DocTachyon

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

Here’s me, writing my award nominations when I really need to be working on my next post.

Before I start in on specific awards, I just gotta say, it’s been incredibly difficult to choose. I love reading the IC. We have some genuinely amazing, powerful stories going on here, and many characters brought to life in ways I’ve never seen before. I usually find myself wishing we had a full length novel from each of you about your characters. Trust me, even if I don’t mention you below, I’m sure I’ve got something great to say about your character.

Best Character: @Morden Man as The Fantastic Four
Technically this isn’t a fair contest. Where everyone else writes one great character or another, Morden pulls off four. My only real exposure to the FF has been the mid-2000s cartoon, the live action movies, and Reed Richards time as The Maker, but Morden’s posts have me itching for any kind of great FF story I can get my hands on. Despite relatively little screen time for each member, as they need to share the space, I get a real feeling of distinct character from each one, even in supporting characters like Guy Gardner and Hill.

Best Character Concept: @Eddie Brock as Captain America
When coming upon this thread to apply, the first exemplar sheet I looked at was Eddie’s Cap. The idea and the possibility space of it was incredible. Most incarnations of the Captain that I’m familiar with see him as a big Boy Scout fighting for truth, justice, and the American way, but this is a Cap that I think fits this RP much more than the standard version would. UOU presents a world that has had its information ruthlessly policed by two overarching international organizations for decades, almost like 1984. It wouldn’t feel quite right to have a more traditional Cap in a world like that, so instead Eddie gives us an incredible take on the character perfectly suited for this world. I’m chomping at the bit for more Cap posts, I can’t wait to see more of this character.

Best Character Development: @HenryJonesJr as Spider-Woman
I’m biased in favor of this character, as someone finally starting the crawl out of his teenage years. HJJ captures what it’s like to be a teenager better than most actual teenagers. Gwen bleeds believability, it’s no stretch at all to imagine someone like her walking around the halls of my old High School. It’s fascinating to watch her grow in all the little ways, dealing with her mixed emotions around Peter, her increasingly complicated relationship with her Dad, and juggling all of her responsibilities as a freakin’ superhero. Gwen’s story has all the character focus of the best Spider-Man stories, and I’m excited to see where HJJ’s writing takes her next.

Best Story: @Simple Unicycle as Punisher
One of the first comics I ever read was Punisher MAX. Garth Ennis writes the Punisher with unrelenting ferocity, brutalizing his opponents in ways that often made me turn away in horror. To me, this was The Punisher at his core, a deeply damaged person exacting his revenge on the Universe for dealing him a bad hand in the most violent way possible. I’ll sing Garth Ennis’ praises until I die, but damn if Simple doesn’t give him a run for his money. It can be extremely difficult to appropriately communicate action in writing, since it’s usually more given to visual media, but Simple writes Punisher with such unrelenting force that I can practically see Punisher leaping off of the screen and annihilating bad guys before my eyes. It’s just as good as watching John Wick, and it doesn’t let up, issue to issue, I can’t get enough. My one wish is that at some point, we get to see Frank square up against Barracuda.

Best Post: @Byrd Man as John Constantine; The Curse of Frederick Waltham
I sat here for too long looking at the blank space below this choice. I went for this link immediately once I saw a “Best Post” category, but I find myself without any idea where to begin. There’s so much to love here, from Waltham’s desperation to Stowe’s abject terror. Perhaps the most amazing part is that this post doesn’t even focus all that much on Constantine himself. 10/10, would read again.

The John Lees Memorial MVP Award*: @Nightrunner
This was a contentious category, but y’all be sleepin’ on Nightrunner. This guy takes all the abuse and jokes for his edginess like a champion, and I’ve felt that he provides a certain color to the OOC that no one else can quite bring out. Cheers to the Forget-Me-Not squad.

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

<Snipped quote by DocTachyon>

I think we're probably on the home straight as regards the Surfer interaction so I wouldn't stress too much about getting involved if it's a hassle.

As MB has said, there'll be plenty of opportunities to get involved in things like this in future. (By then you'll hopefully be writing posts on more than Google Drive on your cell phone!)

@Morden Man

Well, my last post saw him leaving for Central City, but if things wrap up before I can post I fan just ret-con that one away.

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

Vigilante post coming soon, to have him link up with Superman and Flash. Unfortunately I'm on a family vacation and all I've got to work with is mobile Google Drive for a few days. Post should be incoming soon, though.

DC Unlimited 2.0 iCheck

Midnighter will arrive soon. I just need to bang out all the kinks I put in the first version after I wrote it in a sleep-addled haze.

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

<Snipped quote by DocTachyon>

You didn't really need to rush.

@Sep

The price I pay for not reading the OOC as thoroughly as I should.

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

Mad rushed Vig/Ghost Rider post up so I can slide on in just in time for the event.

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

”The Ranchero of Miracle Mesa” - Something Wicked This Way Comes
Now retconned, True Believers! Check out the upcoming "Strings: Part Three" for the situation with Vig!

Warpath, Texas

---

”How’s the news treatin ya?” Vig asked. Jonah Hex sat with his feet up on the porch of the Crossroads Saloon, L-Pad in hand. For an old world cowboy, he’d caught on to the new technology quick. He didn’t much prefer it to newspapers, but those had stopped coming a long time ago.

“That Punisher boy in New York just blew through the last o’ the Italians, n’ the Spider lady took out some rough n’ tough goons. Usual. No word from Frank or the others.” Hex said.

Vigilante nodded slow and pulled his hat off his head. He ran a hand through his sweat slicked hair. The sun was high in the sky, he and Hex and just spent the last six hours using horse teams to drag in old car husks from the nearest junkyard to bolster the outer lines. Gunn was down by the Town Square, trying to teach the townsfolk what he could about gunplay.

Much like The Crossroads, Vig reckoned that Warpath was damn near impossible to kill. Three years real-time with only Gunn and and handful of other gunslingers to protect it and the town held out like it was the Alamo. In Hell, it was impossible to defend a single location. If you tried to lock down any one spot, the demons would be itchin’ to bumrush you before you could proper take your boots off. Maybe it had something to do with the magic of the spot. Or maybe Gunn was a better sharpshooter than anyone realized.

”Well, they better git back soon. More and more Fatboys coming to knock every day. Saw three or four fixin’ to breach while you were just readin’.” Vig said. Fatboys were entities of plague. Demons wearing human skin, gone turgid with puss and disease. They were low level scum, but usually packs of Fatboys meant somethin’ a whole lot bigger and meaner was around the corner.

Hex gave a slow nod and set the L-Pad down on the porch railing. He leaned back into his rocker.

“Yknow boy, there’s some things you never consider missing. Like that lucky ol’ sun.” Jonah Hex’s eyes lingered on the sky, following the clouds. Vig joined him, gazing up into the great blue expanse. There was a kind of possibility there. Here was a place of infinite rolling plains, giving way to the heavens themselves, dominated only by the great yellow jewel of the universe. Maybe that was why the monsters clawed their way to the surface. To gaze unto it and wonder where it all went wrong.

”Mhm. First time in a long time we got somethin’ to protect.” Vig said. He leaned on the railing and stretched his arms, willing the ache in his shoulders to go away. The voices had quieted, now. They usually did around this time of day. Vig figured it was something about the sky, maybe they were the souls of the damned and the light let them reminisce about what they had instead of screaming about what they lost.

Way on the edge of the horizon, there was a brief wisp of light. Almost like a shooting star in the day, a little blue-silver trail almost blotted out by the blue of the sky. Just on the edge of human register, if you were looking.

“HIIIIIIIIIIMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!” It was like a bomb had gone off in his brain. Souls sreeched across his mind, vomiting blood and sin and fear into every crevice of his head, bellowing out for retribution in one voice. Greg dropped to his knees and spasmed, choking on the air.

“Greg?” Hex stumbled to his feet and vaulted the railing. A shaky hand reached for him, while blackness swallowed Vigilante’s consciousness.

”Hex?” Vigilante’s voice felt small in his throat. The darkness closed around his vision, and all that was left was the fiery head of death itself.

“The bringer of the end calls, Greg Saunders. A being more powerful than any mortal can imagine trembles on the edge of our being. The Herald alone drags trillions of wailing souls behind him. Destruction of untold magnitude lies in his wake. Vengeance Must Be Done.”

---

To Jonah Hex, Vigilante had stopped moving. The Cowboy lay flat across the ground, eyes rolled back into his head. He was lost in some kind of sleep. Or maybe the Good Lord had come from on high and struck ‘im down for bargaining with The Devil.

Hex was on his knee, shaking the boy. They’d come too far to have this be the end. Fallen dead in the street of a brain aneurysm while hellspawn waited just outside the perimeter to slaughter countless innocents. Hex pressed the back of his hand to Vig’s head, looking for any sign of life. He was hot. Too hot, boiling. Hex grunted and pulled his hand away, rubbing the back of it.

Vigilante’s flesh began to drift away from him in chunks, floating into the air before dissolving in an orange light. It revealed stark white bone underneath, that blazed with unholy fire. Hex drew to his feet. His hand went to his pistol.

Skeletal fingers shot out of his friend’s body and locked around his wrist. His flesh burned and he screamed, trying to yank his gun from its holster. A skeleton pulled itself from the hunk of flesh. The last bits of Vigilante’s skin and sinew clung to the bones and the monster’s tattered clothes. The skeleton’s other hand came around and snagged Jonah Hex under the chin, hoisting him into the sky.

“Everyone. Central City. Now.” The words gurgled from the skeleton’s jaw. An inferno broiled in its eyesockets, it seemed to stare into Hex’s very soul. It dropped the old man in a pile of dust and turned on its heel. It made for Vigilante’s bike, The Silver.

Hex fumbled for his gun. He snatched it out of the sands and drew it to his eye. He pulled back the hammer and fired. The round entered the skeleton’s shoulder blade and exited out the front; it didn’t flinch. Long finger bones caressed the bike’s fuel tank and a shade spread over the bike, enveloping it in a dark metal. Wicked edges and lines of bone grew from the bike’s chassis as the skeleton sat astride it. The beast wrapped it’s hands around the handle and fire flashed across it.

The engine didn’t rev as much as it howled. A cacophony of souls begged for blood, bellowing from the engine. The rider shot out of Warpath, leaving a trail of hellfire in his wake as he headed for Central City.

CLOSED - Ultimate One Universe: Season One

I liked Incredibles 2 fine but it felt much more like a popcorn film than the first. The first one actually explored complex emotions and had its characters change in interesting ways, but this was one was just... Bleh.

Pokemon Masters: World Cup

I think it makes more sense to drop that tier thing and keep the base stat restriction.

Pokemon Masters: World Cup

It seems a little silly to have a Base Stat Total restriction AND make it so that we can only have 1 Pokemon per tier...