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It's not that it directly advises it, it's that it somewhat discourages using the itemless system. The problem with the itemless system is it becomes another table to consult when levelling up, and it's very easy for players to forget to consult the thing in the latter half of the Dark Sun book to see if they get +1 to their defenses or whatever. I like their system for defiling, though. It's not a bad one, although the defiling radius is very small by default. Did some tweaks of it for my party.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 00:53 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 04:42 |
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doomfunk posted:they encourage GMs to pretty much throw magic items at you as normal for that version of D&D. doomfunk posted:Yep. There's an option in the book that is curiously similar to the Book of Exalted Deeds' Vow of Poverty feat, where in lieu of distributing magic items you just kind of... power your party up, because 4E as a whole is balanced around a party draped in magical poo poo. There's exactly one creature catalog for Athas. With a little more work and a couple more published setting books they could've done a fine job of balancing creature encounters around a zero-magic-item loot sum, but no. Plus they have more Boons and Grandmaster Training things, non-magic-item intrinsic applications with benefits to simulate things like winning favor in the arenas or getting a blessing from a Sorc King. They really, really don't just encourage you to throw magic items at the party.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:01 |
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doomfunk posted:The standard 4E races are all in, including tieflings and dragonborn. Dray are a thing, so the latter isn't exactly a big deal, but... tieflings in a setting with no fiends? PurpleXVI posted:The Sun's basically gotten the BAD TOUCH from both the Halflings of the Blue Age and Rajaat in the Green Age, so maybe now there are some genuine sacrifices that have to be made to squeeze any power out of it. I played a Sun Cleric in a short-lived game on this forum, and ran him as being a bit schizophrenic. He had vague feelings of a sun that wanted to help, but then a big angry sun that wanted to hurt. So he'd cast healing spells then punish himself by burning patterns in his skin with a bit of blasted glass polished into a magnifying lens. Or demanding a man nearly die of heat exhaustion in the noonday sun before healing his sick child. That kind of thing. It was purely a roleplaying consideration, but I thought it made sense since I was playing a 'good' sun priest who wanted to restore the Sun to its prior state.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:01 |
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Athas DOES have a planar connection, but it's severely wonky, and there's one or two gateways in total (canonically) through which Fiends could enter(I think there's actually one adventure that does involve shutting down a gate that's been set up in the badlands, with Fiends disguised as Gith). It's just that, going by the books, trying to enter or leave Athas has a roughly 75% straight-up failure rate. And on top of that a 25% chance or so to get stuck in the Gray. The Gray is basically a big, soupy muddle where the souls of dead Athasians end up, sort of melting until they fade away. Which probably accounts for why Athasian undead are usually pretty pissed off. The only Sorcerer-King with a reliable planar portal is Dregoth, though, and, well, if I do City By The Silt Sea, we'll see what he thinks of races that aren't Dray(hint: he doesn't like them, not one bit). Canon also says that, yes, undead constructs and chitin/bone golems are a large part of some Sorcerer-King armies. They even have sort-of tanks. Where they take some Mekillot-sized beetles, or bigger, kill them, hollow them out, stuff their shells full of firing ports and ballistas, install some internal decks and partitions... and then re-animate them to serve as huge, undead siege engines staffed by Templars and slaves.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:11 |
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PurpleXVI posted:Canon also says that, yes, undead constructs and chitin/bone golems are a large part of some Sorcerer-King armies. They even have sort-of tanks. Where they take some Mekillot-sized beetles, or bigger, kill them, hollow them out, stuff their shells full of firing ports and ballistas, install some internal decks and partitions... and then re-animate them to serve as huge, undead siege engines staffed by Templars and slaves.  If I wasn't already looking into starting something, I'd be sorely tempted to give Dark Sun 4th Edition a try. I dislike how much it depends on the PCs having magic items, the optional rules sound awesome.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:17 |
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Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:As it stands the implementation isn't that people just "power up," it's that the math fixes are baked into the characters instead of attached to the crap they pick up. If anything the inherent bonuses system makes sense for a Dark Sun style game considering, haven't the materials to this point been going on about how you have to be rough and tumble to survive Athas to the point where you even start adventuring? I see what you're saying and like it. Guy who ran the game I was in chirps occasionally about running it again, I'll see if I can push him into offering mundane gear as item rewards, with boons and such being more pertinent. I always forget about boons, because... they never happened with us.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:17 |
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Semi-related to the Sun priests bit, but from what I recall on reading from the Dark Sun priest book Earth, Air, Fire, and Water, there's a fun dichotomy between the elementals and the para-elementals, where the elementals (the just mentioned earth, air, fire, and water) drive their priests to try to rejuvenate and revive Athas, even as the para-elementals (silt, sun, magma, and rain) try to destroy it further. Except rain, I guess. But silt, sun, and magma totally drive their clerics to wreck even more havoc on the planet.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:20 |
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Tieflings could have originally been humans who received a much more potent dose of the environmental stresses that give modern DS humans odd physical traits. Or they could be an earlier, failed experiment of Dregoth's. Or maybe their DNA got messed up through generations of defiling. Mekillots are goddamn awesome. Dumb as rocks and twice as tough, they'll carry you around the world without stopping... as long as you keep them watered. Just don't get between them and an oasis, or they'll roll over you like a steamroller.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 01:31 |
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ProfessorCirno posted:Semi-related to the Sun priests bit, but from what I recall on reading from the Dark Sun priest book Earth, Air, Fire, and Water, there's a fun dichotomy between the elementals and the para-elementals, where the elementals (the just mentioned earth, air, fire, and water) drive their priests to try to rejuvenate and revive Athas, even as the para-elementals (silt, sun, magma, and rain) try to destroy it further. Except rain, I guess. But silt, sun, and magma totally drive their clerics to wreck even more havoc on the planet. Dark Sun! By your powers combined, I am Captain This Planet Is hosed!   Just a quick aside before we get to the Kreen, I promise they're next on this list. Earth, Air, Fire and Water is the priest/druid handbook for Dark Sun. Psionicists and Defilers/Preservers get addition books, too, but sadly, as far as I know, the rogue(speaking of, I missed one more expanded setting edition: The Trader, a rogue class with some thiefy skills, slightly better combat than a base thief, albeit no backstabbing, and a talky focus) and fighter classes do not.  The book has two parts, first it explains the relations between Clerics and their elements better, and secondly it expands the class with, as mentioned, Para-Elemental Clerics, more spells and finally epic-level(20+) rules. Clerics in brief Athas is, as we've established: hosed. And none of the elementals are happy about this, even the fire elementals are kind of nervous, because as much as they love stuff burning, there's just so little fuel left on Athas that they're fearful of consuming anything that remains. The world will soon be completely burned out if nothing's done about it. Elementals posted:Unfortunately, the remote and chaotic elementals realized Athas impending doom far too late. Most sages agree that the planet's spiraling decline has become irreversible. So if you don't mind lacking heart, you could have a Party of Planeteers out to save the world of Athas from itself. Maybe Heart can be a Bard or something. Now, as much as Clerics are usually tolerated, they're also enemies of Defilers, and the Sorcerer-Kings are big-time Defilers directly to blame for much of the planet's current state, so Templars generally hunt Clerics unless they're doing something directly beneficial to the city-state they're in. To make matters worse, as tapped-out as the elemental powers are, they can only recruit limited numbers of followers and still grant them powers, so you're never going to have armies of Water priests gating in vast amounts of fresh water to replenish Athas. Clerics also have the unique power to counter defiling damage by directly sacrificing hit points when near a defiler casting spells. It doesn't stop the spell, which may very well nuke them out of existence shortly thereafter, but at least the land is preserved. Each element also has its own initiation rite for its clerics. Earth: Buried alive for half a day. If the elemental spirits reject you, you STAY buried. Air: Thrown off a loving mountainside. Better hope the elementals catch you! Fire: Left inside a bonfire. Predictably, if you get rejected for the role of elemental dude, you get kinda crisped. Water: Your mentor finds a lake, weighs you down and chucks you in. Once again, you don't want to gently caress this one up.  more goofy headwear than a Touhou game Paraelemental Goofiness Silt(Ooze), Rain(Ice), Magma(Magma) and Sun(Smoke) expand the spell lists and spheres of Athasian clerics. For normal clerics, they're combination schools, for instance, an Earth and a Fire cleric could combine their powers to cast Magma spells. Alternately someone could be a maniac singularly worshipping one of these forces. Unlike the older and purer elements, all of these(Rain aside) are actually getting more powerful as Athas dies, cracks and turns to sun-baked dust with magma flows. Their initial rituals are also similar, except for Rain clerics, who get a hilariously Mad Science initiation that basically involves tying them to a pole and sticking them into a passing storm cloud(rare as those are). Silt posted:Silt clerics wish to destroy the trees, grasses, and fauna that retain moisture, preventing wind erosion and holding the land together. When the plants are finally destroyed, the land will crumble and turn to silt, and the moisture from the ground will be trapped below the silt, rather than allowing normal evaporation through the plant’s stems and leaves. Magma posted:The paraelementals of magma are desperate and scream constantly for succor. Some clerics have been driven mad by their eternally beckoning pleas, and they pursue the pact with maniacal hatred. When they are encountered as wanderers, it is generally because their most recent magma eruption failed and they seek another to tend. Others may simply be trying to escape their patron lords for short periods of time. A wandering magma cleric may take several years to find another source of lava, and often he is in no hurry to reach his destination. Fortunately for him, the magma paraelementals don’t seem to notice large amounts of wasted time—probably because a decade is but a second in their almost eternal time frame. Not fun folks by any stretch of the imagination. Templars The book also has a short chapter on the character of the various cities' templars. In Balic, for instance, the Templars are all shady fuckers who abuse legal loopholes like it was second nature. In Raam they roam in small squads that constantly fight each other and the citizens. In Nibenay they're disciplined warriors and masters of defense. Advanced Beings Much like a level 20/20 Defiler/Psionicist becomes a Dragon, and a 20/20 Preserver/Psionicist becomes an Avangion, 20/20 Cleric/Psionicists become something new and interesting: They start to become their element. The more they advance, the longer they spend each day in elemental form. For instance, a 21st-level cleric must spend at least an hour each day in elemental form. If he doesn't assume the form on his own, he spontaneously snaps into it as the day nears an end. Interestingly enough, these clerics also get summoned to do war on their "home" planes. As Athas is kind of shut-off from the planes in general, it also has splinters of each of the elemental planes, and they're close enough to Athas that, say, a major victory for the forces of Water over the forces of Fire or Sun could bring a direct change to Athas itself, for instance in the form of more rainfall. Silt Realm posted:The realm of silt bears a striking resemblance to the Sea of Silt on Athas, and some wonder if the similarity is more ominous than anyone imagines. Air Realm posted:The Plane of Air is a vast, seemingly endless expanse of nothing —except air. Dark clouds from the plane of Steam sometimes float through here, and a traveler can leap from cloud to cloud without fear of falling. If he falls, he simply lands on another cloud. The creatures that live here float on fierce breezes, or dwell in secret in the very center of a floating cloud. Water Realm posted:Water’s plane is a series of sandy islands, drifting through from the Plane of Earth, and surrounded by muddy tides of murky brine. Most of the spirits live beneath the rippling surface, and one may venture anywhere without fear of drowning. Here, a traveler will see little but water and the pillars of sand that form the islands. And of course, being so close to Athas, these elemental splinter planes are much more habitable than their originals. There's not much more left to the book, it's really a somewhat-minor supplement you won't get that much use out of unless your characters survive up to what is effectively level 40+ on Athas, which is about as likely as Paranoia characters becoming clearance Ultraviolet. PurpleXVI fucked around with this message at May 15, 2012 around 02:19 |
| # ? May 15, 2012 02:11 |
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I saw the Dark Sun Trader book at a used bookstore a couple years ago. I think the trader class also got connections and status in their merchant house as they leveled up. The book also talked about what the various city-states imported and exported. It didn't seem very interesting overall.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 02:37 |
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PurpleXVI posted:Dark Sun! I read a lot of Dark Sun novels many years ago. They were pretty mediocre for the most part and introduced way too many changes to the Dark Sun mythos. Killing sorcerer-kings left and right? Executing Borys the Dragon and a having mul child resealing Rajaat? Sadira becoming a super-powered Mary Sue? gently caress that noise. Give me the bleak, hellish, unconventional red wasteland of the core 2nd Edition AD&D manuals any day. The rulebooks fleshed out Athas more than the novels ever did. From them we learn about rad stuff like the ancient halflings and their wild-shaping, the silt sea and other horrors unleashed by the changing of the sun, the Cleansing Wars designed to exterminate all of the non-human races, the foundation of the varied city-states. Any one of those would make for a more interesting book or adventure than what we got. Tithian the templar was kind of a cool character, though. Count Chocula posted:Has anyone else played the Dark Sun PC games? Wake of The Ravager was my first exposure to D&D. I was too young to figure much out, though I do remember beating some Veiled Allience members by casting Cone of Silence, speaking to them, and starting combat. It was a kinda proto Baldur's Gate thing. I think even Al Qadim got a game. I wrote a review of Dark Sun: Shattered Lands a while ago. It may be interesting to you and other fans of the setting. Mods, if this is considered spamming, I can edit this paragraph out of my post.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 06:17 |
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Say, that Remnants mecha game, how feasable would it be to adapt it to a more optimistic setting? Crazy, I know, considering the default setting's so bleak, but I just want to play a fast, high-powered mecha game in a relatively optimistic setting (I'm willing to homebrew for my group).
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| # ? May 15, 2012 08:35 |
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CommissarMega posted:Say, that Remnants mecha game, how feasable would it be to adapt it to a more optimistic setting? Crazy, I know, considering the default setting's so bleak, but I just want to play a fast, high-powered mecha game in a relatively optimistic setting (I'm willing to homebrew for my group). Utterly possible, but its difficulty would be determined by what you mean by optimistic. Simply increasing the level of agriculture and decreasing the hellishness of the landscape is entirely a fluff matter, whereas increasing the technology could make things a bit difficult (although there are stats in the book for basic guns if you want some city-states to have progressed that far). The remnant rules (which is what you're here for really) are pretty portable. They'd fit into any setting where: 1) Mechs grow with their pilot. 2) Pilots are bonded to their mech, and it reverts to basic on their death. 3) Mechs can fights in melee, at extreme range, and via drones. I will say, though, that raising the tech level might reduce the starting awesomeness of the characters in their remnants. Considering that your generic starting remnant does as much ranged damage as a longbow and a little bit more close damage than a claymore raising the level of weaponry people have either makes Ishin a lot less impressive or requires you to upstat them quite a bit.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 09:58 |
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DocRanger posted:Wolsung Steam Pulp Fantasy This is Zybourne Clock as hell. quote:Dwarves – Why do the dwarves live underground and have long beards? Because the light hurts them. They’re cold, calculating, reasonable. They are the only race that can replace more than one limb with mechanical ones – but once they replace their own heart, they are more machines than people. Obviously, they’re fascinated by technology and inventions.  quote:Gnomes are what Jews would be if they came from North and worshipped Odin. They are a mistrusted, alienated nation without a country, living in ghettos, having their own religion and customs. They also invented modern golems and difference machines. I am totally digging the 'Jewish gnomes'/'Orcs are every orientalist fear, fantasy and threat' motif. 
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| # ? May 15, 2012 11:38 |
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That steampunk thing is weirdly good. Also, am I remembering correctly that the githyanki or some other bunch tried to invade Athas?
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| # ? May 15, 2012 13:15 |
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Wolsung reminds me a lot of Arcanum. And yeah, some gith... spelljammers, I think, ended up crashing on Athas ages ago, and have got big, strong, and dumb over time.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 13:26 |
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Flavivirus posted:I will say, though, that raising the tech level might reduce the starting awesomeness of the characters in their remnants. Considering that your generic starting remnant does as much ranged damage as a longbow and a little bit more close damage than a claymore raising the level of weaponry people have either makes Ishin a lot less impressive or requires you to upstat them quite a bit. That's not quite right. A Remnant's melee attack defaults to Lead+2 damage (which is a longsword), and the ranged attack defaults to Lead+4 (a longbow is +2). I didn't mention this before, but Remnants are considered "mounted" and get +1 damage against targets half their hieght (i.e., normal humans). On top of that, don't forget that Ishin have a base Armor of 5, which acts as flat damage reduction, and are very fast. They can get in, hit someone, the zip out easily. And that's not getting into any special abilities the Ishin has on top of that.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 13:31 |
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Flavivirus posted:The remnant rules (which is what you're here for really) are pretty portable. They'd fit into any setting where: Evil Mastermind posted:That's not quite right. A Remnant's melee attack defaults to Lead+2 damage (which is a longsword), and the ranged attack defaults to Lead+4 (a longbow is +2). I didn't mention this before, but Remnants are considered "mounted" and get +1 damage against targets half their hieght (i.e., normal humans). On top of that, don't forget that Ishin have a base Armor of 5, which acts as flat damage reduction, and are very fast. They can get in, hit someone, the zip out easily. And that's not getting into any special abilities the Ishin has on top of that. Yeah, I was thinking of refluffing the Remnants into something akin to small biological suits of power armour issued to spec ops or commissioned by really wealthy and powerful dudes that grow with the wearer. As for the game setting, I'm kind of thinking, well, spec ops/explorers- after a few nasty trips into Tomb Worlds with my RT group, I began fantasizing about super commandos (who aren't Space Marines) doing that for a living.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 13:44 |
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CommissarMega posted:Yeah, I was thinking of refluffing the Remnants into something akin to small biological suits of power armour issued to spec ops or commissioned by really wealthy and powerful dudes that grow with the wearer. As for the game setting, I'm kind of thinking, well, spec ops/explorers- after a few nasty trips into Tomb Worlds with my RT group, I began fantasizing about super commandos (who aren't Space Marines) doing that for a living. There is some stuff later in the book about refluffing the setting that I'll talk about when we get there. But for now... LET'S READ REMNANTS - Warriors are born, not made. Chapter 4: The Characters The character creation chapter starts out by pointing out an important consideration about the game: everyone is meant to be an Ishin pilot. But how does that work when you've got a lot of characters? It's already been established that only the big city-states have more than one or two Remnants. quote:Before you start building your character, take a moment to broaden your perspective and look at how your character will interacts with his companions. Remnants can be played as a solo RPG with a single PC and the GM or it can be played with 2 to 4 PCs. While the rules do not preclude larger groups, it is not recommended. The game works best with few players for a few reasons. With more Remnants, the GM has to do a lot more prep on combat encounters and it becomes harder to balance and manage battles. Also, lots of Remnants acting together stretches the internal logic of the setting. No land or area but the city-states can even afford to employ more than one or two Ishinari, let alone a half dozen. In other words, this isn't a game for a group of 6 players unless you change some of the base setting assumptions. It really is better suited to three or fewer players; and while I don't have a problem with that, it would have been nice for the game to be a little more up front about that, instead of putting it halfway through the book. Now that that's out of the way, let's talk about making your character. You start out by putting together a character concept, picking a name, and putting together a background. This is all standard-issue stuff, but the book does give a few ideas for background based on the nine "regions" from before. quote:The Canyon Tribes Nothing to out there or mechanical; just some suggestions for the types of people you'd typically get in those regions. Next, you pick your Ishin's style and your relationship to it. Is it an Ancient Find, or did your clan sieze it recently from an enemy? Again, nothing mechanical here; just layign more groundwork. Now we get to assign stats, and this is a little odd. Remeber how you only had 3 stats: Body, Mind, and Spirit? Well, they all start at 0 (average), and you get a whopping 1 point to add to one of your stats. You can lower a stat by 1 point (down to -2) to raise another by 1, but that's all you get starting out. No matter how you adjust your points, your stats are going to sum up to +1. This also means that every character's Situational Awareness (the stat used for Remnant combat) is going to start at +1. Next up you pick your skills. Skill rating goes from 0 (untrained) to 6 (Grand Master). You get one skill at 1 for free, based on your starting region, then get another 10 skill points to buy the rest of your skills. Skills cost their level, but you can't start with more than 2 levels in a skill. Each region except Wastelanders and The Vast get two region skills to pick from; Wastelanders have to take Survival and people from The Vast have to take Ride. The skill list is pretty standard-issue. There are 23 skills all told, ranging from Craft to Stealth to Melee to Social Sciences. No real surprises here except for Social Sciences, which is "the catch-all skill for political science, archeology, and sociology". At this point, you figure your derived stats: Defense, Resist, and Health. The next part is picking your Advantages and Disadvantages. Each advantage and disadvantage has a Major and Minor version; you can take up to one Major and three Minor advantages, but you need to balance each one with a disadvantage of the same level. There are surprisingly few ads and disads listed; there are only seven advantages and eight disadvantages. quote:Friends in Low Places The book does suggest making your own ads and disads, but sadly there's no advice on how to figure out what's considered major or minor. They don't even have any mechanical benefits. Not that that's a bad thing, that makes them simple roleplaying cues, but still it would have been nice to have some numbers to back them up, because without a mechanical backing they're really just character quirks that you'd probably come up with anyway. Calling the kind of character/background things players make on their own out as "advantages and disadvantages" just seems out of place. Next up is Gear and Money. Like Apocalypse World, money is abstracted; everyone starts with 20 points of "Easy Living". One point of Easy Living buys you one day not "on the job". There are guidelines for how much a job pays out; for example, a simple caravan escort would get you 1 EL a day. If you want to set up your own caravan or buy a plot of land for yourself, then the GM has to determine how many days of EL that would cost. A small parcel of land might cost 180 EL (which is about 6 months), whereas an actual house in the city could cost upwards of 1000 EL. You can also opt for "Decadent Living", where you spend more EL per day to live better (ranging from 7 to 30 EL per day depending on how decadent you go), and "Frugal Living", where you spend 1 EL to last for 3 days. You can stretch that even more with a Business roll, difficulty 7, and getting the Lead in extra days. That's assumuing he has a useful trade he can live off of, though. In addition to the 20 EL, everyone starts with a weapon or two, light armor, and a pack of basic survival gear. It's assumed that Ishinari travel light since Remnants don't really have storage space for anything except the pilot. Weapons and armor are also generalized, with weapons being classified as either light (Lead+1 damage), medium (Lead+2), or heavy (Lead+3). The only thing about heavy weapons is that you need a Body stat of at least +1 to use them. Ranged weapons are long and short bows, crossbows, and thrown weapons, and don't do more than Lead+2 damage. Well, heavy crossbows do Lead+3, but they only fire every third round so it's not really worth it. Armor goes light-medium-heavy as well (Resist +2/+3/+4), with shields adding another +1. Information is provided for guns, but they're considered "optional". At the GM's discression, he can decide that the city-state of Amantin has re-discovered gunpowder and has access to simple flintlock weapons. Pistols do Lead+2, muskets Lead+3, and each requires 3 rounds to reload. They also don't fire when wet and have a chance of misfiring. On the plus side, guns ignore 2 points of Armor on non-Ishi targets. So they don't do anything extra against Remnants, but they'll gently caress up infantry just fine. Once you have your gear picked, it's just a matter of finishing up your character details and you're done. All that's left to do is build your Remnant, but we have two more parts of this chapter to cover first. There are optional rules for playing Near Humans, which really just boil down to skill packages. quote:Porteth - The True Wastelanders - While many Wastelanders live in the Wastes, Only the Porteth thrive there. Porteth are of average height, gangly to the point of emaciated, have ashen-gray skin, and are immune to many dangers of the Wastes. They are known for their cold demeanor, preference for silence, and brilliant shooting skills. While Wastelanders often sight small family groups of Porteth, and Porteth guides are considered some of the best, no one has ever seen Porteth in larger numbers. Persistent rumours claim that the Porteth have an entire city-state hidden in the Deep Wastes. Characters playing Porteth make the following changes:  The last part of this chapter is about XP. XP is earned in three ways: doing something awesome, spending Reserve, or accepting a Critical Failure. When one of these things happen, the skill you were using at the time earns an experience point. In addition, you get 1-5 XP at the end of each session to put in whatever skills you want; the only limitation is that you can't put more that 2 XP on a skill per session (which becomes no more than 1 XP when your skill hits level 4). Skills cost double their new level to improve, and can be bought up as soon as you have enough XP. At the end of the session, you also get 1 Stat Point, which are not assigned to one of your stats. Increasing a stat costs 10 points the first increase, the next increase costs 20, and so on. The max for any stat is +2, but you can get a +3 if you give the GM a good reason. The only real problem I have with Remnant's character creation is that the character all feel kind of same-y. Everyone has the same stat block for the most part, and there aren't a lot of mechanical ways to differentiate one character from another. It feels like when you made old D&D fighters and the only difference between Bob the Fighter and Larry the Fighter was their gear. I get that the Remnants are the focus of the game, but a little more "spread" in character creation would have been nice. NEXT TIME: The part you've all been waiting for: building your giant fighty robot!
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| # ? May 15, 2012 14:29 |
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Feng Shui: It's like they opened my skull and scooped out the part that gives a drat. SCAF-PLATs are big and intricate...and as a result, htere's all kinds of things you can break. The second floor superconductors, if destroyed, will choke off all power to the antigravity nodes and drop it from the sky. This takes 1000 points of damage to all the coils and wires...but that's a lot, isn't it? You can disable them all from the central circuit junction with a diff 12 Fix-It roll over the course of one sequence. The trick is finding and fighting your way to the central junction. And since it's the second floor, the area's full of ice and coolant and so on. The eaiest way to make the cooling system fail is to head to the cockpit and take it offline on the third floor, which takes a sequence and a diff 6 Fix-It roll from the commander's control panel. (It involves getting the computer to believe the plasma vent is being turned on when it isn't.) The third floor has the most guards, naturally. You can blow the entire thing up if you manage to turn the plasma vent and then either prevent the cooling systems from switching to plasma shielding, get the plasma vent working at full power and turn it off while the fortress is balanced on top of it or turn the vent on when the vent guard is closed. All of these can be done from the commander's computer, and each takes two sequences and a diff 6 Fix-It roll. You can also do the first one from the second floor. It's diff 10 to find an auxiliary control panel (which can be as awakward to find as the GM wants), and then a second diff 10 roll to make it happen. If you're doing this while the vent is preparing to fire, you're good - you have sixty seconds to get out before the thing blows up. Try hijacking a grav-car. If the fire sequence has not started yet, it's off to the fourth floor to start if by finding the other control panel and rigging it, with the same difficulties. Then it's the same sixty seconds to get out, but you have two more floors to go back through. Of course, if you use this method, Buro's already destroyed whatever's below you. If the PCs can find that fourth floor control panel and sabotage it - which means more than just shooting it - the SCAF-PLAT will start falling immediately. PCs have about 20 seconds to get out before impact. Good luck! The simplest option is getting the plasma gun to fire while the gate is closed. It maeans finding yet another control panel and making a diff 13 Fix-It roll, since you're basically breaking the gun. Then it's back upstairs, find the vent controls, activate them as before. You now have ninety seconds to get out, because the platform isn't going to crash until it explodes in midair. Anything in the mile underneath it is still pretty hosed, but that's...well, that's normal when you're under a Flying Fortress. And yes, a lot of these options involve screwing around on the fourth floor, which is super hot and full of tubes containing plasma. If those break, everyone gets a brief moment of horrible plasma burns! But not deadly ones, just really painful. Your homework is to come up with new and exciting ways to kill a SCAF-PLAT. Overloading the fusion core, shutting down the engines or breaking all the antigrav units on one side so it starts spinning in place really fast, that should all work. Basically, as long as the PCs have fun and work out a vaguely plausible method of breaking the drat thing, let it work as long as it isn't easy. CDCA Research and Development Facility #1 is where it all started: Ad Dammam, Saudi Arabia. It is the small, secret lab where Anita Dao and Boatman were able to work unencumbered by oversight. It's a decent feng shui site, but not compared to what else is around these days. It doesn't see a lot of cutting edge research any more, not since the Biomass Reprocessing Facility opened. Still, Boatman has a bit of a soft spot for the place in what passes for his heart. That's why the place is perfect for the Museum of Abomination Research, better known as the Zoo. There's a dozen types of early and obsolete abominations here, kept in secure and rather unpleasant habitats that simulate the areas of the Underworld the critters traditionally come from, such as the Skinned Alive Forest or the Ocean of Boiling Blood. Fun! There's also some more impressivem onsters that, for various reasons, can't be deployed. R&DFac1 is out in the middle of the desert, so it's not easy to get there. Getting back once you blow it up might be worse. The good thing is that if you let the abominations out, one of two things will happen. Either they're going to shred the local landscape so much that the building can't be rebuilt, or the Buro will send in enough firepower that the building can't be rebuilt. Boatman's still attuned to the place, so bonus! The facility itself is a big dome in the middle of a valley, with turret-mounted GOBS on either side of the canyon. Once you get past those, there's a road that is carefully monitored by a turreted Hellgarrower in front of the dome. It's probably easier just to rappel in from the cliffside. Once you get into the dome, there's the zoo, home of the fabulous Blood Squid, modified for anti-submarine activity, or the Earth Swimmer, so dangerous it's kept sedated at all times! The monsters are kept in the dome's big chamber in individual habitats, with paths between the exhibits, much like nay zoo. You've got your basement labs as well, full of tools that could kill people, and your five to six dozen soldiers in the barracks. What gets kept there? Well, we start with the blood squid, a giant squid demon with lamprey mouths for suckers. They keep it in a giant aquarium full of blood, and as far as I can tell they just don't use it because it's hard to steer and is really, incredibly tough. Also it dies when out of blood for around six sequences (or, perhaps, water - we'll never know). The Inside-Out Demon appears to be a moderately attractive woman. However, she can split herself down the middle and fold herself inside out, allowing her to terrify folks with her hideous muscle-and-bone armor and to drain their blood. She can then turn herself back the right way, taking the shape of the person she drained. She gets that person's stats (except Mind) and memories, making her an excellent spy...if it weren't for her ease in rejecting neural greppers. As a result of that, she's kept locked up here. The Cybertengu was made of a tengu, a Japanese mountain demon whose skill with the sword is legendary. This particular one was machine-gunned half to death and put back together, so he's got nasty scars as rell as red skin, a huge noise and blue, coarse hair. All tengu have a unique ability: their Martial ARts score is exactly equal to the person they're attackin. The Buro figured that if they gave the thing a VM sword and a few other enhancements, like a Neural Stimulator, it would be more than a match for any Guiding Hand fighter. Turns out they were wrong, thanks to kung fu powers. The Cybertengu got shelved as an oddity and has not been used since. The Flying Bladder used to be part of a giant demon named Yang Luo. It killed two squads of monster hunters, so they sent in their normal response to such things: overwhelming force. Even that only blew him to bits rather than killing him. His evil was so powerful that even his organs were able to move around and be intelligent. His legs ran back off to the Underworld but had to make a deal with the Lotus to get in. Same with one arm. The other arm got melted by the Ascended when it found its way to the Hub. The intestines got to the Sunless Sea and are a menace to navigation. The heart was captured by Ming I and became the base for the Molten Heart. The head has never been found. But the bladder and kidneys? The Architects got those. It's eight feet tall, four feet wide and has its own eyes and mouth. They stuck wings on it and figured it'd be a great tool. The neural grepper worked great, but Buro learned that the Bladder was able to grow new brains somehow...and since it was chronically disobedient and needed a new grepper each time, well, they decided to wash their hands of the whole project and locked it in the Museum. It is drat hard to kill. The Earth Swimmer is the final major monster in the Museum. It resembles the blood squid, vaguely, in the same way a Great Dane resembles a Chihuahua. It is twenty feet long, has three faces, each with one eye, and one gigantic mouth on theb ottom. It can slither along on the bottom face, and has several tentacles tipped in fifty foot digging paddles. The Earth SWimmer's immense size means it takes up most of th display space in the museum, and it is constantly kept sedated by an industrial-size Wave Suppressor. It was supposed to be theultimate weapon - it's big, it's strong, it swims through the earth itself. Unfortunately, its brain is too big to be effectively killed by a neural grepper. The Earth Swimmer is so big that a grepper large enough to kill it would weigh so much that it wouldn't be able to use its special movement abilities - and htose were the point, since it was meant to destroy feng shui sites from below. They tried a few missions with it, but when it had to carry around half a ton of explosives to do its digging, it was really slow...and no one wanted to be near it. By the time it got to its objectives, the enemies had either fled and burned the site behind them or fortified the place massively. Either way, not worth it. Now it stays in the museum, and the Wave Suppressor is all that keeps it safe - they had to remove the neural grepper to fit it into the facility. Its unique attack is Devour - it grabs a guy and eats them. At first, you take no damage and it takes a full sequence to move you to its mouth. You can spend 3 shots to make a diff 15 strength check. Succeed even once, you squirm out from beneath the Earth Swimmer. If you go an entire sequence and don't get even one success...you get eaten. And die. Period. No roll, no damage, just death. One success but less than three keeps you alive until next sequence, when you have to try again. Three successes in one sequence means you break free. People being eaten cannot make Martial Arts or Guns attacks while being eaten. We head now to Hollywood and the set of Combat Shopping! You've seen the Price is Right. Have you ever thought 'this would be way more entertaining if everyone had guns and wanted to kill each other?' So did Buro! The show evolved from pro wrestling and Japanese game shows, creating an entire subgenre of ultraviolent game shows. (I don't think Bonengel likes them much.) Anyway, the contestants are all given a sum of money to buy guns and armor. Anything they don't spend they get to keep if they live, so greedy contestants can be completely underequipped. Once you have your gear, you're set loose on a giant set full of durable consumer goods. All the goods have a price tag, and you have between seven and ten minutes to grab all you can. Anything you grab increases your score by its price. Any item you destroy decreases your score by half its price. Any item you take from another player decreases their score by its price and increases yours by double its price. Obviously, you want to steal stuff from other players. Easier said then done - there's more danger on the set than homicidally greedy clerks. The set looks like a department store, but it's full of traps. About one prize in a dozen is booby-trapped by the same sort of people who design the temples Indiana Jones runs through, and the best prizes usually have hazards protecting them. At the end of each round, you get to cash in your prizes and reinvest in more weapons, so there tends to be escalation. However, anything spent on weapons is not kept at the end of the show. Combat Shopping is so popular that the network actually set up a professional league; the rules are a little different, but not notably so. The amateur version is still very popular, too, thanks to the fun of watching accountants and factory workers try to kill each other. CDCA Secure Facility #12 in Bonengel, Australia is where you're going to go if you get arrested. They used to keep captive Innerwalkers in the Biomass Reprocessing Center, until one too many prisoners got out via Shaping. Now, they use SecFac112, which combines prison and experimental lab, where they try to figure out chi powers, sorcery and so on. Sometimes they interrogate, sometimes they vivisect, sometimes they create false chances to escape so prisoners will use their powers. Other times they just get fed up, kill prisoners and try to see what they can recreate from the brain's memory structures. It's not an exact science, but they've gotten some successes. Ice Station Yves in Antarctica is also known as Paranoia Base. If everything goes wrong and a war starts in 2056, a serious war - well, this is where the top brass will be coming to hide. (Except Boatman. He plans to run to the Biomass Reprocessing Center. Bonengel suspects this, and has a hidden part of his brain trying to figure out what to do if Boatman betrays him.) The best troops are stationed here, doing cold weather training and getting ready for anything. Sometimes they take captured rogue abominations and hunt them in the ice, but not often - CDCA doesn't like giving them out. Bonengel is also doing offensive training here - he knows that Antarctica is empty in most junctures and sees it as the perfect place for a secure base. (He is not aware that the Ascended have beaten him to it in the 1990s.) His troops are training to build bases and survive in the least hospitable place on Earth, and when the logistics are ready, he's going to send them to 69 AD to build a polar base. BTM HQ is in Geneva, Europe. Here, the Bureau of Tactical Management plans all of BuroMil's operations. Three of the flying fortresses are stored here when not in use, security patrols the place in full platoons and all sorts of secret plans exist in the computer banks underground. There's miles of 'em. And yes, that is all we're told about the place. Well, that and 'Have fun!' We also get a fun little picture telling us that Curtis Boatman's childhood home was a massively powerful feng shui site that ofcused its energy in his nursery. His parents bought it in 1999, and he was born a year later. Interesting! We now get the first of two adventures here: The Cancer Factory. This is designed for starting PCs. The Cancer Factory, AKA the Dunville CDCA Lab, requires a bit of understanding of Buro politics. Bonengel likes cops, doesn't like the CDCA. He is terrified of civilian insurgency - it's his personal pet peeve. Most counterinsurgency tasks and funds go to PubOrd as a result. One day, though, CDCA promises a solution to the rebel problem which is cheap, fast, certain and costs fewer lives. Bonengel is dubious, but they promsie it'll kill Innerwalkers, too, so he funds the research and the Cancer Factory is born. The theory is that demon DNA can be harvested, nuked into dormancy with arcanowaves and added to food. As longas the mystic climate does not change, the DNA stays dormant. If it changes, the DNA wakes up and kills the host like a form fo savage, nearly intelligent cancer. Leaving 2056 is a climate shift enough to wake it - but the CDCA wants it to reactivate for a more subtle change, like that caused by fighting against the world's dominant chi flow. If it works, then Buro doesn't need cops and surveillence, it just needs tainted food that will kill poeple if they think bad thoughts. The first widespread experiment was done in the small town of Dunville. When the CDCA introduced their food, it took between a week and ten days to get an effect. The local hospital was overwhelemed, and when it became clear tha their experiment was becoming an epidemic, the CDCA shut off the railroads and had PubOrd send in choppers to round up those who made a run for it. The citizens tried to riot and invade the lab, but the PubOrd Floating Fortress assigned to the area killed them all before they got out of town. The next batch of PubOrd officers didn't have guns - just bulldozers and backhoes to bury the dead. Once the magnitude of the catastrophe became obvious, the CDCA got the Bureau of Truth and Ideological Hygiene to delete Dunville completely. It isn't on maps, trains don't go there and everyone who lived there disappeared from the phone books overnight. Relatives were told a variety of stories, from train wrecks to an outbreak of the Melter to Jammer violence. So, how do the PCs get involved? Maybe a confused relative wonders why Aunt May's body wasn't shipped out to be buried like she wanted. They investigate and find the whole town gone. This could be a friend of any PC from 2056. Maybe one of the PCs inherits something from a relative in Dunville, but htere's a legal complication: there is no Dunville any more. Maybe the Ascended found out about Dunville and steer the PCs towards it in the hopes that it will make the PCs hate the Architects, which isn't unlikely. Or, hey, the CDCA lab is built on a feng shui site. Anyone who's got it in an earlier juncture might want to go see what happened to it. The 1990s site is an isolated ranch house in Dunville, Montana which gives only 2 bonus XP per session but makes the PCs totally invisible to income taxes. MAybe some of Dunville's survivors escaped and one of them found hte PCs. Whatever you want, really. Your first problem is getting to Dunville. It's in the middle of nowhere, trains don't go there and the old road goes to another town around 100 kilometers away. However, the Architects missed a Netherworld gate around 9 kilometers from the town, out in the woods. Maybe the Ascended or another group found it and told the PCs. Once they get to Dunville, well, it's a ghost town. It's obvious to anyone there for an hour or so that there was either a battle or a massacre here, complete with a fresh mass grave. Digging the bodies up isn't very revealing, though - the CDCA introduced microbes to encourage decomposition so the corpses didn't get hauled in for autopsy. Only bones are left. All the charts and records from the hospital were deleted. Detectives, cops and so on might be able to judge from the grass that the slaughter happened maybe a month ago. Only one road has been used since then: the road from the train station to the lab. There's two main ways to get into the lab: the smart way and the dumb way. The smart way involves spying on the place and learning that boxcars of supplies get sent in once a month, and that there's a fifteen minute gap betwene the time the boxcar is dropped and a truck hauls it off. (The delay is because the only two people who met Buro's safety standards for large vehicle operations are nicotine addicts having an affair. They usually drive down to the railroad tracks, have sex and smoke in the empty truck before loading up the boxcar.) If the PCs can sneak into the boxcar, they're golden. Instead of a horde of guards, they just have two who'd rather have a snack and a nap than a fight. They'll be found soon enough, but they'll probably get past the wall and maybe even the courtyard by then - and no one in the factory will be ready for them. Next time: The dumb way.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 15:16 |
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Soulcleaver posted:
Chernobyl Peace Prize posted:They really, really don't just encourage you to throw magic items at the party. MadScientistWorking fucked around with this message at May 15, 2012 around 15:34 |
| # ? May 15, 2012 15:25 |
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MadScientistWorking posted:You do realize that all of that crap that was in the novels were in the manuals right? In fact if you actually read the 4th edition book carefully they actually reference the fact that they rebooted the setting because of all the changes made to it. Not sure exactly what you mean here. Sun Wizards were only in Preservers & Defilers after Sadira became one, for instance, and Psionic Artifacts of Athas(which drops all the FACTZ on halfling life-shaping stuff) is also written post-Prism Pentad(as it repeatedly references characters and actions from it when describing the various artifacts). The novels were not inspired by the manuals, the manuals were in part written to cover things introduced and changed in the novels.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 15:39 |
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PurpleXVI posted:Not sure exactly what you mean here. MadScientistWorking fucked around with this message at May 15, 2012 around 15:45 |
| # ? May 15, 2012 15:40 |
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MadScientistWorking posted:Yeah exactly. They killed off all of the sorcerer kings in the setting because of the novels. Oh, right, I misunderstood. I thought what you meant was that the novels were written subsequently to justify changes made in the manuals first.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 16:26 |
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MadScientistWorking posted:Yeah the only magical item I can think of for 4E Dark Sun is split into twelve pieces, scattered to the lands, is capable of killing the Sorcerer Kings, and no one has any loving clue where it is. Are you kidding? The 4E book as a selection of magic items in it that range from like level 5 to the 20s, including blood-obsidian magic weaponry, silt strider sandals, folding silt skimmers, and other such things.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 18:09 |
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Dark Sun! Bug-men from the post-apocalyptic sands!   Thri-Kreen of Athas This book has a loving hideous cover. There you go, that's the worst drat thing about it, the cover. The content is all gooey goodness, and the internal art kicks rear end(and in at least one case it's fuckin' adorable). If anyone cares, by the way, the internal art is by an artist named John Dollar who also did internal art for several other Dark Sun books, several pieces for Birthright books and a good pile of art for White Wolf(primarily Changeling: The Dreaming art, it seems). Thri-Kreen of Athas is, predictably, about the Thri-Kreen(of Athas), explaining their mentality, physiology and culture. Because as alien as, say, the Elves of Athas may be, they're still basically just eccentric humans compared to the Kreen. Thri-Kreen Psychology The main thing that sets Thri-Kreen apart from humans in mentality is loyalty. Humans may be loyal, but compared to a Thri-Kreen's loyalty to his pack, clutch and nation(for the "civilized" Tohr-Kreen of the far west. SPOILERS.), even the most steadfast human fanatic is small-time. The clutch is the most central of these organizations, each Kreen has at least two, firstly his Birth-Clutch, the other Kreen he's born with, and later on in life a willingly chosen clutch that may include non-Kreen. Now, it may seem like a clutch is basically just an adventuring party, but there's more to it than that. A Kreen who has no clutch to be with, work for, and be supported by, feels distinctly unsettled. He's got no place in the universe if he doesn't have a clutch. An effect of this is also that, no matter how the Kreen might regard and handle the outside world, towards his clutch he's as loyal and selfless as a paladin.  As already described, of course, with regards to other races, this can sometimes be a bit odd for them to understand. As the Kreen may come across as a bullying jackass when he's just trying to figure out who's in charge. Secondly, two Thri-Kreen pretty much instantly know when they're close enough to form a clutch, or for one to join the other's clutch, and they hold to the "Laws of the Clutch" pretty fanatically. Non-Kreen, though, can both break these rules or may simply not understand how deep the clutch-loyalties are to the Kreen who invites them to join one. Clutch Leadership posted:As previously stated, a clutch is organized along a strict hierarchy based on dominance; each clutch member knows who is more powerful and who is less powerful. In most cases, determination of clutch hierarchy is peaceful; most thri-kreen can tell who is more or less powerful and aggressive, and give or take orders accordingly. Most positions in the hierarchy are determined by someone giving an order or making a suggestion, and others following it; the one whose suggestions are followed the most is the clutchleader, while the clutchsecond is the one followed next most frequently, and so forth, to the thri-kreen who takes the dominance (and orders) of all other clutch members. When hierarchy is determined in this manner, it relies partly on the thri-kreen’s charisma; however, the other thri-kreen in a clutch also judge a potential leader’s intelligence, aggressiveness, and strength before taking an order. Thus, a non-charismatic warrior who the clutch recognizes as a strong and cunning hunter will be accepted as leader more readily than a charismatic, but weak, individual. Packs are collections of clutches that work together in some fashion, and in the Tyr region this is what everyone assumes a Thri-Kreen "nation" to be. There are six sub-races of Thri-Kreen(which we'll learn about later), but packs are almost always purely one-subrace, as are the nations of the west. So really, all that defines a "nation" is some sort of racial unity.  Another thing central to Thri-Kreen mentality is the "Hunt," not always a literal hunt, but they tend to regard everything in terms of predator and prey, or some sort of hunting challenge. Even trading usually goes like this, and they will often seek to be the one initiating bargaining so they can assert themselves as the "predator" of the situation. With regards to actual hunting, though, they will hunt and eat pretty much any drat thing, even species that other races cannot stomach(like Kanks), but despite rumours to the contrary, they tend to put intelligent species lowest on the list for hunting. Though at least part of that is because intelligent species are loving dangerous to fight just for food. quote:Elves and other intelligent species are cunning opponents; while this might make for an exciting challenge, it does not make for a ready meal, so hunting for elves and other sapients is not really conducive to the continued existence of the thri-kreen species. The book also straight-up states that if the Thri-Kreen wanted to eat elves primarily, they could depopulate the entire Tyr region of its elven people with minimal effort. Why? Because Thri-Kreen are loving badass, is why. Elves are preferred prey when hunting intelligent prey, though, because A) they're competitors for other prey animals(and hunting intelligent prey is usually done when other prey is scarce), and B) Elves smell really delicious to Thri-Kreen when exerting themselves or terrified. Despite all of this, though, Thri-Kreen rarely actually feel bad about killing and eating intelligent prey. If it's not Thri-Kreen and not accepted as a clutchmate, it's usually not regarded as "people." If the hunt goes badly enough that eating sapients and seeking new territory doesn't cover the pack's appetites, they visit the big city, and either join arena battles to eat their prey, or just stalk the city's avenues and alleyways after dark to eat hobos and elves. Or elven hobos. Mostly just elves, though. This is part of why Thri-Kreen have such a bad rep: Most of the ones who visit the cities are the ones who're half-mad from starvation and will happily prioritize you for eating. quote:Thri-kreen in cities might be found eating prepared food in taverns or inns, if they can figure out how money work, obtain some, and use it to buy the food. However, despite a well-known eatery in Tyr that caters to and is popular among thri-kreen (The Hungry, Hungry Halfling, run by a halfling thief and a thri-kreen fighter named K'kikrik, few thri-kreen like prepared food enough to make a habit of eating it. They like fresh meat and the hunt far too much. But clutch-loyalty is always the most important thing, even in the last case. Other packs are attacked first, then clutches split to battle within their own pack, but Thri-Kreen would literally rather starve than kill a clutchmate for cannibalism(though they WILL eat a clutchmate killed by something else if that's the only way to survive). Other details on the Thri-Kreen mind: Everything is shared within the clutch, they mate for life, they do not like to be called "bugs" or "it" and their religion is really just a rudimentary belief in reincarnation(they like to lay their eggs at burial sites, and then see if the hatchlings recognize any old items once they're born). Thri-Kreen and Other Races quote:In fact, thri-kreen test members of other races. If the thri-kreen are the majority, the tests are mainly to see if the other is worthy of acknowledgement as a person; if so, the other might further be considered as a potential clutchmate, and tested for that status. However, if a thri-kreen is among members of another races, the tests determine if the others are worthy of becoming clutchmates, and the place and ranking of the thri-kreen in their group.  I still think Thri-Kreen are hilariously awesome. "OH, REALLY NOW? YOU'RE AFRAID OF BEING EATEN BY AN EIGHT-FOOT GIANT MANTIS? I GUESS THAT MEANS YOU'RE A PUSSY WHO SHOULDN'T BE IN CHARGE. NOW LET ME WATCH YOU SLEEP." They tend to get along with dwarves and Muls because boths are about as sturdy as Thri-Kreen and have much of the same sense of loyalty and honour. And it's not rare for escaped Mul slaves to join Thri-Kreen packs. Humans take a bit longer to figure out, and it's more individual, but usually humans are flexible enough to get with the program after some exposure. Halflings' loyalty to their own race makes it easy for them to understand the Thri-Kreen clutch-mentality. On the other hand they're some of the only sentient creatures who'll chow down on Thri-Kreen, so it's rare that they hang out together. Half-Giants are respected for being HULKING MEAT MOUNTAINS, but are a bit too slow to keep up with raiding or hunting packs a lot of the time. Their relationship with elves is somewhat entertaining as, while elves hate them enough to have a Thri-Kreen-slayer specialist kit, Thri-Kreen don't really mind elves as such. Of course it could be argued that elves have a point, but most Thri-Kreen have never eaten elf(but the ones that do tend to keep on doing it, as elf tastes SO GOOD to them that it has addictive properties). quote:This is rather a shame, because elves and thri-kreen have a similar mentality: a love of freedom and running, hunting and taking, and strong racial unity and a disregard of other races. This similarity is another problem; neither race trusts easily, and tends to wait for others to make the first move. When a thri-kreen and an elf are together, each waits for the other to show they can be trusted, neither willing to make a beginning. Thri-Kreen & Magic They really do not like wizards, and they can't cast arcane spells. On the other hand, up to half the Thri-Kreen population has wild talents, so they're rear end-deep in psionics. And that's about all you need to know to get along with a Thri-Kreen, or roleplay one. Next time:  Adorable Thri-Kreen kids! PurpleXVI fucked around with this message at May 15, 2012 around 22:26 |
| # ? May 15, 2012 19:18 |
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MadScientistWorking posted:You do realize that all of that crap that was in the novels were in the manuals right? In fact if you actually read the 4th edition book carefully they actually reference the fact that they rebooted the setting because of all the changes made to it.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 19:23 |
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Mors Rattus posted:The 1990s site is an isolated ranch house in Dunville, Montana which gives only 2 bonus XP per session but makes the PCs totally invisible to income taxes. This sums up why I love Stolze. He can go from destroying a helicarrier to a tossed off detail that might make no difference to an epic PC but would change a normal person's life forever.
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| # ? May 15, 2012 22:38 |
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Complete Book of Elves: "That is why i say it's a good book for NPC purpose (if you consider elves = people that should be above normal heroes, with time - a lot of time-). " Chapter 3a: Physical Attributes. Subtitle: Wherein we add random increases to elven power for no given reason. It goes without saying that the first person narrative bit is entirely about how elves are better then everyone else. This time from a ranger! It's kinda cliche; elves are more in tune with the world and more sensitive but never want to reign over the world, ignoring the fact that grey elves totally do. And of course they're super amazing at swordplay and using a bow and don't need to sleep and blah blah blah. Let get into the book itself (where we will be told the same thing). So, elves! Physically! They are like small, thin humans, enough so that they could disguise themselves as such, but they do not, because pretending to be a human is dumb and for losers. They are also beautiful. ALWAYS BEAUTIFUL. ALWAYS. quote:There is really no such thing as an elf born ugly; those who have low Charisma were either scarred accidentally or marred magically ALWAYS BEAUTIFUL. Also, despite being very slim, they're still super powerful. Indeed, they're some of the most powerful creatures ever created, and has seen "the crawl of humanity from the primordial ooze," which is weird because I didn't expect a treatise on evolution from my nerdbook. Anyways, they are super powerful and older then the trees themselves but hide this "innate power" beneath a "delicate exterior" so others assume they are harmless. Speaking of evolution, elves apparently lack canine teeth, because they were literally created by God(s) unlike all the other races which, I guess, evolved? Even though the fluff earlier said all the races were made by the gods? Who the gently caress knows. Elves are pretty much all white. Even half-elves are pale compared to their human parents. They have their stereotypical pointed ears which gives them sensitive hearing, which, incidentally, lets elves literally whisper in a tone they can hear but others cannot. I was unaware they had this power! They have it now. Before we get to all the cool magical stuff elves can just innately do, we're reminded that, although they are literally better then every other race, they don't see other races as "inferior," why, they simply rejoice in how unique and blessed they are! By the way, these cool magical things elves innately do? A lot of comes from this book. So now we're going to talk about the magical abilities elves have always had, starting now. Oh, and don't confuse this for the optional mechanical rules that get introduced later - not only are these things elves I guess have always been able to do? They are also things that all elves do, period, non-optionally. Communion The first new ability elves get, this is that strange psychic thing I mentioned a few updates back, where they can share basically everything about themselves with another elf that they love or trust. It's elves only, too - not even half-elves can do it, and it only works on willing elves. It requires all involved elves (up to a max of four) be in a state of complete relaxation and serenity, thinking only about each other in a setting without any interruptions, without judgement or prejudice. When they reach this state, they touch their hands and MIIIIINDMEEEEEELD! Mechanically speaking this gives them a -4 penalty to all mental saves while in this state, but they can't be scryed on or overheard, and...I guess, made invisible? It says they can't be spied on physically, and that it creates an invisible barrier, so...who the gently caress knows. Beyond that, this communion is so incredibly personal and amazing, that for the next 24 hours all bonded elves can fight in perfect harmony. When fighting side by side against common foes, they gain +2 to hit and -1 to AC (remember, in 2e, negative AC is good). Communion can only happen once per week, for vague fluff reasons. Elvensight This is one of the abilities elves already had, so that's a relief, at least. All elves except Aquatic and Drow have infravision for up to 60'. This only works in "less then starlight" light conditions. And indeed, we even have a vague nerf to elves! If they are exposed to bright light while using their infravision, they take -2 to all actions for 1d4 rounds while their eyes adjust! Aquatic elves have "aquatic vision" instea, for up to 360'. It's described as not keying off of heat or cold, but rather "the movements of water currents" and is flatly just called "sonar." SONAR EYES. Drow, in their need to show up all the other elves, get infravision 120' instea of 60', and their infravision is so intense that their eyes actually radiate heat, which sounds like it should hurt. On the other hand, if you thought their magnificent facial hair wasn't enough... quote:Someone viewing a drow through infravision sees two burning eyes atop a normally glowing torso Manifestation So apparently, whenever elves are discounted, despite several bits in the book previously mentioning how elves like to be taken for weak - in this loving chapter, even - they can show off "manifestation" whenever someone looks down on them. I'll be blunt: manifestation is literally a shonen anime power. The elf suddenly has an imposing presence, making them seem far larger and more "there" then they actually are. This is something that occurs in every single shonen anime ever. Oh, and as a nice side jab, it's said that they love to use this against impressible humans to keep the credulous ones at a distance and to ensure the humans do not underestimate elves. Nice. Of course, this isn't an illusion. This is the elves "connection with the land," and them showing this off. This does mean it can only work in the Prime Material, and while in a natural or elven-shaped environment. It can also only be used on either an elf's home world, or after they've lived on that world for 50 years, at which point he loses the ability to do it in his original home world. Manifestation doesn't actually do anything, is the thing. It's advised you give a +3 to reaction checks (and -3 for enemies) and draw attention to the elf, but that's about it. The book even states that, aside from impressing people, the power is useless. Oh, and elves are all immune to it, of course, but they "admire the timing if particularly noteworthy." Reverie This is the second ability elves already had - their whole "we don't actually sleep" bit. Rather then fall asleep, they enter a state called "the reverie" in which they vividly relive past memories, which they have no control over. They never dream in reverie, only when they actually sleep, even though we were just told they don't sleep. Ok. Oh and their dreams are sometimes prophetic, but not always, so I'm not sure what the point of that is. All their dreams (YOU JUST TOLD US ELVES DON'T SLEEP) are highly symbolic. The reverie accounts for why elves are always so chilled out and high, because if you had to constantly relive your memories, you would spend all your days following the School of Snoop, too. It also makes those few "truly noble" elves who do the hard things in life I guess extra important, since this means they make a grave and truly terrible sacrifice of drawing in all the unpleasant memories. This is also apparently why elves are so resistant to sleep spells and charm enchantments. Resistance to Heat and Cold Ok this is just bullshit. So apparently monks are so attuned to the world and it's meteorological cycles that they're flat out resistant slash immune to extremities of temperatures, at least compared to other races. This translates to them being able to ignore temperatures between 100 and 32 degrees. Below and above that they suffer the same penalties as anyone else, but in between elves just don't care. This is mentioned as to why elves remain Beautiful White People all the time; their resistance to the elements means they can...block...UV radiation? I guess? Man, whatever. On the bright side this doesn't mean elves get to ignore fire or snow. Elves are still just as burnable as anyone else; it's only natural temperatures they're resistant against. Other Elven Abilities loving. Bullshit. So, elves are immune to disease. No, yeah. gently caress you, book. I guess elves are immune to disease. Well, "remarkable resistant." It advises you just give elves anywhere between 0% and 50% resistance. That this "won't destroy game balance." That's utter poo poo. This is AD&D, where a disease can spell certain, unavoidable death, and where a paladin's immunity was a Big loving Deal. And this book just took one of the cool iconic paladin abilities and went, eh, gently caress it, all elves get it. Besides that, it mentions there's some diseases that only effect elves, spoilers they don't exist to my knowledge. Oh, and elves are immune to scarification. Elves are so beautiful that scars on their bodies heal under rapid conditions until they disappear entirely. It doesn't work on actual wounds or healing HP, it's just there to ensure elves are always beautiful. Wait didn't the start of this chapter say that the only ugly elves were scarred ones? Welp! I'll end this part with a fun taste of what's to come in later chapters. Elven regeneration doesn't extend to regrowing lost limbs or organs, though we're told that elves are totally the original creators of those magicks. However, elves don't need it, as they are ont he pioneering edge of creating artificial mithril limbs and organs. Yes, this book will let you create transhuman cybernetic elves. ProfessorCirno fucked around with this message at May 16, 2012 around 04:14 |
| # ? May 16, 2012 04:11 |
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ProfessorCirno posted:
ProfessorCirno posted:Normally you'd want to portray a genealogy or family tree by showing it to be vibrant and alive to represent the health of the family, with dead branches only in, well, dead branches. I can't help but notice that all of these Elf trees are dead.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 04:49 |
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Excellent. That just means it will burn all the more easily.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 05:15 |
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ProfessorCirno posted:Yes, this book will let you create transhuman cybernetic elves. I think you mean Transelven cybernetic Elves. Because these perfect, wonderful and majestic creatures have never been sundered by suffering the terrible imperfection of being human.  (Am I doing this Elven racism thing right guys?)
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| # ? May 16, 2012 05:27 |
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Who had the magic-cyborg arm in Dragonlance? Was it an elf? e: Nope, nope, wasn't an elf. Was a human. Arm was also made by humans. 
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| # ? May 16, 2012 05:37 |
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Evil Mastermind posted:The character creation chapter starts out by pointing out an important consideration about the game: everyone is meant to be an Ishin pilot. But how does that work when you've got a lot of characters? It's already been established that only the big city-states have more than one or two Remnants. I've alreayd bought the book, and it seems the only downside with having Remnants aplenty would be that the GM would have to spend a little more time improving the fights to match the players, which any GM worth his salt would do as a matter of fact. Seriously, I'm not seeing many problems with upping the power level here.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 05:58 |
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ProfessorCirno posted:I'll end this part with a fun taste of what's to come in later chapters. We used to use bits of that book, mainly bladesong stuff because our group was pretty powergamey by default. This other stuff? We just skipped it. I'm not sure the GM knew about it. I loving winced every time someone brought that stupid Reverie thing up, usually as an excuse not to be caught unawares while they were resting. I can't remember where it is in the book, but there's a bit about elves speaking the elven language that is just goddamn precious.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 12:02 |
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doomfunk posted:Who had the magic-cyborg arm in Dragonlance? Was it an elf? Theros of the Silver Arm. God I read so many lovely Dragonlance novels as a kid. I remember his ended right before he goes out and gets said arm, aka the only interesting or notable thing about the character. 
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| # ? May 16, 2012 12:07 |
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^^^ The dumbest part about him is the arm exists to turn him into a Super-Merchant. Oh, that and the fact that the smith with one arm happens to uncover a magical fake arm that lets you make sticks that kill dragons real good. Re-reading this segment of the Tome of Elven Majesty, I think the authors were trying to rationalize, like... the notion of the first-age Tolkien elf with D&D. Tolkien's noble elves were essentially sacred entities to some degree, didn't scar, didn't succumb to disease, and were basically perfect creatures aside from massive glaring faults of personality (particularly the line of Feanor). The problem with that is those elves, to Tolkien, existed as metaphysical constructs, supporting characters or deus ex machina, not protagonists. Still, this is really showing how strongly first and second editions owe a lot of their flavour to LotR/the Silmarillion/the Hobbit. Book is still stupid. 
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| # ? May 16, 2012 12:12 |
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doomfunk posted:aside from massive glaring faults of personality Sure, Melkor was a dick, but they would've been fine if they hadn't gone MY PRECIOUS, and they wouldn't even have bad any trouble in the first place had Galadriel said "Oh yes, I guess you can have a few strands of my hair to encase in beautiful crystal" or Feanor hadn't overreacted to being rejected.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 12:26 |
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It's not even 'the elves', it's the entire house of Feanor, as pretty much every other Tolkien elf is totally chill. However, Melkor still coveted the sum of creation, which really can't be discounted. From Tolkien's perspective, Feanor's acts were well-intentioned folly, but Melkor (and later, Sauron) were the nemeses of goodliness.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 12:29 |
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| # ? May 20, 2013 04:42 |
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I always had the suspicion that new and improved racial abilities added to the Complete Books of Not a Human were an after-the-fact supporting argument for nonhuman level limits in 2E.
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| # ? May 16, 2012 13:26 |
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