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Ganymede

Holy crap Gany! In my experience finding people who play Earthdawn, much less know about the game is a rare treasure of a find.

I was a bit of an RPG connoisseur in my youth. Earthdawn is balls-out badass. It's Exalted, without the Anime suckiness. It's AD&D without the epic slowness of THAC0 and shit. Where you can kill a dragon with a dagger if you keep rolling 4s on a d4.

Yeah. It's totally the best fantasy RPG ever. And the world is damned interesting too.

Lithium

@Ganymede said:

Earthdawn.

MechWarrior.

These are the things I grew up on, and it shows.

Otherwise, I dig the GMC. All of it. Very much.

These are two systems that are hard to translate to a mush I have found. I've wanted to try and make a Mechwarrior/Battletech MUX that incorporated megamek but the only way I could think of doing it was for every 'unit' and 'house' to have an individual staffer like ChampionsMUSH used to do back in the day with every super team and every PC needing sponsorship from a GM.

Earthdawn would be easier to do, built it around Parlainth

Ganymede

@Lithium

There was once a BattleTech MUX. It had a coded combat system. But it was clunky.

And, I admit, Earthdawn would be painful to code, unless you had a list of inputs from Step 1 to 40 that rolled properly for you.

But I was told to list the games I want others to love, not the ones that ought to be made into MU*s.

Lithium

@Ganymede

That battletech mux game is still active, but, it uses real time coded combat which to me is against the essence of traditional battletech, and made code more annoying than it needed to be. Battletech is a turn based game, so keep it as a turn based game. If I could code an in game combat code I would make one in a second but... terrain. It'd be annoying to set up and I am not able to do it successfully yet.

Ganymede

@Lithium

Yeah, terrain was something I thought about when constructing the homebrew combat system I've been working on for 2+ years. I tossed the concept, and went with something stupidly simple.

Jaded

@Ganymede

When I was in the game shop buying Shadowrun books I saw the Earthdawn stuff, so I bought the core book and the Ruins of Parlainth boxed set thinking my players would love to get into it.

Some of them did. My more hardcore lovers of 1st and 2nd ed AD&D didn't.

tragedyjones

I don't have time to rant about them right now, as I already made an EFFORT POST about Promethean, but I second Manu's love for Exalted, as well as suggest Shadowrun.

A pair of games people may not know so well that are getting new editions "soon"

Scion is a game about Mythology and the modern world. Scion lets you play the children of Gods from various historic Pantheons. At its base power level, it is mildly superhuman, maybe around the level of Xena: Warrior Princess. As the game released new supplements, they increased the power level to be more and more mythical, to the level of juggling battleships and smiting continents.

Trinity Continuum was a trio of games from White Wolf in the late 1990s. They cover three time periods and different settings and genres that are linked in being a single universe, told in reverse. It starts with Trinity, a Science-Fiction game of action and intrigue in the 22nd century where you play a Psion, specifically created psychics with the power to protect the human race from themselves, hostile aliens, and worst of all, the Aberrants. Aberrant is set in the dawn of the 21st century, and is a gritty take on superhumans. It is a game of hope and godlike power with a dark side of taint, the saviors of this era become the monsters of the next. Adventure! is set in the 1920s, and is the first birth of extraordinary individuals. It is Pulp action, globe trotting excitement.

Coin

@tragedyjones said:

I don't have time to rant about them right now, as I already made an EFFORT POST about Promethean, but I second Manu's love for Exalted, as well as suggest Shadowrun.

A pair of games people may not know so well that are getting new editions "soon"

Scion is a game about Mythology and the modern world. Scion lets you play the children of Gods from various historic Pantheons. At its base power level, it is mildly superhuman, maybe around the level of Xena: Warrior Princess. As the game released new supplements, they increased the power level to be more and more mythical, to the level of juggling battleships and smiting continents.

Trinity Continuum was a trio of games from White Wolf in the late 1990s. They cover three time periods and different settings and genres that are linked in being a single universe, told in reverse. It starts with Trinity, a Science-Fiction game of action and intrigue in the 22nd century where you play a Psion, specifically created psychics with the power to protect the human race from themselves, hostile aliens, and worst of all, the Aberrants. Aberrant is set in the dawn of the 21st century, and is a gritty take on superhumans. It is a game of hope and godlike power with a dark side of taint, the saviors of this era become the monsters of the next. Adventure! is set in the 1920s, and is the first birth of extraordinary individuals. It is Pulp action, globe trotting excitement.

Can't wait for these, man. Cannot wait.

Thenomain

I couldn't get through Aeon I mean Trinity. I don't mean that it was poorly written; I have no idea because the layout was so far past the "ass" spectrum that I can only assume nepotism is the only reason its layout artist was hired at all. The book was one large glob of rats stuck together with mud, blood, and tangled fur. I've seen first year art school students do better on less sleep.

I mean sure, that was during the time where you just had to assume that everyone in White Wolf was drugged 24/7, but damn what a horrible book that was. Horrible. Horrible.

Horrible.

Ganymede

@Jaded said:

Some of them did. My more hardcore lovers of 1st and 2nd ed AD&D didn't.

They are fat, old, and stupid, and probably haven't gotten laid by a hot chick, like, ever.

Lithium

@Thenomain

I couldn't get past Aeon Trinity because you had all this power, but then you couldn't fucking /use/ it because the resource to actually use psychic powers was so bloody limited you could do like 3 things and then you were done, and you're more relying on your armor and weaponry than what made you god damned special! Sorta like first edition Mummy... which is not surprising cuz they were written by the same guy iirc.

Aberrant was way better in that regard to me. Aberrant is an interesting dichotomy between power and corruption as one leads directly to the other, no way around it.

Removing 'Taint' as a game mechanic is an option though and one I am considering for my superhero game, changing taint to something more like regular flaws.

Miss Demeanor

oWoD Vampire: The Masquerade, 2nd Ed. Preference for Sabbat over Camarilla. Playing the bad guy was never so much fun.

nWoD Changeling: The Lost. Sue me, I love the story of slowly becoming the very thing you fight against.

Also, I would play the shit out of some Scion.

And I love me some 3.5 D&D/Pathfinder.

Ghost

Marvel Superheroic Roleplay and the new Firefly RPG system.

Okay, sue me. I'm the guy that is fine with playing as an established Marvel character, and MSHRP wasn't very good about making your own chars and the license died out. HOWEVER, I have always felt the wealth of canon material and the RP/STORY focused dice system leads to some of the most rewarding team-based play I have ever seen. Firefly uses the same dice system and I love it so so so so hard.

WHAAAAT?!? You mean I can roll for a success JUST to add dice to the next PCs roll? FASTBALL SPECIAL MOTHERFUCKER!!!!! AAAAAUURRRGGH!!!

tragedyjones

If I am playing Superhero in an established world I enjoy being an FC.

Ghost

@tragedyjones I play a mean Deadpool and Spider-Man

EDIT/EXTRAPOLATION: As Deadpool, I once introduced my character to a female PC with Deadpool running down a street yelling "GO GO GO". He had two gold-plated Desert Eagle .50s with La Raza inscribed on them and was being chased by a street gang and their pitbulls. The guns were sweet and he stole them fair and square, but his teleportation belt was malfunctioning. Once they escaped to rooftop, something complimentary she said was taken as flirtation, so he arranged a date to Kentucky Fried Chicken with her. She said she'd go, then OOCly laughed and told me her char would be sticking him up.

...which resulted in a news post about a sudden holdup/terrorist threat in downtown NYC at a KFC as an man armed with AK-47s and a mask walked in and attempted to purchase a bucket of chicken.

Arkandel

@tragedyjones said:

If I am playing Superhero in an established world I enjoy being an FC.

Same. I like FCs for comic book-based games.

Lithium

I don't mind that people enjoy FC's, I just prefer a game without them because then /everyone/ is the FC. Everyone is the star. And to many times have I seen OC's overshadowed (often brutally) by 'FC's'. Which is why original world for my game.

tragedyjones

@Lithium said:

I don't mind that people enjoy FC's, I just prefer a game without them because then /everyone/ is the FC. Everyone is the star. And to many times have I seen OC's overshadowed (often brutally) by 'FC's'. Which is why original world for my game.

Also, I know I mentioned Aberrant earlier but I would be VERY careful about choosing it as a system. It can be clunky, unbalanced, and HYPER lethal. Which is fine if your game world supports that.

And in setting like Aberrant everyone being an OC is awesome. In the Marvel Universe I may want to be Iron Fist.

Lithium

@tragedyjones

Yeah it is hyper lethal, but that is one of the things I really like about it.

If Thor punches a human, that human /should/ be chunky salsa or a fine red mist.

Also yes, not using an established comic book universe. Coming up with my own world, so, it will probably be a niche game but it'll be mine damnit.

I am inspired more by judge dread than anything else. Humongous city, so many people that even thousands of supers can't keep up with all the crime, so there is bright sections, dark sections, sections off the grid completely... a strong enough super could realistically take over a whole chunk of land and... the authorities might not have the time to do anything about it so long as things don't get out of control.

It opens up a lot of possibilities and stories for RP.

faraday

Shadowrun is my favorite RPG, especially since they streamlined the rules in 4th/5th ed. Such a rich universe, and I enjoy the mix of heist and combat RP. Earthdawn is fun too, but I haven't played it in forever. I like the interwoven backstory between SR and ED.

I don't think either of them translate well to the MU front though. I'm naturally partial to FS3 there because I think complex systems get in the way of RP more than they aid it. The FS3 dice mechanics are somewhat similar to SR4.