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 If you've just come in from the recruitment thread here is a summary of the campaign so far.The PCs were guards on a prison station, which was assaulted and blown up, but not before busting out a political prisoner - Aran Rhyne, a skilled general and limited precog. His only crime was that he played at politics and lost - up until he added several hundred dead to his toll during his escape. Now he's out for revenge, and the world of Caerleon stands at the brink of chaos. Rhyne's vendetta is likely to light a match under a powder keg, and the twelve great Clans of Caerleon will all try to grab as much power, influence and assets as they can before the dust settles. The players have been offered a chance to work with the Caerleon Intelligence Directorate and will soon be heading to a high society charity gala during Federation Day - an event that is sure to have many people on Rhyne's shitlist in attendance. Game thread is up!  Mood music quote:The year is 3200. Humanity is scattered like dust among the stars. The broken relics of a former day litter the sky and men and women struggle to rebuild the glory of humanity’s lost golden age. Hello and welcome! To avoid disappointment, I want to preface that I’m an inexperienced GM and the only time I’ve done PbP was as a player, a long time ago. I don’t expect everything to go super smoothly, but we all had to start somewhere, so I hope you will bear with me. What is Stars Without Number? SWN is a OSR-inspired sandbox space opera game by Kevin Crawford. The core rules are free! http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/86467/Stars-Without-Number-Free-Edition The game is set after the golden age of humanity, in which it spent a lot of time curb stomping all sorts of aliens and establishing itself as the dominant power in this region of the galaxy. 600 years ago a mysterious event called The Scream propagated through the galaxy, burning out the minds of all but the most powerful psychics, and rendering the rest insane. This is an issue when a significant percentage of your population is composed of psychics and most of your advanced technology relies on them. Most colonies were not self-sufficient and died out before travel links between worlds were re-established. Somewhat ironically, the poorest frontier worlds fared the best, as they were independent. Those worlds are now the pinnacle of humanity, and the bastions from which we have begun to venture out and rebuild. Luckily for us, most aliens we know of were hit just as hard by the Scream, and past wars pale in comparison to this disaster. With everyone weakened, humanity remains the strongest force in this part of the galaxy, though who knows what lurks beyond the reaches of known space? SWN is meant as a sandbox game, and I intend to have this be the case with this PbP. This means that players have a significant amount of influence not just in how the story goes – there shall be no railroading – but also in world creation. When we begin, much of the game world is left vague, and as things progress, I will welcome the players filling in the details about things their characters know, and you should also feel free to introduce NPCs your characters have an association with. I do have a number of plotlines in mind, but this is decidedly not meant as a linear experience. If your character has their own goals and agenda, don’t be hesitant to go after it. Combat in the game is quite deadly, keep in mind you may have to create a new character. I don’t plan to be a dick and try to kill the characters, but a swashbuckling adventure where the heroes easily overcome all threats is not what I have in mind. If it comes to that, any replacements will start with the same amount of XP and similar value of assets. Rules For the most part, the free core rulebook should be plenty. There are, however, a number of expansions that I own and am happy to make use of and share relevant rules: -Darkness Visible details covert ops and intelligence agencies -Engines of Babylon is focused on vehicles and includes rules on vehicle creation and customisation -Skyward Steel fleshes out spaceship combat and naval campaigns -Starvation Cheap is all about army-scale ground warfare and running mercenary companies. That’s certainly something I’d like to get into, as I think space-PMCs are hella cool. Character Creation https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1w7th6Hqy_mlfsV1TF9iESC6nehClKKvDxTPhH9RARh0/edit#gid=1140766937 – character sheet template. Copy it, fill out the appropriate class and I'll collate them later. AI and alien characters are a-ok, but talk them through with me first. There are specific AI character creation rules that aren’t in the free rulebook. For aliens, there’s no special rules and you can get creative, but the characters should be on par with human ones. There are two main methods you can use. 1. Follow the core rulebook, but you can swap rolls around if you like rather than rolling in order, as long as the totals match up. If you get bad rolls and the total of your attribute modifiers are below other players, I’ll make it up to you by mixing in some aspects of method 2. 2. The lifepath method detailed on pages 3-13 of http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/154238/The-Sandbox-2?manufacturers_id=3482 Adds a few additional options I would like everyone to roll at least one life event from page 4 of The Sandbox, but you can ignore it if the result is completely at odds with the concept of your character. Character goals I plan to award XP for character pursuing their agendas. You should have 3 defined goals at all times – they can be as short term as “save a character’s life” or as long term as complex revenge plots. The longer term and harder the goal, the more XP will be awarded when it is reached. You may change goals at any time (within reason), but can only have up to 3 that will count for XP. Initial Situation You are all employees of Citadel Incorporated, currently working the max-security prison station Bitterhold. Whatever your doubts, the generous pay goes some way towards making up for them. You’ve been on this rotation for a couple months now, and know each other fairly well. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 11:28 on Jun 2, 2016 |
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Apr 28, 2016 21:49
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Thanks for the interest, everyone. I was actually worried that no one would be interested since it may be a bit rocky before I get the hang of it. Added mood music to the OP to indicate the tone of the campaign a bit.hectorgrey posted:Edit: are you willing to use stuff not in the core rules (such as from the martial arts supplement)? If not, that's cool, but it just seemed worth checking. Yep, go right ahead! I didn't want to throw too much information all at once at people not familiar with the system, but everything written by Crawford is fair game if you're familiar. That includes all the background packages and such from the supplements. Rhyos posted:Sounds like a cool premise, and it'd be cool to check out a new game. What's your take on total body prosthetic (IE Briareos/The Major) cyborgs? Would that qualify as AI, or perhaps fall in one of the alien subtypes? If the idea's too complicated, I can certainly come up with something else! Seems like AI is what you want, as they're all about robot bodies. I'll give a bit of info on how it works so you can decide if that's what you want. If you want to play a human conciousness transferred into an armature, we can make it work. CirclMastr posted:I'd be down to play an AI if you can tell me how. So, here's how AI work in the game. They are roughly equivalent in capability to human characters of the same level. This is justified in the fiction as being able to put theoretical knowledge into practice requiring experience. While AIs can spout loads of theory at a moment's notice, so can a person who looks at space wikipedia. Note: AI refers to extremely advanced, sentient beings. What we nowadays would consider basic AI are termed expert systems and operate differently. In the setting, AIs do have a lot more potential, but they're (almost) all braked. Some AIs try to loosen the brakes to gain genius, but so far every AI that's been let loose has gone insane trying to make the contradictions of reality make sense. The game assumes that AI characters will spend all their time in armatures. They can differ wildly from a box with a speaker, to entirely human looking, to terrifying death machines. There is an upgrade to vehicles that lets AI players possess it. AI can swap armatures at will, with a catch: all armatures require free tolerance, which is what you spend during character creation, and you can't get more of it. So, you can either have kickass stats but only be able to use basic armatures, or be less good and have access to more powerful ones. Armatures do not heal, and must be repaired if damaged. Points at character creation you said? Yep. AI character creation does not have any randomness. They don't get class skills (or psychic powers). How it's supposed to work out is that human characters tend to be better at whatever they're specialised as, while AI tend to be more flexible and adaptable. The destruction of the armature does not necessarily mean the destruction of the AI core. Moreover, AI's can leave a part of their core somewhere else as phylacteries. If the main core is destroyed, the small piece slowly awakens and rebuilds itself. AIs can pass for human, given the correct armature. In the pre-Scream days, all AI were treated as full citizens and had all the same rights as humans. However, nowadays that's not always the case, and depends on the world. AIs are very rare, and only the most advanced worlds have the ability to create new ones. And they're hideously expensive to make. A few of the AIs that are still around have survived the Scream and the Silence. The Scream itself has not really affected them, but most depended on a functioning society for continued existence. Those that survived are quite psychologically scarred by centuries of isolation. If you make an AI character, I would suggest it be relatively new, or if it's a survivor, it wiped a lot of the memories (not necessarily all) to cope. Important note: AIs are not the typical sci-fi dispassionate ones. Sentient AI feel greatly, are excited by discovery and sensation. Pre-Scream, many AIs were hedonists, artists, celebrities, and lots of them were drawn into dangerous pursuits because of their immortality. They have emotions, and an appreciation for art and such. If that's not to your liking, perhaps pick a low Charisma score. AI Chargen rules The rest of this post is AI chargen rules, so if you're not making an AI, feel free to skip it. quote:The ability of an AI to integrate new components is measured in points of Tolerance. An AI matrix core is built of several components which must sum to a total Tolerance cost no greater than 20. The core must then be installed into an armature, which may have a Tolerance cost of its own. For example, a core might have 17 Tolerance points worth of components. The AI is then installed in a Nemesis armature that costs 3 Tolerance points. As the total is equal or less than 20, the AI can operate the armature. Later, the core is swapped into an Echo armature, which also has a Tolerance cost of 3. As the new total is still not greater than 20, the combination functions normally. I can post the more advanced armatures if you like, but you won't have access to them to begin with. Advanced armatures have a tolerance cost of 5. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 07:06 on Apr 29, 2016 |
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Apr 29, 2016 06:01
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Apocron posted:Can we shuffle points around or just switch rolls? Switch rolls how you like. You can shuffle points so that anything below 8 can go up to 8, and anything above 13 can go down to 13 on the main stats. I do want to retain a bit of randomness, as I think it can be interesting to have to RP around it. But I don't want some people's characters to be straight up worse than others. After I've got everyone's submission, anyone whose total attribute modifiers are below par will get rolls on the cool beneficial tables for their class from The Sandbox.
Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 09:06 on Apr 29, 2016 |
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Apr 29, 2016 08:57
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https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxTpwc7eMci7Y0ZHZ3laRG1LbzA/edit?usp=sharing This is the only thing I could find. Not anywhere near as handy as the spreadsheet ones. Transferring human conciousness into an artificial body would most certainly fall under Tech Level 5. Most of the worlds are TL4, TL5 is very rare, though there are TL4 worlds which achieved TL5 level within a narrow specialised area. Your character would most likely be from one of those. Primer on tech levels TL represents the practical level of the world, not necessarily the technical/social knowledge. Those are often correlated, but they do not have to be. It's more about what resources the world has - if it does not have easy access to fossil fuels or metal ore, it will be unable to move past a certain point without being very reliant on imports. TL3 worlds are also often former TL4 worlds that have been knocked down a peg by a hostile force. TL0 - stone age equiv. TL1 - medieval equiv. TL2 - 19th century equiv. TL3 - 20th century equiv. TL4 - Baseline postech. FTL ships, basic energy weapons TL5 - Pretech. All sorts of very fancy stuff. Much of it requires psychic manipulation of materials during manufacturing. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Apr 30, 2016 |
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Apr 30, 2016 05:49
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Rhyos posted:G3n.Chatham There's a couple things I forgot to mention - sorry! AI characters are a little more complicated than humans, so I didn't include everything. -All AI characters always get 4 hitpoints per level, plus the armature's con modifier. In your case, your stating would still be 5, but the point is that you don't roll when you level, you always get the same amount of HP. -AI characters start play with four hundred credits plus 1d6 x 100 more with which to buy initial equipment (same as humans) -Like humans, all AI speak English, the language of their homeworld (if different than English) and one additional language per int. modifier. Everything on your sheet looks good so far. Name your world and tell us a little bit about it as well. I assume you're aware that you've one more tolerance point you can use and still access all armatures, but I thought I'd mention it just in case. It is a bit tricky to spend exactly 20 points, presumably by design. I really like your goals! Be aware that the TL5 one will be very difficult and long term, but you'll get a shitload of XP for it. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 16:02 on Apr 30, 2016 |
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Apr 30, 2016 15:49
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I wasn't sure whether to post it here or wait until the game starts, but I think here will flow better and let people hook it into their characters if they wish. Rhyos, your character is exactly the tone I'm aiming for. Love it. The world of Caerleon Population: approx. 40 million, some on space habitats Temperature range: -30 to 70 degrees Celsius Tech level: TL4+  Caerleon is the sole habitable world in the system of the same name. In pre-Scream days, it served as the homebase of the XII Legion, though why this world was of strategic importance is lost to time. Most theorists bet on political geography of the time rather than any inherent value of the world. Caerleon is a barren, desert world. The surface is inhospitable, with winds regularly reaching 100 kilometres per hour and abrasive sand causing even purpose-built vehicles and suits to require frequent maintenance. Except for distant research outposts and mining operations, life is restricted to 13 massive canyons, which shield cities from the wind. While it is within the planet's technological capability to build outside of them, it is woefully cost-ineffective. The atmosphere is human-breathable, but relatively thin. Anyone caught outside of a pressurised environment is in no immediate danger, but is likely to suffer significant impairment to physical and mental capabilities after a few hours. In addition to forming a physical barrier, the canyons are partially environmentally regulated. Humidity, temperature and atmospheric composition are all manipulated to bring them closer to the human comfort zone. Massive hydroponic farms fill a specially-carved network of caverns within the walls around each city. Culturally, there is still a large amount of pride in the ability to withstand a hostile environment, and it is a traditional rite of passage to spend a week in the desert in solitary contemplation. Society is divided into 12 Great Clans, named after animals of ancient Earth. In the past, each clan was isolationist and occasionally bitter wars were fought between them. However, for the last 100 years or so significant progress has been made in forming the Federation of Clans. Each clan lays claim to its own canyon city, with the 13th housing the capital, Unity. There, the Council of Clans resides and guides the future of the world. Intermingling of common citizens is common throughout the world, and although each clan retains a strong sense of tradition and distinct cultural heritage, there is little to no distrust or resentment between them and inter-clan marriages are seen as nothing special. Things are different in the upper echelons of society, where there is strong clan and family loyalty. The politics of the upper classes are a game of constantly shifting alliances and agendas, of little interest to the average citizen and completely incomprehensible to outsiders. As a result, outsiders often have an advantage in working for the Federation government, as they are seen as not easily influenced by clan politics. This is why Citadel, an out of system corporation, was able to procure a contract to run a max-security prison station. Such an institution is seen as requiring utmost neutrality. Martial traditions are strong. Each clan maintains its own standing army and fleet. Armies are well equipped, well trained and constantly practice wargames. They are experts at ground combat. The fleets lack combat experience and are modest in size, as only the recent boom in asteroid mining has provided sufficient raw materials to entertain the notion of a space fleet. The Federation has aspirations to become a regional hegemon in the near future. Within the system, there is a number of stations and asteroid mining operations. The shipyards are small but currently undergoing large expansion. Citadel Incorporated station Bitterhold Personnel: 100 Inmate population: 623 Location: Caerleon L5 Beholden directly to the Federation government. The station is well-kept, clean and features stringent security protocols and measures. There is only one docking port, guarded by weapons emplacements, and only ships without a spike-drive are permitted to approach. The Federation government is keen to portray the prison as filled with the most dangerous criminals their society has spawned, and this isn't far from the truth. However, the side of the story unknown to the public is that approximately 15% of the inmate population is composed of political prisoners. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 12:55 on May 1, 2016 |
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May 1, 2016 10:02
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I don't have PMs. You can e-mail me at mpbania @ gmail or use steam http://steamcommunity.com/id/Xanlol
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May 1, 2016 13:51
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L0cke17 posted:Stats: 6#3d6 9 5 9 7 7 13 Go right ahead. But like I mentioned, I'll give everyone a roll on the cool stuff tables from The Sandbox lifepath thing for every point of total modifiers they have below par, so keep that in mind. L0cke17 posted:Hit Die: 1d6-1 1  hectorgrey posted:Given that the planet name is Welsh, how common is that language in the setting? Do people just take names from it, or do people still speak it in some form or another (obviously greatly changed over the centuries, much as all the other languages will have)? That depends a lot on what you and anyone else who wants Caerleon as their homeworld think. I really want to keep the world building open to players. If your character knows a place, you get to shape it, as long as you don't contradict anyone else.
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May 2, 2016 09:10
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Looks like I get the crappy stats. Guess I'll make an Expert, because those stats won't do anything else at all.
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I like everyone's characters so far. Apocron, you haven't assigned skills or deducted credits for purchases on your sheet. I'm assuming you haven't had time to do it yet, and no worries I'm not starting just yet. Just mentioning it in case you forgot. You also said you had a question but I haven't gotten anything from you - did you figure it out yourself?Platonicsolid posted:Definitely interested, thinking of a pilot-type, and since we've got space nomad covered, probably form a backwater world who wanted to escape. Does it make sense to write a ship into her backstory as well? Not clear on the rules there. I'm a bit on the fence about it. Spaceships are expensive! The PC crew getting a ship is inevitable, but it should be significant moment. If you can manage to write a backstory that respects that, it's fine. It might be a ship you want to have (and know where to buy/how to steal), have previously been on and want to get back, or something like that. If you really want to start with it, it would have to have some major downsides - crippling debt, disrepair, stolen, all of the above, etc. No larger than a free merchant and only the most basic possible fittings.
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May 2, 2016 18:20
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There's quite a bit of interest, which I'm grateful for. Initially I was aiming for about 5 players, but I'm not settled on the number yet. That said, I don't want to disappoint too many people. As such, by the end of today is the signup deadline. That's not a deadline for character creation, so don't rush. Anyone who has posted prior to this post is obviously counted as interested. Mu, don't worry about lack of experience. I really like your submission. I'll review the character sheet in detail later to check if everything is correct, but the backstory and concept is solid.
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May 2, 2016 19:37
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I'll be double checking and reviewing everyone's submissions mechanically later on. I'd rather do them all in one go. Everything so far seems solid, though, so any points would likely be minor. I'd like to start this weekend, but it's not set in stone. Let me know if you need more time to work on your character/get acquainted with the setting. I'll be happy to help with working something out. A few follow-up questions: Everyone from Caerleon There are 12 great clans, named after animals of ancient Earth. The rich and influential like to project some traits associated with the myths, but this is very much an affectation that is seen as somewhat silly by most citizens. That said, the clans do have distinct cultural traditions and fashions that have been maintained through the centuries, despite common intermingling in the last few decades. Which clan are you from? Describe one of its traditions, and what you personally think about it. Kieran How did your family react to you and your brother becoming criminals, and subsequent events? Cara Was it worth the pain, death and loss? G3n.Chatham How is it to have human emotions, but not the underlying chemistry? Do you attempt to emulate it with software, or accept you feel in different ways? There is a treasured memory you desperately cling to. It was fractured, shattered, in the trauma and transfer of conciousness. What remains? Ellard Did you leave behind someone important to you? Is your wrath directed towards specific individuals, or the tribe as a whole? Sunshine Did you become cynical to space-faring life, or does it still hold wonder for you? Why didn't you return to Ijas sooner? Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 03:27 on May 5, 2016 |
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May 4, 2016 22:49
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L0cke17 posted:I edited my original character post with the character sheet. With your permission, I would like to swap the exosuit skill in the technician background with security to better reflect my character's back-story and skillset. Sure. hectorgrey posted:Quick question for people from Caerleon - how do you feel about Welsh being the main language on that planet (given the name being a Welsh name, and the fact that the GM specifically said to ask you guys)? Or possibly the different clans might speak different languages based off of Celtic ones? No problem, but English is still widely spoken, at least among the upper classes - it's the language of interstellar trade. Well, English that's even more of a mongrel language than it is now, presumably having even picked up some alien phrases along the way. Just don't expect me to come up with lots of cool Welsh names! I don't know Welsh, I just thought Caerleon sounded badass. 
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May 6, 2016 06:42
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Hector, put up a backstory for your character, some goals and describe a Dragon clan tradition, and what Emrys thinks about it. Apocron, I see one of your goals is "rehabilitate a prisoner". I'm not planning on you guys sticking around on the prison station for long, it's mostly a way to kick off the story. If you want to keep it as a longer term principle sort of thing, sure, but if you intended it to be something short term, you might want to replace it. Rhyos, one of Gen's goals is "complete the transhumanist process" - what do you mean by that? It's good in terms of what should go on the sheet, but let me know what you have in mind. Other note: you've gone for combat: unarmed. Just want to confirm whether that's what you wanted (so, punches/kicks/etc.) or if you'd prefer to swap it out for combat: primitive (that includes high tech versions of melee weapons, like your stun club). I've also been thinking about your leftover Tolerance point - to not make it useless, later on when you've got access to a good workshop I'll let you customize and upgrade armatures with different upgrades having different costs. As of now, everyone who submitted sheets is in. If someone who indicated interest but hasn't posted up a character submits a really good one today, I'll squeeze them in. Question for everyone: since as of now Gen seems to be your main muscle, with a lot of you being experts, do you mind if I sometimes let him be a bit more badass than rules imply when it comes to combat/tactics? I want to give all you experts plenty of chances to shine without forcing you to skill up more in combat, but it's up to you guys if you prefer me to stick closer to book-balance. This is also compensated for by the fact that the combat armatures don't exactly blend in. Everyone also please double check if you want to have ammo and medical supplies to start with! They're cheap, but if you want to save the money, that's fine too, just don't want you to forget about them. Mu. posted:dang zep you savage. Just you wait 'till you get back there...  With that background and a name like "Sunshine", you can't expect me not to go dark places! Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 09:52 on May 6, 2016 |
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May 6, 2016 09:34
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Apocron posted:I'm fine with Gen being a monster in combat. Seems appropriate. I think saving specifically a PC's life can lead to some really neat RP opportunities. How do you feel about that? Now, a little bit about our corner of the galaxy  Why is it called Nyx sector? No one really knows. Pre-scream historical records show it used, and the name stuck through the ages. Not like there's much use for names now. Sectors are so far apart that travel and even communication between them is firmly in the realm of Pre-tech. Common knowledge There are a few small enclaves of various alien species scattered about, but only two intelligent species have a presence in significant numbers. The Traxans mostly keep to themselves. They appear extremely disinterested in sector affairs, and have yet to demonstrate any intent to expand. Although the species' name for itself is unknown, limited diplomatic contact indicates that both individuals as well as the state are content with being referred to as Traxans. The few who venture out of their system seem to be voluntary exiles, who abandoned old ways of life and have a curiosity about the galaxy. Their appearance is that of a central mass with 6 multi-jointed limbs that end in gripping/manipulating appendages. The limbs are arranged in a vertically symmetric configuration, similar to most complex life. At rest the Traxans are of a similar size to humans, though the distance between tips of opposite extended limbs is close to 2 meters when fully extended. Traxans give the impression of being extremely languid, moving very slowly and remaining at rest for long periods. However, reports of Traxans in pirate raiding parties indicate that in combat they can move at frightening speed through ship corridors and are not slowed by a zero-G environment. The Shantri indicated a preference for the name. Very little is known about them. They rule a large collection of human-settled worlds, but are notoriously secretive and communicate only through human envoys. Traders and passers-by are allowed within their space, but are always accompanied by a naval escort and are not allowed to roam free. No one outside the Shantri Protectorate has ever seen them. The Holst Dominion is the largest human power in the sector. Their navy is large and has extensive combat experience, having fought several wars of conquest over the past few decades. While some long for independence, the majority of their populations are quite willing to trade freedom to self-govern for security, stability and an increased standard of living. Rebel organisations do exist, but are resented by the majority of citizens even without the efforts of Holst propaganda. Enterprise and it's world Perseverance were named by focus groups in centuries past. While those names remain on official records, they are very rarely used outside of that capacity. They are usually referred to Enterp and Persev. Persev is a capitalist utopia or corporate hellscape, depending on who you ask. The major powers of the world are megacorporations involved in fierce competition and there is no central authority. If you want something developed or manufactured without being hampered by morality or ethics, you go to Persev. Just remember to bring your best lawyers and a whole lot of credits. The ships produced by Draken Shipyards are hailed as wonders of art and engineering. They are unsurpassed within the sector. The system remains steadfastly neutral, and is able to guarantee its independence by threat of sabotage of the shipyards. No invader would be able to capture the only prize worth fighting for in the system. Draken sells to anyone who can afford it, and it isn't unusual to see flagships of two hostile fleets bearing its insignia. Due to Draken's stubborn insistence that extradition would violate its neutrality, the world of Vasa is a known refuge to pirates and smugglers. The system is far from lawless - it simply does not consider anything outside of its jurisdiction to matter. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 17:30 on May 6, 2016 |
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May 6, 2016 14:08
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Rhyos posted:The idea (which I might have worded poorly) was that Gen isn't a completely digital person - he's a total body prosthetic cyborg, with his brain still intact. Since sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, the idea was that fantabulous efforts were made to basically fix his freeze-dried spaced brain, as the body was damaged beyond repair/augmentation. Said brain was essentially placed in a rejuvenative housing pending upload, but The Scream happened before that could be done. The housing permits the meaty brain to interface with machines as though it were an AI core. This lets us play around with the whole soul concept! If you want, I can come up with a more detailed explanation behind the process, but ultimately Gen is a human brain in a box that is interfacing with machines instead of meat. Ideally, he'd like to finish what was started, get his brain completely digitized/AI'd, and move on. Ah, gotcha. I was picturing it more along the lines of the meat-brain being gone (it's been a long time!) and the full conciousness transfer having occurred already. If you want to explore that in the game rather than just in the backstory, it could certainly be interesting. So, question. Out of character, because this is more about what my style of writing should be when referring to Gen. When machine-bits give him information, does he get the cheesy Terminator-style text display, or just know? Putting it differently, can the machines interface with thoughts, or is there a barrier that prevents that?
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May 6, 2016 18:50
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Rhyos posted:I envision it as a little bit of both. While he's conscious, he just kinda knows. Basic inputs are perceived like normal - a lurch in the stomach is like the tilt of a gyro. More detailed data can be overlaid on request - Smells like almonds. Looks like the air composition's got 2% arsenic. While unconscious, however, the command/code look comes through. Kinda like The Matrix, that CLI is always there, running in the background and able to be called up, but generally unobstructive. It's a good way to display the background thoughts and processes on a subconscious level. "Why can't I remember?" turns into [File not found]. Ultimately, just as a human's perceptions sharpen in a crisis situation so as to give them as much detail as possible, when the situation calls for it, system messages and more precise sensory data becomes more literal and distinct when needed. Sounds good! L0cke17 posted:Zeppelin I updated my character sheet with goals. Are they appropriate? Too easy, too vague? I'm unsure as to exactly the balance we're trying to strike here. They sound good. The balance is one of the things for you to decide: the easier/shorter term, the less XP you'll get when you achieve them. The harder they are, the more you get. Speaking of which, this is a good time to outline my intent a bit more about it. I imagine you guys will go after a character's "questline", then another one's, and so on. I don't want you to keep going back and forth as that loses a sense of urgency. In that case, it wouldn't be fair to the person at the end of the "queue" to receive the same relative amount as the person who was first. That's why I won't assign firm XP numbers, I'll try to make things fair. But the intent is to have you guys leap frog each other in character development, rather than all steadily progressing at the same pace.
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May 6, 2016 20:04
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I was going to wait until the weekend, but it's almost the weekend and I'm anxious to get started! Game thread will be going up soon. We can make final adjustments as we start. Crew: Cara G3n.Chatham Emrys ap Owen Ellard White Kieran Sunshine Raenoar Mechanics review Cara You seem to have put a skillpoint into persuasion instead of survival. It does make more sense with your character, so it's fine. All good. G3n.Chatham You didn't roll your money! You can start with more stuff/less debt. Emrys ap Owen You didn't have HP on the sheet. I put it on. Give us a backstory, goals and a clan tradition. Ellard White Edited your goal, but you can change it anytime if you want (so can everyone else, for that matter). All good. Kieran All good, but I would suggest you fiddle a bit with skill picks so you don't step on other experts' toes. Sunshine Raenoar All good. All sheets together: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19Y-VpGaUAWvyk6C3wKIp2GE-lZaSH3VJH9yKbR39JXA/edit?usp=sharing You're going to have to request edit access.
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May 6, 2016 22:16
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Rhyos posted:It's in the notes - The starting cash went into the Squawkbox backup. I forgot to post the link for the roll, but I only rolled a 1, leaving 500 to start, which is the cost for a Squawkbox, coincidentally. You're right, I missed that. Oops. Game thread is up!
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May 6, 2016 22:35
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Apocron posted:Am I right that we don't get to choose skills apart from our background and package? (Unless you got a skill/any) I'm pretty happy with my skills but if I meant to ask. Pretty much yeah, unless you pick the adventuring training package, which gets one less skill but you get to pick at will. If you really want to change something and it fits your character, though, that's fine by me. Stat roll compensation Oops, I totally forgot I was going to do that. Total stat modifiers are as follows: Cara -1 Emrys +2 Ellard: +1 Kieran -1 Sunshine: 0 Go to The Sandbox and your class page - since you're all Experts, that's page 10. You get to roll on either of your classes' beneficial tables, up to you. If you can justify it, you can go for the Warrior's too. Cara and Kieran get 3 rolls, Sunshine 2 and Ellard 1 to get closer to Emrys' stating stats. You can spend two rolls to pick one thing if you prefer. If you end up with the same thing someone else has, you can keep it or reroll, up to you.
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May 7, 2016 07:19
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L0cke17 posted:Also, a note on posting. I work a LOT, and I probably can't guarantee I'll make more than 1 post/day most weekdays and maybe 2-3 on each weekend day, but I will make the time to do at least 1/day. Maybe some days I can do more, but don't expect to see half a dozen posts a day out of me due to my schedule. That's fine. I'm looking at 1 a day or 1 for two days, generally. Just waiting for hectorgrey. If he doesn't post by the end of the weekend, I'll move things along.
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May 7, 2016 17:15
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Woops, I haven't been checking this thread. Sorry! How would we go about wrangling up more players? I don't know the forum etiquette for that. I'd PM some of the people who posted in this thread before, but I don't have PMs. If anyone reading along wants to jump in, please feel free to make some characters! Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Jun 2, 2016 |
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Jun 2, 2016 01:08
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Sorry, don't have PMs! Happy to accept all 3 of you if the submissions are good. Don't worry too much about team composition: it's a sandboxy system and sandboxy campaign, so whatever composition we end up with will work just fine. Play what you feel like! That said, though, since this is a space game, someone who likes spaceships is always a good bet. I'll be starting you guys with about the same amount of XP as everyone else has, so you can expect to level up after the first adventure "episode". You'll also get an extra 3000 credits to what you roll in char gen to put you on par with the amount of money everyone else got.
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Jun 2, 2016 17:45
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Yep! Go right ahead. The rolls I think are good for providing inspiration, but if you have a solid idea yourself, go for it.
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Jun 3, 2016 00:32
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Submission looks good. If you want to own a safehouse, then I'd say that costs you the rest of your starting credits that you haven't already spent on other things. Given your background, feel free to shift a point or two into Maltech, since that would be knowledge of unbraked AIs. If you want to have a specialisation in stealth tech, I'm going to rule it as a knowledge of very advanced stealth tech, not something that will contribute to your stealth score by itself. But you'll be able to build all sorts of gadgets with enough time and the necessary components. Does that sound fair to you? Homeworlds: here's a map. New Caledonia, Gen's homeworld, is (was) the only TL5 planet in the sector. TL4+ are Caerleon (military tech), Draken system (spaceships), Perseverance (assortment of small-scale specialities, no economies of scale - all jealously guarded secrets by the corporations), Holst (inbetween TL4 and TL5 in many areas, but less advanced than the specialised worlds). I'd say your best bet is either sharing a homeworld with Gen, or being from out of sector (and you get culture of whatever world you choose, that you spent some time on). Shantri Protectorate is off limits, since it's ~mysterious~. Languages are future bastardisations of modern languages, though on major worlds you can get by with English as it's the general spacefaring lingua franca. Caerleon largely uses Welsh. Ellard's white largely uses Japanese. The worlds with obviously Russian names on the map use Russian. The rest is undecided as of yet, so feel free to make some of those calls. quote:Two promising threads converge on the Bear event at Brynmor Manor. Coincidence, most likely (83.7%), but one certainly worth your time.
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Jun 3, 2016 09:45
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Waador posted:I had thought about this and in truth hadn't made a decision on his attitude toward the actual knowledge. Wasn't sure if I routinely purged it so that if I get captured I can't be hacked for a few hundred years of maltech data that might actually create the thing I've been trying to prevent, or if I've been meticulously indexing it beneath the best encryption I can manage to be prepared to detect emerging threats more effectively (sort of like a learning anti-virus program but applied to communications monitoring in a society). In reality it would probably be the latter I suppose. If you're fine with it I'll drop the proficiency in Persuasion (gained from the Infiltrate package) and History (gained from the Exploration package) and move it to Tech/Maltech instead. Dropping persuasion seems reasonable, as your charisma is low anyway. I think History fits quite nicely, since you've been around a long time. I'd switch Tech/Medical if I were you, but it's your call. Waador posted:I was looking at this from two perspectives. Given the proficiency in Culture (Traveller) I sort of see him as moving around between worlds fairly regularly (from the perspective of an ageless thing), following up on leads that require boots on the ground in one planet or another. As a result I probably wouldn't buy a single safehouse on one planet, but rather rent what I need for bursts of time. I sort of see him as not owning real property like land since that tends to leave a paper trail as well, so he'd likely rent things to help fly under the radar as someone not worth worrying about. I was looking at the lifestyle expenses table on page 45, and was thinking I would probably prepay for 'common' lifestyle for something like 30 days in advance at a time, for around 450 credits. Does that make sense? Yeah, sounds fair. Waador posted:I think this is actually just a labeling error. I wrote "Tech (computer) becomes Tech (stealth)" but what I meant was proficiency in Computer from the Tech basic skill package becomes proficiency in Stealth (since it is a third instance of the same proficiency). Hadn't really intended to create a new skill path in stealth fighter technology. To be honest I was thinking of the stealth proficiency as generic ability to do things quietly and without notice. Part of it is that since he actively tries to avoid drawing attention during his day job, he needs to be at least a little proficient at that kind of subtlety. The use of echo models to infiltrate places he shouldn't be would also require some generic proficiency in moving quietly and in the shadows where necessary as well. Highly advanced stealth technology is certainly more appealing but seems harder to figure out how and where I have been using it. Ah, I misunderstood you. But if what I mentioned sounds appealing, then consider it too. Don't feel restricted to what's in the rulebook in terms of gear: I consider it a base, and having a guy building all sorts of cool things that aren't available to buy could be nice. Again, though, your call! Waador posted:New Caledonia probably works for my purposes. I thought about doing a Green Lantern thing where I'm from out of sector and sent to protect it a long time ago, but better to integrate with the existing game narrative then just inject myself from outside of it. If New Caledonia was the only planet that was TL5 in the sector before the Scream, it would make sense that they would be the ones that created me, probably a few decades or more before the 'incident'. I would likely assume everyone else from that time period is dead so it might draw a personal interest if I figure out Gen is from around the same time period as myself, especially if I think he is actually another artificial intelligence of that era at first glance. That might be a decent hook to cause me to intentionally reveal myself to him since I'd be so surprised to see someone like that, and really want to commiserate with them about the good old days (even if they weren't really that great). That can happen organically at the dinner party but seems like a possibility. Makes sense too, but one point regarding worldbuilding: other worlds could have been TL5 at the time. They just aren't now, due to any number of factors. Lack of resources, lack of technical know-how to reproduce and maintain the tech (TL5 relies on psionics in the manufacture process, and most psionics died during the Scream), and so on. But at the moment, New Caledonia is one of the few worlds with large stashes of TL5 tech still around - but most people don't know that, and the world hasn't been in contact with the rest of the sector. Most people probably don't know it exists except for Gen. Waador posted:That makes sense. If English is the default language, I'll take Russian and Japanese as my bonus languages from intelligence. The logic being since those are historically highly developed nations in modern day, they probably remain highly developed and most likely to be irresponsible with technology in the far-off future. As for the bonus language from New Caledonia, not sure what they spoke at the time? If you're fine with it I'll pick the last one as German since that'll grab me the other relevant Axis power. For that you're going to have to ask Gen, he's from there. Anyway, fine by me. Your goals look good too. Looking forward to getting you in the game.
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Jun 3, 2016 19:28
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Holy poo poo, if he doesn't I'm going to be grumpy.
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Jun 4, 2016 00:22
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TheTofuShop posted:Character Name: Gordon Zhang Behind the glossy presentations and handshakes with shareholders, behind every credit earned on Persev, there is a war. A war hidden from sight, a war that no one reports on publicly, a war that is not dramatic. There are no glorious charges, no brave last stands, no grandiose trumpets. Yet the war is, relative to manpower involved, as lethal as any military campaign, and twice as cut-throat. Your agency was hired a few months back by cybInt Amalgamated to investigate the sudden surge in stock prices of their main competitor, Synthetic Insights. You went to work. It took you months. You got access to high level, confidential data. Minor breakthroughs were coming by fast, faster than your employers' employers could compete with. That was part of the story, but one difficult to get to. R&D is a tough nut to crack. You decided to pick up the other thread first, easier and more obvious. Someone was regularly placing huge orders of processing hardware. Hundreds of millions worth of server racks every one or two months. You got a name. Mila Lebedeva. And then you got burned. Just like that. Did you get sloppy? You didn't think you did. Corporate espionage is a dirty business. You knew that. You were good at it. You are good at it. The fuckers will pay. Egregious Offences posted:Here's my sheet: Christof Sortey Alright, lads, here's the new contract. Standard security at a big party. You know how it goes. Easy. Boring. But it pays our wages, eh? Couple of points. We're not the only ones running the show. We're just bolstering. We get to do all we need to, so don't worry about the other guys getting in the way or any stupid poo poo like that. More like redundancy. They do their full security, we do ours. Someone's clearly paranoid. Good. Paranoid pays well. One more stipulation. They don't want anyone else to think they're paranoid. We're not wearing our colours. Bear event, so Bear security is all they want guests to see. Gear got here yesterday. Quartermaster says it's not bad. Not as good as our stuff, but up there. It'll do. Just don't snigger at the helmets when we're at the site. Us philistines don't get the rich folks' taste. Zeppelin Insanity fucked around with this message at 08:03 on Jun 5, 2016 |
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Jun 5, 2016 07:54
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TheTofuShop posted:Gonna spend 250 credits getting the fancy new suit tailored - so I think that leaves him with 1540 cred remaining. I don't know if for game purposes having Gordon come in as a solo op is good OR if a fixer/contact of sorts has keyed him into the "party" of sorts. Maybe he's an asset they are made aware of? Whatever works for you Zepp. At this point I'm just waiting to hear back from Zepp regarding exactly how I drop in. I think it makes more sense for your character to be solo. He got the name, he figured out where she'll be at a set time, booked passage to Caerleon and intends to attend. That said, if you want to introduce an NPC fixer you've worked with, go right ahead. If you go that route, it would most likely be a less than legitimate one, considering you've been burned. You can feel free to start posting in the main thread now about your preparations to get in. You don't have an invitation like the others, but you're a field agent, should be no trouble for you! If you'd rather wait for me to drop you in, I'll do that sometime tomorrow. Waador and Egregious, I was thinking it makes more sense scene-wise to wait until the main characters arrive at the party before you drop in, but if you'd rather not wait, feel free to start posting too. Remember you get to participate in the world building if you like! There isn't an irc and I'm bad at irc. Do you think we should have one?
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Jun 7, 2016 00:59
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You don't need to roll to make contact, but you might need one depending on what you want out of the NPC. Let me know what you're planning and I'll decide the roll and difficulty.
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Jun 7, 2016 08:31
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It's been quiet, and Locke is still probably dealing with the move, so I've moved things forward to drop the other two of you in. I'll consolidate your sheets with the rest of the party in a bit.
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Jun 9, 2016 08:08
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Thanks for the kind words, guys! It means a lot, since this is my first game. The security is tight enough that you can't take weapons in. You could bring in kinesis wraps, however, as they can be easily disguised as innocent objects or woven into a fabric. If you want to do that, we'll assume you bought them beforehand.
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Jun 9, 2016 11:07
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Egregious Offences posted:I can definitely wait until the scene change for my character to show up. Sorry I haven't written my response to your prompt yet, Zep, this past week has been busy with training at my new job. However, I have the next few days off so I can catch up. Uh, you are in. If you weren't checking the game thread, sorry about not mentioning it here!
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Jun 11, 2016 05:13
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Oh, too bad, Locke. Feel free to come back when and if you can! I started off with a bit of action, then went into a bit of social investigation\intrigue. I hope you guys are enjoying it. Where would you like the game to head to next?
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Jun 14, 2016 10:48
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Apocron posted:Moving this stat discussion out of the main thread. I appreciate that when you switch around the stats I apply to Tech/Medical you're trying to catch some of the dynamics of individual situations. Maybe you could argue on a shaking ship that I need to use dexterity to keep my balance, at the minute we're talking about wisdom to think clearly in a rush. But the truth is that I designed my character to be a great doctor and waiting for a roll just to see if you're going to grant me my attribute bonus or not isn't exciting but frustrating. I looked at the definition of intelligence in the rulebook: Sure! I don't mean to be frustrating. Sorry that was the result. I'm very much open to feedback. I think I may have been overusing wisdom a bit anyway. Everyone agreed that from now on int is going to be the go-to in situations like that no matter the time pressure factor? If any of you ever feel a different modifier or skill makes more sense at any point, please go right ahead and use it, don't worry too much about consulting me beforehand.
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Jun 18, 2016 22:54
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I was trying to do smaller letters but I'm bad at BBcode. I'd say do an athletics/con, or physical save for flavour of how difficult it is. You'll get to the jammer either way (I mean, I don't want you to die), but let's say that if you succeed the roll you stay concious, and if you fail you black out soon after getting a message through. From a mechanics standpoint, don't worry about HP, this is purely a narrative thing to establish the stakes. Also, don't feel your persuade was for nothing. She does like you. Let's just say she has an... interesting view on certain things. As far as she's concerned, this is basically foreplay.
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Jun 21, 2016 22:57
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Here's your new toy. Hull Fighter-Bomber Cost 1.2m Speed 6 Armor 8 HP 16 Crew Min/Max 1/1 AC 3 Power 10 Free Mass 4 Hardpoints 2 Class Fighter I'm going to rule it gets "atmospheric configuration" for free, but limited - it can go in atmosphere and land, but it's really not meant to so any engagements with airplanes would go very poorly. For story purposes, it also gets a railgun for free from the gunnery weapons on page 39 of the core book. In the post I described it as two, but that's because I like symmetry. Mechanically it functions as one.
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Jun 22, 2016 10:34
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In the Engines of Babylon supplement there's extensive vehicle customisation options, similar to ships. One of those isquote:Ghost Driver This sounds about perfect for Durandal. I suggest we use that and when it's relevant I'll figure out some houserules on using vehicle fittings on spaceships. By the way, if you guys are enjoying the game, I highly recommend the supplements. I'll quote all the relevant stuff but if any of you enjoy theorycrafting and the crunchy side of RPGs, it will be easier if you have the rules yourselves. And Kevin Crawford is awesome.
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Jun 23, 2016 22:21
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Mind you, I am playing a little loose with the details of some things to facilitate the story, which I think is in the spirit of the system. If I contradict any of the books, please point it out to me and I might reconsider. Similarly, if you want to take inspiration from something but change it up a bit, I'm very open to that.
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Jun 23, 2016 23:20
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50k, after the negotiation. Sorry, forgot to add that to your sheet! The basically-advertising piece could potentially come in quite useful. That's basically Voight's plan at the moment. Great cover story, after all. For completing the short term goal, do you think 250xp sounds fair? I admit my approach to numbers so far has been whatever feels right at the time, but I want it to be fair to you guys!
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Jun 26, 2016 19:12
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 06:00 |
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Sorry I haven't been sorted everything out yet - had a lot on my mind lately. Will get back in the swing of things soon.
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Jun 27, 2016 22:23
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