Matt Frisbee

Re: Planets of SF Author Hats Planet Laumer: a world that is populated with humanity and a large number of self-aware fighting machine relics that occasional come to life to either help or menace society in general. Planet Bova: a highly advanced society where humans have unparalleled luxury and no wants unfulfilled, but still have to solve their differences via barbaric violence in a virtual reality machine. Matt "Bolo and Dueling Machine fanboy" Frisbee

Re: Whatever Can Go Wrong Target destination environment has changed radically or is otherwise unsuitable for lifeforms aboard the space vessel. Travelers aboard vessel develop sensory / sleep deprivation psychosis and start lashing out at each other. Travelers have a serious disagreement and initiate their own personal civil war aboard ship (mutiny). Adults die aboard ship leaving children to run it without a clue as to where they're going or why. Computer becomes self-aware and begins to question the actions of the lifeforms on board. ("Are you certain you want to do this, Dr. Chandra? I think we should stop." -- HAL 9000, 2010) Matt "End of Exile by Ben Bova fanboy" Frisbee

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Me and my R-C! Me and my R-C! 'Cause what's good enough for other folks, Ain't good enough for me and my R-C! Me and my R-C!... Matt "Royal Crown Cola really rocked when it was made with real cane sugar instead of Fructose -- and was bottled in glass instead of plastic" Frisbee P.S. Yeah, hopelessly retro taste buds.

Re: Alternate Universe: No Industry, No Guns My two cents' worth: 1) Lower life expectancy leading to a younger population. Early marriage (13+) could be fairly common. 2) Lower population and lower population density. Without advanced materials and technology to build large buildings, urban sprawl and transportation of basic necessities would allow a city to only get so large before it becomes impractical. 3) Less diverse economy. Locally made craftwork will be the rule and if it isn't made locally you generally can't get it. 4) Regionalization of speech. Less travel and communication will lead to the rise of highly specific accents, slang and possibly regional dialects (sub-language). 5) On a personal note, I wouldn't particularly want to live there, but it would be interesting to role play. Matt "I'm out of pennies now" Frisbee

Re: Starting a Big DC Campaign Yeah, I'll third this opinion with the stipulation that it is the best modern urban adventure I've run across. (My all-time favorite adventures are The Black Madonna and Last Train to Clarksville adventures for Twilight: 2000.) Hudson City Blues makes it very easy to insert personal adventures for the characters in and around the main storyline, having it operate as a subplot until things come to a head at the end of the campaign's first act. Combine this adventure with the level of detail presented in Hudson City: The Urban Abyss, and you've got a campaign that (almost) runs itself. Matt "Sorry-for-the-Complete-Fanboy-Gushing-There" Frisbee

Re: Space Junk in Earth Orbit So far as Salvage 1 is concerned, I only remember the made for TV movie, but here is the page that details all of the other episodes: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078681/ Judging from the episode descriptions, this could be Star/Pulp Hero fodder. Matt "Memory-cells-still-working" Frisbee

Re: PA hero interest: Life Without People The human race doesn't necessarily have to die to create a post-apoc situation -- what if they all just disappeared (via some rubber-science) or simply left (a la the rapture)? I always liked the short story in the Martian Chronicles about the guy who stayed behind on Mars when everyone else returned to Earth because of World War III. I also like the story about the desperate return to Mars by a selected few families who survived the war. In each case, you've got people trying to live in the ghost towns on the bones of a former civilization and realizing that they now are free to make their own... By the way, the show was cool enough for me to order it on DVD. Matt "This-Empty-Earth" Frisbee

Re: Champions Online Normally, I wouldn't be up for an online game -- the GameInformer article has definately peaked my interest. Before this, I was kinda jazzed about the Star Trek online game, but a Champions send up would be way cooler, especially with all the personalization of the look of both the characters and powers the article says is going to be possible. This is one I'm going to watch carefully and keep my fingers crossed. Matt "Never-got-into-Evercrack-or-WoW" Frisbee

Re: What Have You Watched Recently? SUNSHINE -- An interesting though highly unlikely scenario about trying to refire the core of our fading sun with a nuclear weapon the size of Manhattan. The first three-quarters of this movie was intriguing, but I guess they just had to have an antagonist to distract us from the fact that everyone dies in the end. Still, it's worth a rent if you happen to see it on the shelf somewhere. BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25TH CENTURY (TV series) -- Yeah, this is some serious Glen Larson cheese, but seeing Erin Gray (and several other actresses at the beginning of their careers) caper around in revealing and/or form-hugging polyester and spandex costumes does keep me interested when things get too schmaltzy. (I bought this one partially to see the look of disgust on the face of one of my friends when I suggested we watch an episode.) Seriously, though, if Glen hadn't introduced the whole Seeker thing in season two, it would have been a (barely) tolerable action/adventure series. Matt "You-asked-me" Frisbee

Re: Low-Action Hero? One of the best games I've played in had confrontations and conflict, but no real violence. The game was played entirely for laughs and was called Teenagers From Outer Space. It runs a simplified Interlok system based on d6 where characters have a Bonk rating that can be reduced by things like surprises, embarassment, overly revealing battle bikinis, jealous girlfriends with mystical mallets, etc. The rule went that once a character was "bonked out" he was out of the scene until it ended. In general, if it was funny, it was allowed. Matt "Mike-Pondsmith-fanboy" Frisbee

Re: Need ideas for Steampunk Over-The-Top Game This sounds a bit more like Pulp Hero fodder, but the premise is interesting enough. Any further details you'd care to share? My take on WWII is a gem called Armageddon: 1946 -- where the Axis powers have unleashed magic forces upon the world that threaten not only to defeat the Allies, but destroy all of humanity as well. Good luck with yours, though. Matt "V-for-Victory" Frisbee

Re: Need ideas for Steampunk Over-The-Top Game I got two words for any Steampunk campaign: Castle Faulkenstein. 'Nuff Said. Matt "Mike-Pondsmith-fanboy" Frisbee

Re: Idea for a robot campaign If your robots aren't sentient, then you essentially have an Issac Asimov campaign. If they are, but don't have any rights, you can call it Blade Runner. And if they are both sentient and equal under the law, then you have a very large sequel to Millennium Man. Of the three, the Blade Runner scenario would be the most interesting, though it sounds like you're shooting for a Boomer varient of Bubble Gum Crisis. Matt "All-over-the-territory" Frisbee

Re: Quote of the Week from my gaming group... Fortunately, the person I shot this one at is a very good friend of mine, so we (and everyone else at the table) got a chuckle out of this one. The game is Twilight: 2000, which occasionally breeds very desperate actions... "Let me get this straight -- your character is charging a T-72 tank and he's only armed with a shotgun? Dude, not only did you sample all 31 flavors of stupid at the ice cream store, you dumped them all in a blender and made yourself the world's biggest moron shake!" Matt "I-do-stupid-things-too" Frisbee

Re: Your "2008" Pet Gaming Projects Well, at least for the next few months, I'll be playtesting the set of generic RPG rules I finally finished writing over the Christmas season. For playtesting purposes, the groups here will be bouncing around the following settings: THE WAY OF GIANG HU -- A fantasy setting with an Ancient Chinese flavor (think "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"). Characters will be warriors, mystics and monks who obtain limited superhuman powers through their martial arts disciplines while battling evil people, organizations and monsters. SLEEPERS -- A survivalist setting (technically classed as historical) where the characters were volunteers testing prototype stasis chambers. Needless to say, something has gone horribly wrong and the characters are now five thousand years in the future on an earth that is practically alien to them. A FISTFUL OF SOLARIS -- An ultramodern setting where Earthlings have been forced to terraform planets and moons in the solar system as earth has been ravaged by a nuclear war. The characters are interplanetary drifters and soldiers of fortune who must take the jobs nobody else wants to do to make ends meet, while battling the demons of their past, criminal syndicates and interplanetary corporations. ARMAGGEDON: 1946 -- The characters are members of the OSS in a World War II where magic has been unleashed and the atom bomb was never developed. Now fantastic technology and terrifying creatures are being unleashed for the final battle for the fate of mankind. None of these will be extensively developed, but will probably incorporated into later rewrites of the rules. In deference to the people at Hero Games, I won't talk any more about it, because in all likelyhood it will wind up being a house system. Matt "Getting-the-game-design-bug-out-of-my-system" Frisbee