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[Let's Read] Freedom City: Every Edition!
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<blockquote data-quote="Libertad" data-source="post: 8514924" data-attributes="member: 6750502"><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://imgur.com/Jp54pEU.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p> <p style="text-align: center"></p> <p style="text-align: center"><strong>Law & Order</strong></p><p></p><p>It is inevitable that superheroes will interact with both sides of the law, so sections on government and law enforcement get some decent entries. Freedom City’s government has an elected mayor and eight city council members who serve four-year terms, with the mayor acting as a tie-breaking vote when the council finds itself split on an issue. During <strong>1e</strong> and <strong>2e</strong> the mayor was Michael O’Connor Jr., who won a landslide against Franklin Moore due to that one’s unpopular history of corruption, and unlike his predecessor he made good on promises to fight organized crime. In <strong>3e</strong> the mayor is Calliope Summers, who was the previous Raven. Now retired from superheroing, she has found another way to do good in Freedom City. Michael O’Connor Jr. is now a Senator for the state in which Freedom City is located.* We also have write-ups for three city council members who have been the same for all editions as well as three city Commissions focusing on various interest groups (civil rights, law enforcement, and economic development). There’s also write-ups of government departments, including one of interest to superheroes: the Medical Examiner’s Office which can help PCs investigate strange deaths, and in <strong>3e</strong> gets a named NPC as a coroner!</p><p></p><p>*Somewhere on the East Coast but otherwise left to the GM’s discretion.</p><p></p><p>Now we move on to law enforcement proper. The local Freedom City Police Department used to be riddled with graft and corruption during the Iron Age, but things are better now after a thorough clean-up and replacement of the Commissioner with Barbara Kane, a cop who more than proved herself in defending Bayview against a group of Omegadrones during the Terminus Invasion. The police also have a special department known as the STAR (Superhuman Tactics and Regulation) Squad, who basically act as a SWAT team but with more advanced technology. As of <strong>3e</strong> many other American cities and states developed their own STAR Squads.</p><p></p><p>AEGIS (American Elite Government Intervention Service) is the SHIELD equivalent of Earth-Prime, although they primarily have national rather than international jurisdiction. They’re a federal agency which recruits the bulk of its members from other law enforcement departments, and while they specialize in dealing with all things superhuman most of their agents are non-powered yet well-trained. AEGIS agents don’t go toe-to-toe with super-powered opponents unless necessary, although if the need arises the organization has access to MAX (Man-Amplifying eXoskeleton) power armor suits. And yes there are stats for such armor; they grant the typical “battlesuit” abilities such as enhanced strength, protection, radio communicators, and an array of weapons that are a kinetic blast, capture net, and blinding beam. AEGIS also has write-ups and stat blocks for three notable agents: AEGIS’ Director, Horatio “Harry” Powers, has the ability to sense the presence of superpowers of all types at a distance which he masks as “hunches.” Then there’s Patriot,* a Golden Age hero enhanced with super-soldier serum whose mind has been transplanted into a cyborg body by the US government and now acts as a secret weapon against terrorists and criminals of the super-powered variety. Finally there’s Stewart “Rockstar” Bonham, Chief Administrator of AEGIS’ Freedom City branch, who tends to engender a love-hate relationship due to his habits of glory-hogging, dating superhumans, and performing in rock bands in his free time. We also have a full-page map and details on the Iceberg, AEGIS’ underground lair in Freedom City. It contains all of the accouterments appropriate to a comic book government agency, such as labs to analyze supervillain gadgets, a hangar with helicopters and fighter jets that can fold into far smaller forms, and an advanced computer system that may or may not be a fully-developed AI.</p><p></p><p>In <strong>1e</strong> and <strong>2e</strong> he had stats, although by 3e he was moved into the Atlas of Earth-Prime sourcebook.</p><p></p><p>There’s also smaller write-ups on real-world law enforcement organizations, local emergency services, and the court system. Some of the more interesting entries include the firefighter June “Asbestos” Abados, a woman who is immune to all forms of heat and fire whose powers gave her minor celebrity status (accompanied by a less than-amicable marriage turned divorce), the head of the Probation Department Harriet Wainwright who proposed a “work release” program for superhuman criminals to use their powers for public service in exchange for commuted sentences,* and “Judge Joe” of the hit show “Video Justice” which is basically like Judge Judy. Our section wraps up with the four major prisons in which Freedom City houses its criminals, although the only one of note that gets any detail and a full-page map is Blackstone Federal Penitentiary. Located on an island off the coast of Freedom City, it is dedicated to housing super-criminals exclusively, with most of its facilities moved underground after Omegadrones decimated its foundations during the Terminus Invasion. We have stats for several security features and traps, write-ups of 2 named NPCs (Warden Joshua Drummer who has the ability to nullify superpowers and Abigail Wallace who helped design specialized security and once had an affair with the prison-obsessed supervillain Warden), and the Blackguard security guards who are non-powered but have access to AEGIS MAX suits.</p><p></p><p>*In <strong>1e</strong> and <strong>2e</strong> it was approved as a limited program, but as of <strong>3e</strong> it’s been overall successful.</p><p></p><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://imgur.com/FXtum1a.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p> <p style="text-align: center"></p> <p style="text-align: center"><strong>Freedom City Underworld</strong></p><p></p><p>This section is surprisingly short, and focuses more on the non-superpowered side of organized crime and gangs although there is some crossover with supervillains. The most powerful organized crime syndicate is the Italian Mafia, aka the Freedom City Mob, who specialize in drugs, smuggling contraband, vice trades, and using legitimate businesses such as labor unions and casinos to launder their dirty money. The Mob’s upper ranks are overall non-powered, although their ace in the hole is a fortune teller known as Tarot who their leader “Big Al” Driogano consults before doing anything riskier than usual for a mob boss. <strong>2e</strong> noted that Tarot had trouble predicting the actions of superpowered people, particularly the vigilantes Foreshadow and the Silencer.</p><p></p><p>The other real-world crime syndicates who have a smaller presence in Freedom City are the Russian Mafiya who specialize in smuggling Soviet super-science gadgets, the Triads whose local branch is loyal to the supervillain Dr. Sin, and the Yakuza who mostly focus on corporate crimes and money-laundering but otherwise leave the city alone due to the Mob’s prominence. Street gangs tend to be disportionately teenagers, as older and more experienced criminals join the Mafia or get killed by them. There’s the Brotherhood, a white supremacist gang who are particularly dangerous due to being allied with the supervillain Knightfire, the Malanti who operate in the West End and mostly do petty crimes such as vandalism, and the Lincoln-based Southside C’s who make most of their money dealing drugs.</p><p></p><p>We have write-ups on three illegal drugs that can grant or interact with super-powers: Max which can grant increased physical abilities although the withdrawal symptoms can cause immediate heart failure, Zombie Powder which is brewed by the followers of Baron Samedi that can act as a painkiller but can also make one vulnerable against magical mind control and raise the addict as a zombie upon death, and Zoom which can grant super-speed but also risks immediate heart failure.</p><p></p><p>A more unusual “mob element” is the Toon Gang, fictional cartoon characters brought to life by the supervillain Toy-Boy. They look like short living cartoons and act on genre-appropriate logic. This means that they’re virtually immortal to most forms of harm even though they can still feel pain, and they don’t have a head for any crimes more complicated than robbing businesses at gun or knife-point. They’re considered small-time distractions on the scale of super-powered threats, although given a recent scheme with a truckload of marbles they’re taken more seriously after the deaths of 15 mobsters.* There’s also the Circuit Maximus, an illegal underground superhuman fighting ring. In <strong>1e</strong> and <strong>2e</strong> they were led by August Roman, the Centurion’s arch-enemy and self-styled Emperor of Crime. But as of <strong>3e</strong> his daughter Saturnalia Roman has inherited the family business as her father has grown too sick and bedridden to do much of anything. Finally there are rumors of a covert mobile clinic known as the “Power-House,” which specializes in cybernetic and biochemical enhancements that can “juice up” people with super-powers for the right price…and unpleasant side effects requiring regular treatments to avoid them.</p><p></p><p>*This entry is the same in 3e as 2e, which seems odd given the 15-year time gap.</p><p></p><p style="text-align: center"><img src="https://imgur.com/a3MHvcB.png" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" /></p> <p style="text-align: center"></p> <p style="text-align: center"><strong>The Freedom City Series</strong></p><p></p><p>This chapter was added into the <strong>2e</strong> and <strong>3e</strong> versions, talking about how GMs can plan for campaigns and make use of the material for players who want closer ties to the setting “canon.” <strong>2e</strong> also included campaign secrets and behind-the-scenes explanations, although as of <strong>3e</strong> that entry got lengthy enough to become its own chapter which we’ll cover in a future post.</p><p></p><p><strong>Freedom City Origins</strong> and <strong>Legacies</strong> are PC-friendly material, compiling a bunch of common origins for broad superpower concepts and their most likely sources in the setting. A few of them have templates, particularly in the cases of certain alien species or human off-shoots such as the Ultima (think flying brick but with “cosmic energy control”). Or heroes with legacy powers, such as the Light-Bearer template for Beacon (flying energy control with light-based power array). Interestingly we have a template for the Scarab appears twice in <strong>3e,</strong> in two different places in the book and one with significantly more Power Points than the other. The one here in Origins has 101 points with a variety of telepathy/telekinetic powers, while the one in the Pyramid Plaza entry in Secrets of Freedom City has only 51 points with fewer and cheaper powers. I feel that this is a misprint, as the latter version makes use of the term “feats” which are renamed “advantages” in 3rd Edition.</p><p></p><p><strong>Series Frameworks</strong> provides brief outlines on eight different campaign ideas making use of the Freedom City setting. Quite a few of them are standard: one where the PCs join the Freedom League, one where the PCs are students at Claremont Academy, and one where the PCs are the “local hero team” instead of the Atom Family/Freedom League/Next-Gen. But the more novel suggestions include one where the PCs are street-level vigilantes operating in the poorer neighborhoods or even during the Iron Age Moore Administration, one where the PCs are former supervillains part of Harriet Wainwright’s “Project Freedom” work-release program, and ones where the PCs are non-powered (but gadget-equipped) members of STAR SQUAD or AEGIS, and one where they’re a new government-sanctioned superhero team for AEGIS!</p><p></p><p><strong>Alternate Freedoms</strong> is exclusive to <strong>3e,</strong> providing suggestions for different takes on the setting rather than different campaign ideas. The Price of Freedom theorizes a world where vigilantism is still outlawed and Freedom City is ruled by a corrupt government. The Freedom Storm takes the events of Emerald City (alien AI mass-empowering people with <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhMsboqMMzs" target="_blank">nanomachines</a>) and moves the event to Freedom City. The Star District is one where the alien refugees are never relocated to the moon Europa, and instead settle into the least desired parts of the city with a less-than-understanding human populace.</p><p></p><p><strong>Thoughts So Far:</strong> I’m feeling a bit mixed on these sections. The coverage of various groups and peoples varies in length and depth, so one cannot help but feel that something’s missing in certain even if the material that we do get is likely more than enough for a GM. Some parts I feel weird about are the setting’s Captain America Expy becoming a high-ranking federal agent, on account that his inspirational figure has been notable for wishing to champion American values in spite of (and even against) the aims of the government. Barring a few examples, many NPCs don’t have built-in hooks or adventure material, instead primarily serving to populate the world with people the PCs are likely to interact with during their careers as costumed crime-fighters. This isn’t bad in and of itself as it’s merely a different set of game design priorities, although it results in a lot of “okay here’s the health department and who works for them, here’s what the Coast Guard does and they’re also friendly with Siren, etc.” While the Origins and Legacies serve a useful function, the few times they provide templates about half are incredibly expensive for the default PL 10, and I feel that more affordable options would help give players more room to build what they want.</p><p></p><p>I will say that I’m fond of AEGIS, as they are definitely a group that would have a much larger spotlight in most games than other agencies, and I do like how the book acknowledges how the criminal underworld adapted to a super-powered world even if it’s more brief and simplistic rather than in-depth treatises and theory-crafting. But then again superhero media isn’t usually one to get lost in the details, so going by “rule of cool” more than works.</p><p></p><p><strong>Join us next time as we cover Secrets of Freedom City and the World of Freedom!</strong></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Libertad, post: 8514924, member: 6750502"] [CENTER][IMG]https://imgur.com/Jp54pEU.png[/IMG] [B]Law & Order[/B][/CENTER] It is inevitable that superheroes will interact with both sides of the law, so sections on government and law enforcement get some decent entries. Freedom City’s government has an elected mayor and eight city council members who serve four-year terms, with the mayor acting as a tie-breaking vote when the council finds itself split on an issue. During [B]1e[/B] and [B]2e[/B] the mayor was Michael O’Connor Jr., who won a landslide against Franklin Moore due to that one’s unpopular history of corruption, and unlike his predecessor he made good on promises to fight organized crime. In [B]3e[/B] the mayor is Calliope Summers, who was the previous Raven. Now retired from superheroing, she has found another way to do good in Freedom City. Michael O’Connor Jr. is now a Senator for the state in which Freedom City is located.* We also have write-ups for three city council members who have been the same for all editions as well as three city Commissions focusing on various interest groups (civil rights, law enforcement, and economic development). There’s also write-ups of government departments, including one of interest to superheroes: the Medical Examiner’s Office which can help PCs investigate strange deaths, and in [B]3e[/B] gets a named NPC as a coroner! *Somewhere on the East Coast but otherwise left to the GM’s discretion. Now we move on to law enforcement proper. The local Freedom City Police Department used to be riddled with graft and corruption during the Iron Age, but things are better now after a thorough clean-up and replacement of the Commissioner with Barbara Kane, a cop who more than proved herself in defending Bayview against a group of Omegadrones during the Terminus Invasion. The police also have a special department known as the STAR (Superhuman Tactics and Regulation) Squad, who basically act as a SWAT team but with more advanced technology. As of [B]3e[/B] many other American cities and states developed their own STAR Squads. AEGIS (American Elite Government Intervention Service) is the SHIELD equivalent of Earth-Prime, although they primarily have national rather than international jurisdiction. They’re a federal agency which recruits the bulk of its members from other law enforcement departments, and while they specialize in dealing with all things superhuman most of their agents are non-powered yet well-trained. AEGIS agents don’t go toe-to-toe with super-powered opponents unless necessary, although if the need arises the organization has access to MAX (Man-Amplifying eXoskeleton) power armor suits. And yes there are stats for such armor; they grant the typical “battlesuit” abilities such as enhanced strength, protection, radio communicators, and an array of weapons that are a kinetic blast, capture net, and blinding beam. AEGIS also has write-ups and stat blocks for three notable agents: AEGIS’ Director, Horatio “Harry” Powers, has the ability to sense the presence of superpowers of all types at a distance which he masks as “hunches.” Then there’s Patriot,* a Golden Age hero enhanced with super-soldier serum whose mind has been transplanted into a cyborg body by the US government and now acts as a secret weapon against terrorists and criminals of the super-powered variety. Finally there’s Stewart “Rockstar” Bonham, Chief Administrator of AEGIS’ Freedom City branch, who tends to engender a love-hate relationship due to his habits of glory-hogging, dating superhumans, and performing in rock bands in his free time. We also have a full-page map and details on the Iceberg, AEGIS’ underground lair in Freedom City. It contains all of the accouterments appropriate to a comic book government agency, such as labs to analyze supervillain gadgets, a hangar with helicopters and fighter jets that can fold into far smaller forms, and an advanced computer system that may or may not be a fully-developed AI. In [B]1e[/B] and [B]2e[/B] he had stats, although by 3e he was moved into the Atlas of Earth-Prime sourcebook. There’s also smaller write-ups on real-world law enforcement organizations, local emergency services, and the court system. Some of the more interesting entries include the firefighter June “Asbestos” Abados, a woman who is immune to all forms of heat and fire whose powers gave her minor celebrity status (accompanied by a less than-amicable marriage turned divorce), the head of the Probation Department Harriet Wainwright who proposed a “work release” program for superhuman criminals to use their powers for public service in exchange for commuted sentences,* and “Judge Joe” of the hit show “Video Justice” which is basically like Judge Judy. Our section wraps up with the four major prisons in which Freedom City houses its criminals, although the only one of note that gets any detail and a full-page map is Blackstone Federal Penitentiary. Located on an island off the coast of Freedom City, it is dedicated to housing super-criminals exclusively, with most of its facilities moved underground after Omegadrones decimated its foundations during the Terminus Invasion. We have stats for several security features and traps, write-ups of 2 named NPCs (Warden Joshua Drummer who has the ability to nullify superpowers and Abigail Wallace who helped design specialized security and once had an affair with the prison-obsessed supervillain Warden), and the Blackguard security guards who are non-powered but have access to AEGIS MAX suits. *In [B]1e[/B] and [B]2e[/B] it was approved as a limited program, but as of [B]3e[/B] it’s been overall successful. [CENTER][IMG]https://imgur.com/FXtum1a.png[/IMG] [B]Freedom City Underworld[/B][/CENTER] This section is surprisingly short, and focuses more on the non-superpowered side of organized crime and gangs although there is some crossover with supervillains. The most powerful organized crime syndicate is the Italian Mafia, aka the Freedom City Mob, who specialize in drugs, smuggling contraband, vice trades, and using legitimate businesses such as labor unions and casinos to launder their dirty money. The Mob’s upper ranks are overall non-powered, although their ace in the hole is a fortune teller known as Tarot who their leader “Big Al” Driogano consults before doing anything riskier than usual for a mob boss. [B]2e[/B] noted that Tarot had trouble predicting the actions of superpowered people, particularly the vigilantes Foreshadow and the Silencer. The other real-world crime syndicates who have a smaller presence in Freedom City are the Russian Mafiya who specialize in smuggling Soviet super-science gadgets, the Triads whose local branch is loyal to the supervillain Dr. Sin, and the Yakuza who mostly focus on corporate crimes and money-laundering but otherwise leave the city alone due to the Mob’s prominence. Street gangs tend to be disportionately teenagers, as older and more experienced criminals join the Mafia or get killed by them. There’s the Brotherhood, a white supremacist gang who are particularly dangerous due to being allied with the supervillain Knightfire, the Malanti who operate in the West End and mostly do petty crimes such as vandalism, and the Lincoln-based Southside C’s who make most of their money dealing drugs. We have write-ups on three illegal drugs that can grant or interact with super-powers: Max which can grant increased physical abilities although the withdrawal symptoms can cause immediate heart failure, Zombie Powder which is brewed by the followers of Baron Samedi that can act as a painkiller but can also make one vulnerable against magical mind control and raise the addict as a zombie upon death, and Zoom which can grant super-speed but also risks immediate heart failure. A more unusual “mob element” is the Toon Gang, fictional cartoon characters brought to life by the supervillain Toy-Boy. They look like short living cartoons and act on genre-appropriate logic. This means that they’re virtually immortal to most forms of harm even though they can still feel pain, and they don’t have a head for any crimes more complicated than robbing businesses at gun or knife-point. They’re considered small-time distractions on the scale of super-powered threats, although given a recent scheme with a truckload of marbles they’re taken more seriously after the deaths of 15 mobsters.* There’s also the Circuit Maximus, an illegal underground superhuman fighting ring. In [B]1e[/B] and [B]2e[/B] they were led by August Roman, the Centurion’s arch-enemy and self-styled Emperor of Crime. But as of [B]3e[/B] his daughter Saturnalia Roman has inherited the family business as her father has grown too sick and bedridden to do much of anything. Finally there are rumors of a covert mobile clinic known as the “Power-House,” which specializes in cybernetic and biochemical enhancements that can “juice up” people with super-powers for the right price…and unpleasant side effects requiring regular treatments to avoid them. *This entry is the same in 3e as 2e, which seems odd given the 15-year time gap. [CENTER][IMG]https://imgur.com/a3MHvcB.png[/IMG] [B]The Freedom City Series[/B][/CENTER] This chapter was added into the [B]2e[/B] and [B]3e[/B] versions, talking about how GMs can plan for campaigns and make use of the material for players who want closer ties to the setting “canon.” [B]2e[/B] also included campaign secrets and behind-the-scenes explanations, although as of [B]3e[/B] that entry got lengthy enough to become its own chapter which we’ll cover in a future post. [B]Freedom City Origins[/B] and [B]Legacies[/B] are PC-friendly material, compiling a bunch of common origins for broad superpower concepts and their most likely sources in the setting. A few of them have templates, particularly in the cases of certain alien species or human off-shoots such as the Ultima (think flying brick but with “cosmic energy control”). Or heroes with legacy powers, such as the Light-Bearer template for Beacon (flying energy control with light-based power array). Interestingly we have a template for the Scarab appears twice in [B]3e,[/B] in two different places in the book and one with significantly more Power Points than the other. The one here in Origins has 101 points with a variety of telepathy/telekinetic powers, while the one in the Pyramid Plaza entry in Secrets of Freedom City has only 51 points with fewer and cheaper powers. I feel that this is a misprint, as the latter version makes use of the term “feats” which are renamed “advantages” in 3rd Edition. [B]Series Frameworks[/B] provides brief outlines on eight different campaign ideas making use of the Freedom City setting. Quite a few of them are standard: one where the PCs join the Freedom League, one where the PCs are students at Claremont Academy, and one where the PCs are the “local hero team” instead of the Atom Family/Freedom League/Next-Gen. But the more novel suggestions include one where the PCs are street-level vigilantes operating in the poorer neighborhoods or even during the Iron Age Moore Administration, one where the PCs are former supervillains part of Harriet Wainwright’s “Project Freedom” work-release program, and ones where the PCs are non-powered (but gadget-equipped) members of STAR SQUAD or AEGIS, and one where they’re a new government-sanctioned superhero team for AEGIS! [B]Alternate Freedoms[/B] is exclusive to [B]3e,[/B] providing suggestions for different takes on the setting rather than different campaign ideas. The Price of Freedom theorizes a world where vigilantism is still outlawed and Freedom City is ruled by a corrupt government. The Freedom Storm takes the events of Emerald City (alien AI mass-empowering people with [URL='https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhMsboqMMzs']nanomachines[/URL]) and moves the event to Freedom City. The Star District is one where the alien refugees are never relocated to the moon Europa, and instead settle into the least desired parts of the city with a less-than-understanding human populace. [B]Thoughts So Far:[/B] I’m feeling a bit mixed on these sections. The coverage of various groups and peoples varies in length and depth, so one cannot help but feel that something’s missing in certain even if the material that we do get is likely more than enough for a GM. Some parts I feel weird about are the setting’s Captain America Expy becoming a high-ranking federal agent, on account that his inspirational figure has been notable for wishing to champion American values in spite of (and even against) the aims of the government. Barring a few examples, many NPCs don’t have built-in hooks or adventure material, instead primarily serving to populate the world with people the PCs are likely to interact with during their careers as costumed crime-fighters. This isn’t bad in and of itself as it’s merely a different set of game design priorities, although it results in a lot of “okay here’s the health department and who works for them, here’s what the Coast Guard does and they’re also friendly with Siren, etc.” While the Origins and Legacies serve a useful function, the few times they provide templates about half are incredibly expensive for the default PL 10, and I feel that more affordable options would help give players more room to build what they want. I will say that I’m fond of AEGIS, as they are definitely a group that would have a much larger spotlight in most games than other agencies, and I do like how the book acknowledges how the criminal underworld adapted to a super-powered world even if it’s more brief and simplistic rather than in-depth treatises and theory-crafting. But then again superhero media isn’t usually one to get lost in the details, so going by “rule of cool” more than works. [B]Join us next time as we cover Secrets of Freedom City and the World of Freedom![/B] [/QUOTE]
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