Originally (if you watch the time lapse), I just had the cutlass bounce away from Cecil. I figure at a minimum, his new armor suit at least has the same defenses as his old business suit, which means he has that refraction field that deflects high-velocity projectiles. But, then, I though maybe Red Shift should be doing something. If he wasn’t classified as “front line” then that means he should be ready for defense and counter attacks. So he does the Flash thing where he just grabs a Batarang out of the air and looks at it.

How tough is Ironside? Well, he is a Juggernaut homage, which is a Marvel property so I don’t have official canon stats for his power level in Mutants & Masterminds terms. But let me spell it out for you using the original Marvel Superhero RPG. Thor has “Ungodly” strength, which means he can punch for 100 points of damage. With Mjolnir, I think it’s +1 CS which means he does Shift-X damage or 150 points (possibly Shift-Y, or 250 points I think). Juggernaut has a class 1000 forcefield, which means that Thor can never-ever hurt him no matter what he does. Period. Of course the original Marvel FASERIP system (IYKYK) lacked a lot in terms of common sense and play balance. But still, if you don’t have someone with psychic powers to mind blast Juggernaut, you are utterly incapable of hurting him with anything. Just go home.

Does anyone here know if they ever announced how much damage a tactical nuke does in the Marvel RPG?

Oh, plus Ironside has powerful force blasts. I’m thinking like Blastaar-level. Tried like heck to make that blast look like it’s dangerous. It is buckling Grayhawks “cone of defense” and shoving them away.

Lady Crane seems to have some kind of beef with Cecil. We never did explore her backstory. Maybe some of that will come out in the inevitable mid-fight conversations during this battle.

Also, let’s all have a hand for the Return of Banter! This comic has gotten so serious-ish lately.