Posts made by Bobotron

@faraday
I try to read descs, but the last game I was on was more purple prose descs than not, which kinda killed my interest in two page mass scrolling descs.

On the flipside, I suck at describing cuts/etc. of clothing, so a general desc plus an image link to an outfit is about what I'm up for nowadays, barring a few things.

@lithium

EACH OTHER! I dunno.

@ganymede

The schizotech is about the only thing that has interested me in that. But I was raised on Phantasy Star-levels of schizotech.

@lithium
Penn also has MUX-style channels as a default option now. Like, I don't think it requires any extra set up; it's just part of the core, and should just straight-up work with addcom or @clist and such.

I love the people who run the Werewolf the Apocalypse LARP in town. It's small (but hopefully growing), but hella fun. I feel like it helped that 1. the staff come from a boffer LARP background so designing WtA stuff isn't super foreign to them, and 2. they played for nearly the entirety of the Masquerade LARP I ran, so they also understand the differences between a boffer LARP and a WoD LARP. I am loving my Shadow Lord Philodox Homid, who is a mid-50s corporate lawyer who changed way late.

ETA: Honestly, I love the politics and backstabby and stuff of vampire... but I kinda feel like the 'us against the crashing tide' angle of Werewolf is refreshing, and that the politicking that happens (for rank, for positions, etc.) is interesting because of the things that you DON'T do in Werewolf that you do in Vampire.

@ganymede
Admittedly, I didn't read the one in Danse Macabre since I was told that it was a reprint of the one in Invite Only and I could've sworn that you lost WP as you got hit. Now that I've went back and re-read invite only, I totally misremembered. I did like the fact that they included a list of stuff you cannot do with the social combat rules (at least in Invite Only).

@saulot

All my upvotes. For me, people who ignore required timelines for work and do 'easy things' to get numbers and not look like they have past due things. Newsflash, if everyone did the things that have shorter timetables first no one would look past due.

@thatguythere

This is essentially also how the NWoD Requiem social combat rules work, though your health is involvedi n your Willpower. It's done with calculations that are familiar to people. It's detailed out in Danse Macabre and Invite Only.

@ortallus
This is essentially how ASoIaF does, including social defenses, social 'armor' and such. Marvel Heroic uses Cortex, and it's neat in that when you do social damage to someone, you can bid that damage against them as a die to use against them.

@surreality

Influence? It has a slightly different connotation than Lies or Persuasion.

For my own thing I'm building, I'm playing around with a system where your social capabilities give you points of Leverage which is then bid as both offense and defense, and it becomes a bit of a bid-raise-call situation. Each character describes what they hope to accomplish, establishing a context for the bets and for the eventual win/lose/draw outcome. As the scene advances and you maneuver socially, it becomes a bidding war. You bid initial Leverage to start the process; the target can Call (counters/defends, paying the same as your bet), and then a Raise/Call process begins. At any point, anyone can Fold (gives in to the outcome declared at the start of the intrigue) or Cash Out (offer something else in response for a lesser outcome; ie: you might offer a Favor, or grant Prestige, or something of that nature).

Right now I'm trying to figure out a fair way to handle refreshing the Leverage pool.

@surreality

Right, but you can design into the ground, if your players don't choose to engage with your policies and the things you design, what can you do? I agree with all of your points, as a note. I'm just saying, it requires a culture shift.

@Ganymede
I agree. I'm just pointing out the obvious for outside people looking in, and ways that people game the system. I can count on the number of times I've tested Leadership or Politics in tabletop or LARP, for example.

@surreality
All this is well and good, but...

1. This requires players to understand that they CAN do this and NOT be bothering staff, and a willingness to do so.
2. It requires staffers to actually be present, around and able (or in some cases, WILLING) to adjudicate these situations.

How often do we have whinging about both points on this forum? Staff availability is the biggest culprit, from what I see.

@Ganymede
And yet, the whole 'match of wits and writing,' on a game that has a social stat system, then turns right back around into 'Roleplaying Stats Not On Your Sheet' which I think the majority of us have said we find bad sport. And again, we swing back around to devaluing the purchase and, to be blunt, purpose of those skills and stats.

If Player A's stats posit them as a socially mousy guy with no oratory skills, that should be their default mode; if Player B's stats posit them as a social powerhouse with a silver tongue equivalent to Frank Abagnale, Jr. then you should TRY to RP that, and our stats should be used appropriately to back up your concept.

@Ghost
I agree there re: 'playing the player'. This is also why I try to preach 'good metagaming,' which boils down to OOC player trust and willingness to compromise between players, even to a character's loss.

@Arkandel
Re: 'three types of systems'
Eh, this won't get rid of metagaming; it'll just drive the people who metagame and handling loss other ways, vis a vis murderface.

@Thenomain
Well, I had read some interviews and saw some youtube videos of LARPers who went to the Nordic-style LARPs that were based on WoD (Convention of Thorns, and End of the Line) and I spoke briefly with a friend who does a variety of Nordic-style parlor LARPs a long time ago about the ones she plays in. Here are some things that are commonplace between all of them:

• The biggest concept of the game style is collaboration. People coming into these Nordic LARPs come in to build and collaborate on interesting stories, and come in on the same mindset to do so. It's a mindset that drives how people act, even when they are opposed in game.
• There is a great attempt to manage Bleed and metagaming. For EotL, one of the things that was reportedly done was a pre-game 'I am <player> and I will be <character>' in order to sort of center yourself as 'the Character,' and the reverse was done at the end of the game with 'I was <character> and now I am <player>'. Great attempts were made to keep IC as IC.
• The core mechanic of the entire game could really be boiled down to: If everyone involved agrees that something goes down a certain way, that’s the way it goes down. Again, we swing back to collaboration.
• Mechanics were mainly used to: Emulate some facet of the world that is entirely un-actable or ensure the comfort and safety of all participants. In mechanical comparisons in EotL, it was 'highest stat wins' and collaboration on the outcomes. In CoT, it was very similar, along with how you verbally presented. To Dominate someone, you would tell the person 'I really want you to X' and you changed your verbiage to show your capability with the power.

Too Long... here's the article in question from a LARPer who attended: https://aeriondyseti.com/2016/09/08/end-of-the-line-part-one-introduction-liminality-and-mechanics/

The biggest takeaway? Collaboration and cooperative methodology is the key point of all of these things. Even the weird stuff like the Dr. Who LARP, or the 1940's housewife LARP, or the Not-Harry Potter LARP functions on this. It's why I don't forsee it being a good buy for a MUSH, because for every two people that are awesome about the collaboration, you have one person who is In It To Win It.

This is a combo of RPG book recommendation and regular book recommendation. It'll probably only be useful for people who are fans of Vampire the Masquerade, but the fluff portions of Beckett's Jyhad Diary are ten kinds of awesome in my opinion.

@arkandel
WELCOME TO MONDAY! WHERE NOTHING GETS DONE.

Ahem.

1. The plan is for the power structure to be filled by (at this time) Rostered NPCs initially. Part of my goal with this is to try to present 1) some interesting characters that will fade out over time, and 2) a way that I/staff that I end up getting don't have to portray every NPC on the game. Additionally, I would endeavor to work close with these people so it's not just 'Princeps of House Julius hosts a paaaaaartaaaaaay!' events. Ultimately, Roster characters are beholden to work with staff to help keep stuff going on the game.

Right now, the plan is to have the Praetor (assistant to the Consul), the six Princeps (Heads of House in town), the Legatus (military commander), and one of the Quaestors (handles public affairs and judiciary) as Rosters. The Aedile (handler of public works and vampire locations), one of the Quaestors, ans the six Lictors (attendants/personal guards of the Princeps) are open at this time due to plot stuff and PCs will have opportunities shortly after opening to try to claim those. The Consul is the only true NPC that staff will be specific to run, though any unclaimed Roster can be snagged by staff (and to an extent, players for some plot stuff).

2. I'm hoping to be pretty open here. Want to host a paaaaartaaaaay? That's cool. Want to go investigate sightings of monsters in the forest at Miller's Reserve? I'm cool with that. Want to have a fighting tournament in the Arena and test the new reinforcements to the structure? Certainly. I am also going to try to develop some hooks to float there for people and staff to grab and do stuff, as well as try to run something every couple of days. And I want to use the Rosters to farm out things like getting PCs into the open positions, though probably not immediately like, within the first week of opening. I suppose it's good that my brain doesn't stop running at 100 mph.

3. Well, everything will be set up and easily searchable on the wiki. An understanding of the theme and concepts as detailed in a couple of files on the wiki is the lowest thing to grok, though I'm hoping that people are willing to read since it's, overall, significantly less than a WoD book. Like 5 pages of 'mythic backstory,' a few pages of character setup and info, a few pages for your chosen House, probably about 3 or so pages of modern city setting... I mean, I can't really comment on length because I'm not done with everything. But I'm more than willing to help people along (as long as they're willing to put forth some effort to learn too.)

4. People earn XP. XP is used to buy up Attributes, Skills, Assets and Powers. Right now I'm looking at monthly capped XP, though I haven't finalized the XP costs and amounts (though the baseline is looking at flat-cost XP), with 1. award-based system (+votes from people you've RPed with are 1/4 XP, +vote from someone you've never RPed with is a full XP that first time), 2. an XP floor (in current theoreticals, if you don't earn 2XP you get a minimum of 2XP; and right now this XP floor applies to new PCs coming in) and plot XP (staff awards are a full 1XP).. New characters also get 30 starting XP in current calculation to 'round out' their characters from starting ranks. I can't say there won't be a gap, but it won't be insurmountable.

MONDAY IS ALMOST OVER! BE STRONG!

So. I had a good spate of writing today. got a few things done, including some 'mythic age legends of the vampires' that I want to share. And by mythic age I mean from the late BCs to 2nd and 3rd Centuries AD.

Legends of the Blood: Other Supernaturals
Myths of the Blooded during these formative years tell of encounters with other supernaturals, both within Rome and without as they traveled afield. Some of these encounters were benign and even informative; others, full of violence and conflict. Though much has been lost to history, secrets kept even in True Death, some have been recorded by Blooded historians.

• The First Therian War: Reportedly the first meeting between Wolf Therians and the Blooded, the First Therian War was a bloody battle over a period of years dealing with territorial disputes in Rome and her immediate surroundings. Though the specific events and terms of the war are lost of time, the Blooded and Therians eventually came to territorial division known as the Primum Pactum, or the First Agreement, believed to be the precursor to the modern-day Accords that some cities present.
• The Headhunters: Recorded in a fairly well-kept analytical treatise by a proles of Allecta Axia, The Headhunters tells the story about the Blooded's first encounters with a large group of organized humans, led primarily by a Greek liberti who hunted them. In the treatise, it talks about how they were hunted as the monstrum, and the near-destruction of Lucretia at the hands of the headhunters.
• The Uprising: With most records wiped out during The Reckoning, information on The Uprising is scant. What is known about it comes from broken oral records put down before some vetis sanguine left to hibernate and dela with their ennui or rage. The Uprising told of an attempt by three Blooded, whose names are stricken from record, who attempted to slay Licenia and Titus, and take their blood and supplant them as Divina Parente.
• The Hunters' War: The first actual conflict with the Fae, in which the Blooded clashed in bloody battle with the night riders now known as the Wyld Hunt. Another war with information lost to the destruction of members of the Houses, the common oral myth involves the Wyld Hunt being denied of proper souls by Blooded of House Gaius bringing dying soldiers on the battlefield into the Blood. From this, the Hunt sought vengeance upon the Blooded for stealing what was rightfully theirs.
• The Second Therian War: Written records of the Second Therian War survive to this night, penned by Marius Asinius Firmus from his campaign into Britannia during the War. During the height of the Roman Empire and expansion, Blooded afield in Britannia in the city of Verulamium were engaged in bloody battle with wolf- and bird-shifter Therians during Boudica's sacking of the settlement. Marius himself is reported to have led troops amidst the Roman garrisons, but the Blooded were routed and their forces retreated to Londinium as Boudica destroyed Verulamium.
• The Witches' Warning: Modern copies of information on the Witches' Warning are disputed as being fact; written by a member of House Claudius known for styling similar to ancient Greek playwrights. Many modern Blooded believe the records are a somewhat-fictionalized version of a true event, written to bolster Blooded morale. In the Roman province of Egypt, a number of Blooded had disappeared, including the Consul. It was revealed, through the combined efforts of House Claudia and House Fabia, that Egyptian Witches were stealing away with Blooded, using the vitalis that kept them in a state of immortal stasis, to fuel powerful and forbidden magics in an internal coup. The Witches were found and, after philosophical discussion between their leader, Tahena, and legendary Claudian, Neskhnum e Claudia Euphemia, she and her cohort slaughtered the Witches and used their bodies to despoil their sacred site. Along with this, it was written that Neskhnum also left an involved message to the Covens justifying her slaughter of their people.

I AM GETTING THERE WOO!

@fantom

The amount of planets isn't what I'm getting at. I'm going to posit a perhaps bad example, but... having 3 Resistance, 2 FO, seven Black Sun Criminals, 4 Junkers, 3 Politicans... at what point do you have any reason for more than a few players to come together to RP with each other at any given time? At what point is it really IMPOSSIBLE for certain types of characters to reasonably RP with each other and stay within theme? At what point does frustration of lack of faction RP (2 FO guys? Are staff running their entire command structure and everything they would do for internal RP for/with them?) hit your players, causing them to seek out places where RP actually happens? The onus must be on the players to RP, sure, but the game MUST PROVIDE avenues for RP to happen. Spreading your playerbase across multiple factions, plus multiple planets, including any necessary space system-induced travel times and stuff is just asking for people to get bored and done.

You talked heavily about the business/economy model. What about players who don't care about that type of minutiae, and they are part of an organization so small that there is little for them to do? It seems like you're shooting for a 'Star Wars sandbox' and... I don't think that will work.

The whole 'allow anyone to play whatever they want' is a lofty and noble concept, but there's such a thing as dilution of concept and focus. Games that want to 'allow everything' are fine, but unless you're SURE you're going to have dozens of players in each faction, why potentially shoot yourself in the foot? Isn't the 'lack of things to do with a group' a CONSTANT complaint that gets seen on this forum? Not to mention probably OTHER forums that this community doesn't see.

My thoughts?

• Set it during the new movies. Perhaps right after the Hosnian Massacre, giving an ease of working into the next point...
• FOCUS ON ONE GROUP. All PCs must be Resistance + allies, or all PCs must be First Order + allies. Do not do this FORTY BILLION PLANETS AND FIFTYSIX FACTIONS stuff. Engineer your game to provide easy RP for your players, also making it easy for them to FIND RP, and easy stuff for your staff to run.
• Allow or disallow Force-sensitives, but if allowed, make them generally-allowed, and something like Broom Boy; they might have one or two tricks, but not much else.

@wildbaboons
OGL has to post the rules, but noting else I believe. No idea how Starfinder, as a Pathfinder + SciFi functions there.

@Lithium
Didn't say it was working. Just said that it's what I had heard as to why it's not on DTRPG.

@rnmissionrun
That's a pretty standard way that DTRPG marks some of their stuff (on DTRPG it is your order #), but it's entirely dependent on the publisher when you get them through DTRPG, as I have some books from By Night Studios that do it, and some that don't; same with OPP. There are also other hidden watermarks that will be looked for if something shows up on the intertubes, since the hidden stuff is harder to clean out without intense knowledge of Adobe.