Question about Kimono Troops and BAM Comix setting

Yeah Bob Morane´s original backstory had him a WWII pilot, spy and adventurer (in the novels, he works for the first Director of the CIA even at several points), but this backstory became more and more irrelevant as time went on, because sliding timescale and him not getting older.

Recently they did a comic called "Bob Morane: Reloaded" that is a modern day re-telling, where he is an Bill are officers in the French Foreign Legion who are stationed in an African country for peace keeping operations and ending up becoming heroes for saving a African Family from the deaths at the hand of rival tribal group. That results in them being thrown out of the Legion for not following orders and the like.

Its an interesting take for sure, but its a lot grimmer and grittier then original, as it deals with a lot of real life political issues and both Bob and Bill are at the beginning of a character journey.

I will try and merge the classic and the modern origin into one, that way you get the best of both and you can explain away a few things.

As for the Headsculpt: Interestingly enough, the Batman Arkham Bruce Wayne headsculpt that is floating around on E-Bay seems to be very close to what Bob Morane looks like, and I wonder how that came about.

he looks like a cool character to make!

ZeroDelta wrote:Yeah Bob Morane´s original backstory had him a WWII pilot, spy and adventurer (in the novels, he works for the first Director of the CIA even at several points), but this backstory became more and more irrelevant as time went on, because sliding timescale and him not getting older.

Recently they did a comic called "Bob Morane: Reloaded" that is a modern day re-telling, where he is an Bill are officers in the French Foreign Legion who are stationed in an African country for peace keeping operations and ending up becoming heroes for saving a African Family from the deaths at the hand of rival tribal group. That results in them being thrown out of the Legion for not following orders and the like.

Its an interesting take for sure, but its a lot grimmer and grittier then original, as it deals with a lot of real life political issues and both Bob and Bill are at the beginning of a character journey.

I will try and merge the classic and the modern origin into one, that way you get the best of both and you can explain away a few things.

As for the Headsculpt: Interestingly enough, the Batman Arkham Bruce Wayne headsculpt that is floating around on E-Bay seems to be very close to what Bob Morane looks like, and I wonder how that came about.

I've seen that sculpt also. I think it would be a good choice. A good place to get WWII style khaki clothing is The Veego Store in Hong Kong. I have bought from the a few times and they are reliable. I would look at the British WWII stuff ans the German Afrikakorps stuff also. The American section also has a bit of Khaki clothing like in some of the illustrations.

https://www.veegostore.com/index.php?cPath=60

I have some very retro looking figures in K-Troop as well and I think they turned out very well.

Monty_2 by Gary Menten, on Flickr

Katanga's Lost Diamonds Part II: The Valley of Strange Occurences by Gary Menten, on Flickr

Oh I saw that RAF Tropical outfit at Machinegunfr and had put it on my wishlist, they have a whole bunch of other items that would be very useful.

ZeroDelta wrote:Oh I saw that RAF Tropical outfit at Machinegunfr and had put it on my wishlist, they have a whole bunch of other items that would be very useful.

It's actually completely kitbashed.

The cap is from a guy in England who makes WWII and some modern cap and sells them on ebay as Banjoman. I've bought a few times from him an his product is top quality...better in fact than what you get with complete figure sets. His line is constantly expanding and he does stuff no-one else will.

https://www.ebay.ca/itm/371292320708?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649


The bush jacket is from one of the Ujindou SAS desert raiders sets, and were popular in the RAF as well.

The belt and holster are from the same set, but his pistol is an S&W Victory model .38 Special from Battlegrear Toys.

The riding breeches are from a no-name Chinese Grand Moff Tarkine uniform set I bought in Giantoy for $20.00. I did not like the jacket and threw it away and repurposed the breeches for Wintergreen.

The boots, (not seen in the photo) are from a DiD German officer.

Ah thank you.

So say, how did the 10th Doctor end up working with BAM? Does UNIT exist in this world? I wonder how if I can somehow put SHADO in there somewhere.

ZeroDelta wrote:Ah thank you.

So say, how did the 10th Doctor end up working with BAM? Does UNIT exist in this world? I wonder how if I can somehow put SHADO in there somewhere.

The Doctor first landed at BAM-HQ while looking for Martha. As for Unit, I have never made reference to it, but I'm sure it will fit in easy enough.

Ah thank you. Now I was wondering about something: you had a storyline about an Action Man returning "from the wild" and something about him being lost for ages, that made me wonder, how old is Commander Rivers and co anyway? I know its a bit of an injoke about a toys life and sometimes it seems you break the 4th Wall with mentioning how they are action figures, but I do wonder about the time scale a bit.

Also, one of the main events is Rivers shooting a Senators son by accident during a mission, from what I understand, that was on US soil, so why was the SAS Allowed to operate there and why was no US Agency involved in this as well?

So Project Genesis seems to be a revived Super Soldier Project that created Captian America, Steve Rogers is even mentioned by name, so does that mean we have WWII with super heroes? Is Hydra a thing? If so I have some ideas regarding that.

ZeroDelta wrote:

Also, one of the main events is Rivers shooting a Senators son by accident during a mission, from what I understand, that was on US soil, so why was the SAS Allowed to operate there and why was no US Agency involved in this as well?

That incident is an active sub-plot in the Hidden in the Shadows story.

In brief, Jake Rivers resigned from SAS after that incident. A few years later he was coaxed out of retirement by his old SAS commander, the mysterious Mr. Tibias, and put in charge of a top secret Black Ops team now called BAM-HQ.

The Hidden in the Shadows story is re-visiting that incident, which also involves Jake's arch-rival and former colleague, Demitri Redbox, and previously hidden details are emerging.

BAMComix will provide more detail when he sees this question, I'm sure.

Also, Kamiko at Kimono Troop hates Redbox and has been discretely forming an alliance to kill him if he should betray Commander Rivers, whom she deeply respects.  

As for the SAS operating on US soil, I can't really telly you how Dal arrived at that, but if one accepts my description of the world with the British Union as the prominent political / military alliance of the western world, it becomes more plausible.  This being said, it is perhaps best not to get too caught up with the rules of the real world and trying to apply them to this universe. When I started my collection, I too was more tethered to both scientific and political reality. That started to change as soon as this character made her way into my collection:

Page_5 by Gary Menten, on Flickr

ZeroDelta wrote:Ah thank you. Now I was wondering about something: you had a storyline about an Action Man returning "from the wild" and something about him being lost for ages, that made me wonder, how old is Commander Rivers and co anyway? I know its a bit of an injoke about a toys life and sometimes it seems you break the 4th Wall with mentioning how they are action figures, but I do wonder about the time scale a bit.

Also, one of the main events is Rivers shooting a Senators son by accident during a mission, from what I understand, that was on US soil, so why was the SAS Allowed to operate there and why was no US Agency involved in this as well?

So Project Genesis seems to be a revived Super Soldier Project that created Captian America, Steve Rogers is even mentioned by name, so does that mean we have WWII with super heroes? Is Hydra a thing? If so I have some ideas regarding that.

Okay, I will try and cover your questions zero the best I can without giving anything away. Banner (the missing trooper) was a soldier lost on a mission and later returns, However, all is not as it seems with him as you will see in a previous story, An old face returns. As for Jake's age, I have always set him in his early forties, which closely mirrors his actual age. (I had him for my birthday in 1979! Gosh, that seems like such a long time ago!).

The mission in the U.S. was initially a black ops mission, no one knew they were there, as for the rest of the details, as Dave says, the details are still unfolding.

The early stages of 'Project Genesis' do indeed lay in Cap's humble beginnings, but with tech advancing so much since then, and the cutting edge files that Jake's team recovered in the U.S, things advanced quickly. If you wanted to go with the Hydra idea in a past tense, or flashback, that would be cool!

I dont know about a Flashback, for that I would have to get WWII German stuff and that can be a bit tricky, because symbols of the Third Reich are banned here by law and can land you in hot water if you are not careful, its also out of my usual wheelhouse. My range starts with Vietnam and ends with scifi stuff.

Now, that reminds me, what sort of Tech Level are we on anyway ( https://gurps.fandom.com/wiki/Tech_Level or https://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Technology_Level )? How far advanced are we? From the stories so far, I can see that we have cloning, genetic engineering, advanced robotics and more. So I am just wondering what I can get away with.

Also, the whole SAS on US Soil reminds me of the DC comic "Hitman". Tommy Monaghan, the titular Hitman was a Marine during he Gulf War and on accident, kills a group of SAS in a "Blue on Blue" engagement. For this, the SAS wants to take revenge, and send a SAS Team after him to Gotham City, where a bloody firefight ensues.

Speaking of, will we ever see the Senator who´s son got killed? I had some ideas on how to handle that, but I am not sure I can get involved just now, there still needs to be setting up and stuff. I mean, my idea would be to have that Senator hire someone to kill Jake, after all his tires to get him to justice fail and he goes and hires a Hitman from SMOG.

Also, SMOG will stand for "Spy and Mercenary Organization Gamma" and they work for the highest bidder, no matter what it is.

ZeroDelta wrote:I dont know about a Flashback, for that I would have to get WWII German stuff and that can be a bit tricky, because symbols of the Third Reich are banned here by law and can land you in hot water if you are not careful, its also out of my usual wheelhouse. My range starts with Vietnam and ends with scifi stuff.

Now, that reminds me, what sort of Tech Level are we on anyway ( https://gurps.fandom.com/wiki/Tech_Level or https://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Technology_Level )? How far advanced are we? From the stories so far, I can see that we have cloning, genetic engineering, advanced robotics and more. So I am just wondering what I can get away with.

Also, the whole SAS on US Soil reminds me of the DC comic "Hitman". Tommy Monaghan, the titular Hitman was a Marine during he Gulf War and on accident, kills a group of SAS in a "Blue on Blue" engagement. For this, the SAS wants to take revenge, and send a SAS Team after him to Gotham City, where a bloody firefight ensues.

Speaking of, will we ever see the Senator who´s son got killed? I had some ideas on how to handle that, but I am not sure I can get involved just now, there still needs to be setting up and stuff. I mean, my idea would be to have that Senator hire someone to kill Jake, after all his tires to get him to justice fail and he goes and hires a Hitman from SMOG.

Also, SMOG will stand for "Spy and Mercenary Organization Gamma" and they work for the highest bidder, no matter what it is.

Okay...As far as Tech levels go, I'll pretty much let Dal answer that except to say that the tech levels are not universally shared by all commands or evenly distributed.  As far as weaponry goes, K-Troop carries mostly fairly modern weaponry, with a smattering of older but still deadly weapons like WWII era Thompson's and 1950's vintage Sterling SMGs.  Glynnis also carries a WWII vintage Inglis Browning pistol, which remains in service in the Canadian military as of this date.  Heidi carries a Colt M1873 as a sidearm as befits her semi Old West look.  WWII jeeps and Kubelwagens are in service with various HQ's as I write this and K-Troop has two vintage Curtiss P40 fighters that they use for air superiority and tactical air support in their backwater theater of operations.  

Their primary enemy in the area, Stahltruppe are armed almost entirely with WWII era German weapons which were either smuggled into America before or during WWII, or brought by former Nazis when they fled to South America post WWII.  Our laws here are different but initially, I was reluctant to put Nazi insignia on my Erika von Stroheim character, thinking:

1. They might offend someone, as there are a number of German members here and I did not want them thinking that I equate modern Germany with WWII Germany.
2. The character, who i first conceived as a more serious character was not a Nazi at all but simply admired Rommel and tried to emulate him.

That all pretty much changed as the character became more of a caricature and and a fool who always fails, but it also takes on a sort of seriousness in the sense that Fascism and authoritarianism are once again gaining popularity in parts of today's world, and there has been a Nazi movement in America since the 1930's.  

I would simply say that the simple solution to flashbacks is not to have any... Stick with your comfort zone.  No-one here will criticize you for not having WWII flashbacks.  You really have quite a lot of discretion as to how you configure your characters, back story and their HQ's.  It's entirely up to you of course, but I would also suggest not getting too mired in historical accuracy or modern accuracy.  All of my K-troop figures should be wearing body armor, helmets and carrying a lot more ammo.  However they would lose much of their sex appeal if they were realistically dressed.

ThePhotogsBlog wrote:WWII jeeps and Kubelwagens are in service with various HQ's....

As well as modern day vehicles, including SUVs, Humvees, sports cars, and modern motorcycles.

ThePhotogsBlog wrote:... and K-Troop has two vintage Curtiss P40 fighters that they use for air superiority and tactical air support in their backwater theater of operations.  

There is an ongoing sub-plot, mostly running in other stories but which might possibly be mentioned at some point in Hidden in the Shadows, about various HQs and subgroups attempting to win, borrow, buy, or steal an Avro Vulcan bomber.

Tech levels: there are robots and clones, so on the GURPS scale probably a 9 or 10. There is discussion of advanced tech, including nanotechnology, so on the IET scale, probably 8 or 9. The "visual sense" varies among participants: LondonRoadHog and Mister Popper definitely favor ultra-modern sleekness (although London Road Hog infuses elements of retro-1960s elements evoking the James Bond films). BAMComix favors "rugged modern" while also including brightly colored "comic book style" artificial outdoor settings. Both ThePhotogsBlog and davidd lean toward a "dieselpunk" visual style, with many visual elements reminiscent of the 1930s-1940s, pop cultural references from the 1960s and 1970s, yet a plot setting in the "vaguely defined near-future" with an awareness of high-tech and sci-fi type tech.

The basis of the plot is a search for "alien artifacts," so the likelihood of interplanetary and interstellar travel by races from beyond Earth is a given.

As for the Swastika thing - whatever comes with the sets as purchased is what I use. That said, the design of most of the "fascist" characters "suggests" a certain time period in mid-century European history rather than displaying "the twisted cross." If "banners" or "flags" were to eventually appear, speaking for myself, they will likely "hint" at the source rather than depict an actual swastika. There are iron crosses and Balkenkreuz (bar cross) emblems on some of the vehicles and aircraft, the in-story rationale being that these are actual war surplus or salvaged (or stolen) military vehicles. I hope this will not be too problematic for you. Nobody will mind at all if you avoid such symbology completely.

I will add to what Dave has said by saying that using old tech in the modern world....MP40's, Thompsons, Lugers, P40's is fine as there are many of these left in the world in working order. They will kill. What does not work would be doing say, a WWII flashback where one side is carrying M16's and the other is carrying AK-47's or something like that. Dave and I have strong Dieselpunk stylistic impulses, and frankly, often old fashions come back. Example...Bell bottom pants. A better, more contemporary example is that the US Army's new Class A uniform is heavily based, though not quite identical to it's WWII Class A uniform.

So really, the bottom line is choose a style or styles that you are comfortable with tech-wise aesthetically and go with it. No-one will care if at some point your characters modern-day use a WWII walkie-talkie or radio except you. Are adventures are character driven far more than the are technology driven. The alien artifacts we are chasing after are more MacGuffins than anything else.

ZeroDelta wrote:I dont know about a Flashback, for that I would have to get WWII German stuff and that can be a bit tricky, because symbols of the Third Reich are banned here by law and can land you in hot water if you are not careful, its also out of my usual wheelhouse. My range starts with Vietnam and ends with scifi stuff.

Now, that reminds me, what sort of Tech Level are we on anyway ( https://gurps.fandom.com/wiki/Tech_Level or https://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Technology_Level )? How far advanced are we? From the stories so far, I can see that we have cloning, genetic engineering, advanced robotics and more. So I am just wondering what I can get away with.

Also, the whole SAS on US Soil reminds me of the DC comic "Hitman". Tommy Monaghan, the titular Hitman was a Marine during he Gulf War and on accident, kills a group of SAS in a "Blue on Blue" engagement. For this, the SAS wants to take revenge, and send a SAS Team after him to Gotham City, where a bloody firefight ensues.

Speaking of, will we ever see the Senator who´s son got killed? I had some ideas on how to handle that, but I am not sure I can get involved just now, there still needs to be setting up and stuff. I mean, my idea would be to have that Senator hire someone to kill Jake, after all his tires to get him to justice fail and he goes and hires a Hitman from SMOG.

Also, SMOG will stand for "Spy and Mercenary Organization Gamma" and they work for the highest bidder, no matter what it is.

Okay, so the guys above have covered the tech levels, and Gary is right, go with what you are comfortable with .
As for the Senator story line, That one is solely MisterPoppers story line, I asked him to come up with a story after I outlined a key key events. I will say that, that particular story line will be wrapped up soon.
I am positive though, that you can come up with an idea that we can easily tie in? I would suggest a call to K-Troop after receiving a request to join S.I,M.O.N. That way your guys can be linked in, or maybe S.I.M.O.N. will contact them after they get wind of an incident that could be ted in with on-going story line. Alien tech, secret caves or even the discovery of an alien body. I am sure you can think of something.

Incidentally, the Chief of Operations at S.I.M.O.N. is a Japanese woman named General Nishizumi, loosely based on the character of Shiho Nishizumi from the Girls und Panzer Anime series. She has not appeared yet in the comics because I have not found a suitable head sculpt for her. She was Kamiko's boss in the JSDF intelligence branch during the war with China and Kamiko was her top agent....some say assassin.

https://gup.fandom.com/wiki/Shiho_Nishizumi

So, I finally came up with a name for my Organization: H.U.N.T. (High-risk United Nations Task-force). Created for the purpure to Defend Human Freedom against all threats, be they earthly, like S.A.V.A.G.E. (Specialist-Administrators of Vengeance, Anarchy and Global Extortion), SMOG (Spy and Mercenary Organization Gamma) or be they alien in nature, HUNT will be called in to handle those missions (but alien stuff is however, often dealt by S.H.A.D.O. (Supreme Headquarters Alien Defense Organization).

HUNT is a diverse organization, having agents and troopers from around the world, with many of the countries supplying their best of the best for the Task Force. Its internationally funded and has the highest level of Technology available to them. Critics say that the group is a Western Tool for imperialism and in many ways was often used by NATO members to sort out messes that no one else would, but it has been undoubtedly one of the most effective groups, stopping The Triad from blowing up the world in the 1990s for one thing and dealing with various other terrorist groups since then.

What do you guys think?

ZeroDelta wrote:So, I finally came up with a name for my Organization: H.U.N.T. (High-risk United Nations Task-force). Created for the purpure to Defend Human Freedom against all threats, be they earthly, like S.A.V.A.G.E. (Specialist-Administrators of Vengeance, Anarchy and Global Extortion), SMOG (Spy and Mercenary Organization Gamma) or be they alien in nature, HUNT will be called in to handle those missions (but alien stuff is however, often dealt by S.H.A.D.O. (Supreme Headquarters Alien Defense Organization).

HUNT is a diverse organization, having agents and troopers from around the world, with many of the countries supplying their best of the best for the Task Force. Its internationally funded and has the highest level of Technology available to them. Critics say that the group is a Western Tool for imperialism and in many ways was often used by NATO members to sort out messes that no one else would, but it has been undoubtedly one of the most effective groups, stopping The Triad from blowing up the world in the 1990s for one thing and dealing with various other terrorist groups since then.

What do you guys think?  

Very cool ideas, though I would humbly suggest dropping SHADO since in our little world, S.I.M.O.N. is already tasked with dealing with aliens and other "non-earthly" threats and so they would be parallel organizations. Also, I don't think we have bases on the moon at this point or the tech to do build them....yet. This being said, it looks as if you've thought about this long and hard about your HQ and I think we are all very interested in what you come up with.

Okay that is no problem at all then, I can drop SHADO altogether then if SIMON takes care of it already. Also, technically, we can build moon bases already, our current world tech would work fine, the problem is just to get it all up there.

Moon bases: there have long been rumours that the Germans put bases on the dark side of the moon during the war, so I think the idea of secret bases on the moon is completely plausible in our retro-future world.

SHADO could be a parallel organization to SIMON, or an earlier organization that elected to merge with SIMON, or a "rogue" competitor.

davidd wrote:Moon bases: there have long been rumours that the Germans put bases on the dark side of the moon during the war, so I think the idea of secret bases on the moon is completely plausible in our retro-future world.

SHADO could be a parallel organization to SIMON, or an earlier organization that elected to merge with SIMON, or a "rogue" competitor.

That's all we need here...another parallel organization....

I wish I could get a Nigel Hawthorne headsculpt so that I could do a Sir Humphrey Appleby character. I have a script already written where he explains SIMON (and possibly other secret organizations) to the new PM who know nothing of this upon taking office.

ThePhotogsBlog wrote:

I wish I could get a Nigel Hawthorne headsculpt so that I could do a Sir Humphrey Appleby character.  I have a script already written where he explains SIMON (and possibly other secret organizations) to the new PM who know nothing of this upon taking office.  

Oh, do this! Have Bond-Fleming do it, injecting his own ego and anecdotes in to a rambling explanation! Kamiko and perhaps the dapper new fellow, Montague Wintergreen, and some of the others could interject with corrections along the way! Could be hilarious!

PM: "So, there are underground caves beneath a secret HQ that have a doorway to another world?"

Bond: "Yes, Prime Minister, that is the case. That reminds me of the Volcano Hideout of Blofeld, from where he launched his spaceships from, so he could steal Soviet and American Spacecraft, so the 2 nations would blame each other and even go to war. We had to raid this place you know, with Ninja commandos and all. As it was......"

PM: "Erm, yes, you have had a long career, but that does still not answer the question about those alien Artifacts"

Bond "Yes, Prime Minister, also there are those strange alien artefacts all over the world, left behind by advanced alien civilization......oh that reminds me, have you met The Doctor yet? He is from Gallifrey or some place, he can travel through space and time. He worked for UNIT as a Scientific advisor in the 70s and early 80s. Oh do you know the Brigadier? Very nice fellow, may he rest in peace, he was there when The Doctor stopped the Yeti menace in the Subway tunnels of London. Now that reminds me when we had to stop Blofeld....."

PM: *facepalms* "Dear lord, if I knew this was part of the job, I would not have not accepted this position. I could be at my home, sipping tea and watching Criket......"

ZeroDelta wrote:PM: "So, there are underground caves beneath a secret HQ......"

You've been asking about "the method" used to create joint stories. What you have done here is our "method" in a nutshell. Now all you need to do is set up a couple of figures talking to each other, snap a few photos, and either paste this dialog in to comic-style word balloons, or in to captions beneath the pictures. That's all there is to it!

davidd wrote:

ZeroDelta wrote:PM: "So, there are underground caves beneath a secret HQ......"

You've been asking about "the method" used to create joint stories. What you have done here is our "method" in a nutshell. Now all you need to do is set up a couple of figures talking to each other, snap a few photos, and either paste this dialog in to comic-style word balloons, or in to captions beneath the pictures. That's all there is to it!

Or send it to one of us, and we'll put it into comic life for you

Say, for the Dinosaur Valley, what size of Dinosaurs have been used? I was wondering about that, because I want to use creatures as well, but I need at least to know what toyline and size they are so it might fit.

ZeroDelta wrote:Say, for the Dinosaur Valley, what size of Dinosaurs have been used? I was wondering about that, because I want to use creatures as well, but I need at least to know what toyline and size they are so it might fit.

No full-size dinosaurs have yet appeared in Dinosaur Valley because none of us have found realistic dinosaurs that are big enough.

There have been a few "baby" dinosaurs running around in the undergrowth in some of BAMComix's pics.

I suppose "big enough" depends on one's needs and definitions, but here are two that I've tried (in the first post and some later ones too) --

https://onesixthfigures.forumotion.com/t442-jurassic-pratt