Hey all, I thought I was waiting on someone but I wasn't. I'll update tonight (hopefully), butI'm actually currently in the hospital. I will have my computer though, so an update will come soon.
Long story short: I was not allowed to keep my computer or communicate with the outside world beyond a wall phone. Sorry for the delay, incoming post from me tonight.
Sorry to hear that, GM.
I stand waiting further development
Hope it's nothing too serious.
No worries! The mental imagery of several nurses trying to separate someone from their computer, while they're being held at bay with hospital equipment did make me chuckle, however.
It was more they tricked me into filling out a form so they could "voluntarily" admit me, told me I could keep all my electronics, and then confiscated them (the ones my girlfriend just didn't take back with her) along with more or less everything on my person, including my shoes. You would think that when admitting someone to a psych ward you'd want to take care to make sure they understood exactly what was going on in order to curb anxiety about it as much as possible, but clearly that is not their modus operandi. When I finally got a chance to talk to someone--on a f*cking wall phone, no less, it was like going back to my childhood--I found out the phones hadn't even been working, and apparently my mother's mind immediately jumped to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest; as the man on the inside, so to speak, I can't say I didn't share the sentiment at that moment. Either way, I'm back home now and I've reclaimed my previous laptop, so they can't keep me away anymore! I'm FREE!
As a simple segue, this is something I've taken to trying to tell people as soon as possible when I start running a game; as a simple head's up, I suffer from Bipolar Disorder Type-II. Normally I function completely fine, but occasionally I will have some problems (despite my medication) that might impact posting even if it doesn't impact the rest of my life all that much. If I ever disappear for a little while or my posting slows for a period of time, that's probably why. Unless I say a game is dead I intend to get back to it when I can, so just hold on for a little bit if that happens. I've never had quite as... severe a problem as I did this week, but that's just life; you gotta roll with the punches, even if sometimes if the person punching you happens to be yourself.
Working on a Gameplay post now, by the way.
PS: I know this might sound strange, but if you have questions or anything don't hesitate to ask; I have no problem talking about it (I've been diagnosed for the past 7 years, I'm used to it by now) and I'm about to graduate with a Bachelor's in Psychology, so don't feel like you'll be offending me or making me uncomfortable by doing so.
Hey all, just a head's up that I'll have a post up this evening. The next post is going to be rather long since it's setting up what all of you are doing separately, and I just haven't had time until now to sit down and write the whole thing.
Gonna leave until tomorrow for some more people to post in with their actions, at that point I'll move us along.
Hi all!
I know I've been rather quiet lately, which is in relation with what's been happening with me for the last week or so. Life's been generally bad, and I'm currently getting some major flak, related to Britain's current state of affairs (as a foreigner there), and I'll have to take at least a week or two to get my head around things.
I fully plan to continue the game, and I'm sorry I only now let you know, but up to today, I thought I'd be able to get things done, which is no longer the case.
Sorry about all that, and hopefully, see you soon!
Thank you for the opportunity, and all the best until later!
No problem, thanks for letting me know. Just jump in when you're back and ready to continue, I'll have Bogatir hang out with Bronze and such until your return. If we advance significantly and you have trouble getting caught up let me know.
Hey all, still waiting to hear from both Michael and Junkyard. Everything alright?
Sorry, didn't realize I had to go. I was wondering where everyone was?
I've been kind of busy, and trying to think over what to do here at this point. I meant to post yesterday, but this slipped through. I should get something up later today.
That's fine, stuff like that happens. Thanks for responding quickly, though. Once I get a post from Michael we'll move forward.
I'll be doling out karma once you've actually hit the museum, by the way. If I ever forget to give you some for an extended period of time just let me know, as I probably just forgot; when I play Pathfinder I don't actually hand out experience and I just let people know when they level up, and so I'm not always in the habit. I've been pretty good about it in my Savage Worlds game, though.
Also, I'm guessing not, but has anyone heard anything from Bogatir? I don't know if anyone is in a game with his player elsewhere, but it's been a while since I've heard anything. I know he mentioned a few weeks being needed, but it's been almost a month. I'll give him some more time, but I was just wondering if anyone else might have happened to have heard something.
Everything alright here, guys? I haven't heard from anyone in Gameplay in a couple days.
Alive and kicking.
Just waiting to see what the others are gonna sound off on, and if we think we're ready to go
Yeah, I am still here. Sorry for no activity...
So, we haven't heard from Bogatir in almost two months.
At the moment, I think my plan is to cut him out and look for someone else. There are a couple things coming up where I can axe him without saying he's definitely died, so if his player ever pops up he can join up with us again without any issues. Alternately, he did have Borrowed Time so he may come in as someone else. Regardless, I think I may ask around my other games and see if anyone wants to join in on this. If not, I may repon Recruitment, but that's not as likely I don't think.
Hey guys, this upcoming week is my last week of my senior year of college, so I'm gonna be... busy. I have a ton of stuff I need to get done this week and not a lot of time to really do it, so my activity on the boards may take somewhat of a hit. I'm going to prioritize posting in games I'm running as they kind of need me to move forward (as opposed to someone being able to bot me otherwise), but it's likely my posting will drop some. I will do my best to keep regular updates this week, but I'm already falling a little behind at the moment. Also, games I've recently started will get a bit of priority since they are less stable in terms of momentum, but I'm gonna hopefully be able to keep them all moving as much as possible. Just wanted to give you all a heads up, so no one's in the dark if I'm not around for a little while. The next week is finals, but I have more free time as I only have one test. I have other things, but nothing really scheduled which I'll need to worry about.
Hello all!
This is just a message to let you all know I'm back and I'll have time to post on a normal schedule again. I meant to update this tomorrow with two of my other games, but I just wasn't up to the task at the time. I'll let you all know if I expect a serious interruption but for the time being it's smooth sailing.
Hi all! Really sorry for my much longer than expected absence. I'll understand if you'd like to continue as you were, as I was gone without notice for a really long time, and I didn't contact either of you.
However, I'd be looking of going back into the game, if you'd have me. If not, I wish you the best of runs, and the best of luck. And don't go around making deals with dragons.
Hello Bogatir! Good to see you!
I forget if I actually said it, but I did have Bogatir along for this part of the run; he's with Michael and the others up on the first floor, so you can just jump in whenever you read through the stuff you missed. I've had some trouble moving us as fast as I would have liked, so we haven't gotten TOO far, so it shouldn't be too hard to catch up. Once you do, feel free to post in whenever you have the time.
Welcome back my ork samurai brother!
I, for one, welcome you back to the team.
You and that tank cannon you have, that is!
Oh, you've moved quite a bit! I've decided to go with the 'glitchy old system loading for the first time in years' thing. Hopefully the tech people can understand just enough so its interesting.
Regarding dragons turning up, I think now that I'm back, we have the lethal option, though abstaining from it is a good choice.
Hey guys, I'll get this updated today but first I have a question for you! I may have asked already (but I don't think so) do people want a map for combat in this game? I typically use it for games like Pathfinder but in other systems I don't always do so both because it's difficult to acquire maps for it and because it isn't always as necessary. If we want one, I typically use Roll20 and I can put up a game for us on there. However, we don't need to use one.
Just let me know your thoughts for the time being. If I don't hear much on this before I post in Gameplay later I'll just leave it with no map for the time being and I can make one later if we want one.
Blue: In checking to see if I asked this question before, I saw a question you asked a while ago that I never answered. The relationship between summoner and spirit is not always confrontational. If you make it a point to repeatedly summon a specific spirit and don't consistently have it moving into machine gun fire I can easily see the relationship being different. Perhaps it grants more favors or resists less when being summoned or something like that. The first time you summon a specific spirit it's definitely going to not like it, however.
How would that change, if at all, in the case of bound spirits? I do have a couple of bound spirits, and I would like to reveal a kind of history between Blue and the spirits he binds as the game goes on.
EDIT: For maps, I guess if it is a combat that is going to be mostly stationary, or is tactically complex, a map might be nice. But I am pretty okay with Theater of the Mind (ToM) as well. I have both run and played in games that use ToM and as long as people understand that it will be a little hand-wavey and abstract, then it works well.
I'm good with no map. SR in particular seems to flow more easily when the players don't get hung up on the maps and counting squares / etc.
I agree with Bronze here - Theatre of the Mind isn't hard to imagine, and reduces the strain on the GM, too, which is fairly important. And I personally don't have to worry about range increments.
EDIT: Regarding the theatre of the mind - I gathered that everyone except Bronze and Junkyard are next to Michael as he picks up the egg. Are they outside of the chamber of the egg, next to our getaway vehicle, setting an ambush for the guards, or are they in the same room, getting ready to slow the approaching guards with lethal/non-lethal means?
Bronze and Junkyard are in the basement area, with explosives planted and ready to cut a hole into the sewers and allow our escape.
Also ready to ambush any fools who step up and wanna get froggy.
I find Theater of the Mind can work really well for most games, and I think for something like Shadowrun it should be fine. As long as we have an abstract sense of the surroundings and can wave small things--"You're in a parking garage, so yeah, with a move you can get some cover behind a pillar or a car"--it should work out fine.
I've not been reading on my 4e books for a while - I've indicated the number of hits Bogatir got, as have I the damage he'd do with the rubber bullets, assuming no dodges or soak.
If there's anything unclear about the situation - He's got Agi 9 for shooting the gun, a skill of 9, and a hard-wired smartlink. The recoil calibration is 13, 7 from the weapon and 3 from each arm, the arm one being able to reduce movement negatives, as the one from the running.
As for the cover, yes, that sounds fun. Also, fighting in museums and stuff like that gives the opportunity to go and describe bullets tearing through vases, glass, additional alarms starting. Shadowrun does lend itself to that rather nicely.
Bogatir, I don't know how much money you have left (if any) but I would recommend investing in some armor add-ons at some point. You could easily wear something like heavy military combat armor--as could Bronze, actually--and also use the form-fitting body armor which are both in Arsenal. They'd boost your damage resistance by probably around 10 for ballistic and 6 for Impact, which isn't anything to sneeze at. If you have the cash for any of it now I'd be willing to retcon that he owns this stuff if you want.
For tying for initiative, I believe there was the abbreviation ERIC, or Edge, Reaction, Intuition, Coin toss. :)
I am pretty sure Bogatir has the right of it; one of the many ways that Edge influences the game is as a tie-breaker.
Regarding healing Stun damage, I think that's not a thing, due to mages then being able to heal drain. However, if it specifically won't be able to heal Drain, I think the GM might be willing to think about it.
Also, I don't like this ork coming on my turf with his fancy arms. I will be going for him next, with a full-auto burst at him. Should give him something to think about.
@Retroactive Armour - Bogatir was left with practically nothing after I gave him most of the gear, so I can't buy anything. If he survives this one, he might look into purchasing some.
I'll allow you to heal Stun Damage, with the caveat that it can never be used to heal Burn. Also, thanks for the acronym for Initiative. I believe that means most of you are going before the second group of guards...
It actually specifically says that it cannot be used to heal damage resulting from magical Drain. That is why Blue has pain resist 3 and a pretty big drain resist pool.
Ah, then yeah you can go ahead and heal Stun damage if it already has that caveat. That seems like an odd ruling, otherwise.
Looking at the party, you all have higher Edge than the standard guards, so for the group above initiative looks like this, while downstairs is below:
I'll repost this in my next Gameplay post, just wanted to give you all a heads up.
Hey guys! This is me putting out feelers, looking for replacement players for another game of mine I'm running here on the boards. I had a player who had to leave and another who, as of right now, has gone missing. She may show up but the other person will not be coming back, so I'm looking for 1-2 new players for this game. What's the game? Glad you asked.
This is a game based on the XCOM video game series, primarily XCOM: Enemy Unknown and XCOM 2 as those are the ones I actually own. The players at the moment are former UN Peacekeepers that have been drafted into the XCOM Initiative after it was reinstated due to an alien incident which destroyed the city of Basra in Iraq. The game is set a few years in the future (I believe 2019 is when I set it, specifically?) but is basically in our world a few years down the line. If you were to join, you'd be taking on the role of another UN Peacekeeper who was involved in the Basra incident where an alien ship crashed into the city which destroyed it. Aliens were loose in the ruins of the city and killed quite a few people before the remains of the city were bombed by the UN and the initial damage was blamed on terrorists who had gained access to experimental weaponry. At the moment, the group is tracking down a traitor within the Peacekeepers who has kidnapped a terrorist leader they had previously kidnapped. This is mainly to introduce a secondary antagonist to the game in addition to the aliens. I intend for this game to be a merging of the kind of action you expect from XCOM with the more heavy roleplay element obviously present in a tabletop RPG. There are going to be plenty of situations where skills other than shooting a gun will be useful and even necessary, and you may be embroiled in situations with no clear-cut right solution. Of course, you ARE all soldiers. This also isn't a direct copy of any of the game's plots, so no worries there.
The system we're using is Savage Worlds. If you aren't familiar with it, it's a very simple game system (I'm talking build a character in 5-10 minutes simple) and is very easy to learn but still allows from complexity in character creation. I'm looking for characters that... vageuly fill the game roles but if you have an idea that doesn't fit within them I'm not going to exclude it. If you don't know the system but are still interested, I can send you a copy of the Core SW book (which is the only one in use at the moment) so you can look it over. If you're interested, do feel free to let me know here or (preferably) through PM with an idea for a character you might have. I can provide additional details on the game and what's happened so far that you'd be aware of if you're interested.
-Jon
Sounds good. Also, as someone in another game I'm running asked, here are the existing characters:
Existing characters are:
Gavril Vasilescu: Gavril is a French-Romanian who served with the French Foreign Legion in the Middle East combating terrorist threats before joining the UN Peacekeepers. He's a massive, muscle-bound machine gunner who also uses a shotgun and a tactical tomahawk in battle. He also speaks a large variety of languages and is currently serving as the group's translator since they're still in the Middle East. He's tough to take down and built to be a mix of Heavy/Assault from the new XCOM games.
Rosa Vasquez: A medic who originally worked with the LAPD SWAT team, she volunteered for service as a combat medic with the UN Peacekeepers in Basra. While still capable in combat with a submachine gun, she's less focused on outright damage and instead is a very good support character; she currently has abilities to make her a more capable healer and also to make her good at talking with people. She's building to be a Support class character, mainly.
Jacob Farrell: Jacob is a former IRA terrorist who ended up working with the Royal Engineering Corps and has been working with bringing technology to improve the lives of those in less developed areas of the Middle East. He was working with the Peacekeepers as a demolitions expert as well as having an advanced knowledge of repairing all sorts of technology. He has an assault rifle but as of now seems to certainly prefer his grenade launcher in combat. He's similar to the Grenadier in terms of roles from XCOM 2 but isn't exactly correlated to any specific class from the games.
Borax Bohan: Borax is a former member of a US-led black ops team devoted to looking for any trace of alien activity; the program was shut down after a lack of findings and believing the funding could be better spent elsewhere. Previously a US Marine, he joined the Peacekeepers after his unit was disbanded. He wields an assault rifle in combat but is focused on taking abilities that make him a more capable team leader, giving bonuses to other members of the team instead of being a pure damage dealer in combat. He's technically the 'highest ranking' member of the team and therefore the team leader, but command structure is a little looser than real life so it's mainly just his role because he's taking abilities to be good at it mechanically. He doesn't make decisions for the group or anything like that. He's sort of an Assault, but only somewhat.
The game has been pretty fun thus far. We had a little bit of tension not that long ago that carried on probably a little longer than it should have, but we've moved past it and we're getting back on track here. Feel free to submit an original concept, obviously, but if you would like to know the characters that have left the game and are interested in playing one, let me know and I can let you know about them as well; in short, we originally lost a shotgun-wielding Norwegian who was later replaced by a knife-and-pistol wielding German who has also had to leave, and a British sniper. Characters can obviously be from any UN nation, as they do have to be Peacekeepers at the moment as knowledge of the alien presence isn't known beyond the people in Basra and those commanding them. The characters just hit 20 XP so they're now at Seasoned rank.
Ooh, I'd love to play a Mossad sniper/infiltrator!
I would imagine Bogatir not being willing to surrender, so he'd probably be firing at the guards, while the rest of you escape. He'd also prefer it if you didn't get caught on your 'final' mission.
It's not that he's itching for a fight, just he wouldn't be willing to go in prison, but rather cover you or draw the fire to himself. Which means, I am totally getting more armour the moment it's available.
@the XCOM game - I checked it out when it came out, I think, but I think I had a couple too many games on my tab at the time, and it's looking like I might be stretched a bit too thin.
That being said, I did have a concept for another XCOM game in the works, an Tanzanian ranger involved with several wars in the continent, and being recruited in the XCOM initiative after being... exposed to extraterrestrial individials while on the job. I'll give it a thought, but I'll gladly let someone else take on that sweet XCOM opportunity.
Glad to hear there's some interest in XCOM. Anyone who is interested can communicate with me via PM for more in-depth stuff about builds and characters.
Also, when it comes to combat, I've been rolling your damage resistance, but I don't have to. Would you prefer to roll it yourself? I can just post the damage you're rolling against and you all can roll it yourselves. This allows you to default if you want too. I can also just assume you default if it will save you more health in the long run. Let me know what you guys would rather do and we'll roll with it that way.
I'm good with the GM rolling. So long as we get the opportunity to spend some edge if bad rolls would really frag us up, of course.
Expect a PM fairly soon, GM
As a heads up to those interested in XCOM, our sniper has (probably) shown back up. It looks like she wasn't getting any updates from the game threads. I'll make sure she's still interested in continuing but I think she may be back.
Given I have quite a few people interested, I... might take two people anyway.
With the outages, I've been a bit behind in all my games. I'll have a post up here tomorrow. Bronze, expect a PM from me as well.
Didn't get home until 11:30 and the site is being janky, don't have time to wait for it to work smoothly again. Sorry guys, tomorrow's the day. I've got a feeling.