Day 17th: Acid Crocodile, Mutants and Masterminds 4e

 Day 17th: Acid Crocodile, Mutants&Masterminds 4e

 17th day, we're more than halfway done with the challenge and only 2 more weeks in January already! Crazy, where is all that time going? Anyway, as promised all the way back at the start of the challenge, I've returned to my old friend Mutants&Masterminds, this time showcasing the upcoming 4th edition of the game. The game is still in active playtesting and the rules have already been changed from the Origin Edition Green Ronin released last summer, but the change log is available on the Atomic Think Tank instead of an updated PDF. I tried keeping tract of all the changes, but there's of course a possibility I missed some. I gotta say, I was a bit lukewarm about 4e leaning positive, but the change I saw do feel good! Now if they could remove Agility from the game or change it so it's in anyway worthwhile to take... Oh well, it's not like 3e didn't have several useless attribute! Warning about the sheet this time however, for some reasons, the Font when I edit the sheet in Firefox is smaller than it ended up being when I save it as an image, making the sheet very hard to read. :/ 

Art by Azill on ych.commish.com

As always with M&M, it's better to come in with a strong concept to keep character creation under control. Especially with 4e as it doesn't have something like Hero Lab to help you out and let's you forgo jumping around a big book! With a big crocodile fellah like this one, strong and tough was the most obvious aspect! The weird chemical running through tubes and glowing through his throat did suggest something more than just a pure power-house. I decided to keep it fairly simple though, giving him a cumulative affliction to represent a Acid Touch, in the LSD sense of Acid! Usually, hallucination would be Figment/Phantasm/Delusion, but the way these conditions are described makes me think it's more fitting for an illusionist who control what you see, like Mastermind or Mysterio. Instead I went Dazed/Stunned/Incapacitated to represent the affected character falling deeper in a drug-fueled, vision filled torpor. I gave him a cone-area, non cumulative version of the same effect as an alternate power to represent his ability to use his Acid as a breath weapon. I also gave him a "Crocodilian Physiology" power, using various effect to make him adept at moving and fighting underwater, with water-breathing, low-light vision and quick swimming. I also gave him a low rank of protection with the Obvious flat flaw and the Hardened extra. I could have saved a power point here by just applying Hardened on one rank, as I'm taking it only so the character won't take damage on successful toughness check, but may as well make him stronger against normal people attack.

There are a couple spot I could have optimized my point usage, but decided not too! Even though the character has few attack overall and no ranged option, I still gave him a few point in Attack and then specifically into Melee to meet his limits. He's mostly a brawler and grappler, but in a pinch he can pick up a gun and blast away or more likely he'll throw cars at big villains. By the time I was done on this part, he was shifted toward Fortitude and Toughness compared to defense, dodge and will, but not excessively so, his offense being balanced at +10 to hit, +10 DC and the combat section being completed with a +4 Initiative. I limited myself to 6 advantages, picking up Fearsome Presence, Counterattack, Menacing Attack, Improved Grab, Improved Hold and Tracking. He's a scary guy, he got decent reflex, he's good at grappling and his crocodilian senses allow him to track. The left over points went to skills, I made him pretty good at an handful of skills that made sense to me. His expertise are in Hockey and Science, those were his focus when he was in University.

With the mechanical aspect done, I had a clearer image of how the concept would come together! I gave him an obvious name, Acid Crocodile, pulled a real human name out of the air, Jimmy Campbell, made him 23 years old. For the complication, I gave him an Accident Complication, representing that he sometime lose control of his acid powers and can accidentally dose someone with LSD with a touch or simply by breathing it out. His motivation is Acceptance, he's hoping that acting as a Super-Heroes will lead people to not be afraid of him anymore. Finally, he lose his Acid powers when his tubing get severed or otherwise get removed, but it also turns his mind into that of a wild crocodile. He doesn't necessarily go berserk, but he acts like a crocodile with opposable thumbs and it's pretty likely that a situation where he lose his tubes are also one that would aggravate a crocodile. I will recopy his backstory below, as the conversion to .PNG killed it.

 Jimmy Campbell was a bright university student majoring in Science and playing on the Hockey Team, ensuring him a great future! However, he was abducted by his Biology professor working for the Government on a super-soldier program. He went missing for weeks, along with several reptiles from the local zoo, during which he was pumped full of mutagens and subjected to awful and invasive surgery. By the time he was rescued by some local vigilantes, Jimmy had been transformed into a terrifying humanoid crocodilian with a split tailed and tubes cycling unsavory serums through his body, but his mind was still mostly his own, as the brainwashing process had not yet fully started. He lost control during the fight as one of his saviors tried to remove his tubing in the hope of reversing the transformation. He ate his professor's hands in the ensuing chaos before the heroes managed to subdue him, causing his professor to become the notorious Doctor Magnethands on his next appearance.

 Unable to go back home and return to his normal life, facing the risk of being once more experimented on in the super-soldier program, Jimmy escaped into the sewer. Initially thinking of becoming an hermit in isolation, he stumbled unto a gang of villains harassing a community of homeless persons. His heart still pure despite the hardship, he could not stand by and do nothing, he fought to protect the communities, expecting nothing but fear and scorn from them. To his surprise, all he received was gratitude and friendship.

 On that day, Acid Crocodile was born and would fight for the innocents and down-trodden in the hope of showing his humanity to all. No matter what though, he will fight the good fight.

That's a pretty classic super-hero backstory, just how I like them. Doctor Magnethands is of course a shout-out to the eponymous game. I wanted to give it a little nod, as it's not something that can be used with this challenge!