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Toughness got a use in 1st level wizards, who want to not die from a stray shot. Aside from that... it's a joke / punchline? dunno.
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Mar 4, 2020 21:51
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Gun Jam posted:Toughness got a use in 1st level wizards, who want to not die from a stray shot. The correct choice there is still Improved Initiative anyway. Dare your DM to kill your level 1 character while staring him/her down for actually starting at level 1.
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Mar 4, 2020 21:56
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And if your level 1 wizard dies big whoop, make another. But that spent feat on Toughness ain't ever coming back as you level up. It's just a pure trap.
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Mar 4, 2020 21:58
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Yeah, that's one strong thread of the rich tapestry of problems that a system with Toughness as an option has: If level 1 is swingy enough that death is very real without it, you're either pitching a very mud-farmer-y game (which is okay! that's a valid genre!) or one that accidentally becomes one. And if it's not enough to make a difference between life and death, then it's a dead feat, isn't it? So it's lose-lose unless you're playing within a specific band of gameplay that the rest of the edition's supplements and rules fails to support.
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Mar 4, 2020 21:59
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Xiahou Dun posted:And if your level 1 wizard dies big whoop, make another. I did specify "want to not die", didn't I?
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Mar 4, 2020 23:00
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 Alright, so I'm a little behind on getting this out. But it's not dead yet! (Previous posts are here, here, here, here, and here.) Part Four: Rules of Action So, Infinity splits up the action rules into separate modules. The main three in the corebook are Warfare (physical combat), Infowar (hacking), and Psywar (social combat), as well as a section on Vehicles. Later books add in further modules, such as mass combat or spaceship combat. The idea is that all of these modules can be used concurrently, and GMs will mix and match them to create memorable setpieces. The modules have some rules in common, however, and that's what this chapter covers. Rounds Scenes are divided into rounds, representing an amount of time based on the type of action sequence being played out. During a round, each character gets a turn, starting with all of the PCs, followed by any NPCs. The GM also has the option of spending 1 Heat stick an NPCs turn in before a PCs. During a turn, characters can take a Standard Action, a Minor Action, and a Free Action. Standard Actions are usually anything that requires a Skill Test, as well as other actions that take up most of a character's attention. Minor Actions are actions that take some focus, such as moving. Free Actions are anything that could be resolved with little effort, time, or focus. Standard Actions can be exchanged for a Minor Action, and Minor Actions can be exchanged for any number of Free Actions. Characters also have Reactions, triggered by enemies' or allies' actions. Characters can take any number of Reactions, but they cost an increasing amount of Heat: 1 Heat for the first, 2 for the second, etc. Attacks There are 4 ways to attack a target: Melee, Ranged, Infowar(hacking), and Psywar(social). Each attack method has a designated skill used, a range band they operate in, and a damage type. All attacks are Standard Actions, made as D1 tests. If the target decides to perform a Defence Reaction, the test instead becomes a Face-to-Face test, with the defender using the appropriate skill. Physical attacks, if they hit, hit a random body part determined by rolling on a table or rolling special Hit Location dice available, or you can spend 2 Momentum to choose the location struck.  A successful attack inflicts damage. Damage is a combination of a fixed value and a number of Ns. The base damage is modified by various bonuses or penalties, such as extra Ns for having a high rating in the associated Attribute. After adding everything together, roll all of the Ns and add the result to the fixed value for the final damage amount. If any Effects are rolled, all qualities triggered by Effects will activate. The defender then applies their Soak to reduce the damage. Soak comes in two forms, persistent and conditional. Persistent Soak is a fixed value, while conditional Soak is determined by rolling Ns. Soak can reduce the damage of an attack to zero. Any remaining damage after Soak is applied is subtracted from a character's Stress. Each damage type has its own Stress track. Damage is considered incidental unless 5 or more points of damage are inflicted with a single attack, or if the damage brings the character's Stress to zero. If either of these occurs, the character suffers a Harm, or two Harm if both occur. Harm represents serious injuries, and each Harm suffered also inflicts an additional negative effect, determined by the person who inflicted the Harm. Each type of Harm has a list of example negative effects in their respective chapter. 4 Harm os a single type is considered incapacitating, with additional negative effects depending on the type of Harm. NPCs can suffer fewer Harm before being taken out; Troopers have a limit of 1, Elites have a limit of 2, while Nemeses take harm as PCs.  There are multiple ways to recover from damage. Each Harm suffered increases the difficulty of that type of test by 1. Recovery tests represent a character's natural healing, or the self-repair programs of electronic devices. A recovery test can be made during an action scene to recover Stress, or you can spend Momentum or Infinity points to recover 1 or all stress of a particular type respectively. Outside of action scenes, resting for one hour allows for a D1 recovery test for each type of Stress, recovering everything on a success. Doubling the time spent resting reduces the difficulty by 1, to a minimum of D1. Recovering Harm must be done one at a time for each type of Harm, with a D1 test that removes a single Harm if successful. This test takes one day if they are suffering from a single Harm, or a week if they are suffering 2 or more. If a character is suffering multiple types of Harm, they can make recovery tests for each type simultaneously. Momentum can be spent to heal additional Harm during these tests. Treat tests represent professional assistance in fixing damage. Characters can use treat tests to assist characters making recovery tests. During an action scene, a treat test can be made to remove a Harm Effect, but not the Harm itself. Finally, a character can make a D1 treat test to remove one Harm from a patient plus an additional Harm for every Momentum spent. Treat tests made by a character on themselves increase the Difficulty by 1. Conditions The game has various conditions that can affect character during action scenes. While the names may suggest more physical impairments, many conditions can apply in any of the three action modules. Bleeding inflicts random damage that ignores soak at the end of each turn. Burning is similar to Bleeding, but it also inflicts mental damage. Blind and Deafened inflict mental damage in addition to increasing test difficulties. Checked, Hindered, and Stuck all affect character's movement. Dazed, Fatigued, Helpless, Staggered, and Unconscious either increase the difficulty of actions or forbid certain actions. Marked makes it easier to attack an enemy, and Prone makes it more difficult. Stealth Stealth in Infinity can apply to any of the three action modules. Sneaking up on an enemy with knife in hand is treated much the same way as launching a covert hacking attack, or subtly tearing down a person's confidence. At it's core, stealth is handled with three different character states. Revealed is the default state; other people can see them, they can be reacted to normally. Detected means the enemy can't see them, but has a general idea that they are there and where they are. You can attack and react to Detected characters, but the difficulty is increased by 2. Finally, Hidden characters are those the enemy cannot perceive or know they're there. You cannot attack or make Reactions against a Hidden character. The test used for stealth, a D1 Stealth test, is also known as a stealth state test. Any time a stealth state test is failed, the character's stealth state decreases by one step (Hidden>Detected>Revealed). Opponents can make stealth state tests a Face-to-Face test as a Reaction, or use a Standard action on their turn to force a Face-to-Face test. Any time a stealth state test fails, opponents can spend Momentum to move the character directly to Revealed. Stealth state test difficulty can also be modified by environmental factors, or assisted by other characters making distractions. To become Hidden, a Minor Action and a stealth state test is required. Once concealed, the character's actions are divided into three categories, as determined by the GM. Silent actions do not affect the stealth state. Sneaky actions require a Free Action stealth state test after being performed. Noisy actions allow opponents to make a D0 Observation test to reduce the character's stealth state by one, and also allow for Reactions to attempt to further reduce stealth. Characters can spend Momentum to make actions stealthier. Attacking from stealth makes the Exploit action easier and possible as a Free Action. Surprise scenarios, such as ambush, betrayal, or Mexican standoffs, are handled by Face-to-Face tests. Each side nominates a leader who will make the test, while everyone else assists. Each character on the winning side gains 1 Momentum and automatically acts first at the beginning of combat. If appropriate, they are also considered to be in a Hidden stealth state. Momentum Rounding off the chapter is a short table of Momentum spends applicable to any of the action modules. Each individual module chapter will have further options for Momentum.  And that's the basic action rules. It's nice that everything is standardized across the different modules, so you don't have to remember weird little minigames for each type of action. There are, of course, exceptions and corner cases, especially when getting into Infowar and Psywar, but overall it's pretty similar. Next up: Reach out and shoot someone
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Mar 4, 2020 23:16
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Gun Jam posted:I did specify "want to not die", didn't I? Yes but it's just making you straight up worse long-term. It's actually better for your character to die rather than get hosed over down the line. It's the character-building equivalent of a pay-day loan.
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Mar 5, 2020 02:54
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Tibalt posted:To point to d&d 3.5, the interesting thing about the Toughness feat isn't the +4 HP.
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Mar 5, 2020 09:36
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Part Five: Warfare Now that we have the basic rules for action scenes, we can focus on the first module, Warfare, for physical conflict. Zones Instead of using grid maps or measured distances, the Infinity RPG abstracts the environment into zones. Zones are based on the terrain and composition of the battlefield, with no set size or shape for each zone. Characters can move within and between these zones as they take their turns.  Range is similarly abstracted, divided into five categories. Range also determines what action is needed to move that far. You can only perform one movement action per turn.
Some attacks have a set range and can only be used at that Range. Other attacks, mostly ranged weapons, have an optimal range. Attacks made outside the optimal range suffer +1 Difficulty for each range band. This does include ranges closer than optimal. Observation tests are also affected by range, with Medium range increasing the Difficulty by 1, Long by 2, and Extreme by 3. Combat Zone Effects Of course, not every zone is going to be empty. Terrain effects add character and individuality to a zone, and make the battlefield more dynamic.
Examples of common combat zones include aquatic terrain (Difficult Terrain, with a complication causing the character to begin to drown), crowds (a combination of Difficult Terrain and Saturation Zone, with rules for panicking crowds if someone is shot), radiation and vacuum (Hazardous Terrain), vertical terrain (Difficult Terrain, with complication on a failure resulting in falling), and white noise (Zero Visibility Zone for high-tech visual aids). Warfare Actions and Reactions In addition at attacks and movement, there are several specific actions that can be taken during Warfare scenes. Many of these actions are also usable in Infowar and Psywar, and will be referenced later.
There are also several standard Reactions for Warfare scenes.
Warfare Wound Effects and Momentum The chapter closes out with sample Wound effects and additional Momentum spends for Warfare.
 So this chapter was pretty short, since it was just building on the basic rules from the previous chapter. I do like how zones are handled; it lets you pull maps or floor plans from just about anything and then quickly break up the terrain into a gameable state. There are a lot of things to keep track of, between available actions and Momentum spends, and that's only going to get worse as we add in Infowar and Psywar, but I'm a fan of crunch so it doesn't bother me. (And it's still less to keep track of than the miniatures game.) Next up: Hacking and You
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Mar 5, 2020 21:56
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Part Six: Infowar In the future of Infinity, almost everything is designed to interface with the datasphere. This means hacking can affect almost anything, making it a powerful tool for characters. In game terms, anything that possesses a Firewall rating can be affected by the hacking rules. In some cases, when there is little resistance or danger, a simple Hacking test can be enough to access the device or network in question. For more complex or dangerous hacks, the full Infowar rules are available. These can either be used as part of a Warfare scene, hacking characters within physical range, or remotely hacking into a network, where the conflict takes place using quantronic zones. Quantronic Zones Like Warfare, Infowar uses zones to represent the battlefield; in this case, the network the hacker is attempting to access. Each zone provides access to the files and programs in that zone, just like being in a physical zone provides access to objects in that area. Some objects will have their own Firewall values, and will need to be hacked to access and control them.  Range and movement for quantronic zones are treated the same as physical zones, although most quantronic actions can only be taken at Reach or Close range. (It is possible to extend your reach with repeaters, physical or digital objects that let you act as if you were in a different zone.) "Line of Sight" in quantronic zones is limited to the zone you're in, plus zones up to your Analysis Expertise steps away. Secured zones block line of sight without authentication. Stealth in quantronic zones is countered using the Analysis skill instead of Observation. Locating a Target The first step, of course, is to identify the target. This may require skill tests to figure out exactly where to go to get what you want. After the target is identified, further research can be done in the form of additional skill tests, to generate extra Momentum for the run. These tests can be anything from regular research to social engineering to physical infiltration. The Momentum generated can also be spent to gain additional info on the target, or to acquire authentication for the network. Next it's time to enter the target, via an access point. This is usually a zone the character has physical access to, or simply the easiest zone to access remotely. If the GM is using a preset network, it will usually have one or more access points marked. If there isn't a premade network, the GM can approximate one by assigning the target a Security Rating to determine the number of zones between it and the access point, and then modifying it by distance and a D0 Hacking or Analysis test from the player. Authentication A character's authentication in a system will determine what kind of actions they can do without having to make Hacking tests or inflicting Breaches. Authentication can apply to specific zones, and allow characters to ignore zone effects.
There are multiple methods of authentication available. Knowledge factors include passcodes, security questions, or even specific images or snippets of music. Ownership factors include keycards, RFID chips, and other physical objects. Biometric factors use something inherent to the user, such as DNA sequencing or retinal scans. Cube scans take biometric verification a step further and require checking the subject's thoughts and personality. Multiple options can be combined for two-factor authentication. There are several ways to gain authentication. For knowledge and ownership factors, the easiest option may be to simply steal the required object or data. Other factors might be replicated through technology. Infiltrating the target organization may allow a character to gain legal authentication as well. To spoof a target's authentication, a character can attempt a Hacking or Tech test, depending on the procedure used, or simply inflict a Breach on the target. Authentication can also be gained by hacking the server directly, as a Breach effect. When authentication is gained, it starts with a Quality of 0, which can be improved with Momentum. The Quality rating adds d20s to any Stealth tests made in the system. Quantronic Zone Effects In addition to the zone effects specific to quantronic zones, GMs can use many of the zone effects from the Warfare chapter with a little creative explanation. Terrain tests for quantronic zones would use Hacking, Tech, or Analysis, depending on how the effect is overcome.
Quantronic zone effects can be concealed with a D2 Hacking test. On a success, the effect is hidden with a Difficulty modifier of 0, which can be raised or lowered with Momentum or complications. Finding the hidden effect requires a character to scan the zone and make a D0 Analysis test modified by the Difficulty modifier. Success allows the character to see the effect. Zone effects can also be created on the fly, with the Hacking test varying by zone effect. The same Difficulty can be tested against to destroy zone effects, although enemy hackers can turn it into a Face-to-Face test with a Reaction. Infowar Actions and Reactions The following Warfare actions and reactions can be used during Infowar: Absterge, Assist, Defence, Exploit, Guard, Ready, Recover, Treat, and Withdraw. There are also a few Infowars-specific options.
Infowar Momentum Most Momentum spends in Infowar are by specific program, which can have a variety of effects. Breach Effects [list] [*]Blind: If the target is using Neural equipment, they must make a Resistance or Tech test to avoid becoming Blind. [*]Brain Blast: If the target is using Neural equipment, the hecker can deal a Wound instead of a Breach. [*]Command System: Force the target system to execute a command, such as activating devices, opening doors, or the like. [*]Data Manipulation: Directly access the target's files. Delete, alter, copy, create, and hide information. [*]Disable Function: One program or piece of equipment owned by the target stops working. Anything without the Non-Hackable quality can be affected by this. [*]Lock Connection: The target cannot disconnect from the system. Absterge can be used to clear this. [*]Revoke Authentication: Permanently remove a target's authentication for a system. This persists even after the Breach is healed, until the target is granted authentication again. [*]System Disruption: The target makes all tests using Comms Equipped or Expert gear with +1 Difficulty. [*]Spoof/Sniff: Duplicate the system ID of the target, gaining their authentication. [*]Tag: Allows the hacker to track the tagged target, and use them as a repeater. Another reasonably short chapter. I like how hacking is handled in Infinity; the similarity between Warfare and Infowar means you don't have to learn two wildly different systems as a GM, and hacking can integrate seamlessly into physical combat so the hacker isn't off doing their own thing. Next up: Making friends and enemies
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Mar 9, 2020 21:43
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In your experience, Tsilkani, how much of the game happens in each of the three scenes? The different rules are giving me strong Shadowrun vibes, where some characters dominate their preferred type of scene but aren't as helpful in other scenes. If I make a physical combat focused character, am I going to be sitting around waiting for the GM to finish up the hacking part of the adventure with the infowar characters?
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Mar 10, 2020 18:26
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Tibalt posted:In your experience, Tsilkani, how much of the game happens in each of the three scenes? The different rules are giving me strong Shadowrun vibes, where some characters dominate their preferred type of scene but aren't as helpful in other scenes. If I make a physical combat focused character, am I going to be sitting around waiting for the GM to finish up the hacking part of the adventure with the infowar characters? If they're doing a full remote hacking run from the safety of their own hideout, then yeah, the other characters are going to be twiddling their thumbs. The same is true for the full psywar rules; if the other characters can't contribute at all, then they're going to be bored. The game seems to work best when you blend elements together, having the hacker running through a system while the others defend them from enemy forces inside the target building.
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Mar 10, 2020 19:22
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Dragonlance?! DLE3: Dragon Keep  You know what? gently caress DLE3. It is undoubtedly the worst of the three modules in the DLE series and I'm not even going to give it a full and proper review because it sucks poo poo. But let's recap. In DLE1 and 2, good dragons were having a rough time, so the PC's helped them by curing their plagues, fighting off their bad guys and generally putting up with their insufferable bullshit and cursed corn garbage, and at the end of DLE2 they were stranded in a dragon cat's space crib, forced to take care of its baby. Said dragoncat, or ko-dragon, Abriele, had "helped" the PC's in DLE2 by giving them a stupid loving clue they didn't need, and has now started DLE3 by UPHOLDING THE BALANCE, because she's Neutral-aligned, you see, by giving Artha, the primary villain, the secret she's been hunting all along, passing her the location of the portal to the Astral Dragon's plane on the red moon, Lunitari.  So you might think to yourself, how could they gently caress up a module where the party has to go to the moon to fight dragons? Seems pretty boss, right? But they hosed it up anyway. Chapter 1 The party goes to Artha's TREASURE DOME under the sea to find the magic canoe that'll let them fly to the moon. Their guide is Abriele's husband. There they fight a bunch of monsters they can one-shot and which are all irrelevant except for a single sea-beholder that might nuke them with save-or-dies. The game also demands that they rescue Khardra, Artha's boyfriend, who is somehow resurrected thanks to Khardra's magic, and use him as a guide. In this chapter is set up that Zeboim, evil storm goddess, has a rivalry with Artha, which is never used for anything except once where the party has sea shells thrown at them by Zeboim, completely wasting the potential of a divine vendetta in terms of storytelling, scene-setting and general cool stuff. The Sea Dome is filled with mostly three types of items for the players to loot, either items of value that are A) too huge to cart around and B) useless because the players have no need for conventional gear any longer, their only interest is un-buyable magic upgrades, cursed items that kill the players instantly or items that imply cooler and more interesting things to do in the setting(like the fine armory of a tribe of smurf-sized elves that Artha did battle with). Also every step of the way Abriele's baby is there and it does nothing and contributes nothing all it does is annoy the players repeatedly by demanding food and then burping out literal debilitating gas when fed. It will also attempt to eat the PCs' faces for attention, very adorable behavior. Chapter 2 So the party finds the sky canoe and sets off into space. Along the way they encounter a MYSTIC SEMI-SENTIENT NEBULA THAT WISHES TO KNOW THEIR SECRETS oh except none of that is revealed to the players it's just a space fart that envelops them briefly then goes away, completely wasting any potential that might have had. On the moon they also encounter a wizard in his UFO, he is completely irrelevant to the plot, refuses to contribute anything, ignores all questions. They find a neutral God porking some mortal lady in a forest on the moon, he is completely irrelevant to the plot, refuses to contribute anything, ignore all questions. They find the ghost of one of the dragons they saved in DLE2, guess saving him was loving pointless, who gives them a chest with a Magic Plot Item. If they don't blunder into him, the book says to have him just ghost-teleport to where they are with the Magic Plot Item. Then they find the cave with the portal to the Astral Dragon's Plane in it, except it's been sealed up so the good dragons can't dislodge the evil dragons from it before they activate the portal... who sealed it up? A smug idiot eco-terrorist pacifist elf from DLE1 who was like "ah yes if they can't reach each other they can't fight and no one can die, never mind the untold devastation the evil dragons will cause when they subdue the Astral Dragon and conquer the entirety of Krynn." The solution is for the players to explain to her that she's a loving idiot. Note no references to Khardra because he's pointless except as an annoyance to keep yelling at the PC's to get moving. The chapter climax is a huge battle against evil dragons with supporting good dragons in a system that has no real support for mass combat except individually simulating every single combatant and praying for death. Chapter 3 THE ASTRAL DRAGON'S PLANE, where it turns out that oh no, Abriele's husband has betrayed them to Takhisis. She made him lure them and Khardra to the moon because she wanted to recruit the PC's as her lieutenants. Except realizing they might accidentally give the players agency, the writers decided that Takhisis changed her mind about that plan like five seconds after the PC's arrived and now just wants to kill them instead. Congrats you dumb sack of dragon, you just got yourself killed. Also count another subplot that doesn't loving matter. So they turn up at the Astral Dragon's pad and Artha is already there but also already dead because gently caress letting the players fight the main recurring villain, Takhisis just zapped her. Also it turns out the Astral Dragon is actually two dragons chained together, a good dragon and an evil dragon that balance out into a neutral dragon, except Takhisis broke the chain and that means she gets to own all of the previously non-existent neutral dragons that are just gray and have no personalities or interesting traits nor any purpose beyond aggressing against the protagonists. Much like all centrists. And then Takhisis turns Artha's corpse into a clone of herself, and it eats Khardra instantly, more or less, making him completely pointless. The players can't actually fight Artha, they can at most knock her out for a single round. The solution to the CLIMACTIC BOSS BATTLE is that one of them has to hold the Magic Plot Ticket from Chapter 2 while holding hands with Abriele's traitor husband, thus REFORGING THE LINK BETWEEN MORTALS AND DRAGONS and making the Astral Dragon wake up and banish Takhisis. Then it complains about Abriele and her husband accidentally doing good things, and the players wake up at home with a chest full of treasure, and it turns out the innkeeper that started them on their adventure in DLE1 was actually a silver dragon all along. DLE3 is stupid and I loving hate it and I want to set Dragonlance on fire.  Kree! Maybe if we hold hands we can banish Dragonlance with the friendship between humans and skeletons!If only, skeleton warrior, if only. Sadly no magic can save us from Dragonlance.
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Mar 10, 2020 23:33
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We never did DLE3, because the DM said we probably wouldn't figure the solution to the end fight out. gently caress him and gently caress that stupid adventure.
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Mar 11, 2020 01:34
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Oh yeah guess I got angry enough to skip a few words but the HANDHOLDING CEREMONY has to proceed uninterrupted for seven combat rounds against a store-brand knockoff of a literal deity that cannot be permanently put down by any amount of firepower, oh and each time you knock her down she gets back up with all breath weapons refreshed.
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Mar 11, 2020 01:45
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I'm gonna be That Guy as gently caress, but that moon has a diameter of about 86 miles from some super simple math. That seems more than a little small. It's still bigger than the smallest moon Deimos, but for the record the Earth's moon is like 2,000 and change in diameter. Guys, I think I found an unrealistic thing about the moon-dragon adventure.
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Mar 11, 2020 04:19
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Xiahou Dun posted:I'm gonna be That Guy as gently caress, but that moon has a diameter of about 86 miles from some super simple math. Luna is unreasonably big.
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Mar 11, 2020 05:11
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Phobos is about a thousand and change as well, picking another random moon. 86 miles in diameter is god drat tiny. It'd have to be pretty low in orbit even be visible as an actual moon and not a dot. Which means Nuitari would have to be even smaller and closer for those weird moon-eye shenanigans. And Nuitari is specifically only "visible" because it blots out stars (plural!). God knows how the tides work on Krynn. I don't think the astrophysics of this setting with magic and dragons and magic dragons was really well thought out, is what I'm saying. PS while DLE3 the module looks dumb as hell and I'd never play it, I want to buy a van and paint the cover art on it.
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Mar 11, 2020 05:44
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I am officially declaring my abandonment of the 1e Mage Night Horrors book, because it is tedious as hell and interconnected in really dumb ways that make it hard to present - everything is all callbacks to each other in a way that makes it very hard to write self-contained posts about any single thing in it, without actually being cool enough to interest me. Really annoying. However, in the time I've not posted in this thread, two new Night Horrors books have come out for 2e! Night Horrors: Spilled Blood, for Vampire, focusing on new bloodlines, and Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed. for Mage, focusing on soul-stealing and evil wizards. Which one do you guys want to hear about first?
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Mar 12, 2020 16:00
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Mors Rattus posted:I am officially declaring my abandonment of the 1e Mage Night Horrors book, because it is tedious as hell and interconnected in really dumb ways that make it hard to present - everything is all callbacks to each other in a way that makes it very hard to write self-contained posts about any single thing in it, without actually being cool enough to interest me. Really annoying. Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed!
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Mar 12, 2020 16:15
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Since I'm slowly making my way through Nameless and Accursed, I'm curious to see your opinions.
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Mar 12, 2020 16:57
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 Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed This time around, the book opens by telling us its main themes are cautionary tales (of the 'there but for the grace of God go I' sort), temptation and the lure of power, grief or anger to lead you to downfall, and denial that you've done anything wrong at all. In other words, this is about what happens when a mage goes bad. It also seems to want to examine ways wizards can fight that are interesting and fun, given the potential for wizards to end things very fast if they've had time to figure out how they want to approach a problem. One of the bigger suggestions it makes is to make everyone declare intent when a fight starts and using that alongside the Beaten Down rules from the core, with expansions for stranger and less physical forms of conflict, to emphasize the power of magical violence. A mage might become Beaten Down and lose when they run out of Willpwoer or Mana, suffer a Tilt that effectively incapacitates them somehow, suffer a dramatic failure involuntarily, or succeed at and/or resolve an Act of Hubris of some sort, becoming overcome by realization of the consequences of their actions. Social consequences are also given to consider - Consilia, for example, usually forbid killing other mages unless they're legitimately dangerous to everyone, and the presence of Sleepers around a wizard fight can mean dealing with a lot of very nasty mental collateral damage. If you don't go out of your way to avoid witnesses, it's really easy to accidentally run into a Sleeper and gently caress them up - or have their presence gently caress up magic. Chapter 1 focuses on rival mages - normal Seers, Pentacle wizards and Apostate or Nameless mages whose focuses are likely to throw them into conflict with PCs. We get three Pentacle mages, three Seers, two Apostates and one Nameless Order. Chapter 2 looks at Banishers, mages that hunt and destroy other magic. Some do so out of hatred from past trauma or delusion, some out of a quest for power via destruction, and some because their soul got hosed the hell up by an Awakening gone wrong. We get one of each. Chapter 3 is about the Rapt, mages who have lost all Wisdom and become obsessively focused on a single thing to the exclusion of all else, because if they don't, their magic will erupt from them uncontrollably. We get four of these. Chapter 4 is for Scelesti, mages that deliberately and willingly wield the power of the Abyss. Most are nihilistic in some sense, and their corruption can run into their very nature. We have six of these. Chapter 5 is Tremere, mages who have consumed their own souls and now consume the souls of others. They are simultaneously a Nameless Order and a subtype of mage that has Hollow in place of Wisdom, and there are several Tremere Houses that function in different ways in regards to souls. Six of these! Next time: The Spanner in the Works, the Arrow's Poisoned Tip
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Mar 12, 2020 17:39
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That was a quick turn-around. And I really appreciate Tremere being a Mage-antagonist instead of being a Vampire-splat. It's a really good change that I always forget until it comes up again but needs its place in the sun, so to speak.
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Mar 12, 2020 17:51
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Night Horrors: Nameless and Accursed I'm The Guy That Sucks  Gwydion, birth name Sam Drayton, is an Acanthus and member of the Guardians of the Veil. Before his Awakening, he was married to a nice lady, had two kids, and was really, really boring and really, really bored. One night he decided not to go home and just to go driving, flipping coins to decide which roads to take. He spent all night driving, watching probability and fate play out in front of his windshield. He decided that this was it - this was what he was going to do. He was going to walk every road, see every path and possibility. gently caress his nice and boring home, this new life wouldn't be boring. He spent a year or so wandering American highways, interfering in the lives, fates and histories of people he ran into and then moving on. He saw himself as a kind of helpful trickster, getting people out of the patterns they'd worn into themselves, spreading chaos for fun and avoiding all consequences...for that first year, at least. Everything changed when a cabal of Guardians helped him fix a mess he'd made out of a neighborhood's collective fates. During this, Gwydion saw his own future, though the Paradox he'd gathered made it impossible to tell how far into the future the event was. He saw his own death and a city-wide disaster...and then all the threads he'd traced leading to that future broke, and while he spent weeks resting with the Guardians, he was never able to find them again. While he's never really been a great fit for them, he ended up joining the Guardians of the Veil, not because he believed in their weirder views but because he'd witnessed firsthand the risks of irresponsible magic use. He's learned that he's really, really good at pushing people away from or closer to weirdness and at helping his colleagues find candidates for Awakening. While he still spreads chaos, he doesn't do so freely. Rather, he gets flashes of future disasters connected to...well, someone nearby, at least, though he's not always sure who. Once that happens, it's time to gently caress up past and future in ways he hopes will change what he's seen, leaving it up to everyone else to clean up any fallout he causes. Gwydion is a black guy in his mid-30s, though he looks somewhat younger than that and has a face that's easy to trust. (Bad idea, that.) He's friendly and cheerful with his victims, tearing up their personal timelines with a smile. He likes casual jeans and button-downs, as they fit in just about anywhere, and he really enjoys confusing people still, even if it's not the whole of why he does things any more. He likes watching other people fix the problems he causes, and especially loves when he can tell that it's fixed the future he foresaw. He particularly enjoys using other mages' obsessions and pursuit of Mysteries to get them to do his dirty work. His Nimbus causes perception of time to slow down, so that you can tell everything that's happening every instant. His Signature Nimbus, the sign that he's done magic, is a slow-motion mental loop of embarrassing memories in those that witness his magic. His Long-Term Nimbus (the series of events that play out around him repeatedly due to his magical nature) causes people to miss appointments, buses and other events by making people just slightly too late. Gwydion has, however, not totally abandoned the life of Sam Drayton, though he tries to let others believe he has. He shows up at his old home on birthdays, anniversaries and other big events, and he's still really interested in his kids and their lives. He will even use his magic to help them succeed at hobbies, sports and academics. His future vision seems to have taken place some point in the 2020s, and he's not sure how much of what he saw was real and how much was metaphor and symbol. He believes a major Scelestus is going to try to destroy as much of the world as possible, but has been entirely unable to figure out the specific details, except that he will be present at it and the sky may or may not tear open. Several of his fellow Guardians hate the guy and many are surprised he hasn't been kicked out, because when given the choice between his own goals and the Order's, he's always going to favor his own. He's screwed up their operations enough and gotten enough other Guardians into deep poo poo that many Guardian cabals try to ensure he leaves town as quickly as possible unless they need his help. Gwydion resents them for this, but he doesn't have any kind of blackmail or other ways to make them be more accepting of him. Once, Gwydion got interested in a cabal called the Hereafter; they think they pissed him off, but he just thought they were interesting. The reason they think they pissed him off? He decided to mess with their history and ended up causing the events that brought them together to never have happened, because he wanted to see if they were destined to come together in a different way if he did. They did...but one of the original members of the cabal died before they all got back together, and they are not happy. They still have some indistinct memories of the friend that died whom they now never met, and they really, really want revenge on Gwydion. Mechanically, Gwydion's a clever and fast guy but not a physically powerful one. He's very well educated and good at gathering information, hard to track, and extremely good at Fate and Time magic. His main Obsessions are understanding the vision he had of his own death and understanding the methods by which Destiny as a concept selects people for specific fates. He also wants to make a friend that isn't influenced by his own fate. His Virtue is Persistent and his Vice Impulsive, but he can put on a Masque that alters his persona, shifting them to Humble and Greedy respectively. He is also a member of a Legacy called the House of Ariadne, populated mostly by Acanthus, Seers and Guardians. The House of Ariadne, AKA the Metropolians, believe that the myths of Ariadne, Thesus and the Minotaur are a metaphor for enlightenment and Supernal truth in the heart of a city. They follow the tangled threads of Time and Fate that gather in such places, which they believe turn a city into an entity made of far more than the sum of its parts. They study the streets and secrets of their cities in search of the past and future, solving the Mysteries built into their homes to discover Truth. They focus on crowds, alliances, rumors, walking the city and city landmarks as tools for magic, and can regain Mana by discovering new things in their home cities, watching the sun rise or set from high places in the city, visiting tourist spots and attending elite or private events. Their first Attainment is Attune, which combines Time, Fate and the Streetwise skill to let them randomly walk a city's streets for several hours in order to receive visions of the city's history or that of the people within it - including the mage themself. They can choose particular subjects or moments to envision (within limits) but can't control the precise moment they see, thanks to the Fate of the city choosing for them. This can also happen without their deliberate action after they attune themselves to a city once. With Space, they can also learn about the sympathetic connections of those they see in their visions. They also get a bonus socially when in a city they've attuned to, but get a penalty socially in rural or wild places. Suburbs are no bonus or penalty. Other Attainments are not listed, but are noted to require urban environments to function (as does Attune), and that most only work once a city has been attuned at least once. "Urban" is based on how the inhabitants view the place, rather than legal definitions. Overall, Gwydion is an easy enemy to slot into a game - he gets interested in a local destiny and starts doing time fuckery. Good time travel foe who isn't, y'know, literally the God-Machine or otherwise way more than you might be able to deal with as a time traveler. However, he's going to go down hard in a confrontation he can't control, and your players may be annoyed by how easy he finds it to run away. Next time: The Arrow's Poisoned Tip, because mages are complicated and can be an entire post. Mors Rattus fucked around with this message at 18:47 on Mar 12, 2020 |
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Mar 12, 2020 18:44
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I’m torn because I’m just finishing a long-term Mage game, and this new stuff is both really cool and feels weird when it doesn’t line up with my own setting elaboration, you know?
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Mar 12, 2020 18:54
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Oh God are you saying there are people worse than Gwydion to come? "this guy just whimsically fucks up the past and future of whoever happens to catch his attention" sounds like the sort of thing that could unite several disaparate types of supernaturals to hunt him down.
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Mar 12, 2020 19:15
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By popular demand posted:Oh God are you saying there are people worse than Gwydion to come?
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Mar 12, 2020 19:33
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Considering what mages can get up to even when they're pretty firmly considered "the good guys", Gwydion is on the level of "kind of a troublesome rear end in a top hat."
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Mar 12, 2020 19:34
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I do like that Gwydion's just an rear end in a top hat, like, there is nothing inherent to his particular brand of magic that's awful. The House of Ariadne are just people who think truth and enlightenment can be found by walking around a city at random. He's just an rear end in a top hat.
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Mar 12, 2020 19:35
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Well, it's been a wild few months, but I'm back on the archiving. Currently processing page 54.
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Mar 12, 2020 19:39
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Mors Rattus posted:I do like that Gwydion's just an rear end in a top hat, like, there is nothing inherent to his particular brand of magic that's awful. The House of Ariadne are just people who think truth and enlightenment can be found by walking around a city at random. The House are a perfectly normal Legacy - they're from Legacies: The Sublime aaaaaall the way back in first edition. I've had players who've used them for their characters. It's just Gwydion being an rear end in a top hat. We wanted, in a book filled with deviations from the normal Mage rules to cover Tremere, Scelesti, Rapt, and suchlike, to have this first chapter be... Just mages. Normal mages. Who you would want to punch in the dick.
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Mar 12, 2020 19:40
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Side note, had the Rapt received any real attention before this? I can barely remember that they were a thing.
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Mar 12, 2020 19:41
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 Buck Rogers XXVc: The 25th Century Designing Your Own Gennies: I Was Working in the Lab, Late One Night...  This section is prefaced by a “Players: Read no farther!” warning, which always seems a bit much to me in games that aren’t Paranoia. Like, yeah, knowing adventure details is no fun, but here we’re just talking about some of the GM tools. It’s kinda mixed with setting information, though, so maybe they wanted to keep part of that secret. Anyway we start with an acknowledgement that the box set doesn’t have a “bestiary”, a collection of enemies for the players to face. The “Gennies” detailed in Characters & Combat are a starting point, but the following section lets you create new Gennies to serve as NPCs. (There’s not a lot of guidance about generating NPCs in existing species, but at this point games like this basically told you to pick some numbers that looked good.) Genetic engineering is a long and exacting process, but as the book reminds us, a GM can just declare any creature successfully put together by fiat. For the sake of detail, though, we’re given an overview of how it works both in-setting and mechanically. (They recommend using this if a Scientist NPC is creating a gennie on behalf of the players, which seems an unusual situation but of course some PC group probably tried this.) So anyway, genes spliced from one or more organisms are placed in egg cells of a suitable host, and when you get an embryo, it must be placed in a specialized growth vat until it grows to maturity, a rate of one day for every pound the final specimen weighs. (This is weirdly specific.) Halfway through this, the Scientist has to make a Difficult Bioengineering skill check to determine if the specimen is even viable- a failure means you screwed up somewhere in the process and the organism will die. It’s a bit like coding. If it survives, the Scientist makes another, Average Bioengineering check to see if the organism turned out like it was supposed to- a failure means some unforeseen mutation has cropped up, it’s viable but now your ultimate killing machine is now an excellent concert pianist or something. Finally, you check to see how long it takes to educate- Gennies learn quickly, taking 4-7 months with modifiers based on the Charisma of the Scientist. There are three rules regarding what Gennies can and can’t be. Their abiltiies have to be ones that already exist in the wild, you can’t make one with laser eyes or the ability to breathe fire. Their characteristics have to be derived from the animals they’re based on, you can’t just make a humanoid with two heads. (They also note that “superintelligent animals” aren’t really a thing- you can’t fit a human-sized brain in a frog’s skull.) Finally, they’re designed for a purpose, they have some task the company wants them to be good at or a role in an ecosystem. quote:The science of gene manipulation is advanced, but not so advanced that someone can walk into a laboratory and say, “Let’s see what we get if we cross a garter snake with a platypus.” Listen, Pondsmith, that may not be how YOU do things… The game breaks down the process of actually writing up a Gennie into five stages. First you think about the environment they’re going to operate in, with a list of possible adaptations for said environments- a Gennie sent to a high gravity/pressure world would have dense bones and muscles, etc. Then you figure out your genotype, that is to say, which animal formed the base template. Gennies are never quite 50/50, there’s always a base. The third step is filling in a lot of its physical/cultural info, filling in the blank Gennie Profile Sheet included in the game. The fourth step is balancing the critter out, making sure it has advantages and disadvantages. There’s some suggested GM dickery if your PCs insist on trying to make a superpowered Gennie and somehow the NPC Scientist succeeds on the Bioengineering roll, just give it a really dramatic disadvantage (the suggested one is the creature goes into a violent frenzy when exposed to light.) Maybe that’s not necessary. But there’s a nice list of suggested disadvantages for a Gennie based on its strengths. Finally we get to Game Statistics. You can determine a Gennie’s attributes the same way you do a PC, with random rolling and assigning the numbers. However, the game outright says you can then adjust them to whatever’s appropriate to the creature designed, and set minimums and maximums based on the advantages/disadvantages the Gennie has- I suppose random rolling can help flesh out a Gennie, particularly one the PCs want made, but most of the time you’ll want to skip right to assigning numbers by fiat. Gennies can have as many kinds of hit dice as PCs, and it’s based on whether they’re more focused on combat or other abilities. Armor Class is assigned by eyeballing the Armor Class Table (and the additional info in the Technology Book, which we’ll get to) and comparing that to whatever kind of protection/evasion your critter has. And this basically works for Saving Throws, Movement, and THAC0. Only Gennies based on humans can have skills, and at this stage you’re only assigning ones that every Gennie of that type knows. Non-human Gennies are more like AD&D monsters, and you’ll want to note down things like their climate, frequency, number appearing, all the stuff in the Monster Manual. (Indeed when we finally get to the Gennies detailed in supplements they’ll have entries formatted pretty much identically to the AD&D 2e monster manuals.) This section closes out with a detailed example, called “From Theory to Practice: Building the Ganyman.” The Ganyman was described earlier in the entry on Jupiter’s moons; they live under the ice of Ganymede and are mostly into algae farming. So we start with that environment, cold and dark and aquatic. The creature starts with a human genotype, to which fish characteristics are added- gills, scales, fins, etc. Physical/Cultural Data is more detailed: they’re up to ten feet long, weigh up to 300 lbs., have no noses, large eyes, and mouths full of sharp teeth that they only use for defense since the algae they feed on doesn’t need to be chewed. Cultivating the algae is a big part of their society, and they export some of it to the outside world, which is the most contact they have with other species most of the time. For balance, the Ganyman can breathe water but has to remain in water, resists cold but is weak to heat, has high Con and Str. but lower Wisdom and Charisma, tough skin but they can’t wear most armor, and most interestingly- they have the teeth as a natural weapon, but since they don’t have shoulders they can’t use rifles. Some of these advantages and disadvantages are baked into the Game Statistics, and they end up with a natural AC of 4, 3d8 hit points, and a THAC0 of 19. They’re given similar movement to the Delphs, and their bite is like a sword (with a similar range, assuming they can lunge at their target.) And with that the Ganyman is complete. They don’t actually get a proper write-up here, though they are detailed in No Humans Allowed. So that wraps up Gennie creation. It’s a bit weird, blending in-setting stuff with GM tools and guidelines for PCs who can tell NPC scientists to make them a Gennie, and it doesn’t completely make up for the lack of a proper bestiary. While balance is talked about in general terms there aren’t many guidelines for building “monsters” and NPC races with an eye towards making enemies in the game. Still there’s some useful stuff here, and the Ganyman’s a good example of what you can do. Next up, the book will talk about adventure design!
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Mar 12, 2020 19:42
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"sorry I had to keep you from meeting your wife, but somebody was going to shoot the mayor. o well!"
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Mar 12, 2020 19:42
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Mors Rattus posted:Side note, had the Rapt received any real attention before this? I can barely remember that they were a thing. Left-Hand Path had them, but even in the 2e corebook they were the Mad until it became clear that saying "we know this is a bit insensitive" doesn't give you the clear to do it anyway.
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Mar 12, 2020 19:44
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I like how Gwyndion's whole deal is wondering "Hmm, what will THIS button do?" even though he knows for a fact that what that button will do is irrevocably gently caress up people's lives
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Mar 12, 2020 20:03
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The button might do something else too, though! We have to discover if the button does something as well as loving up lives! We cannot stop pushing the button, for the sake of science.
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Mar 12, 2020 20:06
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Also a group of wizards literally want to revenge kill him for killing their friend, so he's probably not long for this world.
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Mar 12, 2020 20:14
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It's like teenage me loving with savegame files to see what will happen, except you can't backup human life and he doesn't care.
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Mar 12, 2020 20:16
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Mors Rattus posted:Side note, had the Rapt received any real attention before this? I can barely remember that they were a thing. As Rand says, they're name-changed Mad Ones, which were in the 1e corebook then ignored until Left Hand Path where they got proper rules. We changed their name because, well.. They were called Mad Ones. A happy side effect is that we finally have an in-setting name for the actual process of losing your last Wisdom dot: Rapture.
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Mar 12, 2020 20:49
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