That is all.

Back on another forum a new Anime section had sprung up with only a single thread to fill it, and so I submitted the following to that forum. Well, I was
looking at it and was rather impressed with everything that I put into it, so I felt that it would be worthy of posting it here as well. So, here is my own
thoughts and opinions on the anime that I've seen and could remember off the top of my head.

Now, I like a good Xander-empowerment fic as much as the next man, provided the next man ... likes Xander-empowerment fic. The problem, of course, lies in
one's definition of "good."

To my mind, a "good" scenario in this case would be one that didn't give X so much power, wisdom, or future knowledge as to have him overshadow
Buffy. Just something that could give him enough of an edge to justify him being on the front line with her and sometimes-Willow.

So I thought about various folks and their power sets, and after a while I decided to concentrate on other vampire slayers, and then my thoughts drifted to
Castlevania.

Alexander Belmont, anyone?

Now this would work fairly well as a Halloweenfic, but for maximum impact I'm thinking that Xander's mom is the/a unknowing scion of the Belmont clan
proper, which would mean that Dracula in this reality is not a poser; he's the First Evil incarnate and the single
Biggest Bad on the planet. (For those unfamiliar with the games, Drac has long since transcended mere vampirism and became the avatar of all human evil; his
"demon castle," the setting of most of the games, is an ever-shifting monster-filled manifestation of his power.)

Being a Belmont isn't incredibly awesome, either. As far as I can tell (and certainly for the purposes of this bunny) they aren't physically or
mentally superhuman in any way, just well-trained normals with a single supernatural gift... the power to ignore nearly all supernatural invulnerabilities. In
other words, if a Belmont, say, breaks a vampire's neck, that vampire will die as if it had been a human. Shooting a werewolf with ordinary bullets, same
deal. Mind you, monsters can still be really tough; it's just technically possible for a Belmont to kill them with sufficient application of non-magical
force.

...Let's use The Judge as an example. "Xander Belmont" could, in theory, kill big blue by lopping his head off with a plain ordinary
human-forged sword... if he could manage to swing it with enough force to penetrate his presumably fairly tough skin, flesh, and bone. And X would have no
particular protection against the Judge's fire. So, not as big an advantage as it sounds.

Of course, there's also the matter of the Belmonts' heirloom weapon, the holy whip Vampire Killer, which is pretty darn awesome. But first Xander
would have to find it, then I think there's a prove-yourself-worthy thing, then he'd have to learn to use a whip effectively...

In this scenario, Xander takes the place of the canonical Julius Belmont (or maybe J exists and decides to train him, either way), and the Scoobies are likely
to get mixed up in the Great Castle War of 1999 -- which would take place during season 3 or 4.

...actually, a Castlevania game where you could switch between Xander, Buffy, and Willow would be awesome.

For full points: no Buffy-bashing; no Spike-bashing, somehow manage to keep him alive long enough to join the Scoobs and maybe get his soul back
(Spuffy-shipper here; go ahead, mock me); and maybe replace Angel with Alucard (no, not THAT Alucard, the one from Castlevania ).

So... any takers? ^.^

--Sam

"Blood covers The City like a big red afghan."

Recient Announcment from Sunstorm on the CoX boards regarding a change to leadership.

Greetings Heroes & Villains,

With Issue 14 there will be some slight changes to the ranking system that you are currently familiar with. Here is some background and information that should
be useful for you to prepare for the new issue.

The new ranking system is mainly needed by our internal Customer Support team. This feature allows GM's to assist players in resolving issues that may
affect an SG or Base.

This tool essentially allows us to resolve your tickets more rapidly, keeps us from getting involved in SG/VG political drama, and also keeps groups that may
have lost leadership from losing access to a fully operating base.

The new rank introduced in this issue is called, duh, duh, duh… "Super Leader." The super leader title does not have to denote
actual leadership or rank within the SG, consider them mainly to be the key master or owner of the group.

Due to the current format in game, we had a few options, we could either demote everyone but one person or we could auto promote a single leader into the new
position. We opted to go with the second option.

So when Issue 14 goes live, the highest ranking leader that had most recently logged in will be promoted to the "super leader" position. This ensures
that every group that is currently active will have someone who recently played the game in this rank.

Any of you wishing to pinpoint who that person should be can effectively set up those permissions now by changing the ranks of members so that you have the one
person you would like to have this access be the only SG leader at the time Issue 14 goes live.

We understand many of you may have questions & concerns as always we are here to help clear up confusion.

We appreciate your feedback.

Heres a Link to the thread this is on.

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat ... st13186399

As usual, the board's still on Standard Time.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

While I was cross-referencing character names in a fanfic, I happened to stumble across All Purpose Cultural Catgirl Nuku Nuku. Suddenly I could not help but
be enticed by the thought of a character based on her. What follows is the non-concrete musings that have flashed through my head.

Natally 'Nuku-chan' Jennings was an ordinary tom-boy growing up in the American mid-west. A highly practical girl, she is sweet natured yet shuns the
activities of other girls. Instead of going out shopping with 'girlfriends' she spent time helping her dad fix the tractor or whatever other peice of
machinery that chose to break down that week. Thus, she is a highly adept mechanic.

Her wave-job was, as is typical amongst most fen, an accident. A friend of hers managed to get ahold of a batch of gray goo, and let her have a small sample
when she voiced curiousity - she was wondering if it might help prevent breakdowns. (She actually succeeded - the tractor works like a champ and the only
quirk is that you have to command it like a mule.)

Her biomod grants her the usual cat-girl abilities, but with a highly unusual sub-set of abilities that sets her apart as an atypical catgirl. For one thing,
her cat-ears are mechanical and enable her to tap into any available Etherwave networks. They can also be hidden, which saves her a bit of the social stigma
of being a catgirl, deploying them only when she needs to use her etherwave connection. She has a tail as well, but she uses the old Sayajin Trick of wrapping
it around her waist to disguise it as a belt. Her body has also taken on a cybernetic nature - not that she has a fuly mechanized body, but her physical
abilities are augmented well beyond that of typical catgirls.

Once she became biomodded, her father, concerned for his daughter's well being, put the word out descreetly that he needed his girl to get off-planet
before anyone official found out about it. Upon leaving Earth, she decided to join the Sammies where she felt that her abilities and mindset would do the most
good and wound up in their corps of engineers. She's one of the few sammies that chooses to wear her coveralls instead of the fukus.

Later on, she found herself as a part of the contingent assigned to 36 Atalante by HRH, Queen Serenity (I,II,III?). There, she's happy as a clam working
with some of the most high-performance vehicles in the system. As a member of the Sammy contingent, she's Chief Flight Engineer of the Peacemaker class
ship, the Tough Love and with her abilities she holds her own quite admirably in punch-ups and shoot-outs.

Thoughts, anyone?

Sony Canada pulls Killzone 2 ads bearing "menacing head".

If you'll pardon me, I'll be over here mass-producing my new "Frowning Smiley Face" signs. I figure with enough of them, I can apparently
conquer Canada by a sheer terror campaign without firing a single shot. Well, unless those Mounties get involved. I hear they're trained to resist even
open visual AND verbal expressions of disapproval. (I keed, I keed)
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."

You'd think this one would be easy, but oh my god no. I've been having very poor luck at finding anything engrossing (or anything other then teenage
angstfests!) to read, and given the success of my previous Sailor Moon and Tenchi Muyo, ect. fic search requests, and given the the huge variety of experience
and depth of knowledge of the subject of fanfiction here, I was hoping for some more suggestions? What in your opinion are the best (or at least GOOD)
Spiderman stories out there? Any universe or continuity is up for grabs.

Quote: ZOE: If they take the ship, they'll rape us to death, eat our flesh and sew our skins into their clothing and if we're very very lucky,
they'll do it in that order.

I was browsing about the CoX forums today, and I came accross a Peacebringer thread that had something interesting in it, not in a good way mind you in regards
of your mouth foaming hate of lack of Mez protection in Human form Peacebringer. You can Thank castle on that hehe. This was copied and pasted from the thread
I found it on.

I - Kheldian forms status

____________________________________________________________________

Issue 13 had an effect not expected at all, the enforcement to take at least the dwarf form, if not all forms.

From Castle :

Quote: Quote:

---

I tested giving a couple points protection to Human form and, honestly, there was NO REASON to take Dwarf form with human for protection.




Human form has such strong flexibility, control, heal and protective benefits with mez protection that giving up those benefits for the minute bonus to mez
resist and/resistance that Dwarf form provided under these circumstances simply was not worth the power, slot and animation time costs. Why would you give up
a better attack chain, access to Stamina, Hasten, Tough and Weave for a small benefit? Almost no one would.




In order to maintain Dwarf Form as a viable option I pretty much have to disallow self status protection in human form.




I'm willing to be shown that I am wrong, though. If you can provide compelling evidence that my conclusions are incorrect, I will happily revisit this
topic.

Quote: