Roger M. Wilcox's Champions® characters

Champions® is, quite simply, the best role-playing game ever to emerge from the mind of man.  Period.  You are not worthy to be in its presence.  Bow down and worship its unapproachable greatness, mortal scum!

Over the decade or so I played the game (1980s and very early 1990s), I wrote up character after character for it.  At the end, my stack of character sheets grew to over two inches thick.  Below, I present to you the cream of my crop.

My Heroes

• Tracer: This was the 3rd character I ever created for Champions.  I first wrote him up all the way back in 1981.  He's been through several revisions since then; the character sheet here is the latest, written for the 5th Edition HERO System™ (the role-playing system Champions uses).  I liked the character so much that I also wrote a novelette about him in 1982 and now use "tracer" as my preferred online nickname.  A 1985 rewrite of the novelette is available on my Tracer novelette page.
• Havok: This is a "me character" — I started with a flattering version of myself, and added superpowers vaguely based on Marvel Comics' Havok (my favorite character from the X-Men).  I played this character almost as much as I played Tracer, and sometimes even played both characters at the same time.  See also the beefed-up, 250-point version of Havok ("150 extra points, and you put them all into your energy blast?!").
• The Generic Hero: Another "me character."  In this alternate-universe version of myself, I used to be a member of the Guardian Angels until the Santa Monica chapter disbanded.  Not to be deterred by this minor setback, however, I fashioned myself a costume (and a shield) patterned after the generic items at Ralphs supermarkets.  You get the same quality heroics without paying for the fancy costume!  See also the higher-powered bionic version of the Generic Hero.
• Mister Wonderful: Yet another "me character," this time for a low-powered Heroic campaign (where everybody had normal characteristic maxima automatically).  I got the name from an old Saturday Night Live sketch called "The Interesting Four."
• Infra Man: I made up this character waaaaay back in 1973 when I was a wee lad of 8 years old.  The name, of course, was a play on "Ultra Man."  I wrote a tongue-in-cheek novelette about Infra Man's origin and adventures, which can be found on my Infra Man novelette page.  I also wrote up a lower-powered version of the character when he was a youngster, named Infra Boy.
• Moon Man: The first Champions® character I ever created — back in the days when the obscure first edition of Champions® was the only edition.
• Hay Man!: The second Champions® character I ever created.
• Rock Man, and his arch-nemesis, Mutant (with his ultimate juggernaut robot Disgusting Brick).
• Tree, a former agent in the Perpetual Army of The Harbingers of Eternal Mankind (T.H.E.M.)
• Jet Man
• The Ray: My childhood version of the Flash (with some later modifications), and his arch enemy, the Speed Demon.
• Jackie Sodium: Once only Jackie Albertson, a chemist like you or me.  At will, he can shift his body from normal flesh-and-blood to solid metallic sodium, with all the drawbacks that entails.
• Bowling Ball: I created this character long before the Mystery Men movie was made, so don't go thinking it was based on The Bowler's father, you hear?  His faithful sidekick is Rubber Band.
• Wo-Man: Aliens abducted Steve Rorkiel and imbued him with the power to change into a superhuman woman, so that he could do their bidding.  Steve, however, was obsessed with the will to be free, and refused to do their bidding, thus earning the aliens' ire for all time.  His normal male identity has a girlfriend, but shortly after trying out his superhuman female identity, she acquired a boyfriend too.  Whenever her alien abductors reappear, she will usually team up with Octoplex to thwart them.  Her arch-enemy is the insane supervillain Projector.
• Ice Maker: Frequently hangs out with his buddy, Carb Ferris, who copied his own brain patterns into Metal Mind (and, later, into Metal Mind II).
• White Dwarf, Neutron Star, and Black Hole
• Ninja Mouse: Parker was a mild-mannered mouse until one day, when cornered by a cat, he "snapped" and a deadly ninja personality came out.  He came back to his senses hours later, unaware of his alter ego, which can come to the fore again any time he's under stress.
• The Chrome Fighter: Max Howzer takes care of the seamy side of the streets.  Grrrr.  Of course, he does it in dazzling, chrome-plated, rocket-propelled armor — no reason you shouldn't look good when you're taking out the trash.  Grrrr.  His arch-enemy is the megalomaniacal Tesla Coil.
• Tuning Fork: A sonic-wielding superhero whose powers don't involve yelling, for a change.  I wrote a piece of electronic music about her back in my UCLA days.
• God: Just your average high-powered masked crimefighter in tights with a cape and a big "G" on his chest — who happened to name himself after the most powerful mythological character he could think of.  Plus, the whole calling-down-lightning-from-heaven bit always impresses the natives.
• Infinity Man: His name says it all.
• Iron Side: Unlike billionaire industrialist Tony Stark, young Tony Asterisk could only afford to build half a suit of powered armor.  The left half, specifically.  Interesting things can happen when he engages his boot jet (singular).
• Meter Maid: Lovely Rita is an ordinary parking enforcement officer by day, a vigilant fighter for the metric system by night.  Just don't go using any British/Imperial units in front of her, or she'll pummel you with metersticks that shoot out of her sleeves.
• Normalman (no relation to Valentino's creation of the same name), and his DNPC Phoenix Firebird
• Unbelievable Man: What would you do with four million Experience Points?  And, for that matter, what would you do with 1.2048 x 10³⁰⁷ Experience Points?  (Thus answereth Unbelievable Man 3.012 x 10³⁰⁰.)
• Peace Maker
• Slinky – Private Eye.
• Pyre
• Rage
• Plagal Cadence Man, whom I thought up during my undergraduate stint at UCLA, where I majored in — surprise, surprise — music composition.
• Unic: Everybody's favorite unicorn Swazibot (well, the only unicorn Swazibot) from Gaea's Rising.
• Web Shooter Man
• Tektite
• Sardonyx
• A typical Freedom Fighter Infantryperson in powered armor, from the (still unfinished) novelette Areopagiticon.
• Mister Inventions, who's designed for a Heroic (rather than Super-Heroic) campaign, and his professional arch-rival, the Skeleton Monster.
• Smokey the Bear: Okay, so this character isn't exactly an original creation.  Just don't play with matches around him, m'kay?

My Villains

• The Exploiter: A villain (boo, hiss!).  This ruthless Exxon employee lives to find the weaknesses in all who would oppose him, and exploit those weaknesses.  His sickly green color inspired him to create Sick Brick, who was the ultimate juggernaut until he created The Sick Brick Robot.  (His later creation, Ridiculous Brick, was, shall we say, even more ultimate.)
• Armadillo: Another villain.  An evil, carnivorous creature driven by his insatiable hunger.  No one is sure where he comes from, or how he acquired his tank-like armored scales, but we do know that he's more than just a mindless beast.  Arch-enemy of the Hundred-and-eleven Strength Old Man.  (Note: Both of these characters came from a dream I had in the 1980s.)
• Endotherm: Yet another villain.  He lives by sucking the heat out of anything warm, even a living breathing human.  It's a good thing his evil cohort, the Icer, is on his side.
• Radioactive Man: I created this hero-turned-villain long before The Simpsons, but then again, it's not exactly the least obvious name in the world for a nuclear-powered character.
• June Bug: Villain.  When she broke out of prison, the headlines read, "June is bustin' out all over!".
• Temperate: A hot-and-cold villain.
• Magma Man: This villain forms a triumverate with his rivals, Mine Man (a beatnik who rides around in a minecar and throws shards at people) and Maze Man (the "hero" from the old Berserk video arcade game), all three of which came from a dream I had in my early teens.
• Maltose Mage: An evil sorcerer out to rule the world by means of beer.  He frequently enlists the help of two or more of his dreaded Beer Elementals to carry out his nefarious plans.
• Phaser Patrol: Villain, but only because he thinks everyone else is an enemy alien.  Based on a video game for the Atari "Supercharger," a memory extender you could plug into the cartridge slot on the once-great Atari 2600 which would load software off of cassette tape.
• Star Fighter: Based on the SC-78503 craft from Sparky Starks' Star Fighter, perhaps the greatest video game ever made for the old TRS-80 Model 1.
• Photon Phace: Villain.
• The Tallest Man in the World: Mind controlled by aliens into being a villain.  Sworn enemy of Super Chicken.
• Solarmouse: He's not a villain, he just wants to be your friend.  Too bad he weighs as much as the sun does.
• The Starlane Destroyer: Destroys space ships against his will.  His favorite singer is the 29th century's Grenda vil Dift. An unfinished novelette of his exploits is on my Starlane Destroyer novelette page.
• Unbelievable Brick: An evil robot that puts The Sick Brick Robot, Disgusting Brick, and Ridiculous Brick to shame.

My Villain Groups

• T.H.E.M.: The Harbingers of Eternal Mankind.  Organized by Norman Dockran, who later dubbed himself "Mister Eternal," this ruthless organization seeks to perfect humanity by phasing out the frail, transient human body.  Here's a typical agent in T.H.E.M.'s Perpetual Army, and here's one of T.H.E.M.'s most frightening villains, Nova, after whom Mr. Eternal patterned his Novites.
• M.A.C.R.O.N.: The Malicious And Criminal Really Ornery Nasty people.  Or maybe they're the Mean Antagonistic Creepy Raiders Of Nations.  Or the Murderous Anti-Civil Rebels Out of your Nightmares.  Or something.  Only M.A.C.R.O.N. knows what M.A.C.R.O.N. stands for, and they aren't telling anybody.  Here's a character sheet for a typical array of M.A.C.R.O.N. agents.

Michael Gersten's Heroes

• Mauler: This character was made up by Michael Gersten, who based it on the Romulan "War Falcon" class Mauler spacecraft in Star Fleet Battles (combined with a pun about a certain late-19th-century composer).  The character sheet here represents the beefed-up, 250-base-point version of the character.  I wrote a short story about the Mauler character's origin (such as it was) and his adventures with some of Michael's other characters (and one character of my own named Magnetic Bottle), which can be found on my Mauler short story page.
• The Scientist, who makes an appearance in the above Mauler short story.  He's a reclusive gadgeteer who occasionally goes out to fight crime (but only for the experience points).
• Blue Shooter, who was Michael's answer to the Green Arrow.  The character sheet here represents the beefed-up, 250-base-point version of the character.  I wrote a short story about his origin as Foxbow and his over-the-top quest to take down The Mob, which can be found on my Blue Avenger short story page.
• Brick One: This character was also made up by Michael Gersten.  He got his name from the fact that he was the first "brick" type character Michael wrote up.  He looks like a brick with arms and legs.  The character sheet here represents the beefed-up, 250-base-point version of the character.  I wrote a short story about Brick One's origin (Michael's words: "He just woke up one morning, and he was a brick.  And he didn't remember how he got that way.") and his exploits with some of Michael's other characters (and a couple of characters of my own), which can be found on my Brick One short story page.
• Keybounce, the Electromagnetic God: Keybounce was Michael Gersten's "me" character, named after his favorite online pseudonym.  The character presented here is the beefed up, 250-base-point version of him.
• Water-and-Ice Man: If cartoons and comics could feature "fire and ice" imagery, so Michael must've figured, then by golly, he could make a character that featured water and ice imagery!

My Heroic Groups

• The Non-Heroes: This was a New-Mutants-like group of teen-agers I concocted some time in the late 1980s.  They're not so much a hero group as a support group for dealing with strange and sometimes scary superpowers.  Its members consist of:
  • Forcefield,
  • Photon Torpedo,
  • Lightning Man,
  • Bulletproof, and
  • Jumper (honorary member)
• The Tactical Performers: Back in the heyday of The A-Team, the ABC television network decided to produce its own "clone" of that hit show, called High Performance.  The show was thoroughly forgettable and very few episodes were made before it was cancelled, yet for some unfathomable reason that show inspired me to make my own team of 3 characters:
  • Proteus;
  • Phaser, who's the group's token hot chick; and
  • Jack Rabbit
• The League of 250-Point Characters: A foil for the evil M.A.C.R.O.N.:
  • Infra Man,
  • Havok 250,
  • Keybounce 250,
  • Mauler 250,
  • The Scientist 250, the Charles-Xavier-like pseudo-mentor of the group,
  • Blue Shooter 250,
  • Brick One 250, and
  • Wake
• The Sanders Group: A former slogan for Kentucky Fried Chicken was "We do one thing, and we do it right!"  Each member of this loosely-knit group epitomizes that slogan:
  • Clinging Man
  • Comeliness Woman
  • Computer Programming Man
  • Damage Man
  • Density Increase Man
  • Disadvantages Man
  • Flight Man
  • Forcefield (also a member of The Non-Heroes)
  • Giant Man
  • Hardened Defenses Man
  • Hawaiian Punch
  • Health Nut
  • The Hundred-and-eleven Strength Old Man
  • Intelligence Woman
  • Jumper (also an honorary member of The Non-Heroes)
  • Lack Of Weakness Man
  • Levi's (from the notion that 1 DEF = 4 pairs of Levi's)
  • Martial Man
  • Meat Cake
  • Mind Scan Man
  • Offensive Ego Combat Value Woman
  • Overall Skill Level Man
  • Phaser (also a member of The Tactical Performers)
  • Physical Defense Woman
  • Presence Man
  • Running Man
  • Sharpness!
  • Speed Demon
  • Stealth Man
  • Stun Man
  • Tunneling Man

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