I think this is the right section to ask something like this... I hope... maybe? :P. Also, long winded post ahead so.. sorry!.


I'm playing a character in an X-Men themed game who is eventually (probably more sooner than later but not sure yet) gonna go through a major life altering change and I'm having problems trying to come up with a good way to play it out.

The premise of the game was that you made a character who was a normal teenager, no powers or weird "I'm a world class assassin at 15" stories or any of that, the GM gave you a random power and you found out what it was while playing out your intro threads before joining the main 'team'. I wanted to try something different/challenging so after talking with the GM about possible options I wrote up a teenager girl who is wheelchair bound. We also agreed that whatever power she might end with should not compensate/negate that disability as that is a rather common practice (blind people who can see, someone mute who can talk in some other way, etc) so she ended up with touch based powers xD.

Now I really *love* the character, the challenges it presents and the intro thread was really amazing. The thing is that the game has been going for more than a year now and it has sorta settled into the standard superhero team mechanics which is a lot more action and combat oriented than it was originally intended and the character doesn't exactly work in that kind of setting without a lot of extra work from the GM and it can get pretty frustrating.


Anyway, on to the actual question. There's a plot we have in mind that is basically about inserting some experimental tech in her to bypass the damaged parts of her spine... you know.. standard comic book science stuff. The thing is that I don't want it to be some magical fix that has her walking out of the OR/recovery room.
There are some basic challenges she will face like long recovery times and physical therapy after being confined to a wheelchair for several years but in the ingame world the tech that would be used to heal her is highly experimental and it would be interesting if there were negative side effects or quirks that need to be fixed/worked over time.

So far all I could come with are:

• Pain of varying intensity at random.
• Some med she would need to take regularly to keep it working/prevent infections/whatever.
• It's technology based so anything that messes up with that could be a problem (like an EMP).

And that's about it... was hoping that some of the much-more-creative-than-me people here would understand the mess I just wrote and throw a couple ideas really anything I could use to keep it challenging and fun =). Doesn't need to be restricted to the tech part and could be anything that could fit a scenario like this.
This message was last edited by the user at 05:01, Fri 14 Aug 2015.

Here's a couple of ideas:

Touch-based synethesia:
The implants/byapss trigger a sensual synthesia in the parts of her body that were previously inaccessible...  Depending on the nature of feeling, she might see different colors, get strange smells hear odd noises.

Phantom-Limb sytndrom
How do you describe phantom-limb syndrome if you haven't actually lost any limbs?  The implants/bypasses provide "feelings" that might actually be some sort of extradimensional sense... The feelings should reproducable if only she could understand what the hell they meant.

Power-Surge/Power-dampenings
The implants/bypasses help to regulate the itnnsity of communication along the nerve-paths.  But different emotions have different impacts on the conductivity of those things...  She gets angry and her legs ramp up to disproporationate strengths... Depression literally weakens her legs...

Malfunctions in unusual situations (knee deep in water, cold) or when she takes damage.

Sometimes malfunctions in 'positive' ways, like super jumping or kicking by accident.

Feet swell, shoes don't fit right.

Meds side effects.

Threat of enemy 'hacker.'

Along the lines jait suggested with the phantom limb, but going all the way ...

How about a "phantom body" = tech should work to fix her but doesn't due to mental blocks (I think Prof X has been down that path before), BUT enables her to to create a phantom (/ghost) form.  Can deliver touch attacks or whatever, but any attack on phantom form feeds back to her physical body.

I seem to remember a very early Starlord story arc about a character known as Star-Thief or somesuch, where the villain of the piece could astrally roam the universe, but the twist was his body was broken and he was confinded to a bed, all but (or perhaps actually, it was a long time ago) comatose.

I know this isn't quite what you asked about, but here's some real world tech you might not be aware of, and want to expand on.  I'm not sure how widely known it is; I believe at the time my brother was using it there were only a couple of places in Canada with it.

He had been told he would never walk again, but he was having none of that.  I believe he had got to the stage of full braces by then, looked rather like using an artificial leg but with limited power in hips to propel him.  He could move himself to and from a wheelchair with some help, and with crutch-like things, and was starting to try to use bars but couldn't really.

He was hooked up to an aerial harness, sort of suspended but 'standing', a type of treadmill thing under his feet, so supporting himself on his legs to some extent but not falling because of the harness.  In front of him was a screen showing the type of surface being simulated - a boat with the water motion, an incline or decline, etc. and the treadmill tipped etc as required.  He said it did a lot for his balance, but without the risk of actually falling and doing further damage.

Following along on others' ideas above, the tech might be vulnerable to damage or stress when pushed too hard so that she has to make choices as to how much she pushes it.

The medication to fight pain or rejection might adversely affect her powers so that she has to carefully balance the effects. Or using her powers might sometimes cause a drain on the augmented spine and reduce strength to her legs, even causing them to completely fail at some point.

That's something the GM mentioned as well yeah. That the implant being so new/experimental could have trouble 'translating' certain feelings and would require lots of tweaking.



Mmm I like this. Have to check with him. The temporary 'boost' should probably be harmful to her in some way too since it would be the implant forcing the movement and not registering the pain/strain (or registering and doing it anyway) rather than her legs having any kind of unusual toughness.




That's a cool idea but it's probably changing the character too much =).




@Brianna: Yup, I've been looking over some real life tech and examples to see if there was anything I could use. Went over some of the prototype medical exoskeletons being discussed/tested too.

@Gaffer: That's what I have in mind regarding the meds. We have already established using her powers isn't taxing at all but I could work something like that out too!.



Thank you all and keep'em coming! :D

Time limitations on using the tech -- simple fatigue. Especially if it's actually relying on her own leg muscles, say -- which wouldn't initially exist, for all intents and purposes. As she gets more used to the tech/gains strength, her viable time of mobility would increase.

Nanite infection -- may be inherent in the tech, but not really understood, or mutate/adapt itself over time. Or may be introduced purposefully or accidentally along the way. May be beneficial (increase endurance/strength/speed/etc.) or detrimental, or actively malevolent. Or have its own agenda. ;>

Shorts -- caused by normal wear (it's experimental, after all), excessive/extended usage, or combat damage, that "deadens' areas, or perhaps causes misfiring (failure, weakness, power surge), which could be quite challenging if it's unilateral and not bilateral, and doesn't happen predictably.

Chronic side effect -- may lead to periods of more severe debilitation than just needing a wheelchair. Back pain would be a big one, and she could end up bedridden for a while after periods of demanding or extended activity. Could have the potential for permanant damage, for a roulette effect -- she can use the tech to go into combat, but at the risk that someday, it's going to leave her so badly damaged it'll leave her more severely disabled -- from para to quad, for example.

Or actual brain damage, since it's likely tapped into the spinal cord. Strain could cause black outs or memory loss, or trigger something like narcolepsy, either as a simple side effect or as the body's way of trying to protect itself (when on the verge of overstress, or having been overstressed, the mind shuts down, resulting in the body going to "sleep" while it recovers -- and she can't be woken until she's recovered enough.

The tech has it's own intellect, and it doesn't always agree with the character.

As an added issue, the second intellect may feel the need to keep it's existence a secret.

I like tech dependency personally. The only person who's combination of technology and medication she needs to be able to move again has less-then-altruistic purposes. Be he a super villain in disguise or just someone with an agenda, having a super team in your pocket can be quite the advantage.

Well getting to the physiology of getting walking...

= she literally has no experience in walking on these legs
Even if she walked until the age of 6 her nervous system has NOT developed walking skills for the now three times longer legs

= No leg strength
Ever notice how permament wheel chair people have skinny legs? No exercise. Just because the nerve damage is bypassed doesn't mean she is going sprinting.

= You can run stories where she is at least able to get up stairs with hand rail. She does perhaps fall down on the battlefield alot. Determination to get back up.

= Walking, jogging and running are skill progressions you can play through.

= Also the bones will be much weaker. So prone to breakae. So you start a battle running until one of those superstrength folks kicks your shin. Now you are back to movement limited.

= Learning to compensate for these

= Getting the team involved. How about the techie dude makes leg armor. Or they start seeing if they can give you a Hover Belt.

Actually...

Hover Belts are cool!

Also... I just remembered that in some versions Wonder Woman is wearing the shoes of Hermes.

Yeah yeah she's DC and X-Men is Marvel.

Depending on your setting you could actually go with Magic, sorcery or Telekinetic. If you have telekinesis why would you spend your life in wheel chair? or walking for that matter.

Thanks for all the great ideas guys!. Got a plot in mind (stealing a few of these ideas) to go about doing this but have to talk with the GM first :P.

Thanks!.

I didn't read all the replies so pardon me if this has been suggested:

Skip the technology, make it a biological implant.  Some really start of the art stuff like alien stem cells or done other drek.  Now essentially she has another life form living inside her with direct access to her central nervous system.  I'm sure you can see where that would go, especially if it was a evil life form.  Think like venom from Spiderman injected straight into her spine.

You could go a bit further with it by adding some psychosis: The life form whispering cruel suggestions, visual hallucinations, etc

Do we get to know what you chose in the end? Did the DM allow it?

Oh I'm planning to update this when a final decision is made :D.

That hasn't happened yet. I talked with the GM and he said the way the game is going to go now will allow her to work and actually contribute something in her current state... the problem is/was that the game is/was way too action packed and she was being completely ignored.

I'll give it a chance and see what happens but if not I'll bring this up again and will let you all know what we chose :D.

For those interested in knowing how this turned out we decided to go a different technological solution.

First we got her depressed thinking that everyone sees her as a burden then angry in that all the teachers/X-Men (remember this is a young mutants superhero game) constantly tell her she's just as good and valuable as everyone else but when people needs help she's the only one pointed out in front of everyone and told she can't help.
Then when she was out and about a random guy came up to her with the offer to use some experimental procedure involving nanites to cure her saying some philanthropist/benefactor that wanted to remain anonymous saw in the news what she did (her origin story involved her saving someone from a burning bus) and wanted to help her.

The idea was that she would be angry/depressed/desperate enough to accept it and go with it without consulting with the people who would know better. This is how far we are now.


In the short term the idea is that she'll have a couple of days of extremely intense pain then slowly regain mobility followed by some intense recovery to get strength back in her legs to be able to actually walk. She'd also have to deal with whatever all the others have to say about her taking such risks.
For the long term. The nanites that healed her will be dormant but still inside her and the guy who offered her the cure seem's to be Wilson Fisk/Kingpin's personal assistant so there's should be some plot stuff coming up later on.


It might not be the most creative/clever solution but I think it works well enough.