S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Oak Ridge (PA Hero)

Legendsmiths · April 20, 2007

You might be saying to yourself, "Whaaa???". As will become clear in a few lines, I am a fan of PA gaming, and more specifically have thoroughly enjoyed STALKER Shadow of Chernobyl (follow the link for the video game guide and setting background). I have played the game through twice (since there are 7 different endings), and have "beat" the game (and learned the secrets of the zone). If you are a fan of PA and enjoy FPS, you really owe it to yourself to play the game. It has its issues, to be sure, but it is an amazing world and hopefully a shadow (heh) of things to come with a merging of FPS and RPG elements.

THAT said, I want more. Specifically, I want it in Hero so I can take it whatever direction I want. Goaded by one of my friends (and fellow S.T.A.L.K.E.R.s) I was consumed to finish the setting info to a playable level.

I wanted to make an American twist on the setting, but stick to all of the elements in the game, including the type of geography and location. I was struck by the idea of Oak Ridge, TN. A modern boomtown built in support of, essentially, a super science facility - not all that different from the relationship between Pripyat and Chernobyl.

As luck would have it, Gooogle released My Maps and I went to town.

What is Completed?

1. The map of the region and detail of the key factions. I have put a fair amount of info into each of the regions. It is not as easy to read as printed page, but it is more contextual. If you are interested, read each of the entries to get the full story. If you have played the game, it will make a lot more sense, but I think the overview should get you grounded enough.

2. The equipment list. Fundamentally, STALKER is a game of treasure hunting. You start out with next to nothing, strive to survive, and trade your way to a better lifestyle (such as you can have in the zone). As the game unfolds and you begin to learn its secrets you can adopt a grander plot, but at its basic level the game is run-and-gun, find/trade goods, and have adventure along the way. The economics should map to the original game, although it is now in dollars.

3. HeroDesigner Prefab of all equipment, including guns, armor, food, and artifacts. If it was in the video game, it's in there with one caveat: all of the weapons are Americanized, and I added a few here and there. For each "level" or "quality" of weapon in the original, there is the same here.

You should be able to take this, create some 100pt characters, give them about $300 in equipment, and head on out.

Artifacts are also detailed (follow the link for an overview of the originals), and I stuck to the originals. I have some ideas for some new ones, but the beauty of artifacts is that they are the "magic items" of the zone. In the equipment listing they show the point cost of the artifact - I build them as Independent and then players that want them can pay points to "bond" with them. Once bonded, they never get those points back, but if they lose/sell the item they still can use those points to bond to another artifact. If you don't like that, and want to keep it cash only, it's all there and the pricing is as balanced as the original game was. Obviously, radiation is challenging to game in Hero, but I came up with a solution that seems to work, starting by declaring the radiation EDR (extra dimensional radiation) which allowed me to still have a radiation type effect, but to game/stat it out a little less realistically than actual radiation exposure.

I hope you enjoy this. I will be running an event Saturday Night at GenCon for this and handing out copies of the gear and such. Stop on by, chat a little, game if you can.

Please, post any questions you have. Any requests or updates, errors spotted, and so on I will respond to as I can and provide updates.

For those who haven't played the game and enjoy PA gaming, I hope I have provided enough context to make this material understandable.

Notes on Trading

Trading is all about having the right contacts. My intent was to represent equipment rarity based on the level of trading contact you have and using the contact roll to determine if a piece of equipment is available. That is the reasoning behind having basic, standard, expert, elite, and advanced elite equipment rarities (and rare steps of each). If you are trying to find an expert piece of equipment at your standard contact, you will roll at -6. If the equipment is appropriate for the level of contact but rare then it is at -3 (hence categories such as standard, rare). Each step down in rarity (e.g. checking if an expert trader has standard equipment) each step (including the interim 'rare' steps) is +1, so an expert trader would have standard gear at a +2.

No players can start with a trading contact, but they should know where one is. My intent was to only allow points earned while on errands/missions for contacts to be spent on that specific contact. It's about building relationships, and for such missions I would probably just award the contact (or a bonus) as the "xp" for the session.

If you play the game, you'll see what I mean. The computer just isn't as capable of nuance as a full RPG session and I think that some of the things you do in the game, or are hinted at, could be fully fleshed out.

I look forward to your comments.

NOTE: Fixed missing STR mins

Legendsmiths · April 21, 2007