What are your Homebrew Infinite Worlds... worlds?

[Flyndaran]

My partially thought out super setting starts with a reality quake that brings out a Superman type entity that has weirdness magnet: origins.
His antics spreads the alternate universe rules around.

I wanted one super to have his power come from accidentally falling into an outhouse right after the original super used it. Now that's a horrifying secret.

[Dwarf99]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I wanted one super to have his power come from accidentally falling into an outhouse right after the original super used it. Now that's a horrifying secret.

If I may, what kind of powers does he have? if they're too... scatological, you can PM them to me.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Dwarf99

If I may, what kind of powers does he have? if they're too... scatological, you can PM them to me.

I haven't decided. I just loved the absurdity and how his mysterious origins could have been hidden for reasons of embarrassment rather than coolness.
From what little I know of comics, it's usually things like blood transfusions or other scientific methods that normals are gifted with powers. I wanted something ridiculously basic.

[Dwarf99]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I haven't decided. I just loved the absurdity and how his mysterious origins could have been hidden for reasons of embarrassment rather than coolness.
From what little I know of comics, it's usually things like blood transfusions or other scientific methods that normals are gifted with powers. I wanted something ridiculously basic.

How about air control? Totally play it straight too, not all stinky, he can make it smell bad, but he can also make it smell nice, or make a leaf blower or vacuum effect, or any other wind based powers.

[robkelk]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I haven't decided. I just loved the absurdity and how his mysterious origins could have been hidden for reasons of embarrassment rather than coolness.
From what little I know of comics, it's usually things like blood transfusions or other scientific methods that normals are gifted with powers. I wanted something ridiculously basic.

Perhaps he can make plants grow faster and more verdant...

[johndallman]

Most of the worlds in my campaign still have secrets I don't want to show to the players yet, but here are three that seem unlikely to get used:

Hess-4
A WWII where things went rather differently after the Battle of France. The key difference seems to be that Hess wasn’t an idiot, but a moderately skilled political fixer.

He noticed Kesselring’s argument that Gibraltar should be taken, but that Hitler wasn’t interested in spending effort on it. He connected some Italian naval officers who’d served in the Spanish civil war with some Spanish army officers, in June 1940, and the two groups realised they had the power to take Gibraltar with existing resources. The MAS frogmen could wreck the net defences of Gibraltar simply by planting charges on them during the summer nights, allowing Italian submarines in to torpedo ships at anchor, followed by an assault from the sea. The Spanish Army was willing to attack from the land side, and the base fell in late July. Somewhat to Hitler’s surprise, but he was always willing to take an opportunity. Malta went in September, while its reinforcements were still off Kenya, and Manstein’s DAK took Egypt in October. They are currently refitting before moving on to Palestine, and then the oilfields of Iraq and Kuwait.

The date is now early December 1940. How do we keep this from becoming another Reich parallel?

Lenin-19
This one departs when the Poles lose the Battle of Warsaw in 1920. That allows the USSR to conquer Poland, which then causes the German revolution to break out again. Germany collapses into civil war which lasts until 1922, officially. That phase ends when a Soviet-backed Social Democrat government is installed, but guerrilla fighting continues, especially in the South of Germany. Hitler appears to have got killed in that. The French and British are naturally concerned about Bolshevism in Germany, Slovakia, Austria and Hungary, and an Iron Curtain goes up in 1927.

Burroughs-1
William S Burroughs was successful in his attempt to join the Office of Strategic Services during WWII, and became head of the CIA in 1957. Rather than changing literature, his intelligence and creativity are applied to the Cold War, resulting in the successful sabotage of the R-7 rocket at the factory and the collapse of the Soviet ICBM project and early space programme. A limited nuclear war was fought in 1965, which resulted in the collapse of the Soviet Union and the acquisition of Siberia by China. Burroughs became POTUS in 1968, in a USA whose counterculture was weakened by the absence of a Vietnam War, and guided the creation of a spaceplane program. In 1979, men landed on Mars.

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by johndallman

Most of the worlds in my campaign still have secrets I don't want to show to the players yet, but here are three that seem unlikely to get used:

Hess-4
A WWII where things went rather differently after the Battle of France. The key difference seems to be that Hess wasn’t an idiot, but a moderately skilled political fixer.

He noticed Kesselring’s argument that Gibraltar should be taken, but that Hitler wasn’t interested in spending effort on it. He connected some Italian naval officers who’d served in the Spanish civil war with some Spanish army officers, in June 1940, and the two groups realised they had the power to take Gibraltar with existing resources. The MAS frogmen could wreck the net defences of Gibraltar simply by planting charges on them during the summer nights, allowing Italian submarines in to torpedo ships at anchor, followed by an assault from the sea. The Spanish Army was willing to attack from the land side, and the base fell in late July. Somewhat to Hitler’s surprise, but he was always willing to take an opportunity. Malta went in September, while its reinforcements were still off Kenya, and Manstein’s DAK took Egypt in October. They are currently refitting before moving on to Palestine, and then the oilfields of Iraq and Kuwait.

The date is now early December 1940. How do we keep this from becoming another Reich parallel?

Oh, dear. I really hope that one's not on Quantum 3, and if it is, that it doesn't have a piece of the Chronobahn.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by johndallman

...

Lenin-19
This one departs when the Poles lose the Battle of Warsaw in 1920. That allows the USSR to conquer Poland, which then causes the German revolution to break out again. Germany collapses into civil war which lasts until 1922, officially. That phase ends when a Soviet-backed Social Democrat government is installed, but guerrilla fighting continues, especially in the South of Germany. Hitler appears to have got killed in that. The French and British are naturally concerned about Bolshevism in Germany, Slovakia, Austria and Hungary, and an Iron Curtain goes up in 1927.
...

Didn't want to deal with the idea of a freedom fighting Hitler? Seen as a progressively ruthless rebel his allies don't yet realize is only going to get worse.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Didn't want to deal with the idea of a freedom fighting Hitler?

He didn't seem relevant to the thrust of events, but I needed to account for him because otherwise people would ask. These worlds tend to come to me as one packet of ideas, rather than being methodically constructed.

[patchwork]

Rockefeller:SCOTUS overturns the Sherman Anti-Trust Act in 1910 on grounds of liberty of contract. Trusts continue to dominate America and have their claws in Germany (WWI was little affected, but Hitler then died in the Beer Hall Putsch). The Soviet Union fizzles after only three years, leaving revolutionary socialism ironically much more credible. This is my Dieselpunk-goes-cyberpunk world; the Trusts are effectively megacorporations which can dictate terms to national governments, but the TL is still 6+1 and the global Marxist underground are an existential threat or civilization's last hope, depending on your perspective.

Luciano: Dutch Schultz murders Thomas Dewey in 1936. The Mob wins the resulting ill-considered crusade by Hoover; Frank Costello gets put in charge of rebuilding Italy after WWII. No President would be foolish enough to cross the Commission on this world; mostly used to keep Homeline mobsters from contacting their fathers or younger selves on a world where they need fear no cops.

Champlain: Columbus sinks, Europe gets distracted with Protestants and Muslims, and the New World isn't discovered until 1603. Without Spanish gold, the Habsburgs collapsed; North and South Champlaina belong to France, while Spain and Portugal have carved up Africa between them, according to the Pope. Of course, the Protestant English and Dutch don't care about that agreement. Clockpunk pirate world, essentially.

Melittus: A letter from the Pope is mislaid, and so the Roman attempt to Christianize England in 601 is done with fire, sword and decidedly mixed success (the pagans are all gone, but everyone in the British Isles understands that the Pope is a Very Bad Man). As an organizational matter, the Western Christian Church centered on Iona is outcompeting the WCC headquartered in Rome.