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Ryvah. Please adapt Ryvah. Because that game will never be stricken completely from my brain.
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Feb 28, 2015 08:39
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Night10194 posted:Why is every single suggestion anime? You're absolutely right. I suggest Homestuck.
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Feb 28, 2015 10:40
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Night10194 posted:Why is every single suggestion anime? Why do you think The Culture is anime?
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Feb 28, 2015 11:15
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There are just a lot of Anime with a certain dosage of insanity that lends itself well to break systems.Omnicrom posted:I second this. If Kromore won't let me play a spaced out rock star who flies around in a transforming jet robot and yells at people to listen to his songs then what use is it? And while I'm at it try Super Robot Wars in general. Kromore better let Basara's friends in the Alpha Numbers or Z-Blue come along for the ride While we're at Super Robot Wars, why not try to adapt some of the more ridiculous attack animations, like...
If that's clearly out of the question, I'd be happy with Thrudgelmir's mile-long energy sword. Baofu posted:I almost drank myself into a coma because my friends put Kancolle into my watch history. Wut o_O ? Doresh fucked around with this message at 12:48 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 12:43
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Kancolle is a cartoon series about teenage girls who "embody the spirit of battleships" and thus can strap on guns and waterski out to fight abyssal It's just a really mediocre moe-and-explosions show to cash in on a popular browser game. If that's enough to drive you to drink, please stop watching Japanese TV, for your liver's sake.
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Feb 28, 2015 13:51
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Should try something incredibly generic and malleable like the Forgotten Realms, just to see how easily the game falls apart in what should be the simplest setting possible.
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Feb 28, 2015 14:03
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Yeah, I guess it's more fun if the system fails at something pretty basic.Siivola posted:Kancolle is a cartoon series about teenage girls who "embody the spirit of battleships" and thus can strap on guns and waterski out to fight abyssal So it's Strike Witches with swimsuits?
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Feb 28, 2015 14:26
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Doresh posted:So it's Strike Witches with swimsuits? Not exactly... it's more like they're anthropomorphized ships themselves. Strike Witches was more like girls wearing machine parts, this is more like the girls are the ships. Most of them don't actually wear swimsuits (the ones that do are pretty consistently submarines). It tends to be more like miko outfits or school uniforms with cannons attached to their backs. Carriers tend to be dressed like archers and fire airplanes like arrows. At least one of them has an onmyouji-like design, having shikigami airplanes and a big scroll representing the landing strip. That kind of thing. Anyway, they're all named directly after actual battleships from the Japanese navy (and recently other navies). Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 14:48 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 14:46
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:Not exactly... it's more like they're anthropomorphized ships themselves. Strike Witches was more like girls wearing machine parts, this is more like the girls are the ships. Most of them don't actually wear swimsuits (the ones that do are pretty consistently submarines). It tends to be more like miko outfits or school uniforms with cannons attached to their backs. Carriers tend to be dressed like archers and fire airplanes like arrows. At least one of them has an onmyouji-like design, having shikigami airplanes and a big scroll representing the landing strip. That kind of thing. Anyway, they're all named directly after actual battleships from the Japanese navy (and recently other navies). Does the Yamato already have a Wave Motion Gun, or does she/it only get that one after turning into a space batttleship in the far future?
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Feb 28, 2015 15:22
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Doresh posted:Does the Yamato already have a Wave Motion Gun, or does she/it only get that one after turning into a space batttleship in the far future? Far future, I'm afraid. She does have a crapload of heavy cannons though.
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Feb 28, 2015 15:47
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Does she get praised as a super-duper warship but participate in almost nothing but losing battles, fire her guns at another ship exactly once, then get sunk as Japan is losing the war having accomplished nothing of note?
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Feb 28, 2015 15:57
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You guys are right, Anime isn't creative enough. Let's go with Literature. Do Franz Kafka's The Castle.
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Feb 28, 2015 15:58
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Go big, The 120 Days of Sodom
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Feb 28, 2015 16:15
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Actually, Candide. If an RPG can do Candide, I will acknowledge all its claims of universalism.
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Feb 28, 2015 16:39
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I wanna see how badly it fucks up with it's own setting first.
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Feb 28, 2015 16:59
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:Far future, I'm afraid. She does have a crapload of heavy cannons though. What a bummer. Oh well, I hope there's some Yuri tension between her and Bismarck-chan. ... Why am I now thinking about a mecha musume version of BattleTech? Humbug Scoolbus posted:Go big, The 120 Days of Sodom Caligula could also work. Doresh fucked around with this message at 18:01 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 17:12
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poo poo, you know we're throwing out all these ideas that Purple might never have run into or might not be familiar enough with. But I know one that he should know well enough and is batshit insane. Purple stat the fieldsverse in Kromore.
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Feb 28, 2015 17:42
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Those are all excellent suggestions and I'm going to go ahead and expect that exactly zero of them can be implemented in the game. Also, Tasoth, you're a loving monster. KROMORE  Character Creation So in Kromore's defense, at least the character sheet doesn't look Eoris-levels of bad, but much in keeping with the rest of the writing so far, the author just cheerfully launches into everything with what I can best describe as bad pacing. The very first page of chargen is just a huge smear of mechanics and how to calculate derived attributes. Also apparently how much you can carry, drag and push is derived only from your character weight, not your Muscle stat, just the first of what I'm going to assume will be many puzzling design decisions. Chargen seems to start off with a "lifepath" sort of thing, where we follow a flowchart through four decisions that give us some starting bonuses, as well as helping determine our starting money. Most of it seems relatively setting-agnostic, meaning that Kromore might at least slightly deliver on being able to function through any of its five supposed settings, though quite a few lifepath options get "piloting" and "tech," which I'm not sure how relevant would be in the "fantasy" or "medieval" settings. Also, while we've had the basic stats explained, and know what they would benefit us for, we've had no skills explained so far, so, for instance, "Operate"? What does that help us do? And of course, almost all of the lifepath bonuses are skill bonuses. Also some puzzling choices, most of the bonuses to skills are static +X bonuses, and we've been told that skill ranks are static +X's to things we do, while stats define how many D4 we roll. But there's a "+1d4" to skills in places, does that mean that I get a RANDOM bonus for choosing this lifepath option? Or that I get another 1d4 to roll whenever I use that specific skill? This isn't explained anywhere. In general, though, the lifepath doesn't seem too badly constructed, and is followed up by assigning points to our basic stats. It's a pointbuy system and, as a first for any pointbuy system I've seen, actually lines up some suggested stat arrays for new players, as well as doing some of the basic math for the player(how many free points a given array leaves them with for the next stage of chargen. Though the terrible organization of the writing and the occasionally "I ran this through Google Translate"-tier phrasing made me confused on the actual calculations and made me think the book got some of them wrong at first.). As clumsy a first impression as Kromore gives, this is actually a nice touch, as pointbuy is something that can occasionally trip up new players. quote:Players should remember they will automatically receive an equal number of free abilities to their attribute score totals. A number of free abilities EQUAL TO their attribute score totals, as it turns out. But anyway, small slip-ups aside it's time for the EXCITING RACES OF KROMORE and oh my God what's wrong with your FACE.  Hahahah, what the gently caress? Is she a smurf or something? Uh, I guess we've got four colours of human, the weird loving things from Avatar with huge noses instead of huge eyes, and dwarves. quote:If players decide to choose a Human race they must select which nation the Human is from. Each Human race holds grudges politically and socially against one another. I look forward to a list of all the human nations that have existed throughout KROMORE's 10,000-year DETAILED HISTORY, cross-referenced by which ones existed simultaneously, and with each one having a detailed rundown of who they hate and who they get along with. I'm pretty sure, though, that we're just going to get, like, five nations, and two of them will have a sidenote of "Only exists during STEAMPUNK ERA" or "Blown up during SCI-FI ERA, replaced with LASER COUNTRY." And, of course, only humans avoid being a monoculture. quote:All races start with the bonus language of Trade. Trade is a language comprised of 100 different words, phrases, and sign language symbols used for basic means of communication. Wait, so, there's 100 words, 100 phrases and 100 sign language symbols? Or there's 100 if you tally up all the words, phrases and sign language symbols? Because the latter's not going to let you do much communicating beyond asking where the loving toilet is or ordering a beer. quote:Natural Defense applies to a characters dodge and is always constant even when the character is caught prone or disabled. Which makes me imagine a team of commandos trying to assault a sleeping Metal Man and falling all over each other because even though he's asleep, his Natural Defense is somehow still applying to his Dodge. I don't know if +2 is a lot, but I hope so, because that would be loving ridiculous and a little bit hilarious. Like, I could see if it was applied to armor of some sort, but dodge? Why dodge? quote:Natural defense for some races is higher due to the races small stature or the races thicker than normal skin. Oh, I guess because the designer is a lazy sack of poo poo and went with D&D-style "armor"/defense as being a rolled-together lump of all your defensive attributes, both dodging and armor. quote:Due to social relations, size, and origin several races have negatives applied to them. These are not bad qualities of the race, but represent their social and physical standings in the ever changing political world of Kromore. I like how it represents their standing in an EVER-CHANGING WORLD, but apparently over 10,000 years, the world doesn't change enough for these things to be different during different periods. Jesus loving Christ. This is even more offensive when the game, a paragraph later, acknowledges some degree of change in that some races only exist during some periods... and of course those are all shunted off to the appendices, but include, we're told, H.I.V.E. Vampires and "realm races." Ferrians quote:“Bendai khu beiz’nehet y’ Razz-I” Why loving bother to translate it if you leave out translating a word that's core to the loving meaning of the statement?  So the Ferrians were transported to Kromore in "the 70th century BSC" by the "Tesck" that have so far gone completely unmentioned anywhere. They live on a continent referred to as "the jungle paradise of war"(???), and they used to live on another continent, but something hosed it up so that it's now "vastly uninhabitable for sustained life." As opposed to very temporary life, I guess? loving hell. quote:The Great Metal War during the era of Steam and Steel left it destroyed after the humanoid Innate wielder inhabitants formed an alliance with the allied nations against the Kalin Parliamentary Order. Metal Men arrived and destroyed the small island continent, a destruction the land never recovered from. Hmmm, yes, these sure are a lot of terms. Not that I give a poo poo what they mean. But the whole thing is basically meaningless without knowing who the gently caress these people or things are, what "humanoid Innate wielders" are. quote:Though the Ferrian have cat like appearances in the eyes and face, they are far more human than cat despite their tails and ears which are both docked at birth. ???????????????????????????????????? Nothing about them is loving catlike, at all. Has this person ever seen a cat? quote:Exiled Ferrian in their native tongue are called “Razz-I.” So "death without battle honor is exiled Ferrian"? Aaaaaargh. Whatever, these guys are basically Cat Orcs/Klingons. BATTLE HONOR, tattoos, live in noble savagery, can wear their SUPER HAIR as armor, don't do much with technology unless it's for war, and when they're in other cultures they're mostly mercenaries or criminal muscle. quote:Many Ferrian do not seek honor battling amongst the stars unless something proposes a threat to their home. The author of this is supposedly from New York, born and raised. You wouldn't have loving guessed it from this writing, would you? I would've guessed, like, Poland, myself. Maybe Dutch. If I quoted every single loving awkward or downright WRONG term or phrasing, I'd be quoting the entire loving book so far. Did you know it's possible to "miss-use" magic? I just learned that, from this book. Metal Men  quote:Their existence was declared a mistake after many rebelled slavery in the Order’s military. Thousands of Metal Men were dishonorably discharged into space before their existence was revealed, but thousands more managed to escape. Hard to tell if he's making a joke or actually thinks that a "dishonorable discharge" involves throwing someone away into the ocean or space or something. But anyway, they were a magical experiment into making SUPER SOLDIERS that accidentally developed free will, like basically every super soldier project in any piece of fiction, ever. At this point it would be a surprise to have an android that actually stayed true to the spirit of its programming or an artificially created species/creature that didn't eventually eat its creator. quote:In addition to their immortality the Metal Men all begin life at the age of twenty seven and never age beyond it. Their previous human memories are gone, Except I guess they used to be humans, yet no matter what, they're always 27 years of age? What if you turn a child into a metal man? Does he become huge and buff? Do old people turned into metal men become young and strong? Can you even do that? Can they reproduce in any sort of way, resulting in a horrific sudden aging of metal man babies? Apparently they're engineered not to procreate, but some "metal women" mutate to "reveal" offspring(what? WORDS MEAN THINGS). So I if all metal men are instantly 27 years of age, that's gotta result in some weird stuff when giving birth, or possibly an Alien-like explosion during procreation. Gross. But aside from that, if new-born metal men are a rarity, and they're all functionally immortal, does that mean that the player is most likely centuries, if not millennia old, and hyper-experienced compared to every other member of the party? I guess this is just completely ignored. And mind you, if metal men don't care about aging, what about other biological necessities? Do they need food and water? Do they breathe? Maybe this would be relevant to address, considering that their description makes them sound like loving robots(metal skin, no aging, no natural procreation, outside of mutants, have trouble with "complex emotions.") I'd also like to point out that while the Ferrians got an entire page to themselves, all the other species basically get a single half-page column. Also for some reason only half the races(Ferrian, Metal Man, Laerish) get a quote, while the other three(Gyx, Human, Zatilok) go without. The Gyx  The Gyx get literally no biological or sociological details shared about them. Nothing. They're just some red dudes that the "Tesck" dropped off on Kromore a couple of times over the eras and who were generally enslaved or murdered by roaming packs of xenophobes, but now they're free. quote:The Gyx are known deadly with a small blade due to thousands of years in servitude. Apparently a history of being enslaved means everyone assumes you know your way around a shiv. Or that you DO know your way around a shiv. I can't tell. Zatilok  GAH, it doesn't get any less horrifying the second time So, the Zatilok are apparently the only true natives of KROMORE, a bunch of NOBLE SAVAGES, not to be confused with the NOBLE SAVAGERY of the Ferrians. quote:Though they are the oldest, the Zatilok are the least technologically advanced of all Kromorian races. They are referred to as space monkeys by Kromorians, because they are no more apt at flying than a monkey is in space. A term used negatively against Zatilok. This also makes no sense to me. Firstly, they're pretty clearly feline-inspired. Secondly, why would monkeys have trouble in space? I mean, if anything, a semi-prehensile tail, and feet that can be used for grabbing and clinging far better than human feet might actually be an advantage in a zero-G habitat. Hell, I'm pretty sure a lot of apes and monkeys would transition to zero-G/micro-G pretty fast, faster than some humans, in fact, once they got the hang of it. But anyway, yeah, they're cats, JUST LIKE THE FERRIANS, GUYS, NOTICE HOW CATLIKE THE FERRIANS ARE, but more catlike than the Ferrians because of their "furry complexions." Laerish  quote:“There was a wee man named Harboro Sam, He took up some drinkin’ with main sail in hand,With nothing but hot air to sail him to land, He shored up to sailors, befriending with man,He threw down his skivvies and threw up his hands SHOVE OFF UNLESS YE DRINKIN!” Everything in this book has an "unknown meaning." quote:During the time prior to the Three Kingdoms and over the era of Three Kingdoms, Laerish lived in barbaric clan houses and sailed long ships. The Laerish of this time focused on pillage and wealth along with technological advancement. So the Laerish are basically honourable Irish(or Scottish? Can't tell) drunk techno-vikings. Or something. Also they've got almost no women(for some reason?). Also everyone likes the Laerish despite the fact that the Laerish used to raid everyone and now, apparently, maintain a stranglehold on high-tech trade because they're just so good at it. Wow, Christ, this is off to a great start. I'm going to handle the humans in a separate post, because it turns out there's actually a few pages' worth of nations/human variants. Not that I expect them to be particularly inspiring, but dealing with this writing is a bit of a challenge.
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Feb 28, 2015 17:49
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Oh hey, metal men! My dad loved that comic! Found your party.
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Feb 28, 2015 17:59
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After all those dumb unnecessary fantasy terms, I have found the ultimate suggestion for Kromore, for a game that I think it could actually fit: Stat Final Fantasy XIII.
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Feb 28, 2015 18:11
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PurpleXVI posted:They are referred to as space monkeys by Kromorians, because they are no more apt at flying than a monkey is in space. What the hell? That is not how you do pejoratives. Why monkeys? Are monkeys particularly known for being bad with space flight? Why not call them "space salmon" or "space bears" or like literally any animal on earth because none of those would do particularly well in space, either. "Monkeys" is completely arbitrary here. Who came up with that?
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Feb 28, 2015 18:13
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PurpleXVI posted:The author of this is supposedly from New York, born and raised. You wouldn't have loving guessed it from this writing, would you? I would've guessed, like, Poland, myself. Maybe Dutch. If I quoted every single loving awkward or downright WRONG term or phrasing, I'd be quoting the entire loving book so far. Did you know it's possible to "miss-use" magic? I just learned that, from this book. I've edited Polish grammar before, and this guy doesn't sound like it- too many articles. His first language cannot be English, though.
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Feb 28, 2015 18:24
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Nah, this feels to me like good ol' homegrown Bad English. It's all down to dropping words and misuse of homophones, though, so it could go either way.
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Feb 28, 2015 18:27
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Is it too late for suggestions? If not, Jabberwocky. How well does it model gimbeling in the wabe?
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Feb 28, 2015 18:29
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Siivola posted:Kancolle is a cartoon series about teenage girls who "embody the spirit of battleships" and thus can strap on guns and waterski out to fight abyssal I appreciate the concern, but this RocknRollaAyatollah posted:They have the souls of warships that committed heinous war crimes. Survivors of sunken merchant vessels being beaten to death for fun level stuff. is the part of Kancolle that drove me to drink. Saying you like Kancolle is saying, "I am willfully ignorant of history AND I've given up on 3D women."
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Feb 28, 2015 18:30
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I think it's less that the Metal Men were dishonorably discharged and then thrown into space and more that they were discharged into space, and that was dishonorable. A poor evident grasp of language does tend to kill puns in their cradles, though.
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Feb 28, 2015 18:34
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Baofu posted:is the part of Kancolle that drove me to drink. Saying you like Kancolle is saying, "I am willfully ignorant of history AND I've given up on 3D women." As far as I can tell Kantai Collection is the most bizarre and amusing symptom of Japan shifting to the right politically. Japan has always been into anthropomorphically personifying things as girls, this is the first time I've seen it so goofily jingoistic. This doesn't necessarily make it any better, but it it does give me to laugh at.
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Feb 28, 2015 19:21
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Tasoth posted:Purple stat the fieldsverse in Kromore. This unholy setting is not allowed to leave the confines of the OGL. Who knows what horrors could be unleashed?! (Speaking of, does Sentai Spectacular count as being part of the fieldsverse? It has a surprising lack of surprise sex, and actually looks decent-ish. I'm confused - or infected with something. Or both.) PurpleXVI posted:Hard to tell if he's making a joke or actually thinks that a "dishonorable discharge" involves throwing someone away into the ocean or space or something. But anyway, they were a magical experiment into making SUPER SOLDIERS that accidentally developed free will, like basically every super soldier project in any piece of fiction, ever. At this point it would be a surprise to have an android that actually stayed true to the spirit of its programming or an artificially created species/creature that didn't eventually eat its creator. Man, I should really continue work on my original sci-fi setting. It has a mad scientist faction whose army is 100% robots who actually do work as planned. Also, I love that the orcs have the feline-ish name, not the actual felines. "Zatilok" could've worked a lot better for Proud Warrior Race. quote:During the time prior to the Three Kingdoms and over the era of Three Kingdoms, Laerish lived in barbaric clan houses and sailed long ships. The Laerish of this time focused on pillage and wealth along with technological advancement. I always suspected Lu Bu was a Ferrian. And now back on the DP9 train! CORE Command Player's Handbook Deluxe Edition  Back when DP9 released its shiny new unified SilCORE rules, they decided to not only bring out new editions of their old game lines, but create an entirely new one as well. This was CORE Command, the self-proclaimed "high-powered epic space fantasy!" setting that tried to show that SilCORE can do gonzo space opera stuff. Things didn't turn out very well. There have only been 4 products for the entire line, 2 of which (the Armory book and the original Player's Handbook) are obsolete because this Deluxe Edition combines both. The 4th book is just a bestiary or something. With that depressing note, let's dive right in! Chapter 1: The CORE Command Universe quote:"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." The basic setting of CORE Command revolves around a galaxy-spanning (5 to be exact) alliance called CORE ("An acronym which meaning has been lost to time", aka "We couldn't be bothered to justify putting part of our rule system's name in the title"). Essentially a super-sized version of the Federation of planets. The eponymous CORE Command is an organization dedicated to explore the universe, uphold justice, and protect the five galaxies from the nefarious D'vor, which I suspect are like Tyranids (except these Tyranids also have some buddies called Kabayans). Starflet, more or less. The book already starts off rather bold as it boasts being a rare and phenomenal breed of science fiction, operating on a scope so grand that the Clone Wars appear like a local conflict, and Death Stars are fancy corvettes. It's pretty much like the Lensman series, or Star Trek crossed with the last 4 or so episodes of Gurren Lagann (if that makes any sense). After a short paragraph worth of "What's a roleplaying game?" (not sure why this is even here, seeing how you already need to own the main SilCORE book to be able to to use this one), we get the same spiel we've seen in Jovian Chronicles, where the book presents the "default" setup and an "advanced" one. The default assumption has everyone be a CORE agent to keep those Not-Tyranids in check. Or you can just be a merchant or something. Like in Jovian Chronicles, we get a few paragraphs worth of themese, which can all be summed up as "super heroic and exotic noblebright / anti-grimdark". We also have a list of recommended uses for Genre Points:
A Brief History This is a summary of the setting's history, except that it starts off explaining the concept of a "Singularity". This describes a civilization reaching a state of exponential technological advancements that lead to them turning into god-like machine or energy beings who just hang out by themselves. You know, those kind of jerks Kirk had to deal with every other week. The history lesson starts in earnest with the humans of Spiral, the galaxy formerly known as the Milky Way. It's speculated that these humans aren't our direct descendents, but a sort of second attempt by Convenient Ancient Precursor Race made long after the original humans have gone extinct. There's quite a lot backing this theory up, as these humans popped up everywhere in their galaxy at the same time, with a common pool of knowledge and technology thanks to conveniently placed vaults they call "Libraries". There's also this planet-sized, intelligent and most likely ancient spaceship called Fractal (so named because its greebles can mess with you if you stare for too long). It seems to be made with Library-technology, but none of the vaults know anything about it. It is maintained and represented by the Mi-Compilers, a hybrid race between humans and a vanished race simply called Compilers. The birth of CORE can essentially be summarized in script-form: Mi-Compilers: "You should totally band together to fend off these D'vor guys." Humans: "We don't believe in boogeymen!" Human Scouts:: "OMGWTF they're eating stars!" Humans: "They may eat our stars, but they may never eat... our freedom!" [Insert space battles that are at least 2 orders of magnitude larger than anything seen in Star Wars combined.] Humans: "Phew, that was quite something!" Mi-Compilers:: "Well done. Here's some comm gear to call neighboring galaxies." Humans: "Awesome! Hey, you guys wanna hang out with us?! We're thinking about a Coalition Of Roleplaying Enthusiasts!" Aliens: "Sure, why not?!" (The actual backstory is much more serious, but doesn't really take up any more space. It's a bit brief, is all I'm saying.) Several thousand years later, CORE is still going strong, and the D'vor have been contained. Now new alient nations are eager to explore the universe. For your daily dose of metaplots that will never be resolved, there's been some disturbing news from the planet Tek'ek'hal (or Tek'ek'hali, the book doesn't seem to be sure). Ancient tablets from the extinct natives speak of strange natural disasters that are disturbingly similar to the ones occuring at the edge of Spiral... Throughout this chapter, we get some sidebars about the standard planet type classification system used in the setting:
The Five Galaxies Now meet the galaxies:
Most alien races have their own name for their home galaxy, but these are the official CORE names. Of course, Spiral aka the human galaxy is the biggest and most important one, with Andromedea a close second. Each galaxy is separated into a Core Region (the most densely populated area), the Frontier (which is partially explored) and the Unknown (which is not explored at all). Aside from your CORE members, you have independent fiefdoms and kingdoms. CORE leaves these guys alone as long as they stay peaceful, or don't opress their worlds too much. If they do, CORE sends some agents to start a revolution - because morally questionable, secretive geopolitic activities for dubious gain are perfect for settings claiming to only have a vague hint of gray morality. We also get a short mention of the Standard Galactic Calendar, whose year zero is the formation day of CORE, and which is based on the "non-changing sub-dimensions of the universe", whatever that means. FTL travel is achieved by exploiting the universe's sub-structure with its layers and pillars (again, whatever that means). The absurd sizes of spaceships we'll see later in the book are justified in that the FTL drive and the generator powering it take up a lot of space. But even with FTL travel, it can take months to fly from one galaxy to the next (except a paragraph 3 pages earlier said it can take days  ). Thankfully, the black holes that can be found at the center of every galaxy have been converted into hyper-tunnel gates long ago by Convenient Ancient Precursor Race, which allow quick access between each other, though opening one requires you to throw in a white dwarf star. Then again, the fastest spaceships - the Galactic Express - also eat up a star to power their FTL drive. Being an environmentalist in the far future must suck.The gates of Doradis and Andromedea have collapsed long ago and are unusable, though there's an additional gate between Spiral and Andromedea. This gate is orbited by the Grand Void Station, a chaotic-looking space station the size of a moon that has most like also been built by Convenient Ancient Precursor Race. CORE Command CORE Command is "just" a few centuries old and tasked with exploring and defending the known universe. Pretty much everything Starfleet does, but one a larger scale. Aside from the above-mentioned revolution backing, CORE Command are definitely the good guys. CORE Command has one HQ for every galaxy sector (the core and 6 radial sectors), each of which having a couple Mi-Compilers to help Fractal organize the whole deal, making him some kind of Space Zordon. Each sector has about 50k CORE agent, with the best thousand of them being called "CORE Rangers" (so Fractal is Zordon.). The elite among the Rangers can have their brain patterns backed up to be reborn as a Recorded Hero (more on that later). Fractal itself is capable of FTL travel, but it choses to stay at the center of CORE (currently in an arm of the Spiral galaxy). It seems to consist entirely of circuits and crystal spires. I'm also getting some mixed messages regarding the describtion of the Post-Singularity planet type: how can Fractal be a Borg collective if the original Compilers have vanished and nobody really knows how Fractal actually functions? And no, the Mi-Compilers are not part of any collective, though they can somewhat interface with Fractal. Not enough to get full access to its vast memory, but it's still pretty darn nifty. Opposite of Fractal's current orbit is Academy, the lush tutorial planet for CORE Command. Training lasts 2 years, with one additional year on Fractal for Danger Room training I guess. Man, that's quite fast compared to Starfleet. We also learn that most CORE agents have a monitor orb floating around him, a sphere-shaped robot with a direct link to Fractal. The rest of the Fractal & Academy solar system consists of an asteroid belt and various types of planets, all used for training and shooting exercises. The Seven Homeworlds This starts of with some additional information / retcons to the backstory a few pages back (where this probably belonged, seeing how bloody short the backstory is). I'm starting to suspect this book could've been organized a little bit better. Anyhow, this new attempt at humanity was actually done by Fractal, spreading them all over Spiral with seeder ships. These ships also acted as a sort of quiz master, as a human civilization needed to find their ship and answer its riddles, with the winners being told about their origin and the D'vor threat. If your civilization couldn't find their ship, have fun getting nommed without warning I guess. The Seven Homeworlds this section is about are the human worlds that originally founded CORE, giving them some major bragging rights.
As a gift from Fractal, the seven founding worlds are protected by an orbital defense ring with weapons and forcefields so powerful it rules out any threat of planetary invasion, able to fend off entire Not-Tyranid Not-Hivefleets. They have no in-game stats, which is a wise choice if you ask me. If it has stats, the players will find a way to kill it. Each of these homeworlds also has its own emblem, which look like alien Unowns, or Unowns cosplaying as Lantern Rings. These are also the same symbols you see at the bottom of every single page.  This second wave of humanity seems to have a distinct lack of creativity. Wonders of the Five Galaxies Some tourist attractions/stories from Fractal's Guide to the Galaxy. Also, its database is so large that most entries have a 27,000,000-character ID. I hope the Mi-Compilers are good at writing SQL queries. Celestial Objects, Made To Order Artificial worlds, be it proper planets indistinguishable from the real thing or small luxury planetoids called "Saint-Exupérys", because this setting's Magrathea is apparently French. The Biggest Weapon Ever Found - And Lost Some legend about a gravity cannon composed of an entire solar system. Despite some dudes claiming to have found it and fired a shot at their arch-nemesis race's homeworld, there's no evidence for it whatsoever, and nobody else has ever found it. Then again, 30 years later, the neighbor system of the arch-nemesis race got hit by a surprise gravity wave ("Isn't it obvious? We missed."). Since the original target was 30 light years away from where the cannon was supposedly located, this means that this weapon can "only" fire at the speed of light, meaning you have to wait decades before you even know if you've aimed correctly - and that's if your target is relatively close. This might just be the worst doomsday weapon ever. The Protector of La-Kham 95457 This story is about an automated ship disguised as an asteroid protecting an ancient planetary structure, blowing anything to Kingdom Come that dared to come close. After several different fleets failed to destroy this Protector for over 200 years, a joint operation of multiple empires finally managed to take the ship down, though it promptly took the structure and most of the planet with it as a final "Hah-Hah!". And the morale of the story: Learn how to properly play Master of Orion. The Kek Creatures living in space in the Andromeda galaxy (don't you mean "Andromedea"?), preferring the cold emptiness of space over planets. They look like five-petal flowers extending over several kilometers. Poachers love turning their dead husks into spaceships. YLJ:KU-31 277431 A white dwarf that sends transmissions to nearby ships (warning them of something or asking them to stop whatever they're doing, like using the star for targeting practice), but never responds to any messages itself. Naturally, scientists are confused. Observation: Sanroks in Spacecraft The above mentioned Sanrok race leaves dust everywhere, so ships with them aboard alwas have a vacuum cleaner robot nearby. Not sure why they didn't put this in the race description later on. Atmosphere Clubs (A-Clubs) Essentialy rentable rooms for aliens requiring a very specific atmosphere to hang out. These are really just a collection of random stuff that happened somewhere at some time, or just general setting information. A shame, really. Some of these could've made for more or less servicable sci-fi short stories. And like everything else in this chapter, they lack a bit in depth. If you want to find out more about the different galaxies and more information about those Seven Homeworlds: Tough Luck. Skipping ahead a bit, this seems to be it. Sure, there's stuff about the most important races, and like a page or so of top secret GM information, but that's really it. Doesn't help that most of the fluff in this chapter is very human-centric, leaving out more than 4/5 of the setting. You know, I'm starting to miss Synnibarr's ridiculous nonsense timeline. At least that was something. Next Time: Character Design - aka Robotic Recorded CORE Rangers. Doresh fucked around with this message at 20:40 on Feb 28, 2015 |
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Feb 28, 2015 19:37
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Doresh posted:Also, I love that the orcs have the feline-ish name, not the actual felines. "Zatilok" could've worked a lot better for Proud Warrior Race. You know... between the orcs being described as having feline features which are clearly not there in the art and having the more feline name, and the actual cats being described as "monkeys" while having a name more fit for the orc race... that makes me wonder, were these switched at some point in development? Given how poorly edited this thing seems to be, there could be a treasure trove of material referring to the wrong race in this thing!
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Feb 28, 2015 20:06
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 says that is exactly what happened and they will be switched later in the book, maybe back and forth.
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Feb 28, 2015 20:07
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CORE Command sounds like a hybrid between The Culture (smug omnipotent space-civilizations) and Gunbuster (fighting star-eating bugs with HUMAN SPIRIT). Which is all kinds of great! Though now I'm wondering how they can possibly model combat at those scales.
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Feb 28, 2015 21:06
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:You know... between the orcs being described as having feline features which are clearly not there in the art and having the more feline name, and the actual cats being described as "monkeys" while having a name more fit for the orc race... that makes me wonder, were these switched at some point in development? Given how poorly edited this thing seems to be, there could be a treasure trove of material referring to the wrong race in this thing! Nah, it specifically points out that the Zatilok are also feline, and that some people think the Zatilok and Ferrians are related, but they're not. Still doesn't explain that loving hideous Zatilok nose, though.
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Feb 28, 2015 21:06
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PurpleXVI posted:Nah, it specifically points out that the Zatilok are also feline, and that some people think the Zatilok and Ferrians are related, but they're not. New theory: The two races were a single Proud Warrior Race Guy race in early design, until someone pointed out they were missing a brutish orc race/weirdass blue cat race in their lineup, so they split them up into two and bullshitted out some new lore for one of them.
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Feb 28, 2015 21:13
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Bendigeidfran posted:CORE Command sounds like a hybrid between The Culture (smug omnipotent space-civilizations) and Gunbuster (fighting star-eating bugs with HUMAN SPIRIT). Which is all kinds of great! Though now I'm wondering how they can possibly model combat at those scales. Very poorly, though that's only partially a rules problem. But we'll get to that soon enough.
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Feb 28, 2015 22:00
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Doresh posted:For your daily dose of metaplots that will never be resolved, there's been some disturbing news from the planet Tek'ek'hal (or Tek'ek'hali, the book doesn't seem to be sure). Tekeli'li.
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Feb 28, 2015 23:21
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I wonder how they envision those apostrophes to be pronounced. Even using them as pauses feels wrong there because there would naturally be pauses between those syllables most of the time. I choose to assume it is a tongue-click.
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Feb 28, 2015 23:24
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Kavak posted:Does she get praised as a super-duper warship but participate in almost nothing but losing battles, fire her guns at another ship exactly once, then get sunk as Japan is losing the war having accomplished nothing of note? Somebody blows her powder magazine big time. I want Kancolle Phoenix/General Belgrano-chan.
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Mar 1, 2015 00:01
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PurpleXVI posted:Still doesn't explain that loving hideous Zatilok nose, though. Looking at the close-up, it's like they tried to make it look like the nose and mouth are projecting forward, like a cat-muzzle. But they hosed up they shading, so instead it looks like the space between the eyes is bulging out. Now it looks like some kind of bulbous cyst.
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Mar 1, 2015 00:51
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 Kromore is far more than I hoped! I was expecting some boring GURPS knock-off, but it's just so full of breakable heart.
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Mar 1, 2015 01:43
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Kavak posted:Does she get praised as a super-duper warship but participate in almost nothing but losing battles, fire her guns at another ship exactly once, then get sunk as Japan is losing the war having accomplished nothing of note?
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Mar 1, 2015 02:16
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