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Throwaway idea: Savage Worlds _Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future_

Started by daniel_ream, October 02, 2016, 06:45:35 PM

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daniel_ream

October 02, 2016, 06:45:35 PM
I was BSing about old TV shows with some friends last night, and this gem congealed out of the conversation.

Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future would make a dandy Savage Worlds Plot Point Setting.  Lots of tactical skirmish combat with squads of bad guys (or good guys, if you want to have human militia), evil lieutenants that are clearly Wild Cards, heroes with cool powersuits.  It pretty much writes itself.
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

Greentongue

#1
October 03, 2016, 01:13:31 PM
You seeing this as a stand-alone or as special unit operations in a Rocketship Empires 1936 campaign?
=

Soylent Green

#2
October 03, 2016, 01:26:28 PM
I see it more as a Cartoon Action Hour series book. Live action or not, it was essentially a cartoon aimed to sell toys. Even the episodes were just cartoon length (30 minutes long) rather than the full hour.
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daniel_ream

#3
October 03, 2016, 02:42:06 PM
Quote from: Greentongue;923083You seeing this as a stand-alone or as special unit operations in a Rocketship Empires 1936 campaign?
=

No, Rocketship Empires is its own genre.  Captain Power has its own tropes and feel to it.
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

Necrozius

#4
October 03, 2016, 02:47:16 PM
OH man that could be cool. Now's the time, what with the 80s nostalgia craze.

I loved that show as a kid. I'm a little afraid to watch it again out of fear of finding it terrible. Soaron still looks cool, though.

daniel_ream

#5
October 03, 2016, 03:15:20 PM
Quote from: Soylent Green;923088I see it more as a Cartoon Action Hour series book. Live action or not, it was essentially a cartoon aimed to sell toys. Even the episodes were just cartoon length (30 minutes long) rather than the full hour.

Oh, that's not even debatable.  It was totally a toy advert.

CAH would work fine for it, but the conversation was more about "what does Savage Worlds work for, really?"  It's a skirmish miniatures game with a skill system grafted on, and it has some real strengths for handling skirmishes with lots of combatants, but we were having trouble thinking of a setting where that happened enough to really show off the system.
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

daniel_ream

#6
October 03, 2016, 03:28:22 PM
Quote from: Necrozius;923097I loved that show as a kid. I'm a little afraid to watch it again out of fear of finding it terrible. Soaron still looks cool, though.

It holds up better than you might expect.  It helps that JMS and Larry DiTillio were the story editors, so they were elevating the show as much as the format permitted.

It's a simplistic setting, and it doesn't hold up to careful scrutiny (exactly why were the biodreads "digitizing" all of humanity?  For the lulz?) but those plot holes are just begging to be filled with better answers.  In my version of the setting the digitized people are slowly consumed to keep Lord Dread's biological components alive.

One thing I'm grappling with is Power[1] as a limited resource.  It comes up a lot as a limiting factor.  If I were running a narrative system then Running Low On Power is just a Complication that can be tagged or whatever, but for SW I feel it should be more mechanistic.

[1]  Yes, with a capital P.  There are no units of measurement in the dark future.
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

daniel_ream

#7
October 03, 2016, 03:39:10 PM
Some fun Captain Power trivia:

Marv Wolfman and Christy Marx (the creator of Jem and the Holograms) both wrote for the show.

There Are Only Twelve Actors in Canada, Captain Power edition:  "Hawk" is now the kindly grandfather in the Hallmark Channel's The Good Witch.  "Scout" was Agent Howard in SyFy's Haven. Lord Dread shows up playing substantially the same character in Earth: Final Conflict and Nikita.  Dude who impersonated Captain Power in that one episode?  DJE from JAG.  Captain Power's Dad?  Professor Ivo from Arrow.  His girlfriend? Best-selling Canadian novelist Anne-Marie MacDonald[1]


[1] I will forever treasure the look on her face when I asked her to sign my Captain Power DVD set at her last book signing.
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

Greentongue

#8
October 03, 2016, 05:56:04 PM
Quote from: daniel_ream;923096No, Rocketship Empires is its own genre.  Captain Power has its own tropes and feel to it.

Ah, never saw the show, didn't know. Just thought the name sounded like a fit.
=

daniel_ream

#9
October 03, 2016, 06:26:05 PM
It's one of those 1980's one-hit wonders.  The DVDs are available, but they're around $40. (and no, it's not worth that)
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

Armchair Gamer

#10
October 03, 2016, 08:15:41 PM
Quote from: daniel_ream;923127It's one of those 1980's one-hit wonders.  The DVDs are available, but they're around $40. (and no, it's not worth that)

  Actually, I've been keeping one eye on them on Amazon for a mix of reasons, and right now, they're around $22 US.

daniel_ream

#11
October 03, 2016, 09:23:32 PM
Well $40 CAD.

The thing is they were originally shot on videotape, which is only about 360-400 lines of resolution, interlaced.  So the video quality is kind of meh and can never get any better.
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

Thornhammer

#12
October 03, 2016, 11:09:36 PM
Wasn't that the one with the flashing lights and you'd fly the ship around and try to shoot at the targets on TV?

daniel_ream

#13
October 04, 2016, 02:34:28 PM
That's the one.

Someone's uploaded most of the show to youtube, it seems: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eAA9rKZc-U
D&D is becoming Self-Referential.  It is no longer Setting Referential, where it takes references outside of itself. It is becoming like Ouroboros in its self-gleaning for tropes, no longer attached, let alone needing outside context.
~ Opaopajr

Kuroth

#14
October 04, 2016, 04:04:12 PM
Quote from: daniel_ream;923108Best-selling Canadian novelist Anne-Marie MacDonald[1]


[1] I will forever treasure the look on her face when I asked her to sign my Captain Power DVD set at her last book signing.
ha! awesome
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