Forums of the Megaverse®

Since I usually get a few questions everyday about common jargon used around the boards and chatrooms, I thought I'd start a little project to start defining all the jargon that Palladium fans use. Feel free to add the tons I've undoubtedly missed. Every once and I while I might even clean things out and put together a new master list of terms, so people don't have to read five million pages of replies. Contributers will be listed in brackets after their appropriate entry.

-10 Rule, The, p.n
A rule for ranged combat, first appearing in Mystic Russia that penalized characters attempting to dodge ranged attacks by -10. A source for great debate both on the message boards and in the books.
Addendum: By debate, I mean serious arguments spanning multiple pages and several years as to whether or not it's any good, useful, realistic, playable, and generally worth the paper it's printed on. [KS]

Backflipping to Fourth Level, phrase
Used to describe ridiculous methods of attaining new levels, by performing skills over and over again.
Addendum: Those 25 points per skill use really add up. [KS]

Casey Jones GM, p.n.
A GM who not only railroads, but all of his games end up as train wrecks! [Quinn Mieron]

"Chuga Chuga...Chuga Chuga...Choo Choo!" phrase.
Used (usually by the players) to indicate that the GM is railroading them. [KS]

Death By Design(DBD) p.n.
A planned (usually well planned, but whom am i to judge) game session in which no matter what a player character is going to die. Usually this player character is upsetting the game, has become to powerful, or the player running the character has/is becoming annoying to either the majority of the players and/or the GM. A well planned DBD will cuase all the pcs to suffer (minorly compared to one certain pc). This tactic is usualy held in reserve for it will lose its power if used too often. [pumpkinhead]
Note-I am sure that there are several definitions for which DBD can apply, this is just one of many.

"Do you hear that, Mr. Anderson? That is the sound of inevitability. " phrase.
Used to indicate that a player (or group of players) have just been railroaded by their GM.
Addendum: From the 1999 movie, The Matrix, spoken by Agent Smith (played by Hugo Weaving) to Neo (Keanu Reeves) as he's about to use a subway train to kill Neo. [KS]

ECHO, abbreviation
Eternally Confused Heroes Organization, an organization of heroes, which is confused, and shows no signs no not being confused any time soon.[Riko]

EWS, abbreviation
Erick Wujcik Syndrome, working on so many projects you never really finish any single one. [KS]

GIJoe rule:refers to the rule in RU that states the last bit of armor on a character absorbs all damage dealt to it even if the said damage exceeds the armors current capacity to do so...
Addendum: so named after the old GIJoe cartoon where people would miraculously eject from an exploding vehicle unscathed. [Damian Magecraft]

Hand of God, phrase
(Concept "coined" by cornholioprime) The somewhat derisive term applied to the various deus ex machina Plot Devices employed in the Rifts Game Setting to allow The Coalition States in general, and Chi-Town in particular, to escape retribution, counterattack, or even significant threats from its (usually self-proclaimed) enemies, Military Targets, and Areas of planned future expansion. [cornholioprime]

Impervium, n.
An Alloy of unknown origin and composition present in all Palladium Megaverse Cyborgs. Theories abound as to exactly how the Armour functions, but the current leading Theory, as set forth by Rogue Scholar Kevin Siembieda, is that the Armour, in concert with a Cyborg Chassis, temporarily transforms the Cyborg's Organic Internal Hit Point Values into M.D.C. However the Armour's inner workings perform, one thing is clear:
Impervium renders the Cyborg's Organic, S.D.C. Components COMPLETELY immune to any and all Damaging Effects that normally bypass other forms of armour, at least until the 'Borg's Main Body MDC is entirely depleted.
To date, no known Psionic, Technological, or Magical means can bypass this Barrier.

Lady of Pain Syndrome, The, p.n.
In many Role-Playing Genres and Settings, those Persons, Places, or Things that are effectively rendered totally invulnerable by the Authors by the Authors' refusal to assign Stats, Physical Measurements, etc., to them.
As pertains to the Rifts Game Setting, The Old Ones (Dragons and Gods), the Cosmic Forge (Rifts: Phase World), the Australian Gods Bunyip and Tikilik (Rifts: Australia), Chi-Town proper, and Psynex the Psychic Entity (Rifts: Psyscape) are examples of such.
Named after the Lady of Pain in the Dungeons and Dragons/Forgotten Realms RPG Setting, the Guardian of the Gateway to all Realities, in a place called
Sigil, who was never given physical Stats of any sort by the Authors and was therefore effectively unassailable -and unconquerable -to any and all potential challengers. [cornholioprime]

Little Timmy, Bane of Mages, p.n.
A small child with a rock who can disrupt spell casting. Coined by Dr Doom III (or whatever he's calling himself now). [KS]

ManHunter Omni-Sight p.n.
This is perhaps the ultimate Psionic Power. Powered by GM Meta-Gaming I.S.P., this Psionic Power telekinetically and telepathically performs a number of astonishing Effects:
First, the Ability alerts the Opposing Forces (OPFOR) -be they Coalition Retribution Squads, Headhunters, Splynn Security Forces, or what have you, magical, psionic, or not -to the precise location of those responsible for a successfully stolen Artifact or successfully completed Operation -namely, you, the Player Group.
Second, this Power tells the OPFOR exactly how much in the way of Armor, Personnel, and materiel needed to provide sufficient challenge to said Player Group. They are also telekinetically Teleported to the Town/City/Kingdom that the Player Characters are in.
Third, this Power locates said Players no matter how many Precautions they took during the commission, whether they were in disguise or not, and whether they were even seen at the Scene of the Crime or not.
Fourth, and most importantly, even if the Characters were incognito while in Town and using anonymous Disguises the entire time they pulled off the Caper, their true Faces and Identities (with appropriate Bounty) will somehow show up on "Wanted" Posters in any future Town they happen to visit. [cornholioprime]

Mouth Off, Mouth Off Forum, p.n.
Derogatory reference to the Sound Off Forum, due to the several people who only post their negative attitudes on the forum. [KS]

Murphy's Law of Palladium Chat, p.n.
States, "Whenever there's players looking for a GM, there's never one around. Conversely, whenever there's a GM willing to run a game, no one's interested in playing." [KS]

New Powers Thread, The, p.n.
Possibly one of the largest threads every created and still active on the Megaversal message boards, located on the Heroes Unlimited forum. The general reaction of those who delve into it for the first time is that they can not be bothered reading over 100 pages of text just to see if someone else has had the same idea they have had for a new super power. [AJ Pickett]

Nightspawn incident, The, p.n.
When the Nightbane book was first published, comic artist and writter Todd Macfarlane threatened to lay a lawsuit against Palladium books for use of the word 'Spawn' in the title.. the title was subsequently changed, though there are many copies from the original printing run which bear the Nightspawn title.
To this day, many Palladium fans hold a grudge against Todd Macfarlane. [AJ Pickett]

Palladium Megaversal Game System, p.n.
Name for the supposed "universality" of rules in Palladium's different game lines. [KS]

Reg, p.n.
The Cat God. Reg is a bug that occured in the pally boards for some time a ghost thread where nothing was saved but Reg would tell the time in eastern every 5 to 10 posts.[Riko]

Rifter, n.
1. Palladium's Quarterly Fan Publication. 2. A Rifts player [KS]

Rule 0:
The rule staring that the GM is always right. [LurkerFreak]
Addendum: The number value of the rule also serves as an indicator of it's usefulness. [KS]

Rule 0.5:
The rule stating that all rules following this one are optional. [LurkerFreak]
Addendum: The number value of the rule also serves as an indicator of it's usefulness. [KS]

Shunning, The, p.n.
Pertains to those intentional actions, direct or covert, that a Gaming Group will perform upon one of its members to show strong disapproval, usually for reasons involving Personal Hygiene, Social Interaction, or for repeated Actions done by the offending Player's Character(s) in-Game that disrupt the Story and/or the Game itself. Such actions are usually done either to 'force' the offending Player to change his Gaming/Social Habits, or to get him or her to eventually leave the Gaming Group altogether. Shunning actions include but are not limited to: "accidentally" giving the Player the wrong Address for the next meet, "mistakenly" ordering just enough Food for everyone else except the offending Player, on in a Gaming Situation, repeatedly leaving the offending Player's Character to fend for itself, usually against impossible odds.
Addendum: Term inspired indirectly by a play on words of title of the Movie "The Shining," as well a Player in an old game Group, John by name, who lacked both Social Graces and proper Hygiene Practices, and who would announce ad nauseum upon arriving at a Game Meet, "Here's Johnny!!") [cornholioprime]

Stinky Books, p.n.
Quick reference to Powers Unlimited 1, 2, and (when it comes out) 3, due to their unfortunate initials (PU).
Addendum: Has no bearing on the quality of the books. [KS]

Swanky Town, p.n.
Kind of a story thread that evolved on the Megaversal message board and just kept on popping up every now and then.. detailing the entire history of these story lines is almost impossible, but occasionally an old timer of the message boards will mention things such as "Rune Spork", "Axis Swank", "Anubis' head in a jar" and so forth.
Eventually the term Swank itself was deemed to be an infringement of an obscure copyright possibly held by somebody else and it dropped out of use on the message boards (but not elsewhere). [AJ Pickett]

TAFL, abbreviation
Two Attacks For Living, the two attacks every hero receives, depending on what game is being played. [KS]

"THOU SHALL NOT KILL", phrase
Not so much jargon, but a general rule, used in conjunction with certain fav characters of KS.
Examples include; The Coalition, Lazlo and that stupid wench Erin Tarn [Rimmer]

Three Powers, The, n.
The Three Basdic Fundamental "Forces" in the Palladium Books Game Setting. Technology, which is the easiest to mass-produce but which is constrained by the Laws of Physics;
Psionics, which is often genetic in nature but whoch can also be instilled by Technology into Living Beings and/or partially duplicated by Technology, but which contains a Supernatural component in its nature, and which can in some cases directly or indirectly influence Magic; and Magic, the most potentially powerful of the Three Forces, which is by far the hardest Power to mass-produce but which usually ignores the Laws of Physics and which can usually only be directly altered, influenced, or negated by other Magical Force. [cornholioprime]

Trouble Magnet, n.
Whatever Device, Weapon, Scroll, Artifact, or even NPC that the GM drops into your Player Characters' laps in a given Adventure.
So named due to the fact that almost every NPC in the Game except the Players usually knows about it/him/her, and usually in a bad way for the Player Group. [cornholioprime]

Type-O Blood p.n.
Blood type that's prone to typos...a better explanation than some people can come up with. [KS]

Typo Daemon, p.n.
An infectious, possessing entity which inflicts Typoid, either through infestation of a chatroom, or by transmission from a Typoid Mary. [Tinker Dragoon]

Typoid Mary, p.n.
Someone who serves as a vector for Typoid. cf. I.Q. Sponge. [Tinker Dragoon]

Typoid, p.n.
An acute, highly infectious disease caused by a Typo Daemon, transmitted chiefly by contaminated chatrooms and by contact with a Typoid Mary and characterized by inaccurate spelling, lack of grammatical structure, and typographical errors, which most commonly afflicts those who are normally excellent spellers and typists. Also known as Typoid Fever. [Tinker
Dragoon]

Wormwood Conundrum, The, p.n.
A seemingly impossible paradox brought about by the fact that all Wormwood Humans are MegaDamgae creatures. Since it is nowhere stated that they also are considered to have supernatural strength, the inhabitants of the Living Planet are apparently free to kick, punch, and bite each other all day without ill effect.
The Conundrum also implies that the invading demons of the setting should have long since over run the human resistance, because the average human citizen is outnumbered by at least 5:1.
[Braden, GMPhD]

YAAI, abbrev.
Yet Another Alien Intelligence (originally coined by someone other than myself): In later Books, The Authors' ad nauseum way of explaining/revealing the True Source of Evil on a given World/Game Setting; lord forbid that the people themselves could be responsible for their World's Actions!! At one point, there were even Forum Members wondering, only half-jokingly, if Emperor Prosek's actions were due to an Alien Intelligence! [cornholioprime]

"You all meet in a bar and the mysterious guy in the corner says..", phrase
The most cliche start to any adventure, universally used by GMs to skip the tedious process of all the characters meeting up, deciding to travel together in some sort of laughable excuse for logical reasons and finding an 'mission' to follow. [AJ Pickett]

Here's one that's been around in one form or another for years:

Deca-Damage Capacity; D.D.C., p.n.
Simply stated, the modification to the existing M.D.C. system wherein 1 M.D.C. = 10 S.D.C. Applied in part, or entirely, to Rifts creatures and technology, especially when translating them to another Palladium game.

Teleport Thread, The

Giant thread argueing weather or not you are able to teleport into an environmentally sealed vehicle. Made somewhat ambiguous by conflicting rules throughout various Palladium books.


PS Issue, The

An issue that while usually occuring in Rifts, but does pop up within most PB games. The lack of ways to compare one type of strength with another, eg: 30 PS equals what SNPS, 15 SNPS equals what RPS and various other examples.

PS - Physical Strength
RPS - Robotic Physical Strength
SNPS - Super Natural Physical Strength

to name but a few.

On a side note, the Lady of Pain is from Planescape, not Forgotten Realms. BIG difference between the two settings.

I'd add:

SoT: Acronym for the "Rifts: Siege of Tolkeen" books by Bill Coffin and typically evoked in the never-ending debate that surrounds them. The canon "war" lasted ~4 game years while the debate over the canon has raged for notably longer and will likely continue for years more to come. Just when one thinks the last has been said about it yet another thread pops up and reaches the 20+ page mark by the end of the day. It is estimated that the last new or original argument in the ongoing SoT debate was made in the spring of 2001.

That one's already been covered in viewtopic.php?t=35677

The acronym maybe, but not the never-ending whine which was the point in the post!

The Fourth Power:

According to some, the Fourth Power is Phase Energy, capable of both counteracting and interacting with Magic, Psionics, and the Laws of Physics, but which does not appear to truly belong to any of the other three categories of Energy Types used in Palladium Books Game Settings.

actually, Chi is the fourth power, Phase Power is the fifth.

Did Chi predate Phase Energy??

More importantly, doesn't Chi simply replace PPE/ISP in certain Palladium Gaming Systems??

Phase Energy interacts with the other Three Powers, yet appears to be almost completely separate from them..

yes, it predates them, no it dosn't replace them. in fact, the powers found in Rifts Japan and China in fact bear little resemblance to Chi power found in N&SS, and N&SS keeps the other powers mentioned

The Supernatural Strength Conundrum:

In the Palladium Gaming System, the confusion that even experienced players often run into when they understandably but mistakenly assume that a Supernatural P.S. automatically indicates a Supernatural Creature, especially in terms of causing hand-to-hand damage to otherwise invulnerable supernatural creatures like Vampires, Undead, and Werewolves.

Said confusion resulting from the time that Palladium Creator Kevin Siembieda first allowed Creatures without an actual Supernatural component to their natures -creatures like Titan Juicers, Kill Cats, Xiticix Killers, and the like -to become capable of receiving the Supernatural P.S. attribute anyway.

Big 4, Big Four, p.n.
The four main hand to hand skills typically found in all of Palladium's Megaversal games, specifically, Hand to Hand: Basic, Hand to Hand: Expert, Hand to Hand: Martial Arts, and Hand to Hand: Assassin.

Falls under a sub artical of the following

The SICK Sense:

The sense of foreboding that the Gaming Group feels when they get to be intimately familiar with a given Game Master's way of doing things and develop a sense of when and where GM Ambushes, Sneak Attacks, and "random" encounters will occur...often much to the chagrin of the GM who mistakenly considers himself unpredictable to his longtime friends/players.

Phrase coined by a fellow Player (from a play on words of the Movie Title "The Sixth Sense"), who in a recent Game accurately predicted when and where the GM was going to stage a "surprise" attack and who then proclaimed "I see bad people.....they're everywhere...."

Kev's Alter Ego - Refers to the rumor started on the old threaded message board (at least that's the first place I saw it) that Kevin Seimbeida and Steve Jackson are the same person.

KevSim - Popular abbreviation of Kevin Siembieda

The Squishy Bits - Usually a reference to the muscles and internals of a MDC animal that are mentioned in canon as being edible by humans. The term springs from the apparent contradiction that an animal can have a hide of MDC material, and yet be SDC on the inside. The source of the catchy phrase "It's all SDC on the inside." Also sometimes used to describe the internals of Borgs (see Impervium).

Finagle's Corollary of Palladium Chat, p.n.
Even if you do manage to get a GM and players together, that doesn't mean the players or GM will be regularly available.

Addendum to "Little Timmy":
A possible source of this term could be from the TV series "Dinosaurs" (1991-1994) & the episode "The Golden Child", which features "Ask Mr. Lizard", a parody of the classic TV show "Watch Mister Wizard". Every time the young assistant meets his end, usually by explosion, Mr. Lizard calls "We're gonna need another Timmy!"

Squishies:
Any creature that is not MDC, in an MDC environment.

Chunky Salsa Effect:
Throwing a grenade into an enclosed environment (typically MDC grenade against SDC targets).

Fine Red Mist:
An attack so over-powering, that the above is all that's left of the target.

Psych Ward GM p.n.

A GM whom loves to give your characters mental traumas due to encounters in the game. Every encounter has a chance at mentally damaging at least one character.

Nut Job p.n.

A character that has accumulated so many mental disadvantages due to Palladium's tight and punishing trauma rules that he or she can barely function as a group member. Tends to be common with Psych Ward GM games.

Gamer's Rule of Female Anatomy

The female character is always beautiful and generously proportioned, and her uniform/costume/armour always shows this.

OOC: I have a Psyche Ward GM. My superhero has five separate psychosis. It happens whenever someone dies around her. Only once was it actually her fault. I've learned to hate the mental deficiency rules, even to the point where I will not take action for fear of getting messed up again.

Strike them like the fist of an Angry god
Meaning that for this one next attack your character will critically strike his opponent in the head or groin maximum damage...though the GM will not see the roll. [/b]

Whoa! ECHO made it in there!!! Rock!!!

Why yes, yes we did.

Also known as pink steam...

Scientists at Chi-Town have developed their own lingo to describe various design problems in modern weaponry.

The D4 barrier: the inability of most hand held weapons to do more than 1d4x10 damage
The D6 barrier: the inability of most power armor weapons to do more than 1d6x10 damage
Burbs Special: the exhorbarent cost of missiles, repairs, and upgrades
NPC bonus: the hidden bonus that NPC's must have to compensate for penalties applied to the abysmally low scores most PCs have in mechanical and electronics skills.
The 98th percentile barrier: The bizarre law of physics preventing Rifts characters from achieving scores above 98% with cool skills like those found in Road Hogs, Heroes Unlimited, ect.

You just have to keep track of your electrical and mechanical skills past 98%, using the overage to balance out the penities for building stuff. While the max roll aginst % is still 98% if you total % is like 110, then a -30% would only lower the roll aginest % to 80%. I've been keeping track on my skills like this for years. (the way I note the skill %'s like these is... 98(100) with the over 98% noted in the ( ).

This was from Shadowrun, either the second or third edition rulebook, and referenced a grenade's "overpressure" effect when tossing a live grenade into a hardened room like an elevator, [the rebounding pressure of the explosion would basically turn living beings inside said elevator into a sticky mass that most resembled chunky salsa].

Second Edition. And it's a great way to wax a troll with a HMG.

Handwavium

Term used to describe super technology capable of amazing feats. Often used in Phase World settings.

Unobtanium-
any material or object that has qualities, that while possible given our understanding of the universe, does not (yet) actually exist in reality.
Examples: efficent laser weapons, piloted robots, self-aware artificial intellegence, most MDC materials.

Technobabble- any technical sounding terms or description used to justify the use of unobtanium or handwavium. does not always have to be scientifically valid. generally only noticed when done badly.


OOC: handwavium should be expanded to "Term used to describe super technology or materials capable of amazing feats in defiance of the understood universe. examples of such include forcefields, anti-gravity, FTL drives.

The Ninja Scroll effect

Where by, when engaged in combat with mega-damage weapons, but without mega-damage armour, even a single vibro-knife wound will cause all the blood in your body to be ejected at once.


OOC: this is caused by having less than 100 points of S.D.C. and hit points combined, and taking a single d6 M.D. wound (often a 6). A better point of reference is a Wilk's laser blast, offering a hole no larger than a pin, and yet your entire S.D.C. and hit points are depleted 6 times over.

Verisimilitude- the appearance or likeness of being real within a given context. often confused with 'realism'. see also suspension of disbelief

Suspension of disbelief- the willingness to accept fictional elements and/or stories as true, even when fantastic or impossible in the known universe. considered a trade, the audience/reader is willing to suspend their disblief in exchange for being entertained.
usually greatly benefited by maintaing a sense of Verisimilitude.

Acme Effect, The: What happens when a player is honestly playing his/her character and they find/are given a new toy. Without any explanation as to how the bloody thing works! Almost always results utter hilarity as they fail, in spectacular fashion, to get control of this new item.

Bull&#%$ Game: A game played with over-powered characters against puny (relatively speaking) enemies for the sole purpose of blowing off steam. No complicated plots, no carefully planned intrigue. Just munchkins blasting, bashing, and razing all Nine Levels of Hell itself (literally).

Cavalry Syndrome:
An unfortunate ailment of some GMs, mostly those new to the job. After the characters get in over their heads and are threatened with imminent death, a large overpowering force will come to their rescue. Whether that force is a single creature/NPC or a mercenary army, it will save the day and vanquish all foes. Can occasionally infuriate the players if the GM continually sends in the cavalry even in the most minor encounter.

Clue-By-Four: Common GM tool used to give the offending player/character a clue as to how things are actually done. Can occasionally be a painful experience.

Expensive Paint: Typically used to describe using a hideously expensive weapon to kill a single person, its a term invented by a player of mine many moons ago. The incident in question involved a 10,000 cr missile, a burb-beater of a car (SDC), and a single idiot who happened to sell the team bogus info. The resulting spray covered a nearby wall in red rather effectively.

Munchkin: Player who insists on making their character nigh-on invincible, by using unbalancing powers/weapons/abilities. A typical example would be a character with intangibility (walk through walls, bullets pass through, etc.) and a super heavy-duty personal force field who wields a minor rune weapon. Also notorious for never accounting for money/rations spent, or explaining how they managed to get a hold of such powerful items in the first place.

PG-Rated Game: Generally speaking, when a GM cuts out all the blood-and-guts goodies to break in a new player or avoid offending an existing one. This can include keeping some of the more graphic aspects out when a teenager or child is playing. {Want a good laugh? Let a nine year-old play a faerie with a very well-stocked kitchen.}

Plumber:
a) A player or character doing such a horrible job of playing spy that it becomes obvious they are a spy. Taken from the oft-repeated CIA mantra "I'm Mr. Smith and I'm a plumber."
b) A player or character who fails to walk and chew gum at the same time. Otherwise known as cannon-fodder.

Purple Cow from Outer Space: A mystical and long-rumored weapon of GMs only deployed against Ultra-Munchkins or Rules Lawyers. It can, supposedly, flatten either species of player regardless of powerful protection devices, body armor, spells, or natural abilities. Striking at a sub-orbital velocity of 3.45 miles/sec (12,420 mph), The Cow will routinely transform said players into manhole covers. Beware the mmmooooooOOOO!

R-Rated GM: The best kind. A GM who pulls no punches, runs the game like a movie director, and never fails to get a physical reaction from the players. This can include making the players flinch while describing a scene, getting a player to literally duck the incoming shot aimed at their character, or scaring them so badly they can't wait to start the next game. {I once gave a player nightmares by graphically describing the after-effects of an artillery bombardment. Right down to the stub of an ankle sticking out of a still-smoldering boot.}

Rules Lawyer: A player who can quote page, chapter and verse when referring to any rule in any book. To make matters worse, they will also insist the game be played exactly as stated in The Book regardless of balance or playability issues the GM may be taking into account.

Ultra-Munchkin:
a) Similar to a Munchkin, only worse (yes, it is possible!). The Ultra-Munchkin will go after the most powerful item/weapon/artifact/mods they can get their hands on, regardless of the GMs opinion on the matter. Where a typical Munchkin would go for a Glitter Boy PA with its own super-ultra forcefield, an Ultra-Munchkin takes it even further. Six-barreled Gatling-style RG-14s mounted to both arms, spells of invincibility cast on the armor, triple-redundant fusion power plants that never expire, and by the way... the character never leaves the armor.
b) Side characters kept separate from the primary game and used in "Bull%@#$" games to blow off steam. Always results in a good laugh as enemies are thrown through buildings, Prosek is strung up by his short hairs, and the Merry Marauders Win Again!



-----------------
Flakbait
Nail, Ogre Two, Rifle! Ogre is off cold and clearing East

No.

*shrug*

Probably made impervious to stop munchkin players trying to kill everything that moves and enjoying their Rollplay not Roleplay

She did have one definable power, and that was the Mazes.
In the books, she is said to be able to trap enemies and threats to Sigil in inescapable pocket realms as a form of prison. She could form them at an instant, without warning and at any location. Effectively, if anyone tried to attack her, they just popped into one and were never seen again.

So she had the spell Imprisonment at will. Nice.

Spells take time and are stopable. This was an instantaneous inate ability.

Hence the "at will"

Perhaps a way of forcing somepeople to roleplay as opposed to oh there is something different to us lets killit whoooooot XP! If thats the way the players did play nothing stopping a munchkinning i have to please my mates DM making some stats.

This is an actual engineering term used to define an unattainable perfect materiel to make anything out of (never breaks, bends just the right amount, etc etc etc.)

I concur.

Swankytown... Ah, the good old days... Back when even mentioning it could possibly get your post/reply deleted. An the 454's shall rise again.

"What the GM Giveth, the GM Taketh Away"

Common phrase used by players in my group when they find they have come into possession of an item or items far to powerful to remain in their hands. I always came up with an interesting way to remove the item from the game.

"Rectal Extraction"

How my GM style was often described by my group after they used their skill of Monkey Wrench +5 to completely take the game session offtrack from its desired course. Alternately, it described my ability to pull together a play session with no prior planning or notice. Figuratively speaking I pulled it out of my ***.

This is the greatest topic in the history of topics. And I've got a few to add.

The "I Can Only Fail On..." Law
A law that states that as soon as you utter the words "I can only fail if I roll a [insert the number here]", you will invariably fail. The nasty part about this law is that when you do fail, the worst possible scenario that can happen will. Example: If you are piloting a jet that is going down and your skill to use the controls properly to eject yourself is so high that you will state "I can only fail if I roll a 100". You then proceed to roll 100 on the percentile dice, and not only do you not eject, but the plane crashes into the side of a mountain, blowing itself up, and causing more damage to you than a scientific calculator can computer.


The PS Conundrum
A twist in the Palladium megaverse that allows normal, extraordinary, robotic, and superhuman physical strength (PS) to all use the same damage dice (aside from the modifiers) regardless of the actual PS score, while only supernatural PS has a table that is used to determine the damage dice and number thereof based on the actual PS score. This is further confused by the fact that in the HU book, under the Robotics category, the entry literally states that the PS of a robot is considered to be superhuman while at the same time giving an example of doing damage with table entry from supernatural physical strength.

While kittenstomp has corrected this in the Tables of Doom thread in the HU forum, this correction is not "canon" and not included in any printed book.


Bookie
A term that applies to the person who's house you are gaming at as they own and have a copy of every possible book needed for a gaming session. All the books are right there, next to the table, and readily available when needed.


Bookworm
A term that applies to the person who currently has the initiative but has their nose buried in at least 1 book trying to determine if the action they are currently thinking of performing will have any effect whatsoever. While this can apply to newbies playing the game (and they are forgiven for taking the extra time), it usually refers to the Munchkin who is using OOC information to determine what to do in-character.

High Percentage of Bugs
Came across this one recently when reading through forums other than Palladium, but it definitely applies. This refers to the seemingly large number of alien races that, when created either randomly or intentionally, are insects or insect-like. Seemingly, whenever creating a random alien race using the PB rules for HU, no less than 60% of the time you will end up with a Humanoid Insect who, most of the time, will have a hard exoskeleton. The really odd thing about this one is that you may have to randomly create alien races for quite a period of time before you see the pattern. But it is definitely there.

Low Percentage of Snakes
Again, came across this one in another forum. This refers to the rather low percentage of randomly or intentionally created alien races that are serpentine or reptilian in appearance. This is shocking considering how many alien races in the movies and other media are reptilian (see "V" for reference), especially when considering that there are 2 separate reptilian possibilities within the Heroes Unlimited random generation rules, and several reptilian races already existing within the AUGG.

Bounty-Handed
An adjective, used to describe someone who rolls dice and then quickly picks them up (bounty is the quicker-picker-upper) to avoid having anybody other than him or herself from seeing what was actually rolled. This is usually done by someone who is a known cheat. The typical bounty-handed person will roll whatever dice is needed, scoop it up really fast (sometimes before it even finishes rolling), and then proceed to palm the dice in one hand while counting on the fingers of their other hand to determine what the "total" dice roll is. Most often employed in combat situations.

Ultimate Artifact
A pronoun referring to whatever extremely valuable or magical object that lands in the laps of the players, is the one object needed to complete the adventure, but at the end of said adventure is the one object the PCs can never keep. 30,000 gold-piece gem? Key to the portal to return to your home world. +10 vorpal sword? Can only be used on the demi-plane of evil, and only to kill a specific monster, at which point it vaporizes itself. Power Armor from the future, complete with every weapon known to man? No power source, and if not returned to its own time in x number of days explodes in a retributive strike. I could go on here, but you get the point. The PCs will never be able to keep that item.

The Law of Searching
A simple law that states every chest, box, crate, barrel, desk, closet, etc., that is searched by a group of PCs will be completely ordinary, have no secret panels, and will hold only mundane, normal items. The inverse of this law states that every one of these objects that is not searched by the PCs will not only have secret panels, but they will also have all of the magic items, money, armor, and even potentially the Ultimate Artifact needed to complete the adventure. Really good at making PCs mad when they search through 18 rooms of stuff and find nothing, but they fail to search the 19th room and everything they ever wanted is right there. Most prevalent in old-school AD&D modules/adventures, but is known to be used by crafty GMs.

"It's Mine - I Saw it First!"
Saying used by greedy PCs who have to have all of the money and all the best items regardless of what would benefit the group the most. Usually done by players who don't care that it's a group game and think they can "win" by having the best stuff for their characters. Can usually be cured by killing said player's PC a few times and explaining that "He who dies with the most toys is still dead."

Schrodinger's NPC:
A term that applies to a person whose in-game, ultimate fate is deliberately left ambiguous in official canon and which is deliberately left to be decided by individual GMs in individual games.

Notable examples include, but are not limited to, King Robert Creed of the city-state of Tolkeen, last seen as a refugee wandering to unknown lands in the west; the Adventuring Group collectively known as The Legion of Northmoor, believed to be lost somewhere in the Land of Eternal Torment in the Palladium world; and Julian the First, perhaps the most famous Juicer ever known, whose incredible longevity even in the face of his own Last Call is one of the great mysteries of Rifts Earth.

The term borrows from the famous thought exercise in uncertainty created by the 20th century quantum physicist of the same name.

EXCELLENT!

You made me spit up my drink!