The League of Superhero Writers

Zinnith — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 08:14:38 +0100

Who else is writing a superhero novel? My MC is Theo, a college student who was born with superpowers. He's been keeping them secret all his life, but he also wants to use his powers for good. He dons a mask and becomes the campus protector, roaming the grounds at night and helping people out of trouble. The only one who knows his secret is his best friend and roommate Prue. Through a long and complicated series of events, Theo comes into contact with Quinn, an enigmatic billionaire who specialises in finding superpowered individuals and organising them. Suddenly, Theo's life is full of conspiracy theories and mysterious people in government cars and he's about to find out more about his past than he ever wanted to know. My main issue right now is that I lack a good villain... So, what are you writing about and what problems are you facing?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Mr_White — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 08:45:14 +0100

I may write the third in my superhero diary series this year, but haven't quite decided yet. My current problem is that I know exactly the shape of a particular plot point, but it's taking a bugger of an age to figure out the best way for everything to happen. (I am telling myself that this isn't outlining, it's still just notes; this may be a lie.)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

MarcyT — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 11:20:09 +0100

I'm not writing it for NaNo, but I have an on hold superhero project. It's about two battling groups of supers and a lot of secrets (I know, I'm terrible at describing story plots).

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

ClueBadger24601 — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:03:45 +0100

Lots and lots of superheroes in my novel; I'm kind of having fun with the fact that the main character's power is basically to be a human boggart (didn't think of that particular description until I'd already thought her up), which isn't really a very typical hero power.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Haselnuth — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:11:37 +0100

I'm writing a superhero novel this year! Though he has no superpowers, he just has a love for comic books and a friend who made awesome gadgets. My main problem will be coming up with gadgets. I'm hoping I will invent them the moment I need them, but I kinda doubt it. It took me weeks to decide what superpower he has (or rather that he doesn't have any). Second problem might be him taking over the novel. Because the whole thing is written from the point of his biggest fan who will be at his side for a while. For now all scenes in my head are only with the hero. I already love him way too much. I admit, I have a thing for broken characters - Cox, House, the Doctor... meow.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

caocao — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:20:32 +0100

I continue to write superhero fiction for Nanowrimo. This time around I will focus my attention on a new team of 4 genetically engineered heroes as they first step in to the world. I have some fun things slowly developing in it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

KelinciHutan — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:31:06 +0100

Does El Zorro count? I'm planning a Zorro novel.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 14:49:38 +0100

Hey, if Batman can be a super hero then Zorro is. My superhero novel is set in modern times with a woman superhero with bug powers. She has the strength to lift over ten times her own weight (like an ant) and jump great distances (like a grasshopper) and even has her own stinger. But enough about her powers, what I really want to focus on in this novel is the romantic interest with an average fellow. It's gonna be in his pov. I'm afraid I don't think I am explaining this very well.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

SparkyDorian — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 21:12:02 +0100

Whoo! Superheros are awesome. My super villain is my protagonist, actually. He's sarcastic and very proper. I'm fond of him. He needs a name... Welp. Well, I guess it'll get there somehow. I'm excited to see how everyone else's plots develop! It's always quite the adventure.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Aneith — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 02:02:12 +0100

Yep, I'm probably going to write a superhero novel. Try to anyway. It takes place about a year after a group of people were kidnapped, tortured, and given super powers. Most of them will be come villains (is that believable?). They were freed (it's complicated to explain). The guy responsible (Aiken) is now collecting things to make himself more powerful and to create his own dystopian playground. A superhero with blood manipulation, an eccentric engineer (mad scientist), a colourful girl who likes explosives, and a roguish guy who can manipulate gravity go to stop him. Then there's a huge plot hole that I hope to fill with action and adventure and exciting things. At some point, they'll find out that one of them is a spy. It will also be revealed that some of Aiken's "followers" were manipulating him (they will stab in the back, figuratively speaking) and that his evil genius/mad scientist is the real Big Bad (Silas). Then there's another huge plot hole while they go after Silas. Then I am confused about how it ends. Wow I need to figure out what goes in those plot holes. Yay! I love villain protagonists! I also like heroes with gadgets. :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Francesca_Moody — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 03:31:32 +0100

I've got a superhero novel in the works. It's centered around a high school girl who discovers she has superpowers and follows her as she masters them and helps to lock away a supervillain who threatens the safety of superheroes and their families everywhere. My biggest worry that it might be to much on the light side and will lack some of the seriousness that typically follows some of the more mature superhero stories.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 04:29:07 +0100

Don't worry about whether or not it is serious or not. Back in the introduction of superheroes, many were light-hearted and fun. I mean, look at the first batman series, it only has been since the 90s and beyond have superheroes have grown darker and more serious. Also, this is nanowrimo, it's gonna be a little bit silly, even if you are trying for a serious novel. Trust me, I've tried. What kind of superpowers does the girl have?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Kaldaka — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 08:12:28 +0100

I'm a big fan of superhero stories that are more lighthearted - Bryan Q. Miller's recent Batgirl run was, IMO, one of the best comic stories of recent times, and while it had its serious moments it was definitely lighthearted and hopeful. While I think there's a lot of angst and darkness to be mined from superhero stories, I think the idea of people who use remarkable abilities to help people has a lot of potential to be hopeful and joyful.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Kaldaka — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 09:32:39 +0100

Mine is about the dawn of superpowered people on Earth, and the subsequent confusion, panic, and path to heroism of one girl who's been chosen to wield huge amounts of power and ensure balance is kept. I don't know what she's going to pick as a codename yet, but considering that she'll be picking it with her trigger-happy nonpowered-but-determined-to-help best friend and a nerdy powered teenager, they will probably all have ridiculous names. :P

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

writerbear — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 10:47:18 +0100

I agree with Psychickid and Kaldaka - don't worry about how light-hearted your story might be. Superhero stories have the potential to go a variety of ways, but none of them are wrong. It all depends on your audience. Who would you like to read the book? Whether or not anyone will read it, knowing what age range you write for will help. Personally, I prefer light superhero stories. The dark, brooding protagonist who agonises over keeping his identity secret and losing friends because of those secrets gets dull and repetitive and is just plain depressing, especially when the basic plot is: guy saves the world. I understand it might be more realistic, but I think there's something wrong if the world is saved and everyone, the audience especially, is left unhappy (because the character they fell in love with along the way didn't get a happy ending, etc). If worst does come to worst though, and at the end of it you still think 'this is way too light', just make it a children's story. There's always gonna be new kids to educate in the art of superheroes and villains.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

writerbear — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:03:58 +0100

I like the sound of this. Whether or not it's believable they become villains depends on the character's original personality. I know they've been tortured and that messes a person up, but once they're free it'll be just them and their conscience (or lack of it, as the case may be). What confuses me (and maybe I'm being an idiot here, I often am haha) is... what happens to the original group tortured and then freed to become evil? I understand that's the backstory, but from the rest of your plot I can't see where they reappear again. Are they Big Bad Aiken's 'followers' who are found manipulating him, or are those 'followers' completely different people? Are they going to pop up as villains the four MCs take down one by one, uncovering the truth of what happened along the way? I like the sound of your MCs though. Four band man is always a good choice - and they sound so much fun to write with. Especially the guy who can manipulate gravity. That would be so much fun (I BELIEVE I CAN FLY ~).

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

writerbear — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:09:03 +0100

I'm writing a superhero plot. Except it's more a parody of your regular superhero plot, but it still counts! I don't have any names set out yet, but I have a general gist of the plot (humour galore, I do believe). I've always been absolutely terrible with naming - I'll probably be wandering in and out of the adoption area a lot, ahaha. As for superpowers... well, one of my MCs doesn't have any (but everyone is convinced she does). The rest are just your run-of-the-mill powers - strength, speed, intelligence, eating one hundred hamburgers in the space of a minute... Evil Overlord List here I come!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Aneith — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 00:04:45 +0100

The blood manipulating guy becomes a hero, his uber powerful sister becomes the Big Good, the guy who can manipulate gravity starts out with the hero, but he's complicated, a woman who can teleport and a guy who can manipulate plants work for Aiken (they don't know who is responsible for torturing them yet), and another might show up as one of Aiken's followers (she's complicated). The others won't show up yet, but they will in another story. The real Big Bad and his followers are (mostly) people without superpowers. Thanks. :) I really like the gravity guy too.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Aneith — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 00:06:18 +0100

Oh I forgot to mention, unfortunately, this plot is frustrating me to the point where I despise it, so unless I can figure things out, I'm dropping it rather than torment myself in november.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Aneith — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 00:07:38 +0100

That sounds interesting. Why does everyone think the MC has superpowers?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Francesca_Moody — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 03:51:54 +0100

Flight, the ability to create shields and engery lasers(I need to find a better term for it). She also has some martial arts training. Also as a side note I completely agree with roping El Zorro into the superhero category. I think the writers of Batman took a lot of their ideas from Johnston McCulley's original stories. The two share many similiarities.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Francesca_Moody — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 03:54:09 +0100

Thanks for all opinions everyone! I've actually been having this arguement with myself for awhile now.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

KelinciHutan — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 04:28:47 +0100

I'm pretty sure they've admitted outright that Zorro was one of the inspirations for Batman. I kind of like Zorro a little better at the moment because a] I'm on a bit of a kick (*blush*) and b] there are a number of episodes of Disney's Zorro at least where Zorro doesn't win. I don't remember too many where he outright looses, but there's one where he only manages to fight the Comandante to a draw, and at least two where he spends most of the episode stealing Tornado back from whoever stole him from Zorro. So, yeah. I guess I like that he's not one of those "with prep time" sorts. He's beatable, therefore he's more...accessible? Fun? Swashbuckley? Something like that. :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

KelinciHutan — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 04:33:44 +0100

Sorry for the double posting, but I just had a brainwave. If the shields and energy lasers your heroine makes are solid light constructs, you could say she's photokinetic?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Castille — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 07:02:14 +0100

One of my plots I'm juggling with this year has do with superheroes. More like a team of non-powered heroes, they're all kind of mentally unbalanced, but in different ways. Anyways, scratch 'hero' and put 'vigilante' on there. The only 'villain' in the plot would be either a gang that they managed to upset or the police. Catch is... the team members all work in the same office as their day job.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 09:45:04 +0100

Joining, since my most stuck -on-my-brain idea that isn't a Criminal Minds fanfic is about a Superman-esque hero, if Superman had come to Earth as an adult soldier instead of an infant, with a biomechanical cavalry beast. His name on Earth is Nick de Comte, but he's not anywhere near the kind of powers as Superman. Most of Nick's capability as a hero comes from Destroyer, his beast and partner, and alien armor and infantry weaponry. I know there'll be a conversation in the story with him complaining about unrealistic Superman is compared to what all the alien species he knows are really like, since in his world the Kryptonians would have invaded Earth because they have superpowers here and annihilated the Human race. I chose an initial genre of Sci-Fi, might change it to Adventure based on how the story develops. What genres did everybody else put?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

writerbear — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 11:16:39 +0100

Her parents and brothers did, so obviously she must have them too. Her parents are FAMOUS superheros, like the best of the best, and her brothers are super good, so it's impossible for anyone to think their offspring isn't. They just think she's being modest or wants to keep it as a surprise. I'm going to have a lot of fun writing her frustration bahaha.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Francesca_Moody — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:10:34 +0100

Photokinetic, hmm, I like the sound of that. I might have do a bit of research on that to see if she fits the classification or if I can tweak my world's science laws haha.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Dudeinapinkshirt — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:16:57 +0100

This is my first NaNoWriMo, and I'll be donning the spandex mantle and writing what is, hopefully, a tight superhero yarn. My story takes place in the not-too-distant future, after an event called the Power Surge, wherein overnight every man, woman and child on Earth was suddenly granted a superpower, by means as yet unknown to them. Sudden chaos erupted as, across the globe, men and women now granted with miraculous power began committing crimes, waging wars, forming vigilante groups, fighting against former governments, and letting the darker side of their natures, brought to light by their powers, emerge. Nine years later, parts of the world have gained some semblance of order. In America and other former first-world nations, local city governments have been able to organize militias of the most powerful Talents [the term in my universe for superheroes] available, and uneasy peace is restored. Top among the Talented is Carroll, a psychic with the power to project his consciousness into any organic structure. Working as a "Talent Scout" (read: detective) for Chicago's elite Superhuman Intelligence Force, he is tasked with scouting out potential threats to the reestablished civil order. Sent on a routine scout mission into a power plant hijacked by third-rate "supervillains," Carroll arrives to find the threat terminated, and the would-be terrorists horrifically murdered. What's more, among their mangled ranks he finds a corpse which looks identical to his own, living body. From here the story will spiral into a whirlwind of intrigue, mystery, and superpowered goodness as Carroll searches to uncover the mysteries behind this and other mysterious incidents around the globe. Readers who stick with me will be led through Cambodian jungles filled with living tree-men superheroes, under the ocean to the abode of a subterranean race of squid people, and to space itself as Carroll matches wits with an enigmatic murderer known only as "The Sun King." Through it all, he will search for the secret to saving humanity from an impending evil, and discover the cause of the mysterious Power Surge which has so affected and afflicted the world. * * * Thus far I have a really solid working knowledge of how want the plot to go, I know how I want the mystery to work out, I know what I want the villains to be like and what powers they should have, and I have a good grasp of Carroll's character and the personalities of the other main characters. What I'm having trouble with is thinking up really unique powers and Talent names for some of the minor characters. I want to make the distribution of superpowers really random, where some people have Superman-like ultra abilities, whereas others have really stupid or useless powers, like being able to convert any solid object into mayonnaise or something. Finding clever powers for background characters is giving me some trouble.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Dudeinapinkshirt — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:40:28 +0100

This sounds neat. Is it set in the modern day, or is it set in a previous time period (Victorian age, maybe?). "The dawn of superpowered people on Earth" is a very intriguing phrase, and I'd be interested in seeing what it implies in your story.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 17:15:15 +0100

That sounds awesome and groovy. I would love to read it when you finish it. Good luck! Some stupid powers, eh? Well how about someone who can change the temperature of objects, meaning that he can boil water or keep it icy cold, or heat up leftovers, but he has to be touching the object. Or a real super power that vaguely exists, they can see numbers in colors. I think it's called synthesism or something like that. It's a strange thing where numbers, letters, or emotions are seen as colors, and I am not meaning seeing auras. Like when a person looks at the number one on a piece of paper, it shows up as a color. It's a bit difficult to explain and I could be doing a terrible job at it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Selene98 — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 19:12:41 +0100

I'm planning on trying my hand at a superhero story this year. The basic idea is that the world knows about people with superpowers, and there re two major rival colleges that teach people with powers how to use them. One is for Heroes and the other for Villains. My MC wants to be a good guy, but he pretty much stinks at being good. So he's going to the Villain college on scholarship. It's pretty much his college life, falling in love, trying to pass Into to Mad Science, and dealing with being given an arch-enemy that should have probably been a Villain.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 19:52:49 +0100

Looking for some support here, am I the only one who can come up with the hero's real name, his entire circle, his backstory, and yet suck donkey at inventing his enemies and choosing a public name for his heroing? Nick's original concept has his heroing identity as the "Night Stalker." I kinda sorta don't like it, but I have a tendency to suck at coming up with supernames at times. Hit some generators and the only real good option I got was "Xenoclad" almost everything else was in something-person format I definitely didn't want. Opinions?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Haselnuth — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 21:23:17 +0100

What are your superhero's powers? How did he get them? Maybe if you share a bit of him, we can help better to find a name. Also this might help you: http://www.superheronation.com/2007/10/15/character-naming-superheroes-and-otherwise/ They have some awesome resources for writing superheroes, powers, etc.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

ClueBadger24601 — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 22:12:48 +0100

I have the same problem, but this site looks helpful!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Zinnith — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 08:57:25 +0100

In your stories, are there fictional superheroes as well as real ones? Do people read comic books about Superman and Spiderman? Are you making this a part of the story? Or are you taking the Watchmen road where another genre has taken the place of superhero stories because superheroes exist in the real world? My MC:s best friend is a massive nerd who loves comic books. I'm planning to use this to lighten up the story with her constantly referencing her fictional heroes to take the edge off the dark and tortured brooding the rest of the characters are so fond of. It's hard to be properly angsty when someone just compared you to Batman and suggested you make your sidekicks wear short shorts and pixie boots. Then again, my heroes aren't the cape-and-spandex type, just people with powers.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Haselnuth — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 09:48:40 +0100

My superhero was a massive fan of superhero comics when he was a child. That was what brought him to do it (as he doesn't have any superpower himself). Though I'm not sure how much I will include, as I'm not a superhero comic reader. I usually only know the movies and some of the comics (shame on me). My MC is rather obsessed with the real superhero,but might also like the comic. Or maybe rather the movies XD

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

ClueBadger24601 — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 12:19:58 +0100

In my world, superpowers have been around for a long time (For example, my MC opens the story by talking about a Roman Gladiator that once ripped seven people in half... superstrength ftw), but for a lot of history they were considered witches/demons/whatever. After superheros and comics became... well, not mainstream, but at least fairly common, people born with superpowers started going public. Of course, there's also a lot of resentment toward non-supers from some parts of the super community, which is where a lot of the villains come from. There are comics about fictional superheros (not specific ones, because I don't want this accidentally veering into fanfic territory, which I could see myself doing), but there's also fictionalized accounts of real superheros. Since saving the world from alien invasions and crazed maniacs doesn't exactly draw a salary, a lot of heros license their image and draw income that way. Also, comics in my world are a lot more mainstream. Since the superheros are real, people treat them a lot like celebrities (hence the secret identities). There are still nerds, of course. Nerds are the ones that read about the fictional superheros. I could go on (I've spent a lot of time thinking about this), but this post is already long enough that no one's going to bother reading it. XD

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Dudeinapinkshirt — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 12:58:35 +0100

I like both of those; thank you for your answer. The wanted to include a younger male child with superpowers at one point in the story, and I think I'll attach the temperature change power to him. Unless you object, I think I'll have him have "Psychic Kid" as his Talent show name, both as tribute to you for thinking up the idea, and because I had not yet thought up what to call him other than his Muggle name (Marcus). Thanks again!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Dudeinapinkshirt — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 13:04:48 +0100

My story chronicles the real world (or, my own fictionalized version of the real world) suddenly being cataclysmically changed, wherein all persons are granted some powers. As such, I'm planning on retaining all the normal elements of modern life where they fit into the story. So my universe will technically have superhero comics, but I haven't yet decided whether any of the characters will or will not read them or regularly reference them. I guess that's just something I'll have to wait on the Muses to tell me.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Dudeinapinkshirt — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 13:42:38 +0100

In terms of your character you mentioned above, Nick de Comte, based on what you've mentioned thus far, I think it could go one of several different ways, all of which are contingent upon his personality and personal style. As a "Superman-esque" superhero (which I presume means he dedicates himself to selflessly saving others) reliant mainly on his mount and his technology, it would make sense for his superhero name to reference one of the three elements of being a savior, using advanced technology, or having access to a cool-sounding ally called Destroyer. Thus, various possibilities arise when you consider whether Nick is the type of person who is: 1) Really intelligent or serious. If intelligence is his main personality focus, it would make sense to play off the technology angle (since that, more than the other two angles, would lend itself to some more highfalutin' words). For instance, as both an alien and a technologist, he could call himself Xenotech, linguistically connoting his foreignness and his use of technology. However, if you wanted to promote one of the other angles, he could call himself something like Shiva (the Hindu deity personifying destruction, which would play on Destroyer's name). 2) Sardonic or humorous. If he is down to earth and funny, he could choose a fun, funny or silly name, such as something like Sputnick (to play off his technology focus and the fact that he's not from this world) or Comte Anansi (as a play on Compe Anansi, the mischievous and funny spider god, with "Compe" roughly translating to "companion" or "comrade," referencing the fact that he's always with his comrade Destroyer). 3) Normal or a Boy Scout/goody-two-shoes. Honestly, the only type of names coming to me for this category are the ones that end in "man," so either I'm just not being very clever or this might be the hardest personality facet to name-cover without falling into the traditional "man" names. Anyway, hopefully some of that helps you out in some way. I look forward to seeing what you do with Nick and Destroyer!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

MissAngelAdorer — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 19:18:08 +0100

I'm not doing it for Nano since I already started but I'm doing a rewrite of my first story. It's a young adult superhero/coming of age story about a girl named Haley, a Marvel and DC comic book fan who lives in a world where superpowers exist but are rare, and people do wear tights to commit or stop crimes. Everybody who does this has a secret identity, an important plot point. But nobody calls them "heroes" or "villains," because it sounds too much like fiction. Everybody calls them costumes or capes. While at the general store in July, Haley nearly gets killed by some lava (long story) but is saved by a costume named Arctana and she decides she wants to be part of the "costume community." Like any superhero story there's some resentment of that part of town. That's the prologue. The rest of the story is set during her school year where her school gets attacked and she realizes someone at her school must be a costume so she tries to solve the mystery. Soon after, she discovers the secret identities of two of her heroic classmates, Clara Fernandez and Patrick . . . something. I'm still deciding. She makes Clara let her help solve the mystery, but along the way she comes to find that things aren't so black and white (even if she technically knew that from reading comics) but that costumes, even the "heroic" types have shades of gray and that powers don't really make the hero. I know, lame and uninspiring idea.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 22:29:51 +0100

He's not quite as selfless as Superman, I'm mainly taking the backstory and tweaking it, and how that would change the circumstances of the hero, like the fact that INS and ICE are going to be a problem for him since his human identity is a little bit fuzzy on legalities like paperwork, since he got here as an adult. Though he eventually lands a job as a wealthy businesswoman's personal assistant. Nick is going to start out pretty serious and get less so as he adapts to Earth, but he sees humans with a sort of superior amusement that he generally hides. At times he's going to be struggling between his duty as a Rishan soldier who is supposed to be reconning Earth for invasion and having gotten to like us backward and naive people. The fact that the rest of his squad died soon after landing and he has no working way to call home help with that. For powers, he's mostly dependent on the Rishan military technology he came here with; energy-based infantry weapons like rifle and handgun, with additional energy weapons built into his powered armor. Without his hardware, the only advantage he has on humans is breathing nitrogen from the 78% of it in our atmosphere, makes a general strength and stamina advantage. The oxygen in our air is a toxin, but he's adapted to that, breathing before they were adapted killed the other soldiers that landed with him. He's got a decent adaptive ability superpower, really only will come up at the very beginning of the story. Destroyer is in the size range of something like an elephant, completely armored and can eat anything from plants to meat to junkyard metal, I figure that he'd be engineered that way as part of being a cavalry beast for the tip of the spear. Superhero comics definitely exist, Nick complains that out in the real galaxy a race like the Kryptonians would simply wipe out humanity and take the planet because they gain superpowers here. He also thinks Independence Day is a stupid movie.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

ClueBadger24601 — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 11:37:22 +0100

It's not lame and uninspiring unless you make it that way! As long as you love what you're writing, it'll turn out just fine. ;) I mean, I'm doing a superhero high school plot (I know, gag me, it's been done to death), but I don't care because it's going to be fun to write!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Francesca_Moody — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 14:56:25 +0100

I agree with ClueBadger. No idea is really new, it's the author that brings something different to the table. It's the author who really makes the story. I'm doing a hero in high school story as well, covering her discovery and first big villain. However, I can guarantee that the two will be night and day, they already sound that way. A story is only lame and uninspiring if the writer makes it that way. Be proud of your story and don't ever say it's lame and uninspiring because then it might fall prey to the dreaded GRAVEYARD OF STORIES!!! (ghostly howling oOohh)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

MissAngelAdorer — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 15:01:19 +0100

Thanks, both of you. I'll keep it in mind. So far despite it being a rewrite I've made major changes and am writing in the first-person present tense, neither of which I write in much, so it's a challenge. But . . . it's FUN. I love writing it. I'm on the fifth chapter and the more I write Haley and her world, the more I love it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

KelinciHutan — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 15:58:49 +0100

I really like this. It's got sort of a Sky High meets Megamind sound to it, plotwise, and some glorious internally-conflicted sounding bits to it characterwise. So basically, awesome.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 18:45:28 +0100

Well I just spend a couple of hours exploring Superhero Nation, and I have some new insights for Nick's character, and I'm trying to make my tech details for his equipment. I'm adding a little problem with fuel cells as a limiter, and difficulty in re-charging and replacing them here on Earth. Which is the primary reason his day job is as the personal assistant for tech millionaire businesswoman Jordan Harris, it gives him access to Harris Industries for equipment. And I've mentally tweaked his boss Jordan's personality, she's still a hard-charging self-made millionaire businesswoman, but I've thrown some weekend party-hard on top of it. This was inspired by: Who else has seen the new Avengers movie trailer? Looks like it'll be good, even though God only knows when it'll be at the theater here in Italy. Has anybody decided who if anyone knows their hero's secret identity if he has one? Jordan will eventually, at first she knows Atlal and about his mission and the Rishan Empire, she won't find out until later that he's also her put-upon personal assistant. I think I can easily do this without forcing Jordan to be stupid, which she definitely isn't.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 20:17:03 +0100

Oh yeah, I would like my story to be kinda like a deconstruction of superhero stories, so there is going to be many references to DC and Marvel heroes. Like Zinnith, I want to use the the knowledge of fictional superheroes as kind of a comic relief. After all, my MC yearns to date a superhero and his roommate warns him, mentioning that most lovers of superheroes get kidnapped and sometimes killed. Fun times.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DKazemi — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 20:52:34 +0100

LOL Yeah that site will suck up your time. I am also planning on writing a super novel. My heroes are not dark. They are the lighter versions like the early days. Still do not have a clear plot... might have to throw in some robots. My characters are all ready. :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Selene98 — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 23:28:40 +0100

Sky High was very much an influence on the original idea I had many years ago. Though I'm hoping to capture the idea in a new way. And I hadn't even thought of Megamind, but yes. Similar in that too. Glad you like the idea! :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

mistyzeo — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 01:39:57 +0100

Ahaha, this sounds brilliant!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

mistyzeo — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 01:43:58 +0100

I've got gay superheroes! The hero is hiring a sidekick to help him take on his nemesis, but is secretly going to use him as bait. Then he accidentally fucks the sidekick during the training, and feelings get complicated, but just as he's having second thoughts about his rather unethical use of a human being the nemesis makes the move he was hoping to force, and the hero has to save the sidekick after all.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 03:35:03 +0100

Wow, that sounds awesome! The only way I can see this working out is if the super hero has questionable means of dealing with villains or he is at the end of his rope and this is the only logical way to end the nemesis's evil ways. Interesting, though, regardless. Is the superhero out of the closet or is this is first gay encounter?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Zinnith — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 07:40:49 +0100

I think I have to check out Superhero Nation. Looks interesting... My heores don't have secret identities as such even though most people with superpowers try to keep them secret. The only people who knows about my MC Theo's powers as the novel starts are his mom and his best friend and roommate Prue. I suppose you could say that he does have sort of a secret identity at first, even if it only consists of a black sweatshirt and a ski mask... (OMG, the Avengers trailer! Steve and Tony butting heads! Hawkeye! I've lost count of how many times I've watched it already! I want it to be May NOW!)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Darkmagyk — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 05:29:36 +0100

Just found this thread and it makes me happy, I've never written adventure before for NaNo so I didn't know if anyone else did superhero stuff. I'm very glad I am not alone. In mine, Superheroes and the corresponding villains have been around for about fifty years( 49 to be exact, the first two: Savior and Nightwatch, who are basically Superman and Batman showed up in 1961 and the story takes place in 2010) There's been Pantheon (basically JLA or The Avengers, who showed up in the 60s) and The Enemies of Evil (Which was named in the silver age and was basically the Teen Titans and were very popular in the 70s and 80s) and the Dark Age happened with in the world, when a prominent hero supporter's (and Nightwatch's secret identity) family was attacked, with most of them killed by a group of super villains. They were tracked down by a group of younger and angry heroes, who killed them all and basically started the Dark age of Anti-Heroes(in 1996). There had always been rather strict laws about the heroes (like what civil rights they can't break, what is admissible in court, and how they can deal with non-powered villains and criminals) , and the Anti-Heroes led to some public out cry, thought they were all mostly stopped and are now serving 20 to life in various prisons. That is the back story and also isn't even really the half of it, but it's basically the world I'm setting everything in. The Plot is Basically that Victor Cross (Billionaire and the former hero Nightwatch) decides to create at team to get back to basics and show the world what heroing is really about. He creates The Enemies, named after the Enemies of Evil because they had all kinds of good press. They don't really do the cape and tights thing. They tend to where reinforced black outfits with easy mobility and some sort of emblem and sunglasses (though they were domino masks underneath encase the glasses fall off. They also don't use typical code names, instead they uses assumed first and last names. The team consists of an ex-marine turned Super Soldier who uses the name Uylesses Strong and gets called U.S. by the team. And Archeology PhD student who figured out how to use magic and is only on the team because it supports his eminence education costs and calls himself Arther Pendragon (though this might change, he's the only one whose name I don't like). Wendy, who is the daughter of a Speedster, she inherited his mind but not the rest of his speed, so as a result the world is on constant slow motion to her and she has a hard time interacting with the real world, she can't watch movies and stuff because she see's it frame by frame and the dialogue takes relative hours for her to listen to. She's an Engineering Masters student and uses her skills to make her gadgets but she also has a photographic memory because of her power, She goes by the name Sophia Scarlet. Harper-Jane is Diana Hunter and a second generation Archer, her father was in the original Enemies and his mentor and foster mother was in the Pantheon, she all so died right before Harper-Jane was born. Basically her father taught her everything one needed to know to be a superhero, but then was very against her becoming a hero. Then there is Lenora Mortals, a Badass Normal of the Batman school. She pretends to be the meek and damaged Daisy, but in reality she's Victor's Granddaughter Nora. Nora acts as the public face of the team and does administrative stuff. The they are trying to bring down an organized crime thing, but there is also a new kid, Robbie, trying to join the team, though he is doing it on the orders of his father who blames Victor for his families death and wants to ruin him. The big difference is that they aren't really normal, and aren't trying to be. They don't really have much of lives outside of heroing. The closest are U.S. (who is very happily married to Larry, who is in on the secret though he could care less about being involved) and Artie (whose life outside of the team consists of Academia. Wendy, Harper-Jane, and Nora were all raised in the life. They've never known anything else, they've never really thought about the idea of hiding there stuff from close friends and family, because they don't really have any close friends outside the team, there family is in the know as it were, and perhaps most importantly, they all know older heroes who went through the whole try to hide stuff from people for there own good and realized how much that did work. Basically they have 50 years of genre savvy on there side. It came about after my friend was talking about how she wished that the Status Quo wasn't God in comics and other superhero mediums because then you could see how they evolved over time. This is the result of that evolution. I could also go into detail about how people get there powers, how people with powers are treated, superhero children's education, the role of comic books in this world extra. But I've already written a lot, practice for November I guess

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Skeith — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 07:05:00 +0100

Darkmagyk: Wow. You've got a lot of interesting things going on. I like your history and such. Your speedster character was the one that interested me the most. I'm not sure if I'll write a superhero novel this year as yet (its fighting for the nano spot this year with two other ideas). Mine isn't fleshed out much, but the premise is that there was an Age of Heroes. Where all those caped crusaders flew through the air like gods stopping villainous acts. Like all superhero and villain relationships escalation happens. To the point that the after effects of a battle would leave the world and its citizens in torment. It all came to a head when a hero caused the deaths of 3 billion people. This caused such backlash in the world that heroes and villains alike were hunted down and executed. Now the world lives in the era of Hero End. That is till one is born. And so begins this person's strife of being the last hero. Well that's the gist. I wanted to call this 'No More Heroes', but that's already been taken. Maybe 'The Last Hero' or 'End All Heroes' instead if I decide to go this route for my novel.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

ClueBadger24601 — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 11:09:06 +0100

Just curious, does anyone think their story fits into an 'age' of comics (e.g. golden age- 1940s, silver age, 1970s, dark age, 1990s, etc)? I usually like writing silver age stories (over the top characters, lots of exclamation points), but my story this year uses so many tropes of today's comics, it is definitely modern aged.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

FlameRaven — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 14:24:04 +0100

Count me in for the superheroes. Well, at least for the superpowers part. My MC is a technopath who gets into some trouble when her powers manifest in the middle of an experiment, creating nanobots that give her advanced healing abilities. Unfortunately they also erase part of her memory, so she's found in a destroyed lab with no injuries and no idea what happened. She was the only one in the lab that night, so everyone concludes she's responsible and is just lying when she says she doesn't remember what happened. She ends up getting recruited into an Academy for similarly powered people when the corporation that runs it strikes a deal with her school: they'll pay for the property damage and medical bills if the school drops the charges against the MC. Unfortunately the Academy is more like Xavier's school if it was run by Aperture science, so this works out very poorly. They want to use her powers for all kinds of evil plots. She then has to break out of the Academy and keep them from taking her back.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

MissAngelAdorer — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 14:52:38 +0100

Mine is a mix of silver and modern age, I think. Never read any golden age stories so I wouldn't know.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DKazemi — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 15:05:42 +0100

Great - discovered the cons of using a phone on here. Problems responding to posts. Meh, could be worse. Anyway, I think my characters fall under the umbrella of the golden age. Back when heroes were solid, upstanding citizens and were saving the world from villains. Maybe with a bit of the silver age. No chromatic age. No Watchman-esque stuff going on either.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Darkmagyk — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 16:50:13 +0100

Mine exists in the self styled "Shadow Age" (that's actually the title, Mortal Enemies: The Shadow Age) The idea is that with in the world of the stories, the different ages existed. Golden Age 1961-1971 (the original heroes) Silver Age 1971-1982 (This is when sidekicks show up everyone and his brother decides he wants to be a villain, but it's more because it's fun and less about crime) Bronze Age 1982-1996 (when sidekicks grew up and becoming a villain for fun fell out of fashion after one to many jail sentences) Dark Age 1996-2004 ( a group of villains killed a well respected family, and a group of younger heroes killed them and then a bunch of heroes jumped off the deep end.) the Shadow age is basically when all the heroes are Shadows of the greatness that came before.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 22:28:39 +0100

http://www.cityofsupers.com/HeroMachine1.0.1/ It's a pretty limited tool, but for those of us *raises hand* with little artistic skill, it can help with a general concept of what our heroes look like. Wasn't perfect, but I put together a pretty good picture of Nick in full armor with his weapons. And just a general thing here, how reasonable do you think this is? I've got a scene in mind where Jordan first gets suspicious of her personal assistant when she sees Night Stalker remove his gauntlets to type at a computer while fixing something on Destroyer's mechanical side. Now, his armor is completely covering, so I'm thinking any bare skin she gets to see she'd remember. Then she sees her PA Nick de Comte typing at his desk in the office, and thinks that his hands look oddly familiar. Reasonable? Fingerprints aside, hands are fairly unique in appearance between people, right?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Darkmagyk — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 22:59:28 +0100

Maybe if his hands had something distinctive on his hand, a scar, a ring, a tattoo, a discolored nail. Maybe it's just me, but I can't really tell hands apart on there own. I just think that would make the connection clearer. That being said, I know one of my characters would be able to remember that, but she has a photographic memory because of her powers, and even my hyper aware detectives and super soldier with enhanced eye sight wouldn't be able to do it after one time. So Jordan has an ability to justify it, they I think it would work.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

ClueBadger24601 — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 01:18:00 +0100

Most hands, no, probably not. But then you have weird hands (lol, like how many start bleeding every November and don't stop until March!) that are definitely recognizable. But I think that even if you make his hands recognizable in some way, readers might think it feels a little forced.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

FlameRaven — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 02:14:13 +0100

My story is definitely set in the same world as fictional superheroes. My MC is probably almost guaranteed to make some kind of remark about Wolverine, given the nature of her abilities. (She has super-healing, but unfortunately no metal skeleton, so broken bones definitely slow her down.) I don't think any 'real' superheroes exist in the setting, just people with powers-- and I think most of those are trained for covert ops or villainry instead of heroism.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Entity_TK — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 03:40:24 +0100

Your MC is named Theo? Wow. That's the nickname of one of my lead protagonists in the first book of my series. Only, the Theo in Unbound Saga is a woman. <_< My series, as I have mentioned in other topics through this forum, is called the Unbound Saga. I wrote book 9 last year when it was number five of five (now of thirteen). I wrote half of book 1 this past August as a warm-up. I had come up with the initial idea behind the first installment back in late 2006 while I was playing City of Villains/Heroes. The idea was to try to tackle the issue behind identifying good, evil, and everything in between... and trying to figure out who decides these things. It's safe to say that idea grew. And I'm writing the second installment come this November. The Unbound Saga gets its name from the superpower system I developed for the whole series. Superpowered beings are called Unbounds, whereas everyone without access to powers are referred to as Held. When an Unbound dies, then within a week a Held will be Delivered and become an Unbound with access to powers within the same family of powers. Alternatively, some powers can be inherited through family blood, and the Unbounds who develop from this are more likely to have the same power as the parent they inherited their powers from. The Held do outnumber the Unbound, and everyone on [the presently unnamed planet] lives side by side barring only regional cultures or beliefs. I am still in the process of breaking down the power families. The MC of book #2 (Issue Arcs and Sagas) and her sister each inherited the same blood family power, but they also Delivered to find access to additional powers of separate power families. They are a rare breed for having both inherited and Delivered powers. Sara/Phane (IAaS main character and recurring character through the series) is the surviving sister as of the end of "Issue X," and she is left with the increasingly difficult task of saving the broken city of Lake Lekree and the rest of the world while a major plot reveals itself. Meanwhile, her sister's Delivered powers have awakened within someone else close to Sara. It is up to them, an amnesiac werewolf, and a former guard and bookkeeper of a casino are all that stand between a single organization bent on world domination, and the potential destruction of the whole world. Meanwhile, the gang wars and power struggles in and around Lake Lekree have hit an all-time high. All sorts of superpowers clash with one another just as much they do with the Held.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

RedRen — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 14:29:11 +0100

my superhero novel completely threw out my steampunk novel MC is an "amnesiac" that decides to join United Power, te elite hero force in the U.S. His trainer notices some wierd similarities between MC and the trainer's dead partner and lover, who was female. Turns out that when his partner died a horribly violent death, another unknown super came in and regenerated her, but the super's powers work by creating more of what is there, and the dead partner had blood of the villain on her. MC was created as the technical son of the villain and partner via the mingling of DNA. He can't remember anything of his "mother"s life, and therefor is "born" an "amnesiac" (wow that a lot of quotations). It is then revealed that the villain had done all that to get to the super with regenerative powers, and just one giant ball of wibbly wobbly, timey wimey this is going to be fun

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Frenzy — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 17:13:27 +0100

All these superhero plots sound so good! Kinda makes me not wanna say what mine is... So here it is: Melissa Cole used to be a good girl and, like everyone, she always wanted to be a superhero. But little did she know that her father was a dangerous super villain and when her favourite superhero team, everyone's favourite superhero team, "The Team" (Working name :D) killed her father, she developed a strong hatred towards them. Being a fairly strong telekinetic, she trained hard to make her powers stronger so that she could eliminate each and every member or The Team. And as luck had it, she had a son, Kevin, who grew up to be a power negator; all she had to do was brainwash her son into believing that The Team were bad people and had to die. She took him along with him when she went to kill them, so that he could block their powers. She had managed to kill all of them... But times can change. Taylor "Ty" Ashley-Curtis is the daughter of two of the most well known superhero's in the world, Erin Ashley and Damon Curtis. She didn't know her father, as he was killed when she was a just a baby. She'd been on the run with her mother her whole life because her mother's superhero team, "The Team" we're being eliminated one by one and her mother was the only one left. Eventually though, the killer caught up with them and, right in front of Taylor's eyes, killed her mother. Taylor would've died too, that's if her powers hadn't chosen that particular moment to come out, and the instant they pulled the trigger, the crying twelve year old found herself in an alleyway miles and miles away from home; and years away from her time. She realised that she had time travelled to the past and upon arrival in this new time period, she was "greeted" by an unexpected acquaintance whom she knew from her own time. Robbie Cartwright; a member of The Team who could morph into birds. He looked far younger, in fact, they we're the same age as each other. This gave Ty an idea. She set out forming The Team earlier than they normally would have been formed if she didn't intervene. Getting Robbie was easy, since he was homeless. This was all part of her plan to get revenge on Melissa, who in this time, hasn't done a thing wrong. Now that she's found all the members of The Team, all she has to do is convince them that they'll become one of the best vigilante team to date; convince them that their powers will become stronger than they are now, and of course, she has to get them to trust each other, as well as herself. But there's one question that has been gnawing at her the second she came up with the plan. When the time comes, can she kill someone who she knows killed... will kill her parents, but hasn't done anything wrong yet? Feel free to point out how bad this is. :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

MartianMenace — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 00:53:37 +0100

Can having a family curse make one a superhero? My MC is cursed to "Live In Interesting Times" and go wherever trouble is about to occur. The curse also gives her a knack for saving herself and others. It's not exactly what one would call a superpower. She does have a magic katana, but doesn't have any talent for magic (her strong suit is causing explosions). But if being a schoolteacher doesn't require Supra-normal abilities, I don't know what does!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

soniclaugh — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 03:35:19 +0100

This reminds me of Dr. Horrible, ever see that movie? :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

soniclaugh — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 03:37:05 +0100

Two of my heroes are gay too! They're not the main characters, but they're pretty important.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

soniclaugh — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 03:56:38 +0100

I'm writing a Superhero novel too! I guess I wouldn't be posting here if I wasn't... Anyway, the plot goes a little like this: Maelstrom is a hero on the verge of retirement. He's 51 and ready to let the next generation take over. The only problem is that the next generation of heroes doesn't look very hopeful. That and the government won't let him quit. While dealing with his desire to retire and put all this crime-fighting behind him, he's having problems on his own team. First off, they took away his position as Leader, then they put a young women named Tempest (who's a bit sadistic) in charge. Then the government gives him "interns", Primavera and Timespan, inapt supers who can't control their powers yet, and a member of his team, Zephyr falls off the face of the earth. And that's not the end, there's a new team of villains, they call themselves the Army, who are destroying cities faster than the heroes can protect them and what's worse is that their leader thinks it's all for the greater good. And the final scoop on the ice cream sundae of misery that is his career as a superhero, his arch-nemesis, the Guardian, returns from a five-year leave with more plans to take over the world. Meanwhile, another superhero team down in New Orleans is having problems of their own. The leader, the King, is distant and dealing with his own ghosts. The Queen is obsessed with how she looks rather than protecting the city in turmoil from the villain known as the Jester. The Princess has gone missing and the Prince is going through puberty. They can hardly help Maelstrom when they can't even keep their own team together. In yet another city with another team of heroes, are the Angels. L.A. hasn't had a major crime in years. There were a few robberies, vandalism, but no super villains, no giant robots, nothing. No one can figure out why, though I'm sure that the "heroes" Dreamer and the Magician could tell you. While they keep their secrets, the brothers Fight and Flight try to maintain their status as heroes, although they are fading. Birthday parties for the rich, red carpet premiers, but no protecting the city. The final group, and the most hated among the other heroes, is the group in Austin. They don't have a name, they don't even have secret identities. They're progressive, or so they say. They protect their city without costumes or gimmicks. Ricky, their died-haired leader, insists that her group should get the respect they deserve since they do help. In fact, when Maelstrom sends out a call for assistance, the only ones who come running are Darren and Issac. So there you have it. I could go into the villain's storylines too, but I don't want to bore you.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

SammyWa — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 03:02:20 +0100

o_o I love you all. Seriously. My novel is based around a group roleplay that spawned ona website about four years ago. It didn't get far but I stayed in contact with one of my fellow writers over the years. We took our characters from that roleplay and re-vamped them into our own creations. ( I have full permission from said writer to use his character in my novel. All other characters from the group roleplay will be changed though. ) - - - - Anaris Kingsley was born with wings. Beautiful angelic wings that made most envious. Upon her fifth birthday, she discovered her ability to control the electrical current within her own body. In other words, she could manipulate electricity. Her parents feared for their daughter's life so they sent her away to an Academy in a large city called Eden. At the Academy, Anaris is trained to use her powers for good and just before her eighteenth birthday, she is given a test in order to join an elite group of heroes; The Guardians. In that group she met the love of her life, Ellian. Or so she thought. There was another there that caught her attention in a way that no one else had. Nicolae was everything she had never wanted in a man but Ellian was the one that made her heart flutter. The Guardians spent three years together keeping Eden safe from evil. Anaris was living a near perfect life until Nicolae went missing. Six months later, he returned and he was far from the man that she once knew. He was vicious and ruthless, a good man turned evil. The Guardians fought him with everything they had but no one was able to defeat him. Nicolae burned off Anaris's wings during the fight, leaving scars over her back that would never fade. It was Ellian who finally defeated Nicolae. Anaris left Eden the day after the fight and she never returned. Four years later, Anaris is now known simply as Ana. She has changed everything about herself in order to keep her old identity hidden. Everything is going great in Century City ( my books version of Gotham ) until a new "hero" appears out of nowhere. Darkane, a shadow manipulator, knows just how to push Ana's buttons and he does it often. Ana hates him with every fiber of being but there is something about him that she just can't ignore. He seems to know so much about her despite never meeting her before. Just as Ana finds herself starting to trust Darkane, a new evil shows up. Hatter is a multi-millionaire with an agenda. He is creating his own meta humans in order to get rid of Darkane and Volte ( Ana ). With them out of the way, he can rule the city and let his lab created meta humans run free. Its up to Volte and Darkane to stop him but a person from Volte's past shows up and brings with him a hellstorm... - - - - So... Would anyone read it?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

woebegone121 — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 03:13:46 +0100

Apparently, I'm writing superheroes. My MC is Elle, and I don't know if she'll actually have any powers. I know her love interests are Phoenix, who moonlights as Darkthorne, the ambiguous anti-hero/possibly-villain, and Drake, who is White Wing (as of right now, it's not my favorite name). And my villain is a little old guy in a nursing home, who brainwashes all of the other little old people in the nursing home to be his minions. And that's all I got right now.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Ronka — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 03:31:51 +0100

Another superhero writer here! It's a YA superhero story, teen protag. I got the idea one night while I was failing to sleep (which is where most of my ideas come from). I saw a kid running from his hero, and my first thought what, "What if Batman were hunting Tim Drake? What would happen? Why would it happen?" I gave it some thought, originalized it a bit, and now I have my Nano plot. Cliff "Hanger" is cocky, self-assured, and has serious superhero-worship. His dream is to join the elite superteam The Order. After he saving his school from a supervillain attack, that dream comes true, and Cliff joins The Order's junior league. But when one of his new teammates dies in action, Cliff learns superheroing isn't as cheery as he thought... and the more he learns about his teammate's death, the more true that becomes... Wow, that was a terrible summary. Basically: "Kid joins superteam; discovers conspiracy; fights from evil heroes; saves world."

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:08:04 +0100

That sounds amazing, I would definitely read that. My only advice is to be careful with time travel cause it gets sticky there. You want to make sure that Ty is still born or else she would never be able to travel back in time. I love anything with time travel so this looks awesome!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

kcde — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:19:15 +0100

I'm not writing a superhero novel but I just wanted to stop by and say I wish I was half as cool as all you guys that are writing superhero novels.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:24:34 +0100

Oh fellow superhero writers, I call upon your assistance! I need help naming my Super hero. She has...bug powers..... More specifically is that she can lift ten times her own weight (like an ant), has a rapier like a stinger, jump really high in the air (like a grasshopper), has hornet-like wings, antennas, and an exoskeleton. She goes around the city and fights aliens and monsters and stuff. Some ideas that I had but aren't very good: Bug Girl and Insectia. If you guys have any ideas, that would be great. I already read the Superhero Nation site for ideas for names. It helped in me deciding not to go with Bug Girl. Any ideas?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

animenut2020 — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:50:31 +0100

What works for me when I base a character's powers on something, is to research it. Research Insects. The phylum Arthropoda or the subphylum Hexapoda could make very interesting and relevant names for your heroine. I once had a hero who could create his own exoskeleton named Thorax. Go find a website about bugs and spend an hour on there. I'm sure you'll come away with a few names that interest you.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Darkmagyk — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 05:59:07 +0100

Depending on her personality and how she feels about her powers, she might name herself after a bug, even though her powers are kind of a grab bag. If she's more tough or something, maybe Hornet, or if she's more of a girly girl, maybe something like Dragon Fly. Other ideas, just thoughts about a bug themed hero: Stinger, Stingerette, Flutter, Buzz, Bug-Bite (for a sarcastic snarky kind of girl) I like her powers, and monsters and aliens, so you idea sounds really cool to me

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

SparkyDorian — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 16:34:50 +0100

Yep! Ah, I adore Doctor Horrible. It's so sad though...

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Captain_Emily — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 17:43:47 +0100

I'm writing a superhero novel this year! My FMC is a kindergarten teacher named Jack. She discovers that she's invulnerable when she's walking home from a date, gets hit by a semi, and walks away uninjured The other important superhero is my speedster MMC, sent to recruit Jack. In my world, metahumans were once largely accepted. But then Paragon, the most famous and powerful hero of them all--got cocky and messed up. People died. Lots of people. A large anti-metahuman movement sprang up and the government stepped in, regulating and controlling the superhero teams.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Write_For_Absolution — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 19:36:35 +0100

I’m also writing a superhero story! It is about earth where the majority of people have powers. In 2020 a powerful meteor storm like none other hit around the earth. This storm caused sea levels to rise and physically split countries apart making earth practically unrecognisable. It was not until around 2023 that people started to notice children who were conceived after the meteor storm were developing weird abilities – super powers. The story is set in 2090 when life prior to super powers is all but forgotten. Super heroes and villains are practically at war against each other, each side having their own ‘safe holds’. The villains have the Akuma Isles or the Demon Isles where Japan used to be which is made up of seven islands and the heroes having the Risen City, which is more of the size of a small country, in what used to be America. It is called the Risen City as the land it is built on is much higher than the ground surrounding it and even has a mote around it. The rest of the world is mostly neutral, though some other places do have alignments. Crime is also very high and still on the rise, even with the heroes best efforts. There are many super hero and villain groups though the main and most powerful two are League of Silver and the Church of Charlatans. The story is about MC Lia Cook –better known by her alias Fulgur- who is one of the best super villains. However, in 2088 she vanished. While it made the League of Silver a bit uneasy, they celebrated. Now a new evil has arisen and the league realise it is connected to Fulgur, but that Fulgur does not know about it. With the realization dawning upon them that they need Fulgur’s help to stop this new evil, two of their best –Ice and Cloud- are sent to find and negotiate with her. With the help of Ire they manage to persuade Fulgur help them after an attempt on her life is made. But before any of them can register what’s going on, they are thrown into an evil plot of mutated lizard men, murderous strippers, sewer monsters, underground cage fighting and explosions. Sorry about the rubbish summary, hopefully it will turn out better than it sounds. I got the idea after playing City of Heroes for the first time a few days ago, and this idea quickly throughout my old idea. Which was also about super heroes, as was the idea before that. It seems I am quite obsessed with them at the moment. The name Lia Cook is probably going to change. What do you guys think of it? Sound any good?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

soniclaugh — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 05:06:22 +0100

Sounds good to me! I love it when the villain is actually the main character and I just love superhero stories in general. :) Just one question, does every is 2090 have superpowers or only certain people?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Write_For_Absolution — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 16:36:38 +0100

Thank you! I love it when villains are the main character as well, I find they’re more fun to read or write about. Most people in 2090 have super powers, though some people don’t. I guess it would be about 80% of the population have powers. Also I’ve written another summary, do you think this one sounds better? In 2020 a meteor storm like no other hit the whole of earth. Sea levels rose and countries physically split apart leaving the earth practically unrecognisable. Soon people began to notice that those conceived after the storm were developing unique abilities – super powers. Seventy years later, life prior to superpowers is all but forgotten and powers are common place. Heroes and villains are practically at war and this new earth is ridden with constantly rising crime. In this dangerous world Lia Cook – more commonly known by her alias Fulgur – is one of the best super villains in the world. But in 2088 she vanished. Her disappearance was largely celebrated, but in the top group of superheroes, the League of Silver, anxiety was spread. Now a new evil has arisen, and the league notices a connection with them and Fulgur. A connection Fulgur does not seem to know about. With the realisation dawning upon them that they will need Fulgur’s help to stop this new evil, two of the best heroes are sent to find and negotiate with Fulgur. But before anyone can register what’s going on, they are thrown into an evil plot of train fights, underground cage fights, gamblers, murderous strippers, lizard men, sewer monsters and most of all explosions.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

soniclaugh — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 18:04:40 +0100

Thanks! That made it clearer! It sounds really good to me. P.S. Sorry for the terrible grammar mistakes in my first post.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

tyches_echo — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 19:52:25 +0100

Have you read PS238? It's a comic about a school for super-powered children, and one of the kids is the son of two of the most famous and powerful heroes on the planet, so even though he has tested negative for every known power and has shown no indications of developing powers at all, his parents assume that he will and keep throwing him into dangerous situations hoping for them to spontaenously manifest. If you haven't read it, I'd definitely reccomend it, as it's a lot of fun (and available for free online!).

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Barnardine — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 00:46:19 +0100

I'm a superhero junky but I've never actually tried to write something. I think this NaNo is time. My idea has some satire to it.... I also just wrote my synopsis tonight, and it's about all I have figured out. I work better in NaNo when I figure things out as I go, though, so not concerned. Seaside City is the premier hotspot for super powered activity. It is not uncommon for superheroes and supervillains to be duking it out in every part of the city. With super powered fights there comes super powered destruction. That's where Lynn Carlson comes in. As an insurance investigator she is called in to assign liability when damage occurs. Insurance against super powered accidents is a big deal in Seaside City. Soon a law is passed holding superheroes and supervillians responsible for the damage that they cause. Lynn finds herself promoted to an Insurance Collector. Her job is to hunt down delinquent super powered individuals. With her new job Lynn finds her love life heating up as well. So what if he seems to have an active night life? Lynn loves her new job, but everything starts to become fishy when superheroes who cannot pay their fines are jailed. What does this mean? Who is behind the heavy levies facing our heroes? Will I ever stop asking questions? Read this novel and find out!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Lady September — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 20:17:48 +0100

I'm just going to butt in and compliment both of you on your awesome taste in movies.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Linara — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 05:07:21 +0100

I'd like to second that. Dr Horrible is pretty awesome.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Linara — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 05:20:00 +0100

Sounds like a pretty good plot. I really like the idea of an Insurance Collector for superheroes. I imagine that many superheroes have to try and get a lot of publicity in order to pay their bills, yeah?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Linara — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 05:37:45 +0100

My first Nano, and I'm a little nervous, but it's good to see that I'm far from the only person writing a superhero story. Well, I say superhero, but... The main characters were supposed to be Vengeant and Vainglorious, these completely insane vigilantes who were college roommates before they started going off their heads, but then things happened. Now my plot looks like this: Arcadia's vigilantes are strange people. You've got Vengeant and Vainglorious running around slaughtering 'bad guys', Blut and Eisen acting secretive and weird(er), and Argot taking a sign language class so he can communicate better with some of his coffee shop regulars. Then Ger stumbles into the whole thing, and while he's surprisingly cool with a bunch of crazy vigilantes running amok, guess who wants to be Arcadia's newest superhero? It should probably be mentioned that Ger is the main character now. Somehow. I suppose loss of innocence is a better plotline than 'psychopaths act like vigilantes, and there is a coffeeshop', but it's hard to tell. This story got completely out of hand when I started getting inspiration from T.S. Eliot poems. As for problems, I'm trying to justify having five vigilantes in one city - it seems very excessive, but the characters are all important. And no matter what I write, Vengeant and Vainglorious fight with flaming swords - that's another justification issue. How did they even get flaming swords in the first place? And what would such a odd group be called? Questions, questions...

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

mistyzeo — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 20:27:13 +0100

I think he'll be at the end of his rope, in a way: he's so used to being able to deal with villains on his own that one that manages to stay anonymous while still wreaking havoc just makes him nuts. As for the closet, I think he's out to himself but not out to the ~locals~ for publicity issues. So it might be one of his few deeper/more serious encounters. :D TWU WOVE.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

mistyzeo — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 23:32:32 +0100

Word! I'm a slash fanfic writer at heart; I just can't help it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

WonderlandPanda — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 23:53:42 +0100

I never realized that so many people wrote superhero stories! I'm taking a twist. You know how they have dark fairytale novels? Mine is a dark superhero story, where the powers they obtain lead to people slowly losing their minds. Where super stength leads to an inability for human contact and commanding dark forces leads to schizophrenia. It's been my baby and I'm excited. :) Summary: When The Toxin came, it changed everything. No one knew where it came from. No one could tell you why 45% of the world’s population slowly began to develop supernatural powers. All anyone knew was that suddenly there were Gifteds. Suddenly, there were people who could fly, control the elements, even look into your mind, like any superhero the movies portrayed. For awhile, it was thrilling, even perfect. For awhile, it was all the world had ever hoped for. But power has its price. Slowly, the Gifteds began to lose their minds. Completely stable people were driven insane by the side-effects of their abilities. As it turns out, there’s a reason superpowers only existed in comic books—the human body cannot support them in real life. With insanity, many Gifteds lost control and brought destruction on people who could not protect themselves. Countless innocent people die. The world became one of fear. Normal people feared the seemingly unavoidable mindlessness of their former heroes. Gifteds feared only themselves. In a world now grounded firmly in terror and isolation, four Gifteds cling together to form some sort of family. Candice is a self-abuser who uses her ability to control fire against herself more than others. Hugh can read people’s minds, but he is losing the ability to lock their thoughts out of his own. Abril’s visions of the future are getting harder to distinguish from reality. Kiernan can speak to creatures in the shadows that never stop whispering to him, and that no one else can hear. Now, the people want all Gifteds dead, and they’ll do anything to see that happen. For Kiernan, Candice, Hugh and Abril, there is only one mission: Stay together, stay alive, and, more than anything else, stay sane.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

mistyzeo — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 03:33:24 +0100

This sounds brilliant.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

AnarchyOpteryx — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 06:51:29 +0100

I've considered writing a superhero story of sorts. Actually, what I've been considering is taking superhero elements (costumes, rogues' galleries, justice leagues, that sort of thing) and applying the concept to an original fantasy universe. So, imagine if you had a Dungeons and Dragons setting like Forgotten Realms, but instead of typical adventuring parties that dressed in regular clothes and armor, you had heroes that adopted unique costumes and names to do their heroic deeds by. And instead of weird science, power-origin stories would be explained as magical phenomena, rather than radiation or whatever. ((and from there you could take the flipside, like a Doctor Strange analogue being a technological expert in the fantasy setting). It wouldn't be that stereotypical, since in my original worlds, I tend to bend towards a hybridization of archaic, modern, and futuristic aesthetics, rather than traditionally medieval ones. The only thing stopping me from actually writing this story is that I'm working on something else, but I may either integrate some of these ideas into that story, or do it at another time.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Papa Poe — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 11:05:30 +0100

Holy cape party, Batman! I had no idea there were so many superhero writers! They hardly ever seem to get literary treatment. Are you planning to make your Nanos into books, or use them as a guide to writing comics?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Papa Poe — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 11:13:14 +0100

Ha ha! Super insurance! Marvel and DC have had references to insurance schemes like this in some of their comics, Spiderman I know had one, boy scout that he is, but I love the twist of having the insurance scheme part of a dastardly plot! That will be so much fun to write!

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

haphazard — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 15:00:21 +0100

Um, here's a question, How do you know if you're writing a superhero story? It might seem like a stupid question, but I'm new at this :x

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

see_jack_write — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 15:13:58 +0100

Yep. Superheroes. I wrote about them post-retirement last year; this year I'm going back to do an origin story. Central plot of this year's is going to be these five people gradually coming together. It starts out with just two dudes - one who has powers but doesn't really use them much, one who has no powers but thinks it'd be very cool to be a superhero anyway - and one by one these other people (with powers) sort of fall in with them. They're all pretty street-level, very much 'average people who just happen to do some heroics in their free time', but as they get stronger and more famous, the bad guys start coming out of the woodwork, so they stay pretty busy.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

AnarchyOpteryx — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 05:21:54 +0100

I guess that gets into how you define a "superhero". The clear-cut things is: 1) Do the characters have superhuman abilities? (or at least superhuman work ethic and perfection) 2) Do they engage in heroics, often but not exclusively on a scale great than real-world costumes? 3) are there recurring villains, and team-ups between the universe's heroes? 4) Are there costumes? If yet to those, then that's basically Marvel and DC, and similar works. That's the traditional "Superhero" genre. Of course, you don't need all that, but then it starts to get fuzzier when you decide, "what is the difference between a superhero story, and a story with superhuman heroes?" Was Hercules a "superhero"? He has superhuman strength, fights monsters, has a nemesis, a sidekick, and you can even argue he had an iconic outfit as well. So yeah. Just like defining "fantasy" as a genre. It's a grey area.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

redsamurai — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 12:33:14 +0100

writing a type of comic type superhero set in my own made up city set in a England but one when super powers and super heroes/ villans are the norm and normal people have learnt to dealt with it lookign as it from the eyes of a new hero / villan as they enter the city and try to make a name for themselves and encounter both heroes and villans my Mc is in the mould of sliver samurai but he is i think going to be bad to the core, with a hidden motive and the hero - his opposite number has a secret linked histiry which i may bring out in the story or hint at.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

haphazard — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:26:41 +0100

Hm... let me try to answer those questions: 1) Yes. All humans in the world I'm writing in have one superhuman ability. 2) Yes and no. The main character rescues her brother but is also engaging in dubiously legal work as a loan shark thug. 3) Not at all. 4) Sort of -- the main character's superhuman ability is to "seem fitting wherever she goes to the point of being unnoticeable," so she wears clothes that seem fitting to the situation she's going into. There does however seem to be a recurring theme of using one's powers for good or evil, which is a particularly compelling issue for the main character because her powers can be so easily used for evil and not as easily used for good. That seems kind of like a superheroish theme, doesn't it? So... that doesn't really help at all in deciding, does it? ^^;

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Gargoylesama — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 22:31:11 +0100

Or possibly Soon I Will Be Invincible. A wonderful deconstruction of both heroes and villains, chapters alternate between a new hero and the villain.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Gargoylesama — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 22:54:00 +0100

I am trying to decide between a Weird West/Steampunk story and a Super story that starts on teen romance and ends with the world in a very ambiguous gray morality, or more succinctly from a crush to what point is the status quo to be protected.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

redsamurai — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 10:15:03 +0000

here is my back ground to the plot :- set in a near future where super heroes are every day - can a new man on the street make a name for himself and which path will he take - hero or villan ? Super Nova City - a City in the middle of england where the golden age of super powers is all around, super heroes battle super villans in the streets and skies as people go about their every day work and lives. Big coroporate companies have super hero / villan team in their pay to do they business as necessary. any one can be a super hero - if they want to take the risk with both companies and back street dealers willing to use the lastest experiement and potions on the willing and unwilling. Gods are willing to give some power to those who are willing to sell their soul to the highest bidder.......... and into this a lone man enters........ he wears a green samurai outfit with a Red samurai helmet - what is he looking for ? is he looking for fame or revenge ? will he be a bit player in the gods plans or will he rise to the top ???

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 04:17:46 +0000

Thank you both for the ideas! It really helped not just with names but just forming her character in general. I decided on Hornet unofficially since her name kinda just comes out of spectulation and not really of her declaring it so or anything like that.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

The Hawks Eye — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 21:34:49 +0000

I've got a superhero who gets chased by the police and eventually arrested, though he is definatly the good guy, but after he arrested i'm not sure what it is he should do next. Break out?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Rae.Xymena.Mia — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 22:27:51 +0000

My superhero story has come out of a long stream of thoughts and drabbles involving the same characters. The story focuses around one boy, Zander Ellis, who is a sophomore in high school. He's called a "borderline," a Mask (as they call them) who is trying to walk the line between the traditional definitions of good and evil. In Zander's case, this is due to possessing powers that can eat away at his mental faculties if he loses his focus, but is raised by a mother with powers that never did such a thing, leaving her very protective and forceful in trying to ensure her son stays on the side of good. Meanwhile, Zander is trying to balance school with his extracurriculars, with his friends through into the mix as people he trusts and protects during the day, but finds as a Mask. Even with his friends scattered on both sides of the conflict, he finds a way to make it work. A little too well, unfortunately, as he draws media attention. The Mage, as they call him, has much in common with infamous supervillain Warlock, something that they are quick to point out on national television. It isn't long before Zander finds out exactly why his mom feared that he would turn evil, as a man who looks strangely like him comes into town and begins to tear the place apart looking for his son. As Zander tries to stay out of sight and still balance his life, the scales begin to tip and he fears that he'll fall, and take everyone else with him. The story is set in a city set up for retired masks, and there are laws that heavily restrict the movements of supers and the use of powers in the background, but they are not major plot points in and of themselves, just peripheral facts that affect Zander's choices.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

carabh — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 02:56:52 +0000

I did find the right forum/topic for this! Ah-ha. I'm flying by the seat of my pants for this nano, but my story is definitely taking the superhero route. Thanks to a clash between heroes and villains, Melanie lives with her aunt in a city that knows little trouble thanks to its glorious, golden, overpowered superhero and his sidekick. Plus the relatively ineffective bad guys that attempt to pull off evil stunts. Not that it comforts Melanie much. She's not a huge fan of the superhero community and supports laws and regulations against them going up in other places. And then she somehow ends up a saving a stupid teenage superhero and an ancient artifact and things only go downhill from there.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 18:07:56 +0000

The first 2K has been written. I'm chugging through the boring-in-comparions origin stuff, and having a short pre-meeting between Atlal and Jordan. She is drunk, and isn't going to remember anything, and he picks up English from her (I'm not stealing Starfire's method, I just thought doing it that way) via eye contact. And I know where one of Nick's tougher villains will come from! Ten soldiers, eight died, one went native. What about that last loyal soldier? Hee, hee.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Andy_Obuof — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 20:58:07 +0000

Decided at the VERY last minute to write a Superhero novel. I'm hoping for it to be light-hearted/absurd but with high stakes. Set in the late 90s, when the MC -a US superhero named Invictus- is in his late 60s. Superheroes can only be created using MAD Science (a respectable scholarly discipline), fueled by a thermonuclear blast (at most 2 superheroes can be created with an underground test). Invictus is from the "Class of 54", and is one of the few non-retired superheroes left (last US nuke test: 1992). His power is invulnerability, which is why he ages slowly. He spent most of the 90s fighting rogue supers from the collapsed Eastern bloc, and is looking forward to retirement, when two revelations change everything: 1) He finds out he has cancer. Because it's made from his own body, the cancer cannot be killed by chemo or radiation (and scalpels don't work on Invictus). It is expected to grow and grow until it impedes vital function so completely that even his superpower is overwhelmed fighting its effects, and he dies. 2) New supers have been spotted wreaking havoc all over the world. They cannot be products of the 2000 or so documented nuke tests worldwide because they've never been documented before, and most are just too young. The new source of supers has to be identified and neutralised, while these new rogue supers are tackled. As leader of Champion Strategic Command's Prime Task Force (CSC-PTF), Invictus must handpick the team for the mission. However, he is haunted by guilt from a past mission: during the cold war he sent his girlfriend Ubix (shapeshifter) into the USSR on a mission so classified even HE didn't know all the details, and from which she returned in a bodybag. Invictus decides to lead the team himself, and with the help of his young sidekicks travels the world beating up rogue supers and interrogating MAD scientists, in the quest to find this new "Godifier Device" and the organisation behind it. He soon realises the key to this mystery lies in the heart of the one that killed his lover. It's called "The Sons of Castle Romeo", Castle Romeo being the nuclear test in 1954 that made Invictus.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

KelinciHutan — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 22:15:03 +0000

Oh goodness, tell me about it. Exposition is the worst. So boring. I can't wait to get to the good stuff.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

shogungari — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 02:53:29 +0000

I think mine counts. It's about a girl (Ace) who was born with God inside her. As such, she can use amazing powers- flying, super strength, energy projectiles, super speed, highly resistant to damage, eventually auras of other people, etc. Although never mentioned in the story, the sequel makes clear that God isn't the only god out there, and Ace isn't the only one with a god inside them. It's hard to talk about without giving away too much.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

SammyWa — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 04:48:55 +0000

I've managed to crack 5k on my hero story and I haven't even gotten to the main villain yet. Not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing...

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

CaptMonkey — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 14:51:19 +0000

Mine is a bit of a superhero story, with a somewhat strange setting. It takes place in 1948. The main character is a young Private in the newly-formed US Air Force who begins to develop some mild psychic powers, much of which manifests in vivid dreams about a super-powered killer. After hearing about his dreams, a man who leads a secret government-backed group of special individuals approaches him about joining their group, because they need help tracking down the villain. I'm going to intersperse chapters in the present (1948) with chapters set in the past, explaining the origins and backgrounds of the other members of the team. The first of these goes back to the trenches in World War I and explains the man who leads this group and how he gained his powers and what they are. So, it's going to have a bit of pulp action, sci-fi, steam punk, and fantasy elements mixed in there. And there's certainly going to be some flashbacks of Frankenstein's monster battling Nazis supermen in World War II, because what novel worth writing doesn't have one of those scenes? I don't have everything planned out, and this is my first NaNoWriMo, so I'll see how it goes.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

KirkJW — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 15:15:54 +0000

Thrilled to see more people writing superhero novels! My wife and I have a superhero novel West Pacific Supers that approaches superheroes from the idea that they would become commercialized in a society like ours and are organized similarly to sports franchises. Our tag line sort of sums it up...imagine a world with superheroes would they change the world or would the world change them. I think with the book it ended up a little of both. It was a tremendous amount of fun to write once we got going. Far more fun than my NaNo project which I'm still trying to get a grip on but it's not superheroes. :)

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 22:20:44 +0000

Now that we're nearing the end of Day 3, whose hero(es) have randomly decided to start adding powers/technology to the concept? Nick was able to learn English from making extended eye contact with not-his-boss-yet Jordan, and now Destroyer can communicate with him in You No Take Candle language via the transponder's screen. And apparently my biological battle tank has a personality akin to a young child. Both of them have picked up their new names now, and will stay that way.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

SammyWa — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 04:15:36 +0000

I've stuck close to my story without adding in any new powers/technology or anything new. In fact, my heroine uses and old flip phone from like...the 90s/early 2000s to talk to people. I have thought of adding in some new tech later on but since I haven't gotten that far, I have no idea if the tech will fit in with the storyline.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 21:40:16 +0000

This is what happens when I procrastinate on I Can Has Cheezburger. Destroyer's communications via Nick's transponder are morphing into LOLspeak. At least it helps give him personality, since he is a sentient animal and an equal partner here on Earth, which he wouldn't be back home.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Divine Virus — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 04:19:59 +0000

I am writing a kind of deconstruction/game of tropes with the superhero genre. No one knows why, but a very slight percentage of the population starting in the mid 10980s started to be born with some manner of supernatural ability. Naturally, as people discovered their powers, they decided they would be superheroes and fight crime. Unfortunately, one of their biggest problems is that so few of them decided to be villains, and superhero life is a bit boring with only heroes running around. Clearly the solution is to villainize each other! My heroine is 22 years old and she possesses the power to experience the intentions of others as a physical sense. People's intentions almost leave scent trails she can read. Her ability ranged from immediately senses such as "I sense someone is intending to pull a trigger on a gun, killing me, in about a second" to " I sense that someone has recently entered this alley with the intent of mugging other passers through." Intentions related to violence, addictions, cravings are the strongest. She can "smell" them from farther away, and their scent trail lasts longer. Gah, she doesn't actually smell them, its just the nearest sense I can use to describe her manner of perception. Anyway, she has no other powers. No enhanced strength or speed, though she is in excellent physical shape, and knows two martial arts. Its a very character driven story, and less an action driven story, actually.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Backyard Bowyer — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 13:40:50 +0000

I tried NaNo last year but after coming up with three stories that went nowhere, I gave up. This year I vowed to start and finish, so I just started writing and the story sort of just pulled itself together. I'm surprised by the amount of people writing superhero novels. I actually wasn't sure where a superhero novel would fit in the genres. I almost put it under science fiction or fantasy. The story itself is pretty straightforward. The main character, Victor, is a middle-aged, newly homeless man who finds himself offered something very unique from a very powerful organization. He signs up for the Alpha program, a special program designed by Doctor Evan Chambers who has a love of order and a strange obsession with the English alphabet. Starting with a team of 26 researchers (whose names correspond to letters in the alphabet), he creates a machine capable of giving people superhuman abilities. After the first three of his research team are given superpowers and their names replaced by their designated letters (A, B, and C), the rest of the research team more or less has second thoughts. Since he's still operating within the law, he cannot force anyone into the project, so Dr. Chambers works with B, who has a very acute psychic ability, to locate and convince certain people with certain talents (and first names that correspond with the rest of the alphabet) to join the program. The story revolves around Victor, now named V, who is one of the last of the new Alpha project members, a project that is already a few years old by the time he joins. He is paired up with a mentor, F, whose powers as a shapeshifter allow him to conceal weapons, change form, change his appearance, and even hide his true self. By the time V joins, the whole point of the Alpha program has been nearly reached. G, a charismatic and multi-talented brute with powers similar to the DC Comics superhero Superman, has been selected as the Alpha, more or less supreme good-guy and superhero. As his training progresses, V gets closer and closer to his mentor, and the two find they share a bond deeper than simple friendship. Torn by social anxiety and a homophobic nature, V finds himself in a very bad position. All 26 positions in the project have been filled, and soon a day of judgment approaches. Of all the others in the project, he is the only one without any apparent powers, and his own anxieties cause him to drive away the only person he has ever truly loved. With the Alpha program complete and G named as Alpha, V starts to see his dream world fall apart. As the Alpha team, consisting of the best and most powerful of the group headed by G, sets out into the world to fight crime and international injustice, a darkness broods within the Haven, the Alpha project home base. Z, the final and most cunning of all the Alpha participants, begins allying with those who despise the Alpha team. F, driven by V's rejection and a broken heart, allies with Z and lets the darkness overtake him. A rift occurs, and soon Z and his group wage war against G and his Alpha team. V, who feels no real connection to anything or anyone anymore, escapes the hostilities and isolates himself in a remote paradise. Through a semi-broken link with Haven's main computers, he slowly learns the truth about who F really is and realizes his mistake. After surviving alone in isolation for three years, the war between good and evil that has been ripping the world apart has finally found him. Without any choice, he begrudgingly joins the fight on G's side, but sees no justice or good in the violence that ensues. He plans to once again flee into isolation. As he tries to break free, he learns that F has been captured by the Alpha team and tortured as they struggle against the tyrant that is Z. Learning of F's fate, V utilizes his seemingly useless power to defeat anyone, good or evil, who stands in his way. Meanwhile, G manages to corner Z and face him. Despite his cunning and power, Z is no match for G man to man, fist to fist. After his furious rampage, V finds and rescues F, only to learn that the love of his life is unresponsive and comatose. He learns that the only one who can free F is G, who holds the key to F's mind which was locked away during the torture. Little does V realize that G did this to protect F's mind from the torture out of a previous loyalty to both F and V. With Z nearly defeated and the world about to be set right again, V enters the scene and strikes down the mighty G. With this spark of hope, Z rallies his army around him with the hopes of turning the tides and ending G, mankind's last hope for peace and balance in the world. With the fate of the world hanging by a thread, V has to choose between good or evil, and frankly he doesn't care either way.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

caocao — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 20:21:38 +0000

I've written some form of super-powered fiction every year for Nanowrimo. This year I'm focused on telling stories about a team of four super-powered "brothers" who were the victims of an evil genetics lab that sought to turn them in to super soldiers. They escaped as children and now, as young adults, have set out to find the organization behind the lab, but to also find the other dozens of super soldiers that weren't so lucky. In the process, the story will be something of a globe-trotting exercise that will allow me to explore the corners of the shared world that I haven't been able to reach as well as let in a few of the meta-ideas I have that shape the world.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

E.C. Oberon — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 23:20:25 +0000

This is my first time writing something like this, so this should be interesting. My story is set in an alternate universe where super powers exist, but you're considered a threat to the public if you have them. It doesn't matter if you want to use your abilities for good or evil. If you're found to have these powers, your death is faked, your memory erased, and you're whisked away to an underground Facility somewhere in the Arizona desert. My MC has what is considered one of the worst powers of all: telepathy. She can read minds, of course, but also alter and erase memories. If something goes wrong while she's inside your head, you could lose your mind completely or die. One day she manages to escape her Handlers with nothing but a teddy bear, a shapeshifter with seventeen different personalities, and a boy who can manipulate electricity but can only manage to drain power from electronics and set stuff on fire. Then my MC goes on a long trip across the country and has to figure out how to survive in High School without really knowing basic math and only being on a thrid-grade reading level. She'll become known as a hero eventually, but something will happen and she'll start a long degeneration into a kind of super villain. Yay for things being too complicated for even me to understand. And looking back on this, it sounds rather cliche and boring. But I will have fun writing this either way.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

animenut2020 — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:30:58 +0000

I would like to say that I love you. Or at least the awesomeness that is your mind. If anything ever comes of this I'd love to read it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

animenut2020 — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 11:34:12 +0000

It sounds fun. It'll only be cliche and boring if you write it that way and I don't think that will happen. I find that if you had fun writing it, then someone else can have fun reading it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

FlameRaven — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 17:00:11 +0000

Aaand I just realized that the bad guys at the corporation have powers, too. I mean, I knew the CEO was a werewolf, but it turns out the MC's lawyer is an empath and the corporate shill has powers of persuasion. Guess this means I'll have to decide if the staff at the school also has powers, and if so, what they are... Plus side: I'm now officially halfway through the book in word count and actual content and that means I get to finally write about the Academy itself. <3

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Beastdude27 — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 20:41:46 +0000

Well I guess you can call my novel a superhero novel. My protagonist is a guy who wakes up in the future only to lose his memory. As the story progresses he discovers he has supernatural strength and fire powers. Later on in the final 10,000 words he finally discovers that he has dragon dna. I looked up a name for him and found the name Ryu (super fighter name, i know) and figured out that it means dragon in japanese (according to name-meanings.com). So whatcha think?

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Smartiez101 — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 18:50:03 +0000

Well, I guess you could call mutations superpowers. :) Kristen (fifteen) was born able to control peoples' minds. She gets captured, thrown underground, used as a slave, the typical. She has a friend, Lea (nine) who can control peoples' dreams. Her friend Nick (thirteen) can teleport, and Ben (sixteen) can shoot energy out of his hands. He can also somewhat go against gravity (running up walls, jumping way too high for way too long, you know). They escape the jail and have to kick some serious butt. Then, they must try and avoid everyone, but it isn't easy with almost literally everyone in the country against them. Problems? I need a good name for an antagonist. Right now his name is Bob. And Bob is the one who started the whole 'capture the mutants' thing. He's short, with a potbelly and is balding (the business started in his prime, some twenty years ago). He's got one heck of a moustache which curls on the ends, is almost always sitting in an office in the 'Institute of Discovery', and constantly wears things with suspenders. xD just for the fun of it. He's not super bright, he's not really dumb, just average. He's pretty strong actually, and is super brave (maybe because his super ego).

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

hotsauce421 — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 20:43:16 +0000

My story is sort of a pre-superhero novel. My protagonist, Jaelyn Free, is a 14-year-old girl being raised by her older sister as her parents were both killed when she was six. Her entire life, she's been told she has anemia and needs to take iron everyday. In truth, the iron pills she's been taking are inhibitors -- they inhibit her super-powered abilities. She accidentally forgets to take them for a couple of days and boom, she realizes the truth about who she is and what her sister, Savannah, has been hiding from her. They move to Tulsa and Jaelyn enrolls in Saprissa Preparatory Hall, a residential school. Jaelyn's tuition is being paid for by Max Pearson, a man who is undergoing his own personal investigation into the Edmund Group, who he believes is responsible in some way for Jaelyn's abilities. Max is hired as the new head of security at Saprissa, intent on protecting Jaelyn to find out the truth -- he has dark secrets of his own. Jaelyn enlists his help in finding out where she came from. The story is two-fold: one is Jaelyn's journey of self-discovery as she uncovers the mystery of the past. The second is, once she's made that discovery, coming face-to-face with the Edmund Group and their leader, Malcolm Walter, and finding a way to take them down as they hatch a plan of their own that will endanger the lives of anyone who dares stand against them. I'm not quite sure what genre this belongs in. It is, in some ways, a coming-of-age story, in other ways, science fiction. It's definitely young adult, though the tone is a bit darker than most YA out there. It isn't all dark; I try to make a healthy mix of light and dark, but there are definitely some heavy themes going on. It isn't so much action, which is different from most superhero stories. There will be action scenes, but they dno't serve as the focal point of the story. I want to make this into the series if I do it right. Jaelyn's a character that I've had in my mind for a while, and I've put her in post-apocalyptic dystopias and space operas, and it never seemed to work out, so now I'm going to try something a bit closer to home.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 21:33:23 +0000

Still hanging in there, I've made my 20K mark and the story is coming together, at least getting into the interesting stuff that occupied my mental plans. Now I have to get these Criminal Minds out of my head since I made today's word count. Thank you, and I may put up a new excerpt. Nick is now known as the Night Stalker due to one TV reporter and he just helped save a burning building, as part of a gambit to avoid the ICE Division Six agents after him being able to "take him out of circulation" without trouble. Is there a TV Tropes page for that, making yourself famous to avoid your enemies being able to get rid of you? Anyway, he's at work and I've introduced the villian I adopted. Jordan is smitten with "Atlal," while already working Nick as a pack mule for her shopping after being invited to a Charity Ball for the police.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Psychickid — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 03:18:14 +0000

Yeah this sounds awesome. I would definitely read this. Now the question remains of what kind of route you want to take. You can take the high school route where she's a high schooler with super powers or go another route of where she has powers and a terrible memory of this facility but all she wants is a normal life. Either way, very interesting and i would love to read it.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Hazimel — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 07:06:49 +0000

Like others, I am amazed to stumble on a thread for super hero fiction. Very cool! You should all check out some of the great super hero fiction that came out in the last ten years like Frank Byrns or A Thousand Faces, the Quarterly Journal of Superhuman Fiction. I have a story in a fun book called Lords of Justice. It's on Amazon. My story this year is Amazon Blade, who began life as a City of Villains character. But the ideas I had for her were way more interesting than anything I could do in an MMO. She is sort of an evil Wonder Woman. But she is carefully controlled by the amazon queen, and only allowed out to kill malicious wizards. But in 1955, she hears rock and roll for the first time, and is temporarily free of the control. Free to rock out, dance, and fall in love... in disguise of course. There are space vampires. So, it's like a scifi, super-villain, rockandroll adventure with bloody battles and motorcycle rides through hell and all kinds of crazy s***. Sorry, I'm excited about it. Going well so far. Good luck everyone! Bryan Hitchcock Published works: "Cold Snap" in Lords of Justice "Blood, like Roots" in Flashing Swords #12

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

Maximilia — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 08:01:50 +0000

I'm not writing about super heroes. I'm writing about super villains. In a post 9/11 world, an "Event" happens soon after the towers go down (still havent' decided for sure, but since the first book isn't about what caused the event to begin with, I'm just chilling on that til a good idea comes to me) which gives a certain percentage of the world population "super powers", turning normal people into meta-people, metas for short. It becomes very clear in a very short time that a few of the real powerhouses can disrupt the entire world as we know it, so some metas take it upon themselves to offer their services to the United Nations to watch over the status quo, and make sure the world can still function. If any super powered being starts a revolt in a country, for example, or floods the world market with gold, the Sentinels fix the mistake so the world can go on. Because of this, things start turning to a global economy. Because there are some metas who can generate nuclear energy with the snap of their fingers, the power crisis has ceased to be. World hunger and pollution become in short order things of the past. There are people who are for them, and people who are against them, but they try to maintain their stance of neutrality, not backing any one nation. The power scale of the metahumans is like a bell curve. There's a few real huge powerhouses, and some who can only move a pencil with their telekinesis, but most fall into the medium range. The United Nations decided to keep their headquarters in New York, but instead of IN NYC proper, due to the rapid advances in technology and science, the Sentinels built a floating platform over NYC to house their base of operations. This is nearly as big as the burrough of Queens, and it houses a new university which takes only the best of the best, and where all the new and fascinating research is being done, as well as the new UN proper. Other platforms are being built in other major cities around the world, London and Hong Kong being the next two. Now, that's all backstory. Hardly any of it is mentioned in the book, because it's all common knowledge at this point. The plot itself picks up with a shipment of power enhancing drugs being destroyed by flaming corpse by the name of Ghostfire, who was hired to do a job. The shipment belonged to a mob boss by the name of Thomas Dinunzio who is a metahuman himself, with the ability to boost other people's powers and/or skills (including his own, so that he has a rough form of telepathy, since all people are at least a little bit psychic, IMO). Disgruntled by the loss of the drugs, which was necessary for part of his plan to recreate the mob into a metahuman powerhouse (the mob having had its power broken in the intervening years), Tommy gets an offer from an information broker by the name of Brand Edwards, who knows of a device being made in "Uptown" which can identify metas by a biometric scan. Although this doesn't make up for the loss of the drugs, it could be useful, so he hires Edwards to get it. He sends his girl, a very strong telepath by the name of Melodie, to help Edwards and to watch for a doublecross (because you can't be too paranoid). The two end up using Mel's ability to mind control to mind control the researched makin this device, clearing out his office completely, and killing him. Mel kills him by absorbing his mind into hers... but the researcher himself was a meta, and this causes problems for her. They end up escaping, more or less unscathed, and after a time, figure out they aren't being followed. Brand goes to drop off the device and notes with Tommy while Mel goes to collect herself. HOWEVER! through some means, they WERE identified, and Mel is captured. She sends a warning to Tommy before being knocked out, and through the intercession of Tommy's captain, Tommy and Brand escape. Tommy laments about the fact that his girl knows all his secrets, and Brand says he knows a guy who can get her out. Tommy's not particular, saying to whack her, but if this guy does manage to get his girl out intact, he will pay more, as a bonus (nice guy, eh?). Brand leaves, and Tommy goes over the device and the notes accompanying it... Brand ended up hiring Ghostire, who does succeed in breaking her out, though she seems a bit disorientated and out of it. When she's dropped off, Brand brings her to Tommy who then has figured out that that wasn't the ONLY thing the researcher was working on... he was also working on a way to biochemically 'tag' metahumans, by dumping a particular non-toxic chemical in the world's drinking water which will bond with their unique genetic markers, and emit a low level of radiation...which the biometric scanner can pick up on a global range. AKA, the Sentinels are going to tag and monitor every single metahuman in the world for their own purposes. Presumably to keep people safe. Presumably. Mel is incensed, Brand grimaces, and Tommy won't let that happen. At this point, the crux of the plot comes to a head: how will they stop this insidious plan? Will the mob boss find some way to turn it to his advantage? Etc. etc etc. Basically, I haven't written or plotted out after this point here, but I've got a lot of ideas. This is the formation of "The Black Guard", which is going to be the opposing league of super villains, people out for themselves, but also out for, strangely, freedom. Yes, the movement towards a global economy, global peace, and so on is "good", technically, but coming with it is increased nanny state mentality, and choices being taken away from people, as well as the whole criminal world being clamped down on, which is, obviously, what these people want to prevent. Whew.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

caocao — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 05:30:53 +0000

As a small press publisher of super powered fiction, I'm very excited to see this high of a post count! Here's hoping several of these novels make it in to book form! (FYI, anyone interested can check out my publishing site through my Author Info).

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 17:37:25 +0000

And because the second page is an unacceptable place for superheroes, win! Of course, this novel is one of my more disjointed efforts in NaNo history, and I think it would be much prettier as a screenplay, or if I actually made some kind of plan before blindly diving into the month, but I did it. The city loves the Night Stalker again, and he's moving Destroyer back in at Harris Industries. He's about to do that now, and I'm not sure whether or not Jordan is waiting for him at the company.

Re: The League of Superhero Writers

DragonGate — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 14:58:03 +0000

Anybody still writing? I'm still playing with my trial version of Scrivener, and I started a new superhero story. We begin with a short look at the brave Badass Normal hero Captain Daring and the five villains of his Rogues Gallery. But then Captain Daring disappears and after two weeks his villains start to worry about him, as nobody has shown up to rescue the Intrepid Reporter Peggy Purina from them or stop their evil plans. After briefly interrogating each other, the five set out to figure out what happened to Captain Daring, and must face and defeat something truly evil to save their hero and their city.