" was actually on their earlier album The Ghosts That Haunt Me, which I'm not sure I've ever heard in its entirety...but based upon my recently renewed love for God Shuffled His Feet, I really need to give it a listen.

Oh yeah!  The song.  It's fantastic...even if it is, as hilariously pointed out by one YouTube commenter, "[t]he most anti-Tarzan song I've ever heard."  Pretty cool video, too.

Now...let's continue talking about Superman, Light City, and The Brick a little bit.  As I've mentioned, I'd like the Brick class for Light City to allow such a character to be shaped into some variant of a Brick-PLUS, with some of the "classic" extra powers added to taste.  Mysterious francophone Light City co-conspirator soner du suggested an "exaltation" at levels 4 and 6, to be chosen from a power menu.  Their suggestions:

"flight, AC bonus, save bonus, damage bonus, bad-ass signature weapon, etc."

This certainly seems like the way to go, with some of the choices (or maybe the "default" option, for which the menu pick substitutes) lending themselves to more "pure" Brick types like the Thing.

The more I think about it, the more I wonder if the add-ons are going to need to start before level 4.  I had intended the three levels of The Brick in The Assembly to hold up to the class's expansion, but that might not be feasible.

At any rate, I suppose the question right now is:  What are the powers that need to be included such that most reasonable variants of a Brick are covered?  I think soner du touched on the biggest ones.  Flight is a given.  Using a specific weapon is probably important to cover stuff like Thor's hammer.  I'd say some kind of blasting, like Superman's heat vision and Captain Marvel's (er, Shazam's) lightning bolts, should be in there.  Some amount of super speed is probably a must.

Should X-ray vision be on the list?  That's so specific, but it certainly seems important in the Supes equation.  But then what about some kind of super breath?  At what point does the class just become an exercise in listing all of the things Superman has been able to do over the years?

Geeky SKAturday: The Aquabats

I've mentioned the Aquabats at least once previously on this blog when I posted one of their cartoons (which I see is now no longer available on YouTube...).  This band is really the primary thing I had in mind when I thought about doing a "Geeky SKAturday" series.  They're a team of heroes from the island nation of Aquabania.  After an attack by the evil Space Monster M, Professor Monty Corndog uses Science to give them powers that will help them defeat their archnemesis.  They also happen to be a band!  They're a pretty perfect convergence of catchy ska tunes, superheroics, and...well, pretty much everything that's fun about being a geek.  Here's one of their older tunes...

You can find episodes of their award-winning, tokusatsu-inspired TV show at the series site HERE and learn more about their story at their wiki over HERE.

And now...let's look at an Aquabat in Light City!

The MC Bat Commander

Pic from The MCBC's wiki entry...

Normal Human  (when asked what power he got from The Professor, he told the kids to "mind their own business")

STR 10    DEX 10    CON 11    INT 13    WIS 10    CHA 10  (I just rolled these...)

1 HD (2 HP)    Saving Throw 17

AC 8[11] (Aquabats rashguard)

Attack:  by weapon

Possesses an Anti-Negativity Helmet to protect vs. negativity, bad vibes, and "playa hataz."

Musical Monday: Superman's Best Songs (Part I)...plus Light City musings

There are a lot of Superman songs out there.  Here's one I like.

Some background:  I was probably in high school when I first saw the title of the Spin Doctors' debut album Pocket Full of Kryptonite.  Young and nerdy me thought it was a pretty cool reference for a popular band.  When I eventually realized that they actually had a song--on the radio, no less--about Superman...well, that's one of those little moments of vindication for the geek knowledge I had acquired.

Of course, Supes is such a cultural icon that it doesn't take much geek knowledge to sing about him.  (I guess that's why a "Superman's Best Songs" series can happen on this blog.)  But still...the angle of Jimmy Olsen pining for Lois Lane is a fun twist.

On the Spin Doctors:  Their sharp and catchy rock was exactly the kind of stuff I was looking for at that point in my life.  They're all probably pretty underrated as musicians.  And...singer Chris Barron gave hope to skinny guys like me that girls could pay attention to me (a prospect that wasn't helped by all of those Charles Atlas ads I had encountered in reading comics).  I just had to figure out how to become a rock star.

Oh yeah, and the band's still got it!  Earlier this month, they released this version of "Jimmy Olsen's Blues" from whatever variant of quarantine they currently find themselves in...

And speaking of Superman...covering his superheroic archetype is one of the critical steps I need to take in getting a more or less "complete" version of Light City into the wild.  The LC Multiverse's Supes analogue is Wonder Man, who has come up previously on here as a founding member of The Association.  I figure the most straightforward way to handle heroes like this is to treat them as Bricks-PLUS...meaning, the archetypal Brick with a suite of abilities added on.  Three levels of The Brick were presented in The Assembly (to cover the Hulk), and the class was extended to seven levels in the French translation/expansion L'Assemblee.  And in fact, The Brick was one of the classes I had in the unofficial queue for individual publication before I fell off the Light City wagon.  I even worked on a cover for it...

...which now looks...uh, pretty bad after converting from the PowerPoint I had access to at the time to the LibreOffice I'm using now.  Looks like I'm having a little font issue. :)  (And yes, I often fulfill my meager layout needs using PowerPoint and its ilk...maybe one day I'll take the time to learn some proper publishing software...)

So, on The Brick...I'm looking to incorporate those add-ons that turn a Brick into a Brick-PLUS as options for levels 4-7.  That is officially in the unofficial queue...

The Fall of Phoenix Jones

I have long found Phoenix Jones to be an interesting figure in the Real Life Super Heroes (RLSH) effort.  He carved a solid place for himself as founder of the Rain City Superhero Movement and arguably the first RLSH to actively fight crime like the ones in the comics we read.  I had never known many of the details of the path his career took until I watched this documentary the other night.

I obviously recognize why he's a bit of a controversial figure, but it's really hard not to pull for this guy.  According to the YouTube comments (yeah, I know), there may be some critical history missing that relates to his reaction to the MMA fight with his brother, but this is overall very well done.  His story is complex, just like many of the greatest superhero stories.

And...because of what this blog is, here's Phoenix Jones for Light City (taking the liberty of giving him a signature item a little early)...

Phoenix Jones

Pic from his Twitter feed...

Level 5 Brawler
STR 15     DEX 13     CON 12     INT 14     WIS 11     CHA 16
5 HD (18 HP)     Saving Throw 10
AC 7[12] (light body armor)
Attacks:  2x Unarmed Strikes, +6 to hit, 1d6+1 damage; Pepper spray 1x/fight, range 10 ft., +7 to hit, 1 damage, target must save or be incapacitated for 2 rounds whether the attack hits or not; Special Improvisation 1x/day.

Horrors and heroes, hot off the press!

Seems like lots of folks are getting in on the sharing of free stuff to make quarantining at home a little more bearable, or at least trying to shine a light on things that others are doing to help.  While I will point out that everything I've put up on DriveThruRPG is free so far, I'm not plugging anything there today.  Not directly, anyway.  No, there are two RPG releases have caught my eye lately that I wanted to spotlight just in case my post can raise their signals a little.

The first is by awesome gaming blogger and all-around great guy Justin Isaac from Halls of the Nephilim, who has written the horror game Slashers & Survivors - Slashcan Edition as a spiritual successor to his game Slashers & Victims.  While the earlier release was a quick-playing, rules-light game that first appeared as an add-on for Swords & Wizardry Light, this new one is...well, still pretty quick-playing and rules-light, but based on the engine of Bloat Games' dark fantasy RPG The Blackest of Deaths.

He's included a bunch of the trademarks of slasher films to help you craft a bloody horror game just how you like it.  Part of the idea with this new release seems to be that you may want to string together scenarios into a slasher campaign, rather than just run one-shots as Slashers & Victims might have been used most often.  This contrast makes me really enjoy the wording of the games' titles (in addition to "slashcan" being a cool word!).

Also, this is just a preview of sorts...there's a full version on the way!  In addition, Justin is currently statting up horror characters for the game in his April A-Z Blogging Challenge efforts over at the Halls.

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The second game for today's spotlight is something that I'm especially happy to share.  Quite a while back, Justin (the same Justin from above) and I published a series of titles for Light City, a hack of Swords & Wizardry Light for superheroic roleplaying.  One of these publications was The Assembly, designed as a quick-start add-on for the already quick SWL base game.  Well, a somewhat mysterious RPG author I know only as "soner du" from comments on here...so that may or may not be his name AND he may or may not be "he," as I am basing that only on his Blogger avatar...has taken The Assembly, added levels to the classes, thrown in a smattering of other stuff Justin and I produced, added his own original content, and translated the whole thing into French!

Even with the very limited French I remember from eighth grade, I can tell this is an awesome addition to the Light City canon.  It's a complete game in itself, which definitely inspires me to want to produce the same sort of thing in English at some point.  I can also tell that the author is (A) very good with small details...which you can see in moves like reordering the results of the 1d6 roll for The Marksman's specialty weapon so they're still alphabetical in French; and (B) not looking for much attention, since I'm not even sure of his name, and he only lists me, Justin, and Erik from Tenkar's Tavern (who created Swords & Wizardry Light) as authors - even though the new contributions are significant!

You can pick up Light City - L'Assemblée over at DriveThruRPG and on Lulu.  Oh yeah...the most exciting part about it is probably the back cover, which is a teaser for an upcoming book of magic for Light City called La Congrégation.  I can't wait to see this new addition to the Light City Multiverse!

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I hope you're all passing your socially distant time in enjoyable ways...stay safe!

E is for Earths

...of the parallel variety, that is.

I'd love for Light City to be accessible for all sorts of supers gaming.  I also just love a good, wacky multiverse.  Here's a little sample what's been discovered so far by the fringe physicists of Light City:

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Earth-Alpha:  The "prime" Light City universe.  In my head, anyway.  Heck, maybe every individual game world is its own Earth-Alpha.  That's the beauty of a prime universe: It's forever malleable, ready to be retconned, revised, and updated for the present time!

Earth-Beta:  The first parallel universe to be found, when Nature Man traversed the elemental planes and found his counterpart from this alternate Earth.  The boom in superheroics occurred much earlier here (in the 1940s...folks with masks and powers were a huge part of the Allied victory in World War II).  Some heroes, like Black Lion, are fairly similar between Earths Alpha and Beta, aside from age.  Others, such as the Flame, differ enough that it's hard to even trace how they're connected.  Still others have no known counterpart on the other Earth.

Earth-Beta

Earth-Gamma:  An Earth where The Assembly is the premier superhero team rather than The Association.  Cities don't all have the word "City" in their names.  And the movies tend to be a lot better.

Earth-Theta:  Here, an aged Black Lion came out of retirement in the 1980s to clean up his beloved Empire City after it had fallen deep into a crime wave.  He ended up facing off against his old pal Wonder Man, who has become a tool of the American government.

Earth-Mu:  A world of anthropomorphic cats.  And superheroes.  So, yeah, superhero cats.

Earth-Mu

Earth-Nu:  This universe has many of the same figures as Earth-Alpha, but the age of heroes began in the mid-1950s.  There are lots of apes, and Wonder Man is kind of a dick who spends a lot of time making his girlfriend look like an idiot.  Scholars of the Multiverse aren't quite clear on whether or not this is actually the same world as Earth-Theta.

Earth-Xi:  Pretty much everything on this world appears to be made out of toy bricks.

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There are a lot more of them out there!  (You might even say they're infinite...ba dump bump.)  I'm definitely interested in knowing what sorts of parallel Earths you would want to encounter in a superhero multiverse!

D is for Dogwood City

I'll make this one quick!  The world of Light City, and really the project itself, is a pretty natural extension of the the trip through the alphabet that I took on this blog two years ago, when I made my first attempt at constructing a superhero setting out of public domain characters.  The focus that year was Dogwood City, based in my mind upon the large southern city that I lived in at the time.

I guess I sort of fell in love with the process, because shaping the details of such a fictional world in my head has become almost an addiction over time.  Seriously, I think about stuff like...oh, how different heroes' debuts should fall on a timeline a LOT more than you'd probably think someone should consider such "facts."  At least Light City is giving me a bit of an outlet for it now!

Anyway, there's really no reason that Light City and Dogwood City shouldn't be on the same map.  (In my little section of the multiverse, anyway...!)  Perhaps there'll be a chance to look at geography in a little more detail in the coming days.  For now, let's take a quick second look at the flagship hero of Dogwood City...Nature Man!

Oh.  Yeah, that was it.  That WAS the quick second look.  Maybe we'll take a slower look when the letter N rolls around.

Up next:  EARTHS!

C is for The Club

The Club is the premier "teen team" of Earth-Alpha, initially formed by some of the younger companions of members of The Association.  At its founding, The Club consisted of just four heroes:  Nature Boy, Cub, Melanippe (sister of Hippolyta), and Leora (niece of the Sea Amazons' Queen Mea).

Nature Boy

Cub

Melanippe

Leora

The Club would go through a number of lineup changes over the years, eventually including heroes such as Young Robin Hood (operating out of Forest City) and Rainbow Boy.  The team later became widely known as The New Club, and as young adults, its members would form a related group called The Crew, leaving the Club moniker to a new generation of young superheroes.

(Nature Boy, of course, would slowly become less involved with the team after taking up the mantle of his mentor, Nature Man, upon the hero's death saving the multiverse.  As Nature Man, David Crandall would eventually join The Association.)

B is for Black Lion

Only nine days into the month, and I'm already on the letter B!  So let's see, looking at the A to Z calendar...

...mm hmm, carry the 2, and I should catch up sometime around no shot in hell.

Oh well.  Onward!  We just took a quick look at Black Lion on Wednesday as one of the keystone members of The Association.  He was also one of the first characters I covered two years ago when I pondered a superhero universe centered on Dogwood City for my first go at the A to Z blogging challenge.  To recap:

Ten years ago, George Davis's brother was stabbed to death for a diamond he possessed.  This senseless act of violence motivated George to take on a persona that would be the bane of criminals everywhere...

And so, we have a dark-clad hero, driven by revenge and operating at the peak of human physical condition...the Black Lion!

Not the MOST original background, but originality is pretty much the opposite of what I'm looking for here.  I imagine him to be one of the most prominent heroes in the prime Light City Universe.  (Hopefully I can be forgiven for some inconsistency in whether or not he gets a "the" before his name.  Even the Batman can vary in that regard.)

And to stat him up for Light City...well, I may as well pull liberally from my previous thoughts on the hero that Black Lion is undoubtedly based upon (hey, I already included the Lion-arang when I gave him rough stats two years ago...!).

Black Lion
Level 7 Brawler
Real name:  George Davis (secret)
First appearance:  Wonderworld Comics #21 (1941)
STR 16     DEX 13     CON 12     INT 18     WIS 18     CHA 16
7 HD (25 HP)     Saving Throw 8
AC 8[11] (Lion-suit)
Attacks:  3x Unarmed Strikes, +8 to hit, 1d6+1 damage; Lionarang, range 60 ft., +7 to hit, 1d6+1 damage; Special Improvisation 1x/day.