AzuJOD: That ultimately depends on whether somebody will write & draw these. But I'd sure like to post ‘em IF somebody did! I’ll make a separate thread for these to see if there's enough interest.

I'd be willing to write the chapter breaks and/or origins. I have no character to contribute to the team just yet, so I definitely don't mind starting with the simpler work.

Quick thought, might've already been covered in the multitude of other posts since before I got here -

Is the team forming due to the challenge presented by issues 1 and 2 (the arena combat), or would it be more towards the mutual feeling that HU is too buereaucratic in it's gov't sponsored form? If the latter, then I suggest a HU vs. HA story in the near future.

dcole
Quick thought, might've already been covered in the multitude of other posts since before I got here -

Is the team forming due to the challenge presented by issues 1 and 2 (the arena combat), or would it be more towards the mutual feeling that HU is too buereaucratic in it's gov't sponsored form? If the latter, then I suggest a HU vs. HA story in the near future.

It is a little of both. The two first issues (hopefully near completion soon, I'm waiting for some input from two others), is more around the challenge, while my pending proposal for an issue #3 deals with the bureaucratic aspect. And we are trying to keep HU and HA separated for the time being, otherwise we would be too closely intertwined.

Gotcha. I just didn't want to see an idea like this, with so much potential, fall victim to poor pacing and unexplored themes. New guy's just keepin' the look out!

I'd like to write chapter 3 on my own for the most part, I hope that's OK with everyone. We can discuss details, but I wouldn't wan't to discuss the main plot. By discussing details I mean the general objectives, among which would be:

- Introducing Bleeder
- Making Mr Imp part of the team
- Introducing an HQ
- Exploring some ties to HU
- Possibly whatever's relevant for leading into ch. 4 (“fanservice chapter” )

I should probably read up on some of the stuff we already wrote in this thread, but I'd also appreciate if everyone just stated their rough expectations and what he/she thinks should be included.

sux
I kinda have this rough idea of story. Ok imagine a sick scientist creates a machine that re-animates the dead, and what would a sick scientist do with it? why not re-animate dead super villains and heroes, I mean that in itself is very morbid and dark, if Acrobat ever showed up in HA or anything like that, could you imagine him having to fight a mind controlled re-animated corpse of Blackhawk?

I found this post from August last year… that was before Blackest Night, right? Maybe you should try and sue DC! :P

Fair enough, Jo. I'm glad to take a breather from the writing a while. And as you said, we shouldn't plan too much on the rest of the season until HA #4 is out.

So the HA roster for this third chapter includes the cast from HA 1-2, along with newcomers Mr. Imp and Bleeder, I assume?

As for something to carry over into HA #4 and work into this, I think it would have to be the pretty important plot thread of Virtus trusting Titan with his secret identity. That is, if that's still in Fuku's draft of HA #4.

I figure with Titan's being from the future, it's possible that she's already come across Virtus' file at some point and is familiar with his secret id, whether he approves or not, so if there's no space for a pre-establishing trust, maybe we can get away with not having it.

Sebastian_Sandberg
So the HA roster for this third chapter includes the cast from HA 1-2, along with newcomers Mr. Imp and Bleeder, I assume?

I haven't decided yet which and how many characters will make an appearance. Safe bets are: Bleeder, Mr Imp, Bombshell, Comet Kid, Azumorph. Possibly also Relik, HU Commander, Virtus. One of the more tricky things about Virtus is that officially he's becoming part of HU, and that what's depicted in chapters 1 & 2 is officially an HU adventure. So Virtus and some others may be something like double agents for the time being, while Bombshell organizes HA as their own team properly.
However, I consider these things side plots. As Bleeder is making her first appearance ever, she might be the most important character. Which kind of forces me to have Germany as a setting (so this'll be the first comic I'm writing which takes place in my own country). I like the idea of a remote HQ, so I'm gonna go with Wes_Nero123's suggestion, the observatory in the Puerto Rican trench (we need to discuss details here). And the third setting will be HU HQ in NY.

Sebastian_Sandberg
As for something to carry over into HA #4 and work into this, I think it would have to be the pretty important plot thread of Virtus trusting Titan with his secret identity. That is, if that's still in Fuku's draft of HA #4.

Is this something the two of you discussed? Because frankly, I don't remember.

Abt_Nihil
I haven't decided yet which and how many characters will make an appearance. Safe bets are: Bleeder, Mr Imp, Bombshell, Comet Kid, Azumorph. Possibly also Relik, HU Commander, Virtus. One of the more tricky things about Virtus is that officially he's becoming part of HU, and that what's depicted in chapters 1 & 2 is officially an HU adventure. So Virtus and some others may be something like double agents for the time being, while Bombshell organizes HA as their own team properly.

I thought we already established that Virtus and government procedures don't mix, and that it was only under the assumption that Bombshell had another thing in mind for him that he decided to tag along. I hope we are quite clear on the fact that Virtus has trust issues if there is ever the possibility of something vital being held against him to get him to comply. I've actually been considering asking for Virtus to be taken out of the HA #4 draft in hindsight due to this, but the idea of him posing as a Swedish masseuse was understandably too humorous and compelling to pass up. Will still withdraw him if the writer feels that I should.

Abt_Nihil
Is this something the two of you discussed? Because frankly, I don't remember.

If you mean with Fuku, yes. If I might spruce up your memory, there were ideas for Virtus to pose as a Swedish masseuse in HA#4. Due to complications with everyone required to know each other's secret identities in order to work undercover, we had a compromise of Titan being the only one to know Virtus's true identity and gain his trust based on what Fuku explained. The other candidate being Bombshell, we settled on Titan, as Bombshell would be playing pretty big parts elsewhere in the story.

fukujunizuke
I figure with Titan's being from the future, it's possible that she's already come across Virtus' file at some point and is familiar with his secret id, whether he approves or not, so if there's no space for a pre-establishing trust, maybe we can get away with not having it.

Or to make things interesting, an obituary from a far too early demise in Titan's dystopian future, which in my mind is the only way plotwise I'd allow the secret to be publicly exposed.

Sebastian_Sandberg
I thought we already established that Virtus and government procedures don't mix, and that it was only under the assumption that Bombshell had another thing in mind for him that he decided to tag along. I hope we are quite clear on the fact that Virtus has trust issues if there is ever the possibility of something vital being held against him to get him to comply.

Don't worry, I won't use Virtus in any way without your agreement. My thought was just that what happens in chapters 1 & 2 would have to show up in a report on the HU Commander's desk one way or the other. And the question is where we'd go from there. When I say he's a “double agent” I'm speaking metaphorically - if Bombshell wants HA to be some sort of undercover team for the time being, then Virtus' involvement would have both an official HU side to it as well as an unofficial HA side.

Let's just keep it at that I don't want to see Virtus give his identity to ANY form of higher authority. That's the only thing that's not negotiable. Well, that and ogling Bombshell, he's better raised than that. XD

Well, what do you think, what would HU file him under? Also raises the question, what does HU do with metahumans who are not part of HU? Would they monitor them? Maybe HU is just an elaborate metahuman monitoring organization… conspiracy theories abound :P

Abt_Nihil
Well, what do you think, what would HU file him under? Also raises the question, what does HU do with metahumans who are not part of HU? Would they monitor them? Maybe HU is just an elaborate metahuman monitoring organization… conspiracy theories abound :P

I have no idea. Do HU have a payroll or something for their operatives? Seeing as how he does all heroics at no charge, maybe that would mean less requirements? Then perhaps, “volunteer”? I'm not familliar enough with the HU structure to figure that one out.

I don't know, wouldn't be very heroic, would it?

Abt_Nihil
I'd like to write chapter 3 on my own for the most part, I hope that's OK with everyone. We can discuss details, but I wouldn't wan't to discuss the main plot. By discussing details I mean the general objectives, among which would be:

- Introducing Bleeder
- Making Mr Imp part of the team
- Introducing an HQ
- Exploring some ties to HU
- Possibly whatever's relevant for leading into ch. 4 (“fanservice chapter” )

I should probably read up on some of the stuff we already wrote in this thread, but I'd also appreciate if everyone just stated their rough expectations and what he/she thinks should be included.

sux
I kinda have this rough idea of story. Ok imagine a sick scientist creates a machine that re-animates the dead, and what would a sick scientist do with it? why not re-animate dead super villains and heroes, I mean that in itself is very morbid and dark, if Acrobat ever showed up in HA or anything like that, could you imagine him having to fight a mind controlled re-animated corpse of Blackhawk?

I found this post from August last year… that was before Blackest Night, right? Maybe you should try and sue DC! :P

I doubt I would get anything out of them :P, they'd prolly ship me in that square thing like they did General Zod

Sebastian_Sandberg

Abt_Nihil
Well, what do you think, what would HU file him under? Also raises the question, what does HU do with metahumans who are not part of HU? Would they monitor them? Maybe HU is just an elaborate metahuman monitoring organization… conspiracy theories abound :P

I have no idea. Do HU have a payroll or something for their operatives? Seeing as how he does all heroics at no charge, maybe that would mean less requirements? Then perhaps, “volunteer”? I'm not familliar enough with the HU structure to figure that one out.

I don't know, wouldn't be very heroic, would it?

It may not be heroic, but it does make some sense for HU, maybe they ARE monitoring other metahumans and vigils and the like, maybe to find who could be good enough to join their ranks, or analyze their potential to become a threat to the world or to HU itself, in the world of heroes and agencies that support them, there is always another motive that is sometimes more villanious than the guy running around with a death ray trying to extort billions of dollars from the worlds governments.

Course that's just my paranoid side talking :D

In my opinion the most obvious thought is that every responsible government would have a plan B in case metahumans would band together and try to overthrow the current order. So it makes sense that HU, being a UN organization, wouldn't just be the metahuman equivalent of the UN peacekeeping troops, but also a way of monitoring metahuman activity on a global scale. While a high percentage of metahumans are conceived as “heroes” or “villains”, there would also be more or less “neutral” vigilantes who'd refuse to cooperate with government organizations. So the question is, how would HU classify those? Probably as potential threats, I think. Just like real-life vigilantes would be classified as criminals. Most superheroes who take the law into their own hands would be criminals, after all.

Abt_Nihil
In my opinion the most obvious thought is that every responsible government would have a plan B in case metahumans would band together and try to overthrow the current order. So it makes sense that HU, being a UN organization, wouldn't just be the metahuman equivalent of the UN peacekeeping troops, but also a way of monitoring metahuman activity on a global scale. While a high percentage of metahumans are conceived as “heroes” or “villains”, there would also be more or less “neutral” vigilantes who'd refuse to cooperate with government organizations. So the question is, how would HU classify those? Probably as potential threats, I think. Just like real-life vigilantes would be classified as criminals. Most superheroes who take the law into their own hands would be criminals, after all.

I could see many of the vigilante style characters that aren't with government facilities or ex-members of them would be seen as threats of organizations like HU, especially the ones who are ex-members since they know how these organizations work, how they operate and the like, so those types would have to be monitored and might even be considered top priority in case they have to be taken down.

Hmm… The government, monitoring a certain group of people solely based on being different, some of them without a single criminal act on their record… Anyone else see the symbolism here? XD

From my perspective - The HU would definately be secretly monitoring any being that they felt posed a high enough threat. The HU Commander is military and takes orders from her superiors.

As at it's position in Energize - The HU Initiative is part funded by the UN (for now) and part funded by Chegwin Tech but is Military controlled.
Members are voluntary

Hmm… Then I guess Virtus would be pretty much an “unknown C-list hero not worth monitoring” if we are relating to power level when it comes to threat. This still doesn't answer my question about secret identities in the HU though.

I always assumed that revealing one's secret identity is not a prerequisite for becoming an HU member. That's not to say that HU wouldn't secretly investigate secret identities of heroes they'd deem a possible threat.

Sebastian_Sandberg
Hmm… The government, monitoring a certain group of people solely based on being different, some of them without a single criminal act on their record… Anyone else see the symbolism here? XD

You may be talking about the Muslim community (or maybe that's just me), but this is basically what the X-Men are about too. But clearly, if someone can fly, see through walls, play mind tricks on you, has super-powers etc., they're worthy of being monitored, as they're not just any kind of “different”.
I remember a report on German TV recently, where some group of paranoid nerds complained that the German government doesn't have a contingency plan in case aliens invaded (as it seems, some governments actually do!). So try to imagine how many would complain if we'd actually had supermen and -women walk among us.

Yeah, that's pretty much how I envisioned it. But no matter what intentions, I think that there would be one or more metahumans complaining that it's racist, or at the very least discriminating to be under watch 24/7 (I could totally see Virtus going down this ranting route, especially if Shell were to drop one too many ‘Super’ remarks). Thing is, in a setting when constant surveillance is considered right, those against the system tend to be written off as villains rather than ordinary people that just happen to have powers. It's the classic clash of freedom vs safety at the cost of individual rights of privacy.

I agree. However, when dealing with this sort of question in the context of HU/HA it's less of a question of right or wrong to me, but rather a matter of realism. Clearly, superhero comics don't have to be too realistic, but in my mind, they shouldn't be too escapist either. I need that certain level of realism to keep myself interested.

Anyway, the more pressing question is: where do you see Virtus after chapter 2? Would he simply be on stand-by, sitting in Sweden right next to a red phone, waiting for Bombshell to call? (I'm exaggerating, of course :P)

I think he'd pretty much be doing his own thing at home in Sweden, the usual vigilante stuff. If Bombshell calls, then he'll answer. Although I pretty much have nothing planned for my so far empty Virtus folder that I would ever want to tie into HA, so that's the best description I can give off it.

So don't be surprised if I some way down the road, perhaps in five - ten seasons or so ask you to kill off the HA incarnation of Virtus for the sake of drama or out of my own frustration if people get confused with the separate continuities of the web-comic Virtus and the HA Virtus.

ok, I know this is going to sound weird, but just go with this.

I was watching the History channel and they had on Gangland, and I was watching the episode around Neo-Nazi's and I got to thinking, what if there was a gang of Metahuman-Supremicaist who wanted to just cause violence and terror against regular humans and try to recruit people to join their hateful war.

I kinda thought of the Brotherhood from X-men but more militant and more of terrorist group.

I'm all for a metahuman supremacist group for the HA to fight.

(Please don't refer to me as my creation. He's heavily based on me, but I don't do RPs here.) Yeah, something along those lines.

I believe it's a given that if enough metahumans exist, there'd be a metahuman supremacist group. My basic assumption about the HU Universe was: Well, there are a lot of metahumans, and so far we've seen only few of them. We might base a chapter on this idea, or include this idea somewhere. Let's see. Of course anyone is free to develop this into a story concept.


A few words on “canonical character-usage”: I don't think the HU/HA Universe and the world I'm just starting to explore in the Bombshell comic fully converge. So I don't really see why we shouldn't take some liberties on HA in general. Of course, every creator has the right to withdraw their character, and they will have the final say on how their character(s) are used. I'm just saying, working on HU I've had some experience with varying degrees of control exerted on some characters by their creators, and it's hard to please everybody and still deliver a good story. This problem also plays into another one, namely the fact that some of our characters aren't that well explored yet, so in the hands of other writers, a lot of guess-work will be involved.

Of course, what prompted me to write about this problem was Seb's remark about (possibly) killing off Virtus (eventually). But I'm also writing about this because I had to make that decision about Bombshell very early on - should her depiction in her own comic completely match her appearances elsewhere? And to me, the obvious answer seems to be: Probably not, because… why go to all that trouble? Personally, I don't see the need to streamline the character in all of her incarnations. There are some basic, essential truths about her, and people have been picking up on those pretty quickly (remember that Nepath wrote her first appearance on HU, at a time when I had just created her, and some very basic personality traits - but he got her completely right, and so has everyone else who wrote her since). I'm happy if we can coordinate all the details about all of the characters, but the only justified expectation should be that the core of the character is portrayed in the right way. I think that on a team-up book, the more iconic qualities of each character should be played up anyway, leaving the more subtle traits to be explored in their own comics.

Just my two cents!

“Canonical character-usage”
I agree with Abt. Let's just use the more basic elements of each character, looks and personality, and not worry too much about consistency in more intimate details of their personal history.


Death in Heroes Alliance
On another note, just a suggestion, if any significant characters are going to die in this webcomic, I suggest that it should be planned well ahead of time rather than kill-'em-off-on-a-whim. So, sorry Seb, that means no unprecedented bailout for your Virtus. Heh heh. This suggestion doesn't just go for our heroes, but also for our villains. Why do I say that…? Every death should have some impact on the continuity of the HA universe.

Ex. If Virtus died, someone will want to know how and why… which will probably lead to “something must be done to prevent that from happening ever again/we can't let his death be in vain…” which would then probably lead to some sort of moral conflict…

Now, if you just want to refrain from your character making an appearance for a while, that'd be something different, and easier to justify. (He was busy with more local matters, he's decided to stay neutral on the matter, he's sick with a mild case of diarrhea, etc).

People get a bit too hung up on the death part of my post rather than my concerns for a shared universe, which Fuku and Abt got the jist about and calmed my nerves.

When it comes to crossovers, I've always felt that comics especially tend to lack any real impact of one universe intersecting with another, it's almost always handwaved away as an “alternate universe similar to the mainstream one” that get to play with crossovers. What I mean to say is, that when I open the door for canon crossovers at some point in the future that have large or small repercussions storywise on both sides of the dimensional barrier, I hope that readers will be able to tell the difference between that and the non-canon crossovers, like DeviantArt Secret Wars and Heroes Alliance. I only justify my love for getting involved in non-canon crossovers with that I haven't managed to find time to push for my private projects.

Fuku - I SAID ten seasons or so, at the rate we're currently going that should be far ahead enough to plan a death. Plus, who says that any death I'd script in a sci-fi setting would be something the usually stages of grief would apply to? I would make it permanent no doubt, but that's not what we're discussing here, it's as you put it, canonical character usage. But on my last comment on the death card, it was far from an easy getaway card, a whole chapter sprung from that idea of a death on the team as well. But I more or less threw it in the trashcan.

I think I'll go with a similar description as literacysucs1 when it came to Acrobat in the HU, as I see Virtus in HA. “The character is an alternate duplicate for crossover purposes.”

Thing is, I tend to use the character a lot more for crossovers than I've had the chance to do with him standing on his own two legs. And I'm just worrying that the HA version will turn out to be the defining perimeter for the character, and that those used to that version will not approve of the version that gets a bit more character development. Especially if the others want to print HA at some point.

Then again, that's a risk I'll have to take now.