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Halflings are supposedly amazing slingers. They also tend to focus on food. I'm surprised there have been less onions used as sling bullets in fantasy media.
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Nov 24, 2015 02:28
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Tasoth posted:Halflings are supposedly amazing slingers. They also tend to focus on food. I'm surprised there have been less onions used as sling bullets in fantasy media. It's harder to carve insults on an onion without tearing up yourself, that's why.
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Nov 24, 2015 02:32
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Tasoth posted:Halflings are supposedly amazing slingers. They also tend to focus on food. I'm surprised there have been less onions used as sling bullets in fantasy media. Too busy using hot soup to scald demon lords to death with a catapult. I will get back to my WHFRP review soon, I've just been traveling for a religious studies conference.
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Nov 24, 2015 02:42
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Night10194 posted:Too busy using hot soup to scald demon lords to death with a catapult.
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Nov 24, 2015 03:46
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Hostile V posted:I assume that's Warhammer talk for "went to a church to yell at a bunch of heathen Sigmarites" Replace it with Ulricans, you outdated Northerner scum. Sigmar built an Empire, Ulric wants to run naked in the snow with wolves and play into Khorne's hands.  I admit part of my dislike for Ulric is how thoroughly assholish Middenheimers are made out to be in Sigmar's Heirs, the Empire book (and the worst sourcebook in the series). That, and Ulric gets at some...uncomfortable bits of the Warhams that I fear might be part of the setting's DNA. Easily ignored parts, but I'll get to that when I get to the churches.
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Nov 24, 2015 03:54
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 Hey hey, it's Legacy: War of Ages! I think this one may have already been covered by someone else here, but we wanted to talk about it anyway! Here, look at this rad art: 
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Nov 24, 2015 19:29
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Regarding the LSH tangent: The best/worst member of the Legion of Superheroes was Fortress Lad, who had the ability to turn into a rocket-shaped building. He showed up for tryouts, and saved the entire team by jumping in front some random villain's mind-eraser ray. This -mostly- shielded them from the effects...except everyone forgot that Fortress Lad existed, and he was completely mindwiped. So the Legion was like "Oh, wow, someone left a cool rocket-shaped building here!" and made it their headquarters. Their living, catatonic headquarters. Also: Warlock: The Black Spiral was a straight up Mage ripoff, yeah. They eventually released it on their website, along with, weirdly, a Thundarr the Barbarian hack of Over the Edge. unseenlibrarian fucked around with this message at 21:54 on Nov 24, 2015 |
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Nov 24, 2015 21:50
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The best name in LSH was Nemesis Kid, who had the power to assume whatever superpower he needed to counter the powers of whoever he was fighting. He was also responsible for the most metal moment in LSH, when Projectra, instead of using her illusion powers, just strangled him to death. Edit: Legacy is more interesting for the type of game it is than for its actual content. It came out soon after Vampire and, IIRC, right after the 1st season of the Highlander series. Ironically, the only area whereLegacy innovated was in imitating White Wolf. Within a few years there would be a dozen games on the market that featured a certain type of design, had quotes at the top of every section, and were about some kind of dark urban fantasy. Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 22:22 on Nov 24, 2015 |
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Nov 24, 2015 22:07
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theironjef posted:
I think the FFing is still in-process. quote:Here, look at this rad art: tbf this is what I looked like in high school and this is the kind of book I would've made then
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Nov 24, 2015 22:19
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unseenlibrarian posted:Regarding the LSH tangent:  big enough for that.
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Nov 24, 2015 22:19
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That Old Tree posted:I think the FFing is still in-process.
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Nov 24, 2015 22:38
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mycot posted:I'm glad the Tenra Bansho Zero write-up has been updating so fast. It's an interesting game, and those ink-brush illustrations are so cool. I do what I can. And the art is rad, especially anything monstrous. Moinkmaster posted:I've meant to agree on this. Plus, it has built-in support for Jaegers if I want to do something Pacific Rim; always a plus. And the section about how to create the big monsters to fight isn't too far away from now. theironjef posted:
This game. It is one thing to make a blatant ripoff of at least two different sources, but it is the art that is just the icing on the cake. Tenra Bansho Zero  Teenage soulgem ninja humans. Ninja  Why do ninja always wear silly headgear? Well, at least this one looks like it is bulletproof. Unlike Samurai, the TBZ Ninjas are pretty close to the source material: sneaky guys organized in clans hired to perform various kinds of shady and dishonorable missions. Because of their sneaky nature, nobody really knows when or how this whole ninja deal started. All that anyone knows is a name: Makabe Genyuusai. No real facts are know about him, but it seems he was a rogue onmyojutsu sorcerer who discovered and formalized unorthodox, stealthy and Shikigami-less applications of omnyojutsu that could be learned and used without really understanding them: Ninjutsu. Living as a Ninja is certainly no easy life: Your employer - heck, your entire clan - sees you as a mere tool that better not ask any questions or develop something like morals. You can also forget any sort of recognition because success was expected. You do what you're told to, and nobody will ever find out what you did or if you ever existed. And of course, failure equals death. Don't even get me started on treason. In other words: Play a Ninja if you want a more serious version of Paranoia. Having doubts over once life as a ninja and trying to flee is a good way of getting killed by your former comrades. This also means that rogue Ninja are also the most dangerous, as only they were bad enough dudes to survive the hunt. The Dark Arts The only real kind of promotion in the world of the Ninja invovles becoming a Shinobi. This word has no special meaning outside of the clans and is used interchangeably with "ninja", but the clans use it to describe a Ninja that makes use of the Dark Arts: By having soulgem fibers implanted into their bodies, they can channel Sha energy much more efficiently, allowing them to spam NInjutsu techniques much faster than ordinary Ninja. This whole operation is a bit like the samuraiification process (both of which are incompatible with each other) , except without the Shikigami part. Unfortunately for the Ninja, their operation goes a lot deeper and requires their entire body to be cut open. Think Wolverine's adamantium treatment without the healing factor. Yikes. If the new Shinobi survives the procedure (which the Northern Court's newly-published medical know-how only managed to marginally improve), there is a very good change he'll suffer from necrosis as is body tries to reject the soulgems. Like a Samurai, the Shinobi are sterile, and their clan will insist on them producing an offspring before the operation to pass on his genes to a new generation, which is at least something. A special sub-category of the female Shinobi are the Kunoichi, who specialize in disguising themselves as concubines, or other professions where being steriles comes in handy. Thankfully TBZ doesn't get into too much detail here. Ninjutsu schools Each clan teaches one or more schools of Ninjutsu, which decide what kind of techniques a NInja can use. The book presents seven schools, but more can be created rather easily.
Ninjutsu  They really get their mileage out of their fancy wings Ninjutsu is bought as a skill (with each school being treated as a separate skill) that grants the character Ninjutsu techniques as he goes up in rank. The first rank of every school also comes with two Ninja Paths that allow you to use the Ninjutsu skill rank in place of another skill. The "Path of the Cunning Sparrow" for example lets you roll Ninjutsu instead of Stealth, while the "Path of Denial" does the same for Evasion. Two Paths are the odd man out in that they instead grant a special ability: The "Path of Broken Earth" boosts your movement speed and gives you bonus dice for every first attack in a combat against any enemy (because your speed catches them off guard I assume), while the "Path of the Smoke Bomb" lets you escape from a scene by using a smoke bomb. Each technique requires what are essentially material components (like medicine, or a cloak; some techniques just require gestures) that you generally don't have to worry about unless you are captured or toss it away purposefully, a Soul Cost (which Shinobi get to reduce) and the Difficulty you have to beat with your Ninjutsu check. A neat mechanic I like is that your margin of success for the check is turned into a pool of bonus dice you can apply to checks related to the technique, as long as it makes sense. You can even give these bonus dice to other PCs (if say your technique causes a distraction your fellow comrades could exploit). Some techniques also allow you to spend those dice to make whatever effect you've caused harder to resist or get rid off. In an odd similarity to D&D, there are a quite a few techniques that come in pairs, with one being the "lesser" and the other being the "greater" version, with the greater version naturally being more expensive and (usually) harder to perform, but offering greater and/or longer effects. I'll list them as one entry to safe space. This system also helps showing off how the various schools specialize in different techniques, as some only gain the lesser version of a technique pair.
Ninpou Techniques The ultimate ninja arts you learn from mastering a school of Ninjutsu. Each school only has one of these, and there are more Ninpou Techniques than there are schools, encouraging the GM (or the players) to come up with new schools. A lot of these can only be used once per session due to the amount of materials and preparation required.
Next Time: Kugutsu - I wanna be a real girl. Doresh fucked around with this message at 23:46 on Nov 24, 2015 |
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Nov 24, 2015 23:32
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 Part 14: "Even so, a number of 'normal' humans are resentful towards the 'super jarheads'." Nemo-2 & The New Navy: Defenders of Humankind By C.J. Carella and Kevin Siembieda So, we get a fiction chunk where a Coalition crew "in patrol in the North Atlantic"... wait, the Coalition patrols out thousands of miles from its actual territory? Maybe New Quebec, but that'd be weird considering what follows, given they're the most practical of the Coalition States. In any case, it turns out to be a bad move, because they get attacked by a monster, but a giant submarine shows up and blows the hell out of it. The Coalition guys are shocked and nearly get court-martialed when they get home. Why? Well, apparently their higher-ups are angry that they didn't try and catch a submersible vessel fifteen times their size, because the Coalition apparently has grade-A dunces in charge. What were they going to capture it with- a net? Origins The New Navy is centered around the USS Ticonderoga, a pre-rifts stealth submersible carrier (slightly more conceivable than a stealth helicarrier, I guess), complete with landing forces and sub-submarines attached to it. It was built during the vaguely titled "New Cold War", and had a number of automated island factories in the Pacific that could be used for repairs. When the rifts happpened, first though thought it was a nuclear war, but then they were attacked by hordes of monsters, but they were able to fight them off and survive with minor casualties. Though morale was hit hard, a Captain Karl Dobson gave a totally rad speech, or so we're told, that held most of the crews and survivors at various bases together. Though they sailed around, they could only find barbarism, disaster, and... Lemuria. (To be detailed in a future book. A far future book.) Captain Karl Dobson's son, Nemo Dobson, was scavenging a wreck when suddenly, a magic rift opened up and bathed him in  "You know I'm not even aquatic, right?" Life in the New Navy So, the majority of the New Navy is, unshockingly, in the Navy. Most children join the Junior Navy at age 5; no idea if they retire into the Senior Navy at 65. Most civilians work in things like agriculture or trade, but are effectively in service to the military if not literally, and we're reminded most Navy members perform noncombatant functions. Communities are treated as if under indefinite martial law and that goes triple for actual Naval vessels. Life aboard actual ships is dangerous, to say the least, though those who serve aboard are given a great degree of respect regardless of their rank or position. There are also two bases called Refuge and Salvation, as a demonstration in the height of subtlety. Technology The New Navy is "roughly as advanced as the Coalition States", which seems surprising that the Coalition could really compete, given that the New Navy never lost any of the old technology and actually - shock of shocks - has a literate and well-educated populace. I bet it's Private Snafu's fault, always goofing off on deck when he could be inventing the blue-green turbolaser that will win the New Navy the war! However, they're bad at bionics, magic, and don't even have access to crazy or juicer technology. I know, you're thinking, "how can they make it in Rifts without boats full of roided-out mental cases with nothing to lose?" I have no idea, friends. I have no idea. Bionics They suck at it and get actual cyborg technology from Tritonia when necessary. They don't like it! Why?  Foreign Relations Generally due to bad experiences with scummy humans, the New Navy don't trust much of anybody. They fight the Splugorth a little and the Lord of the Deep a lot, due to obvious evil, and have an ongoing war with the naut'yll as they try and push that empire out of Earth's oceans. They don't particularly hate the Coalition, but they don't trust the Coalition due to their ambition and aggressiveness. Still, they've come to the aid of seaborne Coalition forces against monsters, as well as aiding the New German Republic once. Lemuria and the New Navy are too distrustful to ally. It notes a Lemuria / Navy alliance could seize the Pacific if only they trusted each other!... and Lemuria was detailed even slightly in this book. Also Japan is a thing, I guess? Not that either really know each other exists, but maybe someday they will! Now that we're done covering crap that doesn't appear in the game line yet, let's see... Captain Nemo-2  As played by David Hasselhoff. So Nemo-2 is three centuries old, which may explain why he thinks mullets are still cool and wears an "N" on his belt. Because of the terrible responsibility he holds, he has no personal life to speak of, but is a great tactician who can no doubt solve any problems in under an hour, including commercial breaks. Though he's a serious dude, he does have a sense of humor, though he holds his men to a very high standard. Also he's a little racist against D-bees due to fighting aliens a lot. Even for a Sea Titan, his stats are ridiculous NPC fappery, and he's 14th level. He knows "several magic countermeasures" which are mysterious and undetailed, and mostly just has a ton of very high skills and high combat bonuses. Also, he's literate! Amazing! It notes, out of nowhere, that he considers himself an American along with the rest of New Navy, and that they still wave that flag. Which is fair enough, but it's a strange thing to only note at the end of a statblock. And without any transition, it's time for some new classes! Navy Seaman O.C.C.  "So, I get badass M.D.C. armor, right?" "No, you get a cap." Seaman.  So it's noted that these are highly trained professionals who are amongst the best educated humans on Earth (tough luck, New German Republic), and that there is no gender bias; women are allowed to serve in the same positions men can. It notes that all Naval crew are trained in combat, since they know well that monsters can teleport or sneak on board. Bizarrely forward thinking, but most of these guys would still serve as extras in Bloodsea IV: Crab Battle. Oddly for an O.C.C., this is less of a occupational character class and almost more of an organizational character class. When you take it, you choose a specialty that gives you a choice from a selection of skills - for example, the artilleryman gets a choice of weapons or demolitions skill, while SEAL gets a variety of intelligence or wilderness skills. Did you know SEAL team members are often expert forgers or disguise experts? Well, I learned it here. Otherwise, they get a basic spread of technical and weapon skills, and get a solid selection of other skills. Not sure they're that well educated given that two out of three Coalition classes get more skills than they do, and thanks to attribute requirement, only 54% of Rifts humans can qualify for it, despite the book claiming 65% of the New Navy is in the, well, Navy. But this is Rifts and math is hard. Of course, if that isn't enough, there's an issue with this class. See, this book later introduces an "underwater" version of different skills you have to buy to do poo poo underwater. And the navy class... doesn't fully incorporate them. So a Navy SEAL Underwater Specialist can get demolitions skills, but since they don't have underwater demolition, they actually get a penalty when using it underwater! Similarly, some of them get land navigation (seems like an obvious gaffe) or tracking (see those tracks on the surface of the water?!), etc. Marine O.C.C.  Wait, I thought the only marines in RPGs were in space? These are the US Marines of the Rifts era, and are ubiquitous in the New Navy. Yes, though the Navy may be new, the Marines are still old. It notes that their training includes monster identification (true) and resistance to mind control (false; they get no such bonus) in addition to combat and technical skills. They get a measly +1 on initiative, and rolling with impact or pulling their punch, and are generally trained as seaborne power armor pilots, not that they get to start with power armor. Their skill selection is only average, but thanks to attribute requirements, you only have a 24% chance to play one. But since they don't have the I.Q. requirement the Navy has, maybe this is the other 10% of the military population. Oh, and you only get 1 in 10 chance of getting a rocket launcher, try not to get too excited, marine! Sea Titan R.C.C.  Is that a regulation speedo? "Hey," you may say "Why would I want to play a super-strong, bulletproof Namor expy when the book already lets me play exciting classes like a Navy MP or a Sensors Specialist?" Well, in addition to being a super-strong, bulletproof Namor expy, you get to be immortal, survive the ocean depths, never have to stuff your face with hideous food or drink, and all of your babies will be immortal water babies. Sadly, unlike an Amphib, you can't end up with a giant fish head, but nobody's perfect. Not be confused with the Titans from either Conversion Book, the Sea Titans are mostly members of the New Navy, but some have left to Numbers-wise, they are a good deal stronger, more agile, fast, and healthy than normal humans. Their M.D.C. is pretty light, and they shouldn't pass on a suit of armor, are immune to mundane poisons, can regenerate their limbs in a day, and have a boosted chance of getting psychic powers. They get a variety of Naval technical skills, and a light smattering of others skills. Because they're immortal, it details the rules for them going up to level 24, but given the oldest Sea Titans in existence don't seem to have gotten beyond level 15, it seems like an academic distinction. Oh, and they can't get cybernetics, their bodies just spit the metal out. Oddly, they're one of the few classes to have "dual-classing" rules, where if you get to 250 years of age, you can pick a different class and start leveling up. Though you don't get secondary skills for that class and it takes double the XP, bear in mind since you're starting over with 1st level, it's actually going to level you far faster than whatever class you were in previously. Of course, given any conventional PCs aren't going to get anywhere near that, it's a weird mechanic to throw in. Lastly there's a footnote that the Sea Titans origin was due to a Lemurian ley line experiment that went wrong!... that would have been better to have that in the history than in the class notes, but feh, organization is hard! It, of course, notes that it was a fluke and that it can't be recreated, this means you, clever PCs. Next: Hovercrafts and helicopters: the weapons of the future? Alien Rope Burn fucked around with this message at 00:30 on Dec 21, 2015 |
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Nov 25, 2015 02:07
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Halloween Jack posted:The best name in LSH was Nemesis Kid, who had the power to assume whatever superpower he needed to counter the powers of whoever he was fighting. He was also responsible for the most metal moment in LSH, when Projectra, instead of using her illusion powers, just strangled him to death. What's weird is that it didn't strike me all that much as a White Wolf ripoff. I'm so used to the formula now. Divide thing into five things, generate 25 abilities or so, introduce a curse. This was much simpler, which would make sense for the first big attempt to copy the genre.
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Nov 25, 2015 02:30
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The Techno-Gothic Universe sounds like a setting that would be designed by the villain from "Grandma's Boy."
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Nov 25, 2015 04:38
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theironjef posted:
Okay, shame on these guys for ripping off Neuromancer. At least they didn't abuse Red Star, Winter Orbit or Hinterlands, because those are my very favorite Gibson pieces (and I'm a huge Gibson fanboy.) But... did they actually LIKE Highland 2?! Because this is Highlander 2. It's just missing General Katana and the planet Zeist.
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Nov 25, 2015 16:22
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My only criticism of your podcast is that you make the game sound like there's more to it than there is. Even games that just blatantly steal from all over the place manage to achieve uniqueness by accident, if nothing else. Legacy is seriously just Highlander with two dashes of Cyberpunk 2020 and a dash of World of Darkness, and that's it. Legacy and Mage came out the same year. I can't narrow it down to the exact date, but an ad in the back of Legacy for their upcoming game, a ripoff of Mage! is no surprise. By the by, Jonathan Taylor Thomas hair is called the Butt Cut. This is important to our history, because setting aside JTT and Jonathan Brandis (RIP), pretty much every man who's a huge star today got their start in the 90s wearing a horrible butt cut. The tragedy of Legacy's art is that there really should be one picture (they could have made it the cover) that sums up everything about the game in one image. A guy in a trenchcoat, over a leather jacket, over a band t-shirt, with a fedora atop his butt-cut, masked by sunglasses, wielding a katana. Sadly, no one picture contains all of these things.
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Nov 25, 2015 17:54
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Doresh posted:You could also pull off an OGL product for the D&D player who already has everything: Onion-related feats. The Onion Master prestige class. The Onion domain. Onion familiars. The onion monster template. Half-Onions as a playable race. I'm pretty sure there was a book that did exactly this, except for rats.
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Nov 25, 2015 18:01
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Halloween Jack posted:The tragedy of Legacy's art is that there really should be one picture (they could have made it the cover) that sums up everything about the game in one image. A guy in a trenchcoat, over a leather jacket, over a band t-shirt, with a fedora atop his butt-cut, masked by sunglasses, wielding a katana. Sadly, no one picture contains all of these things. One of them does have Rich from Red Letter Media with a fake mustache, duster jacket, and giant gun though. That's pretty great.
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Nov 25, 2015 18:51
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Technology Real military power is measured in both technology and skulls. Or it's another of those cases where Rifts isn't particularly consistent. gradenko_2000 posted:I'm pretty sure there was a book that did exactly this, except for rats. Not surprising. This is the OGL we're talking about. Anything you can imagine probably has a book or two dedicated to it.
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Nov 25, 2015 20:00
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theironjef posted:One of them does have Rich from Red Letter Media with a fake mustache, duster jacket, and giant gun though. That's pretty great.
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Nov 25, 2015 20:41
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Tenra Bansho Zero What happens if you combine Pinnochio with Metropolis? Maybe something like this: Kugutsu  I think you can make a pretty big tent out of that fabric. Kugutsu (aka "puppets" or "marionettes") are artifical women. Mannequins carved from sacred trees and given life by onmyojutsu and tree spirits, they are perfection in body, mind and soul. They are both art and human, and the ultimate status symbol for lords and regents. Owning a Kugutsu is like owning the Mona Lisa - if the Mona Lisa could also dance, recite poetry and make some drat fine tea.  Before... While initially only wooden dolls, a magic spell known as the Illusion gives them a soul and an appearance that is indistinguishable from humans. They can even bleed, and the only think that can tip people off is that they turn back into dolls upon death and don't age, as to not tarnish their beauty. As they can think and feel just like a human, quite a few Kugutsu can't stand living in a golden cage and flee from their owner, forcing them to hide their true identity. Some Kugutsu may not even be aware that they aren't human. Either of these two is the typical background for a player Kugutsu.  ... and after. Kugutsu-Makers are the rare breed of onmyojutsu sorcerers who dedicate their life to creating Kugutsu. As it can take up to a decade to create and train a Kugutsu, this profession only attracts pure artists, not people who are out for money - though they can surely make quite a lot of money. Because of their high demand and low supply, Kugutsu can be safely assumed to be the single most expensive "items" on Tenra money can buy, especially those of famous Kugutsu-Makers. The most legendary of all Kugutsu-Makers is Shou-un, who is known for three things: Nobody knows his identity or even gender, he has apparently been making Kugutsu for 200 years, and his creations are known as the War Brides because lords will do anything to get one, including starting a war. As it is typical for artists, Kugutsu-Makers tend to have their own little quirks: Some train their Kugutsu in a martial art or sorcery to become Blade Princesses that can also double as a bodyguard, others might add deliberate imperfections like blindness to their creations, and some even create male or androgynous Kugutsu. They can even allow the Kugutsu to age naturally, which comes in handy for Kugutsu mean as body doubles, or Kugutsu that the maker purposely sets free in the world to live as a real human being. The Butterfly Dream Their origin as sacred tree mannequins still infused with tree spirits allows them to see and control dreams. This ability is known as the Butterfly Dream. They can make people fall asleep and enter their dreams, which makes them very useful for lords suffering from nightmares. In terms of game mechanics, a Kugutsu can force a target into the Butterfly Dream with a contested roll (the Kugutsu's skill depending on whether she uses performance or seduction). This creates a new Scene with only the Kugutsu and its target. No one else can enter, but other players and NPCs might act as dream figments. Aside from only being usable once per combat, the Butterfly Dream is very vaguely-defined and open to roleplaying. And it's a got excuse to borrow from Satoshi Kon movies. Next Time: Annelids - Crawling in my skin; These wounds, they will actually heal. Doresh fucked around with this message at 20:45 on Nov 26, 2015 |
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Nov 26, 2015 19:02
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ZorajitZorajit posted:Okay, shame on these guys for ripping off Neuromancer. At least they didn't abuse Red Star, Winter Orbit or Hinterlands, because those are my very favorite Gibson pieces (and I'm a huge Gibson fanboy.)
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Nov 27, 2015 05:00
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Hostile V posted:Not quite. Normality is the same breed of RPG as Power Kill, just executed differently. It's presented as a document from the game world with absolutely no voice stepping out to explain the rules in italicized font or differentiating itself from the rest of the incomprehensible babble. It's like if your GM said "hey, we're running a House of Leaves RPG" and gave you the book House of Leaves and told you to pick a passage or scene or bit that best represented how you think your character would act in House of Leaves. The idea the developers have is an immersive mindfuck where you put yourself in an irrational mindset and just do whatever your id demands. The game has no resolution mechanics, it's just the GM expanding on whatever it is your characters decide to do and balancing whether or not it's actually happening or if your characters are just insane. There's no metagame because the whole game is meta. You're controlling a character in a broken world and you're just letting yourself careen towards disaster The bolded bit is how I tend to play every RPG. I wish this one was written in a more legible font, 'cause as a lit major it seems right up my ally.
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Nov 27, 2015 07:57
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Alien Rope Burn posted:
This kind of crap just never ceases to annoy me. The Forces of Good (to use Siembieda capitalization) are incapable of cooperation and always weaker than their enemies. Then beings listed as mistrustful, arrogant, deceitful, and obsessed with torture and death have no problem striking up accords to wipe out everyone else. Like it was actively impressive that the Empire in Phase World opposed the Splugorth. The Ticonderoga being kind of lovely compared to its enemies' multiple capital ships is just icing on the cake really. I think the idea of a sea-faring techno-nation is neat but as usual they couldn't stick the landing.
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Nov 27, 2015 12:33
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Was 'New Navy' an 80s New Wave band or does it just sound like one?
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Nov 27, 2015 14:08
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Count Chocula posted:Was 'New Navy' an 80s New Wave band or does it just sound like one?
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Nov 27, 2015 14:20
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occamsnailfile posted:This kind of crap just never ceases to annoy me. The Forces of Good (to use Siembieda capitalization) are incapable of cooperation and always weaker than their enemies. Then beings listed as mistrustful, arrogant, deceitful, and obsessed with torture and death have no problem striking up accords to wipe out everyone else. Like it was actively impressive that the Empire in Phase World opposed the Splugorth.
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Nov 28, 2015 05:49
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Count Chocula posted:Was 'New Navy' an 80s New Wave band or does it just sound like one? Not quite, but they are a '10s pop rock band. Or were, looks like they already broke up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UWK8v9ufG8 Nessus posted:Maybe in a half-assed way the idea was to present a scenario where the PCs unite the warring states? Rifts just seems pretty hostile to the idea of anybody who isn't a PC solving any problems, but yet it doesn't have any conception of a PC role beyond the wandering murderhero, and loves, loves, loves setting up villains to be repeat offenders. I'm not sure it really has a notion of a campaign with a larger scope than... well, the PCs' targeting scopes.
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Nov 28, 2015 06:14
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Nessus posted:Maybe in a half-assed way the idea was to present a scenario where the PCs unite the warring states? I'm sure that is the half-assed intention, but it comes up repeatedly throughout the Rifts line and basically perpetually makes it look like the good guys just sit with their thumbs up their asses waiting to be overwhelmed or unified by protagonist narrative agency. It stood out to me in particular with Underseas, I think because it was a rare occasion when several of the competing powers were described as more or less 'good' but were completely unwilling to talk, while the shifty devils apparently had weekly coffee klatches and bake sales to support their evil enterprises. Also the New Navy hating and being bad at cybernetics is dumb, but then, a lot of the declarations against cybernetics are dumb and seem to serve no purpose other than trying to ward PCs away from power-ups.
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Nov 28, 2015 13:58
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occamsnailfile posted:This kind of crap just never ceases to annoy me. The Forces of Good (to use Siembieda capitalization) are incapable of cooperation and always weaker than their enemies. Then beings listed as mistrustful, arrogant, deceitful, and obsessed with torture and death have no problem striking up accords to wipe out everyone else. Like it was actively impressive that the Empire in Phase World opposed the Splugorth. More importantly: Is this behavior in line with Rifts' alignment system? Can evil guys even cooperate without ceasing to be evil? Tenra Bansho Zero So apparently these guys are based on a more obscure ninja archetype I haven't come across before this book because I'm a weird kid who has yet to watch Ninja Scroll. Though I presume Blade of the Immortal goes a bit in this direction. Annelidists  Kamen Rider Double Cross Annelidists (aka "Annelid-users" aka "worm-users" aka "mushi-tuskai") are the witches of Tenra: Their medical knowledge and healing abilities are a boon to any villagers who doesn't want to die of infection or disease, but superstition and fear typically makes them outcasts living at the edge of town (or probably outside the town). In the villagers' defense, this is a bit more justified because Annelidists are incredibly gross and creepy to an outsider. What makes them creepy and cross? Well, they live in a symbiotic relationship with Annelids, members of a very big and diverse family of parasitic worms and bugs. In exchange for being well-fed, they hang out under the host's skin or deep inside his body and defend him if need be. As if having worms visibly move around under your skin doesn't make you enough of a freak, the different types of Annelids each require a specific diet. This can be simple stuff like "lots of fruit" or "just eat more than normally", but some Annelids require the host to eat earthworms, blood or rotten meat. This leads ot obvious slurs like "corpse eater". Not caring enough about your Annelids will have them leave your body, but going to far and having more Annelids than you can handle can easily turn you into a mindless, walking bug colony.  This date is turning out weird... As they have a hard time fitting into normal society, many Annelids live in secluded communities known as Nests where they can breed and research Annelids to their hearts' content. Mad-scientist-types are harshly punished, as no Nest wants a repeat of a certain event were one Annelidist essentially turned himself into John Carpenter's The Thing aand nearly wrecked a whole kingdom, leading to a dark age of Annelidists getting massacred out of fear. Annelidists in urban areas generally have it better than their villager comrades because of the greater anonymity. They make a living by selling basic Annelid knowledge to martial artists and other warriors. A typical background for a PC Annelidist is that of the Peddler, a wandering Annelidist pharmacist who doesn't get into troubles with the Nests he comes across as long as he pays them some money. Annelids  Your new BFFs Having parasite BFFs requires having the Wormcharm skill (which also have to be rolled for a lot of Annelid abilities, like any attack they grant you) and paying for the Annelid(s) with Kiai or Karma.
Next Time: Oni - Dances with Ayakashi.
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Nov 28, 2015 14:56
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Part 15: "Don't forget that the USS Ticonderoga carries a complement of Manta Ray attack ships, tanks, troop transports, jet fighters, helicopters, power armor (see troop capacity listing described earlier in the stat block), 50 small boats, and the two detachable submarines (and their 100 man crews)." Weapons & Equipment of the New Navy Well, there's affordable and stylish jeans - wait, poo poo, that's the Old Navy. This is the New Navy, not the best place to shop for this season's delightful fleece jackets! Ahem.   Why does a pistol have a foregrip? So, yeah. Armor and guns. It notes that other groups have stolen or copied the New Navy's designs, but that most of these weapons are only found in the New Navy. The Navy also might use weapons from the corebook, Rifts Mercenaries, Rifts World Book Six: South America, Rifts World Book Nine: South America 2, or Rifts Shill Book Ten: Buy This For Four More Guns, Obviously We Have Not Published Enough Of Them.
 M-16 x 10 = M-160 We also get stats for depth charges and torpedoes, which are roughly on the same level as missiles, only without the intercontinental range. Then we get into armor. There's the normal navy body armor, which is a bit crap and low M.D.C., buat least gives you floaters that give you a whopping 5% bonus to swimming. The marine stuit is pretty buff, it's not as good as the Triax suits, but it's better than anything in the corebook.  How to make armor badass: fake pecs. "Semper Fi" APA-15 Amphibious Assault Power Armor  Cannot unsee monkey face. So this a power armor designed for water and oh my gently caress I am so bored with these. It has average power armor toughness, a crappy ion gun, mini-missiles, and the "M-90 Multi-Weapon Assault System" which is just a buffer version of the M-160, and it can rocket around in water at 40 MPH. Merovingian Amphibious Tank This is a French tank which for some reason the US adopted, like a lost, ugly puppy. Look, this is a tank with no art, I can't do too much to yuck it up. Blah blah make fun of the French, something about frogs and amphibious tanks do you get it? Balloon tires with rubber tougher than an armored trooper, drives at 70 MPH, floats at 50 MPH, has a special combo laser / cannon that can compete with glitter boys, their armor is solid but not impressive, long-range missiles in case you need to shoot baddies in India, mini-missiles, a "laser machinegun" which is trash, and a "bow-mounted laser gun" which does low damage for a tank. Iwo-Jima Class MIFV Combat Troop Transport  I think G.I. Joe called it the "Whale". Actually, it's a hovercraft. In a setting where people have flying hover troop carriers and hover bikes, apparently cutting-edge military technology circa 1960 is still in vogue. So, this a fuckin' death trap, at 225 M.D.C., carrying ten marines to their doom at about 100 MPH. This can carry power armor troops with individually more M.D.C. than it has. What was this, made by IKEA? Well, its guns are decent, with a powerful ion cannon, the traditional intercontinental ballistic missiles, light missiles, and a pulse gun which you only fire if it's your last thing to fire. But holy poo poo, this can't take more than ten hits from the small arms it'll be facing. You're better off swimming to wherever you're going, at least you'll be a smaller target. S-14 Sea Hawk VTOL Jet Fighter  "We actually fly it sideways, it makes as much sense as most of this section." So, this is a VTOL... somehow... that is the main air power of the New Navy. Why do they need a big aircraft carrier with a huge deck, then? None of their vehicles require a runaway! In any case, it really just looks like a variation of the real-life F/A-18 Hornet. It also has a fancy ejection system that ejects the whole pilot compartment as a floating lifeboat. It doesn't have much the way of M.D.C., which fits a jet fighter to some extent, but it still has less M.D.C. than the "Semper Fi", somehow. It jets around at Mach 3.2, has long-range missiles, mini-missiles, bombs which are like missiles you drop, lasers which are good for letting foes know they're being fired at without significantly hurting them, and a "belly gun" which is even worse. There's a stealth variant that replaces the belly gun with an advanced sensor system, and reduces the top speed to Mach 2.2, which still outspeeds most drat things in the setting. Striker Attack Helicopter  "A Hind D? Colonel, what's a Russian gunship doing here?" If you can hit the rotor, the blades only have 23 M.D.C. each, so this thing can be taken down by a mega-damage slingshot with good enough aim. It's supposed to be a good all-rounder, but rotorcraft are just the worst idea in this setting, since any modestly intelligent creature will take a potshot at either rotor and send this thing spiraling to its doom. Well: 300 MPH, medium missiles, mini-missiles, meh lasers, junk belly gun, but it can carry troops or depth charges or sky hooks or whatever. And once again, in a setting where VTOLs and airborne hover vehicles are commonplace, rotorcraft are still a thing. The thing is, the Navy is supposed to be really advanced since they never "lost" technology. And it's been two hundred years for them to continue advancing tech after the apocalypse! But nope. Helicopters. Manta Ray Multi-Environment Attack Ship  You're sure this isn't a Triax design? They're the ones that love triangles. It's a "air sub" that is part jet, part sub, all rejected '80s toy. Also it's a VTOL because gently caress it, why not throw that in. It can go Mach 1.5 out of water, 58 MPH in water, has decent ion pulse guns, missile pods that let it carry a variety of missiles, a stealth system that gives penalities to sense it with sensor rolls, and a fancy laser communication system that also doubles as a targeting system and triples as a lovely weapon! Trident Submersible Carrier  Is that a propeller? Well, it doesn't have an M.D.C. value, so you can't shoot it. 1,500 M.D.C., weapons 'n poo poo, a great vehicle to base a campaign out of, can carry Manta Rays in launch tubes, special long-range sensors, and anal sex! Well, the latter is inevitable. This isn't SeaQuest or some poo poo. This is real. Oh, and "If the vessel sinks below two and a half miles (4 km), the pressure will crush it, killing everyone inside - no survivors!" Not even in a world of mega-damage, folks. The Ticonderoga Submersible Carrier  Cool but not practical: it's the Rifts way. This is SeaQuest or some poo poo. Well, it was on the air when this book was published. Hopefully the acting is at least better around your gaming table... I'm sorry. Of course your acting is better than SeaQuest. Now that I'm done making fun of mid-1990s sci-fi, the lowest-hanging fruit, this was a big ol' ship made before the rifts before big ol' wars, but it was made late enough that only one was built before the world semi-ended. It's about half-mile long and is a floating city with all sorts of amenities. But mostly, it's about war. It also has sub-submarines that can detach from it. And it's always having cool adventures that don't involve the PCs, who are stuck on a lousy Trident. 20,000 M.D.C., 7,320 troops, 200,000 tons, 2,000 feet long, 200,000 tons, 2 ion pulse cannons, 6 laser CIWS turrets, 6 torpedo tubes, 8 cruise missile turrets, 8 cruise missile batteries, 4 depth charge launchers, 480 Merovingian amphibious tanks, 1120 "Semper Fi" suits, 120 Manta Ray subs, 400 Iwo-Jima transports, 40 Glitter Boys, 40 unspecified "transport vehicles", 50 unspecified "small patrol / transport boats", 60 Sea Hawk jets, 10 Sea Hawk stealth jets, 30 Striker helicopters, 10 undetailed "large transport helicopters", 80 doctors, 50 knots per hour surface, 30 knots per hour underwater, 18,000 tons of cargo, 25 year fusion power plant (refueled 10 times), 1200 sea sleds-  ALSO GOING TO REEMPHASIZE THEY HAVE NO AIRCRAFT THAT REQUIRE A RUNWAY, INCLUDING THOSE AIRCRAFT DEPICTED AS SITTING ON RUNWAYS IN THE PICTURE, OR DISCUSSED BEING LAUNCHED FROM RUNWAYS. USS Stingray & Seadragon Attack Submarines These are the sub-submarines that attach to the Ticonderoga. Why do they do this? Because it's cool, I guess? One is shown in the pic above. Useless numbers!: 100 sailors, 3,200 M.D.C., 52 MPH, "Cargo: Minimal; can carry up to 150 tons of additional cargo.", 360 feet, 4,500 tons, 1 ion pulse cannon, 2 torpedo tubes, 6 mini-torp tubes, 1 surface to air missile launcher, 6 blue-green lasers, 1 deck laser, and 40 "Semper Fi" power armor. After awhile this just blurs into numerically divided stacks of weapons with an M.D.C. value and gently caress it all. Next: More stuff that keeps the water out. Alien Rope Burn fucked around with this message at 00:32 on Dec 21, 2015 |
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Nov 29, 2015 01:16
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Alien Rope Burn - Wow. All that seems so.....so pointless. I mean, what kind of information does this even give the GM? If my players are currently on a Navy Carrier, of course that stuff is all on there, but it would have been on there without the need to count and categorize  Itīs just so....90s.
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Nov 29, 2015 01:21
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Mr.Misfit posted:Alien Rope Burn - Wow. All that seems so.....so pointless. I mean, what kind of information does this even give the GM? If my players are currently on a Navy Carrier, of course that stuff is all on there, but it would have been on there without the need to count and categorize I think a lot of it is inspired by the sort of obsessive numerical "technical manual" material they put together for Robotech that the Robotech fandom loved the poo poo out of... and once Palladium does something once, that's how they do it forever.
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Nov 29, 2015 01:36
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More like Semper Fish, right?
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Nov 29, 2015 02:06
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occamsnailfile posted:Also the New Navy hating and being bad at cybernetics is dumb, but then, a lot of the declarations against cybernetics are dumb and seem to serve no purpose other than trying to ward PCs away from power-ups. Are there any cyberpunk games where there isn't some bullshit arbitrary "you can't aug up or you lose your soul/humanity/whatever" that don't go full Eclipse Phase? (Mental stress or complications are fine, I mean the Shadowrun/CP2020 "you literally go bonko like that dude in AD Police Files" kind of stuff.)
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Nov 29, 2015 11:28
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I guess you could do that in GURPS or any other generic system. 
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Nov 29, 2015 11:32
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Mr.Misfit posted:Alien Rope Burn - Wow. All that seems so.....so pointless. I mean, what kind of information does this even give the GM? If my players are currently on a Navy Carrier, of course that stuff is all on there, but it would have been on there without the need to count and categorize I dunno, a campaign set in and around a high-tech Naval ship sounds awesome. Make it like Star Trek and have the PC be the crew. Maybe toss in a bit of Snowpiercer, old world tech in the post-apocalypse.
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Nov 29, 2015 11:52
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Count Chocula posted:I dunno, a campaign set in and around a high-tech Naval ship sounds awesome. Make it like Star Trek and have the PC be the crew. Maybe toss in a bit of Snowpiercer, old world tech in the post-apocalypse. That does sound like a fun campaign, and is part of the concept of the New Navy that I like. It's the masturbatory tech specs that are less interesting than say, difficulties of constant life on the open seas, psychological issues from being under constant martial law and dealing with scarcity and hierarchy.
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Nov 29, 2015 13:02
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Alien Rope Burn posted:I think a lot of it is inspired by the sort of obsessive numerical "technical manual" material they put together for Robotech that the Robotech fandom loved the poo poo out of... and once Palladium does something once, that's how they do it forever.
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Nov 29, 2015 14:14
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