Mutants and Masterminds Characters

Almost as long as I've been back playing D&D, I've also been playing in a different friend's Mutants and Masterminds Campaigns. These are superhero RPG settings. I've played an eternally reborn Egyptian Prince called "The Scarab" (think Hawkman meets Blue Beetle) in a pretty straight up super hero(but zany as all hell) campaign, a Sorcerer trapped in a Golem's body (John Constantine trapped in a Golem body, basically) during an elder Gods inspired 20's prohibition era NYC setting.

In the fall I'll be playing (as we upgrade to 3rd edition Mutants and Masterminds) a in a sort of Steampunk setting in the 1860's. My character is going to be a 19th century Indian Jones, but a lady, so like Lara Croft, but without so many guns, and normal sized boobs. She will have some small "powers" but this is to be more of an "ability & skill" game I think, than a big super power game.

I won't be posting her Character and backstory for awhile, as I keep changing my mind on this one. Part of my getting going on this blog, is that I've been stuck, when I never get stuck. I sit around making up RPG characters like some people play solitaire, or Skyrim. Lately though, the well has been dry. I'm revisiting some of my faves from the past to get some inspiration.

Here's "Johnny Vertigo Jr.", who I played for quite some time, starting as a sorcerer who had made the wrong deal with the wrong Devil, and ended up trapped in the body of a Golem from Brooklyn ( I even played him with a Brooklyn a bad one) accent, most sessions) , then through some hinky dice rolling and gameplay decisions ended up trapped in the body of his Ex-Girlfriend "Victoria".  weirdly, the sex change wasn't my idea, but the game master's. reality has now mirrored that gameplay as one of the places I feel most comfortable as "Josie" is when at this game.

I've got some internet generated images I made of Johnny as Golem, and as "his real self".

Here's Johnny's Backstory of how he became a Golem

From The Journals Of Johnny Vertigo Jr. (AKA “Junior”)

FBI Casefile //XY:X-23

(fragment from torn out pages, unnumbered transcribed here {original document in storage see storage for the above casefile #}…)

…. How I became a golem for a time is actually an interesting story. 

What had happened was a few years earlier during The War I had been operating in London, making forays into the Continent occasionally to fight the mystic war that was being fought in perhaps even a more grisly and in the end pointless fashion to the war in the trenches. The stakes were even higher, the casualties though not as great. It’s hard to really “kill” a demon. Sometimes you can trick them though, and I, I thought I had done just that by using my somewhat silvery tongue to convince a demon {who shall remain un-named as that would give him power even now.} to help our side when his interests were better served by the Hun…..

To make a long story even longer, this demon, who was as well known in Hell as I was in the Earthly mystical community as  someone who could talk anyone into pretty much anything managed to out talk me, and of course easily out magicked me, we did win the battle of Ypres that took place far beyond the veil of death upon the battlefield in a literal Hell, a France of living flesh and olde entities that scuttle and cling, creep and ooze. But I was maimed like no one else that day, my self and my body were separated, seemingly forever…

 I managed to escape my astral self back to Terra Firma just as the Demon was about to devour my soul… I thought I had tricked him, but little did I know that he had his minions on Earth bodynap me, and hold me for ransom. I entered the only vessel that was available to me, a golem that had lain untouched in a secret room in a farmhouse near the earthly battlefield. I emerged a clay un-living man and I trod through death until I reached Paris and was able to communicate with my father who started the wheels rolling to secret me back the the USA in a cargo hold mystically shrouded from view. Officially I was listed as MIA, but since I was officially in a branch of the service that “doesn’t exist” the point is kind of moot. I had wanted to post war pick up the family biz of Cult building, but alas my moment to shine came once I accepted that I was stuck as a golem at least for awhile. I opened a mystical PI firm and made use of all my olde contacts (wearing my mask, saying how I was horribly maimed in the war) … 

I missed eating and drinking the most of anything while in that body. Even having no spells upon my tongue (or a tongue for that matter) wasn’t as bad as not being able to enjoy a nice beer, whiskey, or even bathtub gin. Don’t get me started on how much I missed cheesecake. Oy. 

Eventually just before I joined a small “outfit” of similar magically enhanced weirdoes that fought off several unwanted mystical attacks on NYC my actual body was somehow procured by Ms. Livinia Masters. yes the very same. I had worked for her on occasion investigating phenomena, of varying degrees of evil since well before the war, and my Golemic transformation.. While she held my body, she and her fellow illuminati supposedly worked on figuring out how to properly re-integrate my soul back into it’s proper earth-shell. That old demon pal of mine had apparently booby trapped the re-entry process. It was going to take some work…..

(Missing the next several pages of the diary, ashes found nearby are suspected f being all that remains of that part of the journal. [end file entry 007]