Parallel Universe Ideas

[prufock]

Hey all,

I have a long-running superhero group that I run one-shots for about once a year. It began as a longer campaign, which we finished, but the players like the characters, setting, plot, and villains, so we come back to it for some one shots. I've been taking some inspiration from movies and comics for these sessions. For example, a game that involved a "Dark Avengers" style team that infiltrated their HQ, another involved zombie heroes and villains returning as in Darkest Night. Most recently, they stopped a mad scientist from exploding the universe at CERN.

In my next adventure, I plan to have the recurring BBEG use that mad scientist to open dimensional portals, bringing a parallel universe idea into the game. Each session could be a different alternate reality, and I might run 4 of them (mini-series!) through the year. The BBEG's idea is to recruit alternate versions of himself to form the ultimate super-villain team.

My main sticking point here is how to do these alternate realities. I've looked at Time of Crisis, but I feel like sapient gorillas and nazi world government are a little too overdone. I definitely want at least one world in which they are evil versions of themselves, but for realistic reasons, not because it's Bizarro world. I have a few ideas, but I'd like to crowdsource some as well.

The characters are
Sentinel (Batman type that is brutal; took up his grandfather's mantle - one world will have his grandpa, the original Sentinel, having lived and remaining the Sentinel of this universe)
Tina (fitness model, clothing designer, telekinetic/telepathic)
Bolt (speedster without too much background; newer member)
Regenerator Rey (damn near impossible to kill; used to have multiple personalities, so I plan to use one of each of those in the universes)
New player (not much to say here, he'll be bringing in a new character if he plays)

I'm also toying with the idea of having them "Quantum Leap" into their alter egos, but this is something I'd have to run by them first.

Some varieties I'm considering:
Dinosaurs were never wiped out, got smarter, and are the dominant life form.
Aliens made contact and formed an alliance with Earth.
Utopian society due to the heroes ruling with an iron fist.
Post-WWIII wasteland.
Silver/Golden age-type setting, very similar to standard Earth, but with that more innocent four-colour feel.
Earlier earth with non-powered heroes, possibly medieval or noir.

Still in the development stage, so any and all ideas are welcome.

Note: I'm using Mutants and Masterminds 3e, but the mechanics aren't particularly important for this discussion.

[arcane_asp]

First of all - the parallel reality plot is a great place to go with Superheroes, can really mix things up. With that in mind, here are 3 suggestions:

1. Blue earth reality - sea levels are much higher in this reality, leaving little or no dry land, just endless ocean. Aquatic variants of humans exist, descended from sea life. Whole underwater ecosystems exist, with empires of different aquatic species vying for control of the seas...
   
2. Super-smart reality - humans in this reality have much, much higher IQ's. Technology is very advanced, wealth more even distributed and general global politics are dominated by logical reasoning. Genius versions of all the characters exist, and super-smart versions of their villains too.
   
3. The hollow earth - in this earths past, a solar flare triggered huge geological activity and created vast caverns beneath the earth, which gradually got infested with life from the surface and seas. Repeated solar flares over the years have all but irradiated the surface, leaving only the subterranean world the primary remaining ecosystem where humanity does its best to survive.
   
4. And just to screw with them - a "gap" earth, a reality where a huge asteroid destroyed the planet totally shortly after its formation. Anyone sliding into this reality finds themselves flailing blindly and floating a vacuum!

[Arbane]

Obligatory super-hating paranoid dystopia.

Magic world.

Earth where one of their enemies won, and rules with an iron fist!

Earth where Rome never fell. (All the heroes have Latin names.)

Earth where humanity never evolved. But then who put up all these obelisks...?

Earth where Atlantis never sank. Everything's crystal spires, togas, and psychic powers.

Earth where the biggest heroes/villains are someone they never heard of... yet. When they get home, and find someone with that name just starting their career, how will they react?

Genderflipped world.

Nazi world

Zombie world

Cartoon world - the good news is it's impossible to die, so the the heroes will survive. The bad news is, their dignity won't.

[dysprosium]

You could also take points in Earth history and ask various "what if" questions. There are various alternate history books out there. You might also have to do some research on certain topics (for more accuracy). These are just the first examples to pop in my head.

What if the South won the American Civil War?
What if the Anglo Saxons were not conquered by the Normans?
What if Abraham Lincoln (or John F Kennedy or Archduke Ferdinand) were never assassinated?
What if Ronald Reagan was assassinated?
What if the Beatles never broke up?
What if Napoleon was better prepared for his invasion of Russia?
What if Babe Ruth was never traded from the Boston Red Sox?
What if neanderthals (or other protohominids) never died out?

Then you could take other genres and ask what if questions too.

What if the events of the Stargate SG-1 series were real but what if there was no Tauri rebellion against Ra?
What if the World of Darkness was real but there never was a Masquerade? Or the Imperium never ended?
What if the Earth was really like what happens in Rifts?

[TheEmerged]

Okay, looks like many of the cliches have been filled so...

>The awkward utopia. One of the campaign's villains succeeded in taking over the world many years ago... and, to the embarassment of the heroes, is actually doing a pretty far job of running it. Works best if the campaign has been going for a while (you described it as long-running) and has a Doom-like "amicable conqueror" type.

>The evangelic utopia. They find a world where everything is going very, VERY well... that is horrified to find out that other worlds aren't so perfect. They decide that it is their duty to go help the other worlds, whether they want it or not...

>The more-mirror-than-thou universe. The success of this one depends on how paranoid your players are. It *looks* like the PC's are back home, but they can't shake the impression that something is just... off. They eventually discover that (minor but bothersome detail) is wrong - there are no donuts here, something like that.

>Hilarity ensues. Works best if the campaign has a FoxBat\Ambush Bug type, the character that thinks s\he's a bigger hero than s\he is and\or is mostly played for laughs (not to be confused for a The Tick type, who actually *is* a big hero in his world). In this world... s\he is, and the PC's are the jokes. I had a successful instance where I combined this one with the Awkward Utopia, where a joke villain had ended up in charge and was doing quite well, almost despite himself...

>HeroVerse. This one was done *hilariously* in an episode of the Darkwing Duck cartoon. The heroes find themselves in a world where EVERYBODY has super powers - on such a scale that the PC's are helpless citizens by comparison. The denizons of this world are overjoyed to have someone to rescue!

[kaoskonfety]

Ctuhulu lives - everyone worships bizarre statues of a amorphous many eyed tentacled... horrors in degrading rites - most major cities are demolished charnel pits. A small resistance holds out baring the dread masters advance with subtle sorcery and stealth - they can provide the worlds "background" and point out possible targets for removal to weaken the Ancient gods hold on earth. No supers here at all or just one - and it freaking Superman (the party entire can, with serious effort, esacpe him/her, fighting is madness), dominated and perhaps empowered by unspeakable things.

A long time ago - choose a change point a ways back in history - the Aztec Empire was exposed to western illness in ages past and when the Europeans show up they loose, hard. and the retaliation demolishes Europes peoples who still struggle under the yoke of empire control, south and middle america are THE superpower. Rome never fell and kept on expanding. The Mongol horde took nearly the world entire and burned most of civization to ash and the whole world looks like some Conan movie (including rogue gods and demons). Mix and match to taste. Oh The Great Khan was an original superhero - his primary power would match your "cannot die fellow" coupled with a few hundred years of getting better at killing.

"What?" - anything WACKED - not odd, nuts: the dominant life form are pcyhcic levitating hyper tech wielding Dodo birds. Humans are retained as a food species for the pit fighting emperor penguins (who the Kiwi view as loins, watching this sport on psychic emmersion vision is their primary entertainment). Humans still speak english (or whatever) and are intelligent - but all the rebelious ones were slowly bred out of the populace/ genectialy engineered obidiance /mind crushed. They can of course find themselves - stripped of power or not - working in a slaughter house....

[prufock]

Some good ideas coming out here! Thanks guys and gals. In particular, I think I'll nab:

Super-smart reality - humans in this reality have much, much higher IQ's. Technology is very advanced, wealth more even distributed and general global politics are dominated by logical reasoning. Genius versions of all the characters exist, and super-smart versions of their villains too.

This one could be interesting....

And just to screw with them - a "gap" earth, a reality where a huge asteroid destroyed the planet totally shortly after its formation. Anyone sliding into this reality finds themselves flailing blindly and floating a vacuum!

This would be funny, and I might throw it in as one of the short jumps just for laughs, but none of the PCs could survive in a vacuum very long. Maybe have them picked up by a spaceship.

Obligatory super-hating paranoid dystopia.

Magic world.

Earth where one of their enemies won, and rules with an iron fist!

Earth where the biggest heroes/villains are someone they never heard of... yet. When they get home, and find someone with that name just starting their career, how will they react?

Genderflipped world.

Cartoon world - the good news is it's impossible to die, so the the heroes will survive. The bad news is, their dignity won't.

I like all of these, and may incorporate them somehow.

What if neanderthals (or other protohominids) never died out?

I was planning to do a world where dinosaurs are intelligent and the dominant species, while mammals are lowly food or slaves. I'll combine these two.

>The awkward utopia. One of the campaign's villains succeeded in taking over the world many years ago... and, to the embarassment of the heroes, is actually doing a pretty far job of running it. Works best if the campaign has been going for a while (you described it as long-running) and has a Doom-like "amicable conqueror" type.

YES! This will probably be the last one I'll use. This works perfectly, since that's what the Big Bad in the campaign is all about. He is actually more of an anti-hero. He has minions that brutally stamp out criminals, and he aims to globalize. Of course, his methods aren't perfect, but a parallel universe where his ideas work would be excellent.

>The more-mirror-than-thou universe. The success of this one depends on how paranoid your players are. It *looks* like the PC's are back home, but they can't shake the impression that something is just... off. They eventually discover that (minor but bothersome detail) is wrong - there are no donuts here, something like that.

Haha, this could be a fun one if only for a throwaway joke. Maybe make this the last world, or next-to-last world, just for a half hour of a session or something.

>HeroVerse. This one was done *hilariously* in an episode of the Darkwing Duck cartoon. The heroes find themselves in a world where EVERYBODY has super powers - on such a scale that the PC's are helpless citizens by comparison. The denizons of this world are overjoyed to have someone to rescue!

This one could work as well. I was planning on a world where everyone was super, but hadn't thought to make them MORE super than the PCs.

A long time ago - choose a change point a ways back in history - the Aztec Empire was exposed to western illness in ages past and when the Europeans show up they loose, hard. and the retaliation demolishes Europes peoples who still struggle under the yoke of empire control, south and middle america are THE superpower. Rome never fell and kept on expanding. The Mongol horde took nearly the world entire and burned most of civization to ash and the whole world looks like some Conan movie (including rogue gods and demons). Mix and match to taste. Oh The Great Khan was an original superhero - his primary power would match your "cannot die fellow" coupled with a few hundred years of getting better at killing.

These are all pretty interesting; I'd probably use them as a backdrop for other things.

Thanks folks, you've given me lots of ideas!

[Segev]

I was going to suggest something like the Aztec-conquered-Europe one.

You can also go with one where nothing is really the same or recognizable on a geopolitical scale, and governments and nations are entirely different in structure, size, and location (not to mention names), and culture is ... different. But it's still recognizable: humans are the dominant life-form, we have 20th century-ish tech in the area the heroes land, etc. It's just had an entirely different history. No planet-of-hats utopias or distopias. Just...different.

[neonchameleon]

No one's suggested a Mirror Universe? Or a universe where superpowers (including theirs) simply don't work? Neither do the villains for that matter (other than possibly the setting joke who suddenly becomes the biggest badass around because they have working powers).

Oh, Hero World will really annoy PCs unless it's done carefully.

[prufock]

Oh, Hero World will really annoy PCs unless it's done carefully.

Yeah, this will be a trick. I'm thinking of ways to do this that don't make the PCs feel useless. After all, if everyone is extra-super here, what can the PCs do that they can't? They would be considered puny and adorable.

[neonchameleon]

Yeah, this will be a trick. I'm thinking of ways to do this that don't make the PCs feel useless. After all, if everyone is extra-super here, what can the PCs do that they can't? They would be considered puny and adorable.

The trick with Hero World is everyone gets their powers from the same source. And that source can either be neutralised or simply blown up. The precautions people will take against the standard powers in Hero World will do precisely nothing to the PCs (what exactly is that Kryptonite meant to do to me? I'm Batman, you idiot.)

[Altair_the_Vexed]

I found this - it might be helpful?

[DedWards]

I found this - it might be helpful?

Lol, I was bout to suggest looking us Sliders :p

Another 2 I thought of that weren't suggested yet are:
1) Virtual World - a world where people are all jacked into a virtual world (either knowingly or not) like in the Matrix, Sword Art Online, Log Horizon, etc. In this world, while their bodies may have powers, their avatars' powers (if any) are dictated by what the virtual world allows. You could have the PCs lose consciousness as they this dimension and wake up in the virtual world.

2) World of Light - This one is inspired by a vague memory of an episode of Charmed. In this world there's two closely similar dimensions, one light, one dark (kind of like yin and yang), but as the PCs arrive (or just before) one or more of the Dark side's 'heroes' causes a shift of the balance of light and dark so that all of each is all on each side. This results in eternal day on the light side, with everyone being way too happy. Additionally, bad stuff, like getting shot, are not reacted to normally, instead of screaming, etc, people walk buy as if nothing was wrong because they're too happy to care.

Another fun one could be one based on DC's Earth-11

[Bulhakov]

Try to track down GURPS Alternate Earths for some good detailed descriptions of alternate timelines.

There's the mandatory Nazi world, the Confederate States of America, a Japan as a colonial empire world, a world where Aztecs invaded the Roman Empire, a world where the Roman Empire never fell, a Tesla-punk world where the transistor was never invented, etc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GURPS_Alternate_Earths