Best posts made by Seraphim73

Unlike some of the others, I do okay meshing with larger groups at once -- if I have the RL focus. But it can still be good to build up the personal connections between the characters in smaller groups if you have that opportunity.

If you're just jumping into a 5-7 person scene and want to get them working together? My best advice is to give them something they all have to react to, and something that they have to work together to overcome/avoid/whatever. @Quinn's advice on tailoring things to the individual PCs is great advice -- particularly if the thing they have to react to either is specifically triggering to some of the PCs (the PCs, not the players) or directly engages with some of their less-used skills as suggested.

I also agree that @mietze's mention of being OOCly up-front and honest about the situation: "This is a scene to get all our characters connected." This will give the players incentive to connect the characters, and when they react to that thing you're doing as the GM that they all have to react to, they don't just react by fleeing the scene.

I would say that it depends on your game's focus. If the focus is on what's happening on the ship or ships, you should absolutely have travel time, but if the focus is on what's happening on the planets, then you should arrange some way for travel times to be handwaved or negligible. That way you can have players actually doing what you want them doing.

We did something like that with The Fifth World: there were portals called Waygates that allowed you to travel instantly between them, so despite the game taking place over several planets and moons, there was rarely any need to worry about whether or not someone could be present for a scene (unless they were away from a Waygate in the wilderness).

If you are going to have travel times on your game, I believe that they should be "off-screen," in that it doesn't actually take you 30 minutes (or 3 days, or whatever) RL time to move your bit from Point A to Point B. Instead, just say that the ship is traveling until X RL date, and all RP should happen on the ship until that date (this is even better if you provide some suggestions/drives to RP during that time).

@mercutio said in A New Star Wars game? (Legends of The Old Republic (Name pending)):

Might I recommend a 3-5 or 5-8 split? Lower the 'distance' between the 'low' and the 'high' of initial application. 8 is a typical choice for the prestige classes it brings. So it depends on what kind of game you want to run off the get-go; a heroic higher level romp, or a start-from-nothing type.

I'm a fan of starting at 4 because it lets you get your first attribute boost (and theoretically your first cross-class skill if you boost your Int and have multiclassed) but still allows you to get your first level or two relatively quickly. 3 and 5 work too, I just think that 4 is the sweet spot between being a character with more than 1 trick and not being too complicated to create. Totally get what you're saying about narrowing the level gap between most starting characters and "leaders" though.

@wildbaboons said in A New Star Wars game? (Legends of The Old Republic (Name pending)):

If I may offer another suggestion.. have some preconfigured kits/builds that people can choose from at chargen

I really like this idea. It might even be something that's done wiki-side rather than code-side, at least at first. A couple of experienced Saga players could create some generic "Republic soldier," "Republic pilot," "Mandalorian Rifleman," "Smuggler," and "Jedi Padawan" builds, and then the commands to create them in chargen could be listed on the wiki. Sure, it would be a slightly-long list, but it would allow players to create basic characters without digging into the books much. I would be -happy- to contribute to such a project.

Along the lines of Chargen, I would strongly suggest not allowing random attribute rolls, and just providing somewhere around 28-30 build points in chargen. With random attribute rolls, there's the equivalent of a 2-3 level disparity if you have a 40-50 point roll instead of the default 25ish build points, even if you're technically starting at the same level.

On a note related to @Mr-Johnson's idea of allowing people to play the default NPCs as PCs... man, those default NPCs are weak weak weak. You'll probably want some "elite" Sith Trooper, Sith Acolyte, Republic Soldier, Mandalorian Neo-Crusader, and Jedi Padawan NPCs with CLs around the level of starting characters. Otherwise it's going to be very, very difficult to challenge PCs.

I like the idea of starting off with a bang in the Mandalorian Wars (being around the edges of Malachor V would be intense for a Force Sensitive). Technically, that would make any Jedi at game-start end up Sith, because except for the Exile, all of the Revanchists went with Revan and Malak. That's totally something that could be changed, and if you have the starting Jedi split into Sith and Jedi... there are some awesome possibilities for personal connections once a portion of them fall. Just... fascinating possiblities.

@Tempest Being the nerd that I am, I have several dozen House Rule tweaks to suggest, but I -believe- that most of them are already integrated into the DoD database--including halving the bonuses to Dark Rage (at +3, +2, or +1 it's not nearly as broken, but it's still great). On the rage issue, I would definitely remove the Dreadful Rage feat from the game. It's not just Wookiees, anything with the rage species trait gets ridiculously awesome in melee. They're good at starting, but the Dreadful Rage feat just superpowers them. I might be able to make that tweak myself (to @Lotherio's point), but I can certainly get you in touch with someone who can make a tweak like that (and who might be able to get you a database without the DoD homebrew stuff in it).

@derp said in Is Min/Max a bad thing?:

This made me lol and I needed that today. Take your upvote, sir.

You're welcome.

@tinuviel said in Is Min/Max a bad thing?:

Not with the amount of bending over backwards to fuck me they seem to be doing.

That actually falls under the Blatant Fuckery Action Skill.

@solstice said in Is Min/Max a bad thing?:

Hey, every now and then you need dodge as a stat as a politician.

I would suggest that that's a background skill. I can't see Dianne Feinstein, Mitch McConnell, or Chuck Grassley dodging that.

@ganymede said in Social Stats in the World of Darkness:

Enforcing the rules should not be something that staff shies away from either.

I think this is just a MU* truism. If Staff is shying away from enforcing whatever rules they've implemented, the game is probably going to have problems.

@ganymede said in Social Stats in the World of Darkness:

What matters is that social combat has been the red-headed step-child on World of Darkness games. I believe that making them on par with physical combat will make people stand up, notice it, and pay it some more goddamn attention. And, as per the example I gave, using social combat may be a way to avoid physical combat as the end-all-and-be-all of confrontations. Further, game lines like Vampire make social combat the front-and-center of a story's focus, yet never make it something as tangible and complex as politics ought to be.

I realize that this thread is about WoD in general, but I would go so far as to say that social interactions have been the red-headed step-child of most RPG systems forever. There are a few, like A Song of Ice and Fire that have "full" systems the equal of physical combat, but most systems that I have experience with have pretty limited social rules. I posit that this is because we're all theoretically social creatures, so the designers a) think we'll be resolving in-game social issues socially, and/or b) social conflicts are damn complicated, much more so than physical ones.

If you wanted to use FS3, you could easily have Weapon Specials for Demon/Slayer Strength and for Werewolf Claws, and that sort of thing. This would give you the necessary lethality/accuracy/penetration/initiative modifiers. You have to trust your players to use the right specials, but if you can't trust them to do that, why the heck are you letting them play on your game?

@mr-johnson said in A New Star Wars game? (Legends of The Old Republic (Name pending)):

@mercutio The thing is, there's a big part of me that wants to focus on the people who did have a reason to be a part of the Mandalorian war, make the game more focused by requiring characters to have some connection to the war. I think by having everyone having picked a side one way or another or just plain being connected to it you've got some built in plot hooks right off the bat. But that's just me.

Yes. Yes. Please. Tie the characters together as neatly as possible. Even if they're all on different sides, make it so that all the characters have an explicit tie to the war, so they all care about events there. The smuggler who wants absolutely nothing to do with the war and ignores it? Is going to be ignoring most of the other PCs too, which is not good.

@mercutio said in A New Star Wars game? (Legends of The Old Republic (Name pending)):

@lithium
You run into unfamiliarity issues. And often, people do want to be part of some of the amazing scenarios brought in with the timeline.

Agreed entirely. Familiarity to theme is very, very important.

@runescryer Exactly all of this with Perrin. Fridging an invented-for-the-show wife was horrible and unnecessary. I get that they're leaning HARD into the hammer-or-axe, but I agree that the wife plotline wasn't necessary at all for that to happen. He's one of my favorite characters, and now I'm just seeing him moping hard all the time.

I agree with those above that the whole "The Dragon Reborn" could be a woman thing could be problematic for the Red Ajah, but it does have the interesting point of making souls genderless (theoretically), which is nice. If someone can be male or female in different turnings of the Wheel, that's very interesting and has strong implications.

To @Arkandel's note, I loved that Alanna and her Warders were a throuple.

@apos said in Social Stats in the World of Darkness:

I've only been MUing for a few years compared to most people and I can think of 3 cases off hand of someone asking some version of the question, "Can I roll my social stats to try to talk my way out of this and not die?" when they were faced with imminent execution. There is basically zero chance someone doesn't try that if social combat exists and someone is trying to PK them, and whether it's allowed and reasonable is one I'd have a handle on.

Shouldn't they be allowed to do this? Or at least to try? I mean, if they've spent the points to buy the skills to be super-smooth-talking, shouldn't they at least get a chance to roll against the massive modifiers for the Prince's higher status, their Resolve (or appropriate defensive stat), the evidence against them, the intimidation factor of all of the guards surrounding them, and the hostility of the crowd? At least to delay things "until a more detailed investigation can be completed?"

@Ganymede Sadly, nope! I wish that were the case. The additional penalty only applies to the pilot facing you in the dogfight:

Elusive Dogfighter: When engaged in a dogfight, any enemy pilot engaged in the same dogfight takes a -10 penalty on attack rolls when you succeed on the opposed Pilot check (see Attacking in a Dogfight, page 171).

I think what they were GOING for is that if you succeed in the opposed Pilot check, -all- enemies shooting at you get a -10, like with the Jedi Guardian Talent Elusive Target.

To the @Arkandel 's point, yeah. If you're looked down on because you don't twink, that's bad. If people are willing to give you tips on building a character if you want them, I see that as good, but if they thrust them upon you whether you want them or not, and/or without even asking, that's bad.

And to be perfectly fair, at least on the game that DoD sprung from (Generations of Darkness), people talked a big game about building awesome +sheets, but stats were... unimportant. Except for the plots that I and a few others ran, the rules weren't followed and things were very freeform -- which can be good and bad. It can lead to awesome stories, or it can lead to the (just barely) Force Sensitive Zeltron Death Watch Mandalorian Empress of the jungle planet (yes, really) Tattooine using Move Light Object to lift a creature larger than a speeder, because obviously she is Force Sensitive, so she can lift big things, even if she doesn't have the Move Object Force Power.

@mercutio Yeah, if you want your Jedi to get involved in the Mandalorian War, by canon they have to be Revanchists (heck, all of the Revanchists became Sith by canon, but you can change that). Then again, don't you want PCs to be the type who intervene rather than sitting by the sidelines? Even if they intervene peacefully?

I would have no problem requiring PCs to not be the type who sit around the temple debating philosophy while the galaxy burns. But I also think that there are a lot of options for why a character might become a Revanchist besides "I want to kill Mandos," and chargen staff can help them find those options.

@faraday The Old Republic Era definitely has fewer fans than the Movie Era, but it was the setting for two very popular video games and a very popular MMO -- it has a lot more name cache with most possible players than say... 1,000 years after The Old Republic (when there really is absolutely nothing going on by canon).

@auspice Don't you know? Cats always land with all four feet inbounds.

@Misadventure said:

Give an example or three of various grades of memorable?

I think that will wildly depend on your theme. To stick with Clone Wars-era Star Wars, because I already brought it up, how about (given that any of these could becoming TOTALLY AWESOME AND MEMORABLE with the right scene):

Barely Memorable:

• Killing Whorm Loathsome, CIS General in a semi-random skirmish.
• Being elected Senator from a minor planet.
• Being promoted from Captain to Major.
• Passing your Trials to become a Jedi Knight.
• Becoming the leader of a street gang on Nar Shaddaa.

Suitably Impressive:

• Surviving Operation Knightfall as a Jedi by escaping the Jedi Temple.
• Defeating Admiral Trench in a pitched naval combat.
• Taking the place of a canon Senator on-screen due to IC manipulation.
• Being promoted to General/Admiral.
• Being acknowledged as a Jedi Master.
• Becoming a Black Sun Vigo.
• Killing General Grievous as part of a larger group.

Pretty Dang Big:

• Surviving Operation Knightfall by dueling Darth Vader to a standstill and then escaping.
• Defeating Admiral Trench while outnumbered and outgunned.
• Becoming Vice Chancellor after out-maneuvering Mas Amedda.
• Joining Republic/Imperial High Command.
• Taking control of Black Sun.
• Killing General Grievous in a solo duel.
• Killing Count Dooku in a solo duel.
• As a Senator, publicly denouncing the Empire as it is created, escaping Imperial custody with the help of others, and helping to found the Resistance.

Ridiculous and Over the Top:

• Stopping Operation Knightfall by defeating Darth Vader in a duel and driving the 501st back.
• Defeating the entire CIS fleet with a single Star Destroyer.
• Going straight from Padawan to Master because you're JUST THAT GOOD.
• Taking control of Coruscant as the head of Black Sun.
• Killing Anakin Skywalker in a solo duel.
• Killing Count Dooku in a solo duel as a Padawan.
• As a Senator, publicly denouncing the Empire as it is created, evading capture by Imperial forces in the Senate Building, founding the Rebellion, and fighting fleet battles against the Empire within your first year of resistance.
• Becoming Emperor.

I think that most games can flourish with any number of Barely Memorable and Suitably Impressive instances, and can host a couple of Pretty Dang Big events per year. The game -might- be able to survive a single Ridiculous and Over the Top, but probably not more than one.

(Bonus, some of the above are actual IC examples from a couple of Clone Wars era MUSHes I've played on, either of things characters did, or things people tried to do.)

@Auspice said in Good writin'.:

That's the key: visualize. (Yes even if it means imagining the many-tentacled-beast.)

This is something that goes beyond just writing within a pose (but I agree is very important within the pose too), but gets into creating characters that fit the theme too. One of the hardest things to remember for many players (myself included at times) is that your character is a product of the world they grew up in, not this world (unless you're on RLMU*, where there's nothing special about the world and it's this one). Did they grow up in austere conditions believing their enclave was the last of humanity on Earth? Then they're probably going to react pretty big to any proof that they're not the last of their kind. Did they grow up in Imperial space, swarmed by Imperial propaganda from age 5? It's probably going to take a big shock to get the to join the Rebel Alliance.

It feeds into good writing within a pose, but stretches beyond that... in order to interact with a world in a way that makes sense, your character has to be a product of that world, so visualize that world, and what sort of person it would create.

@auspice said in A New Star Wars game? (Legends of The Old Republic (Name pending)):

Tho I still want mandos.

There are still plenty of Mandos scattered around. Just fewer of them, and there's a bigger bad on the block. Could even be a few mercing for the Republic to get back at the Revanchists.

@auspice Suck it, Goldilocks. Dirty ass player. Glad to see him clowned.

@ThatGuyThere said:

John Carter the MUSH

Yes please. I've been re-reading The Martian Chronicles, and finally purchased the last two I didn't have (Thuvia, Maid of Mars and The Master Mind of Mars) after 20ish years. I so very much want to play on a John Carter game (books, not movies).

@bored Yes, again, hindsight, we should have made the English ship (if we had it at all) NPC. We should have focused on the pirate ship and the Spanish ship and shore-folk. Turns out, on a pirate(ish) game, most people want to be pirates (or shopkeeps or prostitutes or hawkers), most of them don't want to play the Navy.

@mr-johnson I think that it's totally fair to have a scene with a predetermined ending, so long as a) all of the players know it going into the scene, and b) there are lots and lots of things that provide lots of things to react to (plus time and space to react) and preferrably things to do during the scene.

So if they're at Malachor V, then they could totally be in a fight out at the edge of the system, fighting Mandalorians and kicking butt... they just can't impact the big event that will impact them all at the end of their own boarding action/starfighter combat. Lots for people to do, and they still get to show their characters' reactions to Malachor V "on-screen."

I think it's eminently doable, but I also completely understand where you're coming from.

@auspice I'm really, really looking forward to watching it when I get home from work.