... what does that even mean?
That’s an excellent question. Basically, it’s the shortest phrase I could come up with that expressed a lot of concepts of the game and world. Here’s the break-down:
Firefly-esque
You guys are going to be the rag-tag crew of a free-booting “trade” ship (read: you bounce from one scrap job to the next to keep Aerum in your tanks and your nose to the horizon). Whether you pilot a single large cargo aeirship, one cargo-carrying ship and a couple of smaller fighter-type outflyers, or some combination there-of is up to you guys. What’s most important is the feel of the crew. You guys are outcasts, riffraff, has-beens, hot-dogs or straight-up criminals trying to stay out from under the feet of the world’s much larger, well-funded outfits and organizations.
Steampunk
Blades, bullets, and brass. Top hats and trench coats.
You’ll be playing in the world of Aeru, but more importantly, you’ll be playing in the lands known as the Coalition of Aerite Realms… more commonly (and arrogantly) known as the Realms. Think Victorian Europe in feel as a baseline. Alongside government (traditionally monarchies) as big power players are industry and religion. A highly-established and organized Church of the Almighty doles out the Realms’ moral guidance as well as pushing its pushy fingers into all kinds of places it might or might not belong. The sciences are most notably taught at the universities, but the exploits of adventuring field experts make the front page for taking their scholarship out into the deep and dark places beyond the frontiers. Industry has also shaken things up. Advancements in manufacturing have upended the traditional balance of wealth, and the leaders of great houses and guilds can gather enough influence and power to make Crowns stop and listen.
And speaking of industry… the most pronounced technological toys for this game are firearms and aerships. Most modern armies are able to outfit their rank and file with at least some variant of a musket to go along with their melee weaponry. But for the more successful military outfits, bolt-action single-shot rifles see common use and two-man gatling gun emplacements often hold defensive positions. And for those willing to spend some real cash on personal protection, lever action rifles and six-shooters can be found.
And aerships… oh … aerships. Aerships make this game a thing. The discovery of Aerum—a chemical compound with unique lighter-than air properties—allowed the invention of aerum-ballast tanks. When that innovation was crossed with more traditional mechanical technologies, the aership was born. For this game’s aership, don’t think floating pirate ship (those would have existed, but they would have been the earliest practical types of aerships). For this game, let your imagination run wild. Visually, I want you to be able to style your ship as you want (see below for a few examples to get your juices flowing). From a combat standpoint, think WWII-like mechanics: dog-fights and bombers… then add huge, naval-seeming mega-ships that act as command centers and stuff.
Excellent opening example
Some kind of mid-sized combat cruiser. Possibly of piratical nature, by its construction and paint-job
Military gunship or heavy superiority fighter
Freebooter light transport, modified to have some (likely illegal) gunnery positions
some kind of light personal craft, likely recreational
Yep… that’s the sweet spot.
Dark Fantasy
Humans aren’t inherently magical, and no amount of finger-waggling will change it. Magic is the stuff of God and daemons. Basically, if you want to play a magic user, you’re pretty much going to have to choose between two basic options. First is playing a follower of the Almighty (clerics, inquisitors, war priests), all of whom work within the context of the Church. Or your character can be a dabbler in what is commonly known as Daemonism… folks who embrace and live within a dangerous and illegal subculture and—either through careful tinkering and experimentation or through a highly-rare and dangerous inborn talent—can pierce the veil between our realm and that of daemons and spirits to create supernatural affects.
This will have a distinct impact on available character classes, how they will function in the game/world, and most such choices will have some specific house rule implications.
Similarly, in the “enlightened” society of the Realms, you won’t see a ton of fantastical creatures. You’ll get some of the “smaller” magical beasties, but for the most part, day-to-day life is fairly mundane… and dictated by the larger machinations of the State, Church, and Industry. It’s only when you get out on the frontier that you could run into fey, dragons, and more.
Pathfinder variant, huh?
You caught that, did you? Well, that’s very astute of you. I’ve pretty much house ruled the hell out of this thing to make it feel and play the way I want it to. So first and foremost, I need people willing to roll with these changes to see what works and what doesn’t. Very few of the house rules are my own, more stuff I’ve begged, plundered, or straight-up jacked from other DM’s, groups, and games. Some are small (like Power Attack and Combat Expertise being freebies for anyone who qualifies) and some are really big (like modifications to the way some of the Attribute scores work) and some are in-between (like using Evil Lincoln’s strain/injury variant as well as his static enhancement bonus improvement rules). So what does this mean? Mostly, bear with me, and if we realize something we’re using is out of line, work with me to get it back into line. If that breaks your character concept… well, we’ll deal with that when/if it comes up.
Game tone and style
I have a few main goals for this game. First of all, I just want to have some fun. My version of that (as a newbish DM) is to have fast (and hopefully exciting) combats in a game where you guys can be as serious or snarky as you care to be. You guys live on the frontier of morality as well as civilization, so don’t feel like you should be concerned with writing up a storybook hero. You can, but then be prepared to explain what a hero is doing with this crew of misfits (I mean, Serenity had Book, right?).
For the sake of full disclosure, I have a personal goal of seeing this little game through to some kind of conclusion. I’m not promising a super-long campaign. Your adventures will likely have more of an episodic feel to them, each coming to a small conclusion… though they will also be tied to a set of larger issues or questions that will hopefully give you guys motivation to continue. I’ve tried and failed in a few attempts at DM’ing on the boards before, mostly due to losing confidence and motivation because of more complicated technical or adventure-building situations. I’ve intentionally kept this game small (and borrowed heavily from a few novels to help give me some guidelines), and will be drawing from a host of various solutions to keep the wheels on this thing.
Posting rate
I’m in a number of games as a player, and I think we all know that player participation is a lower investment than DM participation in general, but I want people who recognize the importance of player investment. As such, I’d like people who are able to contribute meaningfully at least once or twice per weekday in general. I have bad days at work, and can generally not post much if at all on weekends (and wouldn’t expect much more from my players) but loss of momentum kills these games, in my opinion. if you miss a day or two every now and then, or end up on a vacation or in a string of business at work, that’s fine. Let’s just all agree that if we’re in on this thing, we’re in… and we’ll all be proactive to keep it fun and alive. That’s a shared responsibility I hope we can all agree on.
And that’s where I have a few requests from you.
First of all, I’m borrowing (read: stealing) heavily from a book called Retribution Falls by Chris Wooding. If you’ve read it, you can still apply, just please keep your knowledge of the plot premise, twists, and turns to yourself. A solid ability to split IC knowledge from OOC knowledge is a must. I’d even appreciate it if you’d tell me if this is the case, just so we’re on the same page. If you haven’t read it, it’s a pretty fun read, but please don’t read it if you plan to play in this game… it’d spoil too much. ;)
Secondly, embrace the game for what it’s supposed to be… some light-hearted, fast-paced fun. I’m not an ace DM, nor do I have all that much experience. I have a pretty strong grasp of the rules of Pathfinder (hardly infallible), but very little (to no) practical experience behind the screen. So bear with me. I don’t aim to railroad, and I don’t think that’ll be an issue, but roll with it if I need you guys to take some steps in a situation I haven’t foreseen or where your own creativity has me stumped. It may not happen, but then, like I said, I’m newbish.
