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Welcome to my PbP game for SFS 1-16 Dreaming of the Future. Hope you would have a blast!
Before we start, I would to share some of my ground rules. (In spoiler tags to not take up space.)
PbP Matters
1. This discussion thread is open for all OOC matters, so no ooc tag needed. For OOC matters in the gameplay thread, please use the [ ooc ] tag.
2. Please post at least once a day. If you would be away, please let me know in advance where possible, and we can work something out. Otherwise, if you go missing, where necessary, I will bot your characters for the sake of the rest of everyone else. Thus, it is a good idea is to leave botting instructions for normal combat (with dice rolls), space combat and non-combat in your profile page beforehand.
3. If you have any disagreements over some of my GM calls or interpretation of the scenario, please take it to the discussion thread or, even better, pm me.
4. If you have played and/or GMed this scenario before, please do not metagame or spoil the plot. And please let me know.
5. I would have thought this would go without mentioning until I encountered this, so… It is the responsibility of the player to keep track of the game, including referencing the map on google slides. I understand that there are times where it is inconvenient to do so. In that case, please be as specific as you can as to where you wish your character to move, what actions to take, etc. If you regularly have issues with accessing the google slides, you might want to reconsider playing via PbP PFS/SFS, as there is always combat, and thus map dependent.
Normal Combat
6. Once surprise (if any) and initiative is determined, for the group of characters who can take actions, I would resolve actions in posting order, NOT initiative order. I used to do the latter but it doesn’t work that well in PbP, so am going with the former instead.
Space Combat
7. I run space combat somewhat differently from the RAW to facilitate posting rate. I’ll roll the initiative at the start for all ships based on the respective piloting checks. Then, once it reaches your ship’s turn, everyone will post but I will resolve the actions in the Engineering – Helm – Gunnery phase order. As such, while you can declare your actions in the open, please have your dice rolls in spoilers. The one exception are the gunners. Gunnery phase might need to wait for all the ship movements to finalise to determine which weapons are available for firing. So Gunners might want to hold your posting until then or set up a series of contingency actions depending on the final facing and positioning.
Character Choice
8. In PFS, I’ve pretty much left the players to sort out what characters to play because only in very rare scenarios do an unoptimized party spread have a significantly adverse effect. And players do generally sort it out among themselves. However, due to the nature of space combat, it is beneficial that there are characters who can cover each of the following: (1) charisma-skills, (2) piloting, (3) engineering, (4) computer, and (5) BAB/piloting rank + dex. Of course, it is not detrimental to be lacking in one or other, but if there are 6 mystics, then we might have a problem.
Rolls and Skill Checks
9. I would do your initiative rolls, as well as perception rolls for the purpose of determining surprise (if any).
10. On knowledge checks for general information, I would usually put them in spoilers with the necessary DCs. Just go ahead to roll, and I'll trust that you would resist reading them if the roll fails (or least not to metagame). (Don’t forget that you can make knowledge checks untrained for DC10.) There might be exceptions for plot-critical information though, where I would explicitly ask for checks and only reveal based on what was rolled. As for knowledge checks to identify creatures, I would put the most basic information in spoilers as well, i.e. identity and creature type, as well as one piece of useful information. If your roll would reveal more, I’ll provide in the next post. If you wish, you can ask for what information you want, e.g. DR, resistances, special attacks, etc.
11. On skill checks where there could be team effort involved, e.g. finding a hidden trail with survival, influencing attitude of NPCs with diplomacy, please be explicit when making the rolls whether you are attempting the check on your own, or whether you are aiding. (And take note of the pros and cons of either.) There might be situations where only one character is allowed to attempt the check (and the rest to aid) – I’ll state so explicitly if that’s the case.
12. On skill checks in general, if I feel you have roleplayed well, e.g. gave a good description of what your character does to search for a trail, came up with creative ways to befriend a hostile NPC, gave a very rousing speech, I would give bonuses, or even waive the DC altogether. :)
Roleplaying Matters
13. The maps and handouts link (at the top of the page) would display all the maps, handouts, pictures, etc as the scenario progresses. The most current page would be right on top, while previous ones would be left there for your reference. (Incidentally, Android and IOS has the Google Slides app in case you work off mobile devices.)
14. Please have your full character information up on your character's profile page for my vetting. Also, please have your stat block updated with the key information. I’m most inclined towards this particular template.
15. Finally, playing by pbp provides many advantages compared to face-to-face games, the chief one being having the time and space to flesh out your thoughts and actions. So please make use of this and have posts that are more than simply dice rolls. :)
Getting Started
Ok with that out of the way, a few tasks before we kick off.
A. Go to the Gameplay page and ninja dot, i.e. submit a post then delete it.
B. Go to the maps and handouts page and fill out the table there. (Don’t worry about the 3 boxes below the table, i.e. token, initiative and perception. I’ll take care of that.) For those coming from the previous game, I’ve ported some of your data over. Please update the rest.
C. In this Discussion thread, do your day job rolls (if any), and share whatever OOC information you would like the rest of the party to know about your character e.g. class, level, special abilities. If you have not decided what class to play, you can discuss that here as well. We’ll leave character descriptions and introductions to the gameplay thread later when we are about to start.
Fantastic!
GM Kuey - for reputation, do you want:
a) reputation for the slotted faction
b) total reputation
c) total reputation tier
d) reputation tier with the slotted faction?
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Alright, first post is up.
1. As we just get started, I would also like to sort out the default marching order. Based on my understanding of your characters, can I suggest the following:
A: Bagit
B: Special Circumstance
C: Zac
D: Sharmain
E: Rom
F: Omzig
Most of the time, I'll put you two-by-two. Please feel free to counter-propose. Basically, I put the melee in front (only Bagit), and then those hardier (higher AC/SP/HP) in front.
2. We won't have a starship combat just yet, but it's as good a time as ever to sort out what roles you'll like to take.
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When it comes to Starship combat, Sharmain has so far been a second gunner. She is happy to fill whatever role is needed.
Possible options:
Gunner +3
Pilot +7
Science/computers +2
She does have a Diplomacy of +7, Bluff and Intimidate +1 each, so while Captain is possible it is not really a great choice and is outside her experience.
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Rom is fine in the back.
It looks like he would be the best Captain, and do fine in science or engineering. And be a fine second gunner.
Computers +6 (1 ranks)
Diplomacy +10 + 1d6 (1 rank, Expertise)
Engineering +6 (1 ranks)
Intimidate +7 (1 rank)
Piloting +3 (0 ranks)
Gunnery +3
Gunners and pilots are most important, and we might have to do some atypical roles to do our best... Here's a suggestion.
Pilot: Sharmain
Gunner 1: Omzig
Gunner 2: Zac
Scientist: SC
Engineer: Bagit
Captain: Rom
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"Zac may be better than some on guns but he is brilliant in the engine room and nothing to sneeze at behind a computer. I have seen him hold a ship together and sweet talk it into providing extra power when and where it was needed. Not sure I would be here without him. Of course, he may want a change from all that..."
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I am wondering if the following would work?
Omzig - primary gunner
Zac - primary engineer
Special Circumstances - Captain
Rom - Science (and backup gunner when needed)
Bagit - secondary gunner (or backup other roles as needed)
Sharmain - pilot
It makes sense to have the second best pilot if the best is also the best gunner. I don't think it makes sense to sacrifice other roles just to have the second best gunner as the secondary gunner.
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Well, this is unfortunate. When I went to slot my boons, I realized I already had the boons for this scenario! Stupid GM credit. So, Rom is about to be replaced by a brand new Formian Technomancer! His sheet is all filled out at home, I just need to digitize him. I'll do that first thing tomorrow morning.
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Boons Slotted this Adventure
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Ally:
Faction: Wayfinders Champion
Personal: Scoured Stars Survivor - 1/day, free action, reduce resolve points to stabilize by 1 & gain 1d6HP
Social:
Starship: Defender of the Fleet - see below
Promotional: Starfinder Player Character Folio
Slotless:
OK team, with Defender of the Fleet we have a choice of:
Finest Computers: You can improve the computers onboard your starship by one step, from a mononode to a duonode, or from a duonode to a trinode. Alternatively, you can upgrade the computer's bonus by 1 while this boon is slotted (to a maximum of +8).
Finest Engines: You can increase the speed of your thrusters by one step. For example, T6 thrusters become T8 thrusters. You cannot use this boon to upgrade beyond the fastest thrusters commonly available for your size of starship (so you cannot upgrade past T14, S12, M12, L10, H10, G8 or C8 thrusters.)
Finest Weapons: Each of the weapons on your starship is the best available in the Starfinder fleet. When you roll damage, you can reroll any damage dice with a result of 1 on the die, you must keep the second result.
Of course, this decision may be best made once we know what ship/s we have available and what other Starship boons are slotted. If enough of us have this boon available we could potentially have a really awesome ship. :-)
Not able to really post right now. Hope to post late tomorrow morning but please bot me if needed.
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Bagit has not posted in more than a week, so I'm inclined to drop him from the game. However, that would leave us with 5 players. Are you ok with that? I could try to recruit one more but that person would only have 3 out of 4 quests in the chronicle sheet.
Also, for this upcoming starship combat, the following was the original proposed roles, but without Bagit, we are shot of a secondary gunner. How would you guys like to reorganise? I suggest moving Special C to secondary gunner since I think the captain's role is the most expendable.
Omzig - primary gunner
Zac - primary engineer
Special Circumstances - Captain
Rom - Science (and backup gunner when needed)
??? - secondary gunner (or backup other roles as needed)
Sharmain - pilot
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Ditto what Omzig said.
Also, we have Finest Engines thanks to Zac. We need to decide between Finest Computers and Finest Weapons. If I am reading it correctly, while I don't actually know what the first option for computers would really do, the +1 on computer bonus could be useful if that applies to all the computer bonuses.
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Majko, this quest no boon slots except for personal boons. Should have mentioned earlier.
Harec, you're welcomed if you don't mind just completing 3 of the 4 quests. I'm quite fine with whatever you want to play, although we do have 2 envoys already. :P
edit: oops, I forgot that Rom morphed into Majko. So only 1 envoy.
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Oh! Well, there goes my first chance to help make an awesome ship. Guess it will wait until next time.
Faction boons? I am guessing we still earn Fame and Prestige.
No promotional though, sigh.
Welcome to the crew, Heric. You will be joining:
Envoy 1
Mechanic 2
Mystic 2
Solarian 2
Technomancer 1
Bring who you feel like playing.
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Great, welcome Harec! I'll nudge things along at the gameplay thread but not too quickly to give you time to relook at the starship roles now that Harec's part of the team. But remember also that you can switch roles around during combat, and certain roles (engineering, science) can have more than one at a time.