|
Cythereal posted:Come to think of it, I suppose part of the grog backlash against Blue Rose and the genre of fantasy it represents is that Romantic Fantasy, in general, is very cognizant of being fantasy. The world wouldn't work like that, of course not. The point here is to imagine a world where it does. Where you can make that kind of difference with a magical singing voice, and where you're accepted and lauded for who you are. It's not about hard facts or logic, or "If you think about it rationally..." I suspect given the target market of the books is young women sexism is also a driver
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 08:28
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 19, 2024 04:51 |
|
|
wiegieman posted:I can almost guarantee I had more fun reading 40k books (the good ones, not the bad ones) last month while I was supposed to be working than the people reading Art books, and let me tell you, those are the very yardstick for genre trash. Oh absolutely, no arguments here, but then there is a huge rear end debate about whether that was more "meaningful" than reading through something saddening/ wanky as it were. Falconier111 posted:But popular fiction? Monstrous. Why would they think so? neonchameleon posted:The difference with Soulbound is that rather than starting as a shitfarmer who has (for whatever reason) had enough of shitfarming you start out as someone special, blessed by the gods and given respect wherever you go. Shitfarmers are background characters. Yes, but the lore of AoS (that we have gotten so far) doesn't want to use that story and most of the literature associated with Warhammer (back in the old days) also didn't deal with it. It's just that, as a collective entity we've decided that the thing we really liked about a setting was one small part of it, and are now getting a bit sad that the wider audience/ corporation does not seem to appreciate the thing we really enjoyed. The game has also had it so that you can start as a squire or a bretonian knight. You could start as shitfarmer and become "Hero Of The Empire" and that's a good arc, but it isn't the only one in that RPG. Personally I'd agree with you. I like the "peasant to knight" pipeline. It's just that the "I want to play a cool character from the off" is also nice.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 09:23
|
|
|
Rand Brittain posted:On the other hand, WHF did give restaurant reviews when detailing a city. I don't recall anything like that in Soulbound. Not in any of the corebooks I've read, but y'all will look for ANY reason to be mad at AoS I guess. "did not have restaurant reviews, 1 star" Speaking of, you guys DO realize there's still a WFRP right? And it's in its 4th edition? With a new release every month? So you can go play that? Instead of talking about how sad it is that you apparently can't do that at all ever any more because AoS is oppressing your table by existing too close to it? Right? Guys?
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 09:56
|
|
|
 Part Nine: The Proper Application of Wisdom is SWORD TO THE FACE Courtiers are the first instance where we step up the complexity on our Secret Arts a bit. Mechanically they're still pretty straightforward, but they are the first Archetype we've discussed that deals with two different Kinds of Condition, and they're the first (at least in the order we're discussing the Archetypes) that has a full suite of Manipulation options and a real Toolset Lore that limits how they can use their Secret Arts. Like Scholars, they use a few different Skills for their Arts, but where Scholars use different Skills based on the topic of their predictions, Courtiers use different Skills depending on what they're trying to do: Awareness for Discovery, Inspire for Manipulation, and Confidence to resist Courtier Arts. Courtiers deal in Passions and Inspirations. Passions, as the name implies, are excesses of emotion. They're usually Weaknesses, but not necessarily. Which emotion goes with which element is presented on the Five-Element Cycle diagram we looked at back in Part Seven, and it's clear enough that I'm not going to repeat it here. Inspirations, on the other hand, represent the higher ideals and principles you aspire to. Conversely, they're most often Hyperactivities. The principles' Elemental associations are also presented on the Five-Element Cycle, but mechanically each of the five represents a pair of Virtues, which are what actually matter to the mechanics, so let's pause to discuss those for a moment:
 This tense diplomatic negotiation over tea is about 3 seconds from turning into a furious kung fu duel, while remaining a tense diplomatic negotiation over tea. I'm going to be honest, based on the actual descriptions of Metal and Water Inspirations, I'm pretty sure Revenge and Obsession are supposed to be swapped here. Observe: Metal Inspirations posted:Perseverance Inspirations focus on the fulfillment of duty, whether that of a farmer or of a glorious hero. At best, they drive you to fulfill the duties that have been entrusted in you by your position or confidence. A corrupt individual focuses only on the duties that they personally prize. This might entail: Water Inspirations posted:Balance Inspirations strengthen the character of an ordinary person, inspiring humane behavior and a strong moral compass. For Wulin, matters of right and wrong are more dire: Balance urges people either towards bloody justice or vicious revenge! The difference between a Chivalrous and a Selfish individual’s expressions is one of motivation. The former strives to correct matters that offends them on a philosophical level. The latter strives to adjust what offends on a personal level. As one might imagine, even Chivalrous heroes tend to stray. Conditions might be: You be the judge. Anyways, Discovery for Courtiers works a little differently depending on if you're trying to Discover a Passion or an Inspiration. You roll Awareness for both, with a base difficulty ranging from 10 to 100, depending on how plausible it seems. Discovering Inspirations, however, has an additional table of modifiers based on the values the target has in a Virtue associated with the Inspiration--at least, for targets that have Virtues: most minor NPCs don't, but I suppose that's easy enough to quickly eyeball. On a success, you Discover a Trivial Condition: a Weakness if you're Discovering a Passion or a Hyperactivity for an Inspiration. On a critical success, you get either a Minor Condition of the appropriate Type or a Trivial Condition of the opposite Type. In either case, you get to choose one of the following Recovery options: Duration 5, Interval 1 Scene or Duration 1, Interval 1 Story. This is one of those cases where having concrete rules for when you get to start making Recovery rolls would be really helpful in assessing when you'd want to pick either option--obviously the intent here is "require more rolls but they get more frequent chances" vs. "one lucky roll clears the Condition, but if they fail it sticks around for the whole adventure," but exactly when they get to make their first Recovery roll matters a lot--if they have to wait the full Interval after a failed Resistance roll, you're almost always better off with the second option because you're guaranteed a full adventure's worth of the Condition. If you're allowed to start trying to Recover immediately, the 5/1 Scene option gets more useful, but that opens cans of worms elsewhere in the rules. There's one other difference between the two, which I would probably houserule away: when Discovering a Passion, the Recovery Difficulty is always equal to the result of your Discovery Roll, whereas when you Discover an Inspiration, you can choose between the higher of your result and 30 (if you Discovered a Trivial Condition) or 40 (if you Discovered a Minor one). I get that this is because of the extra modifiers on the Inspiration Difficulty can drop the Difficulty really low, so you might end up succeeding with a trivially low result--but that's somewhat true even without those Difficulty modifiers, and it leads to weird cases where the more overt and obvious an emotional display is, the easier it can be to get rid of. TL;DR I'd let any Secret Artist using any Art set the Recovery difficulty to either their result or 30/40. EDIT: After writing this update I went back and spot-checked the Doctor's and Priest's Discovery Lores, and both of them also have the "higher of your roll result or 30/40" rule, so I'm more confident in saying that its omission in the rules for Discovering Passions is an error. Courtiers have two Manipulation Lores: one for Passions and one for Inspirations. They start with one unlocked for free at character creation, and each has basically the same unlocks to spend additional Destiny on--this means that Courtiers have a lot more opportunity for Cultivation than any other Archetype except Priests (who are either tied or come out ahead, depending on how you read a particular rules ambiguity in the Priest's Art). They have the full suite of Manipulation options we talked about back in Part Seven, except Internal-External Technique. Their specific applications have a couple of wrinkles: When they use Yin-Yang Technique to create a Passion out of an Inspiration (or vice versa), they can create the new Condition in someone else rather than the person with the initial Condition. This requires that you interact with both characters and they have to interact with each other--could be a three-way conversation, letter exchanges, a free for all battle royale, whatever. Their Paired Condition Techniques create two Conditions of the same Kind, unless you've unlocked both Manipulation Loresheets, in which case you can create one of each. They also get our first instance of the Quick Work technique, which lets you use your Secret Arts in combat--and I'm now realizing that we skipped that section in the combat update and I forgot to cover it in the Secret Arts introduction post. Oops. Anyways, if you have the Quick Work technique, you can spend 1 Chi to use your attack action to make a Secret Arts attack. This replaces your main action, it's not a Minor Action, but you can still use Marvels, internal kung fu, or other techniques that give you a Secondary Attack. You use your Secret Arts Manipulation Skill (Inspire in the case of Courtiers), and if you force a Rippling roll, you get to create one of your Secret Art Conditions instead of an Injury. You don't have a Damage bonus with a Secret Arts attack, but by the same token your target doesn't get to add their Armor or Toughness to their Chi Threshold. In addition, you do face the same modifiers for plausibility as you would if you were creating an after-combat Condition. Finally, a Secret Arts attack can never directly take someone out--even if you triple or better their Threshold or Inflame a Major Condition. The Courtier's tools are the Confucian Virtues: when describing your use of the Secret Arts to Manipulate Chi Conditions, you must incorporate one of the following:
Next Time: KUNG FU MYSTICISM! GimpInBlack fucked around with this message at 12:48 on Apr 10, 2021 |
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 11:18
|
|
|
Chapter 8: Bazaar, pt. 15 Degenesis Rebirth Katharsys Chapter 8: Bazaar VEHICLES You glimpsed them in the lovely adventure, but you can bask in their full manifest glory vehicles! They're a very unusual sight in the post-Eschaton world – and so are the rules: quote:The KatharSys rules are tailored to people and their equipment. While the combat rules take vehicles into account, these rules don’t have the same depth and detail as those for one-on-one combat. Here, creativity is required: Surge Tanks are stopped by attaching explosives to their chains, not by making Action rolls. “Tailored to people” must surely mean “focused on human-scale characters and small arms” as Degenesis was obviously designed without any regard for anyone attempting to play it.  That bit above beautifully illustrates both the general unwillingness of Degenesis to provide tight rules and the lack of graceful translations. Oh, and as the adventure writing shows, there’s a lot of creativity required in rolling to snipe the Giant Enemy Weakspot.  Gearing Up Vehicles have slots. What you can add to them aside from weapons is between you and the gamemommy.  The dude who designed the Taurox is suddenly aroused and he doesn't know why Repairs To repair the body (chasis) of the vehicle, is AGI+Crafting, with difficulty equal to the tech level of the vehicle. Successes repair a body point each, taking 10 minutes and 10 kilo of scrap per. Just imagine a Scrapper throwing random bits of metal at the puncture hole in a motorcycle gas tank, hoping something will get lodged in, and then leaving 9 kilos of scraps behind. For “mechanisms” (so, engines and stuff), it's INT+Engineering and an hour per point. Multi-Variant A side section that points out that the vehicles listed here are just generic examples, and it's up to you and GM to bring souped-up custom jobs and KP-bil to life. I was going to make a Speed Freekz joke, but Degenesis certainly lacks the customary orkish joie de vivre.  Sluggish Sidesection: Boat big and fat, so some table entries list acceleration and braking in rounds. Oh, would that I have posted this during the Suez Meme Crisis... Artillery >Vehicle weapons use AGI+Navigation which is one way to make drivers less prone to MAD, but it also makes you crack Hellevetic markswoman a lot shittier when it comes to mounted guns. >Flamethrowers, harpoon throwers, and machine guns are small enough to fit almost any vehicle, but cannons and catapults would only fit Surge Tank or bigger. As to why one would want a catapult is a question left unanswered. Vehicles >Surge tanks are only ones who have 6 mod slots, enough to fit the 4-slot heavy weapons. They also cost 1.5 mil. Good luck earning that! >You can mount an MG on almost anything save for a Scrapper tractor rig (but including motorcycles). However, Buggies, Koms and Apocalyptic Bikes have slots enough for flamenwerfers.   [Muffled, mirthless "whee" in the distance] Boats and Ships >Tankers are the largest, fattest boats you can get, braking for 20 rounds, and being able to take two cannons. >That's 6 fewer slots than the Armed Catamaran used by Apocalyptic pirates. >The tanker is also about half as expensive as a Surge Tank. DOMESTIC ANIMALS Domesticated >Mounts stand out in the crowd as the general situation is too dire to keep animals you won't eat. >Mounts can be trained, but who cares, the rules are wishy-washy, and only there to stop from outrunning a motorcycle with a Newcrest. >Mammoths: as fast and maneuverable as a chargers, 6 times more expensive, a lot tougher, and have more training slots. Helpers Side-section: you can train a crow or a gendo, but it's kinda hard, and you have to give your GM a kiss or something to hash out the details. Next time: How to discover a cache of medschool degrees
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 14:12
|
|
|
I know next to nothing about tank design but that thing looks stupid to me. Even comparatively to the first generation of tanks.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 14:29
|
|
|
By popular demand posted:I know next to nothing about tank design but that thing looks stupid to me. Even comparatively to the first generation of tanks. That has to do with it being 40k tank design. IIRC they're sandcrawler scale. So yes, wildly impractical. Triple edit: One, I hate that the free edition of Degenesis hosed the bookmarks SO BADLY when it used to be bookmarked down to the subsections (you could jump directly to every Cult's equipment, for example, which is what would be very helpful here...). With that in mind, yes, "sandcrawler scale" is actually inaccurate - it's much larger. "In the cargo holds, tons of artifacts can be stored, and the garage offers room for 12 Koms. Koms being the Scourger cars, of course. Two, apparently the image I was thinking of (as a stylistic basis for something animated) is now used as the inside front cover. Pulled from my PDF hence the gap, whichever artist did it probably has a higher res version on their Artstation since every single art piece makes it there somehow.  Three, mood on Maze below, I've also been meaning to do more than just the one Red Markets post (more of that, some more Degenesis thoughts including my big "what can we actually salvage here", that sort of thing). Motivation, detail, and psyching up is hard. SkyeAuroline fucked around with this message at 15:44 on Apr 10, 2021 |
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 14:36
|
|
|
Should be more Maze this weekend. I thought much too hard about how I was going to handle each section of the dungeon and how many words to waste on each room and blah blah blah instead of actually writing anything, hence the delay.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 15:31
|
|
|
Feinne posted:*Snip TSL* The Conditions as health is an innovation from Masks, and I think it's a great hack for genres like this, where your feelings are more important than your hitpoints.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 16:04
|
|
|
GimpInBlack posted:WULIN I was going to disagree with you on the virtues, because I was pretty sure the book has them in specific pairs, and that's what the Inspirations are building on, but then I looked at the character sheet, and behold:  So they do use specific pairs, and they mixed up their pairings here. Whoops!
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 16:12
|
|
|
Part Ten: Spiritual Boxers The small human has decided she wants nothing to do with me and just wants to watch TV so screw it, let's talk about Priests today, too. The Conditions Priests work with are Curses and Influences: Conditions created by the world itself in response to human actions and emotion. While they are overtly magical, the Daoist knows that they are still the result of logical cause and effect, even if that logic follows the invisible world of spirits and natural Chi rather than the observable world. They always have their roots in Passions (for Curses) or Inspirations (for Influences)--in fact, knowing about a character's Passion or Influence is very good justification for a lower Difficulty when Discovering a Curse or Influence (and vice versa). A Curse is a Condition that causes something that should be happening in your life to be blocked or prevented. The will of Heaven as it pertains to your destiny is being obstructed, which leads to all kinds of calamity. As you might guess, they are usually Weaknesses. Depending on the specific Curse, it might fall on the same person who has the Passion, or on the subject of that Passion. The varieties of Curses and their elemental associations are:
 And trust me, Daoist Witches really don't need the help. Anyways, the Priest's Discovery Art relies pretty heavily on your ability to notice (or bullshit) patterns--basically, any time you think you've noticed a pattern of good or bad luck from a character, you can try to Discover if there's a Curse or Influence at play. This can be general in-game events or even mechanics. If you've noticed that Righteous Devil Po has flubbed an attack roll three times when you've fought him, and each time was on or near a body of water, you might roll to see if he has some kind of boat-related Curse. Much like other Discoveries, your Difficulty value is based on how plausible your justification seems, and you create a Trivial Condition on a success, and a Minor Condition or a Trivial one of the opposite Kind on a critical success. Priests Discover Conditions with Wu Wei, which is also the Rsistance Skill. Like Courtiers, Priests have two Manipulation Lores, one each for Curses and Influences. They can use all the Manipulation techniques we talked about in Part Seven, but have to buy them separately for each Kind. They Manipulate Conditions with Learning. Priests use the arts of Daoist Sorcery as their Toolset when Manipulating Conditions. These include Incantations (basically, yelling at the spirits and threatening them with legal action if they don't comply), which can grant a +5 bonus if you, the player, come up with a whole entertaining reading of the mystic riot act, Finger Gestures (a Difficulty 10 Minor Action like the Courtier's Propriety, worth +5 if you use something like a ritual ribbon or sword), Talismans (paper charms with written spells, worth a +5 automatically but single-use and must be prepared in advance, or +10 if you can make a Difficulty 40 Learning check and spend a few hours), Breath Sorcery (lets you just spend Chi), and Pacing the Constellations (also worth +5 automatically, but you can't go travel--or, in combat, change Zones--while using it). Prayers, Exorcisms, and Divination of auspicious and inauspicious omens also feature, but those are more flavor than mechanics--though if you're doing auguries a lot, you might want to learn the Scholar's arts as well. Next Time: KUNG FU MALPRACTICE LAWSUITS!
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 16:38
|
|
|
Age of Sigmar: Lumineth Realm-Lords Elflympians  Alumnia is essentially the archetypal Tyrionic nation. Unlike the Teclian nations, the four Tyrionic nations revere the sun over the moon. They consider swiftness of thought to be more important than scholarship and find honing the body to be even more vital than honing the mind. They are athletes and warriors more than mages or scholars. Of all the Teclian nations, the Alumnians arem ost renowned for their courage and drive. Their cultural ideal is to surpass that which has come before. They pussh the boundaries of experience and skill, always looking to blaze new trails and break new ground. Many Alumnians become explorers solely for the joy of going to places no mortal soul has ever seen. Alumnian youths are encouraged to be daredevils, climbing mountains, swimming vast distances and traveling through dangerous wilderness simply to prove they are able to do so. Some others of the Lumineth nations say that the Alumnian tradition of the frontier is actually a form of arrogance and that they have no true right to claim those parts of Hysh that have gone untouched for eons. Certainly, many Alumnian explorers have died when they attempted to push their boundaries too far, and Alumnian bones can be found in many monster lairs throughout the Mortal Realms. However, they have also accomplished truly amazing feats that no other aelves would even dare to attempt. They draw their ideals from the legends of the god Tyrion, who first explored the Ten Paradises of Hysh and sought to reach the Border Inimical. They say that he did this not only to seek evidence of his people still existing, but also simply to seek the joy of knowledge and discovery itself. Even when he found the landscape dissolving into abstraction and light, he kept going, and so he earned the respect of the sun itself, at the cost of his very eyes. This great feat is what the Alumnians hope to duplicate in spirit. Of course, entering Haixiah is dangerous and even foolhardy. Most understand it is a one way journey, and even those who somehow return are always utterly changed by the experience. Those who manage to reach the boundary that lies beyond the deserts and plains almost all lose their vision due to the radiance of Hysh's light, but the Alumnians say this is worth the risk, for they gain new and brilliant insights into reality through it. Any explorer who manages to return from Haixiah is hailed as a Luminarian, a rare but extremely high-status person. Their eyes glow with energy and they shine with an aura of power that is unmistakable. The Luminarians are spoken of in hushed tones of fear and respect, and in some nations their stories are told to scare unruly children into behaving. It is said that the intensity of their sightless gaze can even cause paper or cloth to burst into flame. Any time that the Lumineth need to explore a dangerous place, the Alumnians are sure to volunteer for the job. They would die rather than seem cowardly. Those found outside Hysh tend to be more experienced and taciturn types, worn down by what they have seen and prone to ignoring those who seek their advice or try to follow them. That said, if they are impressed enough to talk to someone, they are quick to share valuable knowledge, and often know things that few others have any idea about. This is starting to change as the Lumineth end their self-imposed isolation, however. The Alumnians are at the forefront of this, heading out at the head of Lumineth expeditions to other realms and offering their services as trailblazers, trackers and guides for other nations in return for the promise of being given full and proper funereal rites should they die in their explorations. In death, Alumnian souls are frequently found exploring theu nderworlds of Shyish, eternally seeking out new realms to prove themselves in the afterlife.  Helon is a nation that is constantly being blown around at all times by sentient air currents. Some are small and relatively friendly, like the zephyrs that play in the meadows at the heart of the nation, but others are terrifying cyclones that tear out any plants that grow on the cliffs of the Luminaris Sea. The eldest winds date back to the birth of the Mortal Realms themselves, though most of these elemental spirits have no interest whatsoever in befriending the aelves that live near them. They remember well what the Lumineth once did to their lands during the Ocari Dara. Others, however, have made semi-permanent peace with the aelves who demonstrate enough humility to ask them for help. The landscape of Helon is pretty flat, with few hills or mountains, but is home to a high number of metaliths - floating stone islands generated by the cosmic forces the empower Hysh. The Lumineth of Helon harness these stones for a number of uses, the most important of which is the popular sport of metalith racing. Young Helonites often race each other with grapling hooks and tethers to climb atop a metalith, then use artificial wings or patagia to fly on the high-speed winds around them. This is considered not merely a showing of skill and agility, but also a test of spirituality and charisma, as the best racers must be able to convince the living wind to carry them higher and faster than the others. The sport is vital to the Helonite culture, because racers learn to get along with the elemental spirits of the wind and many end up forming lifelong bonds with these creatures. Like the aelves, the Helonite winds are highly competitive and often take great pleasure in carrying their devotees faster and more wildly than other winds can. Helon is famous for its Great Skyrace, in which young Lumineth put on a display of aerial mastery with wings, kites and even magical pyrotechnics in an effort to prove themselves faster, more dexterous and more in tune with the wind. The wind spirits love the landscape because the wide savannahs and floating islands provide a perfect environment for them to frolic and move as they like, creating artistic displays in the grass and stone...or, well, they did before the Ocari Dara, when the Helonite mages tore out massive craters from the land. It has taken much time since the Reinvention to earn back some of the trust of the native wind aelementors. Many who would in the past have raced solely for entertainment now offer themselves as servants and devotees of the wind, to offer back the service that the wind so often gave them. Their hard labor at restoring the damaged landscape earned the respect of many wind spirits, and the Hurakant temples of Helon are easily the most powerful of their kind. Helonite archers are famous across Hysh for their skill, in large part thanks to their service to and cooperation with the wind spirits. Even the ferocious desert-wind Sevireth has chosen to join the Helonite forces in battle. He's not very fond of living things that can't fly, but he hates Chaos even more and has chosen to work with the Hurakan to help them destroy daemons. In battle, the Helonite forces favor constant motion. They move quickly and shift attack vectors in the blink of an eye, combining Vanari and Hurakan forces to keep their foes off-balance. They focus largely on ranged combat, creating deadly hails of arrows and avoiding contact with the foe as much as they can. They lack the depth of field that, say, Ymetrica favors, and they aren't so skilled in magic as Zaitrec, but Helonite armies take it as a point of pride to keep their casualties low even in mass battle. Some Helonite extremists even claim that anyone who allows themselves to be caught in melee deserves what they get, though they are by far the minority. Next time: Wizards, Dear Reader
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 16:49
|
|
|
Libertad! posted:Last but not least, superheroes as a genre are incredibly broad. Even from the same publisher and era, they have very different set-ups and aspects. Peter Parker’s comics mostly detail an otherwise normal young man whose down-to-earth worries of schooling, his job at the Daily Bugle, and Aunt May help emphasize his grounded nature of a “Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man.” The X-Men focuses on themes of prejudice and the fear of humanity being upstaged by hyper-evolved mutants, with said mutants trying to find their place in a hostile world. Then there’s the Silver Surfer, a space-traveling artificial life form who has trouble relating to Earth at all and often acted as a voice of reason against our petty, backwards ways during the Silver Age of Comics. Each of these characters have different levels of power, but strong attempts at emulating their comics into RPG form will result in very different systems and settings unless one goes for a ‘generic’ approach. Hell, even the city as presented is that bad design tic of "we'll give everyone every option so you can play whatever you want!" that pretty much always results in a bland mishmash of unrelated ideas. The "D&D can do anything" idea applied to setting design. Also, it's loving hilarious to me how even in a game where everyone is supposed to be a high-powered superhero the writers are completely incapable of giving fighters something interesting or mechanically effective.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 17:00
|
|
|
Hipster Occultist posted:And that’s basically it, there’s some lead stuff for Black Atlantic, but I’m not going to cover that. Aww  Great writeups of terrible adventures! And I finally realised that Jehammed = Jesus + Muhammad
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 17:26
|
|
|
PoontifexMacksimus posted:Aww gently caress, how have I been trying to carefully navigate around the right inspiration terms for the Jehammedans (more clearly than "vaguely Abrahamic faith") this long and you just drop this on me Also to clarify on the original comment, "not covering those ties to Black Atlantic" or "not covering Black Atlantic at all"?
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 17:33
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:Not in any of the corebooks I've read, but y'all will look for ANY reason to be mad at AoS I guess. "did not have restaurant reviews, 1 star" We have a few restaurants named in the City Guides for Brightspear and Anvilgard.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 17:45
|
|
|
Josef bugman posted:Oh absolutely, no arguments here, but then there is a huge rear end debate about whether that was more "meaningful" than reading through something saddening/ wanky as it were. The basic operation is that people agree that literature should influence how you think, challenge you, change you as a person in a way that lasts. And great literature really can do that! Literature is also not a bounded category, but a valuation made of works from all sorts of genres. Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus is literature and science fiction (and gothic, etc). Litfic, being the publishing category that emulates the value category 'literature,' is understood to have those qualities that make a work meaningful and life-changing (replicating mostly the Modernist novel and then a bit of an echo chamber within the genre of litfic). This means grappling with the Hard Questions, like, 'why do I feel so alienated living in capitalism' and 'how do I deal with the inherent transience of all things' and so on. It also means a focus on texture, lyrical prose, ideas ordered by character internality, and a dedication to realism and day to day life (again, this is aping the Modernists - Virginia Woolf, however, wrote To The Lighthouse and litfic generally doesn't come close to that). Popular and genre fiction, which does not explicitly pursue these particular genre qualities, is kind of illegible to the litfic lens. It's not trying, to their eyes, to be 'meaningful' in the proper way, or engaging with the specific structures of their form. They've mistaken their genre's form for quality, of itself, which is not something SF fans don't do, but which in this case is much more influential. Litfic also has the advantage of being able to point to the Modernist novel, or Cormac McCarthy, or any number of literary writers, and say 'we're just doing that genre, which is not a genre but just The Novel' and because they're copying stylistic elements, it looks plausible. A litfic afficionado is looking at how well a book Does Litfic, but insists and believes they're looking for how well it Does Literature.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 18:45
|
|
|
E: double post
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 18:49
|
|
|
Red Markets: a Game of Economic Horror Part 15: Gear porn in my economics game? More unlikely than you think  Rather than go over every piece of equipment in deep detail, I’m going to go more broadly over mechanics and highlight a few stand-outs. Red Markets opts to genericize gear to make things run more smoothly (instead of ten different models of every gun, for example, most guns just fit under “Handgun”, “Shotgun”, and “Rifle” with upgrades altering them). As has been pointed out, the design of gear plus last section’s upkeep rules means that RM incentivizes improving specific pieces of gear - a nice little “signature item” sort of thing. So what do I get, actually? Ten bounty, a backpack, and rations. Everything else you’re on your own for. When you’re making your character, spend that 10 bounty how you want or keep it for yourself; afterwards, you need to pass a Networking check to source gear, and of course you have to earn your own bounty. Gear Features Every piece of gear consists of its effect, charges, and qualities. Effect is pretty straightforward “what does it do”, qualities vary by item, but charges are the big one to focus on here - every tool has limited usefulness, and charges are where we monitor them. Just about every item has ten charges, total; some items with the “Hungry” quality use two charges each (effectively has five charges), a few qualities reduce the total number of charges, and some items are Static and ignore charges. But generally, ten charges per item, regardless of what that does. Convenient solution to the problems of gun porn in particular - a charge is the ammo used for x effect, not every individual bullet. Four different ways charges get used, depending on their spend quality:
Buying, Scavenging, and Selling If you cut all the fluff out of this particular section you could fit it drat near on an index card. Buying things up front is a Networking test to find the seller, then pay double the upkeep to get it. Scavenging, pay upkeep plus a skill to assemble it, with access to a workshop of some sort; there’s an extra fun wrinkle that you can scavenge to reduce the materials check, as long as you’re out in the Loss and getting the resulting encounters. Selling can be a little more complicated, because it’s the first interaction with the MBA rules (their own chapter on ”the crew running a business”). Fortunately, for one character selling for their own profit, it’s easy enough - just a Networking check. In the best case you sell at upkeep x3, most of the time upkeep or upkeep x2. Keying sale costs off upkeep while having some variability to it is smooth enough that it should work in play. There is also a block on roleplaying the sale, in which Stokes just decides to invoke “the Market can offer up pointless moments of cruelty with potential mechanical pittances and punishments”. (The example given is “old man buys Suppressin online, spent his entire savings, his wife is about to turn, every possible ending here is bad and the Market should call for Self-Control checks penalizing the player for selling their gear; if they’re lucky they get a +Rep spot though.”) Okay, but where’s the guns? As mentioned, going with the highlights instead of every single thing. Weapons and Armor In a fight, things like Clubs, Hatchets, Handguns, Rifles, and Shotguns are likely your best fallbacks. They work in pretty much every scenario, Clubs are so cheap that they don’t even cost ADP to refresh and have no Upkeep (you just have to make a Scavenge check to refresh them), and they have pretty low upkeep relative to the effects they have. Naturally, you don’t want to be in melee range fighting casualties, either. (Additional note, some of the weird editing comes through here with misnamed qualities and unclear quality text. It’s nothing that prevents use but does make it a little harder on a read. The biggest mechanical editing mess-up is certain explosives, which don’t actually have upkeep, having unclear prices that make them either good or very, very bad.) A few weapons are considered Specialized and need specific skills, but are also pretty effective - Bows and Crossbows are both excellent stealth weapons if you can invest in them and have extra utility factors, Heavy Rifles are absurdly strong weapons if you can match their 5 (!!!) Upkeep on a job, and swords are the only weapons able to upgrade with a full +3 Kill damage and a bonus to your rolls without extra cost, just in case you wanted to be a zombie-fighting samurai. They do eat up even more of your resources to focus into, but they’ll also reward them. There’s also a handful of tools definitely meant for fighting people and not casualties, like the aforementioned Heavy Rifle (which, fully upgraded, ignores cover and armor & does a box of Kill and Stun alike), and the plethora of explosives up to and including incendiary mortars. Explosives, thankfully, don’t cost any upkeep even if they’re quite expensive to keep in stock.  If you want to actually protect yourself… uh, carpet! Can’t bite through carpet, so zombies can’t get you if they bite your arm. Chainmail makes a comeback and with enough investment is actually drat near fantastic (you can buy off all of its downsides, and it covers everything but your legs against everything in melee), a nice touch. Fancy advanced body armor… is very effective, although funny enough a bulletproof vest is more effective against fire and only fire. (Yet another editing oversight I think, considering how the mechanics of armor are moved around and written a little differently every time.) Also happens to drastically slow wearers that get infected, so useful if your buddy gets bit. And… that’s everything except the riot shield, actually. (Does what it says on the tin.) Medic! I appreciate the opener of a blood-testing unit with an optional DHQS model that doesn’t require first aid checks at all, but sends infection results (and immunity) straight to the DHQS. Hell of a tradeoff there. Similarly, you can also get a StopLoss bracelet to call for medevac from mercenaries (Trauma Team style) at the quite high cost of 10 Upkeep, even stabilizing you if you’re otherwise going to be dead… at the cost of Immune Takers getting disappeared and Latents or infected put down. Bit of a gamble, and a hell of a cost. Red Markets also has a surprising amount of depth behind its (battery-powered) prosthetics. They’re not perfect and have limited motor control “at market discretion”, but you can get fun features like “Kill damage on unarmed attacks” or splitting the cost of Athletics checks off of rations and onto the gear. Plus they’re semi-armored. Guess you can lose an arm or a leg after all and keep going! Some other drugs mixed in with various effects, nothing incredibly flashy. Tools and Pets Pretty much what you’d expect throughout and not a ton to talk about though. A few interesting things do pop up, though, like DDJs (anti-casualty landmines that shoot out carbon nanotube wires and cut up/kill casualties) and some of the working animals (the Dog alone is a full half-page of qualities and upgrades). Potentially more interesting are the drones in particular - quadcopters exist and are fine for surveillance, but you can also get the exorbitantly-expensive Dron-key, your own BigDog that can have a shotgun stuck on its back and carry a ton of cargo. Cool. One tiny upgrade you might otherwise miss: Ubiq Specs, those Google Glass? “App: TriggerGuard provides +2 to Self-Control checks when used.” Any taker should be very ready to shell out the 5 Bounty to get some TriggerGuard specs, IMO. Vehicles Vehicle rules are… a lot. They cost a ton, they’re a pain in the rear end (even starting the motor takes a Mechanics check), their charges are stupid-expensive (30 Bounty for a full tank on a car!), but they can carry a hell of a lot of haul for what they are. There’s not really much to say here besides “if you can afford it, it’ll save you time and danger in exchange for eating all your money”.  The art also sucks. Next time: Combat. Hitboxes ahoy.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 18:51
|
|
|
By popular demand posted:I know next to nothing about tank design but that thing looks stupid to me. Even comparatively to the first generation of tanks. The four independent sets of track aren't the stupid part - they're featured on the famous Sno-Cat, it's just that people doing fiction are bad at design. No, the big thing about Siege Tanks is how stupid big they are. When talking about WWII, we already poo poo on stuff like Tiger II for being dummy thick, too heavy for bridges, and so on. Siege Tank is planned by someone who thinks that Ratte is a good idea - and meant to be ridden in terrain more hosed up than WWII Europe ever was while having the logistical support chain of "three Balkhani who weren't fast enough to run away." I can't find the spot, but I think they mention that Surge Tanks sometimes need to be disassembled to cross some places, which is a loving tall order*. INCIDENTALLY, I WAS RIGHT ABOUT CORPSE BEING A PIRATE BASE. *By the way, Soviets seem to have been really hell bent on making mobile bases for Arctic exploration, in both wheeled and tracked varieties. Take that, Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey!
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 18:57
|
|
|
PoontifexMacksimus posted:Aww Sorry, what I meant was I'm still going to do Black Atlantic, just not the little bits at the end of the Killing Game that lead into it. Also, we'll be finding a lot about Jehammed himself in BA as well, so stay tuned!
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 19:19
|
|
|
Hipster Occultist posted:And that’s basically it, there’s some lead stuff for Black Atlantic, but I’m not going to cover that. All in all, much like the last adventure, The Killing Game is a railroaded mess. What’s worse is that these books are presented as a trilogy, but aside for like 1 npc and a macguffin that literally gets handed to you at the end, there’s no narrative threads that link In Thy Blood and The Killing Game. You could literally just have the disc and star fall from the sky along with a bunch of xp, and send your PCs right into Black Atlantic. If you’ve come to Degenesis to solve the setting mysteries and figure out what's going on with the Recombination Group and all of those weird techno-zombies and cyro-sleepers, (and the gross mutant + space evolution rock) that’s the book that will actually begin to touch on that stuff. Yeah, the whole thing with Jehammed's artefacts is just base nonsense. Acquiring stuff like that is worthy of adventures itself, and now they're like DLC content you get for completing an adventure. Blink and you'll miss, and they don't tie in thematically into anything, and you as the player aren't invested in then at all. As for HAHA ISN'T THIS SO DARK AND TWISTED aspect, this is probably the worst module I've read since Glory for EC. Ctech had it's fair share of HAHA WORLD IS BRUTAL AND UNFAIR, SHEEPLE poo poo, but this feels more concentrated.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 19:45
|
|
|
Might need a sit down to understand this tbh.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 19:56
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:
My genre of run on sentences about people being smeared across the old west like Doom textures.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:14
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:Not in any of the corebooks I've read, but y'all will look for ANY reason to be mad at AoS I guess. "did not have restaurant reviews, 1 star" Not in the corebook, no, but the Middenheim book, say, was fairly big on describing different inns and eating establishments and talking about the quality of the food and the individual people who run them, which gave me the impression that individual people and their lives are important to the game. Meanwhile, when I gave Soulbound a try I found myself bouncing off of "oh, the wonderful magical Stormbound Eternals slaughtered three-fourths of their own city but they're definitely not fascists or any similar bad thing." I'm not going to judge people for liking it but I wasn't really able to feel much empathy for any of the groups I was allowed to play as.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:15
|
|
|
Honestly what Red Markets is doing with budgeting is something I'd kind of like to have seen in WHFRP. I think it would have fit.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:27
|
|
|
Rand Brittain posted:Not in the corebook, no, but the Middenheim book, say, was fairly big on describing different inns and eating establishments and talking about the quality of the food and the individual people who run them, which gave me the impression that individual people and their lives are important to the game. The Anvilgard and Brightspear books have those details. As they are city guides like the Middenheim one. Also the factions are not entirely unified. Of the Stormcast the Knights Excelsior for example are crazy, authoritarian, and merciless. While the Hallowed Knights are the inverse and incredibly caring, and tend to be merciful even towards Chaos types.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:33
|
|
|
JcDent posted:Yeah, the whole thing with Jehammed's artefacts is just base nonsense. Acquiring stuff like that is worthy of adventures itself, and now they're like DLC content you get for completing an adventure. Blink and you'll miss, and they don't tie in thematically into anything, and you as the player aren't invested in then at all. The funny thing is, the beginning of Black Atlantic specifically says that the PCs need both the Disc and Star in their possession going in. None of the previous books really do a lot to impress upon the GM or the PCs just how vital and important it is that they keep it, rather than sell it/give it to one of the cults for a big reward. Its very possible that your PCs will not have it going in, and that you'll have to pull some more poo poo to get it back to them Also, if you think this adventure was bad, oh man are you in for a (disgusting) treat with Black Atlantic. Don't spoil it SkyeAuroline
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:36
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:The Anvilgard and Brightspear books have those details. As they are city guides like the Middenheim one. Ah, I missed those since they're included inside other products I was less interested in.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:38
|
|
|
Hipster Occultist posted:The funny thing is, the beginning of Black Atlantic specifically says that the PCs need both the Disc and Star in their possession going in. None of the previous books really do a lot to impress upon the GM or the PCs just how vital and important it is that they keep it, rather than sell it/give it to one of the cults for a big reward. Its very possible that your PCs will not have it going in, and that you'll have to pull some more poo poo to get it back to them I believe I've discussed it here already. Which one though? Dogs? "Dreams"? One I'm not remembering off hand?
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:42
|
|
|
Rand Brittain posted:Not in the corebook, no, but the Middenheim book, say, was fairly big on describing different inns and eating establishments and talking about the quality of the food and the individual people who run them, which gave me the impression that individual people and their lives are important to the game. Froghammer fucked around with this message at 23:22 on Apr 10, 2021 |
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 20:55
|
|
|
SkyeAuroline posted:I believe I've discussed it here already. Which one though? Dogs? "Dreams"? One I'm not remembering off hand? The dream and what follows after yeah. I don't think you'd ever gone over it in detail, which makes it so much worse.
|
|
#
?
Apr 10, 2021 21:28
|
|
|
Tsilkani posted:The Conditions as health is an innovation from Masks, and I think it's a great hack for genres like this, where your feelings are more important than your hitpoints. Yeah I'm a big fan of it, especially with some of the other stuff the game does with it later on. For one thing, it lets moves essentially use health as a resource more often because players are going to be less worried about being Defeated than they would be about dying in a game with traditional health.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 00:09
|
|
|
Joe Slowboat posted:The basic operation is that people agree that literature should influence how you think, challenge you, change you as a person in a way that lasts. And great literature really can do that! Literature is also not a bounded category, but a valuation made of works from all sorts of genres. Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus is literature and science fiction (and gothic, etc). Also worth noting: as much as they like exploring Hard Questions, they’re deeply uncomfortable with anything that provides an answer. Unlike, say, grognards, the litfic world genuinely welcomes and accommodates women within its ranks, and it’s not uncommon for them to embrace people of color or queer folks too. The thing is, while saying “being black/gay/a woman makes me uncomfortable” is lauded, saying “being black/gay/a woman makes me uncomfortable and here’s why” absolutely isn’t. Attempts to explore broader social issues are discouraged, with standard arguments including “it distracts from the focus of the narrative”, “it’s dry and mechanical instead of emotionally rich”, and “it’s forcing politics where they don’t belong” - which, again, sounds familiar. These are all genre constraints being mistaken for Requirements For Art, and in action they subtly imply that any social message makes a piece of literature less artistically valuable. The litfic world is packed full of the sort of people who acknowledge that change is needed but instinctively distrust change, an attitude supported by their subculture’s leeriness of Politics. I keep drawing comparisons between them and grogs for a reason. Both groups are highly insular, value extensive experience in a specific area, believe their area of focus is obviously and inherently superior to its equivalents, regard those who support competing viewpoints as deluded or ideologically-driven threats, and keep themselves ideologically pure by insisting they’re the only ones that don’t have an ideology. As for what this means,  . It’s just kind of bizarre that two very different groups function so similarly.Froghammer posted:I mean, you're also not supposed to find any of the factions in Warhammer Fantasy sympathetic either. They're all painted as morally grey at best and a non-homogenous group of various conflicting interests at worst. The worst and best part of Warhammer is that everybody is an rear end in a top hat. Their special brand of universal mutual assholery is what sets Warhammer properties apart. Without it, AoS is just another gonzo fantasy setting, and those aren’t exactly thin on the ground. Granted, when it’s present it leads to stuff like fascism and nightmare game modules, but without it it’s nothing special.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 00:18
|
|
|
Falconier111 posted:The worst and best part of Warhammer is that everybody is an rear end in a top hat. Their special brand of universal mutual assholery is what sets Warhammer properties apart. Without it, AoS is just another gonzo fantasy setting, and those aren’t exactly thin on the ground. Granted, when it’s present it leads to stuff like fascism and nightmare game modules, but without it it’s nothing special. What's funny is that to me, this wasn't the deal. Rather, what mattered to me was everybody had assholes and everyone was a goddamn mess. You had genuinely decent people all throughout as well, and there were certainly groups written to be more generally on the right side of things (read: Not wanting to be annihilated) but since everyone was a goddamn mess you had sympathetic vampires (in among the much more common assholes), cool mummies, etc mixed in with hat enthusiasts, french people, etc.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 00:26
|
|
|
  Chapter 4: Ghaistala and the Ring of Virtue This covers the “big picture” history of the world of Ghaistala, as well as common religions and the prominent superhero group known as the Portaleers. Ghaistala had divine icons who rose out of nothingness, much like any typical D&D world. The Titans embodied seven virtues, with concepts such as Intellect, Honor, Friendship, and Duty. They created planets in a solar system they dubbed the Ring of Virtue, each taking a personal celestial body as their home. Ghastaila was not claimed by any Titans and civilization grew from the flourishing life. But a foul power of evil nonexistence known as Nul arose, spreading chaos in an event known as the Maddening. Paragon, one of the Titans, managed to save reality but at a terrible cost known as the Toll. Paragon died, civilization fell into ruin, and the planet Kkryt shattered into a field of asteroids. The surviving Titans built a memorial to their fallen kin’s example called Beacon, which sent a signal to worlds beyond the Ring of Virtue. Portals from other worlds and planes opened up, and people settled in the area, turning the memorial into a city worthy of Paragon’s example. The planets bside Ghaistala have life and are inhabitable, but due to their distance and necessity of magical travel not much is known about them by the general public. They do have cool brief descriptions such as Starcyte which is said to have a massive planet-spanning city, or the forest planet of Gotmah which holds storehouses of lore managed by the titan Intellect. The planet of Ghaistala proper is not well explored beyond Beacon’s valley; beyond the Protectorate Peaks live colossal monsters ranging from giants, dragons, and kaiju who occasionally breach the mountains to cause trouble in Beacon. There’s also a unique pseudo-kryptonite element known as Paragite which can weaken those empowered by arkwave energy based on duration of exposure, with in-game effects ranging from halved damage to unconsciousness. The Titans are like gods and can appoint divine champions; even Paragon’s ideals can be instilled in people. There're seven Titans to choose from, and they have every non-evil alignment represented save for Chaotic Neutral along with a decent assortment of domains. Beyond these beings there are other gods, including now-forgotten old indigenous deities of Ghaistala who are said to be sleeping in the sky, as well as the faiths from portal-drawn immigrants both old and new. A few cultural myths and festivals are also detailed, such as the belief that the other planets are heavens where devotees of the appropriate Titan go to serve them and rest, or the Awakening Festival which is held annually to commemorate the 20-year pulses of arkwaves which grant people superpowers. Every 20th year the festival’s held after the pulse so that people can demonstrate their newfound abilities. The Portaleers are Beacon’s oldest and most famous superhero team, modeled and named off of the seven Titans. Their original team was made up of otherworldly immigrants, but in future generations they have passed their Mantles on to future worthy candidates upon their retirement or death. The Mantles are special artifacts bearing powers related to the associated Titan, and each member’s team name follows this model: “The Mantle of Honor, the Mantle of Paragon, etc.” Sadly no game stats are given for the Portaleers, but we do have writeups on their backstories, personality, and overall power sets along with artwork for each of them. The Mantle of Paragon is a two-fisted alchemist who once treated the former Mantle of Paragon at her clinic; the Mantle of Honor is a kobold warrior and son of a barbarian chieftain out in the Nul Wastes who finds his responsibilities between his tribe and the city divided at times; the Mantle of Intellect was born into a family of noble mages but dedicated himself to becoming “Elven Batman” when he discovered he had no magical talent; the Mantle of Willpower was a sidekick to the superhero who bore the Mantle before him, and has the ability to turn her body into any stone or mineral she comes into contact with; the Mantle of Friendship is a gnome with super-speed; the Mantle of Heart is a tiefling bard whose blindness caused her to gain an appreciation for the subtleties of music; and the Mantle of Duty is a half-living, half-undead archeologist who can control weather and cosmic forces. Finally there’s Docent, a golem advisor who takes care of the management of the Portaleer’s headquarters in Paragon’s Peak.  Chapter 5: City Gazetteer Beacon is called the City of Heroes not just for the Portaleers. Be they mundane or magical, empowered by arkwaves, science, or sorcery, Beacon has a knack for drawing the best and most valiant figures from across the planes, inspiring ever more generations of do-gooders in their example. In spite of its unique protectors, Beacon is a dangerous city, full of crime and corruption within and threatened by outside evils as well. Beacon is a vertical city sitting on a bay at the southern end of an unnamed western continent, with some outlying regions and communities. The city itself is a democratic council system where local neighborhoods elect people to the Senate. Public servants known as lamplighters perform typical law enforcement duties and must live inside the neighborhoods they police. Its prison system focuses on restorative justice over retributive justice, meaning that most jails have centers of learning and recreation to help inmates rehabilitate, and only the most unrepentant and violent criminals end up in the Resolute Redoubt super-jail or exiled beyond the Protectorate Peaks. Beacon’s major sections are separated into four levels. Lowcity is primarily lone-income, industrial, and is home to 40% of the population. It is associated with crime and corruption and various crime syndicates and crooked cops congregate here, although most of its residents are more or less normal people in not-so-deal situations. Smugglers are known to ply their trade among massive stalactites in a neighborhood known as Titetown, while word around town is that the Paragite Pub is where to go if you want to find a fence or an ear to the ground on the goings=on in Lowcity. Serenity is the artisan’s quarter of Beacon and home to 30% of its population. Mostly middle and working class, it is most famous for the Crater, a ruinous expanse of broken foundation from an old supervillain battle. The place goes unrepaired as superheroes use it to lure villains and monsters there for minimal risk of collateral damage and injury to bystanders. Serenity’s also home to the Public Library and Archive which has advanced magitechnology recordings in addition to books and scrolls, and private social gatherings and entertainment such as the multi-dimensional Club 52 and the Kobold Club are home to more typical fantasy adventurer “hero for hire” types and hard-boiled detectives. Argentum Square is a governmental neighborhood, devoted to scholarship and civic administration. Home to 25% of the population, it houses the overworked Justicarium courthouse, the Portal Plaza which sees the majority of Beacon’s otherworldly immigrants, and the Library of the Spire where some of Beacon’s greatest minds study, debate, and research...both legitimate projects and more troubling lines of inquiry. Paragon’s Peak is home to the highest-class 5% of Beacon. From this neighborhood people can get a holistic view of the city below from Paragon’s Overlook, or look to the stars above at the Godswatch observatory. The Atrium of Lights is the headquarters of the Portaleers, with the surrounding trees the only place casting shadows of any real size. The Resolute Redoubt is the neighborhood’s largest mark of shame, a super-prison housing Beacon’s most dangerous and unrepentant criminals too dangerous to be sent into exile. The Protectorate Peaks are technically not part of Beacon, but are included in this chapter nonetheless. Widely considered the final frontier of civilization bordering wildlands filled with monsters of Leviathan proportions, the Peaks are home to a secret fortress known as Hope’s Bastion. The Bastion is manned by four regular occupants who are superheroes from an alternate timeline where a villain known as the Warmonger destroyed Beacon with an army of brainwashed Kaiju. They also have access to Photon Rifles and Arkwave Pulse Grenades, technology developed from this futuristic timeline. Although the text earlier teased at the major sections being inspired by the different comic book eras, I’m having trouble matching them up. One would assume Lowcity to be Iron Age with its systemic corruption, but the Kobold Club feels a bit closer to Golden Age pulp sensibilities. They come off much more as typical neighborhoods in a fantasy city, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing but it does feel like a case of telling over showing.  Chapter 6: Regional Gazetteer This details the outlying regions beyond Beacon. A rather short chapter, the individual descriptions are rather brief and home to but a few adventure hooks. The Darnan Forest is home to a settlement known as Hearthfire who trades with Beacon but whose inhabitants pride themselves on their independence. The Grey Rise is a mountain range home to the Asha Trading Company, the setting’s characteristic Evil Megacorp which runs a company town of indentured miners. The Ivory Wilds are a jungle so named for omnipresent white choker vines which crush living prey in order to feed their soil. The Klachton Ocean and Everglint Bay sit adjacent to Beacon and connect the city to outlying islands (some of which have pirates!). The Mirrored Wetlands are a swamp whose water is clear as glass during the day but at night darker things stir deep beneath the surface. Finally, the Nul Wastes are a barren wasteland home to only a few scattered bands of barbarians and is ground zero of Nul’s defeat.  Chapter 7: Organizations This chapter details 17 organizations pertinent to the world of Ghaistala, some beneficial to superhero PCs and some which they’ll find to be at natural odds. Every entry has a small list of Notable Members and 3 adventure hooks. Armorer’s Guild: These guys specialize in security-based equipment and defensive magic. They often hire adventurers to procure promising technology and magical items from ruins and have an interest in arming the outposts beyond the Protectorate Peaks to expand civilization. Artisan Affairs Bureau: City bureaucrats who regulate the city’s artistic and literary businesses. They are particularly insistent in the enforcement of permits, and most people view their existence as a perfect example of bureaucracy where there needs to be none. They come across as more comedic than anything, and their adventure hooks center around strange happenings from weird artwork and exhibit heists. Asha Trading Company: If Lex Luthor was an 1800s mine owner, he’d be running the Asha Trading Company. Although most people know this corporation is full of wicked assholes who keep employees in virtual slavery, they make so much money that Beacon and other settlements rely upon their exploitative labor. They seek to grow beyond their meager outposts outside the city. Adventure hooks naturally involve thwarting them, from aiding an anticapitalist miner’s strike* or preventing the megacorp from collapsing the city of Beacon into the earth via a massive diamond drill machine that is mining paragite beneath the surface. *I’m not exaggerating, the book actually titles the adventure hook “Anti-capitalist.” Which I’m totally down with, by the way. Collegium Beacuarus: This pseudo-religious movement believes that the act of knowledge and inquiry is a holy expression, but not all people are worthy of such knowledge. They hope to achieve a kind of spiritual transcendence, and have a deep interest in the legacy of Paragon and the Titans. Adventure hooks involve unearthed secrets of the past, from stolen books to two time-travelers at cross-purposes claiming to have knowledge of Ghaistala’s pre-Maddening civilizations. Court of Empty Night: Vampires who want to return to a prehistoric ‘golden age’ when sapient beings were easily-hunted primitive tribes helpless at the hands of monsters. They include vampires, werewolves, and other monsters who derive sustenance from mortal life forces. Their NPCs and adventure hooks are straightforward horror movie monster stuff. Gardeners’ Union: This organization is more of a social club of people with a love of gardening and beautifying the city via floral designs. Their leader is a treant, and they like to collect exotic seeds from worlds beyond the portals. Their adventure hooks involving various plant monsters run amok. Guild of Exploration and Reconnaissance (GEAR): Adventuring scientists who seek to learn as much as possible about the worlds of the Ring of Virtue and beyond.Their adventure hooks involve Fantastic Four-style trips to strange and exotic lands. Heroes Guild: An organization that officially signs up and provides support for Beacon’s superhero community. In exchange members must respond to the call for the city’s defense as part of a super-militia at the government’s request. You don’t have to sign up with them to be a superhero, although they help give a sense of legitimacy to those who do. Lamplighters: Cops and trouble-shooters assorted into teams of five with distinct roles (loremaster, chaplain, interpreter, medic, and ‘buster’). They’re basically the people who solve petty crimes and clean up the small fry once the superheroes are done fixing things in the big leagues. Lenskeepers: A guild of glassblowers and cleaners who evolved into a covert intelligence network as their various janitors and window-washers are often paid no mind by the average citizen. Fortunately they are mostly good-aligned, and use the secrets they learn to tip off superheroes and do-gooders in order to avert disasters and tragedies. Lookouts: A Lowcity-based organization of regular citizens and superheroes who investigate missing people society has neither the time nor inclination to find. They are the enemies of the Court of Empty Night, who make a habit of preying upon such people to minimize risk. Scroungers: Salvagers and machinists whose headquarters is underground beneath the Crater. They scrounge a surprising amount of valuable material from the various superpowered fights above, and can fashion such scraps into surprisingly-powerful technological and magical items. They even managed to revive someone known only as “the Retired Hero,” whose powers are so dangerous to the city above he lives with the Scroungers who he treats as his new family. Shattered Sons: Superheroes who view the government of Beacon as a corrupting tool which only attends to the needs of the few at the expense of the many. Some even extend this enmity to the very concept of government itself. They specialize in going after corrupt politicians and business leaders who manage to avoid prosecution due to their power and influence. The book takes a rather positive view on them, and their adventure hooks involve the PCs helping them uncover government conspiracies and injustices. Society for the Preservation of Normalcy and Decency: Un-powered and non-magical people who feel that the superpowered community is more of a curse than a blessing. They come from people who suffered losses during collateral damage from fights, and advocate for alternative means of keeping Beacon safe. A rare few at the top levels of SPND have more nefarious motives. They believe that the Maddening was actually a time of liberation, and Nul a failed hero who was on the verge of freeing mortalkind from the tyrannical Titans. They view arkwave-empowered supers as the primary prevention from Nul returning, and secretly set out to bring death and misfortune in order to hasten his arrival. Stiltguards: Lowcity laborers who use clockwork and steam-powered stilt-suits to do maintenance work on the level’s various machinery. They help out the community in more subtle ways, such as clearing out debris and minimizing damage from factory hazards. They find themselves at cross-purposes with the Lamplighters due to differing priorities on how to “clean up” the neighborhoods. Tenebrignis:A highly secretive organization rumored to be a “shadow government” of Beacon. They...don’t really have anything substantial detailed besides the fact that they know of secrets so terrible they must safeguard them from the public. Treestriders: Inhabitants of the Darnan Forest who seek to protect the ecosystem of their home from unchecked industrialization and toxic magic. Thoughts So Far: The chapters are short, but there’s just the right amount of content and adventure hooks in each of them to give workable material to the GM. While I understand that Beacon is the central point of the setting, the Regional Gazetteer has hardly any material for adventure creation. The Organizations are an interesting array of groups who for the most part have built-in reasons for getting involved in PC affairs. Some of them are more of an attachment or incidental to such events, such as the Artisan Affairs Bureau and the Gardeners’ Union. I’m quite fond of the Scroungers, who definitely feel like a concept that would organically arise from the tropes of a comic book universe. Join us next time as we get a look at Beacon’s finest and foulest in Chapter 8: Notable People!
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 00:46
|
|
|
Evil Mastermind posted:The thing is, people who Only Play 5e are exactly the types of people who think of all superhero comics as "superheroes" and won't zero in on some subtype or try to focus on what they actually want to make. I forgot where I saw it, but I saw someone on RPGnet suggest using the 5e versions of Spheres of Power/Might in Supers & Sorcery for a more versatile option of character customization. I backed both books on KickStarter, and while they still have many D&Disms they do a much better job at character customization and more fine-tuning of concepts. You can totally have a Mr. Freeze style elemental gadgeteer PC that isn't just "pick all the frosty wizard spells." Or someone who actually can at-will teleport outside of melee combat. Or have people who are of the same character class but are mechanically distinct in roles and skills without needing to be spellcasters. That being said, I wouldn't use D&D at all for fantasy superheroes, but if I had to do so then Spheres would be a vast improvement over S&S. Libertad! fucked around with this message at 01:10 on Apr 11, 2021 |
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 00:49
|
|
|
Night10194 posted:What's funny is that to me, this wasn't the deal. Rather, what mattered to me was everybody had assholes and everyone was a goddamn mess. You had genuinely decent people all throughout as well, and there were certainly groups written to be more generally on the right side of things (read: Not wanting to be annihilated) but since everyone was a goddamn mess you had sympathetic vampires (in among the much more common assholes), cool mummies, etc mixed in with hat enthusiasts, french people, etc. Okay, that was badly phrased, I agree with you there. There’s kind of a basic rear end in a top hat strata that Warhammer is based in, but plenty of people actively defy that. And choosing how not to be an rear end in a top hat (or what level of rear end in a top hat you wanted to be) is one of its biggest draws. Even some of the most important NPCs (Karl Franz, Louen Leoncoeur) were actively benevolent. It’s just that the whole thing is more cynical than standard fantasy. E: Actually, the fact that my deepest experience with WHF is with the Border Princes may have tilted my viewpoint.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 00:57
|
|
|
Falconier111 posted:Okay, that was badly phrased, I agree with you there. There’s kind of a basic rear end in a top hat strata that Warhammer is based in, but plenty of people actively defy that. And choosing how not to be an rear end in a top hat (or what level of rear end in a top hat you wanted to be) is one of its biggest draws. Even some of the most important NPCs (Karl Franz, Louen Leoncoeur) were actively benevolent. It’s just that the whole thing is more cynical than standard fantasy. E: Actually, the fact that my deepest experience with WHF is with the Border Princes may have tilted my viewpoint. I'm not really super-sold on this position anymore, but for the sake of a joke I'll say that both games have corrupt societies, but in WHF you're working-class (maybe), and in Soulbound you're bougie.
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 01:00
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 19, 2024 04:51 |
|
|
Falconier111 posted:I keep drawing comparisons between them and grogs for a reason. Both groups are highly insular, value extensive experience in a specific area, believe their area of focus is obviously and inherently superior to its equivalents, regard those who support competing viewpoints as deluded or ideologically-driven threats, and keep themselves ideologically pure by insisting they’re the only ones that don’t have an ideology. As for what this means, I'd argue they're just different flavors of formal conservative, and specifically midcentury formal conservatives: Both the 'literary fiction' novel and the original flavor D&D developed in the post-WWII American context, and while enthusiasts refer back to the literature (fantasy and Modernist and etc) of an earlier period, they have little interest in admitting to the innovations or differences that created their particular style. Instead, they present their style as timeless, inherently meaningful, and possessed of great insight into human affairs - while at the same time deeply begrudging any notion that the style or its insights could change or develop with the time, or be the driver behind any kind of change either formal or social. It's very deeply 'conservative' in a small-c way (and sometimes a big-C way), because change implies that the genre or style is not eternal/pure but historical and contingent. And that would imply they're not doing the ideal Platonic form of literature/tabletop games! They're just doing a particular genre thing, a particular kind of thing, not the ur-thing itself!
|
|
#
?
Apr 11, 2021 01:05
|
|