Best posts made by Ominous

@faraday For me it depends on the culture of the game. If there are no emits then people can set however they like, changing the time and the weather. If there are emits, the time and weather is what the server says it is. Don't make sets that disagree with it.

I really like this idea. It's similar to one I had where PCs were gods who were molding the godly realm using mana, and stealing some ideas from the Mystic Empyrean RPG.

@Paris Yep. I hate actual parties that my friends throw where I don't know most of the people. I would rather go to a bar, because at least we are all strangers there, rather than me not being in the clique.

@jennkryst said in I know it's an old topic but to this day....:

I'd like to go back a teeny bit to the flat earth and troll the thread by asking... why not both?

That would make for an interesting RPG premise. Instead of Spelljammer, Icejammer.

@cobaltasaurus said in Development Thread: Sacred Seed:

I just want to be clear here, I'm not saying that @Pyrephox or @Carex are wrong for their suggestions, or that it's wrongfun for wanting that level of verisimilitude. It just isn't the type of fun that I want to enforce and run as the game designer. I hope that there's enough of interest in the setting for them to overlook the breaking of their suspension of disbelief and play when we're ready, but I'll understand if they chose not to play and won't hold it against them.

Certainly and that's perfectly fine. I might even play there. Who knows? My issue was with someone poo-poo-ing on the idea that a game with limited social mobility is by default unfun and people liking such settings are somehow doing it wrong.

As for the rape factory discussion, I am going to side with the fact that we have actual examples of societies in Asia, Africa, Polynesia, and the Americas that upend the argument of women as property being a default state.

Well, we haven't done great things with the technology we have, so maybe keeping us at Roman levels would be a good thing.

Why are high heels a requisite for going to a bar? I could see a club being that way, but I can't think of any time I saw a woman in high heels in any of the bars I frequent. High heels throw off a woman's pool and darts game.

@jennkryst That's how the Kushiel setting handles it. Until a woman undergoes a certain ritual, no baby-making can happen.

salutes

Good ol' 80s horror. Not my cup of tea, but it is a bunch of people's, and more games is more better.

@GangOfDolls said in Active Games Of The Now?:

Did that replacement for Kushiel's Debut ever happen? I was kinda hoping it might just to try that world out but I'm guessing that it didn't come together, which happens.

They are still working on it, as far as I know.

Are has slowed down a bit. They are now at 2:1 speed and plot is not quite as hectic as it was.

Crossposting from another tread.

The Boys was good, but really dark. Fortunately there is black comedy throughout that adds some needed levity. It was rather predictable as far as plot (there were two moments that managed to go in directions I did not expect and both were in the final episode), but it was still good. It has a wide cast, so there are plenty of characters to see and they are decently developed rather than just caricatures. Even the rapist dudebro is a bit sympathetic. Which is probably why the show was emotionally draining for me at the end. I kind of want to hug everyone in the series and tell them that it's all going to be alright, even the ones who really should be kicked repeatedly in the nads.

So, all in all, good, but dark. Have a bottle of something inebriating on standby.

@Bennie I had a small write up for a similar game idea. I ripped off Cowboy Bebop and the movie version of Jules Vernes' Time Machine with the moon having blown up, raining destruction on human civilization. I didn't go back to 10,000 BC. I shot for more of a bronze age, Conan feel. One tribe was animistic, one was scholarly, one was religious nutjobs, etc. It allowed for layers to come and go. New players are characters that just came in from the wilderness. Players leaving are characters heading out into the wilderness. Just add some communal challenges every month or two to keep things from getting too slice of life-ish - food shortage, wolf pack nearby is attacking, raiders have been spotted, water shortage, etc. Let the players figure out how things will run politically so there is some internal drama as well.

Another idea I would like to see is Space Rome. Feudal lords and ladies in space has been, so lets freshen it up with Rome instead. The setting would be another star system than our current one after humanity had a diaspora throughout space (either generation ships or humanity's space empire collapsed and we lost a bunch of our tech). Space Rome has recently discovered (rediscovered) interstellar travel and is pushing out to other stars, finding other human colonies to interact with. I could see Space Rome having already united all of the star system they are in from the get-go or start with other planets in the star system still independent.

The benefits of this system is the Senate which allows for more players to be involved in decision making, as well as the idea of collegiality that the original Rome had which had multiple people sharing the same position (think the two consuls who had the power to veto the decisions of each other). If one of the consuls suddenly disappears due to RL, you still have another around to get things done. In addition, unlike Space Feudalism where Duke Atreides disappearing results in things hitting a standstill until an heir can be found, Space Rome shrugs its shoulders when Quaestor Atreides disappears and simply elects a replacement.

Let the players drive the storyline and staff just has to mix in the occasional crisis - Space Carthage, led by Space Hannibal, has decided to invade the system; a Space Kraken has entered the system and is attacking ships; Space Pompeii has some seriously bad tectonic activity going on, figure out how to stop it/evacuate the citizens.

One method for resolving this is making PvP impossible except with GM approval for special cases. Now players cannot punch one another without OOC consent, so you don't have any issue.

If you want to keep PvP, I have an idea where social stats give access to resources. Instead of being able to roll dice that forces another PC to do something, instead the social started player can bribe the other character with those resources.

I am going to type some stream of consciousness thoughts about this and the game you want to make to try to help you come up with some ideas, so apologies for the word vomit.

The problem you are trying to solve is the issue of players not stumbling across an important clue due to a bad die roll. Retro-D&D can have this problem and bloggers have come up with some solutions. The easiest solution - don't hide plot essentials behind secret doors - is not applicable, because the style of game you are aiming for is all about mysteries and puzzle solving. Finding the secret doors is the plot essential. However, there are other options.

First is the Three Clue Rule by The Alexandrian, which is a bit self-evident from the title - every chokepoint should have at least three clues that point to the solution. (He also talks about GUMSHOE in the article and isn't a fan.)

Second is avoiding "pixel bitching" with your descriptions. If there is something important in a room or scene, give some hints when describing the room or scene. For a secret door in D&D, you would describe the size of the room, a few objects in the room, and note the worn scratches in the floor next to a nondescript wall, hinting at the door that swings out from there.

The third, and probably the one I would recommend the most, is relying on the in-built resource management of the game. I have no problem with a player in my D&D game taking the action of "I will search the entire room exhaustively" and I will let them definitively know the locations of every secret door, item, etc. without a roll. However, I run a strict Retro-D&D game, which is a game about exploration, looting treasure, and managing resources. It's Indiana Jones. Exhaustively searching a room takes 1 hour, so all the torches that were lit at the beginning of the search are now burned out and I make two wandering monster checks - one for the hour, and one for the noise of the heavy-handed searching (I'm assuming the PCs are banging on the walls with abandon trying to find hollow spots, throwing furniture and fixtures around as they check underneath them or in them, etc.)

How does the third option help you? From the description in your advertisement of the game, it sounded like the PCs would always be in a time crunch during their missions. You can combine all three of those options - put three clues in a mission, make sure that the potential clues are in the descriptions of the scene, and the PCs can always "take a 20" to be guaranteed a clue but it's going to eat up precious time. Thus, the PCs must decide whether it is worth wasting the time and resources and risking up to two fights (old-school D&D is particularly lethal) just to have a guaranteed success on finding anything, assuming there is anything to find.

So for example, the players enter a private library in a mansion. You describe the room as being 30 feet be 20 feet with numerous shelves of books occupying most of the floor space. While most books are mundane, one whole shelf is dedicated to esoteric and arcane tomes including a large black one that stands out from the others. In one corner of the room sits a leather chair and a table with an open letter sitting on it as though it had been set down in a hurry after being read. The book is the Necronomicon. The letter is some other clue that leads in another direction. If they grab the Necronomicon and a player has the "Language: Aramaic" they can translate it. They can roll to see if they can translate it in a few minutes for the clue/magic spell/whatever it is the scenario leads to them finding. If they don't want to roll for it, they botch the roll, or no one has that skill, they can send it off to headquarters and get a translation back in a few hours.

If you really like what The Alexandrian had, I recommend further reading. He praises Masks of Nyarlathotep for how it handles finding clues. For handling mystery adventures and campaigns, he recommends what he calls Node Based Scenario Design.

Hopefully my rambling and those articles I linked to helps you come to some insight that works for you.

@Lithium Samson! I wondered where you went! I play Martin, and I was hoping to RP more with you. I didn't think the one scene we had was antagonistic, but I understand, if you joined with the expectation of someone else playing with you, that your interest waned when the someone else didn't play.

As for too much antagonism, I didn't really encounter much o that. Then again I tend to RP with Fiona, Lip, Cookie, and Frankie, and they aren't antagonistic at all. I will agree that there is a touch of cliquishness, especially as a lot of scenes keep occurring in the PRP rooms, but it isn't near Firan levels yet.

@Lain I ninja'd you. I corrected my misuse of NPC.