[Game Thread] Issue #1 - Welcome to New Liberty

[Palliven]

So it begins...

[Palliven]

Standing behind Mayor Kapoor you could almost feel the force of the cheers and applause washing over her from the crowd she was addressing. You made yourself take a pause just to appreciate the moment. For months you had been talked to, evaluated, tested and vetted. Week after week you watched as your competition fell by the wayside and the group became smaller. It was just two days ago that the final decision had been made. Seeing Bling told she hadn't made the team was hard, but her cheerful goodbye made it easier to celebrate your own win.

And now you were here, standing side by side with the five others that had been selected to form the newest team in New Liberty. You've talked with them all a little but haven't had the chance to get to know them well. Sure, they ran some trials where you worked together but there had been little time for socializing as you had to defeat targeting drones and mechanical death traps. No one said being a hero was going to be easy.

Looking out over the crowd, the smiling faces and cheers promised to make the hard work worth it. A mass of balloons made its way through the crowd, stopping here and there as the vendor peeled one off to give to an excited toddler after being paid for by a doting grandparent. Food trucks were parked off to one the side of the stage area and tables with face painting and finger painting on the other. Kids ran between legs playing and parents shared stories of the heroes they had seen before. And everywhere there were television cameras, capturing the Protector's Day celebration and the pending announcement that you were here for.

It was then that the wall of balloons that you were strategically placed before was released, sending the colors of the Elysian flag floating upwards. Leaving an orange streak trailing behind him, the beloved hero Vaportrail flew overhead sending the crowd into a frenzy or clapping and cheering.

That was the cue they had told you about in rehearsal and just as they said the mayor led into a proclamation to introduce the latest of New Liberty's heroes. It was up to you now. This was your moment. All you had to do was take a step forward and introduce yourself to New Liberty and the world.

 

This is your chance to introduce your Hero to the world! You can go in whatever order you would like.

[girlplay]

Silver Streak Charlotte smiled to her new teammates, perhaps a bit nervously and stepped up to the microphone. "Thank you for your kind welcome, New Liberty. I pledge to serve the people of this city, the rule of law, and the common good. And my name is Silver Streak!" She spread her arms wide and activated her thrusters, rocketing into the sky to add to the spectacle. A hundred feet in the air, she arched overbackward and took a long circling route back to the stage, coming up at the rear while the other heroes presented themselves.

[ArcZero]

Miss Olympus Makes an Impression Dall-E AI+Photoshop Damara sees the balloons go up and all those cheering faces. Children. Families. She balls her fists and stands tall, thinking, "Dad I know you don't believe in all this hero stuff, but look at them. They love it!" She takes a moment to focus her thoughts on the golden olive wreath on her head to Dice Athletics Check Required to Activate Mantle: 1d20+14 (10)+14 Total = 24 activate the Mantle of Hermes. It goes A 24 gives her 9 ranks of speed and brings her up to Speed 11.about as well as can be expected as a faint golden aura starts to thrum about her. Something about Miss Olympus is fiercer, more majestic while the Mantle is active. "Yes I know we were told to stand in place, but how can I look out at those smiling faces and not give them something to root for?" She leans down into a four-point sprinter's pose and carefully lines up her feet one at a time. She looks up to the crowd with a bold grin, before zipping among them for a few moments in a golden blur. She stops at three young kids in the crowd with heroic fantasies in their eyes to give them a high-five and say, "I can't wait until you're up on that stage too, fighting for justice! But you'll have to work hard." Miss Olympus zips back to the stage, enjoying the bit of confusion at her rushing off for a few seconds. She comes to a stop and looks to the heroes at her side, giving them a moment to "do their thing" in greeting the city. After those few agonizing seconds, Miss Olympus steps a good dozen feet to the side, deactivates the Mantle and taps into her Titanic power. The mutant giantess grows to almost 30 feet tall in mere moments. She waves tp the crowd, flexes a bicep and gestures to Silver Streak who was just landing from her display of flight. All with a smile on Olympia's face. Her body still aches from the training, but she wouldn't have it any other way. You don't get to the fun stuff without the sweat and tears along the way. Finally, she jovially booms out to the crowd, "Thank you, Mayor Kapoor! I am Miss Olympus, here to dash to your rescue and shoulder just a bit of the weight of this great city!"

[Runetide]

Barricade Begins Some of the other heroes were pretty cool with their rocket jets and super speed. Barricade loved every moment of it. This was the culmination of months of tension, effort, and scrutiny. Now was the time to really get into character. When his turn came up to present himself, he stepped forward. Deep in his chest the core of his powers flared brightly, the blue light reflected in his eyes and around his body as his force fields built up in a visual display of translucent blue lights. Flexing, Barricade claps his hands together, causing a short-lived 'bubble' of force energy to expand from it like a harmless and soundless shockwave. "Hello people of New Liberty!" Barricade bellows, grinning with a mouthful of perfectly straight white teeth. "This is a great honor to put myself between you and any harm that may come upon you!" Keep it short and sweet, Billy. Short and sweet. he thinks, stepping back and letting the others continue their introductions. Still, watching the civilians out there grinning like this was the best thing ever was more than enough to make him grin like it was the best thing ever. Which, for him, it was.

[PalladiaMors]

Kia found herself bouncing up and down with excitement as the mayor began to make introductions. The positive energy from the crowd was infectious, rather literally in her case, given her sensitivity to such things. She was eager to get started, to get out there and do things, but knew this kind of event was important. Lifting the morale of the people of New Liberty was just as important, if not more so, than just beating up bad guys, an attitude that she was convinced put her ahead of several other contenders. She barely knew any of the others on stage with her, and hoped there would be a chance to change that in the near future. But for the moment, this moment, it wasn't all that necessary. This was a matter of introduction, saying hello to the people they would be serving moreso than getting to know each other. The two heavyweights went first, followed by the group's most defensive-minded member. Kia, or Pandagirl as she had to remind herself, hadn't really established a niche yet, her own powers weren't so easily defined. But she also didn't really see a need to define them. For now at least her role was just to keep that positive energy going. Stepping forward she grabs hold of the mic and approaches the edge of the stage, waving to the cheering people. "Helllloooooo New Liberty!" she yells out, trying to get what is known in some circles as a "cheap pop". "Barricade, everyone!" she continues, pointing over to her new teammate who in his excitement neglected to give his own name. If one was to classify her position on the team it could best be described as support, so she may as well start it off by doing so on the stage, getting applause for the hero who had gone before her. "I'm Pandagirl! And no, I'm not a were-panda or part panda. The ears are sewn on," she laughs, flicking the fuzzy felt ears sewn on top of the open hoodie she was wearing. "And the tail!" she continues, turning around for a moment with a cheeky shake. No reason she couldn't have some fun with this whole introduction thing, to a point of course. "So I'm new to town, but really lookin' forward to gettin' to know it, and alla you! It's been great so far, and I know we've got big shoes to fill, but I know these guys, and we're gonna do our very best. Except for this guy, tryin' to steal my look with the black and white," she continues, narrowing her eyes at Horizon for a moment before breaking into a smirk. "Nah, I tease. Mostly," she adds with a playful wink. A little friendly ribbing to set out the idea that the team were already friendly with one another, she reasoned. "Lookin' forward to seein' how much good we can do around here!" she concludes, blowing the crowd a kiss before handing the mic off to the next hero in line.

[Crocodile]

Starting Lineup Arms clasped behind his back, faceless obsidian gaze sweeping over the crowd, Horizon struck the figure of a reserved, dispassionate observer, seemingly unphased by the cheering of the masses and the excited energy which permeated the air on this day of celebration. That this was in truth one of the happiest days in the hero's career was well hidden both by his opaque faceplate and his propensity for being very internally focused when it came to the enjoyment of outside stimuli. Where the body was calm and still, the mind was aflame with the possibilities of the days to come, with each new demonstration of ability adding fuel to the blaze. Still, if they could see the smile on his face beneath the helmet, there would be less doubt on anyone's mind as to his thoughts on today. Will wonders truly never cease? Horizon broke from his place in the lineup on stage to accept the mic from Pandagirl, offering the animal-themed hero a nod before slowly floating off to the forefront of the stage, his hovering form settling in the open air just over the edge on Mayor Kapoor's left, the nature of his abilities explaining the buoyancy with which he appeared to suspend himself in mid air compared to other fliers. "One would be pleasantly surprised at the instances of species that share our color scheme, Pandagirl! Apart from your chosen ailuropoda melanoleuca, with just a few modifications, you could have just as easily based yourself on the elegant equus quagga, or the ever-prolific mephitis mephitis! I will grant you this though, you wear them much better than I ever could, and I doubt there is a person in the crowd who would say otherwise." "But I digress. I know it will be a pleasure working with you, Pandagirl. And the same goes for the rest of you Silver Streak, Barricade, Miss Olympus, Friendly." With a sweep of his arm he spun on his axis as he called out to the heroes behind him, his free hand extended as if offering out something to his teammates, or perhaps putting his teammates on offer to the crowd below. "I have experience working with others to achieve extraordinary things. Doubtless many of you have heard of me through my work with the Institute, dedicated to nurturing scientific minds and developing technologies to eliminate humanity's woes. No matter what we set to accomplish, our priority is always finding ways to improve the lives of others." "I see being a part of this team as an extension of that mission. Crafting a better tomorrow no matter how daunting the challenge is a dream we all share, no matter what roads we take to get there. Fifteen years ago we witnessed a miracle, an impossibility which I can barely fathom even today. The very miracle which put me on my heroic path, and because of the sacrifices made that day, I stand before you now, humbled by the faith you have put in me, put in us, to be a shield for New Liberty and its ideals of freedom and unity!" "Science in service is the path to the dawn. And on this day, I swear to be a loyal servant to all of you, to ensure that your dreams have the chance to flourish, just as mine have. I will not let you down." Horizon returned to the stage, his body drifting backwards lazily through the air in defiance of the planet's pull before reaffirming it's connection by planting two booted feet on stage, the hero then resuming his observation of the crowd and his teammates, just enjoying the moment he knew he would never experience again.

[girlplay]

Silver Streak While some of the others were giving longer speeches than the first few of them, Charlotte moved over closer to Miss Olympus to have a quiet word. She kept her voice low so that hopefully they wouldn't interfere with what was going on elsewhere. Leaning closer to Damara's ear, Charlotte said, "Did I sound okay? I didn't know what to say; I've never spoken in front of so many people before. And they didn't really tell us what was expected of us. So, I hope what I said was okay. What do you think of it?" OOC: I'm assuming that Miss Olympus returned to normal size. If that's not right, then please let me know.

[ArcZero]

Miss Olympus Reassures Silver Streak Dall-E AI+Photoshop After Damara enjoys a solid minute at her Titanic size, she returns to normal as Horizon is finishing a solid speech. "Did he come up with that off the cuff? All the science names were a bit much, but he's quite charming!" She thinks to herself. Silver Streak leans in close and seems a bit nervous. Damara gives a confident smile to the crowd and looks over at E.S.P.A. or Charlotte. She considers calling her by one of these given names, but since she asked that as much of her personal identity be expunged as possible in her personnel files, it didn't seem right to act too chummy if she isn't comfortable sharing who she is. Instead, she continues to wave while speaking casually to the automaton, "You did great Streak! Got the whole thing rolling after the Mayor's part. I liked how you just took off with those rocket boots. I know they said to stay relatively still up here, but I wanted to show off and get people excited too!" She pats Silver Streak's crazy durable forearm and absent-mindedly wonders who of the two of them would win in arm wrestling contest. To anyone else, it probably appears like a weird moment of concentration on Olympia's smiling face as she looks almost too intensely at the silver woman. "Good job. You said as much as Barricade and myself. I'm sure you could say more if you like. Looks like Friendly over there is lost in his thoughts." Damara peers over at Mayor Kapoor, then Friendly again, and finally Pandagirl and Horizon. Just in case the two most talkative members so far wanted to chime in more. It seems like the rest of the evening will be rather calm, but Damara would rather be catching a bad guy or cranking through some homework if she can. Then a quick gym session to close out the night. If Friendly were to tune into her thoughts, he would probably see a flurry of nutrition macros, exercise sets and anthropology questions giddily going through her head.

[JustSomeGuy]

Intrusive Thoughts A Friendly Face Nervous. That's one word to describe a few of the figures on the podium. Horizon probably would have preferred Trepidatious. As the thought crosses his mind, Friendly grins to himself. Being in front of crowds isn't a new experience for him, though he usually has his face covered when he does. Still, this was big-deal stuff. Elisia has a new team... and what a team! Friendly drops his mental shields when he finally takes his turn at the podium, a grin as sometimes literally!infectious as Pandagirl's on his face. He doesn't look like much, especially standing next to all of these larger-than-life heroes. He's wearing a tactical vest and fatigues similar in form and function to what any SWAT member might wear. Friendly looks like he could be any citizen, standing up for what is right. That's sort of the point. For a long second, he just stares out at the crowd with that smile on his face. What is there left to be said? Not much... but a few of the good bits bear repeating. He has a range of about a mile, which should cover most of the people here. He surreptitiously broadcasts thoughts to the crowd as he speaks to them, so they can hear echoes of the previous speakers in the back of their minds. "Hey there, New Liberty." ...serve the people... "That was Horizon," ...I will not let you down... "and I'm Friendly!" ...put myself between you and any harm... Friendly runs a hand through his curly brown hair, "We're the new team." ...we've got big shoes to fill... "We'll do the best we can," ...shoulder just a bit of the weight... "to live up to the legends that have come before us!" ...how much good we can do... He smiles out at the crowd again for a moment before continuing, "Our story is just starting, but our mission is clear." ...dash to your rescue... "We will strive to end each day better than it started..." ...Crafting a better tomorrow... "because this is our City, too!" He gives a parting wave before turning and joining the other heroes standing off to the side.

[Palliven]

The people had come out this Protector's Day hoping to see something spectacular, and they were not disappointed. First it was Silver Streak rocketing upwards into the sky, the sun glinting off her namesake skin as she swirled high above the crowd. Cheers loud enough to drown out the sound of her thrusters as she came to a controlled landing on the stage gave way to oohs and claps of joy as Miss Olympus raced through the crowd before growing to the height of three-story building right before them.

One particular boy, no more than ten years old kept his arms crossed and head down, refusing to look at either hero despite the urging and coaxing of his mother. For her part she divided her attention between looking down at him and looking up at the heroes on display above her. It was only when Barricade stepped forward with his blue light flaring into planes of force around him that the boy looked up. A smile creased across his face, and he clapped even more excitedly as Pandagirl bounded forward to introduce herself, pointing and laughing at the real live panda-girl before him.

The excitement didn't necessarily die as the next two heroes introduced themselves, but it did take a turn towards a more subdued applause. The initial cheers and clapping that surged as Horizon floated from the stage faded as he spoke at length. It rose in volume again as he floated back to the stage and the last hero stepped forward, only to die down again as Friendly's telepathic conversation echoed in their heads.

"How about that folks!?" Mayor Kapoor said into her headset mic as she walked back on stage, visibly clapping and encouraging the crowd to keep it up. "Wasn't that great!?"

She walked to the center of the stage where she faced the new heroes, clapping for each of them before turning towards the crowd and raising her arms and drawing forth a renewed cheer. She seemed to know just how to work the moment to get the most from her audience.

"And now, I have the honor to formally introduce you all to the newest heroes that will serve our great city." Waiting a moment for the noise to die down a little she continued once she was sure she could be heard. "So without further delay, I present to you...Valorheart!!!"

Cheers and shouts filled the air as holographic images of each of your faces, still shots that had been taken earlier in the week, filled the air behind the stage. For minutes the crowd applauded, and families took selfies trying to capture you and your looming faces in the background. As the noise began to quite to the dull roar of excited talking the mayor signaled to someone off stage. The young assistant, Terrance if you recalled correctly, was walking towards the mayor with an oversized, gold-plated and exaggerated key held in both hands.

"It is with great pride," she said as she ceremoniously takes the key from Terrance and starts walking back to center stage "that I get to present the Key to the City to..."

She never finished her sentence. Instead, she took a step back as a man suddenly sprang up in front of her, his form getting larger and larger in milliseconds from right between her feet. His costume was green tactical gear augmented by a red visored metal helmet that had thin corrugated lines from the back of the helmet to a thin metal jetpack of black and silver. Grabbing the key from the startled mayor he turned to the crowd.

"When you think bank on today folks, forget the chumps up here. Remember that it was Small Haul that got away with the Key!"

At that moment the sides of one of the food trucks fell open, dropping to the ground and revealing a futuristic looking cycle that was hovering in the air off of what looked like circular thrusters parallel to the ground. A young woman with braided blonde hair sat astride it, leaning forward in her black tactical suit that had tubes or cables of some kind connected to the vehicle. Chaos took hold of the crowd and cheers turned to screams and cries of alarm. This was made worse as audible popping sounds preceded the appearance of men among the crowd members. Each man that appeared was wearing the same red costume with black technical belts that were connected to a chest plate with corrugated cables.

"Henchmen, Ride!" The villain naming himself Small Haul shouted and everyone began to move.

 

Ok, this is our first conflict, and we are going to take it step by step. It will be slow so we can all follow along and make sure things are understood and noting is being missed. I'll likely get some things wrong so have some patience as we work through it.

What I need now is for everyone to roll initiative. You can do so as an OOC in main thread. This is done by rolling a d20+initiative modifier. Initiative modifier = Agility + Advantages (if have any, such as Improved Imitative)+Power Bonus (if have a power that modifies initiative or enhances agility and it is active). If two or more roll the same initiative, then it goes to highest Dodge bonus following by highest Agility and then highest Awareness.

[JustSomeGuy]

Ooc - Initiative Dice Initiative: d20+2 (13)+2 Total = 15

[ArcZero]

OOC Miss Olympus Initiative Dice 5 Agility + Improved Initiative 2: 1d20+13 (14)+13 Total = 27

[Crocodile]

OOC - Initiative Dice Initiative: 1d20 17

[PalladiaMors]

The scientific nomenclature from Horizon doesn't slip by Kia in the slightest, the other black and white clad hero cheering along with the crowd as he does his thing. Once he makes way for Friendly she leans over to whisper, "What, no love for Orcinus orca, Spheniscidae, or the humble Canis lupus familiaris?". She gets quiet quickly enough while the friendly neighborhood Friendly does his thing, then resumes the cheering and applause when the mayor takes back over. When Small Haul makes his appearance she's initially confused. Having just moved to Liberty City she wasn't up on the super criminals they might come in contact with, something she knew she had been slacking in but she didn't think it would come up this quickly. So she isn't even really aware that he is some kind of criminal. When mayhem starts to break out she leans back towards Horizon to whisper, "Um... are these guys part of the show?". Though it rapidly becomes apparent that no, they aren't, leaving Pandagirl to quickly Dice Initiative: 1d20+4 (15)+4 Total = 19 get ready to deal with them.