I for one would hate to play on a game where every PC is allowed to be special if the player likes. It would be like a Marvel game where everyone is allowed to be super-powered or a vigilante. Hello? There are way more normal people in NYC and you shouldn't have a superhero in most scenes. We have local government and pizza boys on roster, and put forth the effort to make sure events from our continuity source have their progression maintained, because agency would be disrespectful to the stories the author of told (and what staff wrote in reference material!). It's not like those stories are somehow focused on the exceptional characters, and the average norm is shown mostly in passing bit players, what the monologues of the exceptional tell us, and victims of the exceptional and events they drive. If everyone could play a cape, it just makes things less special for everyone. Especially me, who plays one.

Wipes up the pool of sarcasm.

So the image bump was broken and did little for a temporary endorsement, so I fixed it now that I have time to delve deeper. Useful. Moving on...

MotM has had a long and storied history, some incredibly strong periods and some interminable lulls. The game at present is perhaps the healthiest it's ever been, on several levels, not the least of which are the creative quality of the RP and RPers there and openness to various ideas and preference.

Digging further, the bad:

Some staff are fairly behind the scenes or absent, and there's some Venn overlap here with old players who can be difficult to engage.

The pace of RP here can move much slower than some of the biggest games, with mechanics in place to allow saving and continuing fights largely accommodating those with less time at one spell.

The csys learning curve can seem overwhelming at first. It's a system simplish to learn and forever to master, so don't be too intimidated, but it's good to accept there'll likely be a period of being often asskicked.

Some systems are archaic at this point in the hobby. Email apps, a path system instead of meet, events driven by sign up machine and bb instead of calendar. In defense of this I note simply that in most cases MotMs features predate these quality of life bits, despite being due an update imo.

The theme seems to be such that many mu*ers spurn it as shallow or one note. Which kind of amuses me in a world where tights and gothic eyeshadow are the big things. This one is silly, get over yourself. Nerd.

The Good:

Plenty of staff are active and engaged and non-hostile (an important caveat in the modern scene it seems...). Apps and requests are generally not a horrible wait, and as mentioned, the exceptional head coder is nominally in charge and still tweaking the system for balance and expanding it.

The playerbase is high quality with many deep character driven storytellers; far more than the simplistic source material tends to suggest. My writing has improved here several times through the years, so will yours. The advancement system rewards creative plot, character arcs, and moving on when the tale is told for a char.

CSYS being a system that rewards skill while still involving lots of luck yields dynamic and unpredictable combat seldom matched, in my experience, by consent based conflict or any other combat rules. The setup makes learning new tricks and trying daring gambits inherently necessary and satisfying.

There are umpteen craptons* of pre-statted FCs to learn the game and tweak to your heart's content, many with ample blank space to personalize your characterization color. Players and staff are also patient and helpful in developing a sheet for newbies' OCs when that's the preference... But take note, FCs are the easier tutorial phase!
*(scientifically measured)

Ample systems to run NPCs and adjust a character's effective power level on the fly mean compelling scene hooks can be crafted amongst just about anyone with a bit of thought. Minions, power down, slowdown, spar to your heart's content.

I've played a lot of games over toooo many years but MotM holds a special, favorite place in my heart. I always wind up back here and probably will as long as the lights are on. You should too.

Haha, I knew some PoVs would come up as examples, though in general I don't think they negate the point. I'd also argue Arianne's exceptional aspect is the stark contrast to 'how things are' in the rest of Westeros with the far more egalitarian Dornish. A confident, cunning, assertive woman who's sex-positive and actually in line to rule is in the setting a pretty strong statement, and she's one of the characters I'm saddest was cut from the show. Sam, for his part, is kind of an inverse of that: his exceptional mind and potential inhibited by the attitudes of his society and its opinion on what his quiet, pudgy nature means about his value. Catelyn is exceptional because she's the absolute worst.

As far as comics not being a fair comparison to a gritty low fantasy, I feel that's a bit narrow. Many runs, stories,.graphic novels are dark, low powered, focused on similar themes. But it's not really the point. Similar arguments are made about everything from Star Wars to WoD. And in each case players on those games argue about whether things contrary to their enjoyment and sense of theme and tone should be allowed. (Just see above, presenting OC Kryptonians <or Green Lanterns, etcetc> as something inherently wrong and cheapening, rather than a preference issue. Heck, I've seen Batman players utterly hostile to the supporting cast even existing-- and you can certainly argue Nightwing and McGinnis or various Robins 'cheapen' your take on Bruce).

At that point, while I respect the world building intent and generally feel people can play whatever they want and open whatever kind of game they want, I personally have a problem with those kind of systems and caps because while there's merit in the idea that if everyone is strange and exceptional, no one is, applied on MU* I have serious issues with policy that, effectively, make a portion of the playerbase there to highlight the uniqueness of a smaller group in a realistic way. They're not NPCs, and judgement on worth as a player, concept, etc are seldom as objective as we like to imagine, and prone to influence by our personal rule of cool.

Match of the Millennium. motm.kicks-ass.net is both website and gamesite. 2002 is ze port.

There's no accusation. Just what I consider an apt metaphor illustrating the problems with that approach in a MU* environment. The characters GRRM focuses on to tell his stories are, almost universally unusual, outliers, exceptional. The tone isn't even that different from numerous graphic novels. I'm struggling to think of even one 'average dude' in the SoIaF saga who's a main focus, or many PoV chars who aren't wargs, the cleverest, amongst the most dangerous, or tiny girl assassin badasses. Every time this comes up people fire back with 'While you wouldn't want an army of X or Y would you?!?' as if it's a logical counterpoint to take 'every noteworthy char is frankly exceptional, and most players (not all) want to be exceptional' and assume everyone would app that identical exceptional trait. If that's lazy, it's not meant to be. It IS, however, geared towards 'simple and equated to an experience in the hobby prolific enough to be almost universally understood'.

Especially a parallel book game with NPC FCs. At least if players have the cast, there's agency and unpredictability...

I played on a SW game that mostly mimed Canon (now Legends) events and had staff run FCs... Who were buffed any time a PC got close. It was so very, very rote and frustrating, and any time they popped up in plot the main actor became a staff NPC, not any player/s. Bad form imo.

So it's no secret that the active MU* community is always hungry for new Superhero and World of Darkness games that step past the sins of their fathers, even if keeping that momentum can be a bit of a hat trick-- but without my finger on the pulse of what's come and gone, what's strong and weak right now in a broad sense, everything else seems a bit more of a crapshoot.

I've been mulling over the possibility of a new Battletech MU*, and wondering if the resurgence in interest in the setting is enough to draw (and sustain) a playerbase. I'm thinking we just run FS3 for the character-level interactions and offer resolution via MegaMek (a multiplayer-enabled, awesome, rolls-for-you Battletech tabletop client) for 'mech combat, posing as battles unfold. This part excites me greatly, it's both more user friendly and more compelling than options have been in the past, as well as relatively accessible (since everyone and their mother knows FS3 a bit, and MegaMek makes the tabletop rules far less daunting in numerous ways).

Which brings us to what I think is the complicated part (beyond finding a motivated coder): Setting. My gut check says the "best" setting choice is one of several eras focused around Solaris VII. You have your seedy noir, neo-corporate settings represented from scum and villainy up to... well, really polished scum and villainy! With all the heroes-against-the-grain, gumshoes, and pragmatists a gray setting like Battletech encourages. 'Mech combat becomes sport, giving easy excuses but low(er) stakes for conflict. Thing is, it's not what I like, it's the consumer.

This setting has the 40k, Star Wars, Game of Thrones issue where everyone who knows it loves different aspects of it, different eras, different factions, and different locales. Do we need to be focused on a more military op hotspot? Backwater fringers removed from Inner Sphere -or- Clan politicks and wars? Perhaps center a player-driven narrative around a chunk of one of the larger Mercenary operations. What do people think holds the broadest interest? What would -you- in particular be interested in RP'ing or not RP'ing? What are the most important pitfalls in settling on this main narrative thrust and setting?

I realize this is all vague, partly because I'm mulling numerous directions, partly because I'd like to see where shots land -without- a whole lot of my own fleshing out off the bat. Thanks in advance for thoughtful input!

I'm definitely aware there's a Battletech MUX codebase. It's run on numerous games over the years I believe, sadly I've never found one of them at a time it was truly active. What I found poking around at the code and system anyway was that it was, like many detailed space and combat systems translated to MU*, kind of a steep learning curve and not... optimal in terms of the intended functionality.

I feel like the graphical client MegaMek offers is the best experience, and (probably) the best way to keep people honest outside of purely in-game systems. I'm not super happy with any of the out-of-mech RPG options available (as I remember anyway, it's been awhile for, for instance, MechWarrior)... which just makes FS3 for that sort of thing the path of least resistance, by a noteworthy margin.

The basic divide I'm seeing illustrated is a preference for a PvE, narratively-structured focus where everyone is part of the same unit (or perhaps a small coalition thereof), and the more open PvP options and sandbox nature of Solaris VII. The latter would strike me as relying more heavily on player-driven factions and storytelling, with world events as a unifying thread, while the former would need to be more heavily structured by assigned storytellers and mission-runners.

There are strengths and foibles with both approaches, in my opinion, but that split decision in where to put my focus seems like the most important variable right now.

I'm definitely aware there's a Battletech MUX codebase. It's run on numerous games over the years I believe, sadly I've never found one of them at a time it was truly active. What I found poking around at the code and system anyway was that it was, like many detailed space and combat systems translated to MU*, kind of a steep learning curve and not... optimal in terms of the intended functionality.

I feel like the graphical client MegaMek offers is the best experience, and (probably) the best way to keep people honest outside of purely in-game systems. I'm not super happy with any of the out-of-mech RPG options available (as I remember anyway, it's been awhile for, for instance, MechWarrior)... which just makes FS3 for that sort of thing the path of least resistance, by a noteworthy margin.

The basic divide I'm seeing illustrated is a preference for a PvE, narratively-structured focus where everyone is part of the same unit (or perhaps a small coalition thereof), and the more open PvP options and sandbox nature of Solaris VII. The latter would strike me as relying more heavily on player-driven factions and storytelling, with world events as a unifying thread, while the former would need to be more heavily structured by assigned storytellers and mission-runners.

There are strengths and foibles with both approaches, in my opinion, but that split decision in where to put my focus seems like the most important variable right now.

While the replies CERTAINLY seem to rep the range of interests that I was worried about, it's also heartening to see how much love's out there for this awesome sci-fi galaxy.

In lieu of stepping deeper right this minute (siiick), I just want to tangent briefly onto what an awesome bit of fluff the origin of Clan Diamond Shark is-- with the organism actually created by their arch-rivals to destroy their original namesake (the Sea Fox). At which point Clan Sea Fox (and all of us ever) were like "Shit yea, the Diamond Shark is badass, we're down with this change."

In the Game of Clans, you Win, or you seethe like a chump.

RE: Pre-Clan and Post-Clan eras... the issue I have mechanically with the Clans is they kind of break the system in some noteworthy ways. What I -dig- is that it opens up a lot of cultural clash and other interesting RP.... and let's be real, awesome shinies. It's hard for me to argue that the 3025 phase (before Targeting Computer Gauss omg) isn't the sweet spot of mechanical pace and precision... and a bit less pilot-lethal.

If you're like "What is this Battletech Thing?" here is my favorite quick synopsis of its flavor and nature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnMA1CYOoHw

If you want some lore deep dive gloriousness, you want Tex Talks Battletech on Youtube.

So it's no secret that the active MU* community is always hungry for new Superhero and World of Darkness games that step past the sins of their fathers, even if keeping that momentum can be a bit of a hat trick-- but without my finger on the pulse of what's come and gone, what's strong and weak right now in a broad sense, everything else seems a bit more of a crapshoot.

I've been mulling over the possibility of a new Battletech MU*, and wondering if the resurgence in interest in the setting is enough to draw (and sustain) a playerbase. I'm thinking we just run FS3 for the character-level interactions and offer resolution via MegaMek (a multiplayer-enabled, awesome, rolls-for-you Battletech tabletop client) for 'mech combat, posing as battles unfold. This part excites me greatly, it's both more user friendly and more compelling than options have been in the past, as well as relatively accessible (since everyone and their mother knows FS3 a bit, and MegaMek makes the tabletop rules far less daunting in numerous ways).

Which brings us to what I think is the complicated part (beyond finding a motivated coder): Setting. My gut check says the "best" setting choice is one of several eras focused around Solaris VII. You have your seedy noir, neo-corporate settings represented from scum and villainy up to... well, really polished scum and villainy! With all the heroes-against-the-grain, gumshoes, and pragmatists a gray setting like Battletech encourages. 'Mech combat becomes sport, giving easy excuses but low(er) stakes for conflict. Thing is, it's not what I like, it's the consumer.

This setting has the 40k, Star Wars, Game of Thrones issue where everyone who knows it loves different aspects of it, different eras, different factions, and different locales. Do we need to be focused on a more military op hotspot? Backwater fringers removed from Inner Sphere -or- Clan politicks and wars? Perhaps center a player-driven narrative around a chunk of one of the larger Mercenary operations. What do people think holds the broadest interest? What would -you- in particular be interested in RP'ing or not RP'ing? What are the most important pitfalls in settling on this main narrative thrust and setting?

I realize this is all vague, partly because I'm mulling numerous directions, partly because I'd like to see where shots land -without- a whole lot of my own fleshing out off the bat. Thanks in advance for thoughtful input!

Haha, I knew some PoVs would come up as examples, though in general I don't think they negate the point. I'd also argue Arianne's exceptional aspect is the stark contrast to 'how things are' in the rest of Westeros with the far more egalitarian Dornish. A confident, cunning, assertive woman who's sex-positive and actually in line to rule is in the setting a pretty strong statement, and she's one of the characters I'm saddest was cut from the show. Sam, for his part, is kind of an inverse of that: his exceptional mind and potential inhibited by the attitudes of his society and its opinion on what his quiet, pudgy nature means about his value. Catelyn is exceptional because she's the absolute worst.

As far as comics not being a fair comparison to a gritty low fantasy, I feel that's a bit narrow. Many runs, stories,.graphic novels are dark, low powered, focused on similar themes. But it's not really the point. Similar arguments are made about everything from Star Wars to WoD. And in each case players on those games argue about whether things contrary to their enjoyment and sense of theme and tone should be allowed. (Just see above, presenting OC Kryptonians <or Green Lanterns, etcetc> as something inherently wrong and cheapening, rather than a preference issue. Heck, I've seen Batman players utterly hostile to the supporting cast even existing-- and you can certainly argue Nightwing and McGinnis or various Robins 'cheapen' your take on Bruce).

At that point, while I respect the world building intent and generally feel people can play whatever they want and open whatever kind of game they want, I personally have a problem with those kind of systems and caps because while there's merit in the idea that if everyone is strange and exceptional, no one is, applied on MU* I have serious issues with policy that, effectively, make a portion of the playerbase there to highlight the uniqueness of a smaller group in a realistic way. They're not NPCs, and judgement on worth as a player, concept, etc are seldom as objective as we like to imagine, and prone to influence by our personal rule of cool.

There's no accusation. Just what I consider an apt metaphor illustrating the problems with that approach in a MU* environment. The characters GRRM focuses on to tell his stories are, almost universally unusual, outliers, exceptional. The tone isn't even that different from numerous graphic novels. I'm struggling to think of even one 'average dude' in the SoIaF saga who's a main focus, or many PoV chars who aren't wargs, the cleverest, amongst the most dangerous, or tiny girl assassin badasses. Every time this comes up people fire back with 'While you wouldn't want an army of X or Y would you?!?' as if it's a logical counterpoint to take 'every noteworthy char is frankly exceptional, and most players (not all) want to be exceptional' and assume everyone would app that identical exceptional trait. If that's lazy, it's not meant to be. It IS, however, geared towards 'simple and equated to an experience in the hobby prolific enough to be almost universally understood'.

I for one would hate to play on a game where every PC is allowed to be special if the player likes. It would be like a Marvel game where everyone is allowed to be super-powered or a vigilante. Hello? There are way more normal people in NYC and you shouldn't have a superhero in most scenes. We have local government and pizza boys on roster, and put forth the effort to make sure events from our continuity source have their progression maintained, because agency would be disrespectful to the stories the author of told (and what staff wrote in reference material!). It's not like those stories are somehow focused on the exceptional characters, and the average norm is shown mostly in passing bit players, what the monologues of the exceptional tell us, and victims of the exceptional and events they drive. If everyone could play a cape, it just makes things less special for everyone. Especially me, who plays one.

Wipes up the pool of sarcasm.

Match of the Millennium. motm.kicks-ass.net is both website and gamesite. 2002 is ze port.

Especially a parallel book game with NPC FCs. At least if players have the cast, there's agency and unpredictability...

I played on a SW game that mostly mimed Canon (now Legends) events and had staff run FCs... Who were buffed any time a PC got close. It was so very, very rote and frustrating, and any time they popped up in plot the main actor became a staff NPC, not any player/s. Bad form imo.

So the image bump was broken and did little for a temporary endorsement, so I fixed it now that I have time to delve deeper. Useful. Moving on...

MotM has had a long and storied history, some incredibly strong periods and some interminable lulls. The game at present is perhaps the healthiest it's ever been, on several levels, not the least of which are the creative quality of the RP and RPers there and openness to various ideas and preference.

Digging further, the bad:

Some staff are fairly behind the scenes or absent, and there's some Venn overlap here with old players who can be difficult to engage.

The pace of RP here can move much slower than some of the biggest games, with mechanics in place to allow saving and continuing fights largely accommodating those with less time at one spell.

The csys learning curve can seem overwhelming at first. It's a system simplish to learn and forever to master, so don't be too intimidated, but it's good to accept there'll likely be a period of being often asskicked.

Some systems are archaic at this point in the hobby. Email apps, a path system instead of meet, events driven by sign up machine and bb instead of calendar. In defense of this I note simply that in most cases MotMs features predate these quality of life bits, despite being due an update imo.

The theme seems to be such that many mu*ers spurn it as shallow or one note. Which kind of amuses me in a world where tights and gothic eyeshadow are the big things. This one is silly, get over yourself. Nerd.

The Good:

Plenty of staff are active and engaged and non-hostile (an important caveat in the modern scene it seems...). Apps and requests are generally not a horrible wait, and as mentioned, the exceptional head coder is nominally in charge and still tweaking the system for balance and expanding it.

The playerbase is high quality with many deep character driven storytellers; far more than the simplistic source material tends to suggest. My writing has improved here several times through the years, so will yours. The advancement system rewards creative plot, character arcs, and moving on when the tale is told for a char.

CSYS being a system that rewards skill while still involving lots of luck yields dynamic and unpredictable combat seldom matched, in my experience, by consent based conflict or any other combat rules. The setup makes learning new tricks and trying daring gambits inherently necessary and satisfying.

There are umpteen craptons* of pre-statted FCs to learn the game and tweak to your heart's content, many with ample blank space to personalize your characterization color. Players and staff are also patient and helpful in developing a sheet for newbies' OCs when that's the preference... But take note, FCs are the easier tutorial phase!
*(scientifically measured)

Ample systems to run NPCs and adjust a character's effective power level on the fly mean compelling scene hooks can be crafted amongst just about anyone with a bit of thought. Minions, power down, slowdown, spar to your heart's content.

I've played a lot of games over toooo many years but MotM holds a special, favorite place in my heart. I always wind up back here and probably will as long as the lights are on. You should too.