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Pardon the interruption on the "What the gently caress is wrong with Brucato?" chat, but here's the last bit on the Log Horizon TRPG.  With only Cat people to shame itself in furry appeal. Sample character generation For those that are curious, here's what the official cahracter sheet looks like  Somebody who can into Moonrunes can probably translate all of that stuff, or it can probably be inferred from the pregen sheets already up.  on my end in doing that that though and the amount of stuff to keep track of isn't a lot outside of skills.Doresh posted:No I'm reminded of these Pathfinder discussions that basically amount to how dual shield wielders make for the best sword-n-boarders. Unfortunately, the only offensive Dual Shield wielders in this game are Clerics (filthy casters getting all the fun) and there's really no way around it beyond Changing Equipment all the time (it takes a Minor action to do so). Also, it's not even possible to really use the shield as a weapon by RAW until Rank 3 with the Skill Clerics get. Everything's written fairly clearly in this game though, so making up a skill shouldn't be too hard. (Balancing it might be difficult though). Apologies to the poster in ADTRW who also requested a character, but I don't feel like making another character as of this moment unless an actual game of this is ran or other circumstances call for it. So Fox Tail Guardian, Sub-Class Elder Maid. I honestly have no idea what Elder Maid is supposed to be other than something referenced on one of the skills. The source material also has a few dozen other skills I may have not listed while others were probably lost in translation. But away we go! Base Stats First we'll genreate their base Stats from their Race and Class. Since they're a Guardian, we should boost their STR as high as it can go (7) and then put the remaining two wherever. STR 4+0+3=7 -> 2 DEX 2+0+1=3 -> 1 POW 1+1+0=2 -> 0 INT 3+1+1=5 -> 1 HP 50+8=58 Fate = 1 As a note, it's obvious, I could actually have a Stat lineup of 2,1,1,1, but I didn't. Why? No reason really. It does change when a Stat goes up though if that's at all important. The way I have it now means that at Rank 2, they'll have a lineup of 2,1,1,2 as opposed remaining at 2,1,1,1. At rank 3, they're even so where the spare 5 base stat points are allocated doesn't actually make as much difference in the long run compared to picking up gear or Skills that boost Attributes associated with them. Skills Before we get to our final stats, we can pick up Skills. Since she's a Guardian and a Maid, her duty should be to protect and server her master, so we should pick up skills to reflect that. Each new character starts with three Combat Skills and one General skill The skills we'll pick up are:
In a previous iteration of this build, I chose the Fox Tail Skill Substitute Tail which allows access to a General Skill that the character couldn't normally get such as a Racial Skill belonging to another race. In exchange, the character's max HP is reduced by 10. In the long run, this is a pretty good exchange, particularly for Warrior classes since it's little more than a Rank's worth of HP lost for a Skill that should more than compensate for it. I did this iteration instead since it seemed like a more realistic build.  Gear Starting characters get 350g to spend on stuff to start. No rules listed for starting at a higher Rank. We'll need armor, a weapon, a shield and maybe something else depending on what's leftover. Since our starting character is Rank 1, they only have access to Rank 1 items. Each race has a Skill that allows them to use or equip items of a rank 2 higher than their current. For referrence, the Fox Tail's Skill is for [Light Armor], [Boot]s, and [Cloak]s so it's not very useful for us. The Dwarf has a good onefor Guardians since theirs is for [Heavy Armor], [Medium Armor], and [Shield]s. By Rank 9, this skill is worthless though since there's no listed items above Rank 9. Making an item that follows the scaling is easy enough though, but I doubt the writers of this system care enough to write for those ranks.
Ability Scores and Attributes
Character Data This includes Connections, Subclass, name, Level, Gender, "Guilding Creed"(Why the PC is actually out and about and not still moping about missing the real world) and so forth. Whatever. We're an Elder Maid called Foxy. Our connection is to another PC that we've sworn to protect Final notes So that's our character. In order to see how effective they really turned out, let's compare them to some Enemies. Most enemies are of a rather similar nature in stats though which is convenient for anyone looking to run a game. Also note that I'm ignoring the damage reduction via one of the character's starting moves since it also increases Hate which makes calculations a bit harder. The reduction is also only by 2 so the only difference is about a turn or less of survival. Kobold - The humble Kobold. Normally, Goblins are the typical starting mook, but in this game, it's the Kobold. Goblins are Rank 3. Kobolds use Kobo Slash as their attack. It has an accuracy of 12 versus Evasion (1+2D) and deals 23+2D physical damage. Odds are, our Guardian isn't going to be avoiding that attack anytime soon. It's a 1 in 12 for Foxy to successfully dodge it. The damage, however, is a better bet since PDEF subtracts from damage rendering that 23 to a 7. Without factoring in Hate damage, it would take 5 consecutive turns for the Kobold to finally kill Foxy (14 average damage from the Kobold). Unfortunately, the Kobold has a trick up its sleeve that, for a Minor action, they can add +5 to the damage dealt. This bounces it to 4 turns, again without Hate bonuses. Can the tank kill the Kobold faster than they kill us though? The Kobold has an Evasion of 8 while our roll is 4+2D (Average 11). This means that 5 out of 6 of the Guardian's attacks should go through. The basic attack is Attack+1D damage which means an average of 6.5 damage per turn. With an HP of 16 and a PDEF of 6, it would take about 39(?) attacks to take the Kobold down. Abysmal. Weapon Bash gives us a Attack+4D in exchange for 2 Hate which is an average of 11 (average 17 - 6 PDEF) Damage per hit. It would take about two hits in this case. Much better. Even if that meant taking and additional +4 damage (2 Hate and the x2 Hate Modifier from the Kobold) per attempt (net +2 per turn since each time the Kobold lands a hit, it's -1 Hate). This is a solo fight though and against a part of Kobolds, the likelihood of victory, even if only one of them was focusing on the Tank is worse as each additional Kobold in the same square gives a +1 to [Dodge checks]. Three other Kobolds in the same square make it such that there's only a 1 in 6 chance to hit the Kobold. Pixie - An even worse foe. 34 HP, an evasion of 2+2D, an attack that rolls at 3+3D and deals 25+2D damage. Foxy hits less often with about the same chance to get hit (90%). While the pixie deals more damage at base, they don't have a way to increase it. It still takes the same about of turns to kill Foxy however since the average damage is a 16. The pixie has the same PDEF as the Goblin, but with a little more than double the HP, it would take more than twice the time to kill. Worse for our Tank, but the Pixie's chance to get hit doesn't change, even if there's a swarm of them. Brier Weasel - A magical enemy. 40HP, 1+2D Evasion, and 4 PDEF. It makes a Magic attack with a 4+2D roll against Resistance (2D6) and 4+2D magic damage. Unfortunately, the difference in PDEF is negligable and it would take about the same amount of time to kill as compared to the Pixie. The Weasel hits 5 out of 6 times, but the net damage is so low, I'd swear it was a typo. It's consolation is a once per scene trick where it can deal 10 extra damage on a hit and with its high initiative makes it an excellent cleanup hitter. Kobold Shaman - Same defenses and dodges as the Weasel, 27 HP. It takes about 5-6 attacks to kill it as long as it's alone. It's attack rolls at 2+3D for 17+2D Damage which is another 90% chance to hit and a net average 18 damage per hit. Thus, the shaman needs only 4 hits to kill the Tank. Skeleton - For demonstration's sake, let's try a Rank 2 opponent and see what happens when the Tank is up against something stronger than it. The Skeleton has 21 HP, 9 evasion, 8PDEF, has a 13 Accuracy with 30+2D damage. Would take 3-4 hits to kill and would kill Foxy in about 3. As a consolation, the Skeleton would fall under the category of Weapon Master for that set of enemies so its damage is the highest amongst its peers. Unfortunately, it's also the lowest HP and throwing Foxy against the other tanks is a similarly losing proposition do to some of the tricks they can pull off. Full Tank mode - If Foxy went into full armor, doing the math, it looks as though that there's a net 1 turn increase in survival in 1v1. So the Guardian does its job fairly well, all things considered. It takes hits and can do okay with an attack Skill that isn't the base one. Guardians do have a few personal offensive options based on their gear though. Notably, Onslaught which requires a Two-Handed Weapon and gives 3 Hate in exchange for dealing [Attack+(SR+4)D] Physical damage and gives a +1D hit chance to the next attack. Alternatively, there's Shield Smash which is a Minor Action that requires a Shield and will give an opponent [Stagger] for their turn as long as you or an effect deal them at least 1 damage. [Stagger] is -1d for any Major action taken. As I write this, I realize that this is probably much better than picking up Standout. That's all though! With a few fixes and tweaks, this could definitely be a 4e-esque game without all of the bloat 4e has. I also want to reiterate that allowing multiple characters to share a square adds a whole new dimension to tactical combat that's amazing and more games should do it.
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Mar 29, 2015 06:24
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Untested Thief, the Would-Be Knight and going with the crowd with the Fae
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Mar 30, 2015 01:02
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Better question: Is Sir Bearington a possibility?
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Mar 30, 2015 07:00
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This is Sir Bearington
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Mar 30, 2015 08:02
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GimpInBlack posted:I'm seriously thinking about doing an F&F of the Song of Ice and Fire RPG. It's... special. When the numbers are balanced it's pretty fun, but the numbers unbalance easily. Like, "a starting character can accidentally be literally unbeatable by anyone but the greatest (swordsman/schemer/whatever) in the land" unbalanced. I've seen this from personal experience and it's absurdly batshit how easy it is to unbalance everything by having someone really focused on a given skill. In this case it was Archery and that meant most enemies got taken out fast and early before they even could get close. I also remember reading up on Cubicle 7's Doctor Who RPG and it's a neat little point buy system with multiple tiers of resolution. If I remember correctly, it's along the lines of, from worst to best: No, and; No; No, but; Yes, but; Yes; Yes, and.
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Mar 31, 2015 03:34
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Nessus posted:Ah yes, snakes, noted for their association with music and - oh god they're a snake charming gag, aren't they. I was thinking Rattlesnakes
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Mar 31, 2015 07:46
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GimpInBlack posted:We're almost done with the core book, I'm just trying to figure out the best way to make reviewing what's essentially a big list of spells and monsters interesting. Further Afield will be up next, which is a really cool supplement. Brb making a bear in Log Horizon
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Apr 1, 2015 20:10
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theironjef posted:Because Noun: The Verb is an inherently fun and easy to copy format. Pick a silly name, divide your subject up into five categories, add a curse. Well there's Princess: the Hopeful or something that's probably the only other fansplat that I know of that's had more than a week's worth of development. It's also gone through at least one tone shift during its existence and development since an entirely new bucket of source material came out while it was being worked on.
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Apr 8, 2015 02:51
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Doresh posted:Now I would make a joke about a hypothetical "Magical: The Girling", but I think that's what Princess: The Hopeful is. As for sentai and Kamen Rider, Hunter does that well enough actually. The only reason to make them their own splat is to give mechanical weight to done of their qualities
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Apr 8, 2015 21:37
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Doresh posted:I think I'll stick with Magical Burst. I don't need crossovers between magical girls and scat-crazy furry dudes. I'm sure TSV or Cherion has something in the works like that
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Apr 8, 2015 21:51
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theironjef posted:Well yeah, the whole awesome thing about a dimension hopping game is that the hopping started long before the players figured it out. I think the best way to create new ones is in three parts. Pick a genre, pick a twist, pick a bad guy (who probably generates an additional twist). So say for example... You could probably set up a set of tables during char gen so everyone can participate in the bizarre cosm building
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Apr 10, 2015 16:48
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Doresh posted:Ulisses is also the German publisher of Pathfinder, Shadowrun and other stuff. I would say with having to translate all those foreign books and working on the newest edition of The Dark Eye, they seem to be a bit busy. A shame, really. TORG deserves another go. Every player picks a geographical region, a genre/setting period and names a person fictional, real or made up on the spot. GM fills in holes or players make multiple additions if needed. Then roll on each table for each area, invading cosm and leader of said cosm until satisfied
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Apr 11, 2015 18:48
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Doresh posted:Everything is possible. East Asian version lets you pick playing groups in South Korea or Singapore or Thailand. Playing recruits in Israel might be too serious
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Apr 13, 2015 19:58
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That reminds me, I forgot to ask how my Log Horizon F&F was. It didn't generate quite as much of a response, so idk if I was doing anything right or wrong. I want to do another F&F at some point of some other games, but I want to up my RPG reviewing game.
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Apr 20, 2015 05:27
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Kavak posted:You've never played in a nWoD chat game Anyone who knows anything about WW knows that crossover games are fraught with difficulty between the splats given their different fields of expertise and power levels. Mages are generally head and shoulders above everyone unless certain conditions start occurring (Changelings getting max mileage out of Contracts, Demons going Loud, Vampires manipulating enough sleepers, etc.). Crossover in limited scopes do well though or with a certain thematic bent since with ghosts and spirits, Mages are equivalent to wrecking balls when dealing with those types compared to Sin-Eaters and Werewolves, respectively, who're more akin to finer instruments. Alternatively, gutter mages.
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Apr 24, 2015 21:28
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I there a way to read old F&Fs without archives? A friend who I might be GMing for named a system either in just or for serious and I want to take a look at it to see which it is without asking. (It's Continuum for reference). Also, I want to see the [abandoned] Legends of the Wulin F&F to see if it can be explained to me better. Edit: Thanks! This link Needs to be in the OP Xelkelvos fucked around with this message at 04:52 on Apr 25, 2015 |
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Apr 25, 2015 04:38
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chaos rhames posted:One thing that's annoying about Genius is that it missed an opportunity to balance with other wod lines, so you could have it play with werewolves or vampires. Someone do Princess next. Maybe that might do it.
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Apr 26, 2015 05:27
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ZorajitZorajit posted:Re: Space 1989: Ooh ooh, pick me! Introducing (dredging up?): A one or two post writeup for this might be enough.
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Apr 28, 2015 21:32
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Done with finals, back in the States. Gonna try another F&F. Deciding between Engine Heart, Princess: the Hopeful and Pokemon Tabletop United. Two are /tg/ productions with one simpler and somewhat more successful compared to the other. There's also Adeptus Evangelion (actually two different games due to a rules split) that's another /tg/game based off of Dark Heresy that's worth reviewing, but I'm not at all familiar with that rules set to give it all the lumps. Which should I try and knock out?
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May 15, 2015 12:49
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Princess: the Hopeful Part 1: Another forums.RPG.net production that doesn't understand the importance of editors, images, and turning extra content into supplements [No title image because no one ever made one and gently caress doing that myself] Disclaimer: I have very little experience analyzing TTRPGs and while I am familiar enough with the rules for nWoD to try this out, I'm still a bit lacking in my knowledge for nWoD 2E. Like how Genius seems to lean heavily on inspiration to oMage, there's likely some inspiration from oWoD in this game that will just run right past me since I have absolutely no knowlege of oWoD stuff beyond the names of the games and what I've absorbed from this thread and the WoD thread, so if I miss something from oWoD or nWoD that the game seems to be clearly aping, feel free to point it out. Background: The original foundations for this game were laid in the RPG.net forums and continue to be developed to this day. If this was a proper book and production, what counts as the core book would likely have been split into the core and an supplement. As it currently stands, the pdf runs at 394 pages (and 431 with condition cards). In terms of time spent on development, the first post that started this thing off was dated March 3, 2009 and originally titled Princess: the Fading. It was remaned relatively quickly (since the second thread six months later had it with its current name). One of the bigger sparks in development was the release of the anime Puella Magi Modoka Magica. Even prior to this, there was a lot of inspiration to draw from such as Sailor Moon and subversions/parodies like Sailor Nothing. However, there wasn't really a series that hit the themes of PtH quite like Modoka Magica and likely affected the development heavily from that point forward. Prior to that, much of the development was based on emulation of the genre and then creating their own subversions or elements of darkness. As much as I'd like to go on and on about the dev process for this fan game (since it provides a lot of useful context for something like this), much of itis wrapped up in the rpg.net threads which is now on #8 at ~2700 posts. Compared to Genius, Princess still sees a bit of active development with minor updates usually popping up once a month based on their update log. That log doesn't go past 2012 though. As for how serious this game is, it's definitely a real tossup since this amount of development is too much for a parody, but the original rpg.net post starts with this: quote:Today I remembered John Biles' parody homebrew, Senshi: The Merchandising, and I started brainstorming how'd you go about something like for nWOD. Also, as it turns out, there were two previous attempts to do Princess before this. One was abandoned (by McGiygas and also actually about the forked version that's been stalled since 2012 afaik) and the other is listed as complete (by recon_etc). Both are in archives and just looking at those posts (courtesy of the F&F archive), a bit has changed since their posts including the introduction. Not enough that it may as well be a different game, but just enough that there are noticeable changes. There is no guarantee that I'll go beyond the completed version which got all the way to the Charms section, but one can always Hope Introduction: quote:No matter how old we may be now, all of us were once young. The world was unexplored and exciting, full of possibility. What we lacked in experience and wisdom, we made up for in possibility and enthusiasm. We dreamed of fame, fortune, wealth, glory, respect. We wanted to be astronauts, cowboys, firemen, doctors, singers, rock stars, or all of the above at once. After all, we didn’t know what was possible – and that meant ANYTHING was possible. We looked at the world through guileless eyes, felt it as fully and intensely as anyone ever could. When we came to a new idea, we embraced it zealously and whole-heartedly, convinced we’d found the secret that would change the world. When we loved, we were convinced it was the most passionate ever felt; when we hurt, we thought it was a tragedy the likes of which had never been seen. We were convinced that we had the whole thing figured out, that we could make everything perfect if we just had a chance, if the grown-ups would just listen. After all, we could do anything if we put our mind to it. We were fearless. We couldn’t wait to grow up so we could grab life by the horns. Before we're out of the gate, we get a rousing speech that's the equivalent of the opening fiction I guess. I may be off, but there's definitely some Changeling: the Dreaming vibes based on all of the "growing up isn't all it's cracked up to be" stuff. It's all like this too. Just overblown and a little pompous. I could try an sum up all of the weird nonsense that the introduction puts forth, but it's all kinda bad so I'll just quote it. quote:A Game Of Fighting Fear The theme of the game is obviously Fighting Fear and making a difference against reality and the troubles it brings. The mood is Exhasution since the trials will never end and any spare time is few and far between. Themes of growing up also seem to be apparent based on the Introduction section alone. One thing that's also apparent is how closely it edges on being some sort of Superhero WoD splat instead of Magical Girls. The unending battle for hope and doing the right thing and such just screams Superman rather than any sort of Sailor Moon deconstruction. There's also not a Glossary at this point, so when "Status Quo" appears capitalized in text, it's assumed that it's something important in the text, but idk if it is or if it's just the severe lack of editing because someone didn't get the memo that status quo isn't a proper noun. Princesses (and Princes) are also known as the Nobility (again, no glossary, so I'm assuming here). Inspirations: Sailor Nothing  I'll let TVTropes (  ) explain this one:quote:Take a basic Magical Girl template, influenced most of all by Sailor Moon (note the title). Infuse some Neon Genesis Evangelion, mix in the tone and atmosphere of Animorphs, and add some of the self-awareness of Scream on top. What do you get? Sailor Nothing, a Web Original written by Twoflower and a very scary magical girl story, not unlike Elfen Lied. It also predates some other takes like Futari wa Pretty Cure and Puella Magi Madoka Magica (but not Shamanic Princess), being written in 2000 and 2001. Puella Magi Modoka Magica  As mentioned above, this anime premiered in 2011 and made huge waves in the Magical Girl scene by being less than subtle about the darkness within it which becomes readily apparent after the first plot bomb. The universe doesn't exactly mesh with the setting Princess has so it's not a perfect match, but the trials and tribulations are supposed to be relatively accurate. Mai-Otome Without going into the batshit setting involving nanomachines and the virgin girls they are bonded to, the inspiration noted is based on the Realpolitik that's involved. I don't know either. For further reading though, consider the meme O noes her nanomachines!11!!(  ).Brave - What happens when a Princess shirks their duties Coraline - The world Coraline enters is representative of a Dreamland and the Other Mother is an example of a one of their antagonists. Peter Pan (2001 Film) - The pitfalls of Dreamlands and themes of growing up. First thoughts: As a twenty-something who consumes way too muchanime and superhero comics, the growing up themes actually do resonate with me and I'm sure the collaborators of Princess may have done a bit of the same. Also, Cythereal is a real trooper for being able to get through Genius since Princess seems to be in the same mire of being overloaded with content with the book having a monstrous lack of aethetics to at least soften the blow. There's a lot of text to pore through and I'm sure some of the more obviously dumb stuff might go over my head. However, Chapter 1 has a section titled Nakama so clearly the anime is strong in this game to a likely embarrasing degree. Also of note, the Gordian Knot line has been in the text since 2010 as referenced by a /tg/ thread lambasting the game so any amount of editing and critical commentary has been minimal. At some point somewhere, this was also probably a slight comedy game or something with more noble intentions. However, it's reached someplace a bit creepier and offputting. Also, the lack of Princess Tutu in the inspiration section is a little disappointing.
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May 17, 2015 20:46
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:There's a good argument to be made it's a subgenre of superhero fiction, yeah. There are a few more features that are particular to the subgenre - the superpowers are always magical in nature (hence the name) rather than, say, caused by radioactive spiders or having an awesome utility belt, for instance. But a lot of the usual superhero tropes are there. Fighting other superpowered villains, struggling to maintain a normal civilian life in the meantime, etc. Arguably, it's a subgenre spun out of another subgenre. Tokatsu specifically. Whereas toku is male oriented and features mostly science based or extraterrestrial based powers (at least initially), magical girls are the opposite with magical sources and female oriented. Both run off of some sort of emotion with friendship/camaraderie as part of it. Hot-bloodedness, courage and bravery in toku and love, kindness and hope in magical girls. They're both two sides of the same four colored and sometimes campy coin.
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May 18, 2015 19:20
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Princess: the Hopeful Glossary -or- The thing that's in every WoD book, including Genius except this one Apparently, the wiki for the project has a Glossary of terms. However, the book itself does not. This may be intetional if the purpose of the book is to compile the wiki's contents. That raises the question of who needs it compiled and why doesn't the drat compilation also have this glossary? For the sake of everyone and myself, I'll go over the contents of this before heading into the rest of the book. Beacon - Special mortal with no powers but a close relation to the Light of Hope. Light of Hope is not in the glossary. Blossoming - The first time a Princess transforms Calling - the X-splat for Princess. They are: Champion, Grace, Mender, Seeker, Troubador Charm - The name of their magic skills. Coincidentally comes in ten categories: Appear, Bless, Connect, Fight, Govern, Inspire, Learn, Perfect, Restore and Shape. Each Calling is connected to three of these groups. Hopeful - Used to refer to anyone touched by the Light of Hope (context based on this makes me assume that it's their power source) Invocation - Another form of magic. They are Aqua, Aria, Fuego, Lacrima, Legno, Specchio, Tempesta and Terra. Kingdom, The - quote:the once great and noble civilization that came before the current debased World of Darkness, there is very little actually known about it but a large amount of speculation.  Nobility - Collective name for Princesses Phylactery - Prince(ss) - Who the game is about Queens, the - Group of powerful people who were around before The Fall. There are five Radiant Queens and three Twilight Queens Radiant, the - the Radiant Queens: The Queens of Clubs, of Diamonds, of Hearts, of Spades and of Swords and/or those that follow them Regalia - the stuff a Princess has on when they transform as well as gear granted by Charms Sworn - People empowered by the Princesses Twilight, the - as like the Radiant. Their Queens are of Tears, of Storms and of Mirrors This Glossary is far, FAR, from comprehensive, but it's a start. Things like Nakama and the Dreamlands and the like will be explained when they come up. But more preface before we dive further and deeper into this madness Next time: Fluff and nonsense and pictures to keep the post from being too boring
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May 19, 2015 00:33
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LornMarkus posted:He's dropped that and also Magical Fury which was a more rules-light affair, as I understand it, and might also have been designed to be lighter in tone. Haven't gotten around to reading it yet though so I can't say for certain. It looks like Magical Burst is gearing back up with plans for a fifth iteration according to Ewen's blog (Dated March 15 of this year). Magical Fury also has a Companion book now.
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May 19, 2015 03:51
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Princess: the Hopeful Chapter 1: Noblesse Oblige -or- eight pages of WORDS WORDS WORDS with nothing about how to actually play the game Every chapter from here on, there's no pieces of fiction that actually deepens the world. Instead we get a quote from a famous person before they tell us everything there is to know. We start off Chapter 1 with a bit of how Princesses (or the Nobility) see the world and here we already deviate from the established notions of the WoD where greys are the sum and the whole. quote:Light and Dark  Yeah, I don't know the point of hypothesizing about the source of The Dark is other than some metafictional masturbation. The next section is all about the origins of the realms of the Nobility. Really don't know why it's relevant or necessary at this point, but we're here now and the train's already off the tracks. Consider it similar to when Mage talks about the Fall of the Supernal realm. In this case, it's the Kingdom with the only remainder being a place known as the Alhambra. (The others for potential namedrop reference are Andarta, Aztallan, The Confederacy of Four Winds, Crystal Heril, Danann, Gonel and Wen-Mung.) Due to each place being so different, the assertion of those differences by their reigning Queens allowed Darkness to enter. Eventually the Kingdom fell, blah blah blah, past now remains shrouded in mystery, I stopped caring. Next is what happened after The Fall (the name of what they call the Kingdom's fall). Three new figures are name dropped: The Red, White and Black Queens. They're powerful individuals tainted by darkness and created a trap within the Dreamlands (no explanation as of yet as to what this is and how it relates to other realms) to keep the Nobility there and away from the Earth by creating an illusion of the Earth there. The period is called The Long Night and the trap made it so any Princesses who did incarnate on Earth for whatever reason, alone and without help. The Twilight Queens are name dropped here: The Lady of Alhambra, the Seraphic General and the Queen of Mirrors (who doesn't get a special name) and are shown to be one of the three major factions in the game. quote:In July 1969 mankind first set foot on the moon. The hope released by this single event was so great that for the briefest instant the Light shone brighter on Earth than it did in the Dreamlands. In a flash every soul trapped within knew that they were not on Earth as they believed. The five Queens mustered their armies against their jailors and shattered the machinery of their prison. Their victory was swift and brutal; after millennia of imprisonment the Kingdom was once again free. Being a Princess As a note, to remind everyone again for those who may or may not have forgotten, both males and females (and whatever other genders there are) can become a Prince/Princess.  With regards to the Blossoming, the first transformation, I'll skip most of the fluff to the paragraph that sums up the inevitable. quote:No matter the precise trigger, though, Princesses are frequently idealistic or visionaries in some way, although that does not necessarily correlate with naivety; one can be aware of the flaws of the world and still want to improve it. In the end, all that the Hopeful have been able to detect among the circumstances which granted their powers are broad trends and patterns. Almost inevitably, there will be an exception to any rule they devise.  quote:From the moment she Blossoms every Princess has the ability to Transform. With the simplest effort she pushes her dreams and aspirations outwards from her soul. They flow through her body, transforming her into the woman she always wanted to be.  to  or  if they wanted as far as I can tell.In exchange for these powers, Princesses gain a form of super-empathy called Sensitivity and it increases as a Princess gets stronger. The negative product of Sensitivity are Shadows. There are mechanical bits attached to these things, but they're not elaborated on here. Wisps are their magical resource. I'll skip over the talk about Invocations and Charms since it doesn't really explain anything about them that isn't just fluff. Suffice to say, a Princess needs to feel the emotion necessary to use her abilities. Learning new charms and such is a matter of training (i.e. experience) :facepalm: Next we get into the Dreamlands: quote:Within her dreams a Princess travels beyond her mind and into the very soul of humanity. Within the Dreamlands the hopes and aspirations of mankind take life, they form vast cities. Beautiful vistas with all the incomprehensible forms of a dream. The Dreamlands are more than just a metaphor; they are a true world. The inhabitants have lives, hopes and dwell in functional societies. Many Princesses are surprised to discover something so ordinary amongst dreams and flights of fancy, but is it really so surprising than a Princess’ dreams would form after how she sees the world? For the Princess who cares so much about friendship and community when she is awake, what else would she dream about? The culture section is next and it's best preserved in its original form: quote:The Nobility are really good at community; in the short time since the Release a sprawling culture has grown across a network of blogs, forums and social networking sites. The Hopeful community covers more than just Princesses; Beacons and Sworn are welcome and even ordinary people can often be found on the comment threads. The online Radiant community is hardly a walled garden; it spills forth onto related subjects. Princesses can often be found blogging about and arguing in forums related to politics, current affairs, activism and social justice. Many blogs or forums are considered to be both hubs of the Radiant community – for the author or prominent members are Princesses – and considered to be ordinary websites by their mundane viewers – for the Princesses are still in the closet (at least under this username).  quote:The word “Nakama” means a group of friends; translated into English you might say “buddies” or“gang” in the playful kids’ use of the word.  Fluff on Queens, not really relevant; Campaigns (why?), so an in fiction reason for large groups to get together and fight as though the players and the ST couldn't think of one; and finally the Language section where the creators try to make in-universe explanations for their naming conventions. quote:Terms in Japanese originate from Bonnie Getsuei, an American (and complete Japanophile) who forged much of the Radiant’s community in San Francisco and even provided a common entry point to the online Radiant community for English speaking princesses (presumably actual Japanese Princesses also use their native tongue). That concludes Chapter 1 and now we can get to the really important stuff concerning the game. There's still a lot more fluff to go though so there's still stuff that everyone can groan over. Next: The skeleton and bones of the system and the spookiness therein. 
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May 19, 2015 04:11
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Princess: the Hopeful Chapter 2 - Coronation, Part 1: This is where the Magic happens So after all that fluff, we finally get into making things relevant to the game. It's merely a 15 Step process.  To be fair, it's only a few more steps than most WoD games (just pulled up Demon for example and it has 9, Strix Chronicles clocks in at 7). For the first time in a while while making this post, I've opened a WoD book to compare Princess to it. Color me surprised at Chapter 1 always being a fluff chapter. That being said, Chapter 1 tends to actually focus on the key aspects of that splat (Demon focues on the GM, Angels and the Fall; Vampire focuses on Clans, Covenants and what it means to be a Vampire). PtH instead spends a relatively large amount of time talking about backstory and what makes a Princess rather than spending more time talking about a Princess's trials and tribulations, the moral dilemas that may come up in their campaign against darkness and so forth. How to build a Princess Step 1: The Story Seed - Decide what the game is about (i.e. the plot). This isn't a step I've ever seen in any other WoD game. It's the step that may as well be one of the Zero steps that's done by the person running the game beforehand. Step 2: Character Concept - The standard Step 1. quote:The second step is to try and distil your character down into a single concept. You want something that you can easily hold in your head, this concept will serve as the anchoring centre to your character. When you start adding details later it should be quick and straight forward to ask yourself “does this detail Step 3: Fleshing it out - Essentially Step 2b. quote:Are you playing a Prince or a Princess? Does your character fight evil in a frilly sailor fuku or spandex and a cape? Step 4: Virtue, Vice, Aspirations and Dreams - Hopeful is banned as a Virtue since every Princess has it and that's the core of the splat, so it's already prominent. Five Aspirations and Dreams are suggested with at least two Dreams. Dreams are a special form of Aspiration for Princesses that'll be explained in the next post. Step 5: Attributes - The standard Step 2. 5/4/3 Standard. Step 6: Skills - Standard Step 3. 11/7/4 Standard. Step 7: Skill Specialties - Standard 4. Pick three. Normal. Step 8: Add a Calling and a Transformed Attribute - The first part of the typical "Add _____ template." Calling is the X splat of Princess and represents the way the Princess brings Hope into the world. They'll be explained in greater detail in another post. Each Calling also has two Attributes the player can chose from to get a free Transformed Attribute dot. Transformed stuff will also be explained as this goes on, but as far as I can tell it's a bit disparate and spread out. Typical for White Wolf I guess. List of Callings (list taken straight from the book):
List of Queens (as the list of Callings)
A sidebar (more like box since the book is single column instead of the double that's standard to WoD books) gives players a better idea of how to choose their Queen quote:Choosing a Queen Step 11: Add Charms - Charms are basically the actual tricks and spells that a Princess can do. There are 10 categories of these and players get 5 dots. Two of those dots must go into their Calling's three favored Charm families. Charms are purchased individually akin to Changeling, but rather than being a chain, it's a family (so multiples 1s, 2s, etc), and taking a Two dot Charm in a family requires having a one dot charm in that same family. Upgrades to that Charm cost a single Charm dot. Alternatively, players can trade, at most, one Charm dot for one Transformed Attribute dot or 3 Transformed Skills dots Step 12: Add Inner Light - "A Princess’ magic shines out of her soul to illuminate the world. The raw power of her hopes and feelings is represented by her Inner Light." Start with 1. Spend 5 Merit dots to get another. Spend the other 5 to get the third. Step 13: Add Wisps - The resource stat. Wisps were explained in the previous chapter because I skipped over it. They're a measure of the manifestation of a Princess's emotional and magical energy. Step 14: Add Belief - The morality stat. Will be explained in greater detail next post. Step 15: Add Merits - "As a supernatural being a Princess is given three merit dots to spend at charachter creation, for a total of ten merit sdots." Two typos And that's Character generation! Not too different from what standard WoD char gen might be like. There is no quick reference however. Maybe I expect too much. Experience costs Princess has the standard costs for things: 4 per Mundane Attribute Dot, 2 per Mundane Skill dot, 1 per Merit dot, and 5 per power stat dot. For the other things: Transformed Attribute and Stat dots cost one less than their Mundane counterparts and it costs another XP to convert Transformed dots to Mundane. Affinity Charms costs 1 per dot. Non-Affinity Charms cost the same but with a 1 XP surcharge. Charm upgrades cost 1 XP. Favored Invocation costs 2 per dot and the others cost 3 per. Belief is actually more expensive compared to the two splats I've checked at 3 per dot. Finally, Willpower that's sacrificed can be rebought at 1 per dot. This was another shorter post, but it's on the level of Cytheria's size which I guess is as fine a benchmark as any for post about WoD fangames. Next Post: Princess Traits. And maybe some pretty pictures to doll the post up since this one was kinda bland.
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May 22, 2015 04:03
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Maybe an absolute bastard Grel Fighter/Thief with a few randomly rolled Quirks and Flaws.
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May 24, 2015 19:40
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Don't want to break up creepy cat talk, so I'll just drop this in and let everyone continue. Princess: the Hopeful Princess Traits - Princess PTSD Inner Light Wisps and Attribute/Skill Maxes follow Demon's (and presumably others). Transformed Attribute/Skill Max is the max when transformed. It starts at 5 and goes up 1 every 2 Inner Light until 9 Inner light where it matches the Mundane max. Princesses start with a max effective Charm level of 3. The effective Charm level is the Charm's level plus one per upgrade bought (so a 3 dot Charm with 4 Upgrades bought is effectively Seven). The max Charm level goes up one per Inner Light. Princesses also have Sensitivity, their drawback. The dice rolled for Sensitivity is equal to half of Inner Light rounded up. Sensitivity quote:A Princess is, by nature, sensitive to the suffering of others. When she sees someone in pain she cannot help but feel it herself; when she witnesses cruel or callous acts that cause suffering in others, the light within her dims and flickers. The sympathetic pain echoes in her mind afterward as a Haunting; she may continue to see the face of the victim or relive the moment over and over. Food tastes like dust, her favorite music is nothing but a cacophony, and headaches won’t leave her. Worse, the most severe Hauntings leave behind a lasting injury to her magic, represented as the Shadows trait.  This is one of those rolls where successes are to be avoided. If there are more successes then their rating in Shadows, they get a dot in Shadows in addition to the Haunting effects. The last quoted paragraph doesn't quite mesh with the next table (unless my reading comprehension has gone down the shitter while making this post) which contains effects based on the number of successes on the Sensitivity roll. The Haunting types are also the stages of Grief. All conditions gained as a result of this last for the Haunting's duration 1 Success - Acceptance - Take unpreventable Bashing damage equal to Shadows 2 Successes - Depression - Roll Shadows, lose Willpower equal to the number of successes, minimum 1. Also gain the Memories of Failure Condition 3 Successes - Bargaining - Gain the Senseless Martyr condition 4 Successes - Anger - Gain the Obsessive Vengance condition. If the Princess was the perpetrator, then gain the Pain Seeker condition instead 5 Successes - Denial - Gain the Abject Denial condition. If the Princess was the perpetrator, gain the Willful Amnesia condition instead. All these conditions remind me of the note during The Huntsmen Chronicles development that said that not everything had to be a Condition. Shadows quote:Shadows are the painful product of Sensitivity. They are regrets and sorrows, doubts and fears; they are everything a person says when they say “I can’t” to themselves; and for a women whose emotions are magic they can be as debilitating as any illness. quote:During the scene in which a Princess gains a dot of Shadows, if she manages to make the victim of the Tainting whole, or punish the one responsible for it, she may remove the dot again. After the scene ends, the dot “sticks” and can’t be lost so easily. If a Princess with Shadows fulfills her Virtue, she may remove 1 dot of Shadows in addition to regaining Willpower. If a Princess rolls an Exceptional Success on any roll to regain Wisps, she may also remove a dot of Shaodws. Finally, a Princess may spend Beats to remove a dot of Shadows; the cost equals her current Shadows rating. Wisps There are four things Wisps are generally used for:
To regain Wisps, there are also four ways:
Dreams Dreams are special Aspirations that involve helping others as that's what a Princess is all about. In addition, fulfilling them gives a Luminous Beat in addition to a normal Beat. Otherwise, they're functionally identical to a normal Aspiration. Luminous Experience By fulfilling Dreams and getting an exceptional success on Volunteer Work rolls, Princesses gain Luminous Beats. Five Luminous Beats get one Luminous Experience. Luminous XP can be spent on Inner Light, Belief, removing Shadows and buying Social Merits. Normal XP can be used to supplement these purchases. Belief quote:Belief tracks the strength of a Princess’s convictions, her belief in herself and her cause. Characters with high Belief are confident, assured, able to draw on their power more readily due to the strength of their certainty. They inspire confidence in everyone around them. Characters with low Belief are wracked with doubt and despair, losing their confidence that the world can be saved and that they have the ability to do it, thinking larger and larger compromises must be necessary if there is any hope to win at all. At first, this is only a minor loss, and characters may believe it healthy to learn of their own limitations and view the world more realistically. As Belief continues to drop, though, all hope begins to abandon the character, her powers seem further away, across a widening gulf of gnawing doubt, and she may begin to project an aura of uncertainty and depression on those around her.  Low Belief Princesses will inspire the poo poo out of you  Something I missed in the previous section, Princesses also start with rules that they live by based on their Belief. Think vows of sorts. A rule of thumb is that there's a rule that they live by for each dot of Belief above the fourth. These can change as the game goes on. Other morals codes are implied (such as those involving murder and the like). Whenever a Princess would violate her beliefs, abandon a Dream or cause important to her, fail to save a loved one from an untimely death, cause a friend or loved on to die or use certain Charms, they trigger a Compromise roll. A Compromise roll is the morality roll everyone knows using Resolve + Composure. quote:Dramatic Failure: The Princess’ sense of hope has been damaged, she might never again regain her youthful idealism. Lose a dot of Belief and choose from the following Conditions (or create a new one with Storyteller approval) as her negative emotions send her magic haywire: Shattered Confidence, Dissociation, Abdicated or Madness. Also, take a Beat. Along with this, the game also provides a list of modifiers to the Compromise roll based on the triggering action. Ostensibly, this could be better done with a chart or with just a general cleanup, but idk. quote:• The Princess fought for a cause until the very end but failed: +3 quote:• The Princess has Belief 8-10: +2 The Belief section has two sidebars: One about "Social Manoeuvring" in order to cause a Belief Compromise. quote:The aggressor sets the goal of ”inflict a Belief Compromise”. Calculate the Doors as normal, assume that this always counts as opposing a virtue, and when the last Door is opened make a Compromise roll. The Princess can’t offer an alternative, from a game perspective there is no alternative equal to a Belief Compromise. Vices and leverage can work as normal. Tempting a Princess with tickets to her favourite band gives means she’ll be spending an evening with her tormentor, who can use that time to chip away at the Princess’ self confidence. quote:Any act which carries a -3 modifier is always a Compromise for a Princess with a Belief of five or above. At a -4 modifier the limit drops to Belief four and above. A -5 modifier drops the limit to Belief 3. Any act so heinous to force an automatic Chance Die will always be a Belief Compromise no matter what. This also applies to a Princess’ unique Compromises, should they have a modifier severe enough. A Princess's followers can also instigate Compromise rolls. quote:A Princess is also held responsible for the deeds of her followers. If another person, acting under her direction or with good reason to think she wishes it, fails a degeneration check, the Princess implicitly Compromise her Belief. Unless the Princess explicitly ordered the act this is more forgiving than Compromises that she intended: Half any negative modifiers or double any positive modifiers on the follower’s roll, that is the modifier for the Princess’ own roll. Belief also affects how long a Haunting lasts. At 4 Belief, Hauntings last 2 Hours all the way to 1 Belief making Hauntings last 2 Days. At Belief 0, a lot of things happen: quote:When a Princess hits Belief 0, the anchorstone of her self is shattered. As her sense of hope, drained by so many Compromises, finally runs out her Inner Light starts to go out. She decreases her Inner Light to 0 dots, nothing more than a few fading embers. Her Phylactery shatters, suddenly age-rotted, and she forcefully de-Transforms, back to her normal identity. Without a Phylactery, she cannot Transform. Barred from the Dreamlands the Queens can offer no comfort. Even the Twilight Queens are disgusted by a Noble who falls this far, for Tears sees her as a threat to Alhambra, Storms as just another Dark creature waiting to happen, and Mirrors as a failed True Queen to be forgotten. Just as a pause with the block of text, unless the player wishes to play a villainous PC or this is during the last throes of a game, once a Princess hits 0 Belief, they're essentially out of the game and can become a MacGuffin that the PCs need to protect. quote:If her friends wish to help her they must do so before she loses her last dot of Willpower, for when her Willpower reaches zero she will simply lie down and stop moving. Nothing but the most powerful magics can save a once-Princess from this state. Trapped within, her soul struggles in one last attempt to break free. Roll Resolve + Composure – Shadows. On a Successful roll the soul manages to escape, although will likely be suffering extreme amnesia of any past lives, for it is the least sliver. It will take hard work, and probably several lives to fully recover. On a Failure the soul is trapped, helpless, replacing Fading Light with the Tainted Shell Condition. She becomes the prize in a great battle between Light and Dark: The last fading remains of her Inner Light, so close to the Darkness, cannot help but attract he attentions of the Darkness itself. In turn its attempt to gain such a prize draws the attention of Princesses due to watchful scouts or prophetic dreams.  A General Progression of Belief. Transformed Skills and Abilities On that cheerful note, we hit that last section. When transformed, Transformed Skills and Attributes are added to your normal ones and derived traits like Speed and Willpower are adjusted accordingly. The added Health and Willpower are called Transformed Health and Transformed Willpower, respectively. Transformed Health operates at normal, and the health wraps around when returning to normal unless recovered using Holy Shield or some other method. Willpower points gained while Transformed can be recovered at any time after being spent. If mundane and transformed is spent, Mundane WP is recovered first. Sacrificed WP comes from Transformed Willpower points first. Finally, the maximum dots of Transformed Attributes and Skills gained is equal to Belief + Inner Light with Skill dots counting for a third. (Ex: A starting Princess has a Max of 8 Transformed dots so 4 Transformed Attribute dots and 12 Transformed Skill dots would be the max.) There's a final sidebar about IC justifications of buying certain Skills and Transformed skills and such, but I won't bore you with that. Final notes: Again, there's a crapton of conditions brought up in this section. I'm not sure how often other games hand them out, so it might be normal and I'm just not used to them. I'll probably make another interlude post explaining all of the conditions mentioned in this post so there's an actual explanation of the consequences. Also, there's still a bunch of typos in the text. It's not enough to be noticeable, but they get pointed out when I'm editing. I don't fix them in order to preserve their depiction and "respect" for the writers.
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May 25, 2015 01:20
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Princess: the Hopeful As was elaborated in the previous post, there were a crapton of Conditions that one could gain as a result of their traits. In order to provide context to them without overloading the previous post, here they are on their own in their own short post. Punted this one quick because it was mostly copying and pasting. Conditions from Hauntings All of these conditions do not provide Beats and resolve at the end of the Haunting Memories of Failure - At 2 successes. "After failing to prevent an act of cruelty your character has become obsessed with her inability to prevent it and other similar cruelties. Anyone who brings up your character's past failures adds her Shadows to any social roll intended to dishearten her." Senseless Martyr - At 3 successes. "Your character is willing to offer herself as a victim in the forlorn hope that others might be left alone. She deducts her Shadows when rolling to contest any supernatural power or decreases a relevant attribute by Shadows when resisting a supernatural power." Obsessive Vengeance - At 4 successes and not the perpetrator. "After witnessing horrors and cruelties your character is consumed with the thought, she cannot rest until she has set things right. If the perpetrator is present she mediately goes for him, otherwise she obsessively searches for the perpetrator. If your character wishes to do anything else she must succeed on a Resolve + Composure - Shadows roll." Akin to the Soft Rage in Idigam Chronicles Pain Seeker - At 4 successes and the perpetrator. "Your character has personally committed an act of cruelty and dearly wishes to suffer for it. She obsessively seeks out the person she has wronged and tries to provoke them into a fight. Against whomever your character has wronged she reduces Defence by Shadows, including magical Defence and magical armour. Reduce magical armour first." Abject Denial - At 5+ successes and not the perpetrator. "Your character witnessed an act of cruelty so terrible she refuses to accept such a thing is even possible. She must flee immediately from the perpetrator, the victim and any clear reminders of the crime and its results. If she is forced to confront them all rolls take a penalty of Shadows until she escapes the area." Wilful Amnesia - At 5+ successes and the perpetrator. "Your character performed an act of cruelty so terrible she refuses admit or even remember she ever did such a thing. All memory of it is lost until this Condition is resolved and any attempt to force your character to acknowledge the truth takes a penalty equal to her Shadows." Probably not the worst condition all things considered. Conditions from Compromise Cracked Confidence - Succeeded on a Compromise roll. "Your character is verging on the edge of a Belief Compromise. Somebody who knows why can push her over the edge. Make a contested social roll with a the attackers' threshold being the Princesses' Belief + Composure and the Princess' being the attacker's dicepool. Roll once per turn, and if the attacker reaches the threshold first, make a Compromise roll." Resolutions include "Win or loose, Resolve the Condition after a contested social roll," Gain or Lose a dot of Belief, or the Princess deals with the issue. Heavy Crown - Succeed or Fail on a Compromise roll. "Your character has failed the people who depend upon her and feels that she is no longer worthy to lead. She suffers a dice penalty to all actions where other people depend on her success. -1 for five people or less. -2 for six to 15 people. -3 for 16 to 45 people, -4 for 46 to 100 people and -5 for anything over 100." Resolutions: Succeeds or fails an important roll where people depended on her with at least as many as the original occasion or (as Persistent) the character and their people learn their value as a leader with their imperfections. Self-Doubt - As Heavy Crown. "Your character has done something that shakes her confidence in herself. Emotions are magic, and her doubts are turning her own magic against her. Stripping her of the strength she does not believe she has. In any stressful situation your character cannot use her magical abilities (but keeps any that are already active) until she psyches herself up with a long speech about her ideals and beliefs. This requires an extended Resolve + Expression roll with a target of 8-Belief successes. One roll may be made per minute, or per turn if she uses the Royal Tongue." Resolution: the character psyches themselves up, (as Persistent) the character overcomes a similar problem, or (as Persistent) the character accomplishes a difficult or dangerous task. Over-Compensatory Guilt - As above. "Your character has done something she feels guilty about, as a result she is attempting to counter her feelings by making amends in every way except addressing the real issue: If she stole something she might compulsively give charity, if she told a dangerous lie she might become compulsively honest." Resolutions: Suffer a hardship or gives up on something wanted through misplaced penance or (as Persistent) confess and make amends. Shattered Confidence (Persistent)- Dramatic Failure. "Your character has completely lost her confidence in herself. Emotions are magic, and her lack of faith in her herself and her magic has become a self fulfilling prophecy. Your character cannot Transform, use Charms or Practical Magic. Even A Princess of Mirrors will be limited to her mundane identity." Beat: The character is harmed or fails a significant goal because of their lack of magic. Resolution: Gain a dot of Belief Dissociation (Persistent) - Dramatic Failure. "Your character did something so terrible that she refuses to accept it. Instead she separates her two identities, using one to shield the other. Every time the Princess transforms into her guilty identity (whichever one committed the act) lose one point of Willpower. In addition neither identity are able to remember what they did while in the other identity." Beat: The character gets into trouble because they couldn't remember something (presumably from the other identity). Resolution: Admit to the crime and make amends or gain a dot of Belief. Abdicated (Persistent) - Dramatic Failure. "Your character has been crushed by the weight of her crown, so she has taken it of. She refuses to believe that she is a Princess. She might accept that she used to be a Princess but she might refuse to believe that Princesses or magic even exist, referring to it as a childish game or an urban legend. Until she reclaims her crown your Character cannot Transform, use Bequests or Practical Magic. She still suffers from Sensitivity though." Beat: Suffer significant hardship due to lack of magic or they ail to further an Aspiration or Dream because they lack magic. Resolution: Confront and overcome the trauma, perform an act of heroism that reaffirms their desire to help, or gain a dot of Belief. Madness - Dramatic Failure. I assume it's in another book since it's not in here. Conditions from Belief 0 Wilful Amnesia - Upon hitting Belief 0. Fading Light - Upon hitting Belief 0. "Your character has lost her last shreds of hope. Without hope her Inner Light begins to fade away. She cannot regain Willpower though sleep, and loses a dot of Willpower every week." Resolution: Regain a dot of Belief and will soon die peacefully as a result, become a Dethroned, or run out of Willpower and roll Resolve+Composure-Shadows with a Success allowing the Princess's soul escape and a Failure replacing this condition with Tainted Shell Suggestible (Persistent)- Upon hitting Belief 0. "Your character has entered a fugue state where she will follow any instructions given for she lacks the willpower or initiative to do otherwise. For the same reason she will follow her instructions in a literal and uncreative fashion. Blatantly suicidal or heinous orders are ignored, when multiple people are ordering someone around the most recent order takes precedent." Beat: Do something against their interests because they were asked. Resolution: Depends on how they got there. In this case, they exit when Fading Light resolves. Tainted Shell - Fail the roll from Fading Light. "Your character has lost all her hope and all her Willpower. She lacks the will to do anything, even to move. Without constant help she will starve to death." Resolution: Die or embrace despair. I'm not sure why this needs to be a Condition. One other Condition was mentioned is Running on Fumes. "A Princess' magic is her hopes, beliefs and emotions given form. Your character has used up all her magic, she hasn't lost her emotions but she is out of fuel and running on fumes. It's an uncomfortable situation, but thankfully a temporary one. When adding Willpower to a dicepool you only get +2 instead of +3, in addition you take a -2 penalty on rolls that depend upon your emotions. Typically this covers making emotional connections with people, expressing yourself and enjoying works of art. Wisp regeneration rolls and Charms are unaffected (the lack of Wisps already covers the effects on magical ability)." Beats: Fail a roll because of this condition (roll the missing dice to see if the condition was the cause). Resolution: Have more than 10-Belief Wisps. So yeah. Hauntings suck. Hitting Belief 0 is bizarre and also essentially an extended character death. Low Belief also sucks. Despair seems to be truly a slippery slope since enemies with social ability can start chatting away at the Princess about their failures and make them fall faster. Next: X and Y splats with Stereotypes of Leviathans and Geniuses, but not Demons.
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May 25, 2015 02:39
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Princess: the Hopeful Calling So unlike Cyth's posts with each portion of the X and Y splat being mostly on their own, I'm giving each of them their own megapost (so your Scrollwheel doesn't have to work as hard). I initially intended both Callings and Queens on a single post, but previewing just the Callings gave me a sense that the post would be too big if both were in the same post, so I've separated them into their own posts. Both X and Y splats have stereotypes referring to all of the lines except for Demon (presumably since the section hasn't been updated since its release) and includes the fan lines Genius and Leviathan. I know nothing about Leviathan, though I'm sure someone might do an F&F for that and possibly Djinn since I believe that's also been "produced". Callings are the X splat. They're all rather one-note and can probably be easily boiled down to a single line of description with little to nothing lost. Each Calling has an affinity to three different Charm families and start with one dot in a Transformed Attribute. Of the Charm families, half appear only once with each Calling while the other five are shared between them. Every Attribute also only appears once in the transformed Attributes list except for Presence which appears twice. Each also has a Duty that they can follow to regain Wisps as well as three oaths that are general guidelines the class should follow (I say class since the parallels to the classic D&D classes are way too striking). Champion quote:Champions epitomize the ancient concept of a hero – those who accomplish. In the Kingdom, they were the defenders and the conquerors, the dragon slayers and the chain smashers. Their counterparts in the Reborn world value strength for altruistic reasons. They serve the weak. Moreover, they enjoy physical accomplishment for its own sake – Champions frequently sprout from athletes, those with a penchant for construction or day labor, and even brawlers. Anyone who loves to push their body to the limit or appreciates the simple need for a sturdy pair of hands makes for a grand Champion. They're Fighters/Warriors. Or Knights too. They have affinities to the Bless, Fight and Perfect Charm families and get a Transformed Attribute Dot in Strength or Resolve. quote:Champions regain magic whenever they perform a task for somebody who physically incapable or overwhelmed and don’t have the time and/or resources they need. This can mean doing chores for an elderly neighbor, working for a charity or volunteer effort, protecting a classmate from a bully, or otherwise making a sacrifice of your time and effort for someone else’s benefit. Champions can also restore their magic by protecting the innocent. Wiping out a nest of Darkspawn, defending a child from a wild animal, even walking the beat as a police officer can all fulfil a Champion’s duties. quote:First Oath: The Stereotypes: quote:• Graces: By the time you have raised an army, I will have already won the battle. Examples: Most magical girls fit into this category Kamen Rider Wizard (my own interpretation Magiranger also probably acceptable)  Buffy (theirs)  Grace quote:If we lost anything in the Fall, it was each other. People now wrap themselves in an shell of cynicism and distrust to save themselves from humiliation and risk. They carry popular opinions like armour, not with conviction. People can’t save each other if they can’t understand eachother and they can’t save themselves if they don’t even know who they are. Social-Monkeys like the Rogue (since the Champion does all the Stabbing). They have affinities to the Bless, Connect and Govern Charm families and get a transformed Attribute dot in Presence or Composure. quote:Graces recover their magic whenever they convince act on their virtuous impulses or bring them closer to their fellow man. This covers situations such as convincing an addict to seek out help, easing the anger between antagonistic relatives, getting a classmate to study for her own sake instead of cheating, or even just helping someone act on their crush. Graces also refresh their magic by leading societies. Turning a petition into a law, making executive decisions in a company, debating in the student council, working as a judge, or just making a convincing speech are all sacred duties to the Graces. quote:First Oath: quote:Stereotypes Examples: There's only one provided example for this Calling so you get whoever this is. Hinamori Amu from Shugo Chara! (theirs)  You know who (mine)  Mender quote:All of the Nobility feel the pain of others, but Menders are those who can’t bear to live with it. Their first impulse is always to treat pain, either physical or spiritual. These were the great sages and physicians of the Kingdom, who studied the science of the human conditions on levels undreamt by modern science. A good Mender is always looking around to see how she can make those around her better. Todays dark shrouded world is like a ravenous beast, they say, and it mangles us all, all the time. Without care, none of us will ever be strong enough to break out of the mire that swallows us whole. Nobody should be made to lie crippled as their dreams run on ahead of them. Cleric this time. Their affinities are the Perfect, Restore and Shape Charm families and get a transformed Attribute dot in Intelligence or Stamina. quote:Menders regain magic whenever they provide consolation, comfort, and aid. They can volunteer their time as medical facilities or to provide home care, work as part of emergency hotlines, design new treatments, be a shoulder for someone beset by loss and grief, or do any other number of things to relieve the pain of others. A Mender can work with machines as well as people, a brake line can cause as much suffering as a broken rib. In the end though, it really does come back to suffering. A Mender builds and repairs machines to help people rather than the simple joy of creation. quote:First Oath: quote:Stereotypes Example: This one's the same. Shamal from Nanoha (theirs)  Madaraki Fran from Franken Fran (mine, but not really Magical)  Tetra from Log Horizon (also mine)  Seeker quote:The desire to know is universal human trait, embedded in the heart and soul and genetic code of every man and woman on the planet. What isn’t common is the will to keep chasing after those answers when things start getting dangerous. That’s what sets the Seekers apart. In their previous lives, Seekers were the detectives, scientists, and scholars of the Kingdom. Their dreams of the Kingdom are filled with colleges where the secrets of the universe are revealed and cities where no lie is uttered and not even the smallest misunderstanding is present to obscure the truth. When they dream of the Cataclysm, they see grand libraries and academies burned to the ground, and lies entwined with lies in a web of deception so deep that even the most fundamental truths are uncertain. If not the Wizard class, then the Nerd class and thus likely closest to the heart of the writers. Their open spiel is also the longest. The get affinities to the Appear, Govern and Learn Charm families and get a transformed Attribute dot in Intelligence or Wits. quote:A Seeker regains Wisps whenever she uncovers new facts or information, and whenever she teaches another something that they do not know. A Seeker could be a scientist or explorer uncovering secrets no man has ever known. She could be a detective or journalist uncovering that which unscrupulous individuals try hard to keep hidden. She could be a teacher passing what she knows to the next generation. Many Seekers do a little of A and a little of B. A reporter uncovers a political scandal, then she publishes it. A Professor does exciting scientific research, then writes a paper and gives lectures on it. quote:First Oath: quote:Stereotypes Examples: Four examples with only one of them that I know that really fits the bill. Ms. Frizzle (theirs)  The Question (mine)  Troubadour quote:Soul is not a silent, static egg that we must shelter from the outside world until the time comes for it to hatch. Troubadours know the truth – the soul is a living, breathing maelstrom and unless we open up and let it out, it can smother to death within us. And the Troubadours have the keys to let it out. The Bard. This one also seems a bit more thought out compared to the others even if it mostly boils down to "the Creative one." Their affinities are the Appear, Inspire and Shape Charm families and get a transformed Attribute dot in Presence or Dexterity. quote:Troubadours draw magic from the release of others’ souls. Their duty encompasses providing art that inspires or consoles those who otherwise draw into themselves, encouraging and teaching those looking for a way to express themselves, and energizing those around them with their own vibrant talents. quote:First Oath: quote:Stereotypes Examples: The Elite Beat Agents (theirs)  AKB0048 (mine. Never actually seen this either fwiw)  Next: 
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May 25, 2015 20:49
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Cythereal posted:I took a look at this Leviathan fan gameline, and its premise is that you are a Deep One with themes of family (usually of the intensely, sometimes homicidally screwed up) and transformation of the body and mind with a healthy dose of body horror. Their primary adversary is a group of mad scientists/hunters out to protect humanity from the Leviathans and eradicate their literally ill-conceived kind. I may take a crack at it after Genius. It sounds like Beast before Beast was ever concocted. wdarkk posted:Honestly the thing I would most want to do with Princess is deal with the whole "what if your beliefs are bad" thing. Maybe it's just me, but I feel like the people with the strongest-held beliefs are the craziest. Belief, from what it looks like is expected to go up and down a bit. Probably once a session at least so those tenets aren't so strongly held. The Oaths are meant to be a bit more constant. From what I can gather, a starting Princess would follow those beliefs like a teenager or young adult. Something firm, but probably a bit half baked and not as well thought out. For what it's worth, doing "bad things" like killing or torture or terrorism is verboten for heroic Princesses. There's a Queen for Princesses, though, that take a "by any means" necessary approach to ridding the world of Darkness. Cyth is probably right though in that Princesses may as well just be another sub-group of Hunters since they effectively play the same role as the Wild Card Vigilantes that Hunters occupy just like Geinuses sorta fit the same role as Mages.
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May 26, 2015 00:51
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Cythereal posted:Never heard of Beast. From a glance through Leviathan, the basic deal is that it really does suck to be a Leviathan and the race is in a long decline never to recover. Ancient hunters vanquished their great progenitors, destroyed their once glorious civilization, and their descendants hunt the remaining Leviathans still. This doesn't make them bad people as a whole, and while individual Leviathans can be forces for progress and even forces for good, the race is circling the drain never to recover and the world won't miss them. Don't expect them to go gently into that good night, though. Leviathans retain a measure of their ancestors' power and are capable of immense destruction if unleashed. Beast is the new splat for nWoD in the works. It's about preying on humanity's primal fears and feeding the beast inside. There's supposed to be an element of built-in crossover with the game to enforce an idea of family and relation to the other splats, but it's not very good as of yet. It's still in early development. Leviathan sounds better than Beast IMO. KittyEmpress posted:Princesses sounds unironically fun and I would like to actually play it, and I dislike WoD. With a bit of polish and cleaning up, I could see Princess being a good game. Either they drop the WoD elements and go straight into a Magical Girl game or they fix up the WoD elements and give them a greater purpose that doesn't step in every footstep of Hunter (or go whole hog with the Hunter parallels including low Belief Princesses being as nearly inhuman as low Integrity Hunters). Question for the thread: Should I make my posts smaller and easier to digest? In particular, should I break up the Queen post into 3-5 smaller ones or keep it with all five in a single post? It's shaping up to be bigger than the Callings post right now. I'd also offer to make a sort of example character, but since this is WoD, it's fairly trivial to generate one and it's by no means as complex as what Genius requires
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May 26, 2015 02:31
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Okay. Message received. Since it's Memorial day, I've got nothing to do so that's why these posts are flying out. Also, it's a lot of copy and pasting too. I have two Queens done already, but I'll space their posting out a little. Princess: the Hopeful Queens The Y splat. These sections are a lot longer than the Callings section and include stuff such as the Queen's background, the team colors and Heraldry, and essentially an essay about the group's philosophy. Most of this stuff would have been shuttered away into another book including stuff on the Twilight Queens since it's largely irrelevant to a core book. Also included are Duties for each Queen according to the five Callings. For the sake of completion, I'll include what bits seem important or potentially humorous. Otherwise, I'll skip over sections that don't really add too much. This includes the Character Creation section which seems like common sense to anyone building to a concept. There are technically 8 Queens, but Protagonist PCs are suggested to pick from the 5 Radiant Queens. The other three are a bit morally grey in various aspects and are detailed in the Antagonists section where they'll get their deserved attention. Also, in the previous section, I listed them as Examples, but technically they're Inspirations. For what it's worth, they should be mostly one and the same, but it may explain why a character like Yuki Nagato, a cold almost emotionless sentient servant and an otherworldly AI whose sole purpose is to monitor and observe, is listed under the Seeker Calling since she, in no way, shape, or form would be any sort of example for a Princess. She might make a good Demon though. All Queens have three Attributes they can boost via Practical Magic at a one-to-one expenditure of Wisps to add dice to a roll, either to boost theirs or increase the penalty of another's. They also have an Invocation they favor that lets them apply bonus dice equal to their Invocation rating to a Charm roll if it applies. Normally it costs One Wisp to add an Invocation bonus to a Charm roll. Queen of Clubs AKA: The Matron of the Forests, The Mother Followers' Epithets: Wilds, Turtles quote:In any battle your greatest foe is yourself. You must ask yourself why you fight, what can you hope to gain and is it worth the risk of what you might lose? The enemy who says you cannot back down is none other than yourself; overcome it and look at the other options. You could surrender, often it costs you nothing but an apology and some pride. You could examine yourself, what did you do that lead up to this moment. Why couldn’t you live here in peace? If you can learn to live in harmony with your surroundings, isn’t that a better result than whatever you could win in a fight? The hippie Queen. She takes it easy and is generally chill about all things. When tough problems show up, she takes care of the little things while building up to the big stuff. While she could be an immortal Queen that fears no ageing, she prefers to go with the flow and age naturally. Instead of living in a castle and wearing finery, she lives in the woods of her former kingdom and wears donated clothes. She's just totally chilled out, man.  quote:Philosophy quote:Duties quote:Background Practical Magic: Resolve, Stamina, Composure. i.e. The Resistance Attributes quote:Invocation: Legno quote:Quote Inspiration: Nausicaa (theirs)  Animal Man (mine)  Best I could come up with that fit "peaceful naturalist" Xelkelvos fucked around with this message at 06:11 on May 26, 2015 |
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May 26, 2015 04:55
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Alien Rope Burn posted:I was weirded out by that too, is it really that hard between all the magical girl franchises, especially with ones like Precure that drop a whole new set of faces yearly? From what I can tell in the changelog, those sections haven't been touched for a long, long time. The Callings don't seem to have been touched since before Septermber 2012 (and a cursory inspection on the Wiki seems to confirm this). The Inspirations for all of them don't seem to have been touched much either and seem to be something that was decided upon at the outset and then utterly forgotten. Likely, they pulled their Inspirations from TVTropes and kept it at that. Most of the recent development seems to be updates to antagonists and fluff of later sections. Queens and Callings, I assume, are largely complete to them and need no changing. Except for how samey they both are and the piles of typos still within it. I do wonder if the people on RPG.net that are working on it would react to any of the criticisms we make beyond a huff and a silent dismissal. That aside, let's continue. Princess: the Hopeful The Queen of Diamonds AKA: The Crystal-eyed One, Lady of Clear Water, The Philosopher Queen Followers’ Epithets: Crystals, Lights, Hope-Engineers quote:Contrary to popular belief, people aren’t stupid. It’s just that people don’t think, or they don’t know how to think, or they just didn’t have the right facts. If you don’t think, you miss all the flaws in your plans. If you don’t have all the facts, you make stupid assumptions because you didn’t know any better. If you don’t think and don’t understand the world around you, you’ll put all your efforts into a plan that simply won’t work. And then things go wrong. Sometimes, they go very, very wrong. quote:From her seat in The Academy the Queen of Diamonds rules the Danann Archipelago. Upon a throne of whale ivory and pearl sits The Philosopher Queen: Regal as a glacier, six foot tall and adorned in the latest sleek future-chic fashions of her court. Here she judges the petitions and arguments of her subjects. Her replies are lengthy and explain the facts, theories and reasoning behind every decision. Every word spoken by The Lady of Clear Water is precise and rehearsed, as calm as a moonlit pond. quote:Philosophy quote:Duties quote:Heraldry Practical Magic: Intelligence, Wits or Resolve. i.e. All of the Mental Attributes quote:Invocation: Acqua quote:Quote Inspiration Not for , but the archetype that's being drawn is a pretty common one so rather than putting up images of the ones they list, since it's actually kinda bizarre.Washu of the Tenchi series Sailor Mercury of Sailor Moon Jonas Salk, the scientist  On the Wiki, Iron Man is used instead.Watanabe Eriko of some TVTroper fiction called Saga of Soul (this took me a little bit to find it since there's an actress with the same name) Xelkelvos fucked around with this message at 05:54 on May 26, 2015 |
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May 26, 2015 05:46
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I still abide by "they scrubbed TVTropes for Inspirations in 2009 and then never touched it again" theory. Every other section has received updates of sorts while Callings and Queens are let mostly untouched since their inception. The Charms section will definitely be interesting though since it seems to have gotten a bit bloated over the years. I accidentally deleted the next two Queen sections, btw, so those posts might be a bit delayed. Just like the Queen of Diamonds, though, the Queen of Hearts is nearly exactly like a Calling. Also there's the first overt Pony inspiration.
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May 26, 2015 19:31
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hyphz posted:Hackmaster, 3: Size problems and lots of luck Angawa Battle Cry and Maintenance/Upkeep for Proficiencies One-Upsmanship, Tough Hide, Stort, Less Sleep, Tough as Nails and Improved Awareness all sound good.
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May 27, 2015 00:55
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Princess: the Hopeful The Queen of Hearts AKA: The Rose Bride, The Gentle Patroness, The Queen Regnant Followers’ Epithets: Jewels, Flowers (female), Gallants (male), Rocks (often derogatory) quote:I know what you think of society, you see nothing but the people at the top having dinner with politicaians and hiring expensive lawyers. A big system to keep the rich rich, and the poor poor. Read a history book some day. You will see that opression used to be the sword, not the law. That is why I believe in our society, where you can only see how far we have left to go I see how far we’ve come. We are on the right path, the future will be built upon the foundations of our history. quote:Philosophy quote:Flourish in Community quote:Heraldry Practical Magic: Presence, Manipulation and Composure. i.e. the Social Attributes quote:Invocation: Terra quote:Quote Inspirations: The first pony inspiration appears by way of Princess Celestia. I'll spare you that. The other listed inspirations are Minky Momo (old series) and Queen Serenity of Sailor Moon. Arguably, Mami Tomoe would also fit too. At least until she lost her "crown." Next: "Puckish Rogues"
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May 27, 2015 01:30
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Cythereal posted:They've clearly never played Crusader Kings 2. Actually, to them, it totally did, long long ago before it fell due to the Darkness that arose from the differences in how they ruled their kingdoms. "Prosperous, just, kind and peaceful." Even if not completely perfect.
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May 27, 2015 02:05
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Cythereal posted:Again, an interesting idea if all of that was a complete fabrication they tell themselves and others as an ideal to strive for and just pretend it actually existed (only the leaders might know the truth). Unfortunately, just like Mage and Atlantis before the Fallen World Chronicles struck it from existence, it probably did exist and it was amazing and Zzzzzzzz...
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May 27, 2015 02:14
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Princess: the Hopeful The Queen of Spades AKA: The Queen of Knaves, The Queen of Thieves Followers’ Epithets: Knaves (affectionately derogatory), Rogues (affectionately derogatory), Scoundrels (affectionately derogatory) quote:Why does everyone think we knaves are lazy? Being a Knave is hard work, last week I had five parties, five! That was a lot of planning, and dancing all night really tires you out. Then I spent all last night watching great stand ups and making notes. I know everyone in school’s name, that took weeks of work, I had to write songs to help me remember, and then there’s birthdays and everyone’s favourite foods and what kind of jokes they like. After all that you have to keep yourself full of energy because any time something goes wrong people expect you to be the fast thinker, and you can’t do that when you’re tired. quote:Drifting above the mountain-side settlements that form The Confederacy of Four Winds the Queen of Spades rules from a palace carved out of the clouds themselves. Blessed with limitless energy the Queen breezes through her palace and amusements trailing courtiers and petitioners in her wake. Her regal presence comes not from her appearance but from her character. She is youthful, yet she possesses a presence that blows from her; carrying with it a sense of confidence and power, the smell of windswept desert sand, spices and the Queen’s infectious laughter. Fashion at the royal court is a turbulent affair. The Queen changes her style frequently; always trying to keep one step ahead of fashions. This has memorably led to her occasionally preceding over a court of punks and ravers while dressed in ermine robes. quote:Philosophy quote:Background Practical Magic: Dexterity, Wits, Manipulation. i.e. the Finesse Stats quote:Invocation: Aria quote:Quote Inspirations: A character that appeared only once in FullMetal Alchemist Saint Tail Some dude from Shugo Chara (Ikuto Tsukiyomi) Captain Jack Sparrow Aladdin Pinkie Pie Yeah. The other Pony reference. Other appropriate ones: Aang from Avatar: the Last Airbender the Protagonist of Saint's Row IV Next: the last of the Radiant Queens
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May 27, 2015 18:26
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theironjef posted:Should at least split that up between five teens with attitude. I really do wish Princess was more amenable to Toku stuff. I'll settle for a Compact or Conspiracy (or TFV or Cherion gear)
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May 27, 2015 18:48
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