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Not so fast! Gams Glassjaw, the apathetic superhero is here to... oh forget it. Born in a secret genetic laboratory under the sewers behind a pub in 15th century Prague, Gams was the result of a secret eugenics program to produce the ULTIMATE HERO. The way they went about doing this was crossing a human baby with a lion, and seeing what happens. As a result of her leonic and weird mutant heritage she is immune to fear, unnaturally lucky, has the ability to hypnotize crowds with her mind, is resistant to mind controlling effects from others, and has no genitals! In effect, she was born a paladin! Despite being a lion, she is also black, and lives in Neo-Sweden, a futuristic form of regular Sweden, where everyone hates black people. They are actively repressed, and probably shunted into ghettos and such. Despite this, she is incredibly wealthy. The foundation that created her left her a huge amount of cash, three giant jewels (each worth 10x her outrageous fortune) and a gun. They left a baby a gun. Well, you never know I guess. She was also gifted a military uniform, despite not being in any sort of military. She has, to this day, never removed the uniform, ever. At the age of 8 she was molested by a child of a similar age. I will choose not to dwell on this point! By 10 she was famous for her incredible wealth, known throughout the world! Hooray! At 11 she developed a crush on her teacher... which he reciprocated D: At 13, she saves someone's life! This boughey doyenne is so grateful that she falls in love with our young lion... girl... thing. And finally at 16 she gets an arranged marriage to the ruler of a small country that no one has ever heard of that none the less has frankly ridiculous amounts of cash. Our poor teenage Gams had a... worringly active romantic life. Especially considering her lack of genitalia. This apparently got to the boughey doyenne, who tried to murder her, but only successfully bit off one of her ears. It was replaced with a cybernetic ear by a mad scientist, giving her super hearing. All this trauma was too much for Gams, and she went off to study at Oxford university, getting away from it all. When she graduated, she worked as a professional lion tamer, parlaying her natural understanding of such beasts into her act or something. Being True Neutral and largely apathetic about everything, Gams never thought about going into crime fighting, until she met her bike! I'll... just copy what Ariamaki said. "It's a metallic red custom high-end motorcycle that can convert into a jet-ski. It's been worked over so much it is basically brand new, is in perfect quality, is HEAVILY armed and armored, has a Wonderous Device from 854B, BUT it is absurdly obcious to many, many people, and repairs cost 25% more than usual. Aand it has a fully sentient AI." Now how could she NOT?
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| # ? Jul 17, 2011 21:14 |
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| # ? May 18, 2013 22:10 |
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Changing Breeds Part VIII: Land Titans I just got back from a lovely weekend at my cousin's wedding, and now I'm sitting down to write this. Sometimes, I think I have issues. First off today, we have the writeup of the Land Titans, the elephant-men and rhino-men. Why they're in the same group, hosed if I know. Rhinos are closer to horses and tapirs than elephants, and an elephant is closer to an aardvark than a rhino. I know that the book bullshits this by saying mystical and thematic connections are more important, but aside from "really big African animals" I'm not buying it. It starts by saying GOD drat They tend to stay in the regions where their elephant and rhino brethren are found, and rarely move due to how endangered they are. The book actually makes an interesting scenario by saying that they sometimes get captured by conservationists or zoos in animal form, but that shapeshifting usually allows them to make a break for it. Or not, because apparently anybody who tries capturing them - even people with good intentions - gets horrifically murdered for their insult. They apparently have an affinity with ghosts, because why the gently caress not? Female Land Titans love being among large amounts of their fellow animal type in animal form, integrating themselves into their social webs. Males stay on their own and murder anything that looks at them funny until they get older. One cool thing is that, through semi-formal bonds of integration via gift giving and honor systems, clans of shifters, herds of elephants, and locals often become bound in a large web of mutual aid and defense, with elephants ruining the poo poo of anybody messing with a small village and the villagers shooting up any poachers that try messing with the elephants. The stereotype block is as follows: quote:Stereotypes For once, all those quotes are actually kinda cool (and  as gently caress in the case of the Vampire one.)Anyway, it's time for our first breed, the Azubuike, the Burnt-Horn People, the rhino-men.  Close, but not quite that kind of rhino-man.  Colder.  Very funny.  Once proud and numerous, the strongest shifter breed on land doesn't do so well against high-caliber rounds and explosives - despite my friend and I running tests that show the exact opposite when you hit the actual mechanics. Fun fact, even with a massively overhauled and hilariously deadly gun system, elephant-men (and rhino-men to a lesser extent) can take two anti-tank bullets to the skull before keeling over. Anyway, the Azubuike are all antisocial dicks with poor eyesight (with no mechanical reflection) and a fear of fire that, again, has no mechanical reflection. All two dozen of them in the entire world. The writeup of their animal form says they can run up to 35 mph on a charge, and, (un)luckily for them, I can check their math because they give a sort of speed-to-MPH ratio in the core book's listing for vehicles! Since Speed 103 is apparently 70 miles an hour, it stands that Azubuike must be able to go at Speed 51-52 in animal form to live up to the claim. An ordinary person who turns into a rhino and runs at full tilt goes at Speed 34. While that's still pretty terrifying to most people who can sprint at Speed 18 on average, that's not as fast as real rhinos can (apparently) go. However, if Big McLargeHuge, The Man Your Man Could Kill Like, turned into a rhino, he'd be able to sprint at Speed 46, which is nearly enough to keep pace with cars on most of the roads near me. A rhino bigger than a truck slowly catching up to me on a 30 MPH road is kind of terrifying to think about. Anyway, that ridiculously  derail aside, we get to talk about the mechanics. They start with natural 3/2 (thankfully not bulletproof) armor, a 3L horn, and some flat-out frightening stat bonuses to their forms. While the elephant Warform is kind of the chump's choice, it's actually viable here with only slightly lessened bonuses that are negated when you remember, oh yeah, this form can actually carry giant loving swords or something.The Jhaa are the Asian Elephant breed, and the book implies they fought in Burma, Cambodia, Thailand, and other nearby countries as "ghostly elephant-men who crushed entire platoons in wild mountain fights." Oookay then. Basically, the Jhaa are Gloriously Superior Asians that all are muscular and beautiful with a taste for high living that's being taken away by the White Devil and secular corruption. Also, they explicitly wear "shockingly immodest garb unless formality demands otherwise." Yeah, I'm just going to move on. Mechanically, they're broken as hell, but not as broken as... The Mhole-Rho are the African Elephants, the Walking Mountains, and subject of a long post earlier. Thus, I'll just touch on the fluff. They're colossal, larger than life, empathetic, and bringers of prosperity, something that's sort of fallen apart in modern Africa. They've either tried to struggle through it, or gone a little crazy with bitterness and started murdering soldiers with giant elephant warbands. Most are black people who favor traditional clothing such as dashiki, because they're African, duh, this is how it works. They also often reach seven (or more) feet tall and weigh over 300 pounds. Their elephant form can weigh up to three tons (I know, I'll get to this) and stand from ten to fourteen feet tall, which is kinda colossal when the largest elephant ever officially recorded (Barnum and Bailey's bullshitting aside) was about thirteen feet tall. Hilariously, a three ton elephant is about 6,000 pounds no matter what system of ton you're using, and a fourteen-foot, 6,000 pound elephant would be thinner than a motherfucking string bean. The average elephant weight is about five tons (11,000 pounds), with the aforementioned largest elephant ever recorded being about twelve tons (24,000 pounds). To put it this way, a 6,000 pound elephant's skeleton could be almost a third of its total body weight. Also, the Warform can be up to fifteen feet tall and only gains about a ton. However, back of the envelope calculations using the Square Cube Law indicate this is more or less in the right neighborhood, from what I can tell. In the Other Breeds section is only a single entry, the Iravati, South Asian elephant-men who appear to have a common secret, are all very quiet and stubborn, work hard, but also have a shared greedy streak. They, hilariously, get their weight/size proportions right while mentioning how the Mhole-Rho are still bigger. They are literally Mhole-Rho's stats, with the Primal form one dot smaller, a small Dexterity boost to Warform, and a slightly worsened Manipulation penalty. Way to  , book.Christ, this is a lot more than I was expecting to write for these guys. I don't think I can get to the Laughing Strangers without making this post huge. ... I'm going to have to do a separate entry for every single breed category, aren't I?  Next time: the Laughing Strangers, seriously this time. Featuring: every single art piece in the section being terrifying/bad!
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| # ? Jul 17, 2011 22:01 |
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Lucky for me, most of the Aldenata RPG is just copypasted SRD stuff. Because I'm lazy, I'm only going to be looking at the original content (or PRODUCT IDENTITY). It goes over ability scores, combat, random height/weight, what levels are and other poo poo for players that have never done an RPG before and yet 'are familiar with 3e', various species, AIs and Gestalts... ah, here we go. Classes. First up, the Academic. Highlights include:
Next up, the Biker/Gang Banger. Featuring:
For now I'm going to take a break from the classes, but... oh god. The skills are fun enough, like all the other craft skills just giving "mild, moderate, or loving fantastic," and then Craft (chemical) (poison) goes ahead and lists twenty six poisons out of loving nowhere, twenty four of which are real. There's a gambling skill, which specifically applies to games of pure chance. Roulette is given as an example. You can be skilled at Roulette. There's a six step 'odds, DC, payout ratio, and maximum bet' table, and if the game is explicitly rigged you can still win at DC 40. The heal skill has (1) the exact same activities and DCs as the first aid skill among other unique ones (the only exception being bandaging a wound, which is 12 instead of 10) and can also be used untrained, making the first aid skill pointless, and (2) lets you revive a dead character at DC 30 in five minutes. No, loving seriously.  For comparison, brain surgery or nerve reconstruction is DC 40. This is followed up by this spergfest:  gently caress. I'm going to get back to classes later. EDIT: WHY ARE 'Read Lips' AND 'Sports' SKILLS E4C85D38 fucked around with this message at Jul 17, 2011 around 23:41 |
| # ? Jul 17, 2011 23:33 |
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Does it ever list how much more damage improvised weapons do?
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| # ? Jul 17, 2011 23:43 |
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Mors Rattus posted:Does it ever list how much more damage improvised weapons do? It's one size category up. I haven't looked yet but 3e and 3.5e had this table where if a club would do 1d6 if sized for a medium size character, it'd do 1d4 for a small and 1d8 for a large. Also. Having a line of credit is a feat. quote:Credit Line WHY THE gently caress EDIT: quote:Skip Shot AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA E4C85D38 fucked around with this message at Jul 17, 2011 around 23:50 |
| # ? Jul 17, 2011 23:45 |
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Mors Rattus posted:Continuum: Too much fashion sense invities trouble.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 00:13 |
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Incidentally, in of the book's very few bursts of apparent humor, the example for how frag is gained and lost is 'beer in the fridge'. Joe takes the last beer, so Bob, seeing there is no beer, time travels back an hour and takes the last beer. This frags Joe, who now has a paradox in his hand. So Bob goes, gets another beer, and puts it back in the fridge so Joe will have one to take, thus ridding Joe of Frag.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 00:15 |
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That reminds me of this. Although the principles aren't the same.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 00:31 |
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Mors Rattus posted:Continuum: Too much fashion sense invities trouble. Knowing what you've told us about the author I can only imagine that he keeps an OCD laundry journal and thinks it is the eventual key to time travel powers.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 01:00 |
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veekie posted:How does that work? Does the birth create a brief portal to pop the winged baby out into another dimension's back alley? Vagina + Portals? I would rule that when the time of birthing or egg-laying or whatever nears, she feels an urge to travel to a disreputable part of Sigil that contains the ruins of her father's greatest temple. I would also rule to burn this book before it kills again. Drox posted:It's terrible that this is done for racist reasons, but I kind of have to chuckle at a director that thinks electricity is magic. I'd totally watch those films.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 01:09 |
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recon_etc posted:Skip Shot Why are you bugging out about this? I see nothing wrong here. Is it because it's supposed to be a "realistic" setting, but they have a bullet-skipping feat? Also, for the Academic boost to Bluff checks-- That's a core part of 3.0 and 3.5. Sufficient Knowledge in the right fields can give +2 to an appropriate Bluff check-- You know the material in question well enough to BS a better answer. The class bonus just doubles that effect to +4.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 02:02 |
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Ariamaki posted:Why are you bugging out about this? I see nothing wrong here. Is it because it's supposed to be a "realistic" setting, but they have a bullet-skipping feat? A -2 roll and -1 die penalty in d20 is nothing compared to the benefits that brings. It might work if the penalties were higher or dependant on the level of cover your foe had.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 02:17 |
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It just amused me that it was titled 'Academic Lecture'. That, and the book takes its gunporn 'seriously' enough that you get poo poo like this. PAGES OF THIS. PAGES UPON PAGES UPON PAGES Also I'm a little unhinged right now so I'm going to put the terrible thing down and go to bed.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 02:21 |
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Skip Shot was pulled verbatim from d20 Modern, and for a moment I was thinking the weapon descriptions were copied out of Weapons Locker, Modern's own gun porn book, but nope. Aldenata is even more creepily focused on huge penile supplements. Edit: Also, Modern's versions of those antimateriel rifles aren't masterwork. Instead, they have scope mounts and you take a -1 penalty when firing them without a scope. Dareon fucked around with this message at Jul 18, 2011 around 02:39 |
| # ? Jul 18, 2011 02:33 |
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Gun porn in D20M is always funny, because the system is so coarse-grained and abstract (what's a hit point? how long does a combat round take?) that all the fiddly details that gunporners love just get washed away. Pages and pages of details that resolve out to most assault rifles being pretty much the same. It was the same in TWILIGHT:2000, one of the most gunporny games ever made.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 03:02 |
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World of Synnibarr, Part HERE COME THE loving SPELLS: Gnomes! I am going to quote the first sentence in full. "Gnomes are born wherever Gnomes are born, usually during winter." Very... tautological. They are PEACE LOVING and MISCHEVIOUS. They have a LOVE OF PLANTS and ANIMALS and can SPEAK ANIMAL LANGUAGES. They also CAST EARTHPOWER SPELLS. Earthpower spells are the "very essences of the plants and creatures of the universe". Gnomes tap into this "infinite power source" to cast poo poo. They DON'T BREED THAT MUCH. Gnome women have 2 or 3 children total. They LIVE UNDER TREES. They are MOSTLY VEGETARIANS becuase PLANTS DON'T MIND BEING EATEN. Gnomes Gnomes are also good at TOY MAKING becuase they There are two types of gnomes: the toymaking signing statue appreciators, and the 1 in 10,000 who can actually cast earthpower and become adventurers. The rest just kinda sit around making toys and singing and living in root systems for all their days becuase they're hobbits or something. Gnomes train at Gnome School! But before they go to the Adventurer Capital of the World (Terra, to be clear), they also learn poo poo from their parents, like wilderness survival and basic fighting skills. And also three animal languages, one of hwich is usually for somethign they can ride. All gnomes are expert trackers, and can see in the dark! Gnomes live to about 250-300 years of age. (Due to the wording of the age chart, all PC gnomes will, barring violent or other untimely death or artifical life extension, live to be exactly 300) When they reach the fresh young age of 50, they go to Gnome School at Terranand learn to cast spells for 10 years. The only reason they're even remotely threatening or useful as adventurers (They get 2d10*10 HP, compared to everybody else' xdy*100, making them incredibly flimsy, and have the shittiest stat bonuses of any of the guilds) comes from Earthpower spells, which the book again informs us is generated by life itself. This obviously means it's mostly defensive or scrying. Their Natural Abilities are getting +1 init and +10% dodge becuase they're teeny, having enhanced sight, smell, and hearing for double visual range and 20% bonus to surprise rolls, and darkvision. The skills they get in addition to the SFAGTA are Detect Spell Traps, Moving Silently, Singing, and Tracking. None of the 192 skills in Synnibarr are related to playing musical instruments. Their Basic Abilities are getting an Earth Root staff. Let's check out the entry for Root, Earth in the Monster chapter to see what this does! It is worth 0 XP because it's just a plant. Their roots make decent staffs, being about 3 feet long and weighing 2 pounds. Somebody with one can create the Blue Bolt and Earth Sphere Earthpower effects for 1 con point each, at a level of 1 plus 1 per extra con point. The reason Gnomes want them is so they can use them to store con poitns for later, though. 2 points per level, up to a max of 20. They can't give it to somebody else and let them use it, only they can get it, and they can only do this to one staff at a time. They can also speak Animal Languages. Max of three. If they aren't full, they just mentally reach out while staring at a creature and bam, they can speak Dog or whatever. Un-learning languages is not mentioned, so pick carefully. And last, they get SPELLS. 21 first level, 22 second, 18 third, 20 fourth, 20 fifth, 12 tenth, 10 fifteenth, 6 twentieth, 4 thirtieth, 5 fortieth, and finally 1 fiftieth level spell. ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-NINE SPELLS I HAVE TO GO OVER. God drat. Let's get this show on the road. First level has Catch which is a magic trampoline for not dying on impact, Circle of Protection which is a shield which protects against physical and energy attacks, Cold Resistance 75% which gives you what it says on the label (a 75% chance of being unaffected by cold attacks, that is), Concentration Break which tries to make your victim lose their concentration and not remember what happens while you maintain the spell, Earth Shock which Instantly shocks the target with concussive force, causing 29 Nature damage and reducing melee and ranged attack speed by 20% for 8 sec, Earth Shout which knocks dudes in a wide-beam attack you want to fall unconscious unconscious and nobody else and you don't need to roll to hit, Earth Sphere which is a spherical shield vs magic, psi, and earthpower, Entangle Animation which makes the ground grab people, Heal which will completely heal a dude for cheap, even form death if you get there fast enough, but if they lost their head you don't get the mind back, Heat Resistance 75%, Invisiblity on you, other dudes, or objects and drops if you attack, Resistance to Earthpower 75%, Resistance to Magic 75%, Reveal Mundane Traps which makes traps glow red, Sense-Life Forms which lets you know where alive things are well enough to shoot them, Sense Magic and Earthpower which makes magic or earthpower glow red or blue respectively, Sense Psionics (yellow), Sneak Spell which lets you sneak past the various specific types of spell traps and alarms, Tunnel as per 1st level MW spell, Unlock Doors which just automatically unlocks all doors including magical locks, no save or anything, and finally Ward of Hiding which hides dudes in an area from everything but the Mk. 1 Eyeball. 21 down, 118 to go! ugh. I'll do that in like 10 minutes.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 03:31 |
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Mors Rattus posted:Next time: Time travel diagramming. I am actually very interested to see how they handle this! You should post images.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 04:03 |
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Okay time for Second Level Earthpower Spells! They are: Amnesia as the 2nd level mage warrior spell, Cancellation of Earthpower which cancels earthpower based poo poo, Circle of Plant Defense which protects you against plants and prevents form from sensing you, Cloud of Lotus which makes people go to sleep, Create Matter which lets you make mundane poo poo that doesn't weigh much until you get some levels under your belt and you can't make cool poo poo like gold or dilithum crystals or whatever until 40th level, Ego Refreshment which restores "all normal wisdom and intelligence points, no matter how low they are", Guardian Angel which gives you bonus to defenses, Heal Disease, Heal Insanity, Hypnosis which hypnotizes up to three dudes (4 at 5th level and 5 at 10) and lets you tell them to do whatever except kill. themselves or gently caress up their buddies, Levigation which lets you fly at 75mph, Neptune's Breath which lets you breathe and see and move and poo poo underwater down to 1,500 at which point you suddenly are affected by the pressure and temperature in full (but are fine at 1499 feet 11 inches), Night Blindness which inflicts normal blindness, Orb of Location which lets you find somethign you know about, or at 40% success rate with just a name, and it doesn't give a poo poo about leading you over pits or the like but won't make you go through a wall, Pit of Falling which makes a hole, and makes a nastier hole as you level up, Resistance to Poison 75%, Resitance to Chi 75%, Solidify Water which makes water solid (but NOT ice), Telekinesis, Vision Through Objects which lets you see through walls, and Ward of Warning which gives dudes in an area a bonus to surprise rolls and lets them know if somebody attacks them from within a mile. 22 more down, 96 to go. Third level spells ARE: Argium Armor which protects against psi, energy, mutations, and physical until it runs out and also gives 1 attack per round plus 1 per 10 levels of the caster and you don't need to breathe, Argium Net which puts poo poo into stasis if it fails it save, Argium Sword which makes a bigass magic claymore and you can attack with the same action you summon it, or block things including Phazed and attack twice as much per turn, becoming a beam attack if this pushes you up to 10 per turn or set it to guard an area, Berrymoore's Vertigo which gives the victim a nasty inner ear condition for an hour, Blue Bolt which shoots a blue bolt to hurt things with, Control Emotions of All Creaturesby which it means animals which you can make permanent if you take 5 minutes per animal, Control Plants which lets you either make plants grow (except the cool poo poo unless you're a God), and once it grows to full you can see what it sees if you're within 15 miles (nothing becuase most plants do not have visual sense organs) or let you control the actions of a plant for two hours (again not very useful under most circumstance), Earth Bolt which lets you spew out dirt, mud, sand, rock or whatever to cover people with and lock them in place, Flames of Earth to drain people's Con Points, Ice Bolt to shoot people with "an earthpower-created bolt of actual lqidui helium" , which will freeze people up to a weight, making them roll metabolic shock and if they succeed they're cryofrozen until they thaw (failure means death) or do damage if they're too heavy, Metamorph Self and Other which is polymorph, and refers us to the 4th level Mage Warriro spell Metamorph for what you can turn into, Minor Comet Summoning which create a comet for fairly good damage, and you can split it up to 4 targets for 1/4th damage each, Quiet which lets you silence an area and use it as a shield vs sonic attacks, Refreshment which lets you restore all Strength and Constitution points on a target up to twice per day, which you can cast on yourself if you still have the points to cast it left, Roots of Ruin which lets you summon roots to grab people and drain their strength and constitution, making them fall asleep until they starve to death (not dehydration, oddly) unless broken out, and it lasts UNTIL they are broken out, Solidify Air which lets you turn a chunk of air solid, which will asphyxiate anybody caught in it in three minutes if they have to breathe, and you can't move it without Telekensis, Sphere of Destruction which summons a sphere around somebody giving them 1 attack to attempt to counter it or tesseract out, after which they save or be annihilated. touching the sphere or trying to jump out does the same. Last is Surall's Location which lets you track poo poo real good. 20 more down, 76 to go. oh god what have I done to myself
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 04:15 |
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I searched around for a copy of Central Casting, only to learn that one of my friends has it (it was ratty as gently caress)! So inspired by this thread, have Onos Toolan (I named him after I was done, for reasons that may be appropriate if you know where the name is from). First off, race and sex. I see that I am a Dwarf Male. Excellent start, I suppose. I have strong national and cultural ties to my nation, but not to other nations. Whelp, alright, you know, whatever. What kind of nation and culture do I have? Evidently, a Primitive Dwarven civilization in the wilderness, which means I can create weapons from natural resources (like rocks), am proficient in some basic weaponry (like rocks), and have a 5% chance to be literate (like rocks). My social status is Comfortable, which means I hav 100% starting cash, "may have an heirloom weapon," and "no problem borrowing money at reasonable rates. Because my society strikes me as one that would have advanced economic theory, like "money." Also +5% chance to be literate (these were the only modifiers to literacy, and guess what? That's right, illiterate). I was a legitimate birth between two parents (presumably a male and a female knowing the author's views, despite, you know, magic), 2 brothers (one older and one younger). Onos was born in the 2nd month on the 15th day in the family's home, and unfortunately nothing unusual occured at birth. The Head of the Household (I'm going to assume Dad) had a job with a noteworthy trait. You see, Dad was originally from another culture, which happened to be a Decadent Civilized society in the city. He came from a comfortably well-off family, but for some reason decided to become a hunter for my tribe. Yep. At age 14, I made several friends. Two of them were younger boys, one was a human, and the last one was an elf! An elf! At age 33 I made a rival. She was a friend of mine who coveted my stuff because she's jealous. She doesn't try to hurt me physically, but isn't too put out if it happens. She's able to accomplish her feats of jealousy by posing as a friend. For the record, I reciprocate her feelings and actions exactly. Finally, at age 35 I have a religious experience. You see, my Sun/Fire god starts sending voices into my head, telling me things. That's how it all starts. After a bit, the priests decide to teach me a skill relating to my faith! I decide that reading might be a good skill to have. I would have chosen "Dematerialize into dust and reassemble myself when I want to," but that probably isn't allowed. Since I decided on a stock character, I get one adult event, which happens to be a lover! Sadly, she is not extraordinary in any way. Especially in bed. Next up are my most valued... er, values. First up, the most cherished person in my life is Tellan, my deity of the Sun/Fire (gently caress YOU, DAD!). Of course, despite this, it's only a weak influence on my actions. The real important things are my most cherished item, which is a diary, and my most cherished abstract idea, which is love. My last lover was so bland, I evidently felt the need to devote myself to seek out that someone special. My Lightsides, Neutrals, and Darksides came out to 1:1:1. So that means I'm neutral. Ok, fair enough. Looking at the archetypes/alignments, I'm gonna say that a literate, diary-writing seeker of true love is probably does not exactly conform to a primitive society. So he's going to be a Crusader (of love)! I never rolled any deviant traits, so I assume he's straight, despite what his primitive tribal society would probably tell him (THANKS FOR YOUR LIBERAL IDEAS, DAD!)
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 04:32 |
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Zereth posted:
I do not think you are being truthful with us here 
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 04:45 |
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Wait, a third-level spell in Synnibarr is complete annihilation? And they go up to level 50?
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 04:46 |
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All right Fourth Level Spells! Argium Circle will teleport some poo poo up to 100 miles + 50 miles per level away! Like most eleport effects it takes several attacks to cast. Binding "is the same as" the greater alchemy study except it's earthpower based and costs con instead of star bolt. Circle of Rainbow Light is a circular shield against two of the powers + energy, Cloak of Mist is like the 3rd level Mage Warrior spell, Control Size lets you shrink poo poo down to 1% of normal size and weight (square cube what now) or up to five times normal height and weight, Divining Symbol lets you scry on poo poo, Extra Spell Spell is amusingly named and works like the 2nd level Mage Warrior spell, Historic Link lets you conduct a seance, Leash lets you give somebody a command which they then have to try to complete or lose all init and save bonuses unless they're working on it, and you're allowed to use near impossible commands and "kill yourself" and the like is not excluded, "Luck" lets you... gently caress with die rolls and poo poo, but don't use it more than three times per day or you'll get bad luck, Necromancer's Dance lets you temporarily reanimate the dead, as long as their soul is available, and command them, and if you feed them a mixture heal spring melon, blood orange juice, and mage tree bark or earth root powder ($5000/day) they'll last indefinitely, Mold Stone, Metal, Flesh, and Bone lets you do that, including poo poo like giving somebody flesh wings which work and merging two creatures but not crazy special metals, Scroll Spell as per the 4th level MW spell, Spell Storage as per the 5th level MW spell, Switch which lets you swap places with a dude, Teleport Trap which lets you trace teleports or hitch a ride on teleports or block them in an area for an hour but not actually do anything trap-like, Transform Self to Mist which lets you turn into mist and fly at 50 MPH and I think we've covered this somewhere else  , Transcommunication which lets you telepathically talk to anything with a mind, including visual images suitable for teleport locations, Ward of Charm which gives people bonuses to hit, saves, and init as long as they stay in the area, and Ward of Weapons which temporarily enchants items to give a bonus to hit and block, and do earthpower damage instead of physical which means they ignore armor. 20 more down, 56 to go.FIFTH LEVEL! Argium Pit drops people into a pit and then teleports them into a pocket dimension which drains their strength and constitution and EGs, and you have to use interdimensional teleport effects to get out, Chi Enforcement lets you make Chi function in places it wouldn't as long as Earthpower works, Circle of Confinement lets you lcok a dude in, where they will be under the effects of Total Honestly, Eternal Sustenance, and Refreshment, and the sphere is unbreakable, but from outside it can be, and you can drag the sphere along with you after sealing a dude in it, Circle of Smoke which blocks telepathy, radio, and remote control, Cloak of Peace as per the 5th level Shaman Song, Control Gravity which lets you increase gravity by up to 500 Gs or reduce it to negative 500 Gs, letting you fling dudes miles into the air or crush them into a little ball, Focus which lets you double another magic, psi, earthpower, chi, or mutation effect. For double price you can double double it, for a tripling. You make a disc and you either fire the effect through it or slide it over the person doing it. Golden Sphere is another shield only this one stops phazed poo poo, Mass Apportation lets you teleport a bunc hof poo poo at once, Mass Cancellation of Earthpower does what you think it does, Mass Levitation is like levitation only multi-target, Mass Reconstruction fixes any object, from a computer to a small spacecraft to a BSC, as long as you have at least 10% of it left, but cutting osmething in half and casting this on both halves to get two of it doesn't work, Mutation Enforcement works like Chi only for mutations, Phantoms makes people either fight illusory mosnters they fear most OR if they fail their psychic shcok roll, pass out and have a 20% chance of going insane, Remove Enchantment disenchants poo poo and cant' be put in spell storage, Spell Haste is like the 15th level Mage Warrior spell, Spell Trap is like the 4th level MW spell, Telepathyw works like the 5th level psi spell, Tremor causes an earthquake, and Ward of Protection lets you make an invisible undetectable phazed shield which stops people basedo n their alignment class. 20 down, 36 to go. The end is in sight! And then I have to do Mage Warriors and psionics and shaman songs and oh god  Pyrolocutus posted:I do not think you are being truthful with us here Glazius posted:Wait, a third-level spell in Synnibarr is complete annihilation? And they go up to level 50? Yeah balance is not this game's strong suit. At all.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 04:53 |
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Okay, this should be the last loving Earthpower Spells post. Tenth Level! Yes, it skips levels 6-9. As thigns start thinning out here and getting Argium Porthole lets you and the rest of your party go back in time up to 10,000 years, minimum 500. You stay there for 48 hours max, after which you ahve to go back or be forever lost in time. You can also move through space up to 100 miles per level of the spellcaster (minimum 1000 miles becuase this is a 10th level spell.) The porthole is 15 feet in diameter and lasts for one set. Astral Transformation lets you turn your physical body into an "Astral or ghostlike" form, letting you fly at the speed of through, making you invisible and not detectable by life force, but you are by a bunch of listed abilities. Turn back before the spell runs out or your soul goes to the elemental plane and gets destroyed. Dread-Lock Sphere lets you steal somebody's soul and stick it in a sphere floating next to you, and drain their constitution points, presumably to replenish your own or fuel spells. It lasts until you use up all their Con. you can have up to 5, and the only way to free a soul is by hitting the sphere with an Argium Sword. Bodies deprived of souls in this way fall unconscious and die after 72 hours. It is unclear what happens to the soul after you suck up all the tasty, tasty Con. Mass Paralysis is a no-friendly-fire area effect paralysis spell. Mist of Death is Cloudkill only it's also AOE friendly and you can move it around at up to 50 MPH within a 100 yard radius and it's only a 5-foot sphere and okay it's not very much like Cloudkill at all I guess. Pillar lets you double(/triple/etc) Earthpower spells. The Rope lets you throw a magic lasso which sends people to another dimension, where they're unconscious. You can stuff up to two people in there for up to 24 hours, as long as they don't exceed the weight limit. Security Spell is basically the same as the 10th level mage warrior spell except it also has a Ward of Warning built in and swaps some Mage Warrior spells for similar Earthpower spells. Siphon Sphere lets you drain people of psi points, spell slots, mutations, chi abilities, alchemy abilities, and enchanted items. Permanently. Some of each per turn as long as you have the con points to maintain it. It takes a Mystic Restoration spell to restore this lost poo poo. Soul Tap lets you drain 5 con points form a victim per attack segment as long as you maintain it, which is a duration of "concentration". You can store up to 20 extra con points beyond your normal max, after which you explode. Sphere of the Mists makes stuff in a spot undetectable by anything but the Mk. 1 Eyeball for a while. Ward of Restoration works like Regrowth (which I don't think we've covered) except works on as little as 0.01% of the thing you want to restore, plus it also works on technology, including BSCs. Fifteenth! Argium Defender gives you and Argium Sword and Argium Armor, except now the sword blocks phazed attacks just fine. You can also summon it by itself instead of on you or a dude in which case it will fight for you, and you can see and talk through it and stuff. Circle of Destruction is a 50 foot diameter circle + 1 per level over 15 that does damage of "Disintegration", selectively. It takes a while to cast, though. Comet Summoning is like Lesser Comet Summoning but with bigger damage, can be split 10 times instead of 4, and if it misses you can have it try agian for up to a turn. Great Argium Sphere lets you teleport "virtually anywhere" by which it means 1 con point per 100 miles, or 20 con points per "tarsec". Which refers us to Chapter 13, "Travel in Space". Greater Enhancement of Abilities gives the target +100 to 400 strength, mutations drain half con (but this doesn't affect pure Mutants even if their class con discount for mutations isn't that good yet), and "any natural abilities will also be doubled in power". After it wears off you have to sleep for 16 hours out of the next 24, or you fall unconscious for 1d10 days. Mass Banishment Sphere creates five spheres which banish poo poo to Limbo. So up to five targets. Mass Heal, and well, let me quote it. "This spell does exaclty what its name indicates." Costs 1 con point per target in a 500 foot diamater circle, and you get to pick who you heal. Mass Transmutation "enables a spellcaster to transform completely, anything living and nonliving alike, into something else." You can make whatever you want as long as you've seen it and aren't tryign to make precious gems or metals when under 40th level. (as usual, victims get a save.) Pool of All Seeing lets you scry things in a range measured in parsecs, across dimensions and through Security spells. You can move the view at 10MPH, and anybody looking at the pool of water you cast it on can see and hear it. You can also talk into it and people at the other end hear! Sphere of Sheba is basically the Major Mutation Environmental Kinetic, with different con costs. Twentieth! Bridge of Valhalla refers us to the 20th level Mage Warrior spell. Death Lock is used to prevent a soul from reentering a body so they can't resurrect. Greater earth Sphere is another shield spell, hitting most of the bases at once, but THIS one lets you attack out form inside it! Also it zaps people who touch it. Major Temporal Suspension is Time Stop. Werestorm lets you create up to 10 Werewinds in a cloud that you control, and you can spit them out as you like once you've cast it. They act like the Werestorm around Terra! You can also spend more con points for more winds if you want them. Wereware costs a whopping 50 con points, and the max Con for mortals is 20, so you're goign to need to fill up your staff, have max con, AND have some extra con somehow to cast this poo poo. You can't put it in any potion or spell storage thing or such. It acts a a "self-perpetuating Spell Trap with limited intelligence and the ability to select the spells it will release." It drains Con from life force around it, able to stock up 20 per day. You can basically program it to use up to six spell effects on targets of your choosing under conditions etc etc. And it needs those 50 con points to stay active, PLUS the con points it spends to use the abilities. It can store up to 500 total. Thirtieth! Conjure Ministar lets you summon a tiny star, 1 to 10 feet in diameter as you choose, which does damage based on how big it is. Up to millions of life points at 6-10 feet. It can't come closer than 2 feet to the gorund, but you can control it within 1 mile. You can shoot a flare out of it to attack poo poo up to 10 times, after which it fades out. OR you can stick it 70 miles up in the air to sustain life, like normal sunlight. It lasts a week in this mode, UNLESS you cast it through a Wereware in which case it's permanent and just sits there being a life-sustaining orb and poo poo. Except constant sunlight is probably not good for most things. Give Life of Earth, Sea, and Air lets you make an uninhabitable area habitable! Like an asteroid. Gotta make that Little Prince cosplay that bit more authentic, right? You need a five ounce sample of earth, water, and air to cast it, and if you want life you need seeds or samples of what you want to populate the area. It affests up to a 1 mile area plus 1/4th mile per level after 30, and lasts a year. Once you cast it, the place is hopping in 10 minutes, complete with teeny sun like Conjure Ministar and artificial atmosphere! Casting it through a Focus makes it 10 times as big and permanent. Silver Pentacle is a shield which just stops everything except God Power straight up. And Venderant Nalaberong 50% of the time. (Except a Shielder Bolt, whatever that is.) It takes 4 attacks to cast though so you can't use it as a block. You can't move it, and it lasts as long as you concentrate. Star Weird uses the power of the sun. Real one, not a Ministar. Sun has to be up and visible to use it. A disk appears 1 mile over the target, changing the color of the sun and doing one of three things. Blue nullifies all powers except god power and has a 50% success rate on Venderant Nalaberong. Also Organic Electronics and High Technology. (laser guns and poo poo, as opposed to shotguns and poo poo.) BSCs only have basic abilities in this. Lasts an hour, can be moved. Red stuns everything, every attack segment. White shits a "flair" of energy which does a large amount of damage, and can be used repeatedly. Fortieth Level! Curse holy poo poo this is a long one. It creats a semi-sentient curse which you can basically program all kinds of poo poo. Curse a bloodline to turn into wolves under the full moon, curse and object to give people Mummy Rot if they disturb the Pharaoh's tomb, whatever. Long-lasting curses cost staggering amounts of Con points, though: making somebody turn int a wolf under the full moon for the next sixty years of their life costs 1 con point per month for 720 con points total. If you're doing a bloodline thing, well. I have no idea how you're supposed to come up with this level of con points. Greater Creation of Life lets you play god. Takes a solid week, working from dawn to dusk, and if you're interrupted it's ruined and you have to start all over. If you want to give your creature powers, you need samples from creatures that have those powers! And at least 10% of the body or bodies of whatever you want its general shape to be when done. After designing it as a player, and accumulating the bits, you make some rolls! 95% chance of it being ALLLIVVVEEE!, 95% chance of it coming out the right shape, and 90% chance of it getting the powers right. You can control it by thought at a range of up to a mile! Greater Temporal Displacement "allows the spellcaster to completely change a one square mile area (the range says "1-mile diameter" which is NOT the same thing) from its current time to 24 hours in the future or 10,000 years in the past." Raise from Death lets you, as long as the body is at least 90% intact and in good working order, revive a dead dude, no longer how long they've been dead! Unless they fial their Metabolic Shock roll in which case NOPE. Speak With Gods lets you speak with a god! You need to concentrate 16 hours a day for 6 full weeks, draining the 10 con poitn cost each day, after which the god is aware that you're calling them on the God Phone! They aren't required to pick up, but they are aware of how much of a pain in the rear end this spell is to cast. The resulting conversation, if any, lasts as long as the spellcaster concentrates or until the god hangs up. And finally, the Fiftieth Level spell! One of only two in the book. Xandrew's Transferable Soul lets you take a soulless body, like if you used Dread Lock Sphere on it, and prepare it so it will attract your soul when you die. Don't put it on the other side of a werestorm or on the other side of the crust, that won't work. You can also put yourself in an inanimate object, which needs to have legs and arms to move and manipulate poo poo. In an inanimate body, you don't naturally regenerate Con, but other people can donate it or you can use any method of stealing it you like. Your old body's poo poo doesn't come along, just your skills, mind, memory, and level, you lose all your other powers. Which includes spellcasting. Maybe. Unless you bought spellcasting as a skill instead of a class feature. Iunno. You can use your new body's stuff, though. These use the body's level. AND THAT'S GNOMES AND THEIR SPELLS! Ugh. Next time, we do something less time consuming, hopefully! The next class up is... gently caress. Mage Warriors. For ANOTHER loving SPELL LIST. God drat.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 06:08 |
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Kavak posted:A -2 roll and -1 die penalty in d20 is nothing compared to the benefits that brings. It might work if the penalties were higher or dependant on the level of cover your foe had. Considering the rather limited benefits of cover in d20 its probably too big a penalty even, since you paid a feat for it.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 08:08 |
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veekie posted:Considering the rather limited benefits of cover in d20 its probably too big a penalty even, since you paid a feat for it. What were the benefits? I haven't played d20 in a while.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 08:39 |
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Okay so how do you guys feel about how I handled earthpower spells there? Because I have three more spell lists to go through, and god drat.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 08:42 |
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Doc Hawkins posted:I would also rule to burn this book before it kills again. Burning books is Wrong, Doc. Lock it up or throw it into the ocean or bury it in a swamp instead. mercenarynuker posted:So inspired by this thread, have Onos Toolan (I named him after I was done, for reasons that may be appropriate if you know where the name is from). I am saddened by the lack of indestructible fossilised flint weapons. e; Zereth posted:Okay so how do you guys feel about how I handled earthpower spells there? It was an enjoyable read and now I kind of want to play Synnibar to break the ever-loving poo poo out of everything. Lemon Curdistan fucked around with this message at Jul 18, 2011 around 09:37 |
| # ? Jul 18, 2011 09:35 |
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Lemon Curdistan posted:It was an enjoyable read and now I kind of want to play Synnibar to break the ever-loving poo poo out of everything. god I have to do that three more times. and also there's two more chi-using classes and the Mutations. and the world and mosnters and oh god what have I gotten myself into i hope you're all happy
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 10:38 |
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recon_etc posted:The heal skill has (1) the exact same activities and DCs as the first aid skill among other unique ones (the only exception being bandaging a wound, which is 12 instead of 10) and can also be used untrained, making the first aid skill pointless, and (2) lets you revive a dead character at DC 30 in five minutes. Maybe, to give it the most charitable reading possible, what it means to say is that you can revive someone who's been dead for less than 5 minutes if you make a DC 30 check? I mean that'd still be kind of an... optimistic... implementation of CPR, but at least it wouldn't be totally absurd. Zereth posted:I hate you and once I'm done going over the book, and if I can find a document scanner, producing a higher quality scan of it than the pdf I already have, I may run a game and force you to play to get revenge on you. I'd suggest going through the list and just posting the especially  ones, but that might be more work.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 13:03 |
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veekie posted:Considering the rather limited benefits of cover in d20 its probably too big a penalty even, since you paid a feat for it. It depends on the supporting rules, really. The feat is balanced (Ha!) for d20 Modern, where AC doesn't go nearly as high, even with magic armor in play. The bonus to AC from magic only goes up to +3, whereas cover will be providing at least +2 and up to +7 AC in most situations. Cover thus becomes a way to extend your character's survival. Of course, here I am arguing about the attack penalty, when I've always felt the damage penalty made the feat suboptimal. Anyway. Fate, Part Three: Skill Focus: loving The Vampire Have I mentioned yet that the games set in the Nasuverse are h-games (Or based on h-games)? Not very good ones, though. So far the sex scenes in Fate/Stay Night have just made me laugh uncontrollably. Chapter Four: "Elegance Under the Moon"/"Gekka Ryuurei" quote:If I had more skill in what I was attempting, I wouldn't need so much courage. This section goes into skills, specializations, and their use. It covers basic tests, Extended tests (Those that people with Karoushi will work themselves to death on), and Resisted tests, like Brawl vs Dodge. You can even have Extended Resisted tests, like interrogations. Of particular interest is that nothing here tells you how to buy skills. You have skill points, and I assume you buy skills with them, and given the number of skills and the number of points, you can spend more than one point on them, but this is all speculation. You can specialize in a skill by spending an extra point (I assume skill points, but it doesn't actually say), which gives you a +2 to your roll when dealing with the specialization. You can specialize up to 4 times in a single skill: 1 point for the first, 6 for the second, 8 for the third, and 10 for the fourth. Given that most of the skills here have at least ten different specializations, that seems high. It also doesn't say how abilities key into skills, nor which ones equate to which. Specializing also affects the exploding dice. When you roll a natural 10 on a skill, it's called a Bullseye: you keep that and roll another die. If you're rolling a specialty, that die is a d8. If that comes up 8, you add on a d6. If you're not specialized, or if you're rolling skills where you have to specialize (Such as Academics or Science, no word on whether that's a free specialization or not), it's a d6 and a d4. There are also critical fumbles, which this game calls Botches. Is it just me, or does every game system have its own terminology for special die results? I would probably be surprised if a system called a natural worst roll an Epic Fail, but only because no one was sane enough to realize it was a bad idea. So, without further ado, a selection of skills, and a selection of those selected skills' selected specializations that I've selected for a select purpose and my select button is sticking help select help -Academics: Social Work, Urban Legends, History of the Catholic Church. -Animal Ken: This skill is noted as being kind of essential for anyone with infernal or celestial powers, as for some reason animals can't tell the difference. -Bureaucracy: Fraud, Military Teamwork, Stewardship, Bribery, Police Paperwork. -Computers: Artificial Intelligence, Viruses, 31337 H4xx0r. -Dodge: Bullets are dodged at -2, so having Dodge (Firefight) is basically breaking even. Given the nature of Nasuverse stories, though, guns aren't likely to feature all that much. -Drive: Armored Fighting Vehicle, Mecha, Reverse, Initial D. If untrained, you can only drive an automatic and take -2 to everything else. -Firearms: It doesn't mention this in the skill itself, but Firearms skill is also used to aim several spells and special abilities (Such as Mystic Eyes of Torture and Gate of Babylon), but not bows.  -Occultism: Unquiet Spirits, Tarot, Vampires, Hidden Worlds, Things Man Was Not Meant To Know. I just find it vaguely interesting that you can specialize in knowing poo poo you're explicitly not supposed to. I know it's Cthulhu and poo poo, I'm just of the opinion you should pick that poo poo up by accident, not go out and get yourself a +2 in it. -Wild Card: Wild Card contains skills that ostensibly don't fit elsewhere. I'll cover them, and you see if you can figure out where they might go and still be just as, if not more, effective. I'll provide that myself in a bit, don't worry. -Archery. Bonus: Why is this placement for Archery stupid beyond just having another place it'll fit? -Graphoanalysis. That's handwriting analysis for those with little Latin background. -Intuition (Gambling, Hunches, Bad Feelings). This might be okay as a Wild Card, really. -Streetwise (Includes Seduction, but a different Seduction from Influence, and Locate Playaz). -Torture. Right, then, let's see if you agree with me. Archery: Loses nothing by being grouped under Firearms. In fact, since Wild Card is a skill you have to specialize in, Wild Card Archery uses only d6 and d4 for Bullseyes. Meaning you can never be better at (lucky) archery than someone else could be with a gun. Graphoanalysis: Academics. Intuition: I'd stick Hunches in Investigation, Bad Feelings in Occultism, and Gambling... Probably in Finance. Streetwise: Probably Politics and Influence. Torture: Influence. Chapter Five: "Garden of a Cradle"/"Yurikago no Niwa" This seems to be the actual system chapter, maybe it'll explain all these mechanics we've been working with. We start with times skill uses can take, nothing of much interest here, except that fixing a taser takes the same amount of time as fixing a laser or maser. I think he just grouped those together by sound, and has no idea how either of them works. Now we come to the Botch rules. If you roll a natural 1, roll again and subtract that from your skill. If that roll is another 1, it's a Botch. So if you roll terribly, you do really badly, but if you roll well, you do pretty badly, so you need to roll lovely, but not absolutely lovely to only fail a little bit? There you are, psyduck! I'd missed you.  As usual for critical fumble tables, it provides many Next up, initiative. This is Dex + Alertness + Combat Reflexes + 1d10. this gives you a number of Success Levels. Still no definition of that, though. You then subtract that number from 5, and that's when your first attack will go off. Later attacks happen later in the initiative cycle by adding 3 to the first attack time. Then you do this again next round. A Guide To Skill Use: Common Rolls quote:How do I shot web? Now here are the skill and stat combinations. Turns out there's kind of an okay reason that a stat isn't inherently tied into a skill. Some uses of a skill may use other stats! For instance, cleaning a gun is Int + Firearms, while actually shooting it is Dex. Noteworthy skill uses: -Sneak around by being light-footed: Dex+Stealth -Sneak Around Like a Silent Film Villain: Dex+Stealth. Why are these both here? Is there a difference? -Build a trap: Int + Repair. -Use Alien Machines: Occultism + Technology + 1/2 Int. -Throw a Rock: Dex + Melee - 2. This is the same rule for throwing anything. -Jack Bauer Style "Interrogation": Int + Wild Card (Torture). -Shot Web (Not provided in this list, but we can go back to the Webbing perk and look): Wild Card (Webbing) + ??? I'd assume Dex to shot it at dude, Int to set up a trap or barrier. Hmm. I think I just figured out why there's two different sneaking examples. The list gives the impression of being written by two different people or at two different times. Half of it is written normally, the other half Capitalizes Nearly Every Word. Experience Points and Improvement quote:It's survival of the fittest. They sucked, therefore they're dead. Players will gain between 1 and 5 XP per session, depending on what goes on. You can increase a stat for five XP per level. "Thus, to go from Str 1 to Str 2 takes 10 points." ...Huh? Skills can be increased as much as you like, and cost 4 times the desired rank, so going from rank 3 to rank 4 costs 12 points. Again: Huh? Something is either being misrepresented or poorly explained here. Specialization in skills is usually cheaper, costing 2 XP for the first, and 6 for each afterwards. Now the big psyduck: Adding a perk costs 1 XP per level of the perk. That's it. Want to be a better driver? Hang in there, it'll probably be like six sessions before you can. Want to be stronger? Another four to six sessions if you happen to be a 90-pound weakling. Mystic Eyes of Death Perception? Sure, you can pick that up tomorrow. It says you need a story-based rationalization, but come on, you think that's going to actually stop some horrid munchkin that wants to be or do Saber? Hell, just take the skill-point-boosting perk and boom, your driving is twice as good for like a twentieth of the cost! My brain hurts, this looked like a vaguely interesting system from the outside, and I still need to do combat and sanity. Well, could be worse. I could still have the Book of Erotic Fantasy.  Psyducks in this section: 3 Total Psyducks: 14 Pages covered: 86/242 Ideal Mana Transfer Method: Semen Dareon fucked around with this message at Jul 18, 2011 around 14:16 |
| # ? Jul 18, 2011 13:44 |
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DISCLAIMER: I haven't actually played this game. I only own some books because they are neat.   Sometime in the distant past a terrible monster named Mars was gripped by fury and hurled vast boulders down onto the world. Civilisation struck back and in the war that followed every manner of horror was unleashed upon humanity. The few that survived did so by hiding in enclaves deep under the earth, for nobody knows how long. When people started to emerge they found the surface world to be nearly completely alien to them. Resources were scarce and not all enclaves felt like sharing. They sent out great armies of machines to conquer what was left of the lands. This did not end well. The enclaves fell and survivors were scattered to the winds. Nothing is known of the time after this because there was no one to keep records. Eventually, however, people banded together in growing numbers and began to found cities and strongholds. Two hundred years ago the greatest of these nation-states, the Pyrian Society, was founded in what was once central Scandinavia. It is composed of loosely connected cities held together by sheer luck, the common economic interests of the bourgeois and (of course) the Emperor's armies. Not all are fit for a society so plagued with tensions and the desperate or foolish seek out the lands beyond the new civilisation, into the borders of the Zones, where the ruins of the ancestors promise as much riches as it does dangers. And that is the premise of Mutant: Undergångens Arvtagare (the Heirs of the Ruin), a Swedish post-post-apocalyptic RPG set in, well, Scandinavia. This was actually originally released in 1984 but got a big ole update in 2001-2008. It's pretty much a Swedish Fallout without the 1950's thing. There's a strong STALKER vibe as well. So, what do you do in this game? The most obvious thing is to band together and hunt for treasure in the wilderness. The game provides you with plenty material to justify exactly why your mutant, human or robot would be dumb enough to go there. You can throw in any get-rich-quick-scheme cliché and it'll work splendidly. Another thing you can do is engage in political intrigue in the city or bumble around in its underworld. There are also a couple of adventure modules that explore things like the north-western coastal lands or the machine-worshipping biker gangs of the central plains. Player characters: You can be one of three different classes: Non-mutated human: Descendants of those who hid into the enclaves. They've inherited great wealth and power and mostly want it to remain that way. They are largely not too keen on mutants. All humans receive additional skill levels in their abilities to represent coming from a wealthier background that could afford good education and training. They also have access to a list of special talents like having a regular income, a good reputation or an old friend who can show up to save your rear end. Mutants!: What the game is named after. It's really not sure where all of them originally come from. Some resemble animals, some are nearly human and others look like nothing else. Mutants make up the majority of the population and come from all sorts of social backgrounds. In the cities, though, they mostly make up the underclass. Whether you're a mutated human or animal, you have special access to a list of mutations at character creation. Little wonder, really. They can be anything from a tough hide, multiple brains or limbs, photosynthesis, magnetism or the ability to extract nutrients out of cellulose. There are also the psi mutants. They don't have the common mutations but they do have psychic powers! Suggestion, domination, telekinesis, combustion, weather manipulation. Really quite dramatic stuff. They're rare and the secret police doesn't want them to really stay alive or anything so psi mutants tend to be hidden and shifty people. That the most well known organisation associated with them is a terrorist organisation doesn't help much. Robots: Built long before the catastrophes, robots are quite the special part of society. Most people have seen one but they're not too into the whole social interaction deal. The ones that you can play as were built for minor security work, laboratory research, archival work or sometimes entertainment. Other than the last group, robots are obviously non-human and overly literal. Robots are generally polite and helpful to the point of being annoying. Unless you at character creation specifically purchase options that change this, they are all governed by the Three Laws (obvious mutants can suck it, though). Since they're machines they can be repaired and are immune to mental domination, poison gases, things that suck blood and so on. They're handy to have around. You also have prior occupations such as hunter, lawman, worker, farmer, scholar, mechanic and so on. This game has a somewhat special sort of humour, mostly born from that we all know what a VCR is and don't consider canned food to be a truly impressive technological innovation. For example, there's a little blurb about a farmer mistaking an ancient land mine for a fertiliser device.  I would post more art but I haven't found any of the black and white illustrations inside the books themselves yet. Later on I guess I'll do a run through of character creation and get to grips with the system itself.   
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 14:33 |
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Oh please tell me the system is good, that art is too awesome.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 16:02 |
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Just wanted to mention that the third draft of Magical Burst got released today.quote:It’s a little overdue, but here’s the new draft of Magical Burst. I’m not totally happy with it, but some things have definitely improved.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 16:11 |
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chelsea clinton posted:DISCLAIMER: I haven't actually played this game. I only own some books because they are neat. Awesome.  The MUA books got a special place in my heart, despite never really played the system in full either but I find the setting really cool. Not to mention  Someone on /tg/ has actually posted translated bits of the core rule book and one of the threads with that has been archived here for those interested. There is also this thread about the history of Swedish RPGs that some might find interesting as well.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 16:30 |
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Dareon posted:Players will gain between 1 and 5 XP per session, depending on what goes on. You can increase a stat for five XP per level. "Thus, to go from Str 1 to Str 2 takes 10 points." ...Huh? Skills can be increased as much as you like, and cost 4 times the desired rank, so going from rank 3 to rank 4 costs 12 points. Again: Huh? Something is either being misrepresented or poorly explained here. Also of note is that this is typically a lovely thing to buy in WoD too unless 90% of your powers are based on that attribute. Same for skills.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 16:42 |
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Cooked Auto posted:There is also this thread about the history of Swedish RPGs that some might find interesting as well. quote:Simply put, they put most things on its ear, including the stereotypes most RPGers associate with different species/races. They were still the biggest (possibly the only big) publishers in Sweden, but they'd shot themselves in the foot Oh, grogs. Never loving change.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 16:44 |
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Benagain posted:Oh please tell me the system is good, that art is too awesome. I have been told that it's modified BRP and serviceable but nothing special. The remake was licensed by Paradox Entertainment, by the way. Not heard of any bugs, though.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 16:53 |
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If Syrg Saphire is still looking for a pdf comparator I've got one here. Also I just read all the way through this in one sitting. Then I stared in the abyss and all I felt was relief.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 21:45 |
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I just finished writing up a Magical Burst campaign. THANKS A LOT, DAREON.
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 22:51 |
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| # ? May 18, 2013 22:10 |
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Thuryl posted:I'd suggest going through the list and just posting the especially SIGSEGV posted:Also I just read all the way through this in one sitting. Then I stared in the abyss and all I felt was relief. 
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| # ? Jul 18, 2011 22:56 |
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