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It's time for a final jaunt into the  As a recap, the party are now down to three members - Mags the conjurer, Brian the thief, Janie the druid. Also, 5 dogs. They have just braved the Pratfall stairs, watched Bhed the Paladin's brains leak out after trying to read, and are now staring at a Dead guy with a necklace of giant rubies as described by the mimic in the Throne Room Brian reaches for the necklace, at which point the bandage wrapped corpse starts to sit up. Yes, it's a Mummy, which means our hapless party immediately has to save vs. spell or be rooted in fear for 1-4 rounds each. Fortunately being human they get a +4 bonus to their saves. Janie and Brian make their saves, whilst Mags stands there gibbering in terror for the maximum length of 4 rounds. All but one of the hounds flees in terror. Janie and Brian decide to stand their ground rather than flee whilst the mummy slays Mags. Party and Dogs are going first. Their light was being provided by a lantern held by Mags, which she dropped. On the bright side there's a small pool of burning oil on the ground around her. On the downside, there's a small pool of burning oil on the ground around her. The Mummy's stats are AC 3, MV 6 - it's slower than the party, HP 39, 1 attk, dmg 1d12, THAC0 13. Being undead it's immune to most things, and you really don't want it to hurt you. Fortunately, it's very vulnerable to fire. Mags has one more flask of oil on her, Brian has four torches, Janie and Bhed (RIP) didn't have any light creating things with them. Unfortunately the vial of holy water broke when they were going down the stairs. (RIP) The party gather behind the thin line of fire (which will last for one more round), hoping it'll keep the Mummy away, which it does. Brian digs out Mag's spare flask of oil and sets it up with a burning wick to turn it into some sort of proto-flamethrower, whilst Janie casts Faerie fire on the Mummy making it easier to hit (+1 bonus to hit it given the low light level). The mummy lurches menacingly on the other side of the line of fire. In round 2, Janie goes first, casting Bless on herself and Brian, granting them another +1 to hit, and releases the dog to its certain doom. It snaps at the mummy, but doesn't hit it. The mummy steps across the line of oil, taking 3 damage, and lashes out at the dog, killing it in one blow. Brian squeezes the flask of oil at the mummy, and despite the various spells, misses - the stream of burning oil splashing harmlessly to the ground. In round three, Janie decides that she's going to try and get the necklace at the least, since that was the whole reason they came down here. Brian's going try and fend the mummy off with a burning torch. Janie misses her attempt to get the necklace, whilst Brian does actually manage to hit with the torch, doing an amazing 1 point of damage. Fortunately the mummy misses him (just - it only needs a 7 to hit him) Janie isn't so lucky in round four, taking 3 points of damage and contracting mummy rot. She manages to snag the necklace and manages to break it free. Brian flails with a torch, and the magically induced fear starts to release its hold on Mags; she'll be able to act next round. Round five. Mags takes one look at the situation and tells the others, "We need to get out of here!" she then proceeds to start following her own advice. The other two follow suit, and they dash up the Pratfall stairs. Fortunately, they all make the check to remember the trick step. What they don't do is pass the dexterity check to avoid slipping. Mags, slips, avoids damage from the fall, but slides all the way to the bottom and is impaled on the swords. Brian slips, takes 1 HP of damage and is down. Fortunately, he doesn't follow Mags to the bottom of the stairs. Janie is fine. Apart from her friends and brother being dead. She sees that the mummy is moving very slowing, and takes the time to bandage up Brian to stop him dying. Then dragging the unconscious Brian up the stairs she makes her escape. As she has no way to carry two bodies and doesn't want to spend time here until Brian wakes up, she makes the decision to leave Quota behind. Fortunately she avoids being electrocuted by the 'Welcome Trap'. Once they've made new characters (Lord Winter uses a magical item to cure Janie's mummy rot) the players tell the GM that they're not going back to the Halls. Janie's player tells the GM she's going to sell the rubies (worth 6k each, and there's 14 of them) and use some of the money to hire a bunch of higher level adventurers to raze the halls and recover all the treasure and the painting. The GM having realised that some of the other characters could have been saved (everyone except Bhed, Belle and Mags, really) offers a bit of retconning re: who's alive and who's not. It's this party of higher level adventurers who report back on the rest of the dungeon and discover the Wierd sex stuff:tm:  Rooms the characters didn't see The report from the high level adventurers reveals the following rooms. Some have good loot in, some are just loving weird. If they'd defeated the mummy and conducted a proper search of the Crypt, they'd discover a secret door leading to 15 - The Undercrypt Protected by a skull on a stick - non-magical, just a skull on a stick designed to look like its floating there, the party could have discovered an un-trapped chest containing two canvas sacks, one of which has 509gp and 312sp, the other 3 pink pearls and the remains of a fourth. I guess these are from giant oysters, or one of the canvas sacks was supposed to be made of finer material, or the authors have never actually seen a pearl. The pearls are worth 360 gp each. Leaning against the chest is a sword in an ornate scabbard. The gems on the scabbard are worth 800gp. The sword itself is a Luck Blade. It acts as a +1 weapon, gives a +1 bonus to all saves, and has 1d4+1 wishes. In this case, 1. There's also a Longbow +1 and a Potion of diminution. Even if it is hidden behind a mummy, this (combined with the mummy's necklace), seems like rather a lot of treasure. There's a secret door in room 13, leading into the corridor running north and south. Room 18 is labelled as an Armoury but is mostly empty apart from a heavily damaged wooden table, scarred in the manner of a chopping block, and radiatting faint magic. (the remains of preservative spells, apparently). In one of the room's corners is a pile of mouldy rags in which is a pouch containing one of this module's unique magic items - a magestar. The Magestar is a many-spined, silver-ish sphere. When touched by a creature cable of using spells it starts hovering around their heads like a cutprice ioun stone. Any spell cast at the owner of a magestar is absorbed, storing 1 hp per level in the magestar. If the owner drops to 0 hp, the magestar floats down to them and imbues them with the stored HP. If not charged, it only gives 1d4 hp. Magestars do have a limit to the amount of HP they can store, which if breached, cause the star to explode for 4d6 damage. What's the limit?  This is a fairly neat item, and would really help the survivability of a low level wizard. If it wasn't an invitation for the GM to randomly explode you when they feel like it. At the south end of the corridor are rooms 16 and 17 - Rivior's Study, and the Lord's Bedchamber. The latter of which has one of the more WTF things in it, especially when taking into account the contents of the study. The study contains an awful lot of mouldy books, a near mummified body, some less mouldy books (accounts, porn, and a Libram of Silver Magic - a level up book for Good aligned wizards, which will gently caress up any non-good wizard and anynon-wizards who try to read it), and finally some spell scrolls. Five of the spell scrolls are harmless and useful (flame arrow, gust of wind, locate object, massmorph, remove curse). The 6th explodes in Explosive Runes when read, doing 6d4+6 damage. Well, that's another way to gently caress up a low level party - we're looking at up to 30 points for the reader, 15 for everyone in 10' (no save) and item saving throws all around. The corpse has various thieves implements hidden about its person, and a sapphire worth 1000gp hidden in its boot. None of this is findable unless they start removing his boots and tearing them apart. There's a door leading south out of the study, which leads to the Lord's Bedchamber. A once fine bedroom given over to mold and decay, there's a +2 broadsword on the table. The sword glows with a lavender radiance when drawn. In the closet is a woman in a stasis spell. She's beautiful (of course) with long black hair, and large purple eyes, and an angry expression. She's wearing an open green silk robe, copper bracers, a gem studded brassier and girdle, and high, soft boots. She's also been chained to the closet rods with thin copper wires. WTF? Why is there a woman in stasis in the closet? Assuming the man in the study was Rivior, did he chain her up there, then go to read his medieval porn or something? Anyway, she's Miior, a W2 with the sort of ridiculous stats expected of a Forgotten Realms NPC (S14, D 17, C 16, I 17, W 10, Ch 16). She has boots of Elven Kind, Bracers of Defence AC2, and the gems on her clothes are worth 880gp in total. But I'm sure the characters aren't the sort to strip an ensorcelled woman in a closet, are they? If she's rescued by breaking the chains, we discover that she has no idea how long she's been in stasis for, as apparently, this Wizard doesn't know any dating systems. None at all. Was she kidnapped and gaslighted by Rivior? Is that why she's in a gemmed bikini in a closet? WTF, Haunted Halls. Starting from the entrance the following rooms were also missed out by the original party 9 - The Red Chamber Located behind a secret door in the north wall of the Welcoming Trap room, this room is decorated with moth-eaten and mold-stained wine-coloured silk draperies. Inside the room is a wooden couch - the way its described makes me think it's a divan - on which lies a beautiful (of course) human female, manacled with gold chains to the couch. There's a dagger protruding from her open mouth. She has apparently been killed recently for the purposes of Evil Sorcery. If raised, she's a level 4 wizard, and wants revenge on her slayer, a man who's probably a thief, but actually a Zhentarim agent, who is now somewhere in the stonelands. This is bullshit. What evil sorcery? How does this relate to anything else in the dungeon? (Answer, it doesn't) How did this setup even happen? Between this lady and Miior later on in the dungeon there's an awful lot of sorceresses in peril. This could have been made into a little subquest - the villagers could have mentioned an earlier pair of adventurers if she went to the halls willingly, or some travellers or something. As it is, "Surprise! Dead mage!". The followup only works if the party can get her raised, which is expensive - though affordable if they get all the loot out of the dungeon and don't have to use it raising and curing themselves. Just a pointless room. 19 - Feast Hall All the furniture has gone, but oddly, the +1 shield bearing the arms of a Comyrn rebel prince are still there. Also, a Stirge. Characters may also take 1d4+1 damage as the supporting wires for the weapons and armour on the walls fails and the items fall on them. 20 - Hall of Statues A double gently caress-you room. This room is overlooked by the kobolds in their watchpost, and one of the statues is a doppelganger, disguised as another statue. The obvious way into the room will have them encounter the doppleganger before the statue that it's copying. Sucks to be them. 25 - Chamber of the chain Empty except for a heavy bronze chain hanging from the ceiling. No clues as to what was on the other end, and it's not still in the dungeon. 26 - Plunge fall Floor is weak and collapses, dropping characters into a cave and a colony of green slime. Also the deposits end of a latrine from the upper level, 132' above. The kobolds don't know about this entrance into their stronghold. 27 - Bathing chamber Black, stagnant water which conceals some gold and a +1 horseman's mace. Which will be useful when the Juju zombies that are here wake up and try to murder you. 28 - Room of the fallen giant Room lit with glowing moss and things, containing the skeleton of a giant, still impaled by the spear used to kill it - Shimmering, a Spear +2, giantslayer. Also some boots of the north on a corpse buried under rocks. How did it even get here? 29 - Forgotten gear Some recently abandoned adventuring gear, rations still edible. Neither sign nor clues about the owner. Doesn't seem as if it could be any of the bodies in the place. 30 - Battle-chamber A scorched room with a dead orc that's still fresh enough to stink. Is wearing silk robes, some jewellery (a necklace with 6 softly glowing moonstones, worth 75gp each), a +2 axe of throwing embedded in his back, and an infestation of fake rotgrubs. The maggots leap onto anyone who disturbs the body, deliver a clammy kiss to any bare skin they find and then drop off. In the scorched area of the room is a human skeleton clutching a Rod of Flailing. The DM is encouraged to be an arse and play up people's paranoia about the grubs. My thoughts This dungeon is bad. Most of the rooms are empty, leaving the GM to fill the dungeon themselves or use the Dungeon Dressing table. The village is painfully twee and not actually under threat from anything due to the various high level priests, wizards, and Lord Winter herself, who live there. There's no compelling reason for the characters to visit the halls, and whilst there is loot to be found, there's a feeling of picking through the leftovers that another party missed, which isn't very satisfying. The dead and trapped sorceresses are just plain weird and more than a little creepy - especially Miior - WTF is going on there? Having done some reading, this was apparently supposed to be a Keep on the Borderlands for 2nd edition and the Forgotten realms, but was cut from 96 pages to the 36 or so that made it to print. The problem is that the content has been cut in a slapdash manner, leading to an incoherent dungeon that threatens nothing, and has no active story linked to it unless they manage to raise the stabbed wizard, or the GM decides that there's an interesting reason for the kobolds to have their drow crossbows and poison. Quite a lot of the dungeon is hidden behind secret doors, meaning a group with little care for pixel bitching their way around the dungeon isn't going to find them, and a group that does search everything will probably fall afoul of wandering monsters if the GM is using them - there's one mention in the module, but no custom table is provided, so guess either use the default ones, or make your own. In short, this dungeon is bad, and the writer should feel bad. Score RIP Aiden (lock lurker) RIP Belle (trap) RIP Quota (mimic) RIP Bhed (treasure) RIP Mags (Pratfall stairs/Mummy) RIP Quota's equipment (green slime) RIP Holy water (Pratfall stairs) Angrymog fucked around with this message at 17:49 on Oct 13, 2018 |
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Oct 13, 2018 08:30
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So wait, when it says the Magestar absorbs spells, does it also negate them, and thus offer an impervious defense against most magic? Or just suck up some of the spare wizardy aura and the spell proceeds as normal? Also, Jesus, this adventure was for what, levels 1 to 4? As far as I remember it, Juju Zombies are pretty nasty at times. And most of the slimes and molds in the game are basically "gently caress you if you haven't been reading the Monstrous Manual and use OOC knowledge to know that this particular colour of evil smoothie is capable of save-or-die checks and/or know the cure to their particular brand of bullshit."
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Oct 13, 2018 09:25
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This dungeon is terrible, holy poo poo. Those stair traps alone are bad enough, but putting a damned mummy in at the bottom? I'm not touching the sorceresses. That's just hosed up.
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Oct 13, 2018 13:29
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That was a great writeup of a terrible thing.
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Oct 13, 2018 14:43
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FFRPG 4E Part 7:Magic & The Black Mage Right so our first mage, i sort of covered this before. When you learn a spell group you learn the GROUP. For instance the Fire group has the following spells Lvl1 Fire, Lvl19 Fira, Lvl37 Firaga, Lvl55 Meltdown. The death group has lvl1 Sleep(well that's honest), Lvl19 Zombie, Lvl 37 Condemn(Inflicts death at end of next round, I accept round tracking here), and Lvl 55 Death. However you get later groups which have spells that only start at your new level, For instance the Drain group gets Drain at lvl30 and Syphon at lvl50. This fixes a lot of my problems with magic in 3e, you don't keep up with the joneses. If you know fire, you KNOW FIRE, and you'll get all the fire spells so the spells you learn at higher levels are legitimately more tricks generally. Though the black mage is still a pile of statuses and damage, no one ever thought it would be anything else It's just you actually unlock new abilities rather than "Now your fire does more". It's "Now you can use Water, Quake or Shadow to supplement your Fire magic." Also this game loves mage, I'm not going to call it supremacy because they don't seem "Better", but their core abilities really are their core, their specializations really are supporting that, and you get a goodly number of toys. So it definitely loves mages. Right Onto The Black Mage Level 1- Arcane power : It's equipment and hp/mp, move along. Specializations I'll cover these..... Level 1- Elemental Magic : You get one of the Fire, Ice or Lighting groups. Fire's ultimate spell does meltdown, ice's does stop, I don't even remember lighting's. Grab fire just for the rarity of meltdown. Specialization Elemental Mastery: Every spell tier offers take another group, for elemental magic though you get the third group at 15 so you can have your basic elements. Elemental Burst: Your ST damaging spells damage a random enemy for 25% ignoring M.Armor. That's pretty sweet and can seriously makes me consider not getting all elements. Elemental Shock: Your elemental spells increase the target's initiative dice by 1 to a maximum of 10. If this worked on non-elemental damage i'd consider it but i only have one line of elemental spells by taking this. Criticism: Is this the first time we are seeing knockback? I think so. Call it knockback(X), let it throw dice above 10 and have them roll to value-10 at end of round. That needs to be just a standard rule. If a initiative die is 11+ it goes to the next round and is reduced by 10 in addition to their normal initiative roll. Level 1- Transmutation: You get one of Death, Transform, or Poison spell groups. All good choices for your basic save or suck needs, poison is the best for damage until it's final spell when it gives virus(aka lovely zombie). Death has the best first spell(Sleep) but a weak middle. While Transform has the most balanced progression(Blind, Petrify, Toad, Stone.) Specialization Transmutation Mastery: Standard choose a second deal. Piercing Arcana: Your spells ignore status resistance, but not immunity. This depends on the GM really. Magic Resistance: You resist all status you could cause with a transmutation spells, if it was all spells hoooo boy. Level 15 - Worldly Magic: You get one of Water, Earth or Shadow. The answer is Water which inflicts group sleep with it's final spell, shadow does blind which is fine but isn't sleep, Earth's final spell is amazing(Break) but it's other spells hurt your friends. Specialization Worldly Master: I already know water magic, thx. Worldly Shock: My spells ignore half the target's M.Armor, Pretty decent. Careful Casting: You can make any spell Slow(3) to reduce the difficulty by 3. Now the difficulty of damage spells is a big fat 0, but status spells are a 7, so if you are going status mage this is maybe worth but the point of status mage it to disable them BEFORE they go I don't want this, now if it was pay 25% more mp sign me up. Level 30- Expert Magic: You get one of Drain, Hex, or Mage Bane. Drain is uhhh drain, Mage Bane is stuck with just rasp for now but gets you Osmose at 50, and hex is multi status spells. Specialization Multi-Expert: Pretty high on my list of options. Obliterate: When you use an expert spell applies debarrier(remove protect, shell&reflect) BEFORE the spell effect until end of round. Holy poo poo, this is amazing and it only requires 12 fire. Favored Element: Choose an element, your spells of the element ignore resistance and treat immunity as resistance. Cute but should have been a worldly spec, sure doesn't compete with obliterate or multi-expert. Now you aren't getting anything from 30 except you know filling in your spell ranks except well remember your initial "Specialization". Level 64 Ancient Magic : Scathe- Inflicts 28*Fire shadow damage to all enemies and attempts to inflict death. The ultimate in black mage related related minion slaughter. Ancient Magic : Flare- Inflicts 35*Fire NON-ELEMENTAL damage to an enemy ignoring Shell, Reflect, and M.Arm. The ultimate in black mage related boss murder. (Also MATH! The highest stat is 25 this does 35*Fire damage ignoring armor, 25*35=875 add 5 to that for 880. So using the ultimate damage spell won't even hit the damage cap.) Ancient Magic : Ultima- Inflicts 32*Fire NON-ELEMENTAL damage to all enemies ignoring Shell&Reflect(But not M.Arm). For the black mage who wants death for all occasions. Enjoy choosing, it won't be easy. Criticism: My criticism is I wish the warriors were this well designed, not this good, but this well designed, and I don't begrudge the specialization is the Ult because you don't really have to build for it you just kind of get it, and bluntly the class could have an ancient magic ability that offers Scathe, Flare or Ultima and it wouldn't feel out of place. WhitemageofDOOM fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Oct 13, 2018 |
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Oct 13, 2018 14:56
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PurpleXVI posted:So wait, when it says the Magestar absorbs spells, does it also negate them, and thus offer an impervious defense against most magic? Or just suck up some of the spare wizardy aura and the spell proceeds as normal? Negates it. Absorbs all magic cast at the person who it's currently attuned to, regardless of intent. Here are the suggestions for further adventures in the area... Caverns of the claws - clear out a local troll den and discover why they keep returning. Suggestion - they're being birthed by a Deepspawn, a 14HD monster that makes more monsters. Crypt of the shadows - a tomb filled with Shadows and treasure. Or Zhentarim lies about treasure, and any items are actually cursed. Ironguard - Buy Dungeon #18 and use the mini dungeon in the adventure of the same name. It's also by Ed Greenwood. And I'm starting to think he really has a thing for Stirges, because there's another one in this mini-module. The Warrior's Crypt A barrow containing undead warriors who fell battling a great evil. The suggestion for the evil is a Nabbassu, a 7 HD greater Tanar'ri (fiend). Also, there are apparently many wizard lairs hidden in the stonelands. http://www.lomion.de/cmm/tanagnab.php Mellomir's Mystery - Famous sage discovered great magic in the depths of the haunted halls. Vanished dwarves, false rumour about the ring of Winter. blah blah blah, who gives a gently caress? And finally, as a final gently caress you to the survivors, because this is 2e, and treasure for XP is now optional, Brian and Janie don't even get level ups for getting out with the necklace. Angrymog fucked around with this message at 16:39 on Oct 13, 2018 |
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Oct 13, 2018 16:31
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 Yu Jing Roster I’m going to level with you - I got part way into this list and fell asleep at my desk. YJ light infantry especially is just dull. They’re all okay, and up against comparable units they’re nothing to sneeze at. Or, you could take something more utilitarian and stop caring about A Basic Guy But Varying Degrees of Slightly Better.  I challenge you to feel an emotion about these models. They’re all a bit better than your average jerk with a rifle and a bullet proof vest. Some of them are a little more swordy, some are a little more shooty, some are a little more protected. The Pheasant does something at least useful as a piece, but she does it less well and for a higher price than her former counterpart in the JSA. They all have backstories that go “Okay, if you though x was a real bastard in the service of the autocratic state, wait until you get a load of this guy.” At least it gets better. Check out this rear end in a top hat:  I hate his shoulder pads! And look at his little goat friends! Now that’s a model. This is Xi Zhuang, the named light infantry guy for YJ. Relentless pure secret police, blah blah blah. If he’s in a fireteam with other Celestial Guard, and the team leader is killed, he can instantly take over and keep going, whereas that would ordinarily dissolve your fireteam and you’d have to spend resources to reform it. His little buddies that crack me up are Madtraps. They’re still models on the field, but they’re not units, they’re weapons. They tag along with Zhuang until someone gets close enough to him in the reactive turn, and then they zip along up to the enemy, give them a great big hug, and explode a glue bomb in their cute little tummies. Gluing angry, angry enemies down is both a useful tactic and extremely entertaining.  And these are Celestial Guard, the Imperial Service grunts. Unblinking resolve, ethically questionable, continuous farting noise. That third guy from the left, with the big gun, he’s the only one we care about, because he’s the Celestial Guard with the Kuang Shi controller. What’s a Kuang Shi, you ask?  I used an image of the older sculpts because it gives you an accurate idea of how many of these goddamn things you’ll face if you ever play an Imperial Service player. In vanilla YJ, you can take two, plus you have to take the Kuang Shi controller. That’s okay, I guess. In ISS, you can take eight. And they cost five points a pop. And they all provide regular orders. You can take a fireteam of them that’s the controller and four Kuang Shi, five orders and they’re no longer blindly charging into enemy guns, for thirty-three points. Have that team sit back and take a smoke break, just generating orders for you. Take four more, just let them run up the board. Why not, they get their regular order and an extremely impetuous order, meaning they can move up to sixteen inches if they just gun it. They’re Dogged, too, so while they’ll drop dead if they take an excess wound at the end of your turn, up until that point they keep on trucking. And they’ve got a piece of equipment that means they automatically grant the Targeted state to their allies, and allow their allies to shoot them. Which means you can fire off a smart missile from behind cover and hit one of these dorks after they run up to an enemy position and shell the hell out of it. And when you turn it on, they become an active repeater for all your hackers. And when they die, they explode. So if someone gets up behind your line with a paratrooper, just run some of these bad boys up into their face and push the big red button. They’re not honestly the end of the world. If you’re smart with your positioning you can kill them all before they reach you, and they’re kinda squishy, and they don’t have any ranged weapons. If you kill the controller they can’t be blown up intentionally anymore. The ones in a fireteam usually hang out in a nice neat line suitable for template weapons. They’re just so, so very order efficient. I think “kuang shi” is supposed to be the Cantonese pronunciation of jiangshi, but  . Kuang Shi are repeat offenders and political prisoners sentenced to death in the service of the state. Because ISS just wasn’t comically evil enough, Kuang Shi are shackled, lobotomized, and subjected to constant Yu Jing propaganda playing on the inside of their helmets. The exploding thing is the suicide collar each one of them wears, built to go off either when they wander away from their overseer, get shot down, or the boss just gets bored and pushes the button. I’ve only got one good way to segue after the Kuang Shi, and that’s shaolin monks in space. The Shaolin traded their services to the Yu Jing military in exchange for tax exempt status. I feel like that’s maybe straying from the teaching of the Buddha somewhat, maybe. Monks are extremely impetuous and irregular, so set them up in a place where they’ll be able to charge at the enemy like a bald missile. They’re comparable to Joan in close combat, but they’re breathtakingly terrible shots, and they’re very fragile. They run from five to thirteen points, and you could probably find a use for them if that were all they did. But they have smoke grenades. As a reminder, Infinity is a true line of sight game, with some abstraction with silhouettes so it’s workable instead of a grinding hell-rule. Getting shot is highly lethal for most units. You generally want to be in cover, or better still concealment, as much as humanly possible. Smoke munitions let you block line of sight in a location of your choosing. The smoke template is a circle a hair under five inches across, which creates a column of infinite height that blocks LoS. You throw a grenade at PH +3 within eight inches of your base, and up to 16 inches away at -3 PH. Grenades don’t have to have a target, you can chuck ‘em over a wall at a penalty, and launched versions have longer range. For maximum anime, you can use smoke weapons as a special dodge. Instead of shooting back or trying to dodge a shot, you can toss a smoke grenade out like a ninja cliche. (NB: Special Dodge: Smoke is not a Dodge! It’s a Ballistic Skill attack that keys off your Physique attribute that places a template! Obviously. Infinity tries to be really specific in its verbiage, but the localization can bite hard sometimes.) The best way to employ your monks, therefore, is to send them screaming up the field, moving and popping smoke, creating chains of obscured LoS up the board, while the rest of your army gets into more favorable positions and your opponent stews impotently.  Guija are TAGs. The passage for them specifically states that they’re the best Yu Jing can do, which isn’t much. It’s certainly a TAG. You could put in in your list, or you could spend those points on a greater number of more delicate units, possibly with a novel gimmick to them. It’s Armor 8, which is pretty high, and otherwise totally unremarkable. The fluff also uses the phrase “Imperial socialism” and “comrade-subject.” The model is great - giant robot with a hook sword never fails to attract interest. Behold, Yu Jing summed up in one unit. Heavy Infantry Showcase Yu Jing does good heavy infantry. They’re all at least respectable choices, even if most of them are kind of boring.  Zuyongs are going to be the basis for the Invincible Army, once they arrive. Their stats are basically those of line troopers, but they’re ARM/BTS 3 instead of 1/0, and they get an extra wound. They run about twice to three times the price of your standard rifleman, though, so you’ve gotta puzzle out if that extra durability is worth the decrease in order count. Zuyongs take their schtick from the Terracotta Soldiers.  Wu Ming are a penal unit, their soldiers stripped of their names and sent to die on the frontlines, although for presumably less severe crimes than the Kuang Shi. They’re very much like Zuyongs, but with better-looking models and an extra point of ARM. Keep in mind, a single one of these guys costs the same as the Kuang Shi fireteam.   Hac Tao, left, and Dao Fei, right, fill somewhat comparable niches. Hac Tao get TO camouflage and a beefy statline, for a little cheaper than a Swiss Guard. Dao Fei are regular camouflage and get Infiltration, which makes them great pieces to go out and get objectives. They’re a fair bit more durable than your typical camo infiltrator, although they’re about twice the price. Hac Tao are spooky ghost marines, while Dao Fei get initiated into their unit by getting dumped into the arctic wilds with no weapons or equipment for a two month vacation. Not too interesting, but they are very pretty models.  Right up front, you can look at a Yan Huo and understand it. It’s a big guy with an even bigger gun. They come in railgun or twin missile launcher flavors, and two missile shots can really rain on your parade. Their MOV is 4-2, rather than the 4-4 standard to most heavy infantry, ostensibly to represent how much of their hardware is devoted to lugging around what are otherwise TAG weapons on an infantryman. Weirdly, the fluff calls them out as awfully delicate for HI, but they’re ARM 5 and have two Wounds, and that’s pretty buff, even by the standards of their peers. If you’ve made the mistake of playing Yu Jing and are looking for an outlet for your frustration, may I suggest the Neurocinetics Yan Huo? Ordinarily, your weapon will have a Burst value. High fire rate guns have more Burst, and each point of Burst represents rolling one die per attack. If I shoot using a sniper rifle, I roll two dice per attack; with a heavy machine gun, four. Typically that only applies during your active turn, so if you’re shooting back at me, you’d only roll one even if you’re using an HMG. Neurocinetics flips that, so that you’re firing at full Burst in ARO, but only get one shot during your active turn. Plop this guy in a commanding position and forget about him, laugh at your opponent when they try and dig him out, roll all the dice, forget your troubles for a few brief moments.  Hsien are Imperial Service veterans and the Emperor’s personal guard. They’re more of the same crap fluff-wise, but apart from some very snappy models, they have access to a very important piece of equipment. Multispectral visors are meant to represent various kinds of vision enhancement, from infrared imaging to light enhancement to gait analysis to ($VAR_FUTURETECH not found). It comes in three levels, like many skills and tools. MSV 1 is comparable to what US troops use today, light amps and infrared. MSV 2 is along the lines of Predator vision. MSV 3 is undefined, but Better. The obvious application for this equipment is to work around low light and dark area terrain effects, and sure, you could do that. MSV is also useful for hunting camouflage units; while none of them allow you to automatically uncover a camouflage marker, they’ll vastly reduce the penalty for trying to discover them and then shoot them. MSV 1 negates the penalty to take a look at regular camo, while up at MSV 3 you automatically pass your check to discover a camo unit (though you still have to spend an order to discover them). All of this is well and good, but what you’ll almost always use MSV for is negating smoke. MSV 2 is the one you really want, because it ignores Zero Visibility Zones (IE smoke templates) for calculating line of sight. Note this applies to your smoke as well as your enemies! It’s a common and useful strategy to have a, say, your Shaolin monk toss a smoke grenade somewhere from behind cover, that prevents enemy models from seeing your Hsien, who then proceeds to blast them with no penalty. They can’t shoot back, and dodging isn’t possible unless you can draw LoS, so if they’re caught out by this trick, they may well be screwed. Smoke: It’s Good For You.  Now it’s time for the best Yu Jing unit in the game, the Su-Jian. The picture above is not two separate units, but a Su-Jian in combat and mobility forms. It’s a transformer cat! The combat form is a pretty standard heavy infantry model, but it’s slow like a Yan Huo. But it does have that extra pseudo-wound from No Wound Incapacitation. They come equipped with either a light machine gun, a flamethrower and a disposable rocket launcher, or a vehicle-grade shotgun and the other two weapons. Not too shabby. But then it turns into a cat! Mobility form drops close combat, because they had to have a reason for you to ever use the combat form, and it drops a few points of Ballistic Skill, because cats can’t use guns, dummy. It really excels at tearing rear end up the field, though, because mobility form has MOV 8-2, it dodges four inches when it gets shot at, it ignores rough terrain of all kinds, and it can run right up the side of obstacles without having to climb. Su-jians are great units with a cool trick, fantastic models, and it’s a drat shame they’re the most interesting unit in the entirety of this faction.  Sun Tze is Yu Jing’s answer to Joan of Arc, with blackjack, and hookers. He comes in two flavors, a more armored heavy infantry version, and because there’s no reason to spend that many points on a model for passive boosts, a medium infantry sniper version. Corvus Belli does this thing with a lot of the Recreations where they’ll slightly alter their names, like they’re trying to avoid copyright infringement against someone who’s been dead for centuries. I don’t know thing one about any Chinese dialect, so I can’t say if there’s some extra meaning in changing the man’s name from Sun Tzu, or if it’s just a problem of orthography. Sun Tze is constantly thinking, he thinks real good, good at strategy, see, aren’t you impressed? I’m not sure if this is ALEPH pranking the State Empire by giving them a remodeled dude who’s famous for a book of platitudes. Sunny is very average statwise, and you’re going to take him as your LT if you’re going to bother spending nearly seventy points on him. He comes with Advanced Command as an LT, which gives you an extra Command Token. These are the scarce resources that I’ve alluded to that you use to reform fireteams. You can also use them to reroll certain special checks, or form a sort of temporary fireteam. You ordinarily get four command tokens, but now you can get five. More usefully, he gets Strategos level 3. Keep in mind that unless otherwise specified, abilities with levels are cumulative. Strategos level 3 gets you 1, 2, and 3, etc. Level one lets you treat your LT order like a regular order, and that’s not too bad. Levels 2 and 3 involve deployment shenanigans. Ordinarily before you start a game of Infinity, you make a Lieutenant Roll, where your LTs roll WIP against each other. Winner gets to pick between choosing what side of the table to deploy on, or what order to deploy in. When it’s your turn to deploy, the person who elected/was forced to deploy first puts down all their models but one. Their opponent then does the same. The first deployer then puts down their last model, as a kind of counter pick, and the process repeats for the other player. Strategos level 2 lets you put down two models instead of one, which could be something as simple as a specialist in a position you noticed your opponent missed, or it could be your most dangerous murder unit. Level 3 makes your opponent put down all their models, eliminating their counter-positioning. In the event two Strategos level 3 LTs are on the field at the same time, they deploy normally. Sunny’s passage goes out of its way to close with a brief sentence about how he’s never given the State Empire the slightly reason to doubt him, and how his loyalty is beyond question. Next: Truly, God is great, because Yu Jing is done and it’s time for Haqq.
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Oct 13, 2018 17:01
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Future-China proclaiming itself a hilariously nonsensical self-contradictory idea of communism is pretty fitting, mind. Communism with Imperial Chinese characteristics.
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Oct 13, 2018 17:13
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It pisses me off because Imperial China is my jam historically and argh just make it Imperial China, it will make more sense.
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Oct 13, 2018 17:29
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I've seen way more people take Joan than Sunny.
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Oct 13, 2018 17:47
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I mean, he's what the crazy magic computer and hyper-china decided Sun Tzu is, not the actual guy who wrote the book. Now with implanted supercomputer and the ability to throw someone through a concrete bunker, right? Since they're all in crazy Section 9 superbodies? Hyper-china kind of sucks a lot, doesn't it? I'm really looking forward to the Haqq instead.
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Oct 13, 2018 17:53
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How literally every version of fantasy or scifi China was made: 1) list all the ideas, stereotypes, half-remembered facts, etc. about Chinese history or philosophy you can think of in five minutes 2) write: "but with [robots/magic]" 2) design document complete, well done
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Oct 13, 2018 18:13
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Mors Rattus posted:It pisses me off because Imperial China is my jam historically and argh just make it Imperial China, it will make more sense. I'm not sure I understand. How would that get us to police state death squads? Night10194 posted:I mean, he's what the crazy magic computer and hyper-china decided Sun Tzu is, not the actual guy who wrote the book. Now with implanted supercomputer and the ability to throw someone through a concrete bunker, right? Since they're all in crazy Section 9 superbodies? Sun Tze is PH 12 in powered armor, 11 outside of it. If we assume 10 is normal for someone in fighting shape, and the highest PH I can recall is 17 on things like TAGs, he's either got good artificial genes or he's training like a professional athlete. Other Recreations are a good deal more swole, so he's probably not a secret combat android. It gets weird fast because sometimes PH is just how agile you are, and sometimes it's how quick you are, and sometimes it's how much you can carry (or in that case, how huge and hard to carry you are). MST3K rules apply.
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Oct 13, 2018 18:17
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megane posted:How literally every version of fantasy or scifi China was made: Has there ever been any alt-history where the God-Worshiper jacobins manage to topple the Quing Emperor?
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Oct 13, 2018 18:18
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Oh, the reconstructions are organic? I thought they were robot people for some reason.
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Oct 13, 2018 18:21
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Did they base that off the Shi from Fallout 2? They had a supercomputer as well. Black Isle was going to have the Enclave nuke them in Van Buren for good reason.
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Oct 13, 2018 18:23
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Sun Tsu is a really odd choice to be made into a cyborg super-soldier like this. I mean, Imperial China has a incredibly rich military history, they could have picked someone whose primary claim to fame wasn't writing a beginners' primer at how not to gently caress up at war. It's like if Neo-Italy decided to make Niccolo Machiavelli a megahacker with paired cyberkatanas. Guan Yu. They could have given us loving Guan Yu. Guan-Yu with a gatling gun and even more impressive facial hair.
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Oct 13, 2018 19:02
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Ratoslov posted:It's like if Neo-Italy decided to make Niccolo Machiavelli a megahacker with paired cyberkatanas. I'm gonna be real with you, would want this.
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Oct 13, 2018 19:09
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Obviously its a cyberrapier and cybercape.  (Turns out Sword and Cape is fighting style that appeared in Renaissance fighting manuals.)
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Oct 13, 2018 19:16
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A cybercape that flows over dudes to entangle them sounds extremely cool.
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Oct 13, 2018 19:33
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It really feels like Yu Jing was designed by doing the least possible amount of research. "What do we know about China?" "It's oppressively communist, it used to be an empire, Confucianism was a thing, and that Sun Tzu guy wrote The Art of War and I had to read it for a seminar that one time" "Good enough. "
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Oct 13, 2018 19:34
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Angrymog posted:Negates it. Absorbs all magic cast at the person who it's currently attuned to, regardless of intent. Both amazing and awful. Amazing because it means you can basically go up and shove enemy mages in a locker. Awful because a player party is likely to be the target of much more buffing/healing magic than hostile magic, until they're at a really high level and fighting a lot of monsters with innate spellcasting abilities. Angrymog posted:Ironguard - Buy Dungeon #18 and use the mini dungeon in the adventure of the same name. It's also by Ed Greenwood. And I'm starting to think he really has a thing for Stirges, because there's another one in this mini-module. I support us exploring more of how Ed Greenwood sucks piles of burning garbage at writing things.
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Oct 13, 2018 19:35
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Ratoslov posted:Guan Yu. They could have given us loving Guan Yu. Guan-Yu with a gatling gun and even more impressive facial hair. He could be the Yu Jing's Ajax. Like he'll be almost a third of your points and terrify people they'll focus fire on him all the livelong day, but he's a lot of fun while he's around.
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Oct 13, 2018 19:47
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(As an aside, I had the bad luck to end up at the bottom of last page, so here's the last update if you missed it.) Sufficiently Advanced Part 6: In which plot armor is an explicit mechanic. Okay, we're finally done with fluff and setting for the moment. It probably felt way the hell too long and wordy, but, to the game's credit, that's because everything felt really important to mention. There's not much gristle in Sufficiently Advanced, every passage and sidebar feels significant for understanding the game world or setting the right mood. But, that part's over with, and now it's time to make characters! Chapter 2: Transhumanist ability scores. The chapter opens, of course, with a rundown of the steps in making a character. I'll be following along. The first step is picking a Civilization of origin. I recommend jumping back and taking a look at the relevant updates if you need a refresher. I really dig the far-future social engineering concepts, and the Tao of History is supposed to be the best at Metatech, so our example character will be from there. Core Values: This leads right into the next step, choosing Core Values. Core Values add to one's Metatech and skill ratings to resist being convinced of something that would go against them, though other characters get bonuses to convincing one to do things that are consistent with their values. Additionally, CVs provide a +1 bonus to rolls when acting in ways consistent with them, or +2 if the CV is 5 or higher. We begin with the two Core Values of our home civilization, in this case Authenticity and Tradition, as well as two more of our choice. A sidebar is provided listing a couple hundred sample CVs, and another advises GMs to make sure no CV is too powerful by making sure it's roleplayed properly (for example, "Self-Preservation" could be applied to almost any roll, but GMs are advised to make sure the character with that Core Value behaves in the cautious, even cowardly, manner such a CV would imply). It's also mentioned that we should note our personal interpretation of each of our core values, in order to better define the situations in which they apply. Now, how do we determine the numeric score of our CVs, from 0 to 10? We choose them. Because a Core Value can be as much a weakness as a strength, we may set them to any value we want. Now, I'm making a character from the Tao of History, and I think I'd like to be part of High Society, having portrayed a very wealthy historical figure from the Victorian era, but I did end up decided to leave for the Patent Office. So, I think I'll take Authenticity at 5 (I like the idea of continuing to use disguised items), Tradition 2 (I left the Tao for a reason), Good Breeding 6 (I'm refined, but not too fancy), and let's cap it off with Curiosity 10 (you literally cannot stop me from investigating something interesting). Once Core Values are chosen, you select your Society (if any), and then record what special Benefits you've gained. In my case, on top of the wealth from High Society, my Tao citizenship means I gain a bonus Twist each session, usable only through the Romance, Intrigue, and Empathy themes. And just in time, because that's the very next section! Twists and Themes: Themes are a vitally important mechanic in the game, as they give players a lot of control over how the story plays out, at the cost of suffering setbacks to do so. Now, the ranks we're permitted in Themes is directly connected with how high our highest Capability (essentially, our primary attributes) is, which makes it feel like this section should have been placed after the step where we set our Capabilities, but, this is the order we're given, so I'll work with it. To summarize, based on our highest Capability, we get an Import score of 5-9, representing our overall importance to the story (lower Capabilities get us 9 points of Theme to work with, having a very high Capability gets us 5). Themes can rate from 0-4, which determines how powerfully the Theme impacts the story when used. Level 5 effects exist, but players usually must take a Complication to achieve them. What are Complications? Those are voluntary setbacks and problems Inspectors give the GM license to create, in order to either gain more Twists. Each Complication grants one Twist, and spending more than one Twist on a Theme raises that Theme's effective rating by one per additional Twist. Also, Complications get worse, the lower your Import is. Additionally, each Theme a player has must include a Descriptor, a word or phrase that defines how that Theme applies to their character, which can limit its use. The six Themes are as follows: Plot Immunity: Narrative convention twists itself around to save you. This Theme is used to just make a problem go away, and tell the GM you'd rather not engage with a given challenge. You can use this Theme to avoid death, as well. Suggested descriptors tend to revolve around being an action hero, being very lucky, or having NPCs saving you at the critical moment. Replicant PCs are recommended to take a descriptor of "Send in the clones", indicating that whenever bad stuff happens to your character, you can spend a Twist to declare that it was just one of your clones, and that the "primary" you is safe and sound. Intrigue: This Theme is used to gain secret information or otherwise spy on people, you can even use it to declare you've had people on the inside gathering info the whole time. Suggested descriptors include traditional methods of spycraft, as well as more futuristic ones, including the implication that you simply used psychohistorical analysis to "guess" the information you obtained, which, naturally, will turn out to have been correct. Empathy: This Theme revolves around gaining friends and confidants, and through them, favors and information. It's acknowledged by the book that Intrigue, Empathy, and Romance have some overlap in function, but that their key differences lie in the flavor and what sorts of experiences they tell the GM you're looking for. Suggested descriptors tend to describe what sorts of social interaction you're best at handling, and how people usually relate to you. Magnetism: This Theme is all about leadership and popular appeal, great for acquiring followers and earning votes. Suggested descriptors define why people like you (it could be political, ideological, or even a conscious mimetic effect on your part), or else define what kinds of people tend to like you. Comprehension: Where a few other Themes are about learning secrets, this Theme is about learning stuff that's just hard to figure out. Solutions to puzzles, inventing gadgets, and so on. The suggested descriptors include reasons for your genius, specific fields you might specialize in, or methods a non-genius might also learn esoteric information (such as by tricking a villain into an educational monologue). Romance: The Theme of romantic love and sordid trysts, one should probably be careful not to make it weird. You can also use this Theme to ruin the relationships of others, if you so choose. In either event, your actions will usually get you some sort of advantage, be it access or information. Suggested descriptors include the types of relationships you tend to spark, the way in which your romantic tendencies manifest, or the types of people that end up attracted to you. I want some Capabilities that are on the higher end, so I think I'll assume my highest will be 7, and take an Import of 7. From there, I'll take Empathy 4 (Lovable Gadabout), Comprehension 2 (Oddly-Specific University Classes), and Plot Immunity 1 (Fortune Favors Fools). I imagine my character as a socialite, usually a bit tipsy, bit of a Nick & Nora Charles vibe, with a gimmick of explaining any piece of obscure knowledge as having been a class at Oxford. Of course, the image is entirely manufactured as a way to put others at ease around him. Capabilities: Alright, here's the big moment. So, each civilization has their own minimums and maximums for each of the five major fields of technology in the universe. They're rated from 1-10, but exceeding your civ's maximum ratings reduces your Import automatically, one-for-one. Having 5 or more in a Capability represents entering transhuman territory. Looking at the chart, I see that the Tao's Stringtech is very low (it maxes at 4), and decide that the concept I'm going for could just as easily be handled in The Masquerade. I trade in my Authenticity and Tradition for Anonymity 6 and Identity 10, and swap out my extra Twist for the ability to identify anyone I've ever met before. How do you determine Capabilities? Like with Core Values, you just choose what number you want. You can have that beautiful 10, just remember that your Import will suffer for it. Biotech: This represents all science that directly affects bodily tissues and your genetic code, with the Stardwellers being the most advanced in the field. The Masquerade is a close second (as are the Replicants), with a maximum of 9, but I'll go with 7, to keep my Import up. Passing rank 5 is what unlocks the ability to regenerate your body's tissues when injured, and with 7, I can regenerate even lost limbs. I'm also quite superhuman, able to lift more than a ton, skydive without a parachute, and take only bruises from small-caliber firearms. My eyes and ears remain too complex to regenerate naturally without medical assistance, however, that's a Biotech 8 effect. The life expectancy of my character is about 400 years, though I could later push it to 550 by raising my Biotech up to 9. It's also worth mentioning that one with Biotech 8 could generate harmful agents within their own body, allowing them to engage in biowarefare without a lab. Cognitech: This is the science of the mind. While it includes some direct modification, it also includes methods for streamlining thought, organizing knowledge, and generally optimizing the function of one's mind. The Stored are far and way the best at this, none of the other civilizations even reach 9, let alone 10. The Masquerade tops out at 6, which is what I'll take. This grants me a neural mesh (the benefit for 5+) and access to lenses, as well as a perfect memory and the ability to learn things in half the normal time. If my Cognitech were higher, I could do things like alter my perception of time, take two mental actions at once, and even break encryption in my head. Metatech: Very little of this field manifests as physical technology, this is mainly the study of mimetics and other forms of social engineering. Core Values add directly to this score when resisting attempts to influence you against your beliefs. The Tao of History and Cognitive Union both specialize in this, though they take drastically different approaches to it. Unlike with other Capabilities, Metatech relies instead on the difference between Metatech scores to determine what you're able to do. While the Masquerade can go up to 8, I'll be taking 7. It's worth noting that, with especially large differences in Metatech, you can do things like convince a person to commit suicide, or talk them into standing still and taking it while you're attacking them. Essentially, Metatech techniques can be just as dangerous as any weapon, able to build or destroy relationships, save or end lives, and more. You need a difference of 4+ to start doing the more advanced stuff like brainwashing, if you're wondering about a breakpoint. Nanotech: This is the science of studying tiny poo poo, and mostly represents various nanobot-related implants. It mostly affects your senses, but having 5+ gets you dermal microbots, which are something of a Swiss Army Knife. The Stardwellers have the best Nanotech in the universe, but the Masquerade ain't bad, at 8. As usual, I'll go with 7. This lets me see the entire light/radiation spectrum, only gravity waves and dark matter remain invisible to me. I have a built-in spectrometer, DNA sequencer, telescopic vision, a quantum-dot laser array, and also I can see and hear with my entire body. I can also engage in a manhunt by myself without taking penalties, and I can scan a person with the same or lower Nanotech rating to get an estimate of their Biotech, Nanotech, and Stringtech scores, but this is considered extremely rude in the Masquerade. At 9, a person can engage in nanowarfare without a lab, producing the nanophages from their own implants. Stringtech: Yes, it's based on the widely-discredited "string theory", but more broadly, it deals with the application of physical forces. In other words, this is the stat for beating poo poo up and/or being a robot. Mechanica, naturally, has the best Stringtech, but the Independents are right behind them. The Masquerade caps at 6, and so will I. The main benefit of a 5+ in Stringtech is that your defenses are no longer Energy-Transparent (in other words, useless against energy weapons). My built-in weapons can also now have the Energy (lasers) and Near-c (projectiles fired at almost the speed of light) descriptors, and I have free access to bombs, powerful acid, and compression beams (more on specific weapons later). Also, characters with 5+ in Stringtech can fight in open warfare as though they were an army of a thousand people, though their opponent always gets a bonus for outnumbering them. EclecticTastes posted:As a little sidebar of my own, the Independents are quite interesting, in terms of their Stringtech. You see, technically all of their technology is Stringtech, it's the only field they've managed to advance far enough in to compete with everyone else, due to their refusal to accept Transcendental help. So, for example, while an "Emotion Ray" is a Metatech object and uses that score, an Independent-made one is based on Stringtech, directly altering the electromagnetic signals in the brain rather than employing mimetic light and/or sound patterns to induce emotion. So, to recap, my character has Biotech 7, Cognitech 6, Metatech 7, Nanotech 7, and Stringtech 6. He's pretty good as a face/investigator, and fairly tough, but his smarts and raw power are only about average for an Inspector. Professions Now we're onto Sufficiently Advanced's version of skills, which represent jobs you've worked at over the years. Your Profession rating indicates how long you spent doing that job, and thus you purchase Professions using your life expectancy. With high Cognitech, you reduce the costs of your Professions accordingly (in my case, I reduce costs by half). This makes your ability to take Professions into a function of your Biotech (how many points you get) and Cognitech (the rate of expenditure). You may also take Locality Professions at the same time you're learning others, as Locality just represents where you've lived. All characters begin with 5 ranks in the Locality profession for their home region, representing their knowledge of where they come from. They're also assumed to be literate and possess both basic math skills and technological competence as befits their Capabilities. Certain broad fields (such as Artist or Engineer) may require concentration in a more specific field (Artist permits two at once), and very similar skills can be substituted for a point of Reserve (more on Reserve shortly). Most skills have specialized tasks associated with them, stuff that you can't even attempt without the associated Profession. This actually limits your ability to use the skill even if you do have ranks in it. Now, my character will live to be about 400, so let's say I have about 250 "points" to spend, though more like 500 with the halved costs. Since I'm aiming to be more of a Social/Detective kind of character, I'll take 5 ranks in both Media and Political to represent a basic social acumen, as well as Police and Legal for some investigative background (Police is also one of the game's two skills used for personal combat). I'll also take the Engineer (Metatech) and Researcher (Metatech) Professions at 5, to show that I'm well-versed in Metatech in a general sense. From there, perhaps 5 ranks of Spy and Artist (Writing and Infosphere Design), to shore up my array of Metatech skills. That leaves me with 110 years of experience to distribute. That's enough to bump every skill I've got so far up to 6. With my remaining points, I'm just 2 points short of getting 6 ranks in Financial, which would fit with my High Society stylings. So, I'll add two more years to my character's age, and take that Financial 6. For my Localities, I'll take the Masquerade Locality from 5 to 10, then spend some time with the Masquerade's allies, taking 7 ranks in each of Mechanica, the Tao of History, and the Stardwelling Armada's most prominent fleet. This leaves just enough left over for 6 ranks worth of time in the League of Independent Planets. Reserve All Capabilities and Professions have Reserve pools associated with them. For Capabilities, you have Reserve equal to their rank. For Professions, you have double. You spend Reserve to improve your rolls and avoid dying (weapons in Sufficiently Advanced tend to be, well, sufficiently advanced, and you spend Reserve like Hit Points to avoid getting annihilated by these instant-death weapons, more on that in the next chapter). You recover your Profession Reserve easily, with food and rest, but your Capabilities only recover to a maximum of 5 unless you fulfill a special requirement (assuming you have 6+ to begin with). Biotech: You need special high-energy food available only in civs with Biotech 6+, due to your high metabolism. Cognitech: Your dreams are much more complex than normal, and you remember them better, so you'll end up preoccupied with them unless you send them off to a special service, where the memories are reformatted and returned in a more manageable configuration. This requires infosphere access. Metatech: You need to relax and have some friendly one-on-one interaction with somebody, to prevent yourself from seeing people as just a set of social patterns to manipulate (which undermines your skills considerably). A good tactic in long negotiations is preventing your opponent from managing this, while achieving it yourself. Nanotech: Your Nanotech just needs an hour of downtime to rest and self-repair, usually while you sleep, so it's almost an exception to the rule. Except your Nanotech score drops to 3 during that hour, so you may wish to figure something out if you're expecting a nighttime ambush. Stringtech: You need to plug your implants into a wall jack for 10 minutes per point of Reserve you're getting back (so, 10 minutes for the example character I've made). Your Stringtech drops to 3 as this happens, but you and unplug and be ready in about 10 seconds, so you're less vulnerable than with Nanotech. Any civilization with Stringtech 5+ will have the sort of current you need, but elsewhere, you may need to find an alternate solution, like plugging directly into a power substation. Sample Characters The next section of this chapter is a list of premade characters. What's interesting is despite their distinctly Gregorian trappings, the Disciples of the Void tend towards more Shaolin-inspired naming conventions, it's an intriguing touch. The descriptions and GM notes for these premade characters help give some insight into roleplaying, though it's telling to note that not one of the eight pregens is a Heterolinguist (I'm getting the impression that the Heterolinguists were thought up without the writers themselves even knowing how to play as one). Beyond the fleshed-out samples are a bunch of stat blocks for more generic NPCs from various civs, so GMs don't need to generate random mooks themselves. There's also a sidebar noting that instances of a Replicant are denoted with ordonyms based on when they were cloned (Primus, secundus, tertius, and so on). Character Advancement The final section of this chapter concerns character advancement. If you can start the game with the exact stats you want, where else is there to go? Actually, the game's advice is simply to roleplay advancement. Take lower Capabilities to start with, then raise them when you feel it's appropriate by spending a Twist through a fitting Theme (though you will lose points in your Themes if your Import drops from getting your Capabilities too high). Core Values can be shifted up or down by one point each month, and replaced when they hit 0 (hitting 0 with one of your civilization's CVs will cost you a point of Import). You can even boost your Capability maximums by switching to a new civilization (attaining dual citizenship also gets you a second benefit, which is its own kind of advancement). Professions can be increased naturally as time passes, though getting enough downtime to learn a specific trade can be difficult while working for the Patent Office. That all having been said, no, there is no formal, codified system for gaining power through play. Your characters are who they are, and most development is personal. While I'm sure this is disappointing to some, I can't help but respect the game's confidence in simply stating that no, you don't get level-ups, because this is a game about roleplaying in high-concept transhumanist space, just start out as powerful as you feel comfortable being. Next Time: Fighting, ad campaigns, and hide & seek are all basically the same thing, if you think about it.
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Oct 13, 2018 20:22
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PurpleXVI posted:Both amazing and awful. Amazing because it means you can basically go up and shove enemy mages in a locker.
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Oct 13, 2018 20:56
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Angrymog posted:Unfortunately, the magestar can only be attuned by casters, so no sticking it on the fighter. Unless they have a caster level too I guess. Oh I got a level in casting, casting you into a locker nerd!
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Oct 13, 2018 21:09
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Black Mage is probably the 'bar' with which I judge the other classes in Returners 4e. It's solid, it does what it wants to do, it does it well, and the frills there are pretty even competition with each other. It's not crazy busted but it's the goddamn Black Mage, it gives you what you want as a Black MAge, no more, no less. Unfortunately as I recall you'll soon be hitting the actual Worst Job, either next update or the update after. I think the next one?
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Oct 13, 2018 21:46
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I kind of want somebody to bring Machiavelli back and make him into a cyborg hacker politician, only to have him explain to them, sadly, that The Prince was actually satire.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:11
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Rand Brittain posted:I kind of want somebody to bring Machiavelli back and make him into a cyborg hacker politician, only to have him explain to them, sadly, that The Prince was actually satire. The Infinity guys are replicas made by guessing and don't have any of their actual memories, so replica Machiavelli would be whatever pop culture says he is.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:21
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wdarkk posted:The Infinity guys are replicas made by guessing and don't have any of their actual memories, so replica Machiavelli would be whatever pop culture says he is.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:24
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Rand Brittain posted:I kind of want somebody to bring Machiavelli back and make him into a cyborg hacker politician, only to have him explain to them, sadly, that The Prince was actually satire. The Tao of History has such sophisticated psychohistorical models that they could probably tell you literally every detail of every day of Machiavelli's life, including that The Prince was obviously satire based on his time spent with one of history's greatest sociopaths, Cesare Borgia. However, because the current director of Renaissance Italy is a fan of the oeuvre of Terry Gilliam, their actors portray them more like Raoul Duke and Dr. Gonzo, so there's a bit of trade-off.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:27
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Nessus posted:Is that whole thing the derivation of the theory that you can put enough of someone's public posts and poo poo together to create an accurate simulation of that person if you are the frankenstein gangster computer god? Judging by what I read in the thread, no.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:31
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wdarkk posted:The Infinity guys are replicas made by guessing and don't have any of their actual memories, so replica Machiavelli would be whatever pop culture says he is. It'd be hilarious for one of them to come out wrong because they're too accurate and human, so you end up with someone like Cyborg Megaslayer Vlad Tepes deciding he's sick of war and drinking blood and becoming a vegan pacifist painter and self-help guru.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:33
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Ronwayne posted:Has there ever been any alt-history where the God-Worshiper jacobins manage to topple the Quing Emperor? Are you talking about the Taiping Rebellion? They used to exist as one of the splinter countries that made up China in older versions of the KaiserReich mod for Hearts of Iron / Arsenal of Democracy, but from what I can remember their fluff leaned heavily on the kingdom part (read imperial China) of the "Heavenly Kingdom" and not so much on their proto communist weird christianity.
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Oct 13, 2018 22:49
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Mors Rattus posted:I've got notes somewhere for a PBTA sci fi medical game based on James White's Sector General. From a couple pages back, but there is a PBTA game for medical drama -- it's called The Ward. I haven't bought or played it so I can't speak to its quality. Someone over on RPOL is using it to run a "hospital in Eberron" game, so I guess it could be adapted to other genres.
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Oct 14, 2018 02:59
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Selachian posted:From a couple pages back, but there is a PBTA game for medical drama -- it's called The Ward. I haven't bought or played it so I can't speak to its quality. Someone over on RPOL is using it to run a "hospital in Eberron" game, so I guess it could be adapted to other genres. The Ward is a lot of fun. I had a chance to play test it at a convention and it really focuses on the emotional core and universal tropes of medical dramas, and leaves the medicine much more abstracted. It’d be pretty easy to port it to any setting.
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Oct 14, 2018 03:07
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Communist Zombie posted:Are you talking about the Taiping Rebellion? They used to exist as one of the splinter countries that made up China in older versions of the KaiserReich mod for Hearts of Iron / Arsenal of Democracy, but from what I can remember their fluff leaned heavily on the kingdom part (read imperial China) of the "Heavenly Kingdom" and not so much on their proto communist weird christianity. Yes, and ah, that's a shame,
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Oct 14, 2018 05:17
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FFRRPG 4e Part 9: The Druid Wait Druids? Those aren't part of FFLore, no but the druid is a class with a cohesive set of paths that all have some relation to each other. The Blue Mage and Summoner are obvious, toss in the Geomancer and "Druid" is a fitting name as they are the class that gets power from the world. Level 1- Natures Path: Standard equipment and hp/mp ability with lvl1 specialty. However there's a HUGE problem, your mp multiplier is 1 and you need your mp....badly. If blue mage and summoner didn't tip you off, despite that you have the hp of a mage. Primal Arcana: Increase your mp multiplier by 1, and gain one of the following spell groups. Healing, Fire, Ice, Lighting, Poison, Slow. Bluntly grabbing this feels like the best option just for the mp. Nature Warrior: Increase your hp multiplier by 1, You can equip heavy armor and two weapons from: Light Weapons, Weapon&Shield, Heavy Weapons, Katanana Polearms, Bows, or Staves. Primal Music: Increase your hp multiplier by 1, and equip instruments. I'll take warrior if i want hp and weapon options. Level 1- Awakened: Pick blue mage, Geomancy or Summoning and you'll get your path abilities at the appropriate levels. Blue Mage: You get two initiate blue magic spells, can learn initiate spells by being smacked around. Blue magic is still a grab bag but has been trimmed down to the good parts of the grab bag, it also comes in 4 levels so the GM has a lot more guidelines on what to give you(namely the tier you can learn). Geomancer: You get the slow(2) action !Geomancy, roll 1d10 and add +1 per ten levels, on 1-5 you get the basic effect, at 6-11 you get the greater effect, at 12+ you get the master effect. You currently can't geotrance but there's not 8 abilities per terrain just 3, and starting out you have a 50/50 shot of something pretty decent. The basic effects though....condemned after four rounds? Really?! Summoner: get.....!Tame, yeah no they don't get call right away but instead tame. It can be used to cherry tap a monster for lvl damage ignoring god drat everything and if killed taming them, or on a monster that died as a reaction. I like the cherry tap. Also you don't "Spare" them and so they help you, you steal their soul and use it as a bullet. Specializations Martial Channeling: When you make a magic attack with a geomancer ability you can make a weapon attack instead(but the base difficulty is unchanged), if you do the ability if it does damage does damage equal to your weapon. Uhhhhh this is pretty sweet even if you don't take nature warrior, equipping a rod still works, especially for !Tame since you can basically go around beating monster's to death. Light Steps: You get the flight spell group. No mp bonus? I have more important uses for my mp. Intimidation: Roll Water vs. Fire, if you succeed they can't crit until end of the next round. Welp martial channeling it is. Level 10- Nature's Blessing Blue Mage: You can learn acolyte spells. Geomancer: You can spend mp to scale up your geomancy effects....and you thought your geomancer didn't need mp. This does mean the flat effects of geomancy can be enhanced and scale if you have mp to burn. Summoner: You get !Call, I'm not explaining call except that each summoned monster has a minimum level for both !Calling them and for their grand summon effect. ie spend more mp to upgrade. Specializations Air Gust: A ranged slow(2) action !Air wave does a non-scaling 10*Wind damage, but you can at lvl30+ spend mp to upgrade it to 15*Wind damage or knock off an init die. If it was both maybe, as it is, passssss or you know have martial channeling so you can scale it's damage without needing mp and pay mp to knock off init dice that is also a good plan. !Weak Point: Choose an ally they don't need to confirm crits for a round, wooo. Magical Camoflauge: Whenever you OR AN ALLY uses an action or spell that targets more than one target you can make two unaffected. Great in the right part if not you'll have to stick with air slash. Level 20- Natural Domain Blue Mage: You can learn by seeing bagic cast, Roll your level/10 or under on a d10 to do it. Geomancers: You get !Geotrance, which has an increasing delay based on where on this stupid terrain wheel you are from what you want to do. I wish everything worked like cosmic terrain where it was just a straight Slow(4). Summoners: Can store two soul bullets with tame. Specializations !Parley: Roll Fire vs. (7+Fire) and if it hits the monster flees...So this is our first eject effect, and since monster's don't give exp(except to monster hunters) eject doesn't waste it. It sort of solves itself on bosses as well forcing the dark general or monster you are hunting to flee just delays the fight. Still classed as fatal anyways though, so don't try. Adaptive Tolerance: Whenever you are hit by a status you gain R:That status until end of counter, this is pretty darn sweet. !Earth Slash: Is a Slow(2) action, Does a measly 7*Earth damage or immboilize and hits everyone so the question is how much do your allies care about losing their reactions? At lvl40+ you can spend 60 mp to do 14*Earth damage or immobilize until end of next round, or you can have martial channeling and stick with the previous slow(2) 0mp do about that much anyways damage because you have martial channeling. Level 30- Natural Mastery Blue Mage: Get +1 mp bonus(wait at the level you normally get +1 mp bonus?!), can learn master and ancient blue magic. Geomancers: Get an auto status based on your lowest stat. Earth: R: Crush, Wind: Float, Fire: Premonition, Water: Blink. This is permanent once set making it much less interesting than it could be. Goal 1, don't have wind as your lowest stat(float does nothing but make you immune to "Ground attacks"). Goal 2, have fire as your lowest stat harder but auto-premonition is nuts. Summoners: Get !Summon, which is....much MUCH saner than 3e. On the round you summon you get Wall(I:Physical, not I:all, it's sort of the physical counterpart to reflect.) and some auto-status or elemental absorbs/weaknesses related to your summon, however since you have a summoned monster out you can't !Call anything else. You can however spam gungir with that Auto:Strenghen (Physical) Odin gives. Specializations !Quagmire: Is a slow(4) action, still ground targeting like earth slash and hits a single target for 17*WATER damage and does Slow for two rounds, at 40+ you can spend 60mp to make it group targeting. Not bad, not amazing but not bad. !Truce: Roll Water vs. (4+highest enemy fire), if successful no enemies will attack your party for this and the next 3 ticks. This is a mental effect. Question why FUDGE isn't this on the artist. Natural Resilience: Choose toxic, transform or seal. Gain I:That poo poo. Criticisms: My criticisms are threefold. 1) !Geotrance has that stupid terrain wheel and !Geomancy itself has 4 costs by mid levels(randomness, charge, mp,hoping you aren't in lava terrain). 2) The mp bonus is too low for a mage class. Give them a base of 2mp, or move the bonus mp for blue mages to level....10 and give it summoner's as well. Actually do both. 3) The class could use a pass on it's specializations, but the foundations are strong. Next up is the Monk who inherited the old magic ninja.....Did they do as good a job updating them to usefulness as the mime? WhitemageofDOOM fucked around with this message at 15:37 on Oct 14, 2018 |
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Oct 14, 2018 15:31
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Ratoslov posted:Sun Tsu is a really odd choice to be made into a cyborg super-soldier like this. I mean, Imperial China has a incredibly rich military history, they could have picked someone whose primary claim to fame wasn't writing a beginners' primer at how not to gently caress up at war. It's like if Neo-Italy decided to make Niccolo Machiavelli a megahacker with paired cyberkatanas. One is a guy a person on the street has some name recogition. The other is Guan Yu.
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Oct 14, 2018 18:38
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The closest Haqq comes to Kuang Shi are the Bakshi Bazouks and they only faint to become repeaters, they don't explode, IIRC. I swear, if you do Haqq and don't post Odalisque, the Worst Model of All Time...
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Oct 14, 2018 19:24
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