Rocketeers gang
Context
The Rocketeers are an obscure Marvel Comics gang.
They debuted in 1976, and were defeated by Daredevil within two pages. Three if we count the opening splash.
They can be used as a quick random encounter, much like in their first appearance. Or if you want to develop some forgotten, no-name criminals.
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Powers & Abilities
Wescott and his two henchmen seem to be ordinary thugs. But having been deployed in Việt Nam is a clear possibility, since they were active during the 1970s.
Being a generous and supportive soul, I will *assume* that Wescott is the one who built the rocket car that gave the gang its name.
They also have sci-fi jumpsuits (presumably with minor protective properties) and energy pistols. I’d imagine that it was all bought from A.I.M..
It’s a rocket ! Get into the car !
What the rocket car could do was never demonstrated. That’s so anticlimactic.
It presumably goes fast, and let’s assume some jump jets. Since simply going fast doesn’t seem sufficient to escape the police in Manhattan. Even at night.
When first seen, the Rocketeers were robbing a jewellery store through a hole in a brick wall. One last assumption will be that it was done with their car, which is specially reinforced for ramming.
History
In 1976, the Rocketeers clashed with Daredevil (Matt Murdock). They managed to repulse him, and Wescott even thought he had shot the red-clad vigilante dead.
The next encounter didn’t go as well. All three were arrested, and their rocket car was damaged. Thus ended a series of spectacular, brute force heists.
And, uh, that’s it. That’s the story.
Would you like some cake with that ?
The Rocketeers are eerily similar to characters found in a Hostess Cakes advert – Hy Torque and his gang.
I suspect this is deliberate. Writers seem to have always been tempted to reuse this goofy stuff. The first to overtly cross over into the Marvel Universe was Icemaster, and there have been more since.
DC Heroes RPG
Tell me more about the game stats
Typical Rocketeer
| Dex: 03 | Str: 02 | Bod: 03 |
| Int: 03 | Wil: 02 | Min: 03 |
| Inf: 02 | Aur: 02 | Spi: 02 |
| Init: 012 | HP: 020 |
Skills:
Vehicles (Land): 03, Weapons (Firearms): 03
Skills:
Wescott has Vehicles (Land): 04 and Gadgetry: 04. Gadgetry only applies to automobile engineering, and uses realistic rules.
Advantages:
None demonstrated.
Connections:
Underworld (Low).
Drawbacks:
None demonstrated.
Motivation:
Robbin’ robbers who rob.
Occupation:
Criminal.
Wealth:
004
Equipment:
- COSTUME [BODY 03, Blunting: 03, Enhance (Structural damage RV): 03 (cap is 10].
- Energy pistol [BODY 02, Energy blast: 06, R#3].
- ROCKET CAR [STR 08 BODY 07, Flash (stdy illum only): 04, Jumping: 02, Running: 07, R#2].
Design notes
The dialogue states that these guys escaped from Daredevil an unrevealed number of times.
This suggests that they have a higher amount of Hero Points than you’d expect. And use them to get away in their, well, getaway car. But we don’t have any sense of scale in the material.
The 020 HPs above is a sort of arbitrary average. You can :
- Lower it to 010 or even 005 if you want to play them as a quick random encounter.
- Raise to 025 or even 030 (which they all use to flee) if you want to make them slippery against heroes who don’t bother to spend HPs… until the Rocketeers run out of HPs and get caught.
If you’re going with the second, Wescott might even have the Luck Advantage. To help explain the unseen incident where he thought he had killed DD.
Source of Character: Daredevil Vol. 1 #131.
Helper(s): Ethan Roe.
Writeup completed on the 11th of October, 2021.