Mentor

Re: Combat Skill Levels vs Martial Arts

Re: A Thread for Random Musings After being addicted to *Sid Meier's Civilization IV, I figure I will take a break and play my son's *Sid Meier's Pirates! Live the Life* game as a relaxed blow off experience. I have been averaging the same amount of sleep and game time since then. (About five and a half hours a night)

Re: Combat Skill Levels vs Martial Arts I think much of the definitive problem is the idea of "normal" or "real people" being mistaken for the guy next door as opposed to "real" or "normal" people in drama and literature. gary has made a good point with Batman. The characters played in the movies by Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris, Vin Diesel, in the movies or Tarzan, Doc Savage, Honor Harrington, or James Bond in literature are humans with environmental or training edges. No way can I be convinced that Tarzan or the iconic Bruce Lee could be built with 20STR or 20 DEX and 3-4 SPD. Their marked superiority to elite troops and even "boss" level baddies makes it hard for me to accept that the only choices are "reality" or "mutant".

Re: How to block the "unblockable" punch? Given how unlikely it is for Zlf to miss in the first place, unblockable applies to most of her attacks for most PCs. My personal preference has always been to use villains who can take it. I wouldn't consider blocking as a viable use of a phase against Zlf anyway if I opposed her with a MA with a high enough OCV and skill levels to hit her. She is not all that well defended and I would rather have the villain trade punches and see who lasts longest.

Re: My Son What's To Play A bit of advice when plotting games for kids. Make the adventures grown up, not juvenile. It has been my experience that kids want to play the superhero, not the sidekick or a kid with powers. Anyone remember the old "Superfriends" cartoon, in which they insisted on centering the plot around the dorky kids and the dog? The Justice Leaguers were almost an afterthought as far as plot, dialogue and action were concerned. Most kids want to be Green Lantern or Ben Grimm and make their own decisions, not Kid Flash or Robin and follow the orders of their elders. They have to do that in RL anyway.

Re: The Last Word Porn Firefly Firefly porn:D

Re: Traveller Hero, a major announcement My friends and I started playing Traveller after Star Wars came out and that was the flavor we were hoping for. When my first PC died during the creation process, we knew there were some bugs to work out. Once I had a character survive, he was below average in a number of stats and armed with a weapon that statted out like a WW2 M1 carbine, and lacked either sufficient skills, cash, or influence to get hired. That is when I realized how much a character generation system like Hero would add to increasing game enjoyment. Who wants to play an average Joe in a role playing game?

Re: My Son What's To Play To follow up on Treb's post, both of my son's joined our Champs game when they turned ten. The oldest, now 16, is the most mature for his age and picked up the rules concepts instantly. The youger, now 12, was less mature on the rules end, but absolutely the master of the roleplay/adventure/superhero genre, even compared to most adults I have ever gamed with. Our campaign was already Four color, so no changes were really needed there. I think I can honestly say that neither Trebuchet, Blackjack, El Tripon, or Dangerous Dan ever felt that we dumbed a game down intellectually or watered it down in terms of adventure or intensity because of the presence of the kids. The main benefit is that my kids know that they are part of their dad's hobby, they are friends with their dad's friends and dad doesn't always have to choose between game time or family time and that, as the commercial says, is priceless.

Re: Complicate the Person Above I have pictures of Cancer sneakng out of M. Night Shyamalan's swimming pool after scaring the crap out of all of his houseguests. I bet a movie comes out of that.

Re: Point Efficiency vs. Concept While I don't believe the two concepts are automatically mutually exclusive, I always have concept trump efficiency, all other things being equal.

Re: Free Will I happen to play a Mentalist now and that question comes up often. Prodigy does not kill humans. Ever. Period. If someone commits or seriously threatens an act heinous enough for supers to act with extreme prejudice, suspending or eliminating that person's free will, temporarily or permanently is something he will do. Some players and some PCs find this more horrifying than killing. OTOH, he would never have the arrogance to believe he knew what would be best for everyone, and he lack the power anyway. (Unlike his mentor, Mentor, who has the power but also lacks the arrogance.)

Re: Interplanetary colonies A lunar or even martian colony need not assume that there would not be new blood in and out over the years just based on new arrivals, retirement, different organizations or nations building competing facilities, etc.

Re: Future Sci-Fi Maybe a high tech, space faring civilization would have Sci Fi based around the ideal Biotech absolute immunity, regen, or agelessness. Likewise, a really biologically/medically advanced culture might still use antigrav, translight speed, or miracle materials technology as their version of sci fi. I don't think people will ever stop dreaming.

Re: Pulp A-team I might just play with that mechanism, Derek, and see how it works in action. I have hopes for this.

Re: Traveller Hero sample Draft... Type S Scout Courier In general, I view all Disads as plot/adventure hooks, so rather than asking what bad thing one gets for 10 points, I find it easier to use something like the filters as an introduction. "Our engineer informs us that the filters got prematurely clogged, probably from that dust storm on Thebes VII, so we need to make an unsceduled stopover at Belkin's World for a new one because they have the only decent starport for five par secs. TAS does list Belkin's World as safe, but some rumors from the last system we visited suggests that we keep the power plant warm and the weapons loaded...."

Re: Musings on Random Musings I always thought the big car compensation thing was about losers at the bus stop having no better line than, "Well, anyway, you have a little thingy.":D

Re: A Thread for Random Musings Eenternet eenwented een Roosha. Eempeereealeest Amereekanskis take credit for every proletarian eenwention.

Re: Traveller Hero sample Draft... Type S Scout Courier I forget how the existence of psionics changes the approach to everything in a meieu. That the Scout Service would use their experience and technology gained from their past encounters with the Zhodani makes total sense in retrospect.

Re: Traveller Hero, a major announcement I am getting very impatient. "Bump"

Re: Traveler Hero *sigh* Not soon enough. Between the announcement that T5 supposed being released in 2007 and Traveller Hero news, my appetite for Traveller is being whetted in a big way.

Re: Things I Have Learned Playing a Hard Boiled Detective When you ask yourself if you really need five extra magazines for your .45 automatic, the answer is always; Yes.

Re: Things I Have Learned Playing a Hard Boiled Detective Whenever you have to ask yourself seriously if that guy/gal is following you, the answer is always; Yes.

Re: The Last Word I must admit that our Pulp Games have gone weird fast. My original PC was a two fisted detective with a young millionaire and his Filipino houseboy/boxer as partners. Seemed mundane enough. Once we added in the beautiful Chinese mystic and discovered that our chief enemies were the ageless Yellow Claw and Bavarian Illuminati, everything else was out the window.

Re: The Last Word

Re: Longest Running Thread EVER I got to see Blue Oyster Cult at the El Paso Street Festival. Even the kids got excited when they did Godzilla. Styx followed them but my kids wouldn't last until midnight. I always get lucky when the wife hears Styx. (Buck Dharma looked as old as my dad. )