Wednesday Anima

[SageGenesis]

Begrijp ik heel goed.

Wederom, met -1 geen nieuwe game opzetten. Ik ga zelf ook nog even rustig aandoen en blijf thuis.

[scroipt]

Genoteerd

[wolfy]

Een rustig avondje thuis komt mij sowueos wel goed uit. Maar ik had toch liever een nieuwe game gestart. Beterschap aan de zieken! En over 2 weken weer een poging

[SageGenesis]

Let's not sit still for 2 weeks. If we can agree on some basics of the world then next time will be a lot easier, so we can quickly move on to fine details and character ideas.

What I'm about to say here is just an idea, a proposition. I would like feedback on it, even if it's just as simple as "ok". Silence means I will assume you have not read this post yet.



The year is 1949. The war is still ongoing, though in some parts of the world it rages fiercely and in others it's smoldering like an early version of the Cold War.

This is an alt-history world where the arcane is real. Nazi Germany's Thule Society has unearthed terrible powers which they use to assist the military. Dead soldiers rise once more to wage war upon the living. Sorcerers can walk through fire, split a tree with bare hands, or call upon dark spirits to spy on their enemies. That kind of thing.

Fortunately the allies have some resources of their own.

In particular, the United Kingdom has a secret society which has spent the past few centuries hunting down, capturing, and studying monsters. An important branch of this society is housed in Westenra Park, an old manor where vampires are held, tamed, and in essence rebuilt, through complex mystical means.

The war threatens to consume us all. Neutral nations are on the verge of choosing sides. There are spies, secret weapons projects, dreadfully evil rituals, devastating raids, defecting officers, and a lot more. More than England can handle on her own. So Westenra Park opened the cages and let loose some of the most dangerous agents the war has seen yet...

[wolfy]

Nice, I like it. This way there are a lots of possibilities for stupid things we as players can do

[(me) Melchior]

I like it! though I doubt being "tamed" will be a big feature for our chars.

[SageGenesis]

(27-10-2016 17:43:43)(me) Melchior Wrote:  I like it! though I doubt being "tamed" will be a big feature for our chars.

I think of "tamed" being like it works in the Hellsing anime. If you're unfamiliar: basically you would follow along with the missions provided instead of running off and doing your own thing at the first opportunity. But you're not domesticated. You can be sarcastic, push the edges, go for a lot of collateral damage, and twist around some of the words of your handlers.

When the mission is "assassinate nazi scientist in this hotel" and you choose to interpret that as "blow up the entire hotel", that's up to you.

[(me) Melchior]

cool, that would totally work

[scroipt]

Excellent, non-domesticated \^_^/

[SageGenesis]

Unlimited power!

With all four of you playing vampires, the question rises: what do they do? How do we differentiate between the four?

Well, at the most basic level being a vampire does nothing special. All it really does is the ability to keep on going while clinically dead. ("Nothing special", he said...) There's no universal vampire powers beyond that. So any classic ability, like being strong, or fast, or alluring, or turning into a bat, or anything else like that are possibilities of powers you might take, not guaranteed inherent powers you all get.

Besides the classic vampire things there's also anything you can think of to do with blood, death, darkness, or hell. (And if you're halfway creative you can go a long way with just those themes.) On top of that, many vampires are very proficient in mundane skills because they've had literally lifetimes to practice. Being all occult is nice and all but there's something to be said for being able to drive cars and shoot guns. Oh, and when you're stuck deep behind enemy lines, perhaps some rudimentary knowledge on how to fix and operate a radio wouldn't hurt either.

There's also some things you definitely can't do, though they're rather common sense issues. Time travel. Being immune to everything. Summoning an army of your own. Mind controlling everybody you want. That kind of thing.


So, what do you want your own undead leech to do? Any ideas yet? The system has a sort of toolkit approach, allowing you to construct all sorts of abilities, but that does mean it will save a bit of time if you have some ideas beforehand so I can pre-construct some options for you.

[MaszaH]

Time for me to watch some more anime for inspiration

[(me) Melchior]

Im thinking either an undead monster that hates the Nazis for upturning the natural order and longs for nothing more than to reclaim his ancestral home in occupied territories and turn things back to how they were meant to be, with the midnight aristocracy ruling supreme and the peasants living subservient in darkness and terror, or whatever, who cares about peasants.
He uses proper weapons like swords and claws and is a master at the mystic arts of darkness and necromancy

or

A newer vamp from merica that hates the Nazis cause their are not from merica and stifle individual freedom and thought. in general he loves all the ingenious little human creatures and their inventions, particular the promise of technology to one day cover the planet in a nice cloud of ash. He is more the tech/guns and bats kinda guy.

[scroipt]

New game, new topic?

[SageGenesis]

I have discovered random generators which can create 3e, 4e, or 5e D&D encounters, dungeon-layouts, treasure, NPCs, special events, randomized pickpocket results, dusty old magic tomes (seriously, it has a random tome generator), quests, towns, castles, taverns (including menu, notable patrons, and rumors), weather, dungeon graffiti, and a whole lot more.

This means that, counter to my previous statements, I would be able to run a game on the every other Wednesday evening. Just feed party size and level into the website and some dungeon comes rolling out on the spot. Literally zero prep required, a monkey could do it.

However this does mean the following:

1. While I would not always come entirely unprepared, I expect that often I would. That means simple plots, frequent dungeoncrawling purely for the sake of killing the inhabitants and taking their stuff, and relatively few recurring NPCs and overarching plots. Not my finest work but for an after-work game with beer and pretzels, it could be acceptable.

2. As simple as this all sounds, I expect that sometimes I'd still prefer not to run something. If at all possible I'd like other people to sometimes take over as DM for a session or two. Not mandatory but it'll probably help me a lot.

3. This is an experiment. Perhaps after a month or two I'll still cancel all over again because I feel it doesn't work for me, who knows? "Nee heb je, ja kun je krijgen."

[MaszaH]

Inmiddels heeft mijn werk mijn woensdag avond alweer aardig vol gepropt. Dus ik kan sowieso tot juli woensdag avonden wel vergeten

[SageGenesis]

The random generator D&D idea isn't really taking off, is it? While it would be easier to prepare, it would still mean looking up monsters in databases, running a fairly complex game of "hyper-chess", and just generally keep me busy in a way I was trying to do less.

So let's not.

Boardgames might be enough to keep us entertained for a while longer, but at the same time I think that will run out. You can only run some games so much before you get tired of them. (I don't think I want to do another round of Splendor any time this year.) I also know Marcia will probably come back at some point, and she's not really into the boardgames, plus I think Wolf is currently not a player in anything at all? Just runs something every other week?

So I got thinking: do I know an RPG that's light to prep, light to run, where most of the plot-direction comes from players and their dice, and still fun?

Turns out... yes. Yes, I do. Blades in the Dark is the game I currently use on Mondays and it's working out very well. I talked it over with Mel yesterday and I think that's an idea with real promise.

Assuming you're up for trying it, we'll need to think of what sort of setting/world we'd like to play in.

Option 1: Standard BitD setting. Think of videogames like Dishonored and Thief. A tiny little sprinkling of Iron Kingdoms, perhaps. A dark urban world of industry and crime.

Option 2: StarCraft-inspired sci-fi. Futuristic mercs, rebels, and pirates. (We'd ignore every plot development from SC2, though.)

Other ideas might also be possible, if you can think of something. I've used it for Shadowrun and Vampire so far, seems to work out, so the system is fairly flexible.

So, discuss. Ask. Vote. You know how this works.

[(me) Melchior]

This does sound like a good idea! Setting-wise i have a small preference for BitD, today, yesterday SC had my favor so .. both sound like a lot of fun.

[nar]

we've been having a blast with BitD on mondays and during vampire! can definitely recommend the system, but we've yet to use the actually setting, so i can't speak to that

[voh]

I support anyone playing BitD. It's a great little system which uses its relatively light system to create surprisingly deep story

[MaszaH]

My wednesdays have become a bit full over the weeks, so I'm out atleast until summer.

[SageGenesis]

Ging ik al van uit, Je kan natuurlijk gewoon weer aanschuiven zodra je tijd/zin hebt.

Overigens, gister is Wolf ook op BitD overgestapt voor dinsdag (dit spel lijkt echt alles over te nemen op het moment) met de standaard setting, dus StarCraft-y sci-fi setting heeft bij mij nu grote voorkeur.

Mark, ik weet het, StarCraft is totaal niet jouw ding, maar je zal je er bij moeten neerleggen...

[scroipt]

>_<

---

Moet ik me maar bij neerleggen dan ;-P

[SageGenesis]

This game takes place in the Hades Cluster, a backwater part of the Koprulu Sector that's relatively far away from troubles like the Zerg invasions and such. Because of that, the government diverted many resources to the front lines. Now the Cluster has a bit of a problem with pirates, mercenaries, rebellions, and other such things.

You are not part of the solution. You are a part of the problem.


Also, having a wiki is convenient.

Factions
The Hades Cluster's criminal elements
The Hades Cluster's more or less legitimate institutions
The Hades Cluster's labor and trade
The Hades Cluster's civilian populations and worlds

[(me) Melchior]

nice! is it me or am i noticing a small pirate theme going on?