What are y'all up to these days?

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After exploring 2 planets, we're switching from Alien (Free League) to Galaxies in Peril (the upgrade of Worlds in Peril). Two of my five players were just not into Alien/space genre.We're switching to a superhero game. I've ran two successful Worlds in Peril campaigns so I am hoping for a third.

We're playing in a game world from the second campaign and it is basically a Brave New World mixed with the Boys. Supers have to be registered and the most powerful work for the federal government. The top of the line supers (like Homelander from the Boys) are part of Alpha Prime and there are only a handful of these world wide. The mid-range supers are part of Delta Prime and they assist law enforcement as well as hunt down unregistered supers.

The players' group is the Defiant. And they are unregistered rebels trying to rescued detained supers and take down Alpha Prime (that's the Boys influence).

So far we have:
  • Mind Control teleporter
  • Angelic righteous flyer (almost the Angel Summoner :tongue: )
  • Telekenetic
  • God of Cats (his character remade from Part Time Gods)
  • Tank/Brick
Update. We played a flashback from a few weeks back in game time where the team stopped a caravan transport of prisoners to a maximum security supers prison. They planed the rescue and found out it was a Delta Prime trap to capture would be heroes and they escaped via teleportation inside of an invisibility dome next to the interstate traffic jam they created.

The characters they ended up with for the Defiant, are:
  • Verdigris (mind control teleporter)
  • Oversoul (exoskeleton powered by angelic source)
  • Dr. Force (telekinetic/invisibility fields)
  • Hellcat (the God of Cats)
  • Germ Warfare (a tank/brick who uses a misnomer to throw off his opponents. "When they put on their protective masks, I punch them."
We spent most of the time going over the setting, character explanations, and them getting the hang of the rules.
 
So, in my campaign, there has been a secret society doing shady stuff in the background, but I've not done enough to make the PCs aware of it. So, in our most recent session, they met one PC's dad, who turned out to be a member of this secret society and invited them to join it. That should provide ample opportunity to let them know what the secret society is up to!
 
So, in my campaign, there has been a secret society doing shady stuff in the background, but I've not done enough to make the PCs aware of it. So, in our most recent session, they met one PC's dad, who turned out to be a member of this secret society and invited them to join it. That should provide ample opportunity to let them know what the secret society is up to!
They need to know there's a cat in the box before you can decide its fate. :thumbsup:
 
My attempts to start an Exalted 3e campaign crashed when my hardcopy of the corebook came in. It's over 2 inches thick. It weighs more than my copy of Wheelock's Latin. It immediately became an icon of the combined evils of unfettered developers, scope creep, and needless complexity in exception-based mechanical design.

At this point, I'm just going to wait for Exalted: Essence Edition. 3e just ain't worth the hassle.
 
First in person game last night, we went through character creation for Masks of Nyarlathotep. I decided on a sort of medium-pulp level. Gave the PCs the improved attributes and HP, bonus Archetype skill points, and a single Talent, excluding anything Weird Science, Psychic powers, or anything that uses the Luck spends. Not using any of the Luck rules. I found the metacurrency too cumbersome when I ran Two-Headed Serpent. So I think the higher competency investigators without extra OOC rules should hit a good balance for us.
Received the HPLHS prop set in the mail today. What an awesome collection! Really excited to bring these in next week.
 
Brock Savage Brock Savage Your Carcosa campaign sounds awewome. Are you running this with original B/X or some retroclone like Labyrinth Lord or Old-School Essentials?
 
After exploring 2 planets, we're switching from Alien (Free League) to Galaxies in Peril (the upgrade of Worlds in Peril). Two of my five players were just not into Alien/space genre.We're switching to a superhero game. I've ran two successful Worlds in Peril campaigns so I am hoping for a third.

We're playing in a game world from the second campaign and it is basically a Brave New World mixed with the Boys. Supers have to be registered and the most powerful work for the federal government. The top of the line supers (like Homelander from the Boys) are part of Alpha Prime and there are only a handful of these world wide. The mid-range supers are part of Delta Prime and they assist law enforcement as well as hunt down unregistered supers.

The players' group is the Defiant. And they are unregistered rebels trying to rescued detained supers and take down Alpha Prime (that's the Boys influence).

So far we have:
  • Mind Control teleporter
  • Angelic righteous flyer (almost the Angel Summoner :tongue: )
  • Telekenetic
  • God of Cats (his character remade from Part Time Gods)
  • Tank/Brick


How do you like the game? My group and I finished what I’d call a “season 1” campaign a couple months ago to play some other games, but we’ll likely go back to it.

I found that the rules and process of play was actually much more suited for supers than I was expecting. I had to craft a setting to kind of better fit that, but I was pleasantly surprised, and my group seemed to really dig it.

We hadn’t played a superhero game in ages, it was a lot of fun.
 
How do you like the game? My group and I finished what I’d call a “season 1” campaign a couple months ago to play some other games, but we’ll likely go back to it.

I found that the rules and process of play was actually much more suited for supers than I was expecting. I had to craft a setting to kind of better fit that, but I was pleasantly surprised, and my group seemed to really dig it.

We hadn’t played a superhero game in ages, it was a lot of fun.
Did you play Worlds in Peril or Galaxies in Peril? I really liked Worlds in Peril but my two issues were 1. coming up with conditions and 2. players never used drive or origin. With Galaxies it's too soon to tell since the game mechanics switched from PbtA to Forged in the Dark. I'll know more after next week, but in both version I really like how they address super powers.
 
Did you play Worlds in Peril or Galaxies in Peril? I really liked Worlds in Peril but my two issues were 1. coming up with conditions and 2. players never used drive or origin. With Galaxies it's too soon to tell since the game mechanics switched from PbtA to Forged in the Dark. I'll know more after next week, but in both version I really like how they address super powers.

We played Galaxies with the FitD rules. I backed the Kickstarter so I had the beta for a while. I think a couple of things may have changed slightly once the book was finalized.

I had only previously read Worlds in Peril, I’d never actually played it, so it’s hard to say how different they are beyond the system changes.
 
We played Galaxies with the FitD rules. I backed the Kickstarter so I had the beta for a while. I think a couple of things may have changed slightly once the book was finalized.

I had only previously read Worlds in Peril, I’d never actually played it, so it’s hard to say how different they are beyond the system changes.
Pretty different. I think all they kept was the range of powers (simple, difficult, borderline). WiP did not have archetypes, resilience (stress), threat clocks, flashbacks, etc.

Both my two campaigns in WiP were memorable and a blast. We're continuing the second one with different characters in the same campaign world so the players wanted more.
 
Just realized I didn't write anything about last Saturday's gaming. Didn't run my Basic Fantasy game, as I had to work during the day, as I had scheduled my off days earlier in the week for my covid vaccine shot. The Witchcraft game later that evening was primarily centered around introducing the new PC, a runaway psychic, replacing her Bast character that was killed last session. We think the mysterious organization she's on the run from might be connected to the MIBs we faced at the beginning of the campaign.
 
I'm slowly prepping ideas for pregens for a Conspiracy X one shot I've had in mind for a couple of years now. Unlike most games, the characters will not be government affiliated. They'll be criminals hired to do a job, only to find themselves in the middle of a conflict/game between two Atlanteans
 
Last night we did a one shot with one of the other players DMing, due to our regular DM feeling the effects of his second Covid shot.
We took 2 hours to escape from a 15x15 ft pit that had 4 piles of snakes and a ladder. The first player to fall in the pit dumped a bunch of oil all around, which made it difficult to get out. Despite our characters all being level 7, we were barely able to hit the snake piles. During the 2 hours, not once but twice, a character teleported out of the pit only to immediately fall back in.
I haven't laughed so hard in a while.
 
Cortex GM was out for the evening, so I ran a oneshot of Mythras' A Gift from Shamash. Went well, though I was not as brutal as I could have been. I didn't have a lot of good reason though. They stuck to task, they did the mission, and got out. Things should go smooth.

we have 3 sessions or so of Cortex, then we move to PF2e circus thing. We've tentatively all agreed to an all goblin party. I expect
  • charhide bomber alchemist
  • a bard with goblin song
  • a barbarian of some kind
  • a rogue, because someone will not embrace the silliness as much as the rest of us
I'm currently working on a tailed goblin monk (staff acrobat at 2nd level). Sun Wukong shall not be defeated!
 

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On the topic of my continuing journey through various BX compatible materials I really enjoy the monster entries in the Wormskin 'Zine (the ongoing Dolmenwood Zine). I particularly like how each monster entry has a bespoke encounter table, and often a traits table, both of which are really well done. Here's a example, for the Goatman Thrall:

View attachment 30893

That's some great detail to work 6 as a GM.
Yeah this is great, because if I get the Dolemwood books I think I am much more likely to run it with BRP (MagicWorld, OpenQuest, or Mythras)
So having clear narrative descriptors will certainly help portraying and converting the NPCs/Opponents.
Even if I'm not into D&D as a favourite system, I'm still quite impressed with what Necrotic Gnome is doing with Dolemwood as a setting :thumbsup:
 
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Adventure Seed: Gator Bites
People are going missing in the Louisiana swamps, the heroes have been asked to investigate. Do they have what it takes to uncover truth of Krotz Springs, the adjacent basin, and face the Swamp Mother?
 
My attempts to start an Exalted 3e campaign crashed when my hardcopy of the corebook came in. It's over 2 inches thick. It weighs more than my copy of Wheelock's Latin. It immediately became an icon of the combined evils of unfettered developers, scope creep, and needless complexity in exception-based mechanical design.

At this point, I'm just going to wait for Exalted: Essence Edition. 3e just ain't worth the hassle.
Can you believe that I told the designers outright (that was in my TBP days), even before the KS began*, that this is going to be the reaction of many fans if they don't ditch the exception-based design:grin:?

Their answer was, more or less, "the exception-based design is here to stay":shade:.

My answer was, after checking to make sure they're not going to listen, to shrug and replenish my stock of popcorn:devil:!

*There was a thread "what would you want in a hypothetical Ex3e". I'm sure I wasn't the only one who said "hypothetical my ass, let me tell you how not to mess it up again"...and then realized they're going to double down on the same mistakes:thumbsup:!
 
Can you believe that I told the designers outright (that was in my TBP days), even before the KS began*, that this is going to be the reaction of many fans if they don't ditch the exception-based design:grin:?

My issue isn't with exception-based design. I ran the hell out of Exalted 1e and 2e for almost a decade straight. I love Charms and the use of them.

The problem is that Onyx Path let two....be civil, be civil...developers...run wild and unchecked, stuffing a core rulebook with over 800 Charms, many of which are boring micro-incremental dice tricks.

You want to know what the absolute best Charm in any edition of the game is? Graceful Crane Stance. Why? 1 Essence, 1 Athletics. Commit 1 mote, and for the rest of the scene you can wire-fu without worrying about rolls for balance, athletics, or the structural support of whatever you're kung-fu fighting while you're perched tip-toe on it. Spend X motes and ignore the rules to do this cool thing. That is so much more useful, elegant, and evocative than a Charm that lets you double 9's when sword-fighting in the rain (double 8's if you also know the sword-fighting while wet Charm) or some dull bullshit like that.
 
Galaxies in Peril: The Defiant update. They are playing unregistered supers in a US where registered supers work for Homeland Defense as members of Delta Prime or the super elite, Alpha Prime (this is ripped off from Brave New World).

The team met in their Tier 0 headquarters, a small strip mall church in what used to be a Radio Shack. It was strategy night where they decide they are going to look into missing reporters from the late 1990s who were investigating Delta Prime and the rumors that the government had a Delta Black running illegal covert ops around the world. This took up 75% of the game as they weighed all their other options (eg. use mind control on politicians, capture and kill a member of Alpha Prime, wage guerrilla warfare on Delta Prime). The plan is to gather evidence to expose the whole Delta Prime program for what it is.

On the way out of their base, the local gang is onto to their fake church and attempts (in the very least) to shake them down for protection money. The team showed MAJOR constraint due to the fact that if they unleash their powers at their base, it will not be secret very long. They stall them by convincing the gang lieutenant that they will get the money together in two weeks. The plan is to take out the gang HQ way before the payoff and pull no punches.

I'm using the Copper Jackals gang from the core rules and they have some powers of their own.

The next game will be the assault.
 
So, we're playing a 5e spellslinger game and towards the end of the campaign now; the party is up to fairly high level. At 13th level, we discover that monks get an ability called Tongue of the Sun and Moon, described thus -
Starting at 13th level, you learn to touch the ki of other minds so that you understand all spoken Languages. Moreover, any creature that can understand a language can understand what you say.
So, if a monk were to speak to another character, this could be interpreted as the monk speaking but the target hearing a translation of what the monk is saying - in their native language.

Does this mean that monks actually have bad dubbing as a class ability?
 
No D&D this week, as the DM is once again having trouble with her rural Pennsylvania internet. Maybe I'll use the time that I would have been playing D&D to prep this week's Savage Worlds.
 
First in person game last night, we went through character creation for Masks of Nyarlathotep. I decided on a sort of medium-pulp level. Gave the PCs the improved attributes and HP, bonus Archetype skill points, and a single Talent, excluding anything Weird Science, Psychic powers, or anything that uses the Luck spends. Not using any of the Luck rules. I found the metacurrency too cumbersome when I ran Two-Headed Serpent. So I think the higher competency investigators without extra OOC rules should hit a good balance for us.
Received the HPLHS prop set in the mail today. What an awesome collection! Really excited to bring these in next week.

We just wrapped up our Masks campaign last night. It was the first time I've played it, and I had a blast.

The total casualties for our group (of five players) over the course of the game were seven deceased Investigators and one who went permanently insane. The latter was the only original character from the very beginning (Peru). We used the standard power level.
 
We just wrapped up our Masks campaign last night. It was the first time I've played it, and I had a blast.

The total casualties for our group (of five players) over the course of the game were seven deceased Investigators and one who went permanently insane. The latter was the only original character from the very beginning (Peru). We used the standard power level.
Sounds like a completely reasonable casualty rate for the length of campaign. I mostly wanted to use some pulp rules because I've just been in a pulp adventure kind of mood lately, more than horror stuff. I'm hoping for a fight with the kharisiri on top of a truck that's had its brake lines cut and is careening down a windy mountain road.
We're kicking off our first proper session tonight. Feeling good about it.
 
HEPCATS Episode 36: Follow the Golden Brick Road
16th April, Cat Year
RLD 14 May, 2021
Present: Baron von Braun, N0-5R, Zera
XP: +3

Zera and Pierre return, having rescued Wren from the evil wizard Axendorf, and reconvene with the rest of the team. Pierre is being uncharacteristically quiet.

Intern Agent DJ-Q2 reminds the team that they’re supposed to deliver the corpse of the unstoppable serial killer Chad Theungurg to the good wizard Ozmodius, and if they follow the golden brick road, it should take them there. Chad’s corpse and Cal remain tied together with a snake. Zera points out that gold is so common in Gygakistan that it’s essentially worthless.

The team encounters a young boy, who asks if they’ve heard the rumor. N0-5R asks if it’s the rumor about black-cloaked ladies summoning demons. The boy says no, it’s about how a troll tried to withhold his bridge-management services from the dragon Curlywang MacAllister, and Curlywang got so angry that not only did he burn that troll’s bridge, he’s flying through the land burning all the bridges. The team ponders aloud why Curlywang would inflict his violence on the bridge, rather than the troll, and the boy says that Curlywang has a terrible temper and logic doesn’t necessarily enter into his actions.

Further up the road, the team encounters a jelly creature wearing a trenchcoat and 1940s-style press hat, who introduces himself as “Pa Jelly Hoocho.” When the team says he looks familiar, Pa says they must have met his son, Zed, whom he pushed through the Gates of Pain so he could go explore. The team confirms that they do, in fact, know Zed, and Pa says he is excited about how “someone named Spanker or something” is helping Zed make his own cooking show, even though Pa doesn’t really understand what that means. He also offers that, if the team ever needs someone or something absorbed, he will help them out, and gives them his scrying number.

The team comes to a keep where the staff is wearing the crest of Zera’s dad, Sir. Although Zera is dumb as a brick and has the memory of a goldfish, she does remember that this is her father’s house, and even recognizes him once they go inside. The team leaves Chad’s corpse in the corpse-rack by the door, and Baron’s followers volunteer to watch him.

Sir says that he’s glad to see Zera, but, “now that you’re here, you know I have to try to kill you, right?” Zera asks if they can wait until after they eat to try to kill each other, and Sir decides that would be fine. He asks Zera what she’s been up to, so she tells him about how she and N0-5R were briefly parents to a little boy. Sir is relieved to hear that Zera and N0-5R’s son did not die, but merely chose to stay in another land with his new adoptive big sister/guardian/mom.

Zera also explains how she got married, still erroneously thinking she got married to everyone who was present at the wedding, but correctly relays that she has multiple spouses including a princess and a spaceship. N0-5R makes it abundantly clear to DJ-Q2 that N0-5R is not married. Baron is likewise adamant that he is not married. Sir asks if Zera is now a princess herself, since she married a princess. The team huddles and confirms that they never really figured out how that works, but probably should.

Sir asks if Zera ever found her mom, and she says no. Zera also tells her dad that she has joined a secret society and goes on missions. Sir says that since Zera is already part of one secret society, she ought to know about another one, and invites her and her friends to the basement. N0-5R points out that it’s always a bad idea to follow someone into a basement, but Zera and Baron consent.

Sir takes them to an elaborate iron door in the basement, which he unlocks by manifesting a slender and nimble line of green energy. Baron posits that, since Zera has rainbow energy, but her dad only has green energy, she must have six moms from whom she got the rest of the ROYGBIV colors, and maybe that’s why she had trouble finding her mom. Sir says that if they’re going to enter the room, they have to wear the robes.

Meanwhile, N0-5R notices Chad’s corpse twitching.

In the room Baron recognizes the sigil carved into the floor as that of the Cult of Steve. Sir explains that they’ve re-branded as the Council of Stevens, that Zera is a hereditary member, that she can ask the minor god Steven for favors, and also, some people in the land are beholden to Sir and will do him favors.

Sir and Zera work out that their original attempts at killing each other came from a misunderstanding, but they both agree it would be weird to stop now. Sir also confesses that, although he has tried to kill Zera many times, he never tried too hard and hoped the attempts would toughen her up.

Sir sends out a call for favors to get pack animals to speed up the party’s trip to Ozmodius. Chad’s corpse has progressed from twitching to something that looks more like dancing. N0-5R determines that there must be electricity reanimating Chad’s corpse, because it’s definitely not sorcery, no sir, and wraps him up in a rubber sheet “like a corpse burrito.”

One of Sir’s servants plays an instrument, and everyone begins singing and dancing. DJ-Q2 asks N0-5R if N0-5R wants to dance with him, and N0-5R enthusiastically agrees. Someone arrives with the pack animals, who are also dancing. The corpse-burrito stays still.

To be continued….
 
Sounds like a completely reasonable casualty rate for the length of campaign. I mostly wanted to use some pulp rules because I've just been in a pulp adventure kind of mood lately, more than horror stuff. I'm hoping for a fight with the kharisiri on top of a truck that's had its brake lines cut and is careening down a windy mountain road.
We're kicking off our first proper session tonight. Feeling good about it.

Yeah, we had all played CoC before, so we knew what to expect going into it. If anything we were lucky considering how some things could have gone. We barely avoided a few TPKs.
 
My issue isn't with exception-based design. I ran the hell out of Exalted 1e and 2e for almost a decade straight. I love Charms and the use of them.

The problem is that Onyx Path let two....be civil, be civil...developers...run wild and unchecked, stuffing a core rulebook with over 800 Charms, many of which are boring micro-incremental dice tricks.

You want to know what the absolute best Charm in any edition of the game is? Graceful Crane Stance. Why? 1 Essence, 1 Athletics. Commit 1 mote, and for the rest of the scene you can wire-fu without worrying about rolls for balance, athletics, or the structural support of whatever you're kung-fu fighting while you're perched tip-toe on it. Spend X motes and ignore the rules to do this cool thing. That is so much more useful, elegant, and evocative than a Charm that lets you double 9's when sword-fighting in the rain (double 8's if you also know the sword-fighting while wet Charm) or some dull bullshit like that.
Yeah, I've ran 2e for years, too. You don't need to tell me how useful GCS is, I know it. Though to be honest, I prefer 7SE for the title:grin:!
"I attack".
"Don't bother rolling".
Simple and clear-cut, I say:tongue:!

And for the record, I agree.
But it was clear from the get-go that they were going to deliver more Charms. Which, as I predicted, was going to run into balancing issues - especially with Eclipses and the like - not to mention making chargen even more of a chore than it already is, including for the GM..:shade:
Which is, essentially, your problem, and it has the predictable solution. "800 charms? Screw that, I'm waiting for the Essentials edition":thumbsup:.
 
Masks crew met up last night at the game store for our first proper session.
Peru chapter spoilers...
In keeping with the pulpier tone I'm going for, character introductions were made after fighting off a group of drunk ruffians trying to shake down some Americans fresh off the boat. Aside from that, did some sight-seeing in Lima, met their employer and other expedition party members, including Mr. Elias, learned about his suspicions, and visited the museum for some research, where they found the mummified body of a grad student down in the storeroom. They just missed Mendoza in the act, but recovered the research and are certain he's responsible, so next session they plan to try to spy on him and Larkin to see what they're up to.

The HPLHS props were a great addition to the night. Everyone enjoyed filling out their passports, looking over the maps, and reading the realistic looking handouts. It does a good job of drawing the players into the setting, and a fair amount of discussion around the table was just catching everyone up on the world of the 1920s.
It's great gaming in person with friends again.
 
Third dragon's the charm, hopefully...

In my first campaign, the players cakewalked through the combat parts of the first 3 sessions, so in the 4th session, I threw a dragon at them. Dice explode and it's a one-shot kill of that dragon. Towards the end of that campaign, I thought, "I have a better handle on the rules now, I think I can make a dragon an actual threat." Dice explode and it's a one-shot kill of that dragon, too.

In my current campaign, I'm about to throw a dragon at them and I'm hoping this time, it will stay alive long enough to put up a good fight. But I'm not counting on it. Having a chance of one-shotting the Big Bad is one of the things I like about Savage Worlds, even if it's occasionally frustrating.

And yes, I am aware of the core book advice to put Extras in the battle as well as the Big Bad, and I am also aware of Zadmar's article about Boss Fights. I am looking forward to seeing how it turns out, and I have other stuff up my sleeve in case it's once again a one-shot kill of the dragon.
 
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