Basic Information About Technohol 13

Hello, and welcome to Technohol 13: the Atomic Drink! In the event that this is your first time on the site, allow me to explain just what it is that the 13 is all about. Namely, it is an online warehouse of the various character descriptions, custom rules, and campaign information I have generated since oh, April 9th, 1998. In other words, it's over two and a half decades of gaming material made available for your use.

Of course it should be noted that my particular game of choice is the (Classic) Marvel Super Heroes Role Playing Game (or MSH RPG). This is the system I started my gaming life on, and though I have experimented with and in fact played/ran several others, this is where my brain finds itself most comfortable. But looking around, you just might find materials for a few other game systems here and there.

I have developed a sort of soft spot for the Marvel Super Heroes Adventure Game (MSHAG), and as such have mirrored almost all of my content for that sytem on top of the original, Classic game. Furthermore, I've recently decided to produce game material for two other systems, the first being the 4C System (which is a sort of 'plain label' MSH Classic system), and another game which I'll announce at a later date.

But one of these won't be the Marvel Universe Role Playing Game (or MURPG). I am completely not a fan of this third version of Marvel role playing, and do not currently feel it a good use of my time to support this game, particularly when the publisher stopped doing so after only three terribly proof-read books. Perhaps some day I'll reconsider this decision, but this'll be a long time out.

Perhaps.

But you may ask yourself, why Technohol? Much less the thirteenth iteration of such? And what makes it an Atomic Drink? Well, all that came about because the first thing I wanted to do when I went to the trouble of building my own site was to make it unique. I didn't want to build something as insipid as 'Denny's Marvel Menagerie' or something to that effect - those sites just chap my proverbial hide.

So my big idea was to build a site themed like a sort of beverage, a minty fresh drink one could enjoy in several flavors if they so chose. This was quite awhile ago, though; the minty cyan coloring is but one of many the site now uses (thanks to a handy dandy color cycling thingus I built), but I've dropped the goofy drink theme since it seemed to detract from the overall focus of the site.

But the oddball name itself lives on, because I simply like the sound of it. The actual thrust of the site itself is the same, mind you; I'm here to offer you a bewildering array of new stuff for your Marvel Super Hero games, whether you are using the Classic or Saga version of the rules. I am putting up stuff you simply can't get on other sites because no one else has bothered to write it.

All but a few sites are content to just throw existing statistics for 'popular' characters that were printed back in the 80s and call it a day, but I prefer to make original material for your use. Material if you wanted to run, say, a GI Joe campaign, or a New Universe campaign, or even one involving Transformers! Heck, I've even worked on material for a Golden Age campaign.

In addition to my own, custom-built characters and rules.

That's my job, as far as I'm concerned. When I'm not at my actual job. Or my second job. Or possibly even my third these days. While it may take me a while to get things done here, I fully intend to produce comprehensive handbooks for these folks, and more, to allow you (and, more importantly, myself) to use these characters and concepts in a game setting. I hope you enjoy!

Online Motivations

Why do I bother, you ask? Well, over ten years ago, I started playing this silly ol' game called the Marvel Super Heroes RPG ™. It didn't seem like such a big deal back then; I mean, a bunch of us just got together when we didn't have anything better to do, and we pummeled heaps upon heaps of imaginary villains into pulp, whacked out on too much Mountain Dew ™ in the process.

Sure, I've since played other nifty games, such as Rifts ™ and Cyberpunk ™, both ran by our cool pal Aaron (Oz), and my AD+D PlaneScape ™ campaign, but nothing quite rivaled the raw fun and carnage we experienced on our Marvel game night. Sure, most of my pals eventually stopped playing, turning to other entertainments, but the MSH story doesn't necessarily end there.

I mean, why should I just throw away the volumes of material that I've made for the campaign(s) I ran. Rather than doing that, I'd like to share some of this stuff with you (whoever you may be), so that you can catch a glimpse - however slight - of the veritable magic that was created every Saturday night between me and my chaotic pals. Call it my contribution to society, however slight it may be.

Though slight may be something of a misnomer. The idea was to just post all my custom rules for your gaming use, along with a few character descriptions I built for the MSH RPG mailing list before it was ultimately consumed several times by Topica.com, but it's sort of grown. Bigger and bigger over time this monstrosity has become, with me not just covering my own rules but several obscure areas of comic book lore.

I quickly outgrew the 'free' web hosting spaces offered by Home.com (before they went under) and then the other, crappy 'free' hosts like Geocities.com, until I decided I was better off building my own domain proper. With all the room I'd gained to grow, it was like the floodgates were off, and I went to town trying to expand in every way possible. I have more gaming projects now than I know what to do with.

And I do intend to complete every last one of them, because I still strongly feel that these are areas of gaming that a large number of people will enjoy. Even if they don't like the rules system I use, they can always convert the material to their own game of choice (and I've had a few people that use GURPS and I believe the MURPG that I won't use do so on various sites).

And besides, who likes a quitter? As of this writing, the Transformers thing is done, after a fashion, the New Universe thing is about sixty-seven percent done, and the GI Joe thing is... perhaps seventy-five percent complete. The Timely Heroes deal is always in flux, since I am slowly running out of 'major' characters to cover, but folks are always being 'added' in retroactively. But I digress.

Technical Details

For those of you that are curious, I originally built this site in .html for your gaming use, making a simple yet elegant design that I hope doesn't pull one's eyes away from the gaming gristle I had prepared for your use. This was way back in '98, of course, and I was still mastering the basic tools of the internet trade. I wasn't too bright yet, though - I mean, I even had a Guest Book for crying out loud.

Over time I upgraded the site, and moved from one awful host to another, until I finally settled in at Godaddy, where I was given access to something called Active Server Pages. I started out using .asp functions in it to control things like the color, and a few other oddball variables, but have found over time the original site 'guts' were inefficient in the grand scheme of things.

This is why I have decided to convert the whole thing over to a more efficient, .css style of construction. I still wield .asp to control the basic color rotation, but once you choose a color it'll stick, thanks to a sleek javascript thing I have procured which will set a style sheet and remember it on your computer. I suppose the rotating thing is for 'first use' more than anything else.

If you don't want to ride along with the random color rotator, simply choose one of these as you see fit. This change will be 'permanent' - at least until you pick another, or delete that cookie on your computer that this will leave. But without further ado, choose your poison - minus the yellow palette that I removed, since it was somehow even harsher on the eyes than that which is presented here:

You may currently view the 13 in black, red or orange, green, cyan, blue, or purple!

There's only a few other scripts running on the site as I write this (on 09/07/22), and they're on the 'default' page for the technohol.com domain. These are the Facebook and Google+ things, as well as that Revolver Maps thing. On any other portion of the site, these won't affect you at all, but if you loathe scripts, or perhaps just Facebook, that should point you towards what to block out - should you choose.

Oh yeah! Finally, I sprung for a SSL encryption thing, which is why there is an 's' after the 'http' in the Technoholic pages you visit. Thus, advertising scum won't be aware what you're reading on my obscure, nerdy web site. Which might help you avoid ads from comic book or gaming stores, or whatever? I don't know who would even care that you're here, much less track such, but there's that.

Unlike some sites which seem to be built with javascipt navigation, I felt the need to go just with .css navigation instead, meaning that even if you are running a hyper-secure browsing experience, it should look normal and work properly for you (at least on Firefox; I haven't tested secure methods on Chrome or IE yet). Even with styles off, you should be able to get around - which is great for mobile browsing!

Legal Brou-Hah-Hah

Okay. Just in case you weren't sure, I do not own, nor am I claiming to own the copyrights or trademarks involved with the terms Marvel Comics, Marvel Super Heroes, Marvel Super Villains, Super Hero, Super Heroes, or even the word 'the'. Marvel Comics, Marvel Super Heroes, and Marvel Super Villains are the trademarks of the Marvel Entertainment Group, or Marvel Characters, Inc.

The Marvel Entertainment Group (or whatever their current name is as you read this) also most likely owns the trademarks and copyrights on the Marvel 2099, Marvel UK, New Universe, and Strikeforce: Morituri concepts and printed comics. PlaneScape is a trademark owned by Wizards of the Coat, and the game-specific material therein has similarly been copyrighted by this corporation.

Super Hero and Super Heroes are the joint trademark of DC Comics, Inc., and Marvel Characters, Inc. Furthermore, I'm not attempting to claim any copyright over the GI Joe or Transformers brand names, which I believe are wholly owned by the Hasbro toy corporation megalopolis thinige. The only things I own in this aspect are several keen toys I've bought over the years. Toys like the Thunder Machine!

I'm not claiming that I made any of these folks up, nor would I try (most of 'em are pretty cool, after all, and I wouldn't want to take the credit for them). I am just producing MSH RPG descriptions of them, as they have not been made for these cool people (or were just made poorly). I like the characters enough to dig them out of obscurity for just this purpose, you see.

Characters of this stripe are those that come from (or will eventually be housed in) my GI Joe Handbook, my Marvel 2099 Handbook, my Marvel UK Handbook, my Strikeforce: Morituri Handbook, my New Universe Handbook, my Transformers: Robots in Disguise Handbook, and/or my Vintage Age Handbook. Again, all I claim credit for in the instance of these characters are their MSH RPG write-ups. That's it.

On the other hand, there are several characters and concepts here that I do, in fact, claim a copyright on. This material primarily comes in the form of my Variant Earth 13 work, and those Universal Heroes rule books. If you want to use these in a game or something, be my guest. If you want to put them on your site, or otherwise use them, I don't mind as long as you ask me and don't claim you created 'em.

I don't mind sharing, really I don't, so if you like this material and want to make use of it, great. Just don't make me come after you by pretending you came up with the stuff, that's all I ask. I'm really serious about this. I have seen my material stolen for both wikipedia entries the Marvel.com site and several others, placed there by unscrupulous turds who claimed credit for my work.

And for the jerk who blatantly lifted text I wrote for a certain character, and then published it in an actual reference comic book without even giving me credit for my writing - I'm watching you.

Deus Ex Machina

Well, that's it. I can't think of anything else that needs to be said. I covered all the pertinent information about the 13, from both an artistic, motivational, directional, and legal standpoint. Nothing else comes to mind, so hey, I hope you enjoy your stay at the 13, find something useful or enlightening, or otherwise find yourself entertained. Thanks for dropping by!

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