The Improbable Man
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
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| Odds of the average unarmored pedestrian surviving a direct 60 mph vehicular impact with no significant injuries: 1 in 217,732. | |
| The Improbable Man | |
| Player: Night-Girl | |
| Origin: | Natural |
|---|---|
| Archetype: | Tanker |
| Security Level: | Confidential |
| Personal Data | |
| Real Name: | John Smith |
| Known Aliases: | None |
| Species: | Human |
| Age: | 32 |
| Height: | 5'10" |
| Weight: | 170 lbs |
| Eye Color: | Hazel |
| Hair Color: | Brown |
| Biographical Data | |
| Nationality: | American |
| Occupation: | Professional Crimefighter |
| Place of Birth: | Confidential |
| Base of Operations: | Confidential |
| Marital Status: | single |
| Known Relatives: | Unknown |
| Known Powers | |
| None | |
| Known Abilities | |
| None | |
| Equipment | |
| None | |
| Most events resolve in his favor, no matter how improbable. | |
John Smith is of average height, average weight, average economic background, and is, as far as any doctor can tell, completely normal. He hasn't been exposed to mutating substances, has no mystical ties, doesn't have access to unusual technology, and hasn't had any unusual training.
Regardless of all of his complete and utter normalcy, John's history is filled with events that defy astronomical odds. He has won the lottery 7 times, been struck by lightning twice with no ill effects, survived a 2,000 foot drop from a mid-air plane collision with only minor bruises, and once typed the first page of Hamlet by repeatedly banging his head against his keyboard in frustration.
John Smith is a living statistical aberration.
He is The Improbable Man.
Contents |
Affiliations
Supergroup: Liberty League
Personality
John is somewhat introverted, though vocal among friends. In his early childhood he was a bit risk averse, but when he discovered his unique status in life, that changed.
He likes to make people laugh, and therefore tries to make jokes when he can think of them, though they tend to be hit or miss.
He is often nervous around women, and can get anxious in social settings with large numbers of people.
Powers
None.
Abilities
None.
Equipment
None.
Miscellaneous Notes
People learning of the source of his unusual lot in life might explain it in some magical way, or say that his "power" is luck. It's not, as John has no actual powers. At some point in an extremely large frame of time, one person will have had things go "his way" more than any other person. John Smith is that person. He is a product of probability, an outlier in the sample of life.
He prefers to refer to the reason for his unusual life as "the Lottery", because somebody has to win the Lottery eventually, and other than the nature of money, it doesn't make them any different than the rest of us.
A very significant side effect of the Lottery is that he was invited to join the Liberty League, resulting in many tremendously powerful friends.
Weaknesses and Limitations
As an average human being, John is vulnerable to all sorts of dangerous situations. He just seems to survive them anyway.
Nervous Around Women
John has never been very successful in romance, and tends to seize up, stammer, have difficulty thinking, or become clumsy around women he finds attractive. Note that their physical attractiveness is not all that contributes to this, in fact, if he doesn't like a physically attractive woman's personality, he will have no trouble around her. This sometimes helps against female villains, but not all so-called villains have horrible personalities or are obviously irredeemable.
This can lessen the more he gets used to being around a specific woman, but long absences will tend to restore his anxiety.
Too Trusting
John's nuclear family taught him that honesty was of the utmost importance, and so, despite much experience with dishonesty, he usually wants to take people at their word. He is also a strong believer in second chances, as he once used his situation for personal gain, and later decided to use it for the good of others.
Character History
John Smith was born in an average town, raised by good, but otherwise average people. He is also average, but the things that happen to him are not.
Childhood
At about 11 years old, once John discovered that things often went in his favor, he began exploiting it. He won prizes at arcades, finished first in his Cub Scout troop's Pinewood Derby with no woodworking experience, and made the Varsity Basketball team in Junior High despite constantly skipping practice.
Unfortunately, he found that performing so well with such casual investment was viewed as the hallmark of cheating. He was accused of this on many occasions, and was even kicked off the basketball team under the suspicion that he was hiding superhuman abilities. In time, he learned to choose more anonymous situations, and to at least give the appearance of skill or preparation.
In high school, he received a 1560 on the SATs, without ever paying attention to the question booklet, and just randomly filling in the circles with his #2 pencil. His parents were extremely enthusiastic when they saw the score, and insisted that he go to MIT for computer science. They had no idea that the score wasn't due to his intellect.
College
John found himself completely over his head in college. Though he aced multiple choice tests, and was always paired with the best students for team projects, he continued to fail essays, papers, and solo projects. He eventually dropped out, and had to explain his situation to his parents. They didn't believe him at first, but after enough unbelievable occurrences, they could no longer deny it.
His roommate from college later became a very prominent superhero, though he has yet to disclose who this is (likely because it would reveal said roommate's secret identity).
Before Paragon
After dropping out of college and having difficulty deciding what to do with his life, John spent several years wandering across the country. He lived (often extravagantly) off of gambling and a few lottery jackpots from different states. He occasionally slipped up and found himself accused of cheating, or conned out of his money by people pretending to help him manage it, making enemies across several states (especially in Nevada).
His wandering finally came to an end when he found himself in the middle of a bank robbery being perpetrated by armed thugs on Superadine. Though he'd never taken such a risk before, as he wasn't sure the Lottery would save his life or prevent his actions from causing the harm of innocent people, he decided to try to stop the robbers because he wanted to impress a female bank teller. He foiled the robbery without so much as a scratch, and decided that maybe he really was superhuman.
He sought out and consulted several experts: magicians, doctors, fortune tellers, a voodoo practitioner, and a geneticist. None of them could find anything unusual about him. After a second visit and an impassioned plea for some kind of an explanation, the geneticist said that since he and all the others that John had visited agreed that nothing he was or did was out of the realm of human possibility, perhaps he should be looking for explanations in the realm of probability.
So John went to a mathematician.
The mathematician was the one that gave him the idea to call it the Lottery. He explained that if one looked at the entire length of time the universe has been and will be in existence, and tallied up all the good days that each individual living being has had, there will have been someone that will have had the most and the best good days. John, he said, just might have won that jackpot, the lottery of life.
Moving to Paragon City
Recognizing that while he may not actually have any superhuman abilities, he very likely would be able to help a lot of people, John chose to go where most people do when they have a similar revelation. He moved to Paragon City.
Approximately two minutes and 37 seconds after he plugged his phone into the wall jack of his new Kings Row apartment, it rang. After explaining that he was not Chester Festerburg, and that he'd just moved into the apartment, the caller introduced himself as a (very drunk) 'Mazing Monkey, who then asked him if he wanted to join the Liberty League.
John accepted.
Later Events
In October of 2006, John took an extended hiatus from the League, and set off on his own to resolve some as yet unknown, unfinished business from his past.
He returned on November 27th, 2007, and is again active in Paragon City.
Trivia
- 'Mazing Monkey invited him to the Liberty League after randomly choosing his phone number out of the Paragon City phone book late one night while drunk on banana daquiris. Odds: 1 in 8,143,197.
- One of his pet peeves is when people leave off the "The" in front of "Improbable Man", as he thinks it sounds ridiculous. Villains repeatedly do so, often just to annoy him.
