TeChameleon

Hrm... guess that particular question got buried:

It's looking like this is a no, from the phrasing of answers to questions that skirt the periphery of this one, but:

Is it possible to give NPC-only powers (like Warwolf transformations, or the Tsoo Sorceror teleport) to our Custom Critters?

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Or do we actually write the dialogue for a Contact and everything else?

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Yes.

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* On the critter creator: can we apply nifty back items like Goldbricker jetpacks and Malta gear to our custom critters?

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That one was answered earlier in the thread- custom critters (... cursed childhood habits, I keep wanting to write that 'kustom kritters') are made with exactly the same pieces as player characters.

Hmm... yeah, very very excited about this feature.

Couple of questions, though, also on the custom NPC powers topic... how exactly is that going to work?

Will we be able to give custom NPCs the powersets of existing NPCs, just copying and pasting?

Will we be able to use NPC-only powers (like the triggered-on-death transformations and spawnings, or Hercules Titans merging, sapper beams, or emanators) for custom NPCs?

Will we be able to combine powersets that players can't for custom NPCs, for example like the Swift Steel (Katana/Kin) Tsoo bosses?

How much control will we have over the custom NPCs' stats? Will we be able to give them, say 30% energy resistance, or boost their recharge so that they can spam a single move?

Have the NPCs-are-too-stupid-to-use-toggles problems Castle mentioned way back when been cleared up, or will we have to give them passive versions of armours, assuming we can do that?

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"I know of at least three potential timelines - that thankfully never happened - where he did exactly that", she commented almost absently. "It was one hell of a show, I'll tell you that. Even with the whole running for our lives bit thrown in it was still impressive to see."

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Eileen shuddered a little, and drank a bit of water to cover it. "I'm thankful that those were somehow prevented, at least. He works hard to maintain control, poor boy. Makes him very different from how he was growing up."

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"Exactly." Kia nodded her agreement, "So why not time? No reason it couldn't be. In any case...Paxtera, was it? How come you're here then? Is there something wrong with your history here? Or do you get days off or something...?"

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Mrs. Troy chuckled briefly at Kia's question. "A time traveller with 'time' off? I can't see that being all that difficult; if you don't experience time in a linear fashion, you could probably spend the next forty years on sabbatical without having any particular troubles... beyond aging, I suppose... upon going back to work, since you could theoretically pop up exactly where you left off."

Eileen shrugged slightly. "I can't say for time travel... and just sign for the package, hon, if it starts ticking, slam it into a tub full of water... but 'beings as small as us' can still do an impressive amount of damage, especially with the right toys, and sometimes even without."

She took another sip of water. "My baby brother, for example- Energon X- could erase a significant chunk of the known universe by getting too excited at the wrong time, just because of the way his powers work. It wouldn't be instant- I'm pretty sure his abilities obey local lightspeed restrictions- but I'm not sure it could be stopped if it got started."

Eileen Troy sat back on the sofa, sipping her water with one hand and rolling the screwdriver back and forth with the other, a sharp, wary eye on the automaton. She hadn't gotten her formidable reputation through passivity, after all. If it claimed supervillainy, she stood ready to test it with kick, mace dispenser, bear spray, taser, and just about any heavy object ready at hand.

She glanced down at Johnny when he sighed, and shook her head slightly.

"You need to relax, hon. We heard your question, but the fact remains that there really is no simple answer, so it might take us a moment to get our thoughts together. A lot of our local hero types... well, my brother works directly for S.E.R.A.P.H., albeit on a freelance basis. Ah, S.E.R.A.P.H. is a government division dealing with Science-based supers; part of the Federal Bureau for Super-powered Affairs. My boy, given that he's still just fourteen years old, lives at home, so the whole thing is moot. Aside from what Akemi said, others that I know of are independently wealthy, or their super-ness means that they don't need sleep or food, or their abilities came with their own pocket dimension or some such."

She shrugged. "Really, there are as many answers as there are heroes. Although working a non-hero job has become more common as of late." she added, looking thoughtful.

Then her gaze fell on the automaton. "So, if you things can think, what do you think of when your programming isn't compelling you to shout silly things and wave about guns that look like they belong to a marching band? Do you dream of steampunk sheep?"

((Apologies for the wait, all- it's been a crazy weekend. I'm engaged now, for one >.&gt)

The lich's lightning struck, glowed for an instant, and then became a shimmering wall of light that enveloped Yinglong in her entirety. The light shimmered, then grew into a vast, glowing orb. Darker patches shifted across the face of the coruscation; viewed from the proper angle, it had become a titanic ying/yang symbol.

The orb shattered like an egg with a bomb in it, glittering shards blasting out to form a massive magic circle more than three miles across- if anyone were to bother measuring it, they would find that it encompassed precisely nine square miles, a Taijitu visible from space. From the heart of the light, two smaller dragon silhouettes emerged, resolving into one black, one... not white, exactly, but a perfectly negative image of the first.

The two dragons twined sinuously around one another, a mass of midnight black and iridescent white coils. They spoke in unison.

Tiny dead thing; you are an affont against nature. The very balance cries out against you. Life and death, the great cycle, must be OBEYED!

The titanic circle pulsed once, a senses-shattering flash of magic as the divided Yinglong brought her will into play, a surge of wild magic that sought to restore the natural balance- alloys began to lose cohesion, synthetic fabrics simply distintegrated, concrete crumbled, plastics melted away into bubbling patches of crude oil... and undead would find the magics sustaining their quasi-life being blasted like a candle in a hurricane.

------

High above, the mages continued their assault against the molvias. Flickers of wild energy slid across the protective screens as the sorcerors probed for weaknesses, shifting up and down frequencies, combining elements, even warping space and time itself as the CPSR forces jinked and danced amidst the hail of fire. Now and again, there would be a scream and a blossom of flame that quickly became a comet as another of the mages was stripped away, but the ringwall of ghosts was surprisingly effective at keeping casualties down. They wouldn't last forever, but for the moment, they were enough.

The incoming jets were largely ignored; shattering weather was set in their path as they came around, winds that could shear the wings off in a single gust, lightning that tracked with laser-like precision, and monstrous chunks of hail that hung suspended in the air like an asteroid field.

Amidst the meteorological chaos, a squad of the nimbler spirits lurked, streamlined supersonic ghosts dubbed Interceptor Spirits by one of the less-creative but highly influential elder sorcerors. If the Raptors got anywhere near them- which they would have to, if they wished to continue their attack run- the invisible ghosts would simply phase straight through the cockpits to deliver a single slice, and Teivos would find out how well his jets flew without pilots.

Just as a bonus, the Interceptor Spirits were actively trying to crash the headless raptors into the molvias, in an attempt to break through the anti-magic defenses, and possibly smash the heavy choppers from the sky entirely.

------

Aboard one of the helicopters, Flashpoint Zeo's eyes roamed back and forth, still encased in the heavy block of ice. At the moment, he was trying to keep his flames under control as they reacted to the massive concentration of Chinese sorcery outside, but otherwise he was largely unimpeded- the ice would vanish between one heartbeat and the next if he decided it was time to move. In the meantime, he was observing as best he could.

((Random aside, since I couldn't think how to include it above- Yinglong's latest trick is a highly obscure one- it's doubtful even another dragon would recognize it- but it means one fairly obvious thing. Without medical attention or healing, she's dying. Of course, when that happens, she's going to go off like a nuke. There's going to be an impressively large amount of raw magic discharging, mostly in the form of fire, when she dies, assuming none of the sorcerors manage to break loose and keep her together.

And, as always, if I missed something, let me know. Writing while exhausted, just didn't want to keep you lot waiting))

((Er, no, that's the Malta Titans; the Nemesis Warhulks are ex-Nemesis troops that have 'taken it to the next level'. You run into one guy in a Nemesis Arc that you whomp, and then he turns up a few missions later as a Warhulk, saying that Lord Nemesis allowed him that power to get revenge.

While there might be enslaved Warhulks, I haven't run across them :/))

Eileen Troy gave the whole operation a look that wavered between pity and irritation. "Hon, it's an infiltrator bot. Of course it's going to seem intelligent, that's the whole point." she told the reptilians in general.

She paused as a thought hit her. "Of course, if they really are intelligent, that makes this even more horrifying... not only is Nemesis kidnapping, and presumably killing, people to replace them with these things, the poor things think they are people... right up until the point where their programming takes over and forces them to work for him, killing their personality."

She shuddered a little. "If he is doing that, I think I'm going to have a word with my brother about this. Two or three hundred super-types smashing every member of that armed cult of his that they can find to get at him should give him a thing or two to think about."

((Okay, Devious, W, T, and F? The ghost started to distintegrate on contact with the tank? What?!?))

Whatever the M7A7 had done to Sun Tzu's armour quickly became moot as it vanished in a roaring cascade of burning light. The tank he had remained in stubborn pursuit of was also caught by the god-laser (albeit in the fringe effect); what this did to it, if anything remained to be seen, although considering how indiscriminate the Archlich was being, it was doubtful that it was somehow specially excluded from the beam.

The point of impact was obscured by a cloud of boiling steam and vapourized stone.

The beam struck the dragon squarely amidships, looking almost like it had cut her in half, although the illusion didn't last long. The titanic beast screamed in rage and pain, and the great head swivelled around, burning eyes locking on to the archlich. The undead wizard had gotten Yinglong's attention.

Around the battlefield, the CPSR forces had lost nearly a third of their people to the death raining from the sky, although given that the majority of them had gone in pursuit of their true objective, the Sovereign, as soon as he had disappeared, the death toll was lighter than it might have otherwise been. The battle moved upwards, the Chinese wizards and Ancestral Spirits borne aloft on wings of twisted gravity, teleportational energies, spectral powers and terrible winds in relentless pursuit of the quarry they could sense high above.

Moving far faster than could possibly be expected of a beast the size of a loaded train, the dragon hurled herself at the Archlich, her head drawing level with his body, blood and fire streaming from torn scales along her wounded flanks.

Tiny dead thing, you wield magic with all-surpassing skill. You have neglected one thing, though. You wield magic; I [u]AM[u] MAGIC!!

With the scream of her final word, the dragon exhaled. Raw annihilation thundered from her throat, blue-white flame like the heart of the sun wrapped in anti-magic lancing out, her own anti-teleportation spell coming into play in an attempt to prevent the lich's escape. Building faces twenty metres away slagged or burst into flame, the street itself sagging and running molten into the spacious sewers beneath. Whatever troops, friend or foe, luckless enough to be anywhere nearby didn't even have time to scream as they were reduced to their component atoms.

The dragon's attendant Chinese sorcerors, caught in the backwash of the huge magic-killing aura Yinglong had imbued into her breath, plummeted from the sky, shrivelling away and dying of old age before they even had time to hit the ground as their magic was stolen, their very life-force torn away by the spell.

Sun Tzu coughed as he straightened up in the base of the crater, his armour blasted away and the fifty sorcerors who had been feeding him power reduced to barely twenty, sacrificing themselves to protect him. "Arrogant abomination." he muttered, but made no move to pursue the Overmagus; anything that came within half a kilometre of Yinglong's wrath was going to die without her even realizing it was there.

Instead, he began to chant, his sub-mages joining in after a second as they understood what spell he was casting. The hundred or so ghosts that had gone missing earlier reappeared, the object of their ambush vanished into the transports above. Their outlines blurred, ran together in a blinding effulgence of ectoplasmic fire. When the air cleared once more, Sun Tzu stood in the heart of another ghostly armour, this one looking far more... streamlined. His twenty surviving attendants each had their own, smaller flight-ghost.

With a lunge and a warcry, Sun Tzu took to the skies in pursuit of the Dark Sovereign. His prey would not escape him this day. By the time he cleared the rooftops, he was already doing more than 600 kilometres an hour, and had gone supersonic less than five seconds after that. The hunt was on.

Eileen tucked the screwdriver away, with a significant glance at the presumed automaton that said very plainly that it wasn't gone, just out of sight. Straightening her hair, she glanced at the three draconians, and sighed a little.

"That's not a 'he', hon. That's an 'it'. A non-sapient automaton run on steam power for some daft reason. At least, assuming that he is who that shout made him out to be- an automaton from the Nemesis Army.." she told them. "The Nemesis Army is a nasty bunch... the idiot leading them styles himself 'The Prussian Prince of Automatons'- he's very long-lived, and apparently wishes to become truly immortal; he seems to have achieved some sort of consciousness transfer for that, although no-one is certain."

She paused for a moment, looking thoughtful. "Of course, that wouldn't bother me that much if that were all he wanted. But he also seems to want to rule the world, or the universe, or the multiverse, or some such... it seems to change from day to day. He was the one behind Brass Monday- a rather nasty all-out surprise war, right here in Paragon, along with poisoning a good chunk of this country in the process so they'd crown him emperor for the antidote... he's tried to take control of the weather to blackmail the world into setting him up as ruler... all kinds of mad things. There's even rumours out of Vanguard that he was responsible for starting the first Rikti War!"

Eileen walked back around the couch and sat down, arranging herself. "So you see why his little clockwork spies aren't particularly welcome... although I have to admit, with a little rewiring and some solder, they make excellent teapots."

The cannon fire... splashed... a good dozen metres away from Sun Tzu. White fire crawled across the shadowy form of an invisible... something, which gradually faded into view as the strategist laughed. The Chinese Warlord stood, fifteen metres in the 'air' encased in a mighty suit of 'armour'... a titanic spirit no less than thirty metres tall, armoured so heavily that every move was accompanied by the fading ghosts of metallic thunder now that it was semi-solid.

One small part of his brain was filing away what Hotaka had shown of his powers; being 'saved' by the draconic newcomer hadn't been what he'd planned on, but it was a useful piece of knowledge.

Sun Tzu's laughter ceased quickly, though, when the Overmagus' assault shattered the CPSR forces' carefully prepared spellcraft, and he bent down and reached forwards to take a firm grip on the closest M7A7, one mighty ghostly hand grabbing the barrel, the other the main body of the tank, ignoring the anti-personnel weaponry firing futiley at his armour now that the main barrel had been dragged off-target.

Assuming nothing interfered, the Overmagus was going to himself trying to stop a huge chunk of anti-magic metal with his face.

Meanwhile, the main assault had broken apart and re-formed now that the atmospheric effects were no longer tenable. The dragon had roared in anger and pain when the cannon shell struck her, jaws like an industrial press edged with monomolecular blades clamping down on the attacking vehicle as she finished her lunge... being careful, of course, to do it from an angle that the dangerous main gun wasn't pointing directly down her throat, but stuck out of the corner of her mouth at an awkward angle. A ball of searing white fire engulfed the immediate area as she exhaled at the same time, a multi-pronged assault on the powerful shields and armour of the tank. Her tail, apparently carelessly, scythed towards the group of soldiers clustered near Teivos.

The ring of ghosts had thinned noticeably, barely three-quarters of the original grouping still visible. Those that were still there, however, began grabbing every available hard object, most of them simply tearing pieces out of buildings or the street, and hurling them. A significant portion of this barrage of impromptu artillery had been temporarily phased, creating armour-piercing rounds, and others had been imbued with ectoplasmic energy, creating explosive shells. All were imbued with a good deal of spirit energy, rendering them vastly more durable than they would otherwise be. Three hundred giant stones, pieces of masonry, cars, and anything else that was at hand impacted almost simultaneously from all sides, more than a hundred of them targetting the Overmagus alone, the rest targets of opportunity amongst the forces of the Dark Sovereign. The ghosts rapidly began gathering the materials for another strike, the ring shifting slightly.

The various forces of the CPSR had rearranged themselves- the melee fighters and darkness-wielders had concerned themselves with bringing down Teivos' more conventional forces (and the last remaining un-engaged tank), the gravity-manipulators were working in tandem with the kinetic jammers to bring down the two surviving choppers (assuming the hail of huge rocks didn't get them first), the fire-wielders were backing up the dragon, and the other elementalists were feeding power directly into Sun Tzu.

And everywhere the sorcerors teleported in and out, healing friend and confounding foe with their own personal hurricanes and clouds of darkness. The CPSR hadn't lost even ten men yet- every casualty was back on their feet in a matter of seconds, and thus far the resistance wasn't yet organized enough to have caused any significant fatalities.

((Oy... okay, hopefully I've caught everything. Khell, Devious, or anybody else, if I've buggered up, let me know. And yes, Flashpoint Zeo is still in a block of ice, getting increasingly annoyed. If one of you could grab him, I'd appreciate it; getting him captured by a bad-guy group I control would be a bit weird.

And if anyone wants to jump part of the CPSR forces with their character, just do it, and I'll run the baddies... although make sure you're clear about it, since I'm a bit slow of mind ))

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"Lord Nemesis is watching you Akemi!" and tried to dash off to the nearest sewer grate.

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Before the strange man had finished the first syllable of "Nemesis", Eileen had a hefty-looking screwdriver out of her purse and a dangerous glint in her eye. By the time he managed to get out "is", she was on her feet, and by the second syllable of "watching", she was vaulting the couch facing away from the door in a remarkably impressive leap, at least given her general appearance, age and lack of superpowers.

If nobody faster than her intervened, the erstwhile Mrs. Troy was going to bring this guy down with a flying rugby tackle to the back of the knees and sit on his chest. And if he didn't say something very convincing, very quickly, dismantling would follow soon after.

Flashpoint Zeo jerked in shock as the roaring inferno that normally shielded him briefly turned crystalline, then burst like a popped soap bubble. Combat reflexes honed by years of the most chaotic battles Primal Earth had to offer pinpointed the shooter almost instantly -Building top; knowledge useless.- and with that acknowledgement, the huge tank sprinted for safety, superspeed stretching to the fullest as he blasted for the last-known position of the rebels.

Unbeknownst to most of the combatants in the area, the interdiction field was disabled at around that point in time by a group of Infiltrator Spirits, rising out of the ground to tear the equipment apart.

Flashpoint Zeo found the decimated remains of the rebel force, and simply stopped, staring in disbelief. Then a low growl rumbled from his throat, crescendoing into a roaring scream of challenge, and fire blazed around him, flames leaping twenty feet into the air as building faces in the narrow alley began to soften and run like wax.

As he took his first menacing step, there was a crystalline noise and the giant was abruptly encased in a small mountain of ice that completely blocked the alleyway, the raging inferno going out like a snuffed candle.

"<Celestial Target secured.>" one of the Ice Winds announced in Chinese.

Outside the alley, all hell had just broken loose. The first warning anyone had that a third front had just opened up was a 400 metre dragon materializing in midair to bite a chopper in half, smashing another with its tail in the same motion. Then, with a shake of its head, it hurled the shattered helicopter in its mouth at a tank, vomiting fire to turn it into a blazing meteor of burning metal and detonating ammunition.

Then it 'stooped', a giant serpentine form uncoiling in a straight lunge at the infantry around the tank it had targetted, fiery breath streaking out in a curtain of trailing flame as it shouldered building fronts aside with contemptuous ease, apparently indifferent to the return fire, both the briefly panicked original response and the far more disciplined second volley.

During the split-seconds of the dragon's attack, the sky went dark and a mystic darkness fell over the battleground like a shroud, hungrily devouring any and all wavelengths of electromagnetic energy that tried to pass through it, causing everyone there to be stumbling mostly-blind in the freezing murk, unless they broadcast the proper mystic IFF-signal.

Then the weather went mad. Hurricane-force winds came shrieking out of the sky to hammer everyone present, and hailstones, starting at pea-sized and ramping up to basketball-sized chunks of ice came thundering out of the sky. Lightning screamed to earth, shattering glowing craters out of the pavement and crawling madly across tank shields, tearing brief streaks of light through the all-consuming blackness.

Even more otherworldly effects came into play as tendrils of the darkness gained solidity, smashing into hapless soldiers, coiling around them, or growing blades to slice at their targets. Patches of life-sucking anti-energy drifted invisibly through the darkness, seeking to rip the very soul out of any unlucky enough to be caught in it. Gravity warped and buckled, multiplying by orders of magnitude, or reversing, or sometimes both in a very small area for zones of fearsome rending. Fire blazed forth from all around the mighty black dragon, who seemed unbothered by the mystic maelstrom around her. Psionic illusions stalked forth, gibbering and shrieking as they reached to tear loose the minds of the soldiers of the Sovereign, hands whose owners were lost in the impenetrable murk smashed powered armour with bare fists, magical claws, or devastating kicks, and hundreds of titanic ghosts filled the sky as they swooped out of the clouds or rose out of the ground, forming a perimeter of ectoplasmic death.

Then, and only then, in the heart of the chaos, a brilliant flash appeared, and Sun Tzu stepped from behind the aetheric veil, just standing there, four stories above the ground. The forces of the Chinese People's Sorceric Revolution had arrived.

"Soldiers of a Dark Sovereign!" he announced in accented, but passable, English. "Surrender and you will be granted an honourable death. Vlastislav Teivos, your reign has come to an end. The peoples of the Celestial Kingdom will stand for the rule of an outsider no longer; your head will be marched through the ashes of the Forbidden City on a pike!"

With that dramatic announcement, he gestured, and a pike appeared in his hand. A vicious downward sweep, and a bolt of lightning thicker than a man's waist was torn from the sky to join with the polearm briefly, then leap off the end to raven at the Dark Sovereign's position.

((Devious, I'm going to leave the soldiers', tanks', (surviving ) helicopters' and whatever other military hardware you have running around there's responses up to you; bear in mind that everything prior to Sun Tzu's announcement has occupied the space of somewhere less than five seconds.

For those who don't have the benefit of the PM I sent Devious, there's about 100 Boss-type Tsoo running around, around 400 ghosts and... uhm, I don't remember how many lieutenant-level Sorcerors running around- little help, Devious?- along with Sun Tzu, who in game terms is probably an AV, the dragon (Giant Monster, natch ), Xu Guan (ditto on the AV, sounds like), and Ryuu Hotaka, who's a PC.

Yup, this nice little trap has just been blown all to hell and back

EDIT- Just had it pointed out to me that I screwed up quite nicely by totally forgetting to include Sun Tzu's original positioning. Fixed now))

((Ouch. Apparently Gauntlet isn't working >.&gt)

Flashpoint Zeo watched the tanks zoom in with detatched interest, noting laconically "Shiny." As they landed, he made a beeline for one, spiralling around it in a whirling tornado of flame, making a spirited attempt at removing every piece of it that stuck beyond the hull with sword and flame.

In the midst of the whirlwind, he lobbed the occasional fireball at the other tanks, hopefully drawing their attention away from the fleeing rebels and Primal-Earth heroes. As always, he was carefully regulating his flame so that nearby soldiers (and those inside the tanks) might get slapped around and slightly cooked, but weren't being butchered wholesale.

((we could just have him spontaneously combust/randomly teleport out of there so we can get on with things... this IS Paragon City, after all >.&gt)

((nope, far as I know, we're waiting on Khellendrosic))

Eileen gave Paxtera a look. "I'm going to guess you haven't been super-ing for too long, hon? Because an island full of tiny dragon-people is barely page three news these days." A thoughtful pause. "At least, not been super-ing too long in the present. Honestly, you powered types have the oddest lives."

A soft laugh. "There's so much crazy already in this city that even acknowledging the lesser oddities of the outside world would mean you had a good chance of missing something vital. Last I heard, there were at least three entirely separate societies living underneath the city, four different dimensions actively invading and at least two others trying to, an undeclared secret war by an ancient cult on something close on to three-quarters the population of the planet Earth..."

Mrs. Troy paused for breath, then continued "Another ancient cult trying to raise undead gods to derail the modern age back into the era of mists and necromancy, alien beings hunting one another across the vastnesses of space... of course, you'd know about that last one, Pax... at least three major paramilitary conspiracies, two with extant ties to multiple governments including the US, and the third in the middle of its own internal war across time with and against the aliens I mentioned... oh, and all the usual gangs and idiots."

Another laugh. "If you want to make the city officials all twitchy, go down to City Hall and ask for a dossier on Operation World-Wide Red under the Freedom of Information act. It's quite funny, especially when all the men in dark suits realize you don't have any agenda they can find. Ever see twenty-eight NSA agents running in tiny circles arguing about trying to figure a way to tell you to get lost without violating any laws or arousing suspicion?"

She sat back and took another sip of her water, noting with approval the bat, but not bothering to move as the Peacebringer got the door.

*shrug*

However it comes about, I'll be bringing Target Lad back in

If 101 started back up, I'd almost definitely bring Danny back into play; as far as I'm concerned, he's still a student at Golden Eagle (I've made occasional reference to it in some of the other threads he or the characters related to him have turned up in), so continuing the story would be fine by me.

"Believe it is time for new set of lies." Flashpoint Zeo commented. "Capture minor inconvenience at moment... trapped in stupid dimension anyways, restricted mobility within of lesser difficulty."

The giant worked a shrug into the whirling dance of flaming pain he was performing in the midst of the Sovereign's troops. Unlikely as it might have seemed, his control was precise enough that thus far no injuries worse than broken bones, mild concussions, and the occasional third-degree burn had been sustained by the troopers opposing him. "Will be staying here. Wish word with Dark Sovereign. Or possibly sword, depending on plans for Primal Earth. Others welcome to come or go as desired."

"Danny's doing about as well as usual... his most current conceit is that the universe in general is out to get him." Mrs. Troy responded casually, snagging one of the water glasses and taking a sip. "Granted, there's some evidence for that, although just about anybody with superpowers of any sort tends to act as a lightning rod for trouble in this town."

"As to the cars... well, it's something to get used to for some of us as well... Paragon City puts even my hometown of Vancouver to shame, and we've got no shortage of cars there!" she said with a brief laugh.

She inclined her head to the smallest draconian when he bowed and bestowed on him the beatific smile of a woman who knows she has an armed mousetrap in her purse. "It's nice to meet you, John." she said smoothly. "Must be rather interesting to be wandering about in a world of giants, although I suppose being able to fly would probably help... you're Ishbalan?" she echoed, mangling the name slightly. "So has the kaiser invaded to craft the philosopher's stone yet..?"

Then she caught herself. "Never mind, comes from being married to an anime nerd." she said with a chuckle, dismissing the comment. "But the balance that always seems to exist between supers on each side is a trifle odd, aye. I'd say Kia has the right of it. though- powers have little bearing on whether or not someone is good or evil... although it certainly opens up new avenues of expression for your nature when you can toss a bus half a block."

Flashpoint Zeo glanced left and right, taking in the new arrivals. Then, without warning, he moved, a blurred rush that abruptly tightened in and spiralled around one of the newcomers, one sword out to slice into their armour.

It was showy, impractical, and next to useless in actual combat, but against a foe who wasn't already engaged, and who tended to freeze for the split-second needed, the psychological impact of suddenly having your armour peeled like an onion (and your gun melted to a nub) could be devastating.

Whatever the results, the big tank turned his attention briefly to the soldier next to the one he'd just tried to peel, delivering a stinging swat to the side of the helmet that would leave the soldier in a stunned, smouldering heap if it connected, and resumed his original position.

"To be waiting for what?" he asked. If his initial attacks had connected, this would be around the time the loops of armour would fall off and the soldier he'd smacked would bounce the first time.

He repeated the hand gesture, only this time, he pushed a bit of magic into the challenge. Any attackers would find themselves hard-pressed to focus on anyone or anything other than him for the next forty seconds or so, urged to reckless attacking and a burning desire to close distance with the giant by the small spell he had just released.

------

Sun Tzu frowned at Hotaka's request, uncertain of exactly how to deal with it; Hotaka was not acting properly draconic, in the eyes of the cunning old sorceror. He smoothed his moustaches and gazed into the eyes of the other, seeing little in those dark orbs.

"While it is true that we are able to enter that city covertly, I am not convinced that it is wise to bring your eminence there; it is well fortified and our diviners have uncovered definite indications that the Dark Sovereign has an interest in... acquiring... a dragon for himself." Sun Tzu said eventually, his lips twisting in distaste at the idea that anyone could 'own', or even claim rulership over, a dragon.

"Still, perhaps you have the right of it. I will gather a coterie of our best, and then yourself, I, and Yinglong will lead them. Bailong and Xuanlong will remain here; hopefully that will lead to the restoration of some balance if a strong source of Yang is removed for a time."

The old strategist gave a faint, evil smile. "I believe Xu Guan shall be joining us as well; he has been desiring to cover himself with glory, and who am I to deny ambition?"

With that, he faded from sight, a far smoother teleport than the flashing affairs of the lower-ranked Sorcerors.

((Bailong is the female white dragon, Yinglong is the female black dragon, and Xuanlong is the male black dragon, for the record))