I have both the old FASA Doctor Who RPG and the newer one from Cubicle 7. I was curious if other folks out there ever ran a long term weekly Who campaign or if they've mostly played it as one shots/convention games? Which rules did you use? What style of game did you run? For example, all PCs were companions, one PC was a Time Lord, you used characters from the show such as the Doctor or all original characters, more space travel or more time travel to Earth's past and future, that sort of thing.
Just on a Who kick at the moment and would enjoy hearing how my fellow gamers have played in the Who universe.
L
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I have run a couple of linked scenarios at conventions, the basic set up is that the PCs (4 in the first scenario) are UNIT, Torchwood and civilians advisors who manage to get hold of a TARDIS. The second scenario has an alien PC that was in the TARDIS when it was sent to Earth.
So basically the set up of Who, but without the Doctor himself.
I hope I don't get anyone upset or mad... but I regard FASA's Doctor Who RPG as having, by far, the worst system I've ever played. I tested it out solo, and used it for a one-shot with a couple of friends, but that was about it.
So later, when my high school friends (not the same ones with whom I played the FASA game) and I decided to run a daily lunchtime Doctor Who campaign, I used my favorite engine at the time, MEGS.
Ah, the fun we had! One PC was the Doctor, and the others were human companions. There were only 7 Doctors at that time, and we decided to run this in the Doctor's future, so we made up a 9th Doctor. (We knew that we would probably contradict future continuity, of course, but who cares?) I set the campaign mostly in space, which is the way I like Who. I mean, if you have the whole universe within your reach, with hundreds of habitable worlds you can visit, why keep returning to the same planet? Only one adventure was set on Earth, in the future.
Were the adventures more of the mystery/puzzle solving variety?
Diplomacy?
Exploration?
Funny you should ask. I've been dying to describe the high point of that campaign (and in fact, have briefly described it previously on these boards.)
At the time that I ran that MEGS / Doctor Who campaign, I had recently started a phase in which I felt that combat in RPGs was generally unsatisfying. It sometimes led to character deaths, which could result in hard feelings and awkward logistical problems in running, and playing in, a campaign. Furthermore, I felt that the vast majority of battles in RPGs were forgotten quickly, while the more memorable parts involved roleplaying, and generally, the interactive telling of a story. (Many years later, I was to reverse that opinion almost completely, but that's another story.)
However, my players at the time (and in fact, MOST of the players I've RPed with over the course of my life) wanted more combat and more small-scale exploration.
So when I ran the first few adventures in that Doctor Who campaign, I included little combat, and instead had PC / NPC interaction, diplomacy, problem solving, skill checks, etc.
So one day, I got the inevitable complaint that there wasn't enough combat. It was the first of many, many times that I would get that complaint over the years. At the time, I thought: "You THINK you want combat! What if your character gets killed, or nearly killed, because of a series of bad die rolls? That will change your mind! If you want combat, I'll give you combat, and you'll be sorry you asked!"
So I set up a BIG battle. The adventure I was running at the time was set on Vortis, so I gave the players allies and foes, including Menoptera, devolved Menoptera, Zarbi, Venom Grubs (a.k.a. Larva Guns), etc.
In a way, my fears were realized in that battle. The bad guys were winning, and one of the PCs was nearly killed. As it was, he was rendered unconscious and had to sit out the rest of the adventure.
Actually, I learned several important things from that battle. One was how to fudge it. In the past, I had often fudged die rolls, but at that time, I had recently given up that practice, deciding that it was a bad habit. During this Vortis battle, it occured to me that there was another way to fudge it. After all, the PCs had many NPC allies in that battle. I had an idea or three of how the good guys could turn the tide. I was hoping that the players would think of one of those ideas, but they didn't. Then it occurred to me to let the NPC allies think of one of those ideas. As it happened, this wasn't necessary, as the players got some lucky die rolls that resulted in a win. But that was when I first realized that an NPC ally could "think of" an idea, and I used that technique for many years thereafter. (This was, of course, a last resort, only to be used when it was clear that the players wouldn't think of the idea.)
But the darnedest thing about that battle was the comment a player made about it as soon as it was all over. This was the same player whose character had nearly been killed. He said "You mean... that's it?"
I was flabbergasted. I said "What do you mean "that's it"?!? The battle took us so long to complete, and your character was nearly killed!" What did he want, anyway? For me to have them attacked by more bad guys, so that his character would REALLY get killed?
But clearly, near-death experiences would not deter players from requesting more combat. It would take many more years, and many more players requesting more combat, and several experiences, before THAT lesson would truly hit home for me. However, that comment "You mean... that's it?" was the first such experience.
But the darnedest thing was that here I had thought that combat was so forgettable, and yet, that battle was the high point of that campaign for me, lingering in my memory for decades, as this post can attest.
I have the cubical 7 game, I haven't got to run a game yet. I was thinking of using Jenny (The Doctors Daughter) as having found a broken Tardis that she has very little control over and gathering a group of companions to help her.
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I ran a torchwood game using mostly pathfinder and some elements of the cubicle 7. I have played in a cubicle 7 game and did enjoy the system as a one shot.
As far as the characters it was based on the Tom Baker episode Talons of Weng Chiang meets the newly formed torchwood of the 1800s. It was a play by post and can probably find it on here. I had to stop for a while due to divorce, but it was successfull for a few months.
I always thought the best way to play a Who campaign was for the pcs to be humans (possibly from different historical eras - possibly not) who somehow come into possession of a TARDIS, with some kind of automated AI (?) teaching them (badly) how to use it thinking they're it's actual new (Time Lord) owners.
Gives you freedom, you can have Time Lord remnants as long term foes (trying to get the TARDIS back), and no need for one player to be king of the hill at the expense of everyone else.
TARDIS on auto pilot/helping non-Time Lord PCs control it is an interesting idea Rockheimr. Maybe it is the Doctor's actual TARDIS and the PCs are indirectly helping him get it back, collecting something he needs to be freed from some kind of trap.
I also kind of like the idea of the Celestial Intervention Agency setup in the FASA game as a group looking to help resolve issues that threaten history and eliminate thread to temporal nexus points.
Maybe play a game where the PCs are a bunch of Time Lord repo-men looking to catch up to the Doctor to take back his TARDIS. :-)
TARDIS on auto pilot/helping non-Time Lord PCs control it is an interesting idea Rockheimr. Maybe it is the Doctor's actual TARDIS and the PCs are indirectly helping him get it back, collecting something he needs to be freed from some kind of trap.
Kind of like in "Blink"? That's an intriguing idea.
Still, somehow, I just don't think that a Doctor Who story would be much fun to me - in an RPG or in a TV episode or book or whatever - without a Time Lord to explain what's going on. I'm sure it can work, but I just wouldn't like it.
I do think that for me at least whatever the campaign, at some point there needs to be at least a cameo of some of the signature enemies of the Doctor - in particular Daleks, Cybermen and/or Sontarans - and some use of a TARDIS. Otherwise it's like Star Wars without droids and lightsabers or Star Trek without transporters.
The thing with using Jenny as the NPC Time Lord is she doesn't have the Education or the Doctor does and she needs people to help her understand what is going on around her.
Giving Jenny a broken Tardis means that you can bump them all over the universe and also - Jenny has two goals find the Doctor and get some help or tips on piloting the Tardis properly (ha ha) and getting her Tardis fixed.