The Champions are a prominent superhero team in the Hero Universe, the official setting of the Champions role-playing game. They serve as an example of a balanced team dynamic, a team of NPC allies, or a source of pregenerated characters to allow players to bypass the game's lengthy character creation process.
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The Champions team used in the first three incarnations of the Champions role playing game were the comic book hero team later known as the League of Champions. Because of the separation of the Champions comic book and gaming franchises, the original Champions would be removed from later editions of the game.
The first version of the Champions appeared in the core rulebook for the fourth edition of the game. They were made up of:
While details of the location of their base of operations are left vague in their information to allow the GM to locate the team wherever they wish, various sourcebooks give the Champions' home turf as New York City.
With the Hero Universe heavily revamped for the fifth edition of the game, the Champions were revamped as well. Defender was the only previous member to be kept. The new members of the Champions are:
The latest version of the Champions is headquartered in Millennium City.
After several years with the team Nighthawk quit over a difference of values with Defender and was replaced by Kinetik, who possessed super-speed powers, and Nightwind, a martial artist, which current status is unknown.
Seeker is tacilty portrayed as a member of the new Champions in the in-game comic book published about them, as Nighthawk refused to market his image.
In the Terran Empire setting for Star Hero, the Champions continue to exist, though as a secret organization of psychics "defend[ing] truth and justice" in the face of an increasingly corrupt Empire. No specifics are given as to their membership, except that the group's number fluctuates between 3 and 20 (a breakdown by species is given of the seven members as of the year 2640) and all members have "varying levels of psionic power."
By the time of Galactic Champions the group's previous incarnation had expired, but was re-formed in early 3000 in response to an invasion by the interdimensional conqueror Istvatha V'han. This incarnation of the group includes:
The Champions operate out of Champions Plaza, a headquarters complex in the "old neighborhood" of Millennium City.
The protagonists of the comic book based on the Champions game were likewise called the (League of) Champions. They were based on player characters from the first campaign using the Champions system and character sheets for them were printed in early issues of the comic. The core membership included:
Other superheroes to have belonged to the group include Giant, wearer of a harness created by Zeus that enables him to grow to superhuman size, Gargoyle, a monstrous strongman, and Nightwind, a gadgeteer with a ghostly motif to his tactics (no connection to the Nightwind mentioned above). Later in the comic's run the Champions were joined by Sparkplug, Flare's sister with powers similar to her own but electrical rather than light-based, and Icicle, Icestar's younger sister with ice-generating powers as well. They were frequently aided by Dr. Arcane, a wizard hero from the 30's and 40's, and his granddaughter Donnah Hannah, who possessed significant mystic potential of her own and sometimes fought evil as Lady Arcane (and once was a member of the team under the alias Transpower, though the Marksman was the only one to know her true identity).
Classic Champions heroes and villains will be featured in the Games for Windows exclusive videogame Champions MMORPG Champions Online as NPCs.