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The fluff and the rules were probably written seperate from each other with only the barest communication between the writers. That'd explain the difference there. It doesn't explain the lovely writing in the first place, but we can put that down to "furries" and leave it at that.
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Jan 17, 2015 23:36
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The Deleter posted:The fluff and the rules were probably written seperate from each other with only the barest communication between the writers. That'd explain the difference there. Also valid.
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Jan 17, 2015 23:40
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The book stacked the "libertarian" and "furry" templates on its Author, to min-max batshit insanity.
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Jan 17, 2015 23:44
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Thing is I've seen plenty of spec-fic that has well.. "anthropomorphic animals" in them and doesn't go that far into the crazy. Like Albedo. I think it comes from it being a "Mil-spec game that also has furries" rather than "furry mil-spec game". I can think of at least 3 different ways to do what HSD is trying to do without the strange racism and miscegenation .
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Jan 17, 2015 23:50
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How in the name of CthulhuTech do you spend over half a dozen centuries without developing a culture or society? This happens pretty much automatically as soon as you're in a group. It's a bare minimum for regulated interaction (which is kinda required for a capitalistic utopia). The only way this would make any lick of sense is if everyone was living isolated from everyone else, which is obviously not the case here.Tasoth posted:Hot poo poo, are furries silly about those morphisms. Being a digitigrade would loving suck as a biped. Imagine walking in stiletto heels every moment of your life. I also question how being small for lateralism/microism doesn't directly affect the intelligence of the characters. Although, if laterlism meant you were a significantly larger, but atavistic, version of the furry family, that be loving neat. John 'Sticky' Rourke, PI solving crimes as a labrador sized gecko in hat and coat would be fun. Anyone remember Final Fantasy 12's race of bunny girls who literally all had to tie heels to their feet? They also always wore clothing that exposed their butt cheeks, because why not. And of course do you never see males.
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Jan 18, 2015 00:01
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Doresh posted:Anyone remember Final Fantasy 12's race of bunny girls who literally all had to tie heels to their feet? They also always wore clothing that exposed their butt cheeks, because why not. Sorry, can't hear you over the sound of fans  ing.Which in turn can probably explain a lot of fetish wear in sci-fi and fantasy games.
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Jan 18, 2015 02:33
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Libertad! posted:Sorry, can't hear you over the sound of fans They're usually not very subtle about it either:  Though reading what art directors say, and the general attitude a lot of people have towards working with freelance artists, apparently sometimes it has less to do with what the fans want and more to do with the artists not following directions and just drawing with one hand and expecting money in return. Granted, once you have an entire in-game species of bunny-girls, it's probably intentional from the top down.
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Jan 18, 2015 02:40
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Well you can do digitigrade feet in a bipedal species, it's just that you have to adjust the way they walk and stand. Usually with bended knees and hunched a little bit forward so that your center of gravity is still over your toes. It also requires an understanding of the artist of how animal legs work, and that the 'backwards bending' part of a wolf's leg is their ankle, not their knee. Sorry for the Blizzard artwork yet again but Worgen are easy to find.  Viera on the other hand I wouldn't even count as Digitigrade because this is more akin to foot binding. The bones in the foot are curved in on themselves. I don't think anyone can walk like that without having heels glued to their feet (like the rest of their armor). 
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Jan 18, 2015 02:58
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The digitigrade thing is pretty insane. I've been using a pair of digitigrade stilts for a satyr costume for LARPing, and I honestly cannot imagine trying to do anything more than walking around and occasionally running on flat, level ground with them. You need to crouch down to keep any semblance of balance, and the one time I tried to fight wearing them, I ended up on my rear end in about ten seconds because your center of gravity shifts so much upwards it's ridiculously easy to fall over. It's one of those "legs are not designed to work this way" things, which makes the whole "engineering an entire race of digitigrade bipeds" thing stick out as particularly crazy to me.
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Jan 18, 2015 04:08
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Hedningen posted:The digitigrade thing is pretty insane. I've been using a pair of digitigrade stilts for a satyr costume for LARPing, and I honestly cannot imagine trying to do anything more than walking around and occasionally running on flat, level ground with them. You need to crouch down to keep any semblance of balance, and the one time I tried to fight wearing them, I ended up on my rear end in about ten seconds because your center of gravity shifts so much upwards it's ridiculously easy to fall over. It's one of those "legs are not designed to work this way" things, which makes the whole "engineering an entire race of digitigrade bipeds" thing stick out as particularly crazy to me. Flat-footed plantigrade is better suited for bipedal motion, because of better stability and weight bearing. Digitigrade/unguligrade feet are almost entirely meant for quadrupedal motion, because the shorter upper leg muscles are better at repetitive flexing and more efficient energy use. It's why dogs and cats can stand up and walk, but not for long. Also, something that popped up about centaurs and other 'taurs...  quote:The Trouble With Centaurs: So you know how colts can run almost right away after they’re born, but babies can’t even hold their own heads up for a long time? Yeaaaaah… Young Freud fucked around with this message at 04:35 on Jan 18, 2015 |
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Jan 18, 2015 04:18
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Kurieg posted:Thing is I've seen plenty of spec-fic that has well.. "anthropomorphic animals" in them and doesn't go that far into the crazy. Like Albedo. I think it comes from it being a "Mil-spec game that also has furries" rather than "furry mil-spec game". I can think of at least 3 different ways to do what HSD is trying to do without the strange racism and miscegenation . To be completely fair, while hardcore libertarianism does frequently seem to overlap with the part of the Venn diagram labeled "Unexamined Bigotry" in my experience, it's entirely possible that the author of Dragontaurs In Space isn't himself anti-miscegenation but simply mining the idea of children of mixed parentage facing persecution for cheap, rote drama without actually examining whether it makes sense within the setting.
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Jan 18, 2015 04:21
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Kai Tave posted:To be completely fair, while hardcore libertarianism does frequently seem to overlap with the part of the Venn diagram labeled "Unexamined Bigotry" in my experience, it's entirely possible that the author of Dragontaurs In Space isn't himself anti-miscegenation but simply mining the idea of children of mixed parentage facing persecution for cheap, rote drama without actually examining whether it makes sense within the setting. A furry story with a poorly-thought-out back story and nonsensical designs is the sign of a ... bad writer???? No!
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Jan 18, 2015 06:06
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Young Freud posted:Flat-footed plantigrade is better suited for bipedal motion, because of better stability and weight bearing. Digitigrade/unguligrade feet are almost entirely meant for quadrupedal motion, because the shorter upper leg muscles are better at repetitive flexing and more efficient energy use. It's why dogs and cats can stand up and walk, but not for long. Would that mean centaur babies can give themselves shaken baby syndrome?
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Jan 18, 2015 06:08
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Kai Tave posted:To be completely fair, while hardcore libertarianism does frequently seem to overlap with the part of the Venn diagram labeled "Unexamined Bigotry" in my experience, it's entirely possible that the author of Dragontaurs In Space isn't himself anti-miscegenation but simply mining the idea of children of mixed parentage facing persecution for cheap, rote drama without actually examining whether it makes sense within the setting. Furries putting in tonedeaf persecution storylines? That would NEVER happen!
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Jan 18, 2015 06:08
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I mean let's be honest here, how many RPGs are there where "half-whatever" is a character option and it inevitably results in being hated and/or shunned by one or both sides of your familial lineage? That's been going on since D&D with its half-races. "Is an awkward outsider" was like the defining characteristic of Half-Elves for decades despite basically being humans with slightly pointy ears instead of some freakish catdog hybrid. Ironically, it's just as plausible that this particular bit of inanity has nothing to do with libertarianism, bigotry, or furry persecution fantasies and could very well simply be due to the author going down the checklist of hoary old RPG tropes and ticking them off as he went. "Half-races? Persecuted and shunned, check."
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Jan 18, 2015 06:28
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So, uh, moving away from bad furry RPGs and onto good ones, where do I get the Albedo stuff, preferably a digital version? I can't seem to find it for purchase, but that may just be because I am not Googling things right.
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Jan 18, 2015 06:47
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I'm...actually not sure. I bought the game ages ago in physical format, as did the friend who suggested trying it. It might be out of print, for all I know. I hadn't thought of that. Checking, it's available from Amazon for like 17 bucks, and that's all I can find. Like, I bought my copy 9 years ago. Also, would people like me to do Ironclaw 1e next or Albedo: Structural Integrity? I'll probably end up doing both just because I like the company's design philosophy and I had a really goddamn great time running a campaign about a normal company of mercs with normal concerns like wanting to retire to own an inn or get enough spare pay together to get hammered when I ran it. Night10194 fucked around with this message at 08:05 on Jan 18, 2015 |
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Jan 18, 2015 06:58
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Night10194 posted:Furries putting in tonedeaf persecution storylines? That would NEVER happen! I'm dreaming of a utopia where this is true.
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Jan 18, 2015 09:02
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Man, now I imagine centaur babies getting some weird contraption around their head to keep it stable. And the viera design is even sillier than I remember. As if anyone would give hot bunny waifus legs reserved for stereotypical beastmen  Kai Tave posted:Ironically, it's just as plausible that this particular bit of inanity has nothing to do with libertarianism, bigotry, or furry persecution fantasies and could very well simply be due to the author going down the checklist of hoary old RPG tropes and ticking them off as he went. "Half-races? Persecuted and shunned, check." Like the "Vampire stories always need werewolves, and they never get along with the vampires"-craze? Why do writers never question stuff before including it in their story? Thrash: Anime and Fighting Game Martial Arts RPG  Chapter 3: Character Creation Sadly doesn't come with a weird quote. There were a couple throughout the last chapter, but that would've been overkill. Anyhow, Thrash is one of those games that presents you the entire character creation process before you even know how to do anything. Oh well, let's roll with it! And roll we shall, because the points you spend on the game's 8 attributes amount to 6d10+20. Randomized point-buy - everyone's favorite  !The 8 attributes range from 1-10 like in Interlock (though you can raise the maximum later) and are as follows: Intelligence, Focus, Charisma, Will, Strength, Agility, Stamina and Appearance. They mostly explain themselves, apart from Focus, which is your mental strength. A somewhat strange order for a game centered mostly around physical combat to be honest. And if you're wondering if Agility is just as much of a god stat as Reflexes is in Mekton Z: almost, since you don't have a giant robot to take and dish out the hurt for you. Unspent attribute points are converted into Character Points, which you use to buy everything else (so why just not use Character Points for both?). There are also optional rules for "Heroic Attributes" for more powerful starting characters, which is just a fancy name for "just give them a fixed amount of attribute points". When you're done with your attributes, it's onwards to your Secondary Stats (shouldn't that be "Secondary Attributes"  ?):Base Action Points (APs): Acts as your initiative and is spend to do stuff, which kinda reminds me of FASA's Star Trek RPG. The base formular is [8 + your ranks in whatever styles you have]. Chi: Used for all kinds of supernatural moves. Equals [Focus x 2 + Will] Health: The big bar floating over your head during fights. Starts out at [Stamina x 4]. Dizzying Threshold: How long people have to punch you before you might get dizzy/stunned. [Stamina + 8]. Rage Threshold: Unlike SF:STG, Thrash has super moves! It models this by borrowing from the first two or so Samurai Shodown games where you would get enraged as the bar filled up. This threshold is therefore calculated as [Stamina + Will + Focus], meaning that raising these three attributes actually makes it take longer to pull off super moves, as you are less likely to hulk out. Makes sense I guess, but still weird. Thankfully, there's a little something coming later which allows us to ignore this stat alltogether! Basic Damage: Your damage bonus you add to all your maneuvers. You have one based on Strength (physical attacks) and Focus (chi attacks). It is determined by one of my favorite charts of all time:  Quite the indirect way of saying "Attribute - 4", isn't it  ?As an optional rule, we can further divide the physical Basic Damage into Upper/Lower Body Strength. It's a way to increase your Basic Damage for kicks or punches by decreasing your Basic Damage for the other one, turning you either into Popeye/a gorilla or a dude with elephant feet. They can thankfully not be more than 4 points apart, but there's still no reason to not go all out. It's not like there's much of a drawback in specializing in one kind of attack while ignoring the other. Onwards to Character Points (CPs)*! You start with [Intelligence + Agility + 40], because we can't have anyone get the same amount of points! You can spend these CPs on Skills, Disciplines (Feats you can raise like skills), Styles (the closest thing to a race/class, also raised like skills), Maneuvers (your moveset), as well as Advantages & Disadvantages. Unspent CPs are converted into experience points, though that's not a good deal as this is one of those point-buy games where just about everything's cheaper during character generation. As yet another optional bunch of optional rules, you can spend CPs to boost your starting APs, Chi, Heatlh and Dizzy Threshold, which sounds rather tempting for the former and latter, as those can't actually be raised directly later on. You can also customize skills with Specialisations and Concentrations. Specialisations are your normal "You're better when doing X" deal, while Concentrations mean "You're way better when doing X, but suck everywhere else". You can also leave a couple CPs unspent to later pull of that shounen action shtick of "drat, I didn't want to use IT so soon..." that is totally not a sign of hack writing. This does however cost additional CP to do, so it's not too effective. After a character generation example, we get a paragraph on converting video game characters. It basically boils down to "It's just an interpretation, so don't get too obsessed about finding out Ryu's exact lifting capacity" and "Don't worry about point costs because normal starting characters are supposed to suck compared to the big guys, anyways". Next are skills, a rather long list with the usual suspects like Cooking and Intimidation, with a few notable ones:
I find it a bit odd that the Chi and Vital Points Disciplines aren't "Weird Powers". I'm also a bit sceptical on those Disciplines that give you exclusive Chi-powered bonuses to your rolls. Reminds me of D&D casters going nova during the first battle of the day and then deciding to rest. Lastly, we have Advantages and Disadvantages, some of which have mutliple levels. Most is the usual stuff of "You're stinkin' rich", "You know some people that might help you", "You have better sense than most" and "You have an easy excuse to beat people up". I'll just list the most notable ones:
Next time, we'll be looking at the actual styles. Then we can almost make a character! *) For some reason, Action and Character Points are the only thing in the entire book to get abbreviations.
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Jan 18, 2015 11:32
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Doresh posted:And roll we shall, because the points you spend on the game's 8 attributes amount to 6d10+20. Randomized point-buy - everyone's favorite Random character generation should be about determining how you get to be cool, not how cool you get to be.
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Jan 18, 2015 11:39
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PurpleXVI posted:Space exploration long sat fallow due to an overall lack in returns. It was a curiosity, a public showing, but to most governments, not much else. That changed with the second generation of GeoMats, which were designed to operate in vacuum and under varying degrees of pressure. They were originally intended to work in watery environments to help alleviate the growing population of Earth by building out into the ocean, but when faced with environmental complaints and activism groups concerned about the potential impact on Earth’s largest feature, the corporate entities of the world turned their eyes skyward, and hit upon a new idea. But this isn't how advances in technology, society, or science work. They work off three basic values. War, Profit, and Insanity. He's sort of touching on profit, and outright banned war from being usable. He needs to go to maximum levels of insane, for this to work. I will write him a way to get into space, that is more likely. quote:Lord Paddington Bear the Turgid(Legal name Arthur Pealsulk) had convinced his mad cabal of investors that the only way to be with their deity was to go into space. After covertly moving millions of their funds from terrestrial charities, resulting in an increase in infant deaths and war in Africa, they had finally gotten space travel down to a much more manageable set up, that was no worse than commercial air flight. Lord Paddington the Turgid, having created his great shrine in the farthest edge of the space station, opened the windows to be greeted by his god.
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Jan 18, 2015 11:54
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Night10194 posted:I'm...actually not sure. I bought the game ages ago in physical format, as did the friend who suggested trying it. It might be out of print, for all I know. I hadn't thought of that. Checking, it's available from Amazon for like 17 bucks, and that's all I can find. Structural Integrity, I'd think. And can you tell us more about that campaign? It sounds absolutely
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Jan 18, 2015 13:49
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CommissarMega posted:Structural Integrity, I'd think. And can you tell us more about that campaign? It sounds absolutely Well, that campaign was in Ironclaw, which very much lends itself to that kind of game (As well as games about being kingmakers, etc). One thing I like about it and Albedo is that you're a relatively grounded character, except you're still meant to be someone of great talent and potential. You're not the epic action hero, but you're no shitfarmer, either; you're balanced to start out as someone who is extremely good at their specialty and who probably has a wide range of talents besides. I'll get started on Structural Integrity sometime today, then, though be warned I've used its material much less than the core book and some of it I'm not enormously familiar with.
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Jan 18, 2015 15:59
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Urch posted:But this isn't how advances in technology, society, or science work. They work off three basic values. War, Profit, and Insanity. He's sort of touching on profit, and outright banned war from being usable. He needs to go to maximum levels of insane, for this to work. I will write him a way to get into space, that is more likely. Wait...did Mr. Furry Libertarian write rules for tech advances in the setting or something? 
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Jan 18, 2015 19:33
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Pussy Cartel posted:Wait...did Mr. Furry Libertarian write rules for tech advances in the setting or something? I think Urch is more referring to the fact that about a hundred years after destroying humanity, and everyone having magical Ledgers that provide them with enough to survive permanently(hence basically abolishing profit motives) and no humans(the sources of all war and insanity), the furries just casually invent amazing power sources and effortless planet-scale engineering/terraforming projects. Plus the bit with reaching Mars, which the corporations... didn't really have any reason to do, there was no established reason why corporations would see any profit in Mars, especially since they had their magical GeoMats that could basically recycle everything and provide them with all the materials they'd ever want on Earth. But like, looking for logic in HSD is kind of a lost cause, because no one in the loving setting behaves even vaguely like real human beings... except for the nation states of Earth in the intro fluff, who are Bad People.
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Jan 18, 2015 20:07
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PurpleXVI posted:But like, looking for logic in HSD is kind of a lost cause, because no one in the loving setting behaves even vaguely like real human beings... except for the nation states of Earth in the intro fluff, who are Bad People. "If you guys would just shut up and act exactly like my mary sue furries act this is the glorious future that awaits us. So let's abolish all world governments, adopt the Euro as the worldwide currency, and get to work on that magical bank program that eliminates want. Everyone on board?"
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Jan 18, 2015 20:24
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The problem with furries and indeed nerds of any stripe is that they have to put their object of affection before common sense. It always comes out as a "weird furry rpg" and not "an rpg that happened to be about furries." You can run good games in any system regardless of theme but if the system is laughable then the theme is an extra kick in the balls, and these subcultures tend to produce the latter rather than the former. I'd play Albedo provided I was in the right group because the squad mechanics sound cool and the awe system basically reads "xcom the rpg."
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Jan 18, 2015 21:02
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I've played the original 1980s Albedo and it was a lot of fun. We played it as a military based game were the characters just happened to be anthropomorphic.
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Jan 18, 2015 21:37
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Speaking of, it's time to get to Albedo: Structural Integrity Structural Integrity exists to fill in the holes in the original rulebook. Considering I can't find Albedo for PDF anywhere, I'm surprised an expansion was written, since I get the impression there wasn't much market for depressing hard mil-sci-fi existentialist furries. I've always gotten the impression Sanguine's games are too furry for normal gamers but not furry enough for furries, going by what The Deleter said, though Ironclaw seems to be working out well for them. Structural Integrity adds more background on what happened in the comics, including the idea that the Net sometimes contacts people and goes 'Hey, guy, I need help with this. Don't ask me why. But you need to quietly go do this thing or poo poo's gonna get ugly' since this is apparently what happened to Erma in the comics. I'm not really sure how I feel about that plot point; I kind of prefer the idea of the Net as a passive and omnipresent thing that occasionally ruins your career if you're doing bioweapons research (All research is conducted with the aid of the Net, and it's mentioned that it puts the kibosh on all weaponized viral devices, etc, quietly destroying research and ruining careers when people work on that stuff). The fluff also talks about a dead human being found in a 'Creator ship' on the edge of space, which happened in the comic, and which I saw fit to ignore when I ran the game because I don't like outright answering the question of 'Who the hell made these guys and why'. It also talks about the difference in EDF and ILR gear; EDF gear tends to be general purpose and very solid, while ILR equipment is more experimental and specialized. Their troops are similar; EDF grunts are well trained and broadly skilled, but the ILR prefers a mix of terrifyingly efficient commandos and special forces and more poorly trained and numerous conscripts. It also notes that the ILR has one huge advantage: The EDF has to design gear and armor for troops who can range from 4'6" to 7'6" and vary enormously in body type, since they have dozens of species in their armed forces. The ILR is entirely made up of The Bun, and thus they can standardize and manufacture equipment, transports, cockpits, control systems, etc much easier. It also goes into a lot of fluff detail on the EDF advantage in information technology; every soldier in your squad can set their eyepiece to see through an ally's eyepiece or gun camera, your squad leader probably has a medical and positional monitor on all of you, etc. The ILR doesn't have quite the same level of networking or communications between squads. It also goes into detail about your transport ships. Have you played Homeworld? Good. Your troop transport is the Mothership. On par with 40k ships in scale, the FTL capable VLCCs (Very Large Cargo Carriers) carry enough manufacturing and processing facilities to build their own vehicles and re-equip the squads on board from local resources, as transporting huge amounts of material is difficult. The key resource isn't tanks or guns, it's warm bodies and trained heads. This is one of the reasons the EDF puts so much premium on protecting their troops and getting them back alive. It's much easier to send in a new tank than to replace a highly trained Rapid Reaction orbital drop squad! This is why there's an awful lot of emphasis on medical tech, getting soldiers back alive, prosthetic limbs, and psych counseling. Now, normally, the only advancement that Squaddies get is that after 3 missions, they become Loyal and start battles with 3 Morale. Also, replacement squaddies normally come in green, at 0 Morale, and only move up to 1 after 3 missions. Structural Integrity provides rules for Adjutants; as your PC gets promoted out of squad level work, your surviving squaddies become officers of their own, becoming more and more like actual main characters and gaining stats and things the same way you had them. The idea is that this happens so that you can play as a captain or major or colonel and make decisions and things about where you're sending the team and dealing with higher level officers, then scale down into a smaller squad and take over as your Adjutant character to play out normal squad based action and situations when it's time for adventure, and occasionally take to the field as your original, higher ranking main character. It's an interesting system if you want to go by military realism (Once someone makes company level officer, etc, it wouldn't make a lot of sense for them to still drop with 4 guys and get into gunfights constantly) but I feel it sort of sidelines your original main character. Now, that might be your thing, if you want to play your original hero getting detached from the field by success and experience and occasionally getting together his now-elite commando team for a critical mission, and this whole system is optional anyway, so on the whole, it's better that it exists, I think. Also, reading through again, this clears up (from an example of an Adjutant advancing) that Advancement was meant to be 'here's a list of stuff that you COULD take as a Medium improvement, pick one', which is annoying as it confirms the glacial rate of advancement I feared was the intention. They also include more solid rules for Supporting Characters advancing without becoming Adjutants, staying relatively abstracted but gaining a few Gifts and extra skills to reflect becoming veterans along with your PC. This is a very welcome improvement, as it gives you some more room to differentiate your squadmates and give them more personality, as well as even more reason to keep them alive. I can't recall if it's in this book or the last, but the other penalty for dead squaddies is every lost squaddie inflicts 1 point of Social damage on the PC; no-one trusts an officer who brings home too many bodybags. They next go into a bunch of medals and decorations, my favorite of which is the Distinguished Service Ribbon; it's awarded primarily to Admin personnel, mainly by Admin personnel, and mainly to burnish a record and improve SPI a little as a favor for a favor or for a friend's cousin or something, earning it the nickname of the Desk Sitting Ribbon among most of the infantry. I like the little bits about what the medals mean and what their social consequences and general requirements are, like how someone without at least one DCB (Direct Combat Badge) will generally be considered the squad's whipping boy until he or she earns their first campaign ribbon, or how soldiers generally display markings intended to symbolize their medals on their armor as good luck charms. Next comes vehicle combat, which is complicated and big, so I'll get to it next time.
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Jan 18, 2015 21:42
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Humbug Scoolbus posted:I've played the original 1980s Albedo and it was a lot of fun. We played it as a military based game were the characters just happened to be anthropomorphic. I recall, deep in the past, there was a comic, roughly Eastman/Laird in style that was a direct parody of the first issue of the Larry Hama GI Joe comic, except that the characters were animals. I recall mostly rabbits. I'm now curious if this is at all related to Albedo. And, coincidentally, if anybody recalls that comic besides me.
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Jan 18, 2015 21:54
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Oberndorf posted:I recall, deep in the past, there was a comic, roughly Eastman/Laird in style that was a direct parody of the first issue of the Larry Hama GI Joe comic, except that the characters were animals. I recall mostly rabbits. I'm now curious if this is at all related to Albedo. And, coincidentally, if anybody recalls that comic besides me. I think that might be Catshit 1? Someone mentioned it awhile ago and I vaguely remember seeing something about a manga about rabbit special forces operatives called that?
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Jan 18, 2015 21:59
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Oberndorf posted:I recall, deep in the past, there was a comic, roughly Eastman/Laird in style that was a direct parody of the first issue of the Larry Hama GI Joe comic, except that the characters were animals. I recall mostly rabbits. I'm now curious if this is at all related to Albedo. And, coincidentally, if anybody recalls that comic besides me. I have heard about a manga set in Vietnam/Korea War where all the countries were animals based on puns from their names, but I cant remember the title. The only pun I can remember is U.S.A. G.I. > usagi > is japanese for rabbit. So that might be it? Edit: Night10194 posted:I think that might be Catshit 1? Someone mentioned it awhile ago and I vaguely remember seeing something about a manga about rabbit special forces operatives called that? Im pretty sure that was its english title, or something close with 'poo poo' in it.
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Jan 18, 2015 22:03
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Night10194 posted:I think that might be Catshit 1? Someone mentioned it awhile ago and I vaguely remember seeing something about a manga about rabbit special forces operatives called that? No, there was an Albedo Anthropomorphics comic, that I can remember. The main character was name Erma Felna and ran from the early '80s to '90s. It also went through several publishers in that time. Catshit One/Apocalypse Meow is much more recent, appearing in Japanese plastic modelling magazines around 1998. Motofumi Kobayashi specifically stated he made Catshit One with rabbits and cats because he had tried a more human-centered tale in Vietnam and it was met with apathy largely because of manga audiences were burned out by the setting. He was famous previously for some rigorously detailed Panzergrenadier stories in the '80s.
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Jan 18, 2015 22:08
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I really do wonder, reading through Albedo again, if the decision to use rabbits as the main antagonists is inspired by General Woundwort and Watership Down. Also, one really funny thing about The Bun: They get a huge racial bonus to leap, so ILR infantry are often described as being able to scamper and scramble and leap over fences and other obstructions in wierdly coordinated fashion, which just makes me think of those North Korean propaganda pictures of the soldiers all jumping in coordination to show off their incredible Juche-inspired prowess.
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Jan 18, 2015 22:12
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 Character 1 Continued  Talents The thing that makes the d20 Modern class system go 'round is the second to last thing to cover in the first chapter of Exodus. In addition of a reprinting of all of the standard d20 Modern talent trees such as Fast-Talk and Melee Smash, there are also nine new talent trees and four new talents for old trees. Before getting to a list of the new trees, it would probably be best to briefly note the four new talents added to existing trees. Radiation Resistance is added to the Tough Hero's (well, once Tough Hero's, now anyone's) Energy Resistance tree, and allows a character to ignore 100 x their Constitution modifier in Rad units of radiation damage. This isn't how radiation works in standard d20 Modern, but it also isn't fully discussed until chapter 5, so we'll just ignore going too deep into that for now. Of more immediate understanding is Alluring Gaze, an addition to the Charismatic Hero's Charm talent tree. Charm is already a dumb talent in d20 Modern as-written-for-the-System-Reference-Document, and Alluring Gaze is somehow even dumber. With this talent you effectively get a gaze attack to make people think you are interesting. Members of the opposite sex think you are hot and have their mood towards you increased to Friendly, while members of the same sex find you intriguing and have their mood improved to Indifferent. Both are flat-footed for a number of rounds equal to your character level because they are so fascinated by you. The other two are both additions to the Charismatic Hero's Fast-Talk tree. Smooth Talker makes you king of bullshitting, allowing you to spend 5 minutes talking to a character 4 or more levels lower than you to automatically succeed on a Bluff or Diplomacy check against them. Unlike most talents and feats that relate to Diplomacy, there's no minimum mood requirement for Smooth Talker, meaning you can say a bunch of meaningless platitudes to an arch-villain and win them over to being Friendly toward you without any further effort as long as you are at least 4 levels higher than them. The other talent, Silver Tongue, is a far more unremarkable "you get to reroll a failed Diplomacy save at a -4 penalty, but you can only do it once per Diplomacy attempt on the same target". And those new talent trees? Well, I guess we should get to those. I'm going to try just normal formatting rather than using the list function for these from now on, as I've been bothered by how cluttered bullet lists must make my jumbles of words look to others. Gunslinger: Do you like guns? Do you want to be really good with guns? Then this is the talent tree for you, or at least it is intended to be. In reality, none of its three levels of talent are particularly great. Gunslinger itself gives you a flat +1 bonus to attack rolls with personal firearms, Pistoleer lets you ignore the first two points of damage reduction granted by armor (did I note that this is a system that uses damage reduction rather than Defense/AC bonus for armor? Oh well, I have now), and Machine Gun Johnny grants you Advanced Firearms Proficiency as a bonus feat. Hand to Hand: Do you like to punch things? Do you want to be really good at punching things? Then this is actually the talent tree for you. Its first three talents allow you to deal lethal damage with unarmed attacks and increases the damage dealt to 1d6, 1d8, and finally 1d10, and you can do it at far lower levels than the Martial Artist advanced class would do the same thing for you. And no, they didn't even remove the Martial Artist advanced class either, so there's basically no reason to ever take that advanced class when you could just take three Hand to Hand talents and get the same damage by character level 6 that you wouldn't get with Martial Artist until you had 11 character levels under your belt. Oh, and there are two talents for the tree that give you the effects of Weapon Focus and Improved Critical respectively, but who cares about those? Martial Arts: Oh hey, more redundancy. The first three talents of this tree, referred to as Karate I to III, happen to do the same thing as the first three of Hand to Hand! What a surprise. There is also Judo, which grants a +4 to Escape Artist and grapple checks, and Kendo, which effectively grants Weapon Focus and Improved Critical with any spear, staff, or sword weapon. Mr. Handy: The first pair of talents that actually feels like a pair of talents rather than weird feat-miming or replicating an existing class that wasn't even kept out of this game. The talent Mechanic grants a bonus to Repair checks equal to your character level, while Mr. Goodwrench lets you take 10 on Repair checks even when distracted or threatened. Not particularly amazing to read about, but at least they aren't another Hand to Hand. Quicker Than the Eye: A three talent long talent tree for disguise and disorientation-minded folks. The Matchstick Man talent allows you to substitute a Perform check for a Bluff check for the purposes of making a distraction, Magician grants a bonus to Sleight of Hand checks equal to your character level, and Quick Disguise allows you to take 10 on a Disguise or Hide check even when distracted or threatened. Scientist: Or, more accurately, Chemist. This talent tree has two talents, one that grants a +2 bonus to Craft (Chemical) checks and a second that ups that to +5. Spontaneous Fighting: This is a bit of an odd one. One of its two talents, Improvised Weapon, lets you circumvent the normal -4 penalty to using an improvised weapon. That's definitely spontaneous fighting. But the other? Blades, which lets you deal +1d4 damage with any melee weapon that deals slashing damage. I don't usually consider swords and axes to be that spontaneous, but I guess you can make the case for switchblades and knives being the exception that prove the rule here. Stealth: Go ahead and take a guess what this talent tree's good at. Locksmith grants a flat +2 to Disable Device checks made to pick non-electronic locks, The Shadow Survival: You may be shocked and amazed to know that this talent tree mostly deals with uses of the Survival skill. If you need supplies, you can take Skilled Hunter to be allowed to make a DC 12 Survival check to find a day's worth of food or Dowsing Rod to be allowed to make a DC 15 Survival check to find a source of water. These are both things that a normal DC 10 Survival check can do in standard d20 Modern, but for whatever reason Exodus decided to move these to exclusive talents. The other talents the Survival tree grants are Camouflage (use Survival instead of Hide checks to hide in wilderness areas), Beast Soother (DC 20 Handle Animal check immediately calms a hostile creature to Neutral mood), Ambush Bug (force a -4 penalty to Spot checks to notice an ambush you set up), and Pathfinder (character level's worth of bonus to Survival checks).  Reputation In standard d20 Modern, Reputation is a single modifier that that allows a character to throw their notoriety around with a Reputation check and provides either a bonus or a penalty to Bluff, Diplomacy, Gather Information, Intimidate, and Perform checks depending on whether or not the person in question finds the character famous or infamous. In Exodus, it is literally the faction reputation system from Fallout. You have a Fame and Infamy rating with each faction, such as the Steel Disciples or the Chi of San Francisco, that is on a percentile scale of 100. There is a percentile gain to each based on specific actions. For instance, negotiating a peace treaty between two factions is listed as a +1% bonus toward both of them, while betraying a faction grants +5% Infamy. What does this new Reputation system actually do, beyond give an arbitrary measure for the GM to decide how factions treat you? Just two things. One is that you get a +2 bonus to Gather Information checks in areas controlled by a faction that you have 50% or higher Fame with, and the other is that it affects a specific feat we'll discuss in a little bit.  Chapter 2: Skills There's not actually a lot to go over when it comes to skills. Most skills work the same as the do in d20 Modern with little to no alterations, and there's only one new skill, so a lot of this chapter can be ignored as reprinted material. One noteworthy change is the Knowledge skill. There are twelve Knowledge skills in standard d20 Modern, and twelve Knowledge skills in Exodus. So why are there some odd new Knowledge skills you might have noticed in the backgrounds and occupations? A few have indeed been replaced, but others have simply been renamed. To note the specifics, Arcane Lore has been renamed Occult, Current Events has been renamed Street, Earth and Life Sciences has been renamed Geography, Physical Sciences has been renamed to just Science, and Streetwise has been renamed Underworld. The Knowledge skills Art, Behavioral Sciences, and Business have been removed as well, and in their absent slots are now the Knowledge skills Engineering, Medicine, and Nature. Engineering covers knowledge of buildings, craft materials, and the ability to read blueprints, Medicine covers both behavioral sciences and knowledge of genetic engineering and medical treatment, and Nature identifies animals and plants. Perhaps more directly affecting play, however, is the addition of a new use to the Search skill: scavenging. Scavenging lets you turn a Search check into a specific sweep of a 100 x 100 ft. area of ruins, with a higher result meaning better finds. DC 15 is the lowest result and scavenges up a single bottle of And what of the entirely new skill? Enter Barter. For clearly no reason at all and certainly not because of its Fallout origins, Exodus rules that if you as a player are selling an item, it is half price compared to how many  Chapter 3: Feats In addition to being a thing that already exists in the d20 system, feats in Exodus are explicitly meant to line up with perks. Hell, they even left a rather “whoops” sentence in where they just replaced “Perks” with “Feats” and didn't even remove the part referencing the book's Fallout origins: “Feats Introduction” posted:Most of the Feats from the computer series are presented in one form or another (Advanced Class, Talent, or Trait) in this guide. It's the same story with feats as it was with occupations and talents. The d20 Modern examples are still there, a few have been retooled in minor ways or renamed arbitrarily (like Improved Critical has been renamed "Better Critical" and Improved Natural Healing into "Faster Healing" for whatever reason), and there are also new feats that are often directly related to Fallout perks. Action Boy: Do you really like the extra move or attack action you can get with the Heroic Surge feat, but don't have enough uses per day for your liking? Fear no more, then, as Action Boy lets you pop a Karma Point to get an extra use per day after you've expended the one to five times per day you normally have based on your character level. Adrenaline Rush: If you've dropped below half your normal HP, you get a +2 bonus to attack rolls and physical ability score-based skill checks for a number of minutes equal to your Constitution bonus. Animal Friend: Domestic animals are automatically Friendly toward you and wild animals are Indifferent. On top of that, you also get to have one animal companion in the same style of the D&D Druid. Awareness: If you spend a full round studying an enemy, you get a +1 bonus to attack rolls against them for the rest of the encounter. Bonus Ranged Damage: You get a +1 bonus to all damage rolls with ranged weapons. Hooray? Bracing: Your Strength score is treated as being 2 higher for the purposes of wielding large firearms. Weapons in Exodus have a set Strength requirement to wield them, by the way, as you have just learned. Comprehension: You gain three extra skill points. Not per level, just three skill points to spend then and there. Demolition Expert: Explosives deal an extra 1d6 damage. Dodger: The bonus to Defense from the Dodge feat is increased by a further +1. Dodger is also unlimited in how many times you are allowed to take it, so I'm not sure why they didn't just rule that Dodge itself could be taken multiple times. Earlier Sequence: On top of gaining a +2 bonus to Initiative checks on top of the +4 the character would already have (as you need Improved Initiative to take this feat), you are always able to act in a surprise round. Empathy: Congratulations, you have turned the Sense Motive skill into the discern lies spell.This kind of feat seems like something you'd use as a great justification for taking Knowledge (Behavioral Sciences), but since that Knowledge skill was removed in Exodus it instead requires ranks in Sense Motive and Diplomacy. Exotic Weapons Proficiencies While not technically a new feat, the subsets of Exotic Firearms Proficiency have been almost entirely changed so it might as well be a new feat. In standard d20 Modern, Exotic Firearms Proficiency can be taken for the categories Cannons, Heavy Machine Guns, Grenade Launchers, and Rocket Launchers. In Exodus, Exotic Firearms Proficiency is split up into Energy Firearm Proficiency (laser and plasma firearms), Flamethrowers, Heavy Weapons (heavy machine guns with a different name), and Propelled Launchers (grenade launchers and rocket launchers). I can understand why they decided to change the existing rules that stated flamethrowers had no proficiency and energy weapons where just under Personal Firearms Proficiency, though renaming Heavy Machine Guns into something more vague while keeping its definition the same seems a bit silly. Finesse (or "Feneese" according to the feat list): You get a +4 bonus to confirm critical hits, but deal -1 damage on all attacks. This feat has no relation to Weapon Finesse, and also seems almost more in line with the traits from earlier than it does with feats. Flower Child: You are so  that you gain a +2 bonus to Fortitude saves made to resist getting addicted to the numerous drugs you take.Fortune Finder: One of those classic "+2 to two skills" feats, this one applying to Craft (Salvage) and Search checks made specifically to scavenge. Gain Ability: You, uh, gain an ability. Specifically, 1 point in one ability score. You're only allowed to take this feat once per ability score, presumably to prevent shenanigans like stacking up to 30 Strength or whatever. Ghost: On top of a +2 bonus to Hide and Move Silently checks, you gain 3/4 cover at night or in dimly lit areas. Cover, not concealment. That means you are getting a +7 bonus to Defense just because the sun goes down. Gunner: You gain a +1 bonus to attack rolls made with firearms while you are on a moving vehicle. Considering a moving vehicle conveys a -4 penalty to attack rolls, this feat isn't exactly useful. At all. Harmless: For the entry fee of having a Charisma score of 17 or higher, you gain a +1 bonus to Barter, Bluff, Diplomacy, Gather Information, Sense Motive, and Sleight of Hand checks. Healer: When you use the Treat Injury skill to heal someone's hit points, it heals double the normal amount. Heave Ho!: All thrown weapons have a +10 increase to their range increment. Hit the Deck: This feat gives the tradeoff of taking half the normal damage from explosives at the penalty of being knocked prone after every explosion due to a tendency to dive for cover. Hand to Hand Evade: You gain a +2 to Defense in melee combat, but only if you are fighting unarmed. Hand to Hand Fighter: The bonus to attack and damage rolls granted by the Improved Brawl feat increases from +2 to +4. Karma Beacon: Take a feat, get a single extra Karma Point for your pool. Lead Foot: Any land vehicle that runs on fuel cells (which is any land vehicle that isn't pulled by pack animals) have their top speed increased by 20 feet. Life Giver: You gain 2 extra hit points every class level you take. Light Step: You gain a +2 to Defense and Reflex saves against any ground-based hazard, such as pit traps or land mines. Living Anatomy: Oh hey, a feat that has both combat and non-combat benefits, you don't see those that often. With this feat, you get a +4 to Knowledge (Medicine) and Treat Injury checks, a +1 to attack rolls against humans or human-based mutants such as ghuls and Trans-Genetic Mutants, and the healing effects of the long-term care use of the Treat Injury skill are doubled. Magnetic Personality: Literally the Leadership feat from Dungeons and Dragons. It's been given a rename because there is already a completely unrelated talent tree called Leadership in d20 Modern, rather than for arbitrary reasons as has often been the case in this book. The one major difference between this and traditional Leadership is that your Reputation comes into play. The tens number in your percentage of Infamy or Fame dictates your effectiveness in trying to gain a companion or followers. For instance, if you have 50% Fame with the Steel Disciples, you'd get a +5 bonus to your More Critical: Is the +1 increase to critical threat range from Mr. Fixit: On top of a +2 bonus to Disable Device and Repair checks, the DC of any Repair check is decreased by your Intelligence bonus. Mutate!: You can change out one trait you took at level 1 for another. Whoopee. Mysterious Stranger: How much do you enjoy extremely arbitrary GMPCs? Hopefully a lot, because everything about the Mysterious Stranger is pretty drat arbitrary. By expending a Karma Point when you are in "dire need" in combat, the Mysterious Stranger appears to aid you! What kind of statistics does the Mysterious Stranger have? It's up to the Game Master to stat him up, of course! His level, skills, and class layout are all entirely up to the GM. Is he lower level than your character, equal level, higher level? Who knows, it varies depending on whatever your GM decides. A feat where the GM has to make poo poo up on the fly and the player has to put their entire trust in a GMPC is assuredly a great idea! Pack Rat: Your Strength score is treated as 2 higher specifically for determining carrying capacity. Pathfinder: Overland travel between any two destinations is decreased by 10%. Presence: Another +2 to two skills feat, this time for Diplomacy and Intimidate. Pickpocket: You gain a...+3 to Sleight of Hand checks? I'm not sure you fully understand how the bland skill bonus feats game is supposed to be played, Exodus. Pyromaniac: You gain a +2 to attack and damage rolls with any weapon that deals fire damage. Quick Pockets: Quick Draw, but for non-weapon equipment. Quick Recovery: You can take a free action but provoke an attack of opportunity to rapidly get up from being prone. Rad Child: You are immune to any radiation that is 600 Rads or lower. Surprisingly, it only takes having a +3 bonus to Fortitude saves to have this rather formidable feat. Rad Resistance: You get a +4 bonus to Fortitude saves against the effects of radiation. Given that this feat requires both a Constitution score of 13 and the Toughness feat, it seems like it would be far more useful to take Rad Child if you are that worried about radiation. Ranger: You gain a +1 bonus to Hide, Listen, Move Silently, Navigate, Search, Spot, and Survival checks in any wilderness environment. Strong Back: Like Pack Rat, but at a +4 bonus rather than +2. Pack Rat is nonetheless arguably more useful for Dexterity- or mental ability score-based characters, as it has no prerequisite while Strong Back requires a Strength score of 13 or higher. Stunt Man: Falls are treated as being 20 feet shorter for the purposes of taking damage, and on top of that fall damage is 1d4 per 10 feet rather than the normal 1d6 per 10 feet. Stonewall: You're pretty unmovable, with a +4 bonus to oppose bull rush, overrun, and trip attacks, as well as any effect meant to move you or knock you prone. Surface Vehicle Operation: As with Exotic Firearms Proficiency, this is an existing feat that had its subcategories altered enough that it might as well be a new feat. In standard d20 Modern, the Surface Vehicle Operation categories are Heavy Wheeled, Powerboat, Sailboat, Ship, or Tracked, with general purpose cars, trucks, motorcycles, and the like not needing a feat to operate without penalty. Exodus replaces the three watercraft proficiency feats with Boats ("small" boats such as jet skis, rowboats, and sailboats) and Watercrafts (boats that require multiple crew members such as yachts and cruise liners), Heavy Wheeled and Tracked are replaced by Constructions (construction vehicles like bulldozers and dump trucks), Heavy Duty (large non-construction civilian vehicles like 18 wheelers and RVs), and Military (military APCs, tanks, and such), and the new categories Bikes (motorcycles) and Four-Wheelers (cars, trucks, dune buggies, etc.) are added. Thief: You gain a +1 to Disable Device, Hide, Move Silently, and Sleight of Hand checks. And to avoid ending off on a big wall o' feats, have a gander at some of the descriptions for classic feats, to get a feel for Exodus's attempts at miming Fallout writing. The typos here aren't mine (for once  ), as I felt it would be best to actually keep these intact rather than fix them, just to add that extra flavor.Feat Descriptions posted:Agile Riposte: Father Nelson instructed you as a young child about strange people touching you. So now when your opponents attempt to feel you up, you know how to retaliate. Next Time... Equipment and combat, from power armor and punches to drugs and drag-outs. Fossilized Rappy fucked around with this message at 04:20 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 02:09
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quote:Unlike most talents and feats that relate to Diplomacy, there's no minimum mood requirement for Smooth Talker, meaning you can say a bunch of meaningless platitudes to an arch-villain and win them over to being Friendly toward you without any further effort as long as you are at least 4 levels higher than them. This is how I remember playing Fallout. Maxing out SPEECH meant I could talk most villians into anything.
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Jan 19, 2015 02:45
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Count Chocula posted:This is how I remember playing Fallout. Maxing out SPEECH meant I could talk most villians into anything. But where's the perk for making the villain stand passively by while I fill him so full of Super-Stims that the backlash when they all wear off kills him?
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Jan 19, 2015 02:57
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LornMarkus posted:But where's the perk for making the villain stand passively by while I fill him so full of Super-Stims that the backlash when they all wear off kills him? Programming Exploit: You have found a way to cheese the hell out of the game. Please use responsibly, like when your enemy is bullshit powerful or bugged.
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Jan 19, 2015 03:18
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I think you have the text for not-leadership under Packrat.
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Jan 19, 2015 03:57
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wdarkk posted:I think you have the text for not-leadership under Packrat.
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Jan 19, 2015 04:20
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