1939-42 and 1945-48)
Construction on the Empire State Building began in January, 1930, and the building formally opened on May 1st of 1931. It’s 1,250 feet tall (380 m), not including the famous spire which adds another 204 feet (63 m), and is officially 103 stories high, not including the secret floor that Jeremiah Wilson (who was one of the major financiers of the project, along with John Raskob and Pierre Du Pont) had installed between the 102nd and 103rd floors. He originally intended to use it as office space for his own political plans (including his intention to run for mayor in 1932), which were cut short by his own death that year.
His son Drake inherited the rights to the floor, and systematically removed all record of its existence from public paperwork.
The building, at the time the tallest in the world, was not an immediate financial success- it was in competition with several other new skyscrapers in downtown Manhattan and, on 34th street, was farther from Grand Central and Penn Station. Therefore, several floors remained partially or totally unused until the early 1950s.
The Observation Deck, on the 86th floor, was popular with tourists, fortunately, and helped offset the losses from unrented office space.
There are 64 elevators open to the general public in the building, plus an additional nine service elevators. A tenth elevator is the only one that accesses DOJ HQ, and requires a special pass card be inserted into the wall panel – otherwise it seems to be perpetually “out of service.” It takes seven full turns (84 seconds) to reach the secret floor from street level.
The Defenders moved into Optimus’ secret offices in mid-November of 1939, just two weeks or so after the “Martian Invasion” that brought the team together. They would use it continu-ously until April of 1942, when the “homefront”
Defenders moved to the Project Rainbow base in Haynesville. It sat largely unused and empty until the end of the war, when Meteor Man re-opened it in October of 1945 to be used again by the Defenders. Though they used the offices frequently, nobody on the team lived on the site.
By 1948, when Drake and Mara divorced and Drake moved back to New York City, the team was sufficiently “retired” that he was able to reclaim the offices for his own, and used them regularly again in his new career as a consultant for the United Nations. Indeed, the original proposals that led to the founding of UNTIL were written there.
By later superheroic standards, the Defenders’
headquarters was fairly primitive and under-equipped. It had several offices, including a large meeting room with a direct line to the White House. There were several private quarters- one was for Optimus, and a second was home for Mara. Several others were used as “guest rooms”
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Defenders HQ (Empire State Building)
Val Char Cost Notes
6 Size 12 70m x 32m x 4m; OCV +8 8 PD 9
8 ED 9
3 Body 1 Total Characteristics Cost: 31
Cost Powers END
10 Location: City 0
9 Secret Floor: Concealment 14-
4 Vault: +4 PD/+4 ED, Partial Coverage (-2) 0 4 Library: KS: World History
13-5 Lab: Paramedics
14-Total Abilities & Equipment Cost: 32 Total Base Cost: 63
Total Cost: 13
for members who lived out-of-state during their visits to New York, or as temporary quarters for local heroes like Dr. Twilight, Meteor Man or Lady Mystery. Optimus kept a separate room next to his bedroom for his workout equipment; occasionally, Bulletproof would hang a heavy punching bag in there as well.
A single room was dedicated as a “trophy room” for storing mementos from some of their cases, while more dangerous items and devices were stored in in an actual vault on the east side of the building. Another large space was converted into a medical laboratory for Dr. Twilight to use both for scientific research and as a “sickbay” for injured heroes.
On July 28, 1945, a B-25 Bomber crashed into the building between the 79th and 80th floors in a thick morning fog. The explosion and resulting fire killed 14. Nobody from the Defenders was present that day.
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OPTIMUS
Val Char Cost Roll Notes
20 STR 10 13- Lift 400 kg; 4d6 HTH damage [2]
23 DEX 26
14-23 CON 13
14-23 INT 13 14- PER Roll
14-23 EGO 13
14-25 PRE 15 14- PRE Attack: 5d6
9 OCV 30
9 DCV 30
3 OMCV 0
5 DMCV 6
5 SPD 30 Phases: 3, 5, 8, 10, 12
10 PD 8 Total: 18 PD (8 rPD)
8 ED 6 Total: 16 ED (8 rED)
9 REC 5
55 END 7
13 BODY 3
40 STUN 10 Total Characteristics Cost: 225 Movement: Running: 14m/28m
Leaping: 6m/12m Swimming: 6m/12m
Cost Powers END 8 Armored Costume: Resistant Protection (5 PD/5 ED);
Roll Required 13- (-1/2), OIF (-1/2)
2 Swift: Running +2m 1
1 Athletic: Swimming +2m 1
1 Athletic: Leaping +2m 1
11 Throwing Disks: Blast 7d6; OAF (-1), 2 Recoverable Charges (-1), Range Based On Strength (-1/4) Perks
20 Contact: Various Useful In The Military And New York Society
10 Money: Wealthy ($500,000/year)
2 Reputation: Particularly Brave And Honest Hero (A medium-sized group) 11-, +2/+2d6
5 DOJ Base Contribution Talents
6 Combat Luck (3 PD/3 ED) 3 Lightsleep
3 Resistance (3 points)
6 Physical Ideal: Striking Appearance (+2/+2d6) Skills
12 +1 Overall 10 +1 with All Combat 10 +2 with Pankration
3 Acrobatics
14-3 Animal Handler (Canines, Equines) 14-3 Breakfall
14-3 Bureaucratics 14-3 Charm 14-3 Climbing 14-3 Combat Driving 14-3 Combat Piloting 14-3 Concealment 14-3 Contortionist 14-3 Conversation 14-3 Deduction 14-10 Defense Maneuver I-IV 3 Disguise
14-1 Electronics 8-3 High Society 14-3 CK: New York City 14-3 Scholar
2 1) KS: Classical Literature and Culture 14-2 2) KS: Finance and Real Estate 14-2 3) KS: History
14-2 4) KS: International Affairs 14-2 5) KS: Philosophy 14-1 6) KS: The Military 11-3 Linguist
1 1) Language: French (fluent) 1 2) Language: German (fluent) 1 3) Language: Greek (fluent) 1 4) Language: Latin (fluent) 1 5) Language: Russian (fluent) 3 Lipreading
14-3 Lockpicking 14-3 Mechanics
14-4 Navigation (Air, Land, Marine) 14-5 Oratory
15-3 Paramedics 14-3 Persuasion 14-3 Riding 14-3 Shadowing 14-3 Sleight Of Hand 14-3 Stealth 14-3 Tactics 14-3 Trading
14-14 TF: Common Motorized Ground Vehicles, Riding Animals, Balloons & Zeppelins, Chariots, Combat Aircraft, Large Wind-Powered Boats, Parachuting, Basic, Railed Vehicles, Skiing (snow), Small Motorized Boats, Small Planes, Small Wind-Powered Boats, Tracked Military Vehicles, Two-Wheeled Motorized Ground Vehicles 6 WF: Common Melee Weapons, Common Missile Weapons,
Lances, Staffs
3 Weaponsmith (Muscle-Powered HTH, Muscle-Powered Ranged)
14-6
Martial Arts: Pankration
Maneuver OCV DCV Notes
4 Bend Joint -1 +1 3d6 NND 8 +2 HTH Damage Classes
Total Powers & Skills Cost: 290 Total Cost: 515
400 Matching Complications (75) 10 Distinctive Features: Strikingly Handsome
(Concealable; Noticed and Recognizable;
15 Hunted: The Axis 8- (Mo Pow, Harshly Punish) 20 Psychological Complication: Noblesse Oblige
(Very Common, Strong)
15 Psychological Complication: Old-Fashioned and Conservative, Believes In The Classics (Common, Strong)
10 Social Complication: Secret Identity (Drake Wilson) (Occasionally, Major)
Total Complications Points: 75 Experience Points: 115
OPTIMUS
Background/History: Drake Wilson was born in 1918, the son of wealthy industrialist Jeremiah Wilson and his wife Elizabeth. The Wilson family had been in New York for many generations, owning a fair amount of real estate and investing their wealth wisely in a number of different companies, and were well known as generous philanthropists as well as members in good standing of the upper crust of social society.
Drake was a prodigy in several fields of the liberal arts, as well as a master of multiple sports, and was considered a prime catch by the parents of eligible daughters by the end of his secondary schooling.
However, Drake decided by the time he turned twenty that simply managing and increasing the fortune amassed by his ancestors held little interest for him. He desired something more: an opportunity for adventure and excitement, both sadly lacking in the current pastimes that came so easily to him, and an opportunity to benefit those not nearly so lucky as him in ways other than giving money to charities. Inspired by the masked heroes of the pulp era of the Twenties and early Thirties, Drake created the costumed persona of Optimus, and set about thwarting criminals and rescuing innocents, while all the while serving as a public symbol of the perfectibility of Man. He took every opportunity to speak to the public, either in person or through the press, in order to press his case that everyone out there could be just as remarkable and heroic as himself if they only put themselves in the correct frame of mind and applied themselves diligently to self-improvement, physically but also mentally and ethically.
Needless to say, his charm and oratorical gifts (as well as his remarkable good looks) won him quite a following in the early days of his career, and if some of the rougher-edged cops and masked vigilantes were a bit dismissive of his publicity-seeking, well, no one could deny either his good intentions or his successes (like defeating early
costumed villains such as Blackheart and the Crimson Ghost.)
Optimus came to further prominence in October of 1938 when New Jersey was invaded by alien monsters in death-dealing giant tripods.
The collection of mystery men who responded to the menace became the core of the Defenders of Justice, and it was Optimus who organized the team and acted as its first leader in the team’s early days. By 1941 Optimus was a household name, with a range of publications bearing his name and a weekly radio show (all proceeds donated to charity, of course), but also a great deal of respect earned from the costumed community for his courage, skill and genuine good nature. When the DOJ split into two teams after Pearl Harbor, Optimus led the nonpowered team of mystery men operating behind enemy lines.
Over the years, Drake had romantically fallen for Mara, the exiled princess of Atlantis who joined the Defenders as Sea Hawk. Though the war separated them physically much of the time, their relationship deepened nevertheless, and when Mara returned to Atlantis in 1943 to face down her father’s murderer Optimus was there fighting by her side. When she regained the throne, her first act was to ask him to marry her, and though the conservative Drake was startled by the Atlantean reversal of tradition he delight-edly agreed. The two heroes retired from the Defenders in order to rebuild Atlantis once it had been removed from the Axis, with Drake serving as Prince Consort.
Personality/Motivation: Optimus wants to save the world. He understands the scope of the task he’s taken on, and is quite comfortable breaking the job down into small, manage-able pieces, but nevertheless his commitment to improving the state of humanity as a group is absolute. While the physical acts of punching out supervillains, pulling children from burning build-ings, or dangling from a zeppelin over a major city in order to defuse a bomb are all important in and After The War: Life
was difficult for Drake undersea, as the Atlanteans never were entirely comfortable with a Lander prince, and the physical difficulties he faced in the alien environment wore at the couple. Despite their love for each other, by 1948 it was clear the marriage was effectively over, and they divorced amicably with Drake returning to New York City. There, he realized that the Golden Age of costumed crime-fighters was coming to an end, at least tempo-rarily, and eventually Drake accepted a job with the United Nations, publically both revealing and retiring the identity of Optimus for good in 1950.
Wilson served as the Advisor on Superhuman Affairs to UN Secretary General Trygve Lie from 1950 to 1952, and from that post was one of
the creators of the organization
that would eventually become UNTIL.
He worked for UNTIL in various capaci-ties until his retirement in 1993, and while he occasionally saw action in the field in the organization’s early days he never again wore a mask. He moved to a farm on his property in upstate New York, where he passed away quietly in 2008 at the age of 90.
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of themselves, they also allow Optimus to serve as a masked symbol for the potential hero within every one of us as well. Drake Wilson never loses sight of this, and always acts in whatever manner he feels is closest to “physical, mental and ethical perfection” (to quote one of his Healthy Living the Optimus Way magazines.)
Optimus is a Patriot without a specifi c country or nationality- he stands for ideals that he feels are part of the American Way, of course, but if he ever felt the country didn’t support those ideals, he’d no longer support the country.
Quote: “Th ere is a diff erence between fi ghting against evil and fi ghting for good. I try to do both.”
Powers/Tactics: Optimus has no superhuman powers, but he’s trained himself to near the limits of physical perfection. He carries two steel throwing disks as weapons, and is also highly skilled at pankration, the ancient Greek art of wrestling. Tacti-cally, Optimus is extremely sound, making a point of taking
advan-tage of the environment and using classical techniques of warfare. Indeed, if he has a weakness in this area, it’s that he’s not much of an improviser and can be fl ustered by a genuinely new situa-tion that his intensive study of past masters has not prepared him for. He trains extensively with his teammates and makes a point of knowing the precise nature of their powers, skills and weaknesses.
Appearance: Optimus wears a costume of blue and gold, a skintight bodysuit with a short cape that suggests a Greek or Roman toga, a golden domino mask and headband over his blonde hair and striking blue eyes. His throwing disks are affi xed at his belt. At 6’2 and 190 lbs., he’s muscular while retaining a lean build, like a track and fi eld athlete.
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DR. TWILIGHT
Val Char Cost Roll Notes
18 STR 8 13- Lift 300 kg; 3-1/2d6 HTH dam [2]
18 DEX 16
13-18 CON 8
13-18 INT 8 13- PER Roll
13-15 EGO 5
12-23 PRE 13 14- PRE Attack: xd6
7 OCV 20
6 DCV 15
3 OMCV 0
3 DMCV 0
4 SPD 20 Phases: 3, 6, 9, 12
6 PD 4 Total: 12 PD (6 rPD)
8 ED 6 Total: 14 ED (6 rED)
8 REC 4
55 END 7
12 BODY 2
36 STUN 8 Total Characteristics Cost: 144 Movement: Running: 12m/24m
Teleport: 40m/80m/Special
Cost Powers END 40 Command The Darkness: Darkness to Sight Group
8m radius, Personal Immunity (+1/4); Unified Power (-1/4) 5 40 Stepping Through Shadows: Multipower, 60-point
Reserve, Only Through Darkness & Shadow On Both Ends (-1/4), Unified Power (-1/4)
3f 1) Short Step: Teleportation 40m, Safe Blind Teleport (+1/4); Only Through Darkness & Shadow On Both Ends (-1/4), Unified Power (-1/4) 5 4f 2) Stepping Through Shadows (Long): Teleportation
26m, MegaScale (1m = 1 km; +1), Safe Blind Teleport (+1/4); Only Through Shadows Or Darkness On Both Ends (-1/4); Unified Power (-1/4) 6 45 Bolts Of Darkness: Energy Blast 9d6, Reduced
Endur-ance (1/2 END; +1/4); Unified Power (-1/4) 2 31 Walls Of Shadow: Barrier (8 PD/8 ED, 8 BODY; 8m
long, 3m tall and 1/2m thick) (Opaque Sight Group);
Costs Endurance (to maintain, -1/2), Unified Power (-1/4) 5 27 Shadowy Fear: Drain PRE 4d6; Limited Power (Only vs.
Targets In Darkness or Shadow; -1/4), Unified Power (-1/4) 4 5 Night Sight: Ultraviolet Perception (Sight Group) 6 Padded Costume: Resistant Protection (3 PD/3 ED);
OIF (-1/2)
10 Mystical Nature: Power Defense (10 points) Perks
5 Money: Well Off ($45,000/year)
3 Reputation: Harlem's Superhuman Protector (A medium-sized group) 11-, +3/+3d6
1 Perk: Medical license 5 DOJ Base Contribution Talents
6 Combat Luck (3 PD/3 ED) Skills
15 +3 levels with Darkness Powers 3 Breakfall
13-3 Climbing 13-3 Concealment 13-3 Forensic Medicine 13-3 Interrogation 14-4 AK: Harlem
14-3 KS: Ancient Egyptian Gods 13-1 KS: Egyptian Magic
8-4 Language: Ancient Egyptian (idiomatic) 3 Oratory
14-3 Paramedics 13-7 Power 15-5 PS: Doctor 15-6 SS: Medicine 16-3 SS: Pharmacology 13-3 Shadowing 13-5 Stealth 14-3 Streetwise
14-Total Powers & Skills Cost: 311 Total Cost: 455
400 Matching Complications (75)
10 Dependent NPC: Wife Jenna (and young sons from 1945 on) (Normal, Infrequent)
5 Distinctive Features: African-American (Concealable;
Noticed and Recognizable; Detectable By Commonly-Used Senses; Not Distinctive In Some Cultures) 10 Hunted: Set and Other Egyptian Gods 8- (Mo Pow, Mildly
Punish)
15 Psychological Complication: Protects Innocents, Espe-cially Patients (Common, Strong)
15 Psychological Complication: Angry About Racism, But Conflicted About Solutions; Hides Own Race (Common, Strong)
5 Social Complication: Black in 1940s (Occasionally, Major, Not Limiting In Some Cultures)
15 Social Complication: Secret Identity (Frequently, Major) Total Complications Points: 75
Experience Points: 55
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DR. TWILIGHT
Background/History: Robert MacDonald was born in 1912 in New York, his father a respected doctor in Harlem and his mother a schoolteacher.
Robert himself went on to medical school in Canada, where he excelled in both academics and athletics. In 1938, as a graduation present, he and several friends traveled to Egypt and toured the pyramids at Giza. Somehow he became separated from the tourist crowd and found himself lost in a maze of secret tunnels. He emerged into a previ-ously unknown chamber, where he was knocked off of his feet by a vision of the ancient Egyptian god Osiris appearing in front of him. Osiris claimed that he needed a “champion” on Earth to fi ght against the forces of evil, and placed a piece of his divine power somehow “within” Robert. He awoke from his vision outside in the desert, where he quickly discovered he had powers over dark-ness (and used them to defeat a band of thieves.)
Upon returning to America Robert started working at a hospital in Harlem, where he soon met, fell in love with and married a nurse named Jenna. He also created the costumed identity of Dr. Twilight, and began using his powers to clean up the streets of Harlem. He was one of the heroes who banded together in October to defeat the Martian invasion, and became a founding member of the Defenders of Justice. His teammates never saw him unmasked in the early years, and though they presumed he was “colored” because of his regular appearances in Harlem,
they (and the press) had no actual evidence of it. Dr. Twilight remained mysterious on that and many other subjects for some time.
When WWII broke out, Dr.
Twilight remained with the super-powered membership of the DOJ protecting the homefront. Gradu-ally over time he became closer friends with Meteor Man and Mara, and revealed his secret identity to them in 1942. Despite his prefer-ence to stay out of the limelight, he was continually under scrutiny by both the government and the press as the war progressed. Aft er the war, he remained with the new
lineup of the team as they returned to their role as crimefi ghters.
However, he learned in 1945 that Osiris had not by any means given him the complete truth about his intentions. When Jenna became pregnant, the Egyptian dwarf-god Bes came to live with the MacDonalds in order to “protect”
the children and facilitate the birth, which put a great strain on their marriage. Confronting Osiris, Robert learned that the god’s intention was not simply to create a mortal champion, but to have that mortal champion breed and pass on the divine spark, which would culminate several generations into the future into a line of
partially-divine heroes who would both save the world and help usher the Egyptian pantheon back into prominence as beings to be worshipped.
MacDonald’s receiving superpowers himself was simply a side eff ect of Osiris’ master plan.
Realizing the nature of the impending birth, human mystics and gods alike began to choose up sides in an occult struggle over the child’s eventual fate, climaxing in a massive battle between the Defenders, several other mystics, and a group of Set-worshipping cultists while Jenna gave birth to twin boys. Th ough the
heroes eventually drove the cultists away, they were unable to prevent
After The War: Robert and Jenna separated in 1952, as she was unable to handle his mercu-rial mood shifts. Robert himself disappeared in 1954. His son Gerald went on to be the Silver Age hero Dr. Scarab, while John eventually succumbed to the mark of Set and became his arch-nemesis Serpen-tine. Serpentine’s own son Khalid is better known today as the mystical protector of Vibora Bay, Dr. Ka.
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the dark god himself from “touching” one of the boys (though no one knew until much later which child bore Set’s hidden mark.)
Th e children, John and Gerald, at fi rst seemed normal, and for a while Jenna and Robert recon-ciled and stayed together out of their mutual love for them. However, Robert’s own problems increased over the next several years. He left
Th e children, John and Gerald, at fi rst seemed normal, and for a while Jenna and Robert recon-ciled and stayed together out of their mutual love for them. However, Robert’s own problems increased over the next several years. He left