BlackSword

Re: No scar tissue Disadvantage

Re: Early Pulp Classics Slate has done a week on Pulp Fiction (and other fiction). http://www.slate.com/id/2142392/?nav=ais

Re: CyberComedy: Is it possible? I didn't say it was a vision of the far future. John Nike

Re: CyberComedy: Is it possible? Jennifer Government is a great parody of the Corporate Sovereignty. Employees adopt the last name of the company they work for, some are little better than mercenaries, morality is a distant second to profit.

Re: Sea, Bay or Straight?

Re: How a team fits in its world (team types) The Legacy Team - They were the first super-heroes. Sure some of the newer heroes have more power, or flashier powers and kewl costumes, but these are the heroes who have been there and done that. While they have seen some of their friends pass from this mortal coil, they have also seen the children and legacies of the great heroes rise to take their place. Their job is not just to stand as reminders of the past, but to also help train the next generation of heroes in the ideals of their predacessors. Example (if you have to ask ): JSA

Re: New Player Hates All The Dice Why do you think I play a sorceror in d20. Sure, the might barbarian can roll 1d12+8 damage on his great axe, but wait til you hear the rolling thunder of d6's when the sorceror lets loose a Fireball. Of course the game should be fun for everyone, so I see no problem altering the rules a little so she continues to enjoy the game. I think the idea of treating Killing and non-Killing (Energy Blast) attacks the same, except for defenses (and knockback) is a very workable solution. You might have to tweak the Stun multiplier some to balance it out with standard defenses in the campaign.

Re: If You Had To Play a Marvel Character… Exact opposite problem of the DC thread, I am fan of many of the DCU characters, not so much Marvel. But if I had to choose, I would go with Nightcrawler. I like the teleporting martial artist aspect. Also character-wise he is interesting, a very pious individual trying to understand divinity. Religion is often ignored in comics, so its nice to see a character where it is the central theme of their non-combat development.

Re: If You Had To Play a DC Character… Martian Manhunter is another I would vote for. Great power set, Superman light in the physical powers, plus Desolid, plus Shapeshifting, plus being the most powerful Mentalists in the DCU (except when they need to Worf him to show how powerful a mentalist the JLA's opponent is ). Still he is one of the gentlest beings in the DCU, and the most tragic. Sure Superman is the last of his race, but he didn't see his wife and child die. Even with all his power he is fairly modest about, except when he needs to make a Prescence attack, from the JLU episode when the Cadmus 'Suicide Squad' broke into the watchtower, "Are you sure that's what you want, to be in this room with me."

Re: Different Militaries working together; Alien Wars Just to say 'me too' Special Operations is likely the only place this would occur (unless its a Twilight 2000 Campaign and there are only a few survivors on the planet). Ensure that each character has a specialty so that command 'chose' the team to blend together the different specialities for particular assignements. This will require the most work the first mission, after that command can use the excuse that, 'you guys have worked together before...' As an option, off-screen during down time as GM you can have the PCs going back to their normal units. Another option may be the Navy/Marine force set-up. They would normally be together on ships anyways. What are the specialities of each PC?

Re: If You Had To Play a DC Character… Hard question; the one that first popped into my mind was Black Canary, she is primarily a Martial Artist, but she has the Canary Cry to back her up when she needs to apply a little metahuman pressure to a tough case. I'll go with modern Black Canary as my single vote. Below are some other thoughts. Sticking with the Birds of Prey theme, Huntress is interesting as a superhero trying to make right. She started off seeking revenge for the death of her family. She tried to follow in the footsteps of Batman, but was too willing to go the extra steps towards murder. Now she is trying to redeem herself and working with the BoP. JSA: Any member. The current run of the JSA is great, while being a team book, none of the characters get tons of development (1 book for ten team members, vs 10 books for Batman ), they have done a great job of fleshing out some of the characters and making it a great family book. Batman/Superman: They're the icons of the DCU.

Re: Character "niche" It sounds like both characters are going for different feels, you for pure Martial Arts, and the other guy for sneaky-sneaky. Both of these specialities rely heavily on Dex, so it seems logical that you would both choose Dex as your primary stat. There is some fear that you would both begin to meld into the same. If your character doesn't want to sit around for a long time while your teammate goes off sneaking, and the ninja doesn't want to be punkt in a fight, you might begin to cross specialize. I would recommend specializing in different non-combat abilities, such as one becoming an inventor (good for ninja as he makes smoke bombs), and another in investigation, or something like that. Also on the GM, I might give small OCV bonuses for descriptive combat manuvuers which set the two characters apart.

Re: Musings on Random Musings I was playing Ultima On-Line way back in 2001/2, I was salivating as I had just entered my character's 'Power Hour' where you get bonuses to gain in Skills and Attributes, so I ran off to go mine (greatly increase my STR). I realized something, many Saturday mornings I would go to the gym and work out for an hour or so, but here I was, burning away an hour of time to make an imaginary toon stronger. I shut down the game and never turned on UO again. Since then I have played Neverwinter Nights, EQ II and City of Heroes, but never go addicted as I had my priorities of myself first, and the game a distant priority. Eventually my interest in MMORPG has faded. I may try Warhammer when it comes out, or a SciFi StarCraft or WH40k, if they ever get published.

Re: The latest cliché? First, I don't think every party has to be built in the MMORPG mold. No need for Tank, demi-Tank, DPS, Healer, Magic DPS, and Buff/Debuff as the sole party build. I think the radical departure is sometimes a measure of player maturity. From my own experience, as well as observations, players seem to go through phases of a) Introduction and stick with what's in the book (mundane) -> Mundane is for suckers, I want to be anything that is completely different no matter how hard it is for the GM to justify why 3-headed alien from Rigel 8 is in Middle Earth, and my sole character concept is, "cause its different"* -> c) Well I have this character concept, how does it fit within the game world. *This also sometimes diverges to, "cause its the most powerful build ever."

Re: Steam Punk Fantasy Hero I like the idea of a city being built up, and the 'high' roads slowly covering up the lower wards, very visual. I can imagine being on the ground floor, and only getting snippets of the sky, when it rains water drips down from the overpasses, looking up at night and seeing the bright glow of the upper city, while the low part is dimly illuminiated with a few gas lamps here and there. As they are not able to move out, or up, the poorer districts will continue to become more crowded as refugees pour into the city. One consideration will be how to move goods up, and down the city. Elevators? A large ramp that runs around the city (perhaps a current project)? There will have to be at least one nice road on the lower level leading to the city gates so nobles and merchants don't have to pass through the dreks to enter or leave the city. Thieves with good acrobatics will be king, as they will be able to move in 3-dimensions which will greatly aid in their ability to escape from the law.

Re: Firefly From what I heard at the time (granted this is most likely rumors, lies and half-truths ), the viewing audience was not that large and the per episode budget was fairly high. It was the same thing that happened to Farscape, it got priced out of its target audience.

Re: The Things I've Learned Playing A Mentalist Botching when you shoot fire out of your hands is embarrassing at worst, botching when you are messing around in someone's mind is bad at best Those powers aren't just for combat (also known as, gee BS if you had used your retrocognition we could have solved this mystery 3 hours ago)

Re: Have you used anything from the Asian Bestiaries? I just ordered the books, but once I receive them I plan to use the monsters when appropriate. No reason to limit it to just asian settings, I will be glad to break out of the normal, "you see some orcs...cause its another friggin' D&D clone..."

Re: Steam Punk Fantasy Hero

Re: Steam Punk Fantasy Hero Something that will have to be explained is why the Magic Kingdom has no understanding of technology. If the two countries trade at all previous to their war, then some people in each kingdom will have some cross-pollination. Each may have a distrust of the other (ie magic distrusts tech, tech distrusts magic), but there will have to be a reason they are (seemingly) mutually exclusive. Consider this idea nabbed.

Re: Steam Punk Fantasy Hero For the campaign we're developing my proposed government was for a Monarchy with a House of Lords, similar to Britain. Pretty much we are stealing Britain whole cloth and filing off the serial numbers. I found a great map of London in the 19th century. Its bookmarked at home but I can provide it later in the day. Two other governments I have been fleshing out for other countries include a theocracy, and a confederation of city/states. Each city/state has a prince and sends a representative to a council. The High Counciler is the head of state, though he has no real power, just a figurehead and rules at the pleasure of the princes. There are requirements for joining, so there are a few common laws between all the cities, but for the most part each city has its own laws.

Re: Weapon of war vs. Weapon of terror "High Crusade" is the book I think of everytime someone brings up different tech levels. I particularly like the ending. There was evena movie based on it, though it was typical 80's scifi fare.

Re: Steam Punk Fantasy Hero My friends and I are working on a campaign world with some similar rules. So this is a great chance to exchange ideas and steal...er borrow some ideas. I would stick with black-powder. For some reason going into cartridge rounds seems to be exiting the fantasy era. For clockworks, I would keep the majority of them fairly small. If you ever played City of Heroes, I could see a clockwork army like that fitting into a fantasy setting. Most of them are waist height, a few are taller, and then there are a rare few that are similar in size to WH40K Dreadnaughts. Most of the time the clockworks are just scavenging, but will defend their scavenging area. Some of them maybe built purely for combat with lots of spinning scythes, while others would have picks, hammers, and a load hopper on their back. We have not considered this part. It definitaly works in Full Metal Alchemist, and I don't think it would break the fantasy suspension of disbelief if done right. I would not replace much more than limbs, going into full conversion borgs would start breaking the suspension of disbelief. Another subject we are struggling with. Our approach is to go with fantasy races that can pass for human. So elves, who are willowy, have high cheekbones, and sharp features, but are not so obvious that they scream elf. We are also thinking about changlings, or other fairy races that can use glamours to pass for human. Also some ideas for having a race of craftsmen similar to dwarves that have disappeared from the world. Their works and architecture still exist, but no one has the technology to repeat or rebuild their cities. Absolutely. Or if not a Navy, at least a few, perhaps for transportation as a way to get off the ground and above the clockwork army for safe transport. Personal preference would be to stick with just trains (and zepplins).

Re: Final Fantasy HERO: Limit Breaks There was review on rpg.net for a free RPG based on FF-7 style games yesterday. It might be a place to see some ideas of how another person translated video game mechanics to table-top mechanics, and its free. http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/12/12142.phtml

Re: Pulp Era Journalists If you're interested in reading about a journalist you might try The Skeptic : A Life of H. L. Mencken; by Terry Teachout Besides following his career, it also hits some of the high points of the era and provides one of the brands of politics during the time.