I'm looking to do some Kicking GMing...!

[Supercape]

Cubist,

Its your character, its your kicker, its your choice!

IN my experience in PnP use of Kickers, they work best when they really drive a character. The best one I ever did was actually incredibly simple. I played an alchemist-sorcerer in a pulp Sword and Sorcery game who accidentally poisoned himself with something that had no known cure. Bang! (Between me and the GM we worked out a few extra fun things about the poison I wont bore you with, the principle is there).

Now, if a GM did that to a player there would be an uproar. And so those kind of stories hardly ever happen. But it turned out to be the machine that drove 3 or 4 sessions of role playing fantastically well, not just for me but the other players.

Anyway, take your choice of the above. I will only say in my experience Kickers work best when they clearly spur a character into action. Ravelled put it excellently:

It's a kick in the pants that spurs the character to action.

One thing I will say however is I am uncomfortable using any PL X Characters like Mr. Infamy. I am not totally averse to them, but PL X and even high level PL is where I start to fail (even more badly) as a GM. So I would not want to use them for this, sorry.

[Supercape]

Ok I am summarising interest here:

(This is still open to more people, I will try to work through all requests as long as you read my failures in first post!)

Raveled: Ready with Kicker for Starlight (Stuck as Grue, Pulled to action)

Quote: Expression of interest ? Blueshift ? Ferros, nothing firm yet.

Aoiroo: Ready with kicker for Silhouette (Forced to go 2D in view of others)

TIffanyKorta: Interested, probable Kicker for Revenant (Gangster, Blood tastes nice!)

Breella: Interested, provisional kicker for Flora (Burning building loop)

Bishop: Interested: Probable kicker for Bishop (Manages Crisis, Phone call "Daddy...")

Cubist: Interested: Provisional Kicker for Jubatus (Medical problems ? Conflict)

One people are happy with a Kicker, then let me know and then start up a thread IC/OOC, and I will respond!

[quotemyname]

That's one kicker, for sure! Although it need not be a complete epiphany.

In other games I have played, Kickers work best when they are urgent. In M&M terms, you migh think of a situation that gives you a hero point right out of the box...

To take up your examples - I am going to take Ferros one which I think has more potential - and don't use this, 'cos you know Ferros better than I do, and are going to be far more creative that I will with him...

Make it specific, urgent, and something that propels him.

Jin wakes up from a nightmare covered in sweat, he is momentarily disorientated, remembering his dreams of horrible oriental demons persecuting him, torturing him, and the Monks of the Benzhi Temple warning him of his dangerous powers. As he fully wakes, he see's a metal imp balancing on his chest, holding a dagger, ready to plunge straight into his heart!

Somehow, he knows that only one person could have made that statuette!

Himself!!!

Etc etc...

Does that kind of make sense? So, its the same Epiphany, but now Jin is all sorts of worried - both for his own safety (unconsciously wanting to commit suicide, or being a danger to others), is going to try and stay awake, and has a real urgency to find out about the magical origin of his powers before its too late... dum dum daaah!

Ok, its corny and I am sure you (And others reading) can come up with a lot better, but that kind of shows what a Kicker should do. Really Kick you. Right out of your safety zone and into drama. Yes, its not-safe, yes you get hero points, yes you get fun! (hopefully!).

EDIT: Kickers I think are a great way to dust of your rarely used complications and think about using them (and with the right, urgent, one, starting play with an extra HP!)

Expanding on your ideas (above):

Instead of an imp, we go with the chinese symbol for death: [floatr][/floatr]

Though it doesn't directly threaten his person, he realizes the symbolism in it. If he could do that in his sleep, what else might he be capable of? After some mild research, he turns up a few accounts of this occurring in scattered cases in ancient china. Though he isn't sure how valid the accounts are, it's enough to make him seek answers, before he ends up hurting himself or others. One trend the accounts share is that 13 days after the person sees the symbol, they die. That would put a rather harsh time line on the thread. Especially since, "it's already been a week, and the nightmares aren't stopping!"

[Ari]

As there's room, I'll shove my oar in.

King is a bit better developed( little as that says), so I'll go with him as the Kicker'd one.

In no real order:

King of Suits: Murderer?!

Marcy wakes up one morning to find that an outcry has come up against his alter-ego, who is suspected in the murder of a prominent city councilwoman. Knowing he can't now act in-costume, he moves to solve the mystery of who has tried to defame him without the protection and anonymity of his cape and cowl.

For a lighter tone, how does this sound?

Marceau's dormant powers abruptly flare to life, creating a self-aware monster of pure cosmic power convinced they're an angel and given to random bouts of violence against whoever it decides meets its ill-defined category of 'sinners'. As the only person who it listens to(and can safely hurt it), the King of Suits has to talk down the wanna-be angel and persuade them to return to their dormancy.

If neither sound suitable, I'll gladly offer somwthing else.

[Supercape]

Your character, your kicker, your choice!

King of Suits: Murderer?!

Marcy wakes up one morning to find that an outcry has come up against his alter-ego, who is suspected in the murder of a prominent city councilwoman. Knowing he can't now act in-costume, he moves to solve the mystery of who has tried to defame him without the protection and anonymity of his cape and cowl.

From my experience, this sounds like it has more potential. However, I would suggest making it more specific. Those tend to work a little better.

It doesn't have to be cool or awesome. Less is often more.

Marcy wakes up, turns on Radio...

"Manhunt for King of Suits! Sniffer dogs on his trail!"

...drops his toast and coffee...

*KNock Knock* "Open up! Police!"...

Now, I don't suggest you do this, and the aforementioned is perfectly fine. But I hope you can see here the difference between a kick and a nudge - whilst both are going to address the same story and issues, the latter immediately pushes Marcy into action, without forcing what that action may be.

[NB].

[Aoiroo]

Okay SC, PM me when you got it set up.

[Cubist]

After a bit of cogitation, I think I've fleshed out the core idea I came up with for Jube's Kicker...

Jay Xavier is a very busy man; he makes a point of staying occupied at all times, because that way, he always has something to focus his attention on besides his very much unwanted physical form. Sometimes it's freelance contracts, sometimes it's superheroing, sometimes it's his therapist, and so on and so forth. Jay generally tries to take care of everything via telepresence (email, etc), partly to avoid being bogged down by direct interaction with tempo-1 slowpokes, and partly because Jay isn't very good at interpersonal relations (and he knows it!). Of course, some things can't be handled entirely by telepresence. For instance, a client who insists on at least one face-to-face meeting per week...

As fate would have it, there's a period of a week or two during which a disproportionately high percentage of Jay's tasks require the personal touch... and in the weeks/months leading up to this period, the aches and pains of bipedal posture, which were kind of nasty to begin with, grow progressively worse. Being the over-prepared fussbudget perfectionist he is, Jay goes to his doctor (who is a veterinarian, because Jay is a cheetah, biologically speaking) for a checkup --after all, what if Jay's back gives out while he's in conference with a client? Bad situation, best avoided if possible. Jay was expecting his doctor to prescribe some painkillers; instead, the doc demands that he completely avoid bipedal posture for the next [number] days.

So Jay must go on all fours during a nontrivial number of appointments which simply require him to interact directly with humans in meatspace. In addition, there may well be some troublesome events which demand Jubatus' personal intervention. And on top of everything else, Jay doesn't even pretend to maintain a secret identity; it's not beyond the realm of possibility that some villain or other... maybe even more than one, who knows... might decide that Jay's medically enforced lack of bipedal-ness makes him an awfully tempting target for whatever nefarious scheme(s).

You like? You no like?

[quotemyname]

It doesn't have to be cool or awesome. Less is often more.

Marcy wakes up, turns on Radio...

"Manhunt for King of Suits! Sniffer dogs on his trail!"

...drops his toast and coffee...

*KNock Knock* "Open up! Police!"...

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy used exactly that type of early-morning-grogginess-in-medias-res storytelling to great effect. I wouldn't mind reading that thread :P

[Supercape]

DUe to an active migraine at the moment, delaying anything for a few days.

However, it seems at least a few people are ready to go with threads.

Therefore a question: do players want to start a thread IC with the kicker? that seems the best way to me, alternatively if they post the kicker here on pm me, I can tweak it slightly and start a thread with it.

[Ari]

Okay, so a more immediate issue with a less clear-cut solution? If that's the case, how about this amended version:

One morning Marceau wakes up to find that all his gear(except his grapple gun) has been stolen, with a note on the wrought-iron chest saying simply "Gone crime-fighting. I'll bring it back". A quick round of questioning reveals that someone dressed nigh-identically to him snuck in through the window and took his gear in the night. He wasn't stopped because the stranger told Marcy's associates that he was a superhero down on his luck, and that he would return it the next night.

Marceau isn't convinced, and goes off to figure out what's going on and who is responsible for this.

[quotemyname]

DUe to an active migraine at the moment, delaying anything for a few days.

However, it seems at least a few people are ready to go with threads.

Therefore a question: do players want to start a thread IC with the kicker? that seems the best way to me, alternatively if they post the kicker here on pm me, I can tweak it slightly and start a thread with it.

I'll post a revised kicker here or PM you with it, I guess. But I'd like to see some opinions on my re-write first. What did you think of the newest version back a few posts?

[Supercape]

OK I am back.

Rav is about to set up a thread with a kicker.

Anybody else who feels ready to set one up, PM me or post the kicker here. At present I am inclined to say the player should make the first post.

With regards to individuals inquiries about their kickers: the first rule here is that its your character and your kicker. You will know your kicker better than I ever can. The second rule is that like everything some kickers and their threads end up weak, some ok, and some great. Practicve makes the odds a little better, but you cant ensure great threads and great kickers!

Having said that:

Aoiroo: Your kicker idea for Sil is fantastic - simple, elegant, urgent, to the point. Start thread or pm me and we can be good to go.

Cubist: Great story - What I need for the actual kicker is what "troublesome event" as you put occurs when he is in the dilemna post doctor visit. We can certainly do a few posts about doctor visit. But then we need the kicker of the event that really puts the wind up his sail. Your story is great, and fruitful, and a source of complications. ANd you clearly have a number of ideas of kickers to pair up with it. Can I ask you to choose one and go with it?

Arichamus: That's good to go if you wish. I think more urgency may be better personally, but if you are happy with that lets go for it.

Quote: I love it. That is exactly what a kicker does - completely propel a character into action, feeling a trident poking his behind. Inaction is not an option. This looks good to run, pm me or directly post that as a starter thread and lets run with it.

Tiffany: Looks good to go. PM me or start thread when you feel ready.

Breella: If you are still interested, I like your Idea, probably need to confirm a few details and that your idea with Gwen was the one you wanted to run with.

Bishop: Not sure where you are with this, as you have resubmitted Bishop as PL 7 character?

[Supercape]

For those interested, Kicker threads have begun! I am posting links to the threads that have started at the beginning of this thread.

Some will fail, some will be ok, some will rock (I hope). In any case, thanks to all for helping with this experiment and I hope it takes off.

[trollthumper]

I must say, I like the sound of this experiment.

For Nick, I imagine there might be a fun thread based around the true origins of his necromantic talent. I've been throwing the truth behind the power in Chat for a while, and it might be fun to do a thread where all is revealed.

As for Cannonade... I don't know. At least, not at this point. Maybe something where one of the soldiers from his grandfather's company asks him for help putting some business of World War II to rest?

[Supercape]

Sounds interesting ideas TT.

Your character, your kicker, your choice!

I would suggest choosing one of Nick / Cannonade for now and then fleshing out the kicker a bit as above. Key things are urgency, forcing your character into action, and I would add looking at complication list seems to have been helpful to some.

Also, request list is getting long. Any volunteers to GM some kickers would be appreciated (as I am sure I am not the only person who can GM then usefully), but nevertheless I will do my best to plow through them.

[Bishop]

Bishop: Not sure where you are with this, as you have resubmitted Bishop as PL 7 character?

Hey, saw the Starlight thread, that is AWESOME! I can't wait to see how that plays out!

As for mine, the change to PL 7 doesn't really change anything about the character, including the issues with his daughter. However, I still need to mull that one over.

BUT, I think I came up with something else. I gave him a new complication based on the fact he's using state-of-the-art equipment he didn't build and doesn't fully understand. (Yes, he's super smart, but he never studied technology to any degree. He can use tech, he just doesn't know how to build or fix it.) Part of the deal that allows him to use the tech he uses is that it it is frequently being fiddled with and experimented on, and it doesn't always work exactly as intended...

So, one day he uses his scepter to teleport a long distance and he ends up... elsewhere. Kind of like a Star Trek teleporter accident, he's in an alternate dimension. To make matters worse, the scepter is burned out by energy backlash! He's got to figure out how to get back home from a world of unknown dangers, and he's pretty much unarmed!

[Supercape]

Thats a cool hook, Bishop - we would probably have to thing about the specifics of the dimension (or the "where") and what that means drama/complication wise (i.e. what kind of story do you want to tell and what issues do you want to explore).

Being specific is good.

I know some of this is counter-intuitive to players turn up to a session where GM has the plot and story mapped out (without hopefully railroading), but you really can choose precisely what the kicker is - all the details.

I will make suggestions in terms of what makes a good kicker (urgency, drive, etc), but the details are all yours, baby.

[Tiffany Korta]

Damn and I finally had something for TH.

Oh and I don't have access to my computer so I'm happy for you to start my kicker off. If not I'll set it up in the morning.

[Supercape]

At the moment, I am going with players starting threads off with their Kickers. This seems more appropriate to me, it feels like they are getting more ownership of the thread/story. And I can scrutinise it for little goodies which might show me clues about what they want.

[Ozob]

Just chiming in that I would be happy to run a kicker or two to help you out after your request in chat/

[Supercape]

Just chiming in that I would be happy to run a kicker or two to help you out.

As I am backed up a little, do feel free to take up Ozob on this! from an experimental point of view this is very helpful as it gives me (And you guys) more experience and perspectives on using Kickers.

Having said that, I don't want to turn anyone away as a GM so I am still up for GMing - so I would suggest treating Ozob and any other volunteers as an extra resource so you can post extra kickers too! for instance if you have two characters, I can GM one kicker, somebody else can GM another. Etc etc. The more input on this the better.

[Supercape]

Quote, Aoiroo, Rav have started. Still waiting on others!

[Bishop]

Thats a cool hook, Bishop - we would probably have to thing about the specifics of the dimension (or the "where") and what that means drama/complication wise (i.e. what kind of story do you want to tell and what issues do you want to explore).

Well, I'm thinking the more it seems he is totally hosed, the more interesting it will be.

I was thinking of a few possibilities. First, the Victorian-Steam-Punk Earth your character Lord Steam comes from, which would give a good opportunity to hook up with your character, a fellow "Low PL" type. There, none of Bishop's computer networking doodads will work and he might have a hell of a time figuring out how steam-tech can possibly get him home.

Second, some very-close-parallel world like an "evil-mirror" world where the superheroes and villains are reversed (causing a real possibility of making a BIG mistake before he figures out what's going on, (like on Sliders) or possibly running into his "evil-twin").

Third, a "Nazis/Soviets Won" world. He gets his internet connection working, but everything's in German/Russian and he has to hide/run from totalitarian government police.

As an explanation as to why this happened, perhaps it was an unlucky coincidence involving an experiment into dimensional physics being worked on in else-world to fight the Gorgon there. Bishop just happened to do a jump at the wrong time through the wrong "sub-space" and his equipment wasn't made to handle it.

I see this probably involving lots of running / hiding / figuring out what the hell is going on and a possible deus ex machina rescue by rebel forces / villains-who-are-heroes-there or whatever who explain what kind of crazy thing Bishop has to do / overcome to be able to get back home.

[Supercape]

Bishop - I would say time to start picking one, home down and run with it!

My only note is whilst using Earth Victoriana would be great (it has a wiki entry and is very suitable for stuffing you up technologically), I would not want to use Lord Steam in it - at least other than as an extremely peripheral role NPC wise (if at all).

I am going off using my own PC's in threads I am GMing for a variety of reasons.

[Cubist]

Cubist: Great story - What I need for the actual kicker is what "troublesome event" as you put occurs when he is in the dilemna post doctor visit. We can certainly do a few posts about doctor visit. But then we need the kicker of the event that really puts the wind up his sail. Your story is great, and fruitful, and a source of complications. ANd you clearly have a number of ideas of kickers to pair up with it. Can I ask you to choose one and go with it?

As I see it, the endgame for Jube's kicker is that he gives up on "all bipedal, all the time", and makes a point of going quadrupedal on a regular basis... like, say, he buys a few hundred acres of wilderness and goes there for a 'vacation' every week or so. I don't see any one event as being sufficiently powerful/traumatic to do the job; rather, I see Jube being worn down by the cumulative effect of all the events. The important bit is that it ends up putting a crack in Jube's "gotta be 100% human ALL THE TIME" attitude, which will be the first sign that the poor guy is finally starting to accept his current body.

Regarding the plethora of ideas, I certainly don't expect all of them to make it into the actual storyline. Think of it as a smorgasbord -- take only what you want, and you don't have to grab samples of everything.