|
Stalker
Strength 6c |
Agility 6a |
Intellect 5c |
Willpower 6c |
Powers:
(none)
Equipment:
AK-47 Winter-fit Assault Rifle (v2): while active in the arctic, Lonzo typically trades in his M-32 for a bone-white, winter-proofed AK-47 assault rifle. This fully automatic rifle can be fired as a +5 weapon in a semi-automatic burst of rounds, +5 in a clip-burning, fully automatic hail of lead.
Backpack: Lonzo typically has one of these handy while on the job, in order to carry maps, flashlights, rations, spare clips, and other mission essentials. He'll most often store his vital, yet not directly combat related items here, unless he feels the need to access them immediately in a pinch.
Face Mask (v2): as a ranger, Lonzo is fully aware of the adverse effects the environment can have on one's body. As such, while he's on arctic missions, he'll carry this wind-dampening mask in order to keep his face from catching frostbite. This item protects him from such as per +3 resistance to cold.
Flare Guns (v7, v8): a recent addition to Lonzo's arsenal, these two guns fire small flare cartridges. Though primarily useful for attracting attention (since the flares, when fired, emit light of intensity 8 brightness), they can also be used to set fires or burn people in a pinch (intensity 4 heat).
Fragmentary Grenade: Lonzo always has one of these handy, should he need to blow something up in a jiffy. This explosive can detonate to inflict intensity 10 physical damage to everything and everyone within striking (near missile) distance of where it is utilized, unless they are suitably shielded.
the Joe-Com*: this is a new device given to all Joes since the group's reactivation. This high-tech wristband functions as an audio/video transceiver with an intensity 6 - 250 mile - range, is equipped with a G.P.S. system, a heart monitor, and can store up to a terabyte of raw data - not bad, eh?
Of course, this device also stores a variety of nutrients it can use to supplement activity, which are absorbed directly into one's pores (think of this as intensity 1 life support, where food is concerned). So, not only is the thing a nice, high tech video phone, but it can also save one's life in a pinch!
J.U.M.P. (v1): the J.U.M.P., or Jet Mobile Propulsion Unit, is an extremely advanced (and classified) strap-on vehicle that allows Lonzo (or anybody using it) exceptional mobility in battle. Though somewhat heavy, it lets them fly about a battle zone with impunity, and is described in it's own equipment entry.
Kayak (v2): as his arctic missions usually take place in reach of melt-waters of some iceberg or another, Lonzo may have a special white kayak handy to navigate these treacherous waters. Of course, it comes with a rowing paddle and an on-board machine gun (treat as his .30 cal gun, below).
Knife: in all of his various roles and with each of his uniforms, Lonzo carried at least one blade - usually a small cutting instrument, but a few held more... menace. These blades, in Lonzo's hands, can be used as +2 weapons with each deadly strike, and are made of material strength 10 metals.
Laser Pistol (v3): for a short time, Lonzo took to using a small, experimental laser pistol while on the job, possibly as a test for Flash and the other Joe weapons developers. This device can be used as a +5 weapon with every blast, and can fire six shots before it requires a recharge.
M-19, .30 Cal. Machine Gun (v3): this heavy duty machine gun is used by Lonzo when his ordinary firepower just isn't up to task. In battle, he can fire this device per a +6 weapon in a semi-auto burst, +7 if he uses it to produce a full auto spread.
M-32 Machine Gun: his standard piece, this sub-machine gun can be used as a +4 weapon in a firefight by Lonzo when firing a single shot, +5 if he fires it semi-auto. If a mission doesn't require him to utilize other weapons, Lonzo will carry this one.
Rocket Launcher (v5): when simple machine guns just aren't enough to get the job done, Lonzo kicks back and fires rockets at his foes from this nifty hand-held launcher. These rockets create intensity 10 explosions (energy blasts), which affect everybody within striking distance of their impact.
Shotgun (v5): Lonzo carried this curious weapon around in his later years as a Joe, a shotgun with a pistol grip. In battle, this weapon can be used as a +5 weapon in Lonzo's hands, and can fire two rounds before a reload is required. He doesn't use it often, of course; it's mostly utilized for effect.
* The Joe-Com is something that the Joes started using in their new (as of 2001) comic, and hasn't been featured on a Stalker action figure... yet.
Hindrances:
(none)
Skills:
Aerial Combat: one facet of Lonzo's airman training has involved his acquiring the ability to effectively fight while in the air - preferably when flying some vehicle or another. When piloting helicopters, hang gliders, parachutes, and even J.U.M.P. jets, Lonzo makes combat actions at a reduced difficulty level.
Boxing: in the event that he finds himself unarmed while on a mission, Lonzo can nonetheless defend himself - he could before his military life, and still can now. In unarmed melee, Lonzo can divide his pre-cardplay action score between two attacks, the last of which will occur as a contingent action.
Demolitions (v7+): a recent addition to Lonzo's already impressive skill set is his newly-acquired explosive ordnance disposal (E.O.D.) training. Thanks to this handy talent, Lonzo can easily disarm most any explosive device he encounters in the field, and can even rig them up in a pinch!
First Aid: one of Lonzo's secondary military specialties involves his having the ability to patch troopers under his command back together if necessary. If he passes an average difficulty first aid action, he can restore a card of lost health to anyone who has fallen in the last exchange.
Knives: as a ranger, it is imperative that Lonzo be able to take an opponent down silently, should that become necessary; advance recon missions are hairy that way. In melee, Lonzo can wield a knife of any variety at one difficulty level lower than is usually required - he's that deadly!
Languages / Arabic, French, English, Spanish, and Swahili: one of Lonzo's second military specialties is his role as an interpreter. In order to facilitate this, he has naturally been trained in the use of several languages wielded in the world's hot spots, and only lacks one from the Asian continent.
Marksmanship: essential military training gives one the ability to use guns in combat, and Lonzo is no exception to this rule. As such, when holding any standard, semi-automatic or full auto rifle or handgun, Lonzo makes attacks at one difficulty level lower than an untrained gunman would have to.
Military / United States: having been in the military for over twenty years, Lonzo has this talent as a general matter of course. As such, he knows military protocols and procedures almost instinctually, and can readily lead a body of fighting men and women into conflict if necessary.
Piloting: before he ever became a Joe, Lonzo was trained in the basics of how to operate any aircraft, though specifically in the use of a helicopter. If behind the stick of one of these vehicles, he resolves any maneuvering actions at one difficulty level lower than is normally necessary.
Survival: another facet of Lonzo's ranger training is that he can scrounge up the food, water, and shelter required to survive in almost any climate. Having had specific training in arctic, jungle, and urban survival, he can get along just fine almost anywhere on earth - starting from scratch!
Calling:
Soldier, with a secondary calling of Repentant: Lonzo is a quintessential soldier, fighting because he believes that it is what he must to protect his beloved nation from Cobra. However, his motivations are sometimes colored with guilt concerning his actions back in Detroit and in the 'Nam...
Costume:
Lonzo's first Joe uniform was basically a camouflage outfit. He had a camouflage-pattern, long sleeved shirt, as well as similarly patterned pants. Also, he wore a green belt and beret, and black boots, with black leather straps to hold a spare knife and grenade... just in case.
Lonzo wore his second uniform while he was on arctic missions, and it consisted of a green shirt and pants with a partial camo pattern on it, a white jacket with many pockets, an olive green cap and insulated gloves, and brown boots.
His third suit was composed of a white pair of pants with black camo blotches scattered about, a black military leather jacket, black boots, a black belt, and a black beret with gold trim. He also had several yellow accessory belts strapped across his chest.
For a short time, Lonzo again adopted a suit similar to his second. In addition to the white jacket, he wore white camo pants with brown blotches of color, a green undershirt and scarf, a white cap, a brown belt, and brown padded gloves and boots. Basically just a color change this time around.
His fifth uniform was a primarily black affair, being a black pair of pants, a black, long-sleeved shirt, and a black cap. He added to this with brown boots, brown thigh pouches, and a brown belt, coupled with black accessory belts for his many necessary tools and the like.
Lonzo's sixth G.I.Joe uniform was basically a return to the basics, as it was a variation of his original suit. It was in the exact same style, save for a slight difference in the greens in his camouflage patterns. Other than that, it was the same field uniform - Lonzo's just comfy in this outfit.
Of course, he changed his field suit again after a few years. His seventh uniform consists of Army green trousers, a lime green jacket with an Army green collar over a black T-shirt, a gray belt, gray boots, gray gloves, black knee and elbow pads, various gray straps and holsters, and a lime green beret.
Lonzo's eighth uniform is a slight variation on his seventh - basically being the same save for color changes. It includes khakis trousers, a green jacket over a black T-shirt, a gray belt, gray boots, gray knee and elbow pads, gray holsters and gear straps, black gloves, and a khakis colored beret.
Personality:
Lonzo is one tough cookie, a product of the mean streets of Detroit and the 'Nam. However, he hasn't let this get him down, and has used his experiences to forge his mind and body into a deadly weapon in the service of his country, a weapon that is used time and again against the forces of Cobra.
While a quite personable guy when in the 'real world', Lonzo transforms while out in the field into a veritable fighting machine, his keen mind acting to determine what an enemy is up to before the enemy knows, and doing whatever it takes to get him and his guys home - to live and fight another day!
Real Name: Lonzo R. Wilkinson, Grade E-5 (later E-6, then E7, and finally E-8)
Occupation: G.I.Joe ranger
Legal Status: American citizen with a possible criminal record
Marital Status: married
Alias(es), if any: Ranger
Group Affiliation: G.I.Joe
Height: 6' 1"
Hair: black
Eyes: brown
Weight: 170 lbs
Other Distinguishing Characteristics: Lonzo usually wears a small, pencil-thin moustache, though occasionally he'll grow that out into a full goatee.
Story:
Lonzo grew up on the mean, dirty streets of Detroit, where he eventually rose to power as the warlord of a local gang. Lonzo was under the assumption that this was as far as he'd ever get in life, until two of his brothers were killed on the streets; seeing the horrible effect this had on his mother, Lonzo decided that he would leave his destructive life and do some good for a change.
As such, he enlisted in the Army, excelling in Basic and Advanced Infantry Training, and was then put through Intelligence school at Fort Holabird and the Language school in Monterey. Lonzo also picked up basic flight and first aid skills along the way, skills that would become absolutely vital to him during his first real assignment: Lonzo was shipped off to the 'Nam after all this schooling.
Not wanting his mother to think that he was in any real danger, Lonzo convinced her that he was, in fact, stationed in Germany, and thanks to the help of his cousin, he relayed mail to her from Army bases in that country, letters made up with the aid of his long range recon patrol buddies, Snake-Eyes, Tommy Arashikage (Storm Shadow), Wade Collins, Ramon Escobedo and Dick Saperstein.
This changed, though, after Lonzo and his pals ran afoul of an N.V.A. encampment while on patrol, and three of their number were cut down (though Wade eventually came back as one of the Fred series of Cobra's Crimson Guardsmen). While waiting for their extraction, further casualties arose when Snake-Eyes was shot down by enemy gunfire, and Lonzo made the difficult decision to leave him.
His best buddy, Tommy, didn't like this idea, though, and went after Snakes as he bled in the grass, and despite all probability, managed to bring him out of the firefight even though about twenty enemy soldiers were firing upon him - he just managed to dodge the bullets as though he knew where they were headed. After this, Lonzo's group was broke up, with Snake-Eyes heading home thanks to his injuries.
Lonzo never forgot that decision, though, and would feel guilty about it for the rest of his days. He had some means of making up for it, however, when Colonel Abernathy approached him to be the first member of the G.I.Joe team he was putting together. Knowing that Snake-Eyes had been tucked away in his mountain cabin after the death of his family, Lonzo recommended him for the team.
He figured the action would snap him out of his inner desolation. As such, he and Abernathy (later known by his code-name, Hawk) went and recruited the man back into the military, and the trio then went about assembling the Joe team proper. Once the team of thirteen (including Hawk himself) was ready, they went about their first mission - the rescue of one George Strawhacker!
The man had been captured by Islamic extremists, and the Joe team had a unique opportunity to rescue him and prove their worth to a skeptical Pentagon. An unfortunate accident almost scrubbed the mission, however, when the transport choppers carrying Lonzo's team crashed and burned, taking Snake-Eyes' face with it and seriously injuring Scarlett.
Though seriously wounded himself, Snake-Eyes continued the mission, and he, Rock 'n Roll, and Grunt met up with Lonzo as he surveilled the building where Strawhacker was being held. Upon making their move, the Joes found out that these 'Islamic extremists' were in fact Cobra agents, and set upon them hard core - of course, Lonzo himself got shot up in the conflagration.
Though severely undermanned, the group managed to rescue Strawhacker after all, thus giving the Joe team enough clout to go on in their mission over the years, primarily doing battle with the insidious terrorist organization / state known as Cobra. Lonzo led many of the early battles the Joe team waged against that outfit, and did so quite well - though not all of them went quite as planned.
He went on to serve with distinction on the Joe team for years, through the team's ups and downs, including the battles waged on Cobra Island and the Battle of Springfield. The worst mission he served on, however, found him getting locked up in a Eastern Bloc gulag for months, his mission failing utterly due to a lack of proper intelligence and interference from other government agencies.
He survived this, though, as well as all the other challenges that being a leader of the G.I.Joe team has to offer. However, times changed in the early nineties, and as such, the government decided that the Joe team was no longer necessary. To this end, they mothballed the whole operation and returned its operatives to regular service - those that didn't retire, that is.
Being an outdoorsman by heart, Lonzo simply took this as an opportunity to catch up on his hobbies (hiking, nature photography), and the break allowed him to set up a gang intervention unit in Detroit. Times changed again several years later when the Pentagon decided that, since the threat Cobra represented was growing in leaps and bounds with no opposition, they reactivated the Joe team anew.
Naturally, Lonzo was one of the very first Joes to return to the fold...
Extra Goodies:
Return to the 1982 G.I. Joe main page!
Other G.I. Joe directories featuring a version of Stalker:
* Note: 2002 saw two versions of Stalker (Versions 7 and 8).
|