The Book of The Mask
 

Character Bio - In an antiques shop, a weak, neurotic man named Stanley Ipkiss shops for a gift to give to his girlfriend, Kathy. At the store he purchases an old jade mask which begins to speak to him. When Stanley wears it, he is transformed into a wacky, superpowered being with an abnormally large, bald, green-skinned head and a mouthful of large teeth. After exploring his new abilities, Ipkiss goes on a rampage, taking revenge on personal grudges, and earns the nickname Big Head.

After taking the mask off, Stanley begins to realize what has been happening. His acts as Big Head begin to take an emotional toll on him. He becomes verbally abusive toward Kathy. She kicks him out but keeps the mask since Stanley had bought it as a gift for her.

Later, Stanley breaks into her apartment to steal it back just as the police respond to their earlier domestic violence call. Deciding his only way out is as Big Head, Stanley places the mask back on and kills 11 cops in his escape. He returns home as Big Head and takes off the mask only to be shot in the back and killed by Kathy, who has put two and two together and figured out the identity of Big Head, before putting the mask on herself.

Kathy takes the mask to Lt. Kellaway for safe-keeping. Kellaway, who had been struggling at both the recent Big Head murders and organized crime lords running loose through his city, disregards Kathy's warnings and tries on the mask thinking she is stressed, and not thinking well. Becoming Big Head, Kellaway sets out to take down the crime lords who have plagued his police career.

The city, not knowing of the magical mask, assumes Big Head is still the same killer but has moved his target list to high profile crime lords. Despite Kellaway's good intentions, the mask turns his methods increasingly more violent. Big Head encounters Walter, a behemoth-sized mob muscle-man who never speaks and has taken a vendetta against Big Head for killing his employers. Walter never shows pain and is the only one who can injure Big Head to any real degree.

While fighting off Walter's attacks, Lt. Kellaway, as Big Head, becomes the target of a police manhunt. Big Head fights off the police and tracks down the remaining mobsters. When Kellaway's partner attempts to stop Big Head, the mask-altered policeman nearly kills his friend and colleague. Kellaway, realizing what he has been doing, flees. He removes the mask, buries it away in his basement with cement, and vows never to let it be worn again.
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-Rulings and Clarifications-

• The Mask is an Event Hero and follows Event Hero rules.

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-Combinations and Synergies-

Incoming Synergy:

• As a Human, the Mask has these Human Synergies.

Outgoing Synergy:

• N/A

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-Strategy, Tactics and Tips-

• N/A

-Heroscapers Community Contributions-

• Initial playtest: quozl
• Second playtest (at 350): darkraptor5413
• Third playtest (at 350): Tornado
• Fourth playtest (at 350): Zettian Juggernaut
• Fifth playtest (at 370): Tornado
• Sixth playtest (at 370): Blink
• Seventh playtest: laughing matter
• Reality Warp tweak: Trollbrute
• Final Reality Warp tweak: quozl
• 10th playtest: Heroscaper Guy
• 11th playtest: Flame Gryphon
• 12th playtest: REJ
• Art: Comic, Figure, Background, Markers
• Art by A3n

Card Updates:
7 March 2021 - Class changed to Trickster

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

NAME=THE MASK
SECRET IDENTITY=STANLEY IPKISS

SPECIES = HUMAN
UNIQUENESS = EVENT HERO
CLASS = TRICKSTER
PERSONALITY = WILD

SIZE/HEIGHT = MEDIUM 5

LIFE = 7

MOVE = 8
RANGE = 6
ATTACK = 4
DEFENSE = 4

POINTS = 355

REALITY WARP 13
Start the game with 5 plaid Warped Reality Markers on this card. Before taking a turn with The Mask, if you have at least 1 Warped Reality Marker on this card, you may choose any opponent's Unique Hero adjacent to The Mask. Roll the 20-sided die. If you roll 13 or higher, place a Warped Reality Marker on the chosen Hero's Army Card. All of that Hero's special powers are negated during The Mask's turns.

PARTY TIME!
When The Mask inflicts one or more wounds with a normal attack, The Mask may attack one additional time. Before rolling attack dice for that attack, you may remove up to 2 Warped Reality Markers from this card. For each Warped Reality Marker removed, add 1 automatic skull to whatever is rolled.

YOU GOT NOTHING ON ME, PUNK!
Anytime The Mask is attacked by an opponent's figure and at least one skull is rolled, instead of rolling defense dice normally, you may instead remove one Warped Reality Marker from this card and ignore that attack.

SUPER STRENGTH

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

I think this Black Mask figure, repainted so his head is green and his suit is yellow would work great:

http://cdn.miniaturemarket.com/media.../hcsog-030.jpg

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

13 life with healing factor and his negating power scares the pee water out of me. What point range are you going for here??

I like the design as is, but I'd really push to have his life brought way down. Like 7, 6?

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

Is there really a comic character for him?

Design looks good though, but I am with Bats in thinking the life is too high. I don't think he should be in the league of the other Event Heroes, but obviously I am only basing that on the movie.

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

The bio covers the first few issues of the series. The movie got the power level right, mostly, but the comics character is much more vicious than the movie.

That said, maybe drop the Life to 7 and increase the Defense to 5?

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

Or I just had another thought on how to warp reality.

Maybe he could discard a warped reality marker to ignore an attack in addition to his placing markers on others to negate them.

That way, we could keep his Life and Defense low but he would still be extremely hard to take down like he is in the comics.

So rename this to I GOT JUST WHAT YOU NEED:

REALITY WARPING
Start the game with 8 Warped Reality markers on this card. Instead of attacking, you may place a Warped Reality marker on the card of a Unique Hero within 6 clear sight spaces. During The Mask's turn, a figure other than The Mask with a Warped Reality marker on its card has all of its special powers negated until the end of The Mask's turn. The Mask is not affected by Warped Reality markers on its card.

and add:

YOU GOT NOTHING ON ME
Anytime The Mask is attacked by an opponent's figure and at least one skull is rolled, instead of rolling defense dice normally, you may instead remove one Warped Reality marker from this card and ignore the attack.

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

This approach looks like it would work, but I'd like to keep the defense as it is now and dip to 7 life, maybe 6. I don't see him as a 1000+ figure.

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

Yep, I think 7 Life and 4 Defense would work well with that powerset. I think he should be around 300 points.

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

With the change mentioned above, you'd be dropping Healing Factor, right?

I think if you're shooting for 300ish, you'll need to drop the marker count down from 8 to somewhere in the 4-6 range. A 7 life, 4 defense figure that can ignore 8 attacks is really powerful. I know he'll shed some of those markers to get around the more powerful defensive powers out there, but that flexibility doesn't lower his cost any, IMO.

Also, here's my early vote for gray markers. :-D

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

Yeah, forgot to mention that but there's no need for Healing Factor when you can ignore attacks.

And gray markers for The Mask? You've got to be kidding.

He's going to use plaid markers.

This background:
http://i226.photobucket.com/albums/d...PlaidPaper.jpg

With the head from this:
http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs4/i/200..._nickowolf.jpg

Re: The Book of The Mask - Design Phase
 

So we're thinking this now: