Posts made by Mr.Johnson

Every couple of months like clockwork I vomit up a lot of blood and the doctors have no idea what's causing it. It makes me really scared and depressed because I've got no idea what's going on or how to fix it.

Alright so while I was working on my superhero mush I realized that I was doing far more work on the little side project than I was on the main supers project.

That side project was a little revamp of my old Matrix mush that I ran for some friends back in the day.

This thread is to catalogue development progress on this game concept that's going to hopefully actually amount to something this time around. Will it? I can't promise anything on that front. I'm the first to admit that until I actually launch a game I go through a lot of trial and error testing out what game concepts FEEL right to me.

Onto the meat and potatos of What IS gridlock?

Gridlock is a Matrix, World of Darkness Inspired Mush.

Effectively what this means is that the Matrix world or The Grid is a world of darkness style world with players taking the role of vampires changelings mages excetra as normal but there's a second grid of the real world players can wake up into and jack in and out of the grid.

I've got several arcs planned out for how this can go for general progression similar to how The Matrix Online handled situations as I was a major fan of the game and again will be taking big inspiration from The Matrix properties in the creation of Project Gridlock.

As for the system I'm using I honestly the system I'm going to use is the only reason I'm not launched into a beta state at this point. I just need to decide yet again what to use that's best for me.

If you guys have any questions at all related to themeing development or ideas feel free to hit me up in this thread or in DMs I'm currently going through documentation phase of getting everything done outside of system that I can to make it nice and quick to launch once I decide on a system proper.

@Ganymede I'm honestly likeing the name what about Beyond Virtuality: Nowhere? And I try to make it a bit more of a DC beyond feel. Take more elements of Batman Beyond and the like and mix it with the basic shadowrun premise to make something new. So Decking would be the same as shadowrun magic functions the same we have Elves, Trolls, Goblins, Dragons, Megacorps but with a bit more of that Beyond Feel So it's not QUITE shadowrun proper but instead a bit more comicbooky.

I could even take in some minor elements of kingdom come.

Maybe the reason some of the corporations are able to exist in a world that has people like superman is because they've got Corporate heroes on their side.

all wishing and yearning and churning in my heart aside I'm still working on the Mostly modern superheroes idea, just need to come up with a name. I've even got a host lined up if I want to use Ares, I just need to find a name, and what's in a name?

Either way work is carrying on. I'm as diligent as a termite and hopefully far less destructive.

To keep on the idea of spitballing: I've been thinking about taking an idea from MultiTheme games and allowing multiple people to play characters and have each character affix a prefix to the end of their name. So you might have Tony 616b or whatever as a quick designation and if multiple people wanted to play the role they could. It's just an idea that i'm spitballing but that's what this thread is for: Me to spitball ideas against the community wall

Ah that makes sense. I mean honestly this is a spitball thread for a reason none of these ideas are in stone just what I'm throwing into the night while laying out a foundation. In the case of heroes no mater what setting you're in what makes them super is that they're super in compared to the norm. So in the case of CYBORG his augments are the tip top cream of the crop the concept being that they're heroes because they stick out of the norm. When the norm is more enhanced by necessity the heroes are even more super.

@Lemon-Fox That could certainly work as well just basically do an OC's superheros place where we've got the ultimate in over the top sort of Shadowrun 4ths concept of the Hollywood version of running but even further over the top. The problem we run into with any OC server is that people will STILL app Tony, STILL app Batman. Sure they'll hide them a bit, but at the end of the day no mater what restrictions you put in DC only Marvel Only OC only people will MAKE it a multitheme game. That's just personal experiance talking.

There would be a checklist of conflicts between styles I would have to establish a fix for yes. It wouldn't be easy at all, and I think it would make sense to work on a more.. normal plan alongside it.

I can see some ways of little things here and there. Deciding a meshpoint.

I see for instance a fairly normal comicbook WW2 so you get your captain america, wonderwoman, Flash, Green Lantern and the golden age of heroes all active HERE in this era. The era doesn't require any real changes to fit with this setting and people can still do fish out of water just fine.

I can see things operating normally till the awakening in 2011 our big change there to make matters work is that you've got goblinization as normal but also the first age of mutation. So this would be altered to say all first generation Mutants are from THIS point. It gives us a steady integration point and a way to mesh together metahumans with mutants.

We keep the corporate court mostly the same but I would say the court during the time of our game would be: Ares Macrotechnology (With Wayne Enterprises a subsidiary), Aztechnology, Renraku Computer Systems, Saeder-Krupp, Stark-Fuchi Industrial Electronics, Mitsuhama, Shiawase, Yamatetsu, Lexcorp. Which I think will give good character representation to the most wealthy characters which own a business proper.

Honestly I don't foresee many major changes otherwise. Give an introduction for Atlantis and Theremyscia keep hard line to my standard of: "If DC contradicts Marvel DC is correct" Which should give us a more solidified story for the server.

Put down some hardline elements that ensure we're staying true as we can to the shadowrun world feel while interjecting these recognizable characters and I think we're golden.

As I am aware this idea won't likely hold water I'll still be working on my more standard modern day server.

After taking feeback onboard, doing some self reflection and just looking at what I want I've come to a decision.

I am going to try a game concept that I've wanted to do for ages but been afraid to do. Shadowrun Superheroes.

Is it an idea everyone will like? Of course not. Is it a good idea? Hell no. Do I want to do it? Damn right I do, more then almost anything else in mushing.

Set it 2050, toss down my usual DC and Metropolis grid get some clear easy to understand baselines for what people can and can't play. Dragons running megacorps fantasy creatures hardwired internet cyberaugmentations.

Again, it's a terrible idea but I am going to at the very damn least write it up.

@Sunny I'll be honest man the reason 4TMU was the tech that it was and the style was the discovery of a crashed UFO that contained a hyper advanced Diesel Engine and people just based all their tech around that and didn't really know how to improve upon it significantly enough to really make a suitable replacement because it was just SO efficient on the fuel to power ratios.

Add in the story I was running with CHECKMATE and their conspiracy to destroy the global climate in a way that would allow for the takeover of their alien overlords, and the Society For A Brighter Tomorrow effectively strong arming the culture to conform to THEIR ideal of tomorrow through assassination and mental domination through subtle propaganda campaigns and blackmail, and you had the world the way it was.

I have thought about a lot of this stuff and I do have it in the wings I just haven't really gotten the chance I need to share a lot of that stuff with people.

I was actually inspired in that regard with fallout. If you follow the lore you actually find out that the reason that the society regressed back to the 50's style was actually government intervention and a series of intentional reforms and actions by the united states government to attempt to push back the Chinese communist influence.

Wholesomeness regulations were implemented forcing what kinds of media could be made and they effectively through forced control, assassination, and government regulation FORCED culture to stagnate because anything BUT cultural stagnation was met with extreme force because it was scene as communist influence. McCarthyism cranked up to 100.

Further in fallout the Microchip was NOT invented resulting in technology relying further on Microswitches and vacuum tubes which again I basically took wholesale for the 4tmu idea.

Nuclear energy was big, but it was the discovery of alien technology that ultra propelled american technology into the absolute forefront and made them confident enough that they could put the decency laws into effect. With china stealing some of that technology and reverse engineering it. Eventually the culmination of these technologies would be the microfusion core which would have ended energy scarcity entirely. One core able to last approximately 250 years before needing to be recharged.

Uh sorry for the slight ramble, but the point is I HAVE thought all this through in a fair few regards. I've also done my research into how other people have thought this through which is nice and honestly how I get most of my information. An old slogan comes to mind: Plagerize from so many different sources that it becomes a new idea, because there is no such thing as a new idea.

Now all that said and out of the way I legitimately just want to make a game that can as I said get to that magic threshhold and keep it there. The bright side is that I'm disabled I got plenty of free time to do it. The downside is I've got terrible health so sometimes I vanish to deal with hospitalization.

I've pretty much repeated myself on everything else really, but yeah this is for spitballing figuring out some ideas that would work.

I know some folks are saying that, in DMs as well as on here that their issue in particular was not feeling there was a progressing story to join in on. I would say the issue I was told more often of as I was actually running it was people who were well to put it blunt unwilling to learn the setting and leaving as a result dropping our playercount.

My other staff can attest to this. It was a constant issue we had to deal with. People joining in and just going "uhhh I don't what how?" and no mater how much I put up explaining it the thing never clicked.

Now of course this could very much be me being a really wordy bastard. I know I use way too much text to say way too little, however if I'm using something that fits for the most part more in line with a more familiar world for people? It might work better.

Honestly another one of those things I've always wanted to do is Earth-2 where it's set at the late phase of the golden age. So 1960's or so, but you've got the Earth-2 continuity and characters and that feel, but over and over I get told the same thing.

We don't want historical settings we didn't LIVE in historical settings we don't want to learn. And that really breaks my heart. There aren't enough people who ARE willing to learn a custom setting like that which is more interesting. At least in the cape biz as I've seen so far.

What it really seems people want is: Modern day. Multiverse.

Nothing else 'sells' DC only games even with an active Dev team don't sell. Marvel only doesn't sell. The market has shown over and over that people don't REALLY want anything new.

@Wizz No no the biplanes thing was my solution for the 4tmu* which was trying to go for technologically advanced interwar period because that's an aesthetic I adore.

The idea is using it less as a full unique thing and more as a bit of a flavor to things. Honestly a lot of it is my attempting to still do what I love doing. Wacky twists on more traditional settings without getting the same problems I run into of people lost and confused. That's honestly part of why I started this thread. To try and get feedback, and I suppose understand things a bit better

I have some very specific boxes that I personally like being ticked. The 50's ascetic, the prohibition era aesthetic, Wild West, and cyberpunk all being things I adore.

I'd love to be able to build a world that lets other people explore concepts I personally have my heart set on but I understand that time and again I seem to run into a major issue with not being able to hit the sustainability thresh-hold where we get active players perpetuating stories that keeps the server alive.

I'm not saying I'd want 40-100 players all rumbling about all the time. honestly I'd be over the moon with 20 players running through fun little stories while I do my best to deal with the meta plot.

I know that the ideas that are nearest and dearest to my heart, those ones to which I hold this burning undenyable passion are not what other people enjoy, and if I'm only getting 4 or 5 players I may as well continue just running them as tabletop adventures as I have for years.

I am trying to find some way to assauge the issue of people being confused on the setting no mater how much I write up and flesh the world out.

The solution that's been put forward by most the people who know me is this generic modern day sort of thing with more subtle twists. The twist in this particular case is twofold; The Wider dimension at large, and the attitude the general populace have to powered individuals.

Players are entering a world where the only experience society has with powered people is heat vision burning down population centers, sonic booms in nighttime attacks on major landmarks. The unpowered folks of the world banding together to stop a greater threat that even with the combined might of the worlds governments, the combined effort of all our greatest technology, with even the atom bomb could only weaken him to a point he could be captured.

I hope that'll be enough of a twist to stand out from the crowd but I'm noty sure. It's also not just a twist for twists sake but a story I'm passionate about running players through and sharing the world that kind of outlook could take.

@faraday That is what I was getting at it all exists but it's influenced by the style of the period. I figured it would be easier then full out divergence and new history. apparently I'm wrong.

@Wizz I don't see what you're getting at with what is different between consistent theme and what I'm talking about.

I was asked four or five times, while in a hospital bed, on lifesupport, if I was absolutely certain I wasn't able to work. SSD can suck a D.

Point is. If I was going to do a custom world in my usual style again the way I would go about it to avoid some of the issues I've run into in the past by doing period pieces is the following.

Pick the aestetic of an era I enjoy. Dieselpunk, Atompunk, Cyberpunk, Prohibition era, whatever.

Now set it modern day. History is exactly as it was in the real world everything that happened historically happened the way it did historically we got the same movies same songs etc.

Now pick one thing to change. In the case of this 1950's feel it would be Microchips were never invented.

Remember that all the technology we have to day you need to make it still around so people don't get too confused. In this microchipless world what I would do is decide MicroSWITCHES and vacume tubes are the big thing. You have your smartphones but they're a wrist mounted device, your mp3 players whatever. Also while all the exact same movies and music exist they have that slight different feel of the world we live in the game instead of reality. For this 50's style setting it would be that sort of era of music.

This is the revamp I was going to do for 4TMU before I was advised b y half my friendslist against it. Modern day. Modern history. People know the general setting already just by me saying that. BUT everything is Diesel powered. Combustion engines for everything, monoplanes never caught on. So everything is biplanes and triplanes even the jet engines.

This gives an aestetic feel I am going for lets the game stand out from the route and overdone bog standard world of heroes but lets people have their comfort zone and an understanding of exactly what reality is.

@Ominous Pretty much.

@ZombieGenesis That's exactly what I mean. It's modern day but it's 50's feel you've got robots and rayguns and the world is teetering on the edge of nuclear armageddon with the resource wars in full swing between China and the US

Edit: Could you imagine how someone like Steve Rogers would adapt to the fallout world of 2077? It would be crazy man.

Honestly my other superheros concept I was going to run before I was advised by half my friends list to try something normal was: Fallout pre nukes, but it's superheroes.