Best posts made by ZombieGenesis

If I'm being honest, I'm not sure exactly what you're asking, but I'll answer to the best of my ability.

I run a private game that uses a modded version of the They Came From... RPG from Onyx Path. It's played on primarily by people new to MUing and are kind of intimidated by the idea of going to a full-on game. We use what I'm assuming you refer to as "ruled-based RP prompts" all the time.

They Came From The... system is pretty narrative, meaning it's lightweight and supports what it should; the RP. Most people on the game use it to help direct the flow of their RP, not just accomplish the things they want. We often go into scenes with the idea of "let's start here and see where things go" and let our imagination and the dice results guide us the rest of the way.

For such a system to work, you have to have players that respect each other and the system. I could see some of the stuff we've done being abused by certain types of players. Such as letting social rolls decide how characters felt about each other.

I don't know if that's what you mean, but I think it can work again with the right people.

@arkandel I 100% agree. I'm probably what others might term an "edgelord". I like dark stuff. I like really dark stuff. I read, write, and publish splatterpunk horror. I live for gritty and disturbing fiction.

Just not in my Star Trek. Or my Superman for that matter. It's why I never really enjoyed Man of Steel. It didn't feel like Superman to me.

It's also why I haven't really enjoyed Discovery or Picard(though I intend to go back and try to rewatch Picard season 1 so I can watch season 2).

And while I enjoyed the Star Trek reboots with Chris Pine and crew they also never quite felt like Star Trek to me. I just thought they were okay sci-fi movies(well, the first and third. Not so much the second).

I've been looking forward to Strange New Worlds since it was announced and I don't think the first episode disappointed. I loved it and can't wait for more. It felt like Star Trek and that excites me.

I almost set a mortal only game set in 1984 but I was pretty sure I'd be the only one excited to play there.

@Misadventure Yeah, I definitely think something like that could work. I like the ideas of goals being stated just for the ability to help with possible plot generation. You'd just need to have the Plot Staff to make it work I guess. But I very much like the idea of goals and aspirations giving staff the ability to tailor events and RP to players. Experience aside even.

@Ghost I felt the second half of the season was better than the first. Maybe it's because Strange New Worlds spoiled me, but it didn't seem to hold up to previous seasons. For the most part. As I said, the second half of the season picked up for me.

Well, to clarify, the first episode was really good. Then I feel it started to dip a bit. Then it picked up again and got good.

For me, Strane New Worlds just ruined other sci-fi shows. I thought the first season was a slam dunk. The most I've enjoyed sci-fi since TNG.

Been hankering some sort of Gothic fantasy type RP. Something along the lines of Game of Thrones meets Ravenloft or Vampire the Dark Ages or something. Wondering if anyone knows of anything like that out there?

@Ghost I am very much a fan of RPGs and TT stuff. I'm also a huge fan of narrative storytelling. My sweet spot is when the two meet. That's why I love Ares, the web portal allows me to partake in MUing/storytelling at a casual pace. I often don't have time to dedicate 3 or 4 hours to a session but I can get a pose out every hour or so generally. It's a struggle just to hook up with my regular gaming group nowadays, unfortunately.

Being an adult and having a job and responsibilities seriously cuts into my gaming time!

Sadly, I have deleted this site from my favorites bar and will no longer be checking here for PMs and such, which was all I'd been coming here for over the past few years, anyway.

For those who wish to contact me, I can be found on Discord as Zombiegenesis on the Ares and MuHaven servers.

I think Mortal Kombat would make a fantastic MU. Just look at the playable roster of characters you have in 11 right now. Cyborg Ninjas, regular ninjas, movie stars, special forces agents, wizards, gods, ghosts, Rambo, the Terminator, Robocop, The Joker, Spawn. Set it during the Outworld invasion of Earth and I think you have a setting ripe for RP.

I handle this in one of two ways in the games I run. These are generally used for GMless RP as most of the people I RP with use Ares and asynchronous RP.

1: I've set up a plot where the story can be advanced by completing a number of scenes. I provide a page with a number of prompts and some hidden information for when certain benchmarks have been met. When the players meet those benchmarks, they reveal the hidden information and RP accordingly. One scene leads to the next(scene prompt, action prompts, clue prompts, scene close) until the mystery is solved.

Sometimes I also give the players one scene with various prompts and then have them submit a job when they're ready to move on to the next one.

So here, we use specific clues that lead to a solution.

2: Sometimes we don't have anyone who is running the plot, but we still want to do X, Y, and/or Z. So we do our RP and lean on the system to see how things go. We treat it almost like a game of Clue. We use "oracles" to answer various questions, come up with our guesses, and then determine how correct we think we are. Then we roll to see if we're right and RP accordingly.

For example, through RP and various oracle checks, we're pretty sure the killer(most of my RP happens on horror or superhero games) is the sheriff. Based on how the oracle checks went, we're 75% sure. We roll to see if we're right. If we are, we move on with the plot. If we're not, we RP how our characters found out we weren't and go back to the drawing board.

Not everyone's cup of tea I'm sure but it works for us and we have a great time with it.

@Derp I was so excited for that movie. Dragonlance Chronicles and Legends make up 6 of my favorite fantasy novels. The movie had everything going for it; great setting, great story, great cast. Yet they still managed to muck it up horribly.

@lotherio I think that's where the "how you define success" comes in. If you're looking for a slam dunk of a game with dozens of players and hundreds of logins, you might be let down. Looking for maybe a dozen dedicated players and an equal number of logins? Well, there might be something here for you.

Recently, a brilliant and generous person created a D6 plugin for Ares. This is something I've actually wanted for quite some time. I even started a project to build on myself but just didn't have the time to dedicate to it. So, this was a godsend for me as it has opened the door to do something I've wanted to do for a long time, open a Star Wars game using Ares.

This project is very much 'in development' and I'm just starting to get things put together. I'm posting here fishing for anyone who might be interested in helping out in some way. I've got a good idea for a time period and theme but even those are fluid at the moment. Here's what I'm thinking.

Time Period: Roughly 4,000 years BBY. I put it here because we can easily fudge things. We're not going to be restricted by canon, we're very much going to be our own thing. To that end, I'm fudging things a bit and will be having the Sith War and Mandalorian War be essentially back to back. The galaxy has been in a state of war for 20 years.

Setting: The galaxy. We will likely have some hot spots like Coruscant, Corellia, and some other places, but I don't see the need to limit the game to one specific location.

Factions: Republic, Jedi Order, Sith, and Fringe. I'm hoping to be pretty open with things.

System: D6. It's a bit customized using some of D6 Space and some of the old WEG Star Wars system. Mostly we've combined the Mechanical and Technical skills into one and added Presence. I'm also in the process of simplifying how the Force works basing it more off of the D6 Space metaphysics system. It has full web integration including character generation, a dice roller for scenes, and dice rolling for jobs. It's really slick. I've also added the Traits plugin so people can record other things they may have(starships, equipment, companions, etc).

What I'm looking for: Mostly people who want to contribute in some way to get the game up and running and, once we're open, keep it operating smoothly. Like I said, we're customizing the system a bit so feedback on how that feels will be nice. Getting opinions on the theme and setting will be very helpful. And, once we're open, appstaff and plot runners would be great.

So, if you're interested feel free to drop me a message here. Or if you know anyone that's interested. I'm pretty excited but I'd very much like to have at least some sort of a staff base if I'm ever going to open it to the public.

I agree. Season 2 has been fantastic. I've also been enjoying Monarch Legacy of Monsters and Netflix recently got Tacoma FD(a sitcom done by some of the people from Broken Lizard).

@pyrephox I agree. I think one of the fears staff has with being too open is players making sweeping changes to the grid and/or theme. I'm experimenting on a private game with players being able to claim an area or organization for a plot. For example, the current plot centers around college students stuck in a summer program being stalked by a slasher. It's confined to the college and the characters that are stuck there for the summer. The players can do whatever they want within those confines. I'm hopeful it works well.

As for tools I'm providing them(I'm not actually taking part in the plot to have it almost completely "staff" free) we use a modified version of the Storypath system as presented in They Came From Beyond The Grave as our backbone and for system related stuff. They have disposable NPCs they can use in scenes. And, as said, free reign to do whatever with the summer college crew.

To further clarify we have a +sheet that is powered by a very stripped down and slightly modified version of the DC Heroes RPG. There's a +dice system in place but, again, it's completely optional.

@lotherio I think you could really embrace this with Ares. Say Player A wants to create a setting, they submit a synopsis to staff who approve or reject it or whatever. Say they approve it, they can add the setting to the demographics for people to select(so the directory sorts characters into the right tabs) and the player could either create an actual grid or, and I don't think people do this enough with Ares, create a series of wiki pages describing the setting and locales where RP could happen. Since Ares allows players to define the location of the scene as the scene is created having an actual grid isn't necessary really. You could go gridless or support a minimalist grid or have a full grid if the player was so inclined.

I had been tempted to do something like this once with comic universes. DC, Marvel, Image, whatever. Each separate but everyone on one game.

Got called into work so I won't be around on the game till later tonight. I thought I'd answer some questions I've been seeing here for those who are interested.

1: Will System-X(+roll, equipment, ships) be added to the game?
A: Yes, I fully intend to have a number of subsystems to enhance RP. Right now I'm just focusing on character generation.

2: Will I be able to start as an Edge of the Empire style character and become a force user later?
A: Yes, though I haven't finalized what will be involved in this process yet.

3: Will you be including species X?
A: I intend to add every published species to the system and will be open to adding fan-made species to fill in for what FFG has not touched on yet.

4: Will you be including Emotional Strengths/Weaknesses and Obligations from other sources?
A: Anything that has been published by FFG will be added to the system as a viable Emotional Strength/Weakness or Obligation.

5: Can I play a bad guy?
A: Most storytelling opportunities are going to be geared towards "hero" characters as we assume that's what most people will be playing. We are open to players playing their characters however they want though especially if you're looking to help forward storylines and provide RP opportunities for others.

Those are the most popular questions I've seen so far. Oh, some people have also asked if I know where to get a PDF copy of the various FFG SW games...I do but I won't post the link here. I'll share it on the game, however.

@arkandel I had once thought about locking "major FCs" behind a plot barrier. Want to play Batman? Well, that's cool but you have to run a plot for Gotham. Then, when that plot is over, the character becomes available again and someone else can step in and have a run. I never did it though because I had fears of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman all just sitting idle and stagnant.

LOL. I live in Maine, grew up here, and our beaches are the best part of living here. Especially when you watch people from the west coast come and try to enjoy them. I've been asked, many time, "what the fuck is wrong with your beaches?" What's wrong with beaches filled with sharp, pointy, rocks and ice cold water year round?