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D&D Subforum / Pen & Paper RPG Discussion Thread

Fourier

Posted this in the tabletop forum, but it was suggested some here might be interested:

Anybody interested in an online play-by-post game of some tabletop RPG. I've been finding Roll20 difficult to schedule as most players are in different time zones and so would prefer an Irish crowd.

No experience required and it'd be relaxed enough in pace.

Games I'd be interested in running:

1st Edition D&D, but with one of the modern adventures (award winning ones published in the last few years).

Cyberpunk 2020 Blade Runner-ish, also going to be made into a game by the lads who made the Witcher games

Rippers Resurrected High action Victorian horror, like a lighter Penny Dreadful

All of these have very cheap pdf options.

EDIT: Another possibility is Vampire: The Masquerade.

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Fourier

I'll get that stuff to you this evening Banjo.

Just a note on the thread, there is one purposeful inaccuracy in the last post, to reflect how your story won't be passed on completely correctly to following generations.

Fourier

Banjo wrote: »

Putting Stats aside, let me ask you this - do you want to start as a team, or start as individuals?

I'd lean to individuals, but I really don't mind either way.

Necro

Banjo wrote: »

Putting Stats aside, let me ask you this - do you want to start as a team, or start as individuals?

Can there be both? A couple of lone heroes and a dynamic duo or something like that?

Banjo

Sure.
Groundrules :
In a dynamic duo, one of you has to be sidekick. If you can't agree, we can roll for it and the loser gets the Reluctant Sidekick quality

One of you has to be wearing short shorts.
It'd be great to have a little spiel about how you met and why you teamed up, and also the nature of crime that you fight (whether thats "street level", "we speak for the trees" or "fashion crimes" - just to get an idea of how to place you.

Edit :
Just looked up your two preliminary powersets. Dying to see what you come up with for a Team Name.

Necro

I do look good in shorts, and my guy can't fight for ****.... so...

Baggly

Its agreed so.

Banjo

Yeah - I knew I'd made a mistake in my flippant comments somewhere, cause I couldn't remember who the 2nd woman on the team was.
Necro, re-read your notes. You may fill those shorts out better than you think.

Baggly

'The Flying Squirrels'

Necro

Banjo wrote: »

Yeah - I knew I'd made a mistake in my flippant comments somewhere, cause I couldn't remember who the 2nd woman on the team was.
Necro, re-read your notes. You may fill those shorts out better than you think.

Yeah I meant to ask you about that, as you refer to me as a male in the PM when my gender is noted as female.

Happy to be the first transgender superhero though, if you wish :pac:

Banjo

Sorry, Transgender requires a specific roll on Gender. You are a 57 year old woman. But so is Julianne Moore. Also, at that age, the only cycle you need to worry about is The Squirrel Cycle, your awesome crime-fighting mobility scooter.

Banjo

As mentioned in a bunch of wall-of-text PMs, Specialities are situational bonuses you might get to reflect your characters training or adaptation to niche skills. Some of them are more useful than others, but all have their place.

I think they're mostly self-explanatory. If something seems like a broad catagory - e.g. Weapons or Art - it's because it's a group catagory and you choose a subgroup. Eg. For Weapons you choose Blades or Guns etc.

For those of you with Specialty choices, here's whats on the menu

Aerial Combat
Art*
Athletics
Business
Deception
Drive
Espionage
Insight
Intimidation
Investigation
Law
Leadership
Linguistics
Martial Arts
Medicine
Mental Resistance
Military
Occult
Performance*
Persuasion
Pilot
Politics
Power*
Psychology
Seduction
Science
Shields
Sleight of Hand
Stealth
Technology
Underwater Combat
Weapons*
Wrestling

Nebelwerfer

Im here too!

Banjo

Fourier wrote: »

Just a note on the thread, there is one purposeful inaccuracy in the last post, to reflect how your story won't be passed on completely correctly to following generations.

Forgot to ask - is that the reference to Karinth inserting himself into Therai's story? Sneaky bugger.

Banjo

Nebelwerfer wrote: »

Im here too!

No one's forgetting you Nebs, or the sacrifice you're making for the greater good having all these 10 minute arguments with me so that I don't have to have them with others over PM across days and days.

Warning you all now - some of the power descriptions are very vague and loose, and there's not a lot of guidance or errata on how to handle that. I'm open to being corrected, and I'm open to being persuaded, but for the purposes of pacing if it looks grey, ultimately I choose whether to call it Black or White and you will be required (eventually) to agree with me.

As such, remember that I'm an adjudicator, not an opponent - if you're planning something that relies heavily on interpretation of your power(s) description that could go either way, make sure you've cleared it well in advance so there are no table-flips at the last second. In most cases, if you catch it early you can make it work. (although, try telling that to Lil' Jimmy and his legs - counter is at 6 BTW!)

And when in doubt we can fudge it with manoeuvres / DP / Trouble!

Necro

Banjo wrote: »

As such, remember that I'm an adjudicator, not an opponent - if you're planning something that relies heavily on interpretation of your power(s) description that could go either way, make sure you've cleared it well in advance so there are no table-flips at the last second. In most cases, if you catch it early you can make it work. (although, try telling that to Lil' Jimmy and his legs - counter is at 6 BTW!)

And when in doubt we can fudge it with manoeuvres / DP / Trouble!

Nebelwerfer

Banjo wrote: »

No one's forgetting you Nebs, or the sacrifice you're making for the greater good having all these 10 minute arguments with me so that I don't have to have them with others over PM across days and days.

More than happy to oblige! Its a welcome distraction

Banjo

Following a few questions about abilities, powers and limits, it's probably best to explain generally how Tests work, and how your powers and abilities fit into that for Combat and other such Super-stuff.

If you go to do something, and there's a chance it could fail, you get Tested.
The corollary is that if there's no chance of failure - or no chance of success - you don't get to roll for it!
e.g. You want to lift a car. If you have Strength 7 or higher, fine. Less, no way.
vs
You want to lift a car over your head, exposing your armpits, while the Tickler attacks you with his Tickle Stick. Ooooh that's a test.

At their simplest, you roll your Effort vs a Difficulty, or vs your Target's effort. You take the Difficulty or Opposing Effort away from Your Effort to get the Outcome. Then look it up on a table I'll put in below.

e.g.
Necro and Pter want to be in a Super Team, but neither one wants to be the sidekick. Pter declares "I'll wrestle you for it!" - The test is on!

[1d6 + Pter's Prowess] vs [1d6 + Necro's Prowess]

That's a simple test. However, Pter has slipped up - Necro has the Wrestling Specialty, so gets a +1 to his roll because this is specifically a wrestling contest, not boxing or martial arts! Next thing you know he's in a choke hold, trying desperately to pull on short shorts before he passes out while Necro screams "I'm the daddy now!" at the top of his lungs.

Here's the Table of Outcomes
-5 or Less|Massive Failure|-3 Degrees|You fail Spectacularly
-3 to -4|Major Failure|-2 Degrees|The effort fails Significantly
-1 to -2|Moderate Failure|-1 Degree|The Effort fails
0|Marginal|0 degrees|Depending on the situation, can be a marginal success with consequences or marginal failure.
1 to 2|Moderate Success|+1 degrees|The effort succeeds
3 to 4|Major Success|+2 degrees|The effort succeeds significantly
5+|Massive Success|+3 Degrees|the Effort Succeeds spectacularly

How does this relate to combat?

Melée - A test of your Prowess vs your Opponent's Prowess or Co-Ordination depending on whether they want to Parry or Dodge.
Note - Parrying or Dodging are reactions, which sometimes you can't do because you're incapacitated. Also, and much more interestingly, while you would normally go with the higher of your Prowess or Coordination for defence, remember that if you opt to Parry with Prowess and your opponent gets a Massive Failure then you automatically hit them as a Riposte. You can't do that with a Dodge/Coordination.

Ranged - a test of your Coordination vs your Opponent's coordination.
You can't use Prowess for this, unless you have an awesome Quality you want to leverage that lets you catch bullets with your teeth or reflect lazers with your magic belt buckle. If you get a Massive Failure on the latter though, I hope you already have a family...

Some of you have Mental abilities. These generally work the same way but operate off Willpower rather than Prowess or CoOrdination. And oh no! Pter is using his mental powers!

[1d6 + Pter's Willpower] vs [1d6 + Necro's Willpower]

Suddenly Necro releases the chokehold and starts clucking like a chicken. It's all over! Their roles decided, Captain Hotpants and the Boy Nugget hit the streets to dish out justice!

Since we're talking about Combat Tests, lets look at Damage and Damage types.

When you hit someone you do damage to their Stamina.
When Stamina hits 0, you are unconcious.

Close attacks - Melée - inflict damage = to the attacker's strength if unarmed, or according to the Weapon's damage if armed.

Ranged attacks deal damage based on the weapon or power used. If you throw an object, usually it will be either the material's strength (Plastic is 2, Iron is 7) or the thrower's strength, whichever is lower.

If you have an appropriate damage resistance, you only feel damage over the value of your resistance. e.g. If your foe has Damage Resistance 4 and you have Strength 3, you better think of another way through them.

Bashing and Blasting : Blunt force - done with fists, blunt objects, table legs, rubber bullets.
Slashing and Shooting : Swords, knives, bullets, nail-guns, energy beams - as a guideline if it's potentially lethal, it's one of these.

And here's what successes do in combat :

Outcome|Meaning|Degree|Bash/Blast|Slash/Shoot
0|Marginal|0 degrees|1/2 damage|1/2 damage
1 to 2|Moderate Success|+1 degrees|Attk Damage|Attk Damage
3 to 4|Major Success|+2 degrees|Attk Dmg + Slam chance|Attk Dmg + Stun Chance
5+|Massive Success|+3 Degrees|Attk Dmg + Stun Chance|Attk Dmg + Kill Chance

So if your power says "choose between Blast or Shoot" then you're looking at lethality.

If your attack inflicts 0 or more damage after resistance, test full damage level against target's Strength.
Slam - knockdown on Moderate, knockback + knockdown on Major+
Stun - 1 page stun on Moderate, Unconcious (0 Stamina) on Major+
Kill - Unconcious (0 stamina) on Moderate, Unconcious and Dying on Major+

Dying is a mechanic heroes shouldn't have to deal with often, we'll get into it if it comes up.

Baggly

The boy nugget. I like it.

Baggly

Banjo

Hola
With Werewolf in full swing I'm going to assume there's no rush on this for most of you.
When you get a chance, please finalise any power and/or origin perk assignments you have outstanding, and fill me in on the following :

1. Your Backstory
Doesn't have to be war 'n' peace. A couple of words giving a vague idea is enough.
There's no guarantee we'll make it as far as the end of issue 1 so if you don't want to over-commit we can work out the details as we go.

2. Your secret identity (which doesn't have to be a secret) and any associated information like your day job, if you live in the burbs or downtown or a slum or the park, if you're new in town or lived here forever etc.

3. Your Heroing style
Are you an active, on patrol type (rooftops? Eye in the sky? Alleys and shadows? Strutting down the street shooting double guns at citizens?) or a reluctant hero who only suits up when you and yours are threatened? Or are you in hiding, and refuse to use your powers? If so, why not go hide in 20 Questions, they'll never find you there!

4. Your heroing (sartorial) style
Cape? Mask? Kiss makeup? Big gloves? Elephant feet slippers? Nothing but a spray tan, a smile and JUSTICE!!!? Let me know!
Are you wearing it under you civvies? Do you change in a phone booth or with a magic twirl or with a nano-bot-filled suitcase?

Note : By Sovereign City law all Superpowers are registered. Let me know if you've registered yours. If you haven't, re-examine #3 above and ensure your hero is not going on a one way trip to The Reef. Necro and Pter, if you're an active dynamic duo you are either registered or on a wanted list.

Speaking of which : Team up rules for Squirrel Squad!
1. Decide who the leader is - assuming they have the Leadership speciality, they can add 1 DP per level of that speciality into the Team's DP pool, which can be spent by any member (currently there's only the 2 of you). If they don't have Leadership, well... never mind!

2. Give your team a couple of Qualities, like a Motto or a rallying cry or a motorcycle/sidecar combination that you use to get into the gritty city from your house in the suburbs or a secret room in your garden shed that serves as a HQ, You can activate these with DP when you're working together.

3. Team members can help eachother out - basically they can share free activations of qualities gained through Manoeuvres.

e.g. Necro rolls a Cordination test and succeeds with a major success, hitting famed master of melee combat The Banjonator on the back of the head with a brick in a handbag-arang and giving him the "Dazed" quality.
It was a major success so he gets 2 free activations of that quality which he can share with Pter, who activates one immediately so when he punches The Banjonator, that dastardly villain can't "react" - it's a free shot on a normally unpunchable foe and a great chance for a Slam or Stun.

Baggly

Just to say Banjo - Necro and i have a lot of that done. We can tighten it up and finish up the last few missing bits once we both finish with the WW game. We cant really communicate until then (some super duo, right?). Hope thats ok!

Banjo

That's cool.
Just remember - you two are holding up the game.

It has nothing to do with me having no material prepared.

Fourier

After Icons the short games will be:

The Veil (Cyberpunk, Powered by the Apocalypse rules)
Torchbearer (Dungeon Delving)

To give something very story focused a try (The Veil) and something very mechanical* a try (Torchbearer). Torchbearer is somewhere between an RPG and an actual game with win conditions.

*Not in the Shadowrun sense of a load of rules, but in the sense of not being focused on story at all

Banjo

Given that people appear to have lost interest in Icons in the middle of character creation, I don't think it would be unfair to say that we may be already living in the time known as "After Icons".

But if we're not, those of you with decisions to make, make 'em.
Player|Outstanding Decisions
Nebelwerfer|Qualities, which of the 15 backstories and names are you going with
Fourier|Qualities
Pter| Qualities, Name, Backstory, Team Name, Team Qualities, Team origin
Necro|Qualities, Specialities, Finalise powers, Name, Backstory, Team Name, Team Qualities, Team Origin
sKeith|Qualities, Finalise Powers, Origin bonus, Name, Backstory

Ah yes, I did say I'd get back to Qualities
Now look - you don't have to define them now. Lets face it, this could be a complete car crash and be over in 5 minutes, so it might not be worth the time, so if you prefer you can make them up as you go along, but they can help to define who your hero is and what they stand for. If you can't think of one, or would prefer to see how this goes first, that's fine.

As mentioned, a Quality is usually a statement that defines something about your character that - in a pinch - you can "activate" by paying a Determination Point to give yourself an advantage. However, it should also be worded in such a way that the GM can pay you a DP to activate it to create Trouble for you.

I think the best way to explain them is look at a few examples. Have you seen Captain America, Civil War? The opening scene in Lagos has TONNES of them.

(If you haven't seen it, this ruins the opener by making a fast action sequence into a really boring wall of text

)

Quality 1 : Redwing - permanent
Falcon has a pet that can scan things and give him insight - he uses it to scan the truck, the building and the market place - as well as using it to resolve the standoff at the end. Yeah, it could be considered a sidekick character, but this way you don't have to account for it's movements on every single page.

Taking the example of the opening scan of the truck, he reveals the truck's quality of "Max Load", revealing Crossbones' plan and losing him the element of surprise. The truck then uses that quality to destroy the anti-vehicle barrier protecting the research building, arguably removing the "protected from vehicular approach" quality!

Quality 2 : Poison Gas - Temporary
When they fire the cannisters in, the bad guys give the building the temporary quality "full of poison gas!". A hero going in unprepared is taking on Trouble in the form of a risk of unconsciousness, and that earns them DP. Cap uses this quality to subdue one of the bad guys when he pulls off his mask.

Quality 3 : "Like we practiced" - Team
When Cap gets Wanda to throw him up to a window, this is both a power test for her and a coordination test for him. He invokes the Team Quality "Like we practiced" to give them an advantage on the rolls and make sure he doesn't face-plant into a wall.
Note - in the previous Captain America movie, when he fights the agents in the lift, they are able to put up a decent showing hand-to-hand with him, because they have the same training and know how he fights - using Like We Practiced to give Cap Trouble, possibly.

Quality 4,5,6,7 : Black Widow arrives - Various
She does loads here. First, using a test of her Coordination, she jumps off her bike and lets it hit one of the thugs, inflicting a temporary Off-balance quality on him, giving her advantage on her subsequent attacks. Then she tries to use her Taser on Crossbones to inflict a temporary Stunned quality on him, and she hits him. But it does nothing! Crossbones has activated his till-now-hidden and permanent "I don't work like that no more" quality, resisting the stun! He hits her for a Slam result, dumping her into the truck below them, and drops in a grenade to create a temp "Fire in the Hole" Quality in the truck - anyone in there is going to be Unconcious in 1 page! Black Widow then uses her Prowess to create an advantage by using a body-armoured Human Shield to mitigate that quality, so she takes a slam through the door but avoids the explosive effects.

Quality 8,9,10 : Crossbones fights Cap
Right off the bat, Crossbones compels Cap to drop his shield with the magnetic bomb, earning Cap a DP for his Trouble. "This is for dropping a building on my face!" Crossbones cries, activating his "A building was dropped on my face!" quality (probably rolls up into I don't work like that no more, but its more fun this way!) to give him improved effort, and Biff! Kapow! Socko! He kicks the **** out of Cap in the first panel. Cap comes back, subdues him, but then Crossbones compells Cap's "I'm with you to the end of the line" quality by talking about Bucky, and Cap freezes up for a page while Crossbones witters on, getting his explosive vest ready to blow. Wanda stunts off her Telekinetic power, enclosing the blast for a panel but it has to go somewhere, and when it does it destroys a building full of innocents, triggering trouble for the whole team due to their team quality of "SHIELD Oversight".

That make sense?
Some qualities are temporary conditions that can be exploited for advantage or to cause trouble.
Some are defining characteristics that stay with you permanently.
'Permanent' qualities can be earned/inflicted through gameplay.
Villain qualities will be unknown to you, but can be discovered through general observation or mechanically by gaining insight. And then you can compel them to create Trouble for the Villain.

Is this too many walls of text, BTW?

Baggly

We have to decide Team qualities and i have to decide my own characters qualities. Rest of it is there or thereabouts.

Havent lost interest at all btw!

Walls of text are fine by me!

Banjo

No pressure but....

Player|Outstanding Decisions
Nebelwerfer|Confirm Qualities
Fourier|Done!
Pter| Qualities, Name, Backstory, Team Name, Team Qualities, Team origin
Necro|Qualities, Specialities, Finalise powers, Name, Backstory, Team Name, Team Qualities, Team Origin
sKeith|Qualities, Finalise Powers, Origin bonus, Name, Backstory
Banjo|Story, Villains, NPCs, Map, Rework story to remove that really racist character, background on <spoiler>, learn Lakota, No wait don't - I said he was too racist, learn Yiddish, read past page 16 in the manual

Banjo

Shaping up nicely. Since it's already most of the way through Wednesday, I don't have availability on Fridays... I Have a kids party at the weekend, and hopefully a hangover, but could be on course to launch of Issue#1 on Monday and then discover just how little availability I really have for posting and how hard Fourier works

Player|Outstanding Decisions
Nebelwerfer|Pretty much done
Fourier|Done
Pter| Done
Necro|A little wangling around origin decisions
sKeith|Qualities, Finalise Powers, Origin bonus, Name, Backstory
Banjo|find the map that you left on your desk last night and it appears someone has thrown out, come to terms with loss of map and set the game in Chicago, Learn about Chicago, realise the murder rate in Newark makes it a much better choice, stat blocks, nemeses rolls, find pictures of dead squirrels

Necro

Banjo wrote: »

Shaping up nicely. Since it's already most of the way through Wednesday, I don't have availability on Fridays... I Have a kids party at the weekend, and hopefully a hangover, but could be on course to launch of Issue#1 on Monday and then discover just how little availability I really have for posting and how hard Fourier works

Player|Outstanding Decisions
Necro|A little wangling around origin decisions

I'll wangle you :P

Baggly

Just to help out!

https://www.shutterstock.com/search/dead+squirrel

Baggly

How we looking Banjo?