Morrow Project meets THEM!

A post-apocalyptic world without giant radiated ants is like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich without the jelly.

Add in the fact that THEM! was one of my favorite movies of my childhood (and one of the best 50s monster movies), and the case was settled. Giant ants would be one of the first villains the players would encounter.

The HERO System write-up is fairly straight forward, and is based upon the movie. There are a couple of points that likely need to be explained however.

The Physical Limit: Takes Cumulative Body for example is an exception to a house rule I've used since Hit Locations became part of the system. In HERO Body is cumulative like HP is in D&D- add up the total damage and when it equals or exceed your Body you're dying.

That's fine (well, not really- but it works ok) if one isn't using Hit Locations. But if you are, characters who have been shot in the foot or hand for injuries that aren't even impairing are suddenly dying. And that's silly both from a genre and realism point of view.

So normally Body damage isn't cumulative in my campaigns (bleeding is), you take the effect of the individual injury and go on down the road.

For THEM! however, cumulative body works very well. The ants don't feel pain as such and in the movies would wade through gunfire unless it was fully automatic or done in mass.

The combination of the Damage Reduction and cumulative reflects this perfectly.

The second thing I'd like to point out is the Mandibles Multi-power. The movie didn't have THEM! cutting people in half (and it's a better movie IMO for that, I hate stupid and excessive gore). I reflected this by saying that the Mandibles aren't sharp by human standards- thus the normal damage attack. They however convert to a kill attack against large enough targets.

Reflects the movie well, and from a game PoV makes it easier for the players to live through a encounter greatly roughed up instead of dead. Assuming they win of course...

So, with the explanation finished, it is time to deal with: THEM!