@thatguythere said in Good TV:
MCU has always been closer to early Ultimate Marvel than Regular Marvel so my guess is you are exactly right, they will kill off the family for pathos most likely sicne that is exactly what happened to Hawkeye's secret family in Ultimates series 2. (Yes I just spoilers part of that story but it has been out for a decade so I have zero guilt over it.)
Also, the Titanic hits an iceberg and Jack drowns.
@coin I'm always reluctant to put 'hard caps' on things because I worry that it leads to 'well, there's no point in doing anything more right now' and situations of 'Alex has done twice as much as Bob but the two are at the exact same point because they've both maxed out'. If I do decide to put some kind of throttle on XP it may be some sort of graduated curve.
e.g. Alex does twice as much as Bob but he only has 1.4x as much XP because of the curve. Charlie has done four times as much as Bob and only has 2x as much XP.
The pool might reset from time to time or it could be a permanent 'conversion rate'. Either way players never hit a cap on earning so there's always some reward but there is also a point of diminishing returns whereby the mechadino slows and doesn't completely run away from the more casual player (this wouldn't be as necessary if Eclipse Phase used a geometric system for XP progression but it is a linear system).
Given the core mechanics for EP I'm not sure how necessary it will be, however. The game simply doesn't have mechanisms in which one character is completely capable of overwhelming another. About the closest thing is that there is a pretty strong combat advantage in having a high speed but that is very accessible to people in character generation and it is far from the 'I win' stat that occurs in other games since everyone has the opportunity to take their first action before higher speed people can attempt a second action (excluding someone so unlucky as to lose initiative and then be removed from combat before they can act, but that does not appear to be a common situation).
Additionally because of the setting it is practically impossible for one player to kill another. About the most significant effect one player could have would be to force another to resort to a 'starter' morph and perhaps lose some recently gained skills as they are restored from backup. This removes one of the largest concerns with 'dinos' becoming over powered.
The second biggest concerns with 'dinos' tends to be them dominating scenes and other players feeling unable to contribute. Again, because of the rules of the game that seems extremely unlikely due to the rules for teamwork actions. I do recognize that I have seen players in the past who have attempted to 'teamwork' with themselves through a variety of tricks (multitasking, forks, etc.) which I already plan on disallowing (sure, there's multiple copies of you working on the problem but the copies are unable to offer any significant insight).
I'll have a better idea about how significant the 'dino' problem will be once I've got the coding finished. I'll probably try a short run of a few months so we can experiment with a couple of things (allow a couple of players to make 'high xp' characters so we can judge how well they interact with relatively new characters, see what modifications we might need to make to nanofabrication rules, etc.) before resetting for the 'real' game.
@coin said in Singularity: an Eclipse Phase Game:
I have OPINIONS regarding this and if you want we can get into it but it's gonna take a while (days and days).
Absolutely fire away. I suspect at the end of the day I'll come up with some kind of hybrid scheme (weekly awards that trickle in to reward longevity combined with participation rewards to encourage people to do more than hang out in an OOC room) but I can't incorporate other ideas if no one tells me them.
@wildbaboons said in Good TV:
@deadculture 2 is the remaining 12 would be him walking around New York telling everyone he sees that he's the Iron Fist
In all fairness almost no one in the MCU has a 'secret identity'. The only real examples I can think of are Spider-man and Daredevil. Black Panther, Hulk, Black Widow, and Hawkeye are probably 'secret identity adjacent' since I think just about anyone with some clearance can look up their real names but I don't think the average person on the street necessarily knows who they are. On the other hand everyone knows Tony Stark is Iron Man and I think most people know Captain America's real name is Steve Rogers.
After that I think most of the characters are like Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Thor, Doctor Strange, Gamorra, and Groot and are using their actual names.
@coin I'm definitely planning on a grid and a way for storytellers to run stories outside the main setting. Out of curiosity what do you see as different between a 'grid for social RP' and 'a way for storytellers to run stories in the main setting'? Do you mean there should be a grid allocated solely for social RP and it should be off-limits for 'stories'?
My initial plan is to have a main grid as well as the ability to create temp rooms. Temp rooms could either be created off the main grid to represent areas that would exist but had not been constructed (e.g. 'Non-descript Noodle Shop', 'Coffin Hotel', or 'Random Back Alley') or they could be created off the Temporary Room Nexus to represent areas that exist but that lack 'simple' connections to the grid ('A Passenger Transport', 'Meathab', or 'Echo IV'). Most social RP would occur on the main grid but stories would occur on it as well.
I've never seen a game where social RP is forcibly separated from 'story areas'. That isn't to say I'm not going to do this but rather I'm just laying out my plan and experiences. I'm quite open to a different layout if other people have had different experiences and can show that there is an advantage to it.
Two other things that I have to start putting more consideration into are earning money and earning XP. Typically these are both under the purview of the game master running stories but I think I would like to try and make things a little more player oriented. I suppose they aren't that much of a problem. I just need to craft up some guidelines that say that this is the XP/credit rewards for participating/running a story. People submit logs and as long as staff approves the log the XP and credits are doled out.
@ixokai Heh. Yes. Evennia's direct database is driven by its Django component, but because command and function programming is done in Python you have access to all Python functionality, including things such as MySQLdb (I have already tested this and it works just fine).
While I have gone ahead and set up my Evennia server to use MySQL to support its core database functions (user accounts, objects, etc.) I didn't actually need to do that. I could have left it using SQLite for the core database while handling the Eclipse Phase aspects through MySQL. This is basically what I was doing during the TinyMUX version so that I would not be storing attributes directly only the player object (or other objects) except, of course, TinyMUX uses its own database format and not SQLite. However I elected to do the core support in MySQL as well so that there is one central DB server handling all data (Evennia core, Wiki, and Eclipse Phase data) rather than spreading it out in multiple places where something might not get backed up.
@ixokai Actually, not so much. When I was working on the TinyMUX code I was doing it with a MySQL connection because I didn't see a particularly good way to handle the massive amounts of data involved just using multiple objects. This is because each character can have an indeterminate number of forks, each fork can have an indeterminate number of morphs, and those morphs are all based off of base classes but with customization since each morph usually can choose a certain number of attributes that get a +5 bonus and may have modifications to their base augments (not just additional augments but modifications since a morph might get rid of a standard augment so it can add an augment that would be incompatible with the old augment).
Working out that schema has actually been one of the biggest issues (and there's a bunch of stuff I haven't mentioned yet like the fact that skills and traits have to be recorded two different ways during CG so that you can recognize the bonuses given by your faction/background when calculating how many CP have been spent) but I'm able to move it verbatim over to Evennia (I was so tempted to store just a few attributes on the character object when I was working in TinyMUX but now I am immensely grateful I resisted). Additionally I've already worked out the majority of my SQL calls for checking/setting stats and while I now need to slot those into Python calls instead of the mux softcode they were residing in before they likewise represent a pretty substantial investment in time that is largely recovered.
That isn't to say there isn't a 'step back' component. Certainly I have to take those SQL calls and move them from the softcode into the new Python code as I said, but this is far from 'go back and start over'.
So once more two steps forward and one step back, I've decided to try and code the game in Evennia instead of TinyMux. I've gotten to a fairly developed stage where I am relatively sure I could complete the entire project in TinyMux if I wanted to but I'm concerned about long term support. Even now looking back at a piece of muxcode that I wrote a month ago is painful. The thought that I might have to go back and work on a piece of code two years from now just fills me with dread.
I have to admit to having mixed feelings about leaving mux behind. I did my first MU* coding close to 25 years ago with a tinyMUSH and it's like a pair of comfortable jeans. I'm use to looking at old code and tweezing it apart and figuring out how it's working. Unfortunately with the extra complexity that an EP game is going to require (to calculate your COG you need to know your base COG, any bonuses from morphs or augments, make sure it is less than your attribute maximum with possible adjustments for augments or traits and less than 40 and did I mention a character can have multiple forks and multiple morphs?) I think I want to try using a real programming language like Python and a real data structure like MySQL that supports many-to-one relationships.
@nemesis said in Life... in outer space!:
Would you broadcast your home address on a HAM radio knowing that the signal might be picked up by a psychotic dictator or religious extremist or bored serial killer in the market for fresh meat?
Late to the boat here, but I'm finally watching Season 1 of Jessica Jones. I've avoided it because of my general distaste for the superhero genre, but this is good! It's nicely gritty and the use of powers seem to be nicely muted and the threats seem to actually be threatening. Overall, I'm digging the whole film noir vibe.
Now, if only Jessica could stop using her powers whenever she gets angry. It looks so fake and is so ridiculous, it just pulls me out of it ever time.
You might want to check out Luke Cage as well. It's very much along the same lines as far as the 'street level hero' and 'muted use of powers'.
@killer-klown Well, that's the main reason for the thread. Some people wish to say that they are more 'hard rules' than 'examples' (to the point where a character might be assigned a penalty for attempting something purely based on their skill level)
@killer-klown The problem doesn't actually exist in nWoD. They do not have the 1-dot, 2-dot descriptions for skill levels (I assume they got rid of them because of these arguments, but that's just a guess and I have nothing to support that).
The only way that crops up in nWoD is when people drag the level descriptions from oWoD, but that can either be brushed off as a House Rule (being implemented by Storyteller/Staff) who want to keep them or as people simply being wrong and assuming they still exist.
@faraday said in Skills and Fluff in WoD:
@the-sands said in Skills and Fluff in WoD:
I would dearly love for someone on the 'it's a rule' side to explain where I am mistaken
OK, new day. Let me try one last time, a different way...
It seriously depends on your definition of "rule", which is why I'm with @ixokai in thinking that the argument is a bit of semantic pedantry. So I'm going to answer the question in a slightly different way.
I think that the Player's Guide (any rulebook, really) contains different kinds of information:
- Vital mechanics that are at the core of the system. (e.g. mechanics for conflict resolution as stat + skill + modifiers, how chargen works, etc.)
- Detailed statistics and descriptions that are important to gameplay but easily altered by the GM without fundamentally changing the game. (e.g. the attribute list and what it means, XP costs, weapon stats, what you can do with skills/powers, etc.)
- Clarifying examples that are intended to be accurate but not complete/exhaustive. (e.g. sample characters, pie-in-the-sky clan descriptions, etc.)
- Fluff text that really has no impact on the game but is fun and helps you understand the world better. (e.g. fiction)
If your question is whether the oWoD skill descriptions are category 1, then no - I don't think they are.
I place them somewhere between 2-3. I don't think they're just category 4 "fluff text" and here's why...
If Bob makes up his character assuming that Drive means "stunt driving" and I make up my character assuming that Drive means exactly what it says in the skill descriptions, then our characters are not on a level playing field.
Ok. I'm going to agree with you here completely. I am not being specific enough on what I mean when I say 'skill description'. If the skill description says 'this is what you need to operate a vehicle' (and it continues to be supported throughout the text) then you're right. anyone who wants to operate a car should have to buy it.
We get into a whole messy situation, however, when we consider the rest of the text because under 'Possessed by' the list is 'Cabbies, Truckers, Race Car Drivers, Automotive Show Hosts, Rebels' and if it really means 'anyone who can operate a car' that list should probably include 'most people in a modern society'.
I would like to leave that portion behind, however, because it is really not what I'm talking about. What I'm referring to is the '1 dot, 2 dot' section. Yes. I can definitely see your point about the earlier portion and we can go back and forth and ultimately it is so badly written that probably most oWoD games should include something somewhere to clarify which of these bits of text take precedence. Is it the earlier line that makes it sound like everyone needs to take it or is it the list of examples that suggests only people who spend quite a lot of time behind the wheel who should buy it?
Same thing if Bob makes up his character assuming that Medicine-1 means First Aid and I make up my character assuming that Medicine-1 means "medical/nursing student". This can have impacts down the line if we try to use said skills and are told by the GM "No, you can't splint that broken bone / drive that stick-shift because you lack the requisite skill". It also effectively gives Bob more points for “useful” skills since I spent some unnecessarily to get basic driving and first aid.
But now doesn't that open up the counter argument that Bob was expecting '6 dice means 6 dice' and is told 'no, even though you have the same pool you can't do that'? There's nothing anywhere in the rules that suggest to Bob that he could suddenly be penalized simply because his Skill is only 1 die. Bob's expectation is that he will always be able to roll 6 dice (adjusted by situational modifiers, of course) and suddenly he's not getting to.
I think that's a Bad Thing.
That doesn't mean that Bob is a Cheating McCheater because he "didn't follow the rules". But it does mean that skill descriptions are important and games should clarify what they intend the skills to mean if they're not going to follow the pre-written skill descriptions in the Player's Guide.
And I absolutely agree. They shouldn't write things badly. However, in this instance we are focusing on a specific game where they have. All we can do now is say 'just how should we handle all these conflicting things?'
One really big danger I see is that if your argument is 'no, you have to have Medicine-3 to attempt this' then shouldn't we forbid people from buying Medicine-3 unless they have earned their Master's degree, done 4 years of med school, and 3 years of residency (the requirements to be a GP)? After all, they aren't a GP so they are purchasing a skill their character 'can't' have by the dot-definition. Doesn't that mean they are cheating? If I expected that only characters with medical degrees could purchase Medicine-3 then doesn't that give you 'an advantage over me' because I'm following a more literal interpretation?
@derp Really, we aren't (I hope) arguing about cases where it's a question of whether you need to roll or not. What I would like to focus on is how important is the text in the skill descriptions? When it says 'Practiced: You can drive a stick shift' under 2 dots of Drive does that have a bearing? Do you have to roll because you have a possibility of failure since you only have Drive-1 but Dexterity-5 while someone with Drive-2 and Dexterity-4 (i.e. an exact identical pool) doesn't have to? Do you have no chance to do something that a person with an identical pool (and no other modifiers such as Specialties) has?
Some people want to take the position that because 'Practiced: You can drive a stick shift' is written down that is a rule. It doesn't seem to matter that there is nothing anywhere in the system that says to treat two identical pools different depending on skill levels, not does it seem to matter that they view other things written in the book as 'not rules' (e.g. I believe they feel people do not need to play pure stereotypes based on clan descriptions).
Now I want to be clear I am not trying to put words in anyone's mouths. I am simply saying this is the impression I have. I would dearly love for someone on the 'it's a rule' side to explain where I am mistaken, but explaining doesn't mean just stating 'it's a rule' and asking 'why don't you want to follow the rules?'
