EDIT: To optimize your enjoyment of this thread, please ensure that the following YouTube video is playing in the background as you read: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CguXjEpIgkk

Lately I've been watching a lot of really terrible martial arts Bruceploitation films with Bruce Lee imitators Bruce Li and Dragon Lee. What is striking about the imitators' films is that while the imitators capture certain aspects of Lee's mannerisms and appearance the films themselves completely neglect the dynamism and grittiness that Lee brought to martial arts films which is, I believe, what made martial arts films exciting and appealing enough for the international mainstream in the 70s. That is to say that the battles still involve improbable acrobatics, a 2 second "beat" with poses, stupid gimmicks like magnetic swords, and incredibly predictable storylines. It's interesting to me that some people had the idea of imitating Lee, and went through the trouble of looking vaguely like him and copying his mannerisms, but then totally ignored exactly the elements that made his films successful and instead just stuck with the cinematic elements which failed to make martial arts films popular outside of asia which preceeded Lee.

However, I did realize that most D&D modules and dungeon crawls, being derivative, mostly predictable, and filled with stupid gimmicks like magnetic swords (or vorpal ones...), and even with cheesy monsters like zombies, actually would benefit quite a lot by being overrun with Bruce Lee impersonators. As long as we're going to have hyperpowered monks out of Oriental Adventures the least we can do is make the monks AWESOME by having them take on a Bruce Lee Impersonator prestiege class.

I'm not familiar enough with D&D 3rd edition to fully stat out a prestiege class, but I've got a few pointers as to the limitations and powers that this prestiege class would have.

Bonuses:
1.) Bruce Lee High Kick Knockout - if a Bruce Lee Impersonator successfully attacks a NPC or monster with half his hit dice or less (does 3rd ed still use hit dice?), the GM rolls a D20. If the result is lower than the BLI's Charisma score, the victim is immediately reduced to 0 hitpoints, since being able to execute this depends on how convincing of a BLI you are. It represents Bruce Lee's movie ability to dispatch a dozen lesser martial artists with a quick one hit knockout kick to the head. This power can be combined with any other powers, feats, or abilities which result in more than one opponent being hit at the same time; this represents a cheesy Chuck Norris multi-roundhouse where one sweep of the foot smacks 4 guys in turn, or the ever-classy jumping split kick versus two opponents and a final aerial roundhouse while starting to fall against a third opponent.

2.) Nunchaku Pain - Once per day, the BLI can reach behind his back into his waistband and conjure a pair of Nunchaku which do tremendous amounts of damage and are capable of causing multiple attacks per round. They can also be used to affect a damaging choke hold in a Grapple. However, the BLI must discard them after using them at the end of the encounter by badassly tossing them on the floor and walking away from them and he is not allowed to pick them up and use them again. This should probably be saved for the climactic boss fight. If anyone else picks up the nunchaku they will just behave like normal nunchaku.

3.) Shirtless Recovery - Once per day, if the BLI has lost over 15% of his hitpoints in a single encounter, the BLI may wipe his mouth with the back of his hand, shake his head, take off his shirt, and begin prancing back and forth on the balls of his feet. This takes one round but it restores 15% of his hitpoints and gives temporary bonuses to armor class and initiative for that encounter.


Drawback:
1.) BLIs are only allowed to portray Bruce Lee in a positive light; they must be Lawful Good. Nobody is going to cast a BLI in a film if he doesn't think the positive popular image of Bruce Lee is going to sell tickets.

Okay, I thought of another one:

Philosophy Major - Once, and only once ever per NPC, a BLI may repeat by rote memory various philosophical things Bruce Lee has said or written (i.e. "Be water, my friend...") in order to convince the NPC in question that the BLI is deep and cool. This only works of the NPC in question cares about philosophy according to the GM (i.e. the dean of a university). When this ability is used the BLI gets a +5 bonus to any social dice rolls with that NPC on that one occasion.

HOWEVER, every time this ability is used there is a 5% chance that the NPC in question heard exactly the same quote from a previous BLI who tried the same thing. In that case, the NPC in question thinks the BLI who attempted the same line again is a pathetic and revolting plagarist and the BLI gets a -10 to any social rolls with that NPC forevermore.

Can I buy tickets to take a trip inside the awesomeness of your head?

...give me a little time. I could actually work one up in the framework of the rules. Designed up a hybrid monk-fighter class called the Martial Adept which stole...er...borrowed from a lot of cinematic stuff from Bruce Lee to Crouching Tiger and even The Last Starfighter (well at least the name for one of the class special abilities). Even had the opportunity to playtest and refine it as PC in a friend's campaign.

Unfortunately, the BLI will most likely already be obsolete considering the WotC announcement but hey, the ideas are already flowing so damn the revision and full speed ahead.