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Trollhawke posted:So I'm working on a hack and I was wondering if there was any written guides somewhere which help with writing an agenda? I have most of the mechanics planned out, but the agenda I'm finding is the hardest thing to write. I have the basics down like "make sure everyone (including yourself) has fun", "explore these themes", so on and so forth, but I was hoping for some solid advice on how to optimize and make my GM's agenda better. The agenda is there to do two things. Give you general guidelines for playing PBTA (play to find out what happens) and reinforce the core genre themes your game is emulating. Keep the agenda items that reference PBTA play pretty much as-is, flavouring them with your theme as you can.
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Jul 19, 2016 02:25
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madadric posted:The agenda is there to do two things. Give you general guidelines for playing PBTA (play to find out what happens) and reinforce the core genre themes your game is emulating. To expand on this. Keep the general pbta ones the same, but otherwise be specific about what your game is about. Do you want them solving mysteries? Make an agenda like "seek out and solve mysteries"
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Jul 19, 2016 02:34
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Anyone know of any moves that are desert themed? Planning to run the low Fallen Empire game in the desert.
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Jul 20, 2016 08:36
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Apocron posted:Anyone know of any moves that are desert themed? Planning to run the low Fallen Empire game in the desert. Make water important. Like a hard move could be "you are dehydrated, -1 ongoing until you can find water" If it's a hot desert, travelling during midday could trigger whatever Act Under Fire is called in FE. I think 'make the environment a threat' is already in the gm stuff somewhere, but if not it would be a good agenda. Lean on that a lot.
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Jul 20, 2016 08:58
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Apocron posted:Anyone know of any moves that are desert themed? Planning to run the low Fallen Empire game in the desert. Do you have access to the Water-Bearer playbook from the second edition? It's easy to make primitive and suits your likely scarcity.
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Jul 20, 2016 10:01
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Apocron posted:Anyone know of any moves that are desert themed? Planning to run the low Fallen Empire game in the desert. Not a move per se, but make sure to have the desert itself be a Threat -- probably a Maze, since its drives are to trap and to frustrate passage. Then it's got moves like "bar the way" or "take something away: lost, used up, destroyed" to ruin everyone's day. You could even have it be a front unto itself, and include various Landscape or Terrain threats inside it, depending on how important you want the fact that they live in a desert to be to the story.
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Jul 20, 2016 10:33
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Thanks for the advice guys.
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Jul 22, 2016 06:53
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Can someone give me a brief rundown in a typical pbta game of how you would handle the big bad as a gm? The big superguy? The Darth Vader style scary and dangerous Endboss fight? I've only played dw and it's a bit more classically "has a bucket of HP and hits harder" for those type of encounters.
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Jul 24, 2016 00:06
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ShineDog posted:Can someone give me a brief rundown in a typical pbta game of how you would handle the big bad as a gm? The big superguy? The Darth Vader style scary and dangerous Endboss fight? I've only played dw and it's a bit more classically "has a bucket of HP and hits harder" for those type of encounters. *extremely Steve Ballmer voice* Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves, Hard Moves... Rolled a 6-? Dude just called in backup. Rolled a 7-9, yeah you did the thing, but he just ducked behind cover now you gotta go find him, oh look a sniper covering that entrance... Take/break their poo poo. Frustrate them. Think tactically as a powerful dude who plans to wake up a powerful dude tomorrow. Unlike d&d, aw does actually benefit from being ever so slightly adversarial in these situations. A hard move is basically the game saying "you can be an rear end in a top hat right now". Soft moves are "tell your players one or more of the ways you can be an rear end in a top hat here".
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Jul 24, 2016 00:27
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ShineDog posted:Can someone give me a brief rundown in a typical pbta game of how you would handle the big bad as a gm? The big superguy? The Darth Vader style scary and dangerous Endboss fight? I've only played dw and it's a bit more classically "has a bucket of HP and hits harder" for those type of encounters. Funny you should mention Dungeon World, because Sage LaTorra (Well, and you could make custom moves to help reinforce the fiction surrounding those kinds of characters, but I feel like it's more important to emphasize the fictional approach when we're talking about making things impressive without hitting people with giant mechanical sticks.) Lurks With Wolves fucked around with this message at 00:44 on Jul 24, 2016 |
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Jul 24, 2016 00:37
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ShineDog posted:Can someone give me a brief rundown in a typical pbta game of how you would handle the big bad as a gm? The big superguy? The Darth Vader style scary and dangerous Endboss fight? I've only played dw and it's a bit more classically "has a bucket of HP and hits harder" for those type of encounters. Play Fellowship, which has rules that not only support, but enforce the role of the "Big Bad" and their generals as fictionally powerful enemies.
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Jul 24, 2016 22:57
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I'm balancing my options of which base system to reskin to be appropriate since I don't love the part finished nature of the star wars hack and the other scifi pbta game I have, uncharted worlds, has a one roll combat move that's a bit binary for my liking (it's not trade harm, it's pretty much 'end the battle') and a mass of cruft elsewhere. I'm looking at hacking/reskinning spirit of 77 actually, since it, weirdly, seems it would map over quite nicely to pure scifi. I'll pop my inevitably terrible results into the thread at some point. I'm not sure about reskinning fellowship per se but I'll definately tale a look at the overlord stuff and see if anything can be ported over.
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Jul 25, 2016 00:40
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ShineDog posted:I'm looking at hacking/reskinning spirit of 77 actually, since it, weirdly, seems it would map over quite nicely to pure scifi. Well that sounds Dandy, baby. 
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Jul 25, 2016 05:53
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ShineDog posted:Can someone give me a brief rundown in a typical pbta game of how you would handle the big bad as a gm? The big superguy? The Darth Vader style scary and dangerous Endboss fight? I've only played dw and it's a bit more classically "has a bucket of HP and hits harder" for those type of encounters. I've been playing around with formalizing some of the ideas in Dungeon World and Urban Shadows that describe how to make a really dangerous opponent. I think it's all about the barriers to just stabbing him so what I do is come up with 1-5 answers to the question, "Why can't they just stab (or shoot or blow up) this guy?" So if I'm doing a Darth Vader type I might answer: 1.Because he is a Master of the Force and will deflect simple attacks! 2. Because he has all the Might of the Empire behind him, and cannot be approached easily! 3. Because he has powerful armor that protects him! 4. Because he has magical senses and can forsee any threat! If the PCs are planning to take down this terrible threat, they'll have to figure out a way to overcome each of the defenses and it becomes a heist battle that's all about the prep work going into it and then the final showdown where it all pays off, maybe with a twist or counterattack if they have some missed rolls. If they're surprised by an opponent like this, it becomes a puzzle fight where they discover each layer and then improv ways to overcome it, or they're overwhelmed and have to flee and develop countermeasures. I'll usually give this kind of enemy relatively weak numbers, but attacks that don't address these defensive layers fizzle out while providing information about why they fizzled out. So "Han you got a perfect (10+) shot on this prick in black armor! But each shot is just absorbed by his hand! It's some kind of sorcery making him impervious to such a simple weapon! What do you do?" You can also just not let them roll their attack moves until the enemy is actually vulnerable to the attack and give them the info, but I usually run PBP where they roll ahead of time. Mr. Prokosch fucked around with this message at 20:30 on Jul 25, 2016 |
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Jul 25, 2016 20:27
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If you enjoy reading rulebooks and paying for good things, you should grab Fellowship. Part of the Overlord mechanics are exactly that.
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Jul 25, 2016 20:43
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Has anyone here run a game of the Warren, and what were your thoughts on it? I've run Night Witches before but this is very different.
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Jul 28, 2016 09:05
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ShineDog posted:Can someone give me a brief rundown in a typical pbta game of how you would handle the big bad as a gm? The big superguy? The Darth Vader style scary and dangerous Endboss fight? I've only played dw and it's a bit more classically "has a bucket of HP and hits harder" for those type of encounters. The story of the 16 HP Dragon probably applies equally well to other PbtA games.
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Jul 28, 2016 09:08
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Vincent and Meguey are doing an AMA right now.
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Aug 4, 2016 18:02
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A new PbtA game game out about Avatar The Last Airbender/ Legend of Korra. I vaguely remember writing it off back in the day, but it could have gotten better with playtesting. Anyone own it? It any good.
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Aug 4, 2016 20:26
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I'm really struggling to flesh out a move that represents Nathan Drake/Indiana Jones/Lara Crofts uncanny ability to find a convenient ladder, handhold, tunnel, whatever, as the temple collapses in flames into the sand around them. Probably because when you're playing a game in that kind of setting, of course there is a ladder, handhold, or secret tunnel when the temple collapses in flames into the sand.
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Aug 12, 2016 00:34
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ShineDog posted:I'm really struggling to flesh out a move that represents Nathan Drake/Indiana Jones/Lara Crofts uncanny ability to find a convenient ladder, handhold, tunnel, whatever, as the temple collapses in flames into the sand around them. Probably because when you're playing a game in that kind of setting, of course there is a ladder, handhold, or secret tunnel when the temple collapses in flames into the sand. If it's an automatic part of the setting, why does it need to be a move?
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Aug 12, 2016 00:57
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I'm kind of wobbling back and forward on it. I think the issue I have is this - dramatic escapes from crumbling temples are absolutely baked into the pulp adventure template, but at the same time they are entirely baked into the lead characters of those stories. It's something Nathan Drake or Indy does, it's not really Cutter or Sully or Marions thing to nearly the same extent. If the muscle or the conman characters have come along and gotten stuck in the temple, it's the two fisted adventurer who finds the way out. So yeah, it's definately a part of the setting, but if you make that specific thing equally available to everyone, the two fisted adventurer loses something.
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Aug 12, 2016 01:11
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ShineDog posted:I'm kind of wobbling back and forward on it. I think the issue I have is this - dramatic escapes from crumbling temples are absolutely baked into the pulp adventure template, but at the same time they are entirely baked into the lead characters of those stories. It's something Nathan Drake or Indy does, it's not really Cutter or Sully or Marions thing to nearly the same extent. If the muscle or the conman characters have come along and gotten stuck in the temple, it's the two fisted adventurer who finds the way out. Give the two-fisted adventurer playbook a move like "When you need to make a dramatic escape, you always find a ladder, rope, open window, secret tunnel, or other exit out of here, right at the last moment." Maybe name it something like "That was a close one." If you need something to be automatic, well, buddy, you're writing in a system where you can just DO that. Its a-okay to make moves where nice things just happen for free under specific circumstances.
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Aug 12, 2016 01:46
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If you want it to be auto, make a move where fails mean there's snakes or it's on fire.
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Aug 12, 2016 02:15
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Yeah. When you escape from a perilous situation using yadda yadda roll + whatever. 10+ you do it with heroic style, take +1 forward. On a 7-9 you make it by the skin of your teeth. On a miss the way is treacherous.
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Aug 12, 2016 02:41
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Or just adapt from AW gently caress this poo poo: name your escape route and roll+hard. On a 10+, sweet, you’re gone. On a 7–9, you can go or stay, but if you go it costs you: leave something behind, or take something with you, the MC will tell you what. On a miss, you’re caught vulnerable, half in and half out.
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Aug 12, 2016 03:08
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UrbanLabyrinth posted:Or just adapt from AW This is what you should do.
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Aug 12, 2016 04:57
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chaos rhames posted:If you want it to be auto, make a move where fails mean there's snakes or it's on fire. On a 7-9 there's snakes, or something is on fire. On a miss, it's both.
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Aug 12, 2016 16:22
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Made a Succubus skin for Monsterhearts, looking for feedback - https://docs.google.com/document/d/1PH_LlKZI3UvcWapWimVjwWm3GXo9kK20tftG8FIF_IE/edit
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Aug 12, 2016 23:44
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First impression is it's way more of a genie unless most bargains are awkward handjobs behind the bikeshed.
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Aug 13, 2016 04:43
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So I'm trying to add Eclipse Phase/Altered Carbon style morphs and stacks to The Sprawl. This is what I've got so far. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FRbB8HsXlcjM31VLjH_lTJD94k_WYhtFpmbciJ3oTHc/edit?usp=sharing Is there anything I'm missing? What do you think?
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Aug 13, 2016 06:30
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chaos rhames posted:First impression is it's way more of a genie unless most bargains are awkward handjobs behind the bikeshed. In Highschool? More than you'd think!
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Aug 13, 2016 13:14
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Before I look, how does this differ from the 500 other succubi skins?
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Aug 13, 2016 21:52
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Why are people making succubi skins for a game about playing teenagers
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Aug 13, 2016 22:27
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Alaois posted:Why are people making succubi skins for a game about playing teenagers Because the game about playing teenagers happens to have sex-related mechanics, one of which is called a Sex Move. I mean, you don't have to have your teenage MH characters have sex, but you can't pretend like the game system doesn't encourage the player to at least think about that kind of thing.
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Aug 13, 2016 23:14
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so what high school clique does the succubus act as a parallel to? because I can't see it leading to anything healthy or tasteful
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Aug 14, 2016 22:01
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Nuns with Guns posted:so what high school clique does the succubus act as a parallel to? because I can't see it leading to anything healthy or tasteful Isn't the Infernal already a drug addict (or at least some kind of addict)? Several of the playbooks aren't exactly positive parallels. Although I have a soft spot for the Infernal because all the other Skins have a couple of lines in the GM advice section, and then the Infernal gets like three paragraphs.
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Aug 15, 2016 00:02
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My succubus, at least, it's the drug dealer, or more generally a person that finds value in other people owing them or needing them, even if it's a toxic relationship.
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Aug 15, 2016 01:28
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That's way more like a djinn. You're granting wishes and twisting them, or punishing people for not following their end of bargains. The first half of the sex move doesn't really fit either. If it's all about temptation, why does sex mean you lose your edge on them?
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Aug 15, 2016 02:16
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bewilderment posted:Isn't the Infernal already a drug addict (or at least some kind of addict)? Several of the playbooks aren't exactly positive parallels. I'm more concerned that a succubus playbook following the actual premise of a succubus would fall into either the really uncomfortable "class slut" school archetype, or worse, go deep into the rape territory that other playbooks (ghoul, vampire) already brush uncomfortably close to. The execution of the succubus playbook here doesn't dip into that, but at the same time that means it also doesn't behave at all like a succubus/incubus is established to behave in mythology and is more like a djin, as chaos rhames says, or something closer to the Old Scratch-type of demonic entity
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Aug 15, 2016 02:39
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