zoran

Re: How do your Star Heroes get around? The mass of humanity travels via a tightly regulated gravetic drive that taps into laws that were theorized in the late 20th century but only realized through our benevolent Empires relentless efforts to speed colonization and improve trade across the galaxy. (Regular FTL, speed based on the quality of the ship. Gov't/military ships are faster then commercial ones.) Rumours of alien species with some sort of wormhole technology are not to be believed. And even if aliens did exist they certainly would not ally themselves with the resistance, despite what the tabloids report. (Teleportation, hour delay and can only be used for an hour once every 2 weeks) But for now the charaters are stranded on a planet without access to either FTL ships or friendly aliens, so I don't really have the game details worked out.

Re: Need help with Weapon Levels that is a good point. Right now I am leaning towards giving the pc's powered armor and making the main weapon to be feared by them a laser rifle. The laser has a continuous effect for a phase and I'll set up weapon so that if multiple attackers can hit the same PC for a few seconds thier armor will heat up and cause them damage. I think that will allow the in-game situations I am looking for. The players could ignore a single attacker, but if they are faced with 10-1 odds on an open field they should be in trouble.

Re: Need help with Weapon Levels Thanks for the tips. Its a 'Heroic' campaign so we won't be paying character points for the equipment. A main plot device is where bad guys equiped with police hardware will have a clear advantage over townsfolk, but fewer PC's with military grade weapons will be able to defeat a large number of foes. (Until they start meeting similarly equipped enemies) I'm really looking for some ideas that will make the weapons grade clear, like lasers vs machine guns vs carbine. Thanks again!

I am creating a new campaign and need some advice about the weaponry special effects for the world. (The players are highly trained normals) The world is setup to support our groups irregular get togethers and it allows us to play whatever characters show up for as much time as we have, all neatly contributing to a grand story arc. But a key to the tension in each session is the players being properly equipped for what they will face. Currently I am building out three tiers of weaponry - civilian, police, and military. Each tier should be more powerful then the one below it such that a person in police gear can defeat about 3 cilvilians and someone in military gear is woth at least 10 people in civilian weaponry. Originally I was thinking about modern weaponry being 'cilivian', our near future military being police issue (caseless ammo, improved body armour) and the military having powered armour and pulsed energy and laser weapons.) Now I am leaning more towards the paper, sissor, rock model. Something along the lines of a Dune type shield that negates slugthrowers but allows some energy weapons, or an energy shield that damps energy weapons but allows some kinetic damage. And to round out the HERO system add in an EGO shield that blocks mental attacks but allows kinetic and energy attacks. But the gimmick needs to be setup so that a player can only choose one type of shield and one type of weapon per outing. Any ideas?

Living Steel based game concept Interesting that this thread came up now. I am getting together a new campaign for my friends that adopts some of the aspects of living steel that I liked. The idea is to build a world where we can have single night game sessions that tie into a larger story arc. The overall story is about 5 seasons, with 6-12 games per season. The individual games themselves will be as heavy or light depending upon our mood. Some plots will go deep into ethics, like do the players shatter the control of a despot over a city. He may be evil but his people are not starving. Other plots involve having to compete in a coliseum death match using vehicles (we love car wars). I also have story lines to open debate around topics from how medial science contradicts evolution to using scarcity of resources as the basis of an economy. The teleporter / Alpha team / resistance cell lets me swap in and out characters based on who shows up. The players will be better normals. They will have their own gimmicks that should allow them to easily defeat an equal number of foes. (But when is the fight ever equal?) Things like superior training, advanced weapons, cybernetics, and physic powers (175pt I think) The universe is setup so that the players can overthrow or reshape the Empire, but the Empire is not just about force – its about commerce and humanities survival. The central figure is a Psychic whose mental ability makes space travel safe. Space travel itself unleashes energies that can cause men to go mad or mutations to occur (think “chaosâ€) The resistance that the players are a part of are split themselves. Some want to kill the Psychic, some want to control him. And the Psychic himself may be the grand Emperor ruling all, or maybe a barely sentient being controlled by an inner cabal. Quite possibly he is quite different then anyone suspects (But that is around the 3rd season) The game starts with the players isolated from the galaxy by a hyperspace distortion. The planet is home to some high ranking government officials, 2 research centers, marooned aliens, mutated flora and fauna (love that 50’s space pulp), and millions of people that will be cut off from the necessities of life very soon. And the hyperspace distortion will slowly drive people mad. Half of the sky is an unnatural red where food won’t grow. I also have a great plot device to allow for NPC's to be very 2 dimentional (but you won't learn that until the 2nd season) So basically the secret/idea/technology that start on this planet will allow the owners to overthrow the Empire and create a benevolent one, or enslave the galaxy to their will. I can go into more details if anyone cares – I’m months away from playing the first game. Does this sound interesting to anyone?