Friday 1 July 2016

Vampifan's Superheroes and Supervillains 04

Continuing with my recent theme of showing you some of my old 28mm scale figures of superheroes and supervillains that I made and converted I present to you the Psi-Prime team of supervillains. These seven miscreants appeared in the Villains and Vigilantes scenario, The Secret in the Swamp, published by Fantasy Games Unlimited in 1986. I did not play this scenario with the V&V rules but I did convert it for GURPS Supers and ran it with two other players using our team of Gothique, Vampirella and Wolverine.
At the far left of the two photos above and below is Psi-Prime, the megalomaniacal leader of this group of supervillains. Born Karl Wagner in Munich, Germany, he developed an unhealthy fascination with genocide during his teens. He would often visit Dachau concentration camp. This coincided with the development of his psionic super powers. He majored in chemistry and discovered a chemical that could instantly evaporate water. His plans for genocide by contaminating the water supplies in Germany were thwarted and he fled to the Everglades in Florida. With a stockpile of chemicals he plans to evaporate all the oceans of the world. In GURPS Supers I gave him the following super powers - Dehydrate level:10, Increased Speed level:2, Psychokinesis level:26 (with Instantaneous enhancement) and Telepathy level:12. He wears High Tech Body armour. He cost 1,000 points. He always carries a bag of coins, which he can use as ammo for a telekinetic attack, propelling them as fast as a bullet. My figure of Psi-Prime was sculpted by me and made of Milliput. He is meant to be tall but I think I've made him a bit too tall.
Standing next to Psi-prime is his girlfriend, White Heron. Whilst studying anthropology at university, Karen Moran was given the opportunity to study a tribe of Seminole Indians in the Everglades, She was even more delighted when she was asked to take part in a secret ceremony of the Indians' gods. However, it was all a ruse by Shaman (see below) and Karen was transformed into White Heron, the totem creature of Shaman's tribe. Shaman was working for Psi-prime and when Karen met Karl for the first time they fell in love. She soon came to accept his vision of his master plan to change the world. Karen can transform into a white heron, as well as spouting wings and talons whilst remaining human. She has one unusual disadvantage and that is an addiction for eating raw frogs, which she must do on a daily basis. She was designed for an average 500 points. Her figure is based on an old Grenadier Miniatures Supers figure and was so perfect for her that I didn't need to convert her at all. Sometimes you get lucky and find the ideal figure for your needs.
Third in line is Antioch, known as Shaman. As an aspiring man since his youth, Antioch became frustrated with the continued maltreatment of the Indians by the Whites. He decided revenge was in order. With the aid of the Five Ancients, supernatural spirits he summoned, he forged two magical devices - an Amulet of Life and a Mind Control device. His actions brought him to the attention of Coot (see below) who was working for Psi-Prime. Coot urged Psi-Prime to recruit Shaman. The old man readily accepted Psi-Prime's offer and has never regretted it. Shaman possesses no super powers but he does know a smattering of magic spells. He has Magical Aptitude level:2 and Spirit Empathy as two of his GURPS advantages. He cost 300 points, making him the weakest member of the Psi-Prime team. Shaman is another one of my unique sculpts and was made out of Milliput.
At the far right is Coot, a being from a limbo-like dimension, who ruled there until he grew bored and sought out a new challenge. Psi-Prime made contact with him and offered him a portion of the Earth to rule and a decent portion of the water that would remain after he put his genocidal plan in place. Coot, hoping that this would be a true test of his power, agreed. Coot's super powers that I gave him for GURPS Supers were Enhanced Strength 23, Extra Hit Points +20, Gadget (a fishing rod with Bind power level:15), Increased Speed level:2, Laser Eyes and Longevity. He cost 1,000 points, making him a formidable opponent. He was made by me, using Milliput. His fishing rod was the shaft of a spear I converted. I like him because he looks so innocuous.

For this trio of villains I changed their bases to reflect the fact that they spend all of their time in the swamps of the Everglades and would never appear in an urban environment. At the far left is Alligator, a villain similar in many respects to the Lizard from Marvel Comics' Spiderman series. Roger Engle, was once a biologist studying alligators in the Florida Everglades. This was a dream job for him but he became appalled at the slaughter of so many alligators both legally and illegally that he decided to champion their freedom and dignity. He developed a formula to give him the powers of an alligator. It worked only too well but it also gave him the intelligence of an alligator. When Psi-Prime found him, he manipulated the confused scientist into aiding in his fiendish plan. Alligator has the following powers for GURPS Supers - Amphibious, Breath Holding level:4, Damage Resistance 20, Enhanced Strength 30, Increased Speed level:2, Passive Defence 3, Speak with Animals (reptiles only), Striker (claws, teeth and tail) and Super Swimming. He cost 750 points. I sculpted him out of Milliput. An easier option would have been to simply use a Heroclix figure of the Lizard but I didn't.
Next up is Sludge, one of the Five Ancients who responded to the summoning by Shaman. His form has changed and he is considerably weaker in this dimension. As one of the Ancients (who all desire the downfall of Man) "Sludge" saw that the powers that Psi-Prime had allied with might succeed so he risked entering this dimension. Due to a freak mystical backlash caused by such power entering this dimension, Sludge was transformed physically and mentally. Shaman's two magic items (the Amulet of Life and the Mind Control device) allow him to remain in this dimension. If either were to be destroyed he would return to his original home dimension totally intact as one of the Five Ancients. Despite being considerably weakened he is still a very powerful entity. He possesses the following super powers - Amphibious, Body of Mud, Damage Resistance 5, Doesn't Breathe, Drink, Eat or Sleep, Enhanced Strength 150, Extra Hit Points +35, Immortality and Passive Defence 2. Note that Body of Mud is a combination of the powers Body of Earth and Body of Water. Sludge can alter the state of his body at will - from a liquid mud form to a wet clay-like form. He cost 1,000 points. For the figure of Sludge I simply used an old Grenadier Shambling Mound from a boxed set of AD&D monsters.
Last of all is Swamp Rat, who has no super powers whatsoever but who is a highly skilled and deadly survivalist. Jacob Archer is a U.S. Army veteran with mental problems. He thinks he is still at war and he went to ground in the Everglades where he adopted the name, Swamp Rat. He now believes the entire world is one vast swamp and if he were ever removed from this environment he would become catatonic. One day, he was approached by a man who he naturally shot. Incredibly, the bullet stopped inches from the man's heart. The stranger called himself Psi-Prime and offered Swamp Rat to help win his war if he helped him. This was too good an opportunity to pass up. Psi-Prime then put Swamp Rat in charge of Sludge, who "Rat" immediately liked (mainly because of his brutal killing strength) and within months had achieved near total control over Sludge. He cost 400 points in my GURPS Supers campaign. Swamp Rat is a converted Games Workshop plastic Catachan Jungle Fighter. I added the rolled up sleeves of his coat as his arms were originally bare. I also modelled his hair to match his illustration. His 7.62mm H&K G3 Assault Rifle came from my spare parts box.
The illustrations below were scanned in to my computer from the scenario book and in some cases modified by me. For example, Shaman was only shown from the waist up in the book, so I had to add his legs to the illustration. For Sludge, I added the long nose that appears on the figure so he more closely resembled it. They were all digitally coloured by me.
Psi-Prime and White Heron

Shaman, Coot and Alligator

Sludge and Swamp Rat

51 comments:

  1. oh God Bryan, what can I say.... I absolutely LOVE these. Your first post in this genre left me thinking “hmmmm not sure", the second got me thinking "HMMM, okay, maybe... maybe." but you kept on posting, and suddenly... eventually, I get it, and I`m like WOW - BOMB BLAST!!! This last batch has sent my imagination shooting sky high. Excellent conversions, AMAZING paint jobs.

    For some reason receiving the wonderful Vampirella, Purgatory, and Succubus from you as a gift REALLY helped me to see your style of painting close up and now I `get them` more than I could ever have don’t before. Your photos are always nice, well taken (obviously on a good camera with a lot of photographic know-how behind each shot). But trust my guys *he says, looking about the room at everyone* its only once you hold one of Bryan`s creations in your hand, and see it close up that you can REALLY get what he does.

    White Heron, Shaman, Alligator, Sludge, Swamp Rat, Coot, and the incredible Psi-Prime just blew me away the second I opened this page.

    Wow, Bryan, I am so impressed by these.

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    1. Thank you so much, Steve. I think the same can be said about a lot of people's minis. They do look different in the flesh than from their photos. Yes, it helps that I have a good camera and photographic gear, plus a good understanding of photography, learnt from a very early age. But a photograph can never be as good as seeing a figure up close in real life.

      I'm also delighted that you finally "get" what these posts are about. Some of thee figures are very old. Sludge is definitely the oldest out of this lot. He only got a new lease of life and paint job when I decided to make the Psi-Prime team.

      I still have a lot more I want to show. I've mainly been concentrating on the bad guys but there are a lot of heroes to show as well.

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  2. These are, very, very, VERY very.. VERY VERY good.

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    1. Gosh! Thank you so much, Tarot! I wasn't expecting such high praise. *Blushes!*

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  3. Don`t get me wrong, this is actually a big compliment: but these remind me of something I would be searching for to use in my own Vulgaria, along with Baron Bomburst' and Lord and Lady Scrumptious (Chitty Chitty Bang bang) or even an imagi-nation game set in Ruritania (Count of Monte-Cristo etc). I search and scour endlessly for this sort of thing to add to this type of game and THESE fit perfect: even though they are not meant to hehe, by sheer chance, they would actually be my ideal.

    As the others say Bryan, these are excellently rendered.

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    1. Hil, I'm going to take that as the compliment it was clearly meant to be. Obviously, I know nothing about these games (or is it just one game?) you speak of although I have heard you mention "imagi-nation" before. I'd love to hear more about this.

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    2. Imagi-Nation gaming is a modern game term, coined to encompass "what if" situations usually with a slightly whimsical or/and sometimes farcical feel and tone to them. Monty Pythons "Holy Grail" or “jabberwocky” would be good examples. “What if” St Trinians school and surrounding lands were attacked by zombies might make another excellent imagi-nation sandbox mini campaign. But an ideal example of what REALLY constitutes imagi-nation on a grand scale is when you take a big chunk of history and use that as a frame work upon which you make up stuff that never happened (But feels like it COULD have happened) and add it to the pot.

      So for example: take the late Victorian era. About the time of Jack the Ripped (1888) one year before Rorkes Drift (Zulu) and The Battle of Isandlwana (Zulu Dawn). Now at the time, the world know Gaslighting and the steam ship ran pretty much side by side with sailing boats. The steam train was pretty universal but electricity was still barely conceived of (as a notion still to be properly invented). But in reality... in real history, there was a brief time when it ws debatable whether the world would go all steam (steampunk), which would have meant flying contraptions and all all sorts of stuff.. all run on steam, or whether the new (almost magical it seemed) invention of `the electric light bulb` would revolutionise the world and see the extinction of steam.

      It was touch and go for a while which idea would win... traditionalists wanted to stick with steam, and the industrial revolutionists wanted to take a chance on this new fangled electric thing (from this comes classic horror novels of the era like Frankenstein).

      Now from a purely wargaming and rpg point of view, this means we can go mad and play about with all sorts of ideas (aka Space 1889 and G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T.). “What if” the Zulu King Cetshwayo had been given steam powered repeating rifles from Prussian/German black smugglers (who wanted to see the power struggle shift from the Boars in favour of the natives... a secret political power play engineered because the little country of Ruritania wanted the diamonds in Transvaal, and currently the Boars sat right on top of the hidden mines Ruritania had discovered).

      Now add a second “What if” element, and say Sir Henry Bartle Frere (the man who most doubtedly was responsible for starting the Zulu wars with the soul intention or seeing the distinction of the Zulu nation) was ill in 1888/9 and was temporarily out of the picture, and the Anglo British aggression was removed from the political agenda at that CRUCIAL moment in history... Maybe the British would come in alongside the Zulus as allies AGAINST the Boars and against the smugglers (very realistic s Britain was vigilently adamant to stamp out smuggling at the time). Suddenly you have a Imagi-nary world and an imagi-nation wargame campaign on your hands.
      That`s pretty much what Imagi-world gaming is Bryan mate. In Hil`s case, she likes to take the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and mess about with “What if” storylines evolving round that classic Ian Flemming story, and take the story beyond the scope of the book and the film... effectively making it into a controlled (more like Low Fantasy) style of play: less fantastical than standard fantasy tends to be, which is why it tends to appeal more to the older (and dare I say mature) type of gamer.

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    3. Steve, what a superb explanation on what Imagi-Nation is all about. Yes, I can see lots of gaming possibilities within this setting. For me, the most obvious is a St. Trinian's vs Zombies campaign, which you briefly mentioned. This has been a goal of mine ever since someone suggested to me that I run a zombie apocalypse campaign set in England. Believe me, it is still on my "to do" list. I'm only holding off doing it because I need to make a St. Trinian's School.

      I can see that this type of game wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea but for those who "get" it, it offers a rich source of possibilities. Fascinating stuff!

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    4. Absolutely Bryan. Its hard sometimes to differentiate between Imagi-Nation games from Fantasy ones. I think the simplest way to describe the difference is to say: fantasy is all about playing in made up worlds (often/usually including races and fictitious creatures which don`t really exist) like the imaginary worlds of Dungeon and Dragons; and Imagi-Nation games are usually based and set firmly within the real world... but a world which is altered in some way... like a zombie infested England in Pride & Prejudice and Zombie", the Medieval setting in Underworld, and (ideal example) the Three Musketeers.

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    5. Yes, I get it, Steve, but good for you for explaining further. The Three Musketeers setting is something I could be very easily persuaded to get into. I'm currently loving the new BBC TV series but I do wish the programme planners would leave it be and stop moving it about or cancelling it just for a stupid game of football.

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    6. Jeeeese isn't that annoying. They did that years ago with a series I absolutely LOVED, called "Robin of Sherwood" and it kept being postponed for the darn snooker. The FINAL EPISODE actually ended up being postponed five weeks in a row, before they finished the series off with the last episode Kinda lost its momentum. I was soooo happy when years later I found it all on DVD.

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    7. Funnily enough, I can remember that as well. Man, I absolutely loved "Robin of Sherwood" and for the finale to be delayed so long was a bloody disgrace. I don't understand why programme planners assume everyone loves sport. I HATE all sports!

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  4. Just spoke with Hils, Tar` and Tiffany (my daughter) and we all agree, these knock hairs off of HeroClix, which is ANOTHER huge compliment because we simply love and adore Clix sculpts so much.

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    1. Now that is HIGH praise! Thank you all so much! "Blushes even more!*

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  5. Another excellent post, showcasing both your sculpting and painting skills. As a lover of all things 'Super', as you may have gathered, I love not only people's original creations (like Roger's Doomwatch) but also 'Forgotten Heroes' such as these. Very enjoyable stuff, Bryan. And there's more you say? You're spoiling us...

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    1. Many thanks, Jez. Oh, yes, there is loads more Superhero goodness I can show. My next post will feature a team of supervillains from the Golden Heroes game, but seeing as they are based on characters found in the Supervisor's Kit you may not be familiar with them.

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  6. "Jack the Ripped" would be a great Imagi-nation name wouldn't it ^^

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  7. LOL man I`m gonna give up writing long relpies on blogs, no one ever understand them (so doesn't reply... that's two now in a row haha)

    grumble grumble*

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    1. I didn't reply earlier because I took a lunch break. But I have replied now. Please do continue with your long comments. I like them and I like to reply in kind where appropriate.

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  8. you`re a historian dear, your mind is full of facts figures and information (which you only really see on historical wargame blogs and sites). So if the conversation is all about Zombies and Superheroes and chibi characters (all of them fantasy, right dear?) and you try and introduce history and things, you`ll probably meet a blank hehe. Most people don't follow that stuff my love (too much like school).

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    1. I must be an oddity then, because history does fascinate me. I may have moved on from historical games but my interest in them most certainly has not. My interest in wargaming came about as a direct result from studying history for my "O" Levels. I scored very highly when I sat my exam.

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    2. And me, I love history and these what ifs are brilliant

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    3. Wooohooo!!!!!! mmmm.... good, good, GOooooooood :-)

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    4. There you go, Steve. Not everyone finds history boring.

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  9. *chuckles and nods, kisses wifey and makes mental note to self.. will only stick to simple fantasy from now on*

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    1. That's generally the safe option but feel free to e-mail me if you want to stick to the historical side of gaming.

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    2. I always do ^^ my ten and twenty page letters must send you to sleep often hehee.

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    3. hehe, we don`t all have an academic Cambridge University upbringing like you Mr Stevie hehe. But naaa, like Bryan, I happen to LOVE history (you and Hil gave me that passion for it). When you both talk, I just grab on and try to keep up lol.

      Tarot x

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    4. Ah, bless you, Tarot! The gaming world needs more people like you.

      And Steve.

      And Hil.

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    5. Grins* yeah but I`m better looking.

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    6. Darling, light of my life, the only way you`d look anything like as good as Tarot is if you were born again in a next life as a gymnastic cosplay dancer. And.. Lord of my dreams, heart pulse of my desires, the only way you could look as good as me well, maybe that's not so hard to achieve lol. But I suppose it depends if you want me to be nice to you ever again *smiles sweetly*

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    7. thank you dear. Nice save.

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  10. yes, but when he writes he still typos like an Irishman lost in a Guinness factory.

    *grins innocently*

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    1. That's an image that just won't leave my head, Hil. "Chuckle!*

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  11. Ah, but sometimes the need to get something out of your head and into the ether overrides your need to be grammatically correct - combine this with the ability to respond via mobile or tablet, and the bane of the mobile poster - predictive text *spits* and the occasional typo is to be expected.

    Don't worry, Steve, we know you're not an idiot...

    obviously can't comment on the drunkeness, but based on when you posted, I'm assuming it's a little early...?

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    1. It's always 5o'clock somewhere Jez...
      And yes I understand the typos that show up because of all the reasons above, the curse of the enthusiastic and highly imaginative alike!

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    2. Oh and Steve - sorry mate but no just no! (And you know the bit that I'm disagreeing with fella....) ;-P

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  13. Terrific stuff Bryan. What an incredible time you clearly had with these rules!! Your enthusiasm for the genre shines through and I'm gobsmacked at the effort you put into these wonderful sculpts. Sludge is by far my fave, but that's not to take anything away from the others in any way. Colourful, well-detailed and full of character, you should be rightly proud of these magnificent models, and the memories they clearly evoke :-)

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    1. Many thanks, Simon. It's true that both I and my players had a lot of fun playing "Villains and Vigilantes" and then "GURPS Supers". Happy times! My favourite figure out of this team is Coot because he is not at all what you expect a demonic supervillain to look like. Sludge is quite a combat beast.

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  14. Smashing stuff as always Bryan, and love the background info too, the first chap reminds me of the big baddie chap from "Streetfighter two" (whatever his name was), but I agree that I think my favourite is Coot too, that is a great characterful sculpt and not at all what he appears to be, like Simon's excellent Molly Hayes miniature.

    Cheers Roger.

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    1. Cheers, Roger. I never got into "Streetfighter" so I don't know who you mean. Sorry. But, yes, there is something about Coot that appeals to me. And good call on Simon's Molly Hayes. I do like her a lot.

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  15. Nice to see some supers. keep them coming.

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