inky has a blog

I was talking with lpsmith about the game, and one of the things he mentioned was that things could get kind of long when you were waiting for your turn to come around again, and that Settlers of Catan had a cool mechanic for letting you do other stuff during other people’s turns. So we talked about that for a bit, and also about how in some version of The Game of Life you could get a lucky number on the wheel and get points whenever it came up. Anyway, I thought I’d work out the idea a bit and see what came up.
(more…)

So, the two sessions of Agents on the Edge of the Galaxy have finished, and now, as is traditional, I will present my GM notes and thoughts about the game. But first, links to the transcripts:

• Episode 1, involving asteroids, ambushes, pleasure planets, and bar brawls
• Episode 2, involving infiltration, revolution, sabotage, more bar brawls, and chefs

And a few summarizing quotes:

Zagor says, “This is the most metrosexual spaceship I’ve been on for a while.”

Heron says, “You could put different colors of gum in the pockets and call it bubblesort.”

Reig says, “I probably *do* secrete acid, at that.”

Tesher says, “Well, I am obviously disguising myself so well that even I don’t know who I am yet.”

Squee says, “But, let’s see, I get a free tag for the window sabotage, and I’d also like to tag The Food, It’s Awesome”

Garue hides his mace in a cabbage.

And now a little more detail.
(more…)

As is traditional (well, once), I am writing up GM notes in advance so I can look back later and see which, if any, get used in the actual game. Also in the hopes it might be helpful.

For the pirates game I mostly wrote up interest groups and character names/traits in them, on the assumption that if the players got proactive about something I’d have some opposition to pick from. But what turned out in practice is the players weren’t super-proactive (hmm, that isn’t quite true — but they’re proactive in the sense of “let’s sneak into this guy’s house”, rather than “let’s try to get a scheme going”). Anyway, what I wrote up last time wasn’t useful. So this time I’m going to try something different. Namely, scenes.
(more…)

This post about spells in FATE got me thinking about FATE/Nobilis mashups. I couldn’t decide which way to go so I decided I’d do them both.
(more…)

I realize there’s virtually no demand on this blog for system hacks for pre-4e D&D, but I didn’t let that stop me before, so I don’t see why not to proceed now. Plus I still see people talking about this on enworld when I go there, since they are basically permanently stuck in a 4e-vs-3.5e turf war, so I’m still thinking about it. Right, then.

One of the main things that strikes me about magic in Conan (and other sword & sorcery properties like Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser) that isn’t represented well in most role-playing games is how physical it all is.
(more…)

Ok, the game ran two sessions and seems to have hit a good stopping point, so perhaps I will write a little about it. As usual the original GM notes didn’t end up having more than a vague resemblance to the final product, but that is pretty much par for the course so I didn’t have too much invested in them. Anyway, let me talk about this in a couple of different ways.
(more…)

Ok, what you need in this kind of improv setup is a vague idea of what’s going on, a list of names, and some power groups to interact with and start trouble. I’m going to try to get a little more tactical here so I also intend to make some zone maps.

So what’s going on is up for change as the game goes on, but the working hypothesis is going to be that Captain Danvers is a bad guy, that he intended all along to cheat his crew and keep the gem for himself and, furthermore, he is now up to something nefarious with this party. But that could change: he could have lost his memory, been replaced by a doppelganger, or just genuinely believe his crew is dead (but this last seems a little uninteresting unless then he turns out to be in trouble and need their help or something — clearly he can’t just hand the gem back to them).

Anyway, power groups. I figure I want at least a half-dozen and ideally more like nine, and obviously they should be linked to each other. Thus:

• Captain Danvers:
  • Map: his estate
  • Minions: estate employees (guards with swords, etc)
  • Wants/plans: not clear; likely candidates including turnaround robbery on the guests, or doing some weird sorcery with the gem and the house and the guests’ souls
  • Notes: has the Sea’s Blood; estate has five guarding aspects of various types (dogs, guards who are watchful and loyal, voodoo spirits (?), exposed (and hence hard to sneak across))
• Seven Blades (out-of-town thugs):
  • Map: warehouse by the docks
  • Minions: thugs with daggers, fists, and crossbows
  • Wants/plans: Perhaps Danvers stole money from them and they want it back; or perhaps they’re muscling in on the local smuggling trade; or both (maybe they don’t know who Danvers is — that might be why he stays at home)
  • Notes: Probably from Vodacce; named like Orio and Pipo and Lara and Gino and Isa
• Local smugglers:
  • Map: smugglers’ caves? tavern?
  • Minions: smugglers (not very tough, but might set up (non-lethal?) traps)
  • Wants/plans: Worried about getting busted, worried about outsiders muscling in; don’t really care about Danvers (or does he have a deal with them to bring him in stuff? or is his estate on the smugglers’ tunnel, perhaps unknowingly? Or perhaps he knows about the tunnels and intends to use it to escape down to meet somebody?)
  • Notes: Are sort of good guys; smuggle to Vesten (“it’s an old family tradition!”); Tom and Ned and Sal and Meg
• Pirates:
  • Map: pirate ship
  • Minions: pirates with cutlasses and hook hands and belaying pins
  • Wants/plans: Why are pirates in this area, anyway? Are they chasing someone? Or desperate?
  • Notes: Perhaps their ship is called the Golden Parrot. Wouldn’t that be enticing? Named like Bloody Dave and Pete the Peg and No-nose (he’s got a nose, but he’s a biter!) and Perkins
• Old Money:
  • Map: ball (social map)
  • Minions: various nobles, old and young, who are arrogant, drunk, hot-tempered, bored, giggly, stone-faced, or hoity-toity
  • Wants/plans: Irritated by new-money folks like Danvers coming in and buying up the estates, but with land prices falling and blah blah; anyway, they want him gone, probably; but some probably also want to buy the gem if it’s awesome
  • Notes: Hoity-toity! Lord Roderick wants to buy the gem at the urging of his daughter Madeline; Colonel Williams leads the want-him-gone movement; Lady Genevieve is conciliatory but her son Arthur is hot-blooded and gets into trouble; Lady Samantha is young and cute and bored and dangerous (perhaps she knows thugs?)
• Merchants:
  • Map: ball (social map), auction (social map)
  • Minions: various merchants, avaricious, ingratiating, sharp, friendly, drunk, social-climbing, eavesdroppy, sensible
  • Wants/plans: Want to make trade deals, want to buy the gem if it’s a reasonable price, don’t want to offend the nobility who they need to buy the wool from
  • Notes: Rachel is the top trader looking to buy the gem; Johannes is looking to bump her off his pedestal — they don’t get along (perhaps Johannes doesn’t even want the gem, he’ll just bid it up); Dominic is working with the smugglers
• Local Farmers and Shepherds:
  • Map: tavern (social/combat map)
  • Minions: semi-rustic folk but come into the city a fair amount, dumb, quiet, watchful, quick to anger, get drunk easily, looking for a sharp deal, willing to cheat strangers, honest, clannish
  • Wants/plans: Think they’re being overcharged by the nobility, want someone to ask Queen Elaine to get rent prices dropped
  • Notes: Jim and Hank and Emma and Zeena and Nate; probably working with the smugglers