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1

RPGs / Red Markets Campaign: Mystery Inc

« on: September 22, 2016, 02:06:49 AM »

Mystery Inc, Gummy, McLovin, and Doctor Diesel based in Troutfitt (though if it goes full on campaign we'll do our own enclave generation.)

Gummy was a cop, made detective then The Crash ruined everything. He, his husband, and his 6-year-old niece made it to Troutfitt where he was a fenceman until a bit ago when he had a bit of an episode and got relieved of duty. Since his husband's kind of a useless professor of Swahili and unrespected teacher, Gummy had to go over the fence.

McLovin was doing pretty good as a firefighter then there was The Crash and then the bite and then the pariah status. That smarts. He and his Chihuahua named “Chihuahua” live in a drafty shipping container next to the fence where he has precious few options for company. With only one small dog to care about going over the fence isn't so bad.

Doctor Diesel was a mechanic, when the crash came he kept on keeping on, fixing broken things and helping people coax extra miles out of dead cars. Somewhere along the way he figured that the human body is just another machine. He gets a lot of the terminology mixed up but the basic idea seems sound. He lives with his pet bull snake “Kaa” and he may be a LALA larvae.

Our story started with vignettes where Doctor Diesel read to his snake and remembered the horrors people did to each other during The Crash. Gummy took his husband and daughter to see a movie, “Left Behind” was showing, after they discussed how god is either dead or never existed and capitalism is the cruel machine that runs their lives. Then they had ice cream. Lastly McLovin lost his chihuahua and searched the latent ghetto for him. After a while he found Chihuahua who had squeezed through the fence into the nicer part of town and bribed him back with some meat that wasn't totally expired. Then McLovin sat quietly with his chihuahua in his lap and listened to the drunk latent next door swear at a TV that didn't work. The Chihuahua shivered in the spring cold of Montana.

It was job time now. The players rolled (I gave them extra research actions) and learned of a job with Boner Hitler the local drug dealer and two jobs over the Ubiq. They went with the train job (“Derailers”) because I wanted to test it out. The job started at 7, Gummy fumbled through the negotiation but did manage to turn down the offered bicycle, while McLovin scared off competition and Doctor Diesel researched the train (out of Trabajo!) and assistant conductor Ramirez. They ended up with expenses which is pretty good and just from pay alone McLovin was profiting. The other two were not.

But they had a blockage to clear and few days to do it. So they were off hiking through the Montana wilderness. Come mid-morning Gummy saw some kind of tower poking above the treeline and they went to investigate. Finding a fire lookout tower and 2 casualties on the other side of it they chose to investigate there was the place to jump over the gap in the stairs and the casualty attractor on the roof which the Takers cleverly disassembled and stole the solar charger. A bit later they figured out how the place worked but didn't bother to do anything about it*. They looted the three broken casualties on the ground and were on their way. Biggest disappointment they didn't ignore the machine and I was unable to have it go off when the were leaving.

The next two legs were lackluster mostly because I rolled them as we went and wasn't prepared and didn't pick/make good ones. They all failed awareness rolls so they missed a bunch of semi-trapped casualties and the weather turned colder.

At last they reached the jobsite. There were three Amtrak passenger cars and one boxcar lying in a low point on the tracks. It's only about two meters of elevation but it'll take half a mile or more for the trains to be level again. The crew spent some time clearing casualties from the tracks and cars, McLovin taking a bad mauling to the leg in the second car. They left the third car locked with some still in to deal with it later and looted the mail and luggage in the boxcar.

Now that it was time to actually do their job, they spent some time researching trains and found a depo just a few miles off that should have a track truck. With that they realized they could even sell the cars to the coming train if they cleared them out.

And session one ended.

*So this is encounter XX on the table, the tower where a dude is card farming the lazy way. The thought I've had with it is what's to stop the Takers from just making it a regular stop? I mean even better to put the place under camera and try to figure out the pattern the owner uses and then just show up a couple days early and nibble on their take.  Plus it'd be a pretty good hook for future consequences when the farmer figures out who's chiseling the take.

So thoughts: My players keep wanting free stuff, they don't like how the machete costs 2 bounty. I think some of it is they haven't completely bought in to the premise/themes of the game. Character creation is super easy and fast, it works well. I'm still confused about some of the Tough Spots but I am sorry for complaining about them. Also I wish someone in an RPPR game would take another taker as a dependent so I could better understand that. The game is moving slowly because new work hours are happening and while my daughter is three months old, another of us just had a son and he's going to keep daddy away from the table a bit. Also I got a lot of Troutfitt wrong but we're going to do maybe a semi-revamp of it.

2

RPGs / Check my base

« on: July 25, 2014, 10:23:36 AM »

So I'll be running Base Raiders at a con here in China soon, this is what I have so far, mostly I'm looking for any problems anyone sees with it or suggestions to add on.

PCs:

Tyrone Jones, social engineer at the top of his field - looking for a bigger field and new challenges
Dana St. Claire, really skilled failed tech startup, screw it, go big or go home
Ryan O'Bannon, super hero otaku, been training his life for this
Jessica Rider, former henchwoman to Destructina, can't cut it in civilian life
Pedro Rodriguez, over achieving extreme sport enthusiast, wants to pay off med school now

Power sources
Ninja Dust, holds the skills of numerous  second rate ninjas, also some coke, the snorter will be haunted by the ninjas who show up to harangue and ask for favors.
Omni-Tool, adjusts to do many useful things, not hand shaped, covers the arms and won't come off.
Vampire Blood, become a half-assed vampire, comes with several classic vulnerabilities.
Good'ol Pangloss psychic mushroom, gives a lot of TK, also some telepathy you don't control.
Alien mutigen: gain the powers and only some of the appearance of the lizard supermen, also an allergy to cobalt.

[Note that all of these grant some form of offensive capability making them Schedule III enhancements. Vampire blood is contagious so it's Schedule I.]

Outline:
The game starts with the players in the back of a U-Haul talking to “Jerry” a base raider of unspecified powers explaining the heist. There is a semi-massive secret base under the West Philadelphia Happy Cow Processing Center, the center does all its' business during the night/early morning, so that's why the team'll be infiltrating at high noon – only the front office has people. He's got some powers for them, as advertised and they've got five minutes to deck themselves out. If they do well he'll vouch for them with the Underground, highly valuable in its' own right.

However the base is still populated, unlike the other hideouts, this on had a deeper purpose and so the henchwomen here had different orders. But after a year of lockdown, only one is left alive – minion 436 - she has forgotten her name and become a wendigo after consuming many other henchwomen. She is still loyal in her own way and will fight to keep intruders out.

The base is also home to an anomalous magical thing, a cancerous godlet stuffed deep into the bowels and kept in check by a constant stream of necrotic energy from the slaughterhouse above. Minion 436 has also been feeding on it. [If longer campaign, dealing with it is a thing.]

Lastly, the man who sold Jerry the base info double sold to “Army of Jeff” a base raider able to duplicate himself. He made it in using a boost patch but when the patch wore off he was savaged by Minion 436 and has holed up in the armory without any willpower left. He can call for extraction (at the cost of 40% of the haul) but hasn't yet.

Challenges:
Choose powers
Navigate new powers
Get past the front desk at the slaughterhouse
Find the entrance (Jerry has GPS coordinates)
Get past the dumb Aide-De-Base doorman (dumb AI)
Restore non-emergency power
OH GOD SOMEONE LET OUT SOME DEATHBOTS/ZOMBIES/FROZEN XENOMORPHS
Investigate base layout (discover the dorms)
Security glitches are funny and only 42% murderous
Talk to the locked armory speaker (shell shocked base raider)
Someone else is keyed into the system, maybe meet Minion #436
Wendigo, everybody panic
Dealing with Jerry

3

RPGs / Building a vampire

« on: September 03, 2013, 09:27:10 PM »

So let's noodle around with Night's Black Agents.

Let's noodle up a new vampire to challenge some agents. This is for the game I'd like to run, I suspect I will never get to run it.

I liked the parts in the book about draining heat and such, so running with that I now have a reverse vampire, which may not be as clever as I would like. They drink blood naturally but also slurp the heat out of people, animals and things, sunning themselves and slowly turning to stone if they lose heat.

The game idea I have is they're an outdated hedonistic anti-state conspiracy, looking back to the Greek city-states as a good time to play men like their own game of Civilization.

Sunpires
General Abilities: Aberrance 15, Hand-to-hand 10, Health 12, Weapons 13
Hit Threshold 4 (5 if distorted)
Alertness Modifier +2
Stealth Modifier +1 (shows up on IR)
Damage Modifier: +2
Armor 1
Free Powers: Drain, addictive bite, heat drain, Infravision, Field effects (cold) Regeneration (in sunlight), exceptional strength,
Other Powers: Distortion (mirage, 2-Aberrance) Invisibility (1-Aberrance but must remain still, the vampire absorbes light instead of reflecting it.) Mental Attacks, Vampiric Speed (1-Aberrance, wind drains heat),
Banes: Beheading, freezing
Desrtoy: behead or allow the vampire to freeze completely to stone and shatter the statue, the pieces must be under 2 kilos and may be scattered no less than five kilometers from the nearest piece or they may reform with heat.
Blocks: Running water (immersion drains 1 health/turn in heat, crossing may also if wide enough and unprotected)
Compulsions: Drink Blood, seek sunlight
Dreads: Cold, Church bells
Requirements: Must maintain heat or they will freeze into pale statues.

4

RPGs / Hero backgrounds

« on: January 16, 2013, 05:10:09 AM »

So after the latest show I was thinking about the DIY heroes and such and I realized that I've been building people without a clear idea of a game to play in. The basic premise is shamelessly stolen from New Arcadia. So anyway, these are some heroes in some sense of the word maybe people can find a use for them, someday I'd like to play one in a game.

The Suitor:
Pilot and kung-fu aficionado, after discovering Atlantian martial arts (which gives various superpowers) he got into the weird side of fighting. Strange magic and rituals and to the death fights done in candle lit places out of the way. Eventually he came across legends of a goddess who every 800ish years chooses a concubine/cohort for the next 800ish years. He wants in on the immortality/divine loving. Armed with a vague outline about how to worship her, and the knowledge that if he does she'll notice him if he performs enough impressive feats, he’s set out to make his name and perform (he hopes) legendary acts to win her favor. Obviously being a super hero means he can beat up super villains which is pretty impressive, he hopes. Any time he thinks he’s about to do something cool he’ll burn some incense in a small portable shrine and hope it means that the Goddess will notice and approve. He more or less has wire-fu powers, his hero costume is a tailored suit and domino mask.
Motivations, loyalties and passions: Become a legend, test his fighting skills, live it up
 
Interceptor:
Used to be a henchman for various super-villains, or so it seemed. He and several other minions were running a massive embezzling operation stealing office supplies for sale on the black market – office supplies being power armor, death rays and memorabilia. After the heroes/villains vanished, he and his buddies cleaned out Surprise Shark’s base. Then they looted the base of Destructina (his buddy Jimmy was dating one of her henchwomen). Then the gravy train went off the rails. Not being good enough to break into a base without minion access, he was running out of money. He used the last of his big score to pick up some “Generic Super Hero Serum,” giving him the edge he’d need to get back into the base looting game. He took the name Interceptor because that was the hero he used to blame for all the missing equipment. (“Sorry boss, Interceptor showed up and trashed the Doom-Van and all the guns we were running,” “And we totally didn’t sell them to someone who’s totally not from the CIA for a briefcase full of cash and coke.”) His power theme is: bargain bin Superman. His costume is a black and white jumpsuit (like a motorcycle suit) with a police car theme.
Motivations, loyalties and passions: Wealth, stand up for the little guy/working stiff show up the powerful
 
Voice of the past:
In a world where Indiana Jones is a documentary, being an archeologist, especially one who specializes in meta-active civilizations, is a job for badasses. She read dodge at Cambridge learned the basic ideas of magic and went out to stumble across the wonders of the ancient world. Now that the heroes are gone, it’s harder and easier, harder because you can’t whistle up some flying lump to put down golem rampages, easier because there are so many less people saying things like “Your discovery can’t go to a museum, it’s too dangerous for man, blah, blah, blah.” Especially the book of flowing power she pulled from a Muvean-Aztec temple. About halfway through the tome, she began to understand how to call upon the spirits of a location and bargain with them. By the time she finished she even understood a bit about making magical objects. She wants to bring magic, especially historical magic, out into the spotlight. And part of that is to reclaim artifacts from where heroes hid them away, putting them into museums where they can jump out of her papers and be seen and appreciated right next to her name. Her costume keeps changing, borrowing elements from various historical religious/ritual dress. Her powers are a variety of spells (I’m thinking she’ll be Helen Montoya and based on Renee Montoya).
Motivations, loyalties and passions: Understand the past, awaken interest in magic
 
Pretty Soldier:
Born a genius and growing up on Gundam and Bubble Gum Crisis, she naturally went into robotics with a focus on nano-scale augmentation. During her post-grad work at MIT she was finally given access to their alien tech vault for her Thesis. During the work she got a hold of satellite imagery of the Tunguska zone and on the side she started a side project looking for a “reality ship,” one from a semi-understood civilization that jumped from alternate Earth to alternate Earth, people think, no one’s sure. They are known to work in a lot of nano-scale engineering and fascinated Jessica. Half way through her work she found a likely ship not too far into the zone but out of the way. She spent her scholarship money on a trip to Russia, bribes and a ghillie suit (it didn’t help her) and hiked her way to the site. It was what she was looking for, untouched by terrestrial authorities but showing damage from some conflict before arrival. Within the ship she found what she was looking for - a nano augmentation kit and a one use large scale fabber she was able to rig to the remaining power of the ship. Pretty sure she understood it she plugged it into the back of her neck and let the nanos do their work. After the screaming stopped, she woke up two days later and her mind was indeed upgraded. With her new knowledge it was child’s play to get the fabber to put out a suit of powered armor. She kind of burned it out but she thinks she can get the suit to upgrade later on, maybe the nanos need recharge time? Either way she has an overly flashy suit of power armor (with a Sailor Moon theme). On her way home she got bad news, her mother had been killed in a car accident and her little brother was paralyzed from the waist down. Since she had blown her scholarship she moved home to help out her father and little brother and picked up a job in the IT field, something made easy by the computer growing in her brain. Her fear is that she’s going to change beyond human, she’s pretty sure the nanos in her brain are growing and her armor can heal her but she needs to feed it base materials, she uses expired meat because it’s cheap. She tries not to think about this too much. And she’s going to be a super hero and protect the innocent, that’s got to be worth it.
Motivations, loyalties and passions: Love and Justice, Inspire little brother and other victims of paralysis, Oh God Am I Still Human?

Champion:
Jose Martinez’s father immigrated to the US, working the fields of California during the 70s he managed to move up the social ladder. By the time Jose was born the family was comfortably middle class. After getting his degree in renewable agriculture, he spent two years doing volunteer work in South America. Somehow during that time he wound up with super powers. Frightening levels of telekenesis, he can even patch people back together. When he came home he decided to test them out in secret, see if he can be a super hero and help the community. Someday he hopes to come out with his true identity, maybe work along side with paramedics and show how superhumans are a valuable part of the community.
Wait a minute, most of that is a lie. His minor in marketing proved a bit more useful and after college he found an internship with Genom (a Monsanto like company) his biology showed promise for genetic augmentation (all interns had to undergo genetic testing) and his background appealed to the PR department. They fabricated the volunteering thing pretty good, the volunteers have evidence of their trip and people remember them. He’s the first generation of deniable test subjects. Right now the narrative is that he had latent powers activated by some chemicals he ran across during his time in Peru. Genom however holds the patent to his special genes (they did make them) unless he proves too much trouble. If he works out and the public responds favorably, the line can go into mass production. As soon as it’s legal anyway, legal is working on that. Genom has got a book and movie deal lined up assuming he works out he’ll be set for life.
Motivations, loyalties and passions: super human relations, wealth and security for his family, take control of his public image

5

General Chaos / Stories about Ye Olde D&D and the Satanic Panic

« on: January 02, 2013, 10:44:03 PM »

So the Slacktivist is looking for stories about people who played D&D or whatnot in the 80s-90s. It might be an interesting thing to look at and has a few funny bits.

Also, who remembers what BADD stands for?

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2013/01/02/mazes-monsters-and-the-badd-old-days-im-collecting-stories-of-the-backlash-against-dungeons-dragons/

My favorite bit so far is how he played Tunnels and Trolls because it wasn't D&D and therefore safe to his community. I've heard a similar story about people playing CoC using the same dodge on the "magic words" trick.

6

RPGs / Cthulhu Dark contest from Yog

« on: April 12, 2012, 11:41:55 PM »

Saw on Yog. There is a contest for writing a Cthulhu Dark Scenario, prizes include money but it's also for a charity book http://www.yog-sothoth.com/threads/23098-Cthulhu-Dark-Official-Contest-Rules From http://heroesinthedark.org/

7

RPGs / Cthulhu/BRP skill system

« on: February 02, 2012, 10:49:46 PM »

From the Cthulhu pod cast I thought I'd put this up. One thing I did to simplify the BRP skill section. I put this up on yog a while ago but thought it might be worth some discussion here.

I shrunk the list down and made three categories, general, field and specific. Most skills start in general and can go to 40 percent. After 40, the player must take a field skill (that starts at 40, after 65 the character must take a specific skill (which also starts at 65). Investigators may have as man field/specific skills as they want. Each tier gives better/more information from a roll (someone with History 35 gets a general view, someone with Egyptian history 45 gets more and someone with Second Dynasty gets the most about their speciality/field.)

I did this to cut down on the number of skills on the sheet and to add a few to the mix so players could avoid having to blow half their points into one skill that may not be used often. (Geology was the example, a player had that skill high because he was a geologist. Yet it only came up a few times over the years. Leading him to declare his next investigator’s occupation would be a “spotter and dodger.”)

So a character would have say: Guns 40 and Pistol 65 costing 65 skill points, for another 15 he can add Shotgun 55.

To get the starting skills, I just took all the old skills and averaged their starting numbers and rounded to the nearest 5.

With this I went back to EDUx15 for skills because there were fewer skills to spend.

Athletics:
Jump
Swim
Dancing
Climb
Dodge
Run
Throw

Shoot
Shotgun
Pistol
Rifle
Automatic fire
Semi-automatic Fire
Exotic (flame throwers, alien guns go at 1/2rd )

Science
Biology
Astronomy
Geology
Chemistry
Botany
Archeology
Forensics
Physics
Natural History
Math
(Others as used, Oceanography etc.)

Stealth
Sneak
Hide

B&E
Conceal
Steal (used for picking pockets/slight of hand)
Pick Lock
Safecracking

History
By region/era, the more exact the more the investigator knows about that part.

Perception
Listen (became important because players kept getting penalties for shooting guns indoors.)
Spot Hidden

Social Sciences
Anthropology
Archeology
History
Architecture

Social Interactions
Bluff
Bargain
Psychology
Persuade
Fast Talk

Credit Rating
Work
Money
Society
Other by sub-group (Delta Green, literary, homeless, academic etc.)

Medicine
First Aid
Doctoring
Pharmacy
Surgery

Unarmed fighting
Punch
Kick
Grapple
Headbut
Block

Armed Combat
Sharp things
Blunt things
Small things
Improvised things
Strange things
Block/parry

Media
Videography
Editing

Psychiatry
By kind and field.

Psychological
Pharmacy
Psychology
Hypnosis

Drive
Car
Motorbike
Heavy (tractors etc.)

Mechanical
Repair
Electronics Repair
Engineering
Use Heavy Machinery

Research
Library Use
Computer Research
(I had something here like interviewing but don’t recall)

Espionage
Tradecraft
Cryptography

Outdoors
Survival
Navigate (air, land, sea)
Woodcrafts
Animals
Natural History

Occult
By area/tradition the more exact the tradition chosen the more info I’d give.

Martial Arts
Various names here, I’d make the player choose which attacks they worked with or give a few other uses oddly, looking at it now I’d put Yoga here though not sure what to use it for.

Law
Criminal
Family
International
Etc.

Forgery
(By kind of thing forged, money, artifacts, comics or whatnot).

Pilot
Ultra-light
Private craft
Passenger
Cargo
Military
Helicopters

No general category
Art
Disguise
Accounting
Languages
Computer Use (Which is really more hacking/operate heavy of the modern world)
Demolitions
Dreaming
SCUBA

Cthulhu Mythos:
Hastur Mythos
Sorcery
Yog-Sothogh Mythos
(Never became an issue but did come close, before she summoned Cthuga.)

8

General Chaos / Banned Unspeakable Oath for sale

« on: December 07, 2011, 10:59:17 AM »

This is more of a curio, but with the hardcore Pagan love here I thought I'd put this up. Yog-sothoth.com is auctioning off a copy of Courting Madness/Mouthful of Madness, the banned issue of The Unspeakable Oath.

http://www.yog-sothoth.com/threads/22243-YSDC-Courting-Madness-8-200

Mostly for drooling (I think most of the scenarios wound up in a later compilation.)