So, Star Wars is on hiatus because Scion 2 has like 68% dropped and incomplete rules don't scare me.
With our old group of fated mortals we did 4/6th of the Visitations last weekend of which highlights include naked Morrigan explaining death isn't personal, superbitch Aphrodite on her way to Milan, Kindly Grandpa Hades handing out chocolate and puppies, and a Merlin lecture about fighting fate (irony alert).
Our remaining Heroes are a clone of Sun Wukong who as such will not be having a Visitation per se because, uh, already aware of everything and our farmgirl daughter of Maudjee-Kawiss. Good ol' MK totally forgot about his little girl so in typical slapdash parental fashion he's just going to throw her to the lions (perhaps not literal). Along with the rest of the Heroes, because why not?
I have three long term arcs in play but what I am (once again) fishing for is episode/adventure ideas. The group is headquartered in Omaha, but no need to limit yourselves. Omaha happens to have one of the world's main gateways so travel isn't really that difficult (either way).
I don't know anything about Scion 2, but based off what you wrote I think I need to correct this deficiency immediately.
飛べねぇ豚はただの豚だ。
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
Want to build up a Slaaneshi leimotif playlist. So far I got Cherry Pie by Warrant and Like an Animal (Fuck like a Beast) by WASP. I kind of want to base the playlist around a Glam Rock/Hair Metal selection. Problem is I don't listen to a lot of Glam Rock although I like the sound. I think I want to keep Hard Rock out as some bands like ACDC are almost too Blues based for the sound I'm going for. Speed is a Slaanesh thing so Speed Metal would probably fit.
Anyone got any favorite Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll type songs they like?
Edit: obviously need some Poison E2: Tesla is Glam? No, wait that fits. Oh “Cumin’ Atchu Live” might be a good intro song for the glam sorcerer. Chain it with Smite (Lightning). Although it’s not really themed after anything besides “I’m bad”. E3: also got motif songs for the Rook. Obviously “One”. “Creeping Death”, “Four Horsemen”, “Cyanide”, “Seek and Destroy” (reaching), “Heart of Darkness”, “The Evil that Men Do”, and a couple others. Wu’s motif is the Wu Tang 36 Chambers of Death album. Literally the entire album.
E4: Khorne- “Raining Blood”; demon/warp summoning in general- “The Thing that Should not Be”, “Number of the Beast”, and “Hells’ Bells”. E5: If I want to be really blunt about sorcery or psyker stuff about, “I got my Mojo Workin”
I don't know anything about Scion 2, but based off what you wrote I think I need to correct this deficiency immediately.
Imagine a really well-written Storyteller-based mechanical engine, but then mated to an urban fantasy setting based in myth and legend instead of GRIMDARK urban fantasy or Kitchen Sink Fantasy.
I don't know anything about Scion 2, but based off what you wrote I think I need to correct this deficiency immediately.
Imagine a really well-written Storyteller-based mechanical engine, but then mated to an urban fantasy setting based in myth and legend instead of GRIMDARK urban fantasy or Kitchen Sink Fantasy.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
So is Scion like Percy Jackson: The Game of mythical worlds secretly coinciding with the mundane world?
Also yey I got to use the glam sorcerer. Months I have been waiting. He had a good entrance. He didn’t explode and completely fuck up like the psyker bard.
One of my players wanted to fight on his side because he was disposing a group of dark eldar that almost killed a few of their group. I had to explain enemy of my enemy doesn’t work with Chaos.
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JacobkoshGamble a stamp.I can show you how to be a real man!Moderatormod
Yeah, it's basically like, gods are real, all the pantheons are real, one of them is secretly your dad, New York is being attacked by a hydra, go.
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BrodyThe WatchThe First ShoreRegistered Userregular
So... American Gods the roleplaying game?
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
Percy Jackson the RPG is a relatively good elevator pitch.
Scion 2 benefits from the least hat-on-butt Story* system as well.
Child of a god isn't the only avenue, though. You can also be a god's chosen champion, an incarnation, a hero of legend reborn, a mortal who answers the call, etc.
If I had to write a trailer bumper it'd probably go...
IN A WORLD WHERE EVERY STORY IS TRUE
Including the nightmares
New heroes will rise
Old gods will fall
Cute dogs will get pet
Figures out of myth and legend will gather
And hold business meetings
Like they're regular people
Aww, cute
But then engage in climactic battles
Against ancient evils
And overpriced mobile phone service plans
One of the things I enjoy about it is that if a player decides their character's way of "fighting" is by correcting small injustices like a broken fence, it can easily snowball into battling a Fomori lordling through the subway of a city that isn't supposed to have a subway. But it can also simply be a matter of dealing with all of the bureaucratic red tape the forces of darkness put between Mrs. Jackson and her fence.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
Alright so Edge of the Empire. I am possibly getting into a friend’s game. My character concept: corporatist Sith with the look and mannerisms of agent Smith. Ayn Rand’s wet dream. From what my bud tells me, this would work pretty well with the current party.
The Sith are stupid. The Rule of Two is insipid. The Kotor sith empires were purile. The Dark Side of the force has potential and the ideology of the Sith is empowering. It just needs its moronic aspects curved. Basically my guy wants to use the force as a tool and build his own type of empire working within the current regime rather than wage some damn fool war.
He does not force the Jedi or other Sith to submit to him. We’re not doing that anymore. If they want to work for Mecorp then that’s fine as long as they are productive and increase our margins. He’s not going to try to corrupt Jedi to the dark side by extolling the dark side’s virtues. He might bring some people over by using their greed and ambition against them, but not to the purpose of bring them some dogma.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
In Edge of the Empire's timeline probably that's how it worked. The red lightsaber and junk can come into it later or not at all.
Edit: Non-sequitur to DH. I would love to have the Rook and the samurai marine meet up. "I lost my family," the Rook says. Katoichi responds, "My entire planet, chapter, and anyone I cared about was destroyed by my best friend."
"You win." E2: Now that I think about it I have like four NPCs and a PC with dead families. I need to branch out. It's so easy though. Also, I like the idea of (relative) Space Marine dropout so much that I have two characters with that as part of their backstory. One is a Fenrisian social viking type that is over it, the other is a Sacrisian (Storm Wardens) Scottish highlander type that is not.
Yeah, it's basically like, gods are real, all the pantheons are real, one of them is secretly your dad, New York is being attacked by a hydra, go.
Hail hydra!
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
If y’all wanted to know where I got my objectivist Sith from, here’s the Sith code
Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.
Also Taxation is Theft
Malkar Tavik was born to a poor mining family. His father was a kind man. A generous man. A trusting man. His trust in the good of others led him to an early grave working a secret mining site on Korriban. Malkar saw he was too weak to help him or his ailing mother out of the chains of a mining corporation working under the Empire. Malkar was forced to take up his debt.
He discovered a buried sarcophagus one day. Out of it he found a tome with faded writing held by a corpse fresher than it should have been. Someone had taken time to translate the tome into basic. “Qotsisajak” was written on one side of the cover. On another side it said “Code of the Sith.” Someone wanted it buried. He took it.
Now Malkar had always felt something around him. His mother told him to keep it secret. He dabbled with what he could do when he was away from prying eyes. Something about that tome awoke something in him. Not just what he could do, but it awoke in him something else. Passion. A thirst for power. His drudgery filled misery burned out of him.
He escaped from Korriban. His mother did not.
He found himself on the run for a few years. Had run-ins with plenty of Imperials looking to hunt force sensitives. He found himself on Nar Shaadaa (where the GM’s current party is) and began to make his name. A new name, free from his father’s weakness. He found it written in the tome he still carries to this day “Breek Galto”. A sith’s former name.
He had been studying anything he could have found on the old Sith. They were damn fools. Going their way meant going against the Emperor and his black leather lap dog. No sir, he wasn’t going to die trying to take a crown. He’d make his own.
Edit: non-sequitur: the only thing I give praise to DH2E’s influence system (which would be fine if it also had a currency system) is no one carries ten lasguns in their backpack to sell them to PDF surplus or some shit. Now that’s immersion breaking. E2: have the want for the glam sorcerer to mind control people into a stadium for a mass sacrifice with “Come as You Are”. He has range. E3: also have a thing where his top minions are his biological sons using that Slaanesh magic to unsterilize himself and get with other cult leaders. Stole the idea of the mirror guard from Warhammer Fantasy. What makes them creepy is that his children almost clones of him, sound almost like him, and grow in very few years. (E5: Kind of like the unholy version of regular Astartes now that I think about it.) E4: Also found a group name for the minions of one of my other big bads. The Matchstick Men. They specifically hunt my first group. There are pictures with Matchstick Men and them. All I ever see is them and my party. Also their leader is a pyromancer type with a dramatic flair and fiery hair.
Need. I keep my stuff in the little dice boxes you get them in. I would lose them a lot.
They cinch closed too!
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
We had a very nice short side session today. We had a nice little bit of world building, some characterization, and a chase scene that ended with a man getting beat like the printer in Office Space.
This was set a month before my players’ concurrent campaigns. I got to make character references to people they knew or know. That man getting beat was the Rook in vigilante: year one a garb gunning down doctors in the street after setting a bomb to lure them out. I am trying to get my first party to still see him as a crazy terrorist type like everyone else in this continuity’s canon does, but I spilled the beans to a player from my second party after the session. His new character was incorporated as a part of another inquisitor’s warband. So when in an interrogation the inquisitor and this guy was in, I cut to the character the other player was playing so I didn’t spoil anything when that player’s party meets this man in their campaign with full kit and caboodle. So that player inside the room got to know everything and promised me he’s keeping it a secret. All the other player knows is the newer player got disarmed, the other inquisitor got head butted real hard in the face, and that guy’s on the run.
What actually happened was after finally being made to say something in interrogation and proving his statements with something he had, he explained himself fully. That inquisitor decided to help his crusade and is the one outfitting him with info, weapons, armour, and equipment like Nick Fury sometimes did with Frank. He even gives him his signature armored bubonic plague doctor type helmet with helpful tools in it.
I even got to explain that the helmet and the crows foot symbol (he spray paints in white on his chest and after killings) came from his kasrkin unit spending time between redeployment on a feudal world. He was explained by a local that wherever that mask was, plague was, and that those natives on planet saw it like a spectre of death had come to them. He regarded it as a curiosity back then, but decided to become that spectre of death to spread a message to all heretics, criminals, and those who helped them in poisoning his family. I am coming. You will not escape me.
Your god(s) will not save you.
Also I added to his backstory that he attempted to kill himself after the mercy killing of his family from Nurgle rot. He could not deal. He messed up and instead blew out a chunk of his frontal lobe, giving him a constant EED state. Although much like Frank he also refrains from killing innocents and is precise.
Kadoken on
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
My Genesys group is funny. 3/4 of them are engineers, so they can wander down the decision paralysis road if I let them. In this situation they were about ready to assault some bandits who were in a defensive position in a chamber while the players were around the corner. They had flashbangs that they had argued about using throughout the entire dungeon. They were finally at the end and successfully peaked around the corner using stealth and knew the lay of the land, but couldn't decide if they should throw the flashbang or run in and do a frontal assault, and were kind of going back and forth. I had the person with the highest knowledge make a roll and he got a couple successes so I looked him straight in the eye and told him deadpan now would be a good time to use one of those flashbangs.
Once that paralysis had been broken the group proceeded to kick ass and take names, and I did get to grievously wound a player with an arrow because he just stood in the middle of the room shooting his rifle, so that was fun.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
Sounds like people I know.
I use the skill “Logic” to a similar effect. If they’ve not quite understood clues I’ve laid out together or how I hope they perceive a situation then when they pass I spell it out. If someone high up is lying through their teeth, your characters noticed, I made it very clear when they’re lying, say straight up “this man has been away on suspicious days apparently ‘out sick’”, and for some reason they want to go talk to someone they would have no easy access to that the lying character mentioned offhand that would take days to get to then it’s time to let their characters (and the GM in their brain) do the thinking and say, “You should follow the lying asshole.”
Also what setting is your Genesys in?
Kadoken on
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
I use the skill “Logic” to a similar effect. If they’ve not quite understood clues I’ve laid out together or how I hope they perceive a situation then when they pass I spell it out. If someone high up is lying through their teeth, your characters noticed, I made it very clear when they’re lying, say straight up “this man has been away on suspicious days apparently ‘out sick’”, and for some reason they want to go talk to someone they would have no easy access to that the lying character mentioned offhand that would take days to get to then it’s time to let their characters (and the GM in their brain) do the thinking and say, “You should follow the lying asshole.”
Also what setting is your Genesys in?
I'm doing a homebrew fantasy pirates/age of sail campaign. It's low magic in the sense that there was a calamity a few thousand years ago and the magic disappeared, though the world is still fantastical, and there are elves, dwarves and orcs along with other shit. I'm stealing lore and history liberally from the Inner Sea module from pathfinder.
My guys are currently crew for a captain, and during session zero I made it clear I would be driving the narrative for the first few sessions while we all figured out the game and mechanics, then it would open up for them and we would go from there, they're still getting tons of stuff to do, but their captain (me) is calling the high level shots right now.
The big overarching plot is that there used to be a slaving guild, but they disappeared years ago, but people are still getting abducted. What's happening is this guild unearthed some artifact that summoned the BBEG and they are now capturing people to use in mass sacrifices to summon some doom creature that was banished during the cataclysm.
At a point soon they are going to be attacked and sunk in a battle in the middle of a maelstrom and will end up talking to my version of Davy Jones. They'll get the mission to stop this shit, get their own cool custom ship and also gain powers, which I'm going to steal straight from Force and Destiny, so They'll be Jedi Pirates. They'll also be able to assemble a crew and have their own stronghold.
That sounds awesome. How do your handle your monsters?
I'm playing around with a sky pirates setting that I'm excited about. But I'm hung up on the work needed to stat out the stable of "normal" fantasy monsters and races. I'm using D&D as an inspirational launching point but the Genesys beastiary is lacking in comparison.
Like, I want cloud giants riding floaty chariots pulled by rocs. I just don't want to go through the effort to essentially re-create the D&D monster manual in Genesys.
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
Right now They've just had encounters with people, We've only had a handful of sessions so far, the fantastical stuff is still fantastical. I had heard that the new Fantasy setting had just game out for Genesys, and I wonder if it has monster stat stuff. Realms of Terrinoth.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
I got the song for the psyker bard to blast at the Slaaneshi daemon. “Kicks” by Paul Revere and the Raiders. The narc-est song of the 60s.
If I want to go really silly, and I do, then a player’s exorcism will require him to use his willpower to sing Vanilla Fudge’s “Keep Me Hanging On” to get the daemon out.
E: and I’ll give him bonuses to willpower if his player sings along as best as he can.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
Those are fun but Kicks and Hanging On are thematically appropriate. Kicks is about a narc douchebag telling a girl she doesn’t need drugs and should go straight; which would be appropriate to blast at a Slaaneshi daemon being the emodiment of sense freaks.
Hanging on is about a tired man telling his girlfriend who he clearly doesn’t love and she clearly doesn’t love him to just leave. My player has had this daemon floating around him plaguing his dreams and making him more insane over time since he won’t let it possess him. Get out is a pretty straightforward message.
Now, I am going to see if this player is willing to possibly sacrifice his character. Near the end of this module, the thing allowing the daemon to fuck about in his brain will be shut off. It was designed to wear the character down by a Slaaneshi cult mistress but she had to be in proximity to him. It was part of the overall bad guy group’s plan to root out and destroy the inquisitorial presence on the planet they’re on. They know their faces and have been spying on them due to them messing up a module earlier.
The daemon is basically going to offer to, meta-wise, spoil almost everything about the series of campaigns I have made. The daemon is connected to the grand conspiracy that the mistress was inducted into after that botched module. She knows the major members, their activities, and their overall plans. What she knows, this daemon knows.
The daemon is also a tricksy fuck and may tell half truths. The next module I have designed is a the Raid/Dredd situation where they’re tricked into a high rise hab block and have to fight for their lives. However, that module will also begin or end with the street ambush I have been planning forever that will use the weapons they failed to prevent being stolen in that botched module used against them. This will also introduce an ongoing antagonist who has been tasked specifically to kill these guys and carry out missions for one of the masters of the Tarot, the grand conspiracy. If he asks and says that a trap has been set for them, which one does he mean?
HOWEVER, doing this means he will be possessed, and possessed hard. The splat book Enemies Beyond has rules for possessions.
E: you know what Hellfire would be good for though? The leader of the Matchstick Men, who is a pyromancer showman type.
E2: I chose the samurai marine’s name, Katoichi, because it sounds like offbrand “Satoichi” and I like the idea of something latin sounding with Kato (Cato) mixed in with the Imperium’s minor Roman Empire theme. I looked up the etymology, and apparently “Kato” means “add/increase”. I designed him because for some reason 40k does not have a samurai themed space marine chapter with any lore and I wanted a reason for the players to reasonably call upon a Deathwatch reinforcement character. Ichi (from my Karate training) means “one”. So he’s their “Plus One”.
So the kids are all right. They took down a baby wendigo because Maudjee-Kawiss is an asshole and throwing his peeps in against challenges without any prep is kind of his jam.
I've got plenty of toys to set up the first major plot arc. Which means all of the visitations are complete and everyone is "fully geared" in the sense of having all of their birthrights.
I did find that a slightly-weakened Monster was not a significant challenge for the group, but that just means I need to try to throw "large amount of mooks and professionals" at them and see how that goes.
As this is a fairly raw and just-barely-tested game engine I'm finding that some questions will need to be answered. We're providing feedback but it's not clear how much they can incorporate before the manuscript has to go to print.
Only a few hiccups and stumbles in our first fight outing; once everyone gets used to the way initiative slots belong to band and foes and then can be jumbled up however they and the Storyguide like it makes for somewhat dynamic combat that involves a lot of teamwork. I am thinking Momentum works a bit more slickly when you're at a table and can hurl tokens around, but group momentum seems like a decent salve on trying to track multiple momentum pools.
webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Ooooh I'm going to add in the Heroic Abilities from Realms of Terrinoth. I'll have to engineer my players first brush with real magic in this setting, and they'll each get to remember some event from their childhood, that they blocked off from themselves, and it will unlock a related Heroic Ability. I'm really excited.
Then of course later they'll become full on Jedi/Sith, but this will be a nice middle step.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
I am the reverse Parker Lewis.
I finally learned today one of my players is in DH for the combat. After two years of off and on play. That has clashed with my narrative priority but I can accomodate him. I suggested if he wanted more of a variety in a character type he should try a psyker. He wants to stick with his sniper type guy who does one thing. That’s okay.
I also suggested that he join the little side mini-sodes I have planned where he could be in combat heavy sessions with not-Punisher in a ganger hideout and a space marine squad in a ork pirate ship. That sounds right up his alley, adds some variety to combat, and helps me establish these characters showing up in their campaign. He doesn’t want to. He really only wants to play that character. I also have offered him little solo minisodes in the past showing him growing up and being a western type bounty hunter to build his backstory and offer some Western/Mad Max type shootbangs. He has refused.
I guess I’m relegating him to the bodyguard since my other players have expressed interest more in the narrative, character, and world building side of things. I’ll try to get him more shootbangs, he might love the Raid/Dredd thing about to go down and the street ambush, but dang. I am offering to do for him what he apparently likes but he won’t bite.
I finally learned today one of my players is in DH for the combat. After two years of off and on play. That has clashed with my narrative priority but I can accomodate him. I suggested if he wanted more of a variety in a character type he should try a psyker. He wants to stick with his sniper type guy who does one thing. That’s okay.
I also suggested that he join the little side mini-sodes I have planned where he could be in combat heavy sessions with not-Punisher in a ganger hideout and a space marine squad in a ork pirate ship. That sounds right up his alley, adds some variety to combat, and helps me establish these characters showing up in their campaign. He doesn’t want to. He really only wants to play that character. I also have offered him little solo minisodes in the past showing him growing up and being a western type bounty hunter to build his backstory and offer some Western/Mad Max type shootbangs. He has refused.
I guess I’m relegating him to the bodyguard since my other players have expressed interest more in the narrative, character, and world building side of things. I’ll try to get him more shootbangs, he might love the Raid/Dredd thing about to go down and the street ambush, but dang. I am offering to do for him what he apparently likes but he won’t bite.
I can’t win.
I have a player like that now in my D&D campaign. He basically wants to play a character with access to fireball, and pretty much is only interested in casting fireball at things.
I've had *some* success with asking about his character outside of the game, and then bringing those elements to the forefront in the game. Oh, that drill instructor you had during your training that you hated? Cool, he's the next quest giver. Childhood crush? Deadly assassin going for a target you're paid to protect.
That kind of thing. I don't know. Some people are just in the game for very specific reasons. I try to just make sure everyone is having fun, and not judge how they go about getting that fun accomplished.
Diagnosed with AML on 6/1/12. Read about it: www.effleukemia.com
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited April 2018
Is he...
Is he the lady from Konosuba?
E: Also I’m not judging him for not getting into the narrative aspects anymore. I just want to help him.
I feel like people enjoying the simple pleasures of a fireball is a positive. Rolling it into a character trait a la Megumin is even better. I feel like as a DM for that kind of person I'd start making all sorts of stuff to support/give some variety to that playstyle. That kind of stuff really gets me going.
Also, my players got me character bios and we've got a couple with superhero backgrounds and I feel like I should ask how hard I can go on it before inflicting definitely not vampirism on one of them.
E: Also I’m not judging him for not getting into the narrative aspects anymore. I just want to help him.
Honestly, I'm super mad I never thought to roll his character that way. Make a custom class where he just gets uber fireball and passes out every time. Takes 3 rounds to cast, so people have to protect him, and then he just blows everything up. Might have been fun!
Diagnosed with AML on 6/1/12. Read about it: www.effleukemia.com
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
Edit: gorram how is this chant not in a song?
“Buboes, phlegm, blood and guts! Boils, bogeys, rot and pus! Blisters, fevers, weeping sores! From your wounds the fester pours.”
Definitely going to use that for the intro. Give it a good 'ol hoarse screm.
Posts
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
With our old group of fated mortals we did 4/6th of the Visitations last weekend of which highlights include naked Morrigan explaining death isn't personal, superbitch Aphrodite on her way to Milan, Kindly Grandpa Hades handing out chocolate and puppies, and a Merlin lecture about fighting fate (irony alert).
Our remaining Heroes are a clone of Sun Wukong who as such will not be having a Visitation per se because, uh, already aware of everything and our farmgirl daughter of Maudjee-Kawiss. Good ol' MK totally forgot about his little girl so in typical slapdash parental fashion he's just going to throw her to the lions (perhaps not literal). Along with the rest of the Heroes, because why not?
I have three long term arcs in play but what I am (once again) fishing for is episode/adventure ideas. The group is headquartered in Omaha, but no need to limit yourselves. Omaha happens to have one of the world's main gateways so travel isn't really that difficult (either way).
Anyone got any favorite Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll type songs they like?
Edit: obviously need some Poison E2: Tesla is Glam? No, wait that fits. Oh “Cumin’ Atchu Live” might be a good intro song for the glam sorcerer. Chain it with Smite (Lightning). Although it’s not really themed after anything besides “I’m bad”. E3: also got motif songs for the Rook. Obviously “One”. “Creeping Death”, “Four Horsemen”, “Cyanide”, “Seek and Destroy” (reaching), “Heart of Darkness”, “The Evil that Men Do”, and a couple others. Wu’s motif is the Wu Tang 36 Chambers of Death album. Literally the entire album.
E4: Khorne- “Raining Blood”; demon/warp summoning in general- “The Thing that Should not Be”, “Number of the Beast”, and “Hells’ Bells”. E5: If I want to be really blunt about sorcery or psyker stuff about, “I got my Mojo Workin”
Yeah that sounds pretty dope.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Also yey I got to use the glam sorcerer. Months I have been waiting. He had a good entrance. He didn’t explode and completely fuck up like the psyker bard.
One of my players wanted to fight on his side because he was disposing a group of dark eldar that almost killed a few of their group. I had to explain enemy of my enemy doesn’t work with Chaos.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Scion 2 benefits from the least hat-on-butt Story* system as well.
Child of a god isn't the only avenue, though. You can also be a god's chosen champion, an incarnation, a hero of legend reborn, a mortal who answers the call, etc.
If I had to write a trailer bumper it'd probably go...
Including the nightmares
New heroes will rise
Old gods will fall
Cute dogs will get pet
Figures out of myth and legend will gather
And hold business meetings
Like they're regular people
Aww, cute
But then engage in climactic battles
Against ancient evils
And overpriced mobile phone service plans
One of the things I enjoy about it is that if a player decides their character's way of "fighting" is by correcting small injustices like a broken fence, it can easily snowball into battling a Fomori lordling through the subway of a city that isn't supposed to have a subway. But it can also simply be a matter of dealing with all of the bureaucratic red tape the forces of darkness put between Mrs. Jackson and her fence.
The Sith are stupid. The Rule of Two is insipid. The Kotor sith empires were purile. The Dark Side of the force has potential and the ideology of the Sith is empowering. It just needs its moronic aspects curved. Basically my guy wants to use the force as a tool and build his own type of empire working within the current regime rather than wage some damn fool war.
He does not force the Jedi or other Sith to submit to him. We’re not doing that anymore. If they want to work for Mecorp then that’s fine as long as they are productive and increase our margins. He’s not going to try to corrupt Jedi to the dark side by extolling the dark side’s virtues. He might bring some people over by using their greed and ambition against them, but not to the purpose of bring them some dogma.
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
Edit: Non-sequitur to DH. I would love to have the Rook and the samurai marine meet up. "I lost my family," the Rook says. Katoichi responds, "My entire planet, chapter, and anyone I cared about was destroyed by my best friend."
"You win." E2: Now that I think about it I have like four NPCs and a PC with dead families. I need to branch out. It's so easy though. Also, I like the idea of (relative) Space Marine dropout so much that I have two characters with that as part of their backstory. One is a Fenrisian social viking type that is over it, the other is a Sacrisian (Storm Wardens) Scottish highlander type that is not.
They already mentioned Ayn Rand.
Darth Galt
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
Edit: I think I accidentally made an evil Lando?
E2: My first goal: gentrification
E3: https://youtube.com/watch?v=H_AQFnqMY3E themesong
Hail hydra!
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.
Also Taxation is Theft
Malkar Tavik was born to a poor mining family. His father was a kind man. A generous man. A trusting man. His trust in the good of others led him to an early grave working a secret mining site on Korriban. Malkar saw he was too weak to help him or his ailing mother out of the chains of a mining corporation working under the Empire. Malkar was forced to take up his debt.
He discovered a buried sarcophagus one day. Out of it he found a tome with faded writing held by a corpse fresher than it should have been. Someone had taken time to translate the tome into basic. “Qotsisajak” was written on one side of the cover. On another side it said “Code of the Sith.” Someone wanted it buried. He took it.
Now Malkar had always felt something around him. His mother told him to keep it secret. He dabbled with what he could do when he was away from prying eyes. Something about that tome awoke something in him. Not just what he could do, but it awoke in him something else. Passion. A thirst for power. His drudgery filled misery burned out of him.
He escaped from Korriban. His mother did not.
He found himself on the run for a few years. Had run-ins with plenty of Imperials looking to hunt force sensitives. He found himself on Nar Shaadaa (where the GM’s current party is) and began to make his name. A new name, free from his father’s weakness. He found it written in the tome he still carries to this day “Breek Galto”. A sith’s former name.
He had been studying anything he could have found on the old Sith. They were damn fools. Going their way meant going against the Emperor and his black leather lap dog. No sir, he wasn’t going to die trying to take a crown. He’d make his own.
Edit: non-sequitur: the only thing I give praise to DH2E’s influence system (which would be fine if it also had a currency system) is no one carries ten lasguns in their backpack to sell them to PDF surplus or some shit. Now that’s immersion breaking. E2: have the want for the glam sorcerer to mind control people into a stadium for a mass sacrifice with “Come as You Are”. He has range. E3: also have a thing where his top minions are his biological sons using that Slaanesh magic to unsterilize himself and get with other cult leaders. Stole the idea of the mirror guard from Warhammer Fantasy. What makes them creepy is that his children almost clones of him, sound almost like him, and grow in very few years. (E5: Kind of like the unholy version of regular Astartes now that I think about it.) E4: Also found a group name for the minions of one of my other big bads. The Matchstick Men. They specifically hunt my first group. There are pictures with Matchstick Men and them. All I ever see is them and my party. Also their leader is a pyromancer type with a dramatic flair and fiery hair.
They cinch closed too!
This was set a month before my players’ concurrent campaigns. I got to make character references to people they knew or know. That man getting beat was the Rook in vigilante: year one a garb gunning down doctors in the street after setting a bomb to lure them out. I am trying to get my first party to still see him as a crazy terrorist type like everyone else in this continuity’s canon does, but I spilled the beans to a player from my second party after the session. His new character was incorporated as a part of another inquisitor’s warband. So when in an interrogation the inquisitor and this guy was in, I cut to the character the other player was playing so I didn’t spoil anything when that player’s party meets this man in their campaign with full kit and caboodle. So that player inside the room got to know everything and promised me he’s keeping it a secret. All the other player knows is the newer player got disarmed, the other inquisitor got head butted real hard in the face, and that guy’s on the run.
What actually happened was after finally being made to say something in interrogation and proving his statements with something he had, he explained himself fully. That inquisitor decided to help his crusade and is the one outfitting him with info, weapons, armour, and equipment like Nick Fury sometimes did with Frank. He even gives him his signature armored bubonic plague doctor type helmet with helpful tools in it.
I even got to explain that the helmet and the crows foot symbol (he spray paints in white on his chest and after killings) came from his kasrkin unit spending time between redeployment on a feudal world. He was explained by a local that wherever that mask was, plague was, and that those natives on planet saw it like a spectre of death had come to them. He regarded it as a curiosity back then, but decided to become that spectre of death to spread a message to all heretics, criminals, and those who helped them in poisoning his family. I am coming. You will not escape me.
Your god(s) will not save you.
Also I added to his backstory that he attempted to kill himself after the mercy killing of his family from Nurgle rot. He could not deal. He messed up and instead blew out a chunk of his frontal lobe, giving him a constant EED state. Although much like Frank he also refrains from killing innocents and is precise.
Once that paralysis had been broken the group proceeded to kick ass and take names, and I did get to grievously wound a player with an arrow because he just stood in the middle of the room shooting his rifle, so that was fun.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I use the skill “Logic” to a similar effect. If they’ve not quite understood clues I’ve laid out together or how I hope they perceive a situation then when they pass I spell it out. If someone high up is lying through their teeth, your characters noticed, I made it very clear when they’re lying, say straight up “this man has been away on suspicious days apparently ‘out sick’”, and for some reason they want to go talk to someone they would have no easy access to that the lying character mentioned offhand that would take days to get to then it’s time to let their characters (and the GM in their brain) do the thinking and say, “You should follow the lying asshole.”
Also what setting is your Genesys in?
I'm doing a homebrew fantasy pirates/age of sail campaign. It's low magic in the sense that there was a calamity a few thousand years ago and the magic disappeared, though the world is still fantastical, and there are elves, dwarves and orcs along with other shit. I'm stealing lore and history liberally from the Inner Sea module from pathfinder.
My guys are currently crew for a captain, and during session zero I made it clear I would be driving the narrative for the first few sessions while we all figured out the game and mechanics, then it would open up for them and we would go from there, they're still getting tons of stuff to do, but their captain (me) is calling the high level shots right now.
The big overarching plot is that there used to be a slaving guild, but they disappeared years ago, but people are still getting abducted. What's happening is this guild unearthed some artifact that summoned the BBEG and they are now capturing people to use in mass sacrifices to summon some doom creature that was banished during the cataclysm.
At a point soon they are going to be attacked and sunk in a battle in the middle of a maelstrom and will end up talking to my version of Davy Jones. They'll get the mission to stop this shit, get their own cool custom ship and also gain powers, which I'm going to steal straight from Force and Destiny, so They'll be Jedi Pirates. They'll also be able to assemble a crew and have their own stronghold.
Hopefully I can pull this all off.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I'm playing around with a sky pirates setting that I'm excited about. But I'm hung up on the work needed to stat out the stable of "normal" fantasy monsters and races. I'm using D&D as an inspirational launching point but the Genesys beastiary is lacking in comparison.
Like, I want cloud giants riding floaty chariots pulled by rocs. I just don't want to go through the effort to essentially re-create the D&D monster manual in Genesys.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
If I want to go really silly, and I do, then a player’s exorcism will require him to use his willpower to sing Vanilla Fudge’s “Keep Me Hanging On” to get the daemon out.
E: and I’ll give him bonuses to willpower if his player sings along as best as he can.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=en1uwIzI3SE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEDDK0XLGfw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDAmqZUECgg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6P4iatMl7M
Hanging on is about a tired man telling his girlfriend who he clearly doesn’t love and she clearly doesn’t love him to just leave. My player has had this daemon floating around him plaguing his dreams and making him more insane over time since he won’t let it possess him. Get out is a pretty straightforward message.
Now, I am going to see if this player is willing to possibly sacrifice his character. Near the end of this module, the thing allowing the daemon to fuck about in his brain will be shut off. It was designed to wear the character down by a Slaaneshi cult mistress but she had to be in proximity to him. It was part of the overall bad guy group’s plan to root out and destroy the inquisitorial presence on the planet they’re on. They know their faces and have been spying on them due to them messing up a module earlier.
The daemon is basically going to offer to, meta-wise, spoil almost everything about the series of campaigns I have made. The daemon is connected to the grand conspiracy that the mistress was inducted into after that botched module. She knows the major members, their activities, and their overall plans. What she knows, this daemon knows.
The daemon is also a tricksy fuck and may tell half truths. The next module I have designed is a the Raid/Dredd situation where they’re tricked into a high rise hab block and have to fight for their lives. However, that module will also begin or end with the street ambush I have been planning forever that will use the weapons they failed to prevent being stolen in that botched module used against them. This will also introduce an ongoing antagonist who has been tasked specifically to kill these guys and carry out missions for one of the masters of the Tarot, the grand conspiracy. If he asks and says that a trap has been set for them, which one does he mean?
HOWEVER, doing this means he will be possessed, and possessed hard. The splat book Enemies Beyond has rules for possessions.
E: you know what Hellfire would be good for though? The leader of the Matchstick Men, who is a pyromancer showman type.
E2: I chose the samurai marine’s name, Katoichi, because it sounds like offbrand “Satoichi” and I like the idea of something latin sounding with Kato (Cato) mixed in with the Imperium’s minor Roman Empire theme. I looked up the etymology, and apparently “Kato” means “add/increase”. I designed him because for some reason 40k does not have a samurai themed space marine chapter with any lore and I wanted a reason for the players to reasonably call upon a Deathwatch reinforcement character. Ichi (from my Karate training) means “one”. So he’s their “Plus One”.
I've got plenty of toys to set up the first major plot arc. Which means all of the visitations are complete and everyone is "fully geared" in the sense of having all of their birthrights.
I did find that a slightly-weakened Monster was not a significant challenge for the group, but that just means I need to try to throw "large amount of mooks and professionals" at them and see how that goes.
As this is a fairly raw and just-barely-tested game engine I'm finding that some questions will need to be answered. We're providing feedback but it's not clear how much they can incorporate before the manuscript has to go to print.
Only a few hiccups and stumbles in our first fight outing; once everyone gets used to the way initiative slots belong to band and foes and then can be jumbled up however they and the Storyguide like it makes for somewhat dynamic combat that involves a lot of teamwork. I am thinking Momentum works a bit more slickly when you're at a table and can hurl tokens around, but group momentum seems like a decent salve on trying to track multiple momentum pools.
Then of course later they'll become full on Jedi/Sith, but this will be a nice middle step.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I finally learned today one of my players is in DH for the combat. After two years of off and on play. That has clashed with my narrative priority but I can accomodate him. I suggested if he wanted more of a variety in a character type he should try a psyker. He wants to stick with his sniper type guy who does one thing. That’s okay.
I also suggested that he join the little side mini-sodes I have planned where he could be in combat heavy sessions with not-Punisher in a ganger hideout and a space marine squad in a ork pirate ship. That sounds right up his alley, adds some variety to combat, and helps me establish these characters showing up in their campaign. He doesn’t want to. He really only wants to play that character. I also have offered him little solo minisodes in the past showing him growing up and being a western type bounty hunter to build his backstory and offer some Western/Mad Max type shootbangs. He has refused.
I guess I’m relegating him to the bodyguard since my other players have expressed interest more in the narrative, character, and world building side of things. I’ll try to get him more shootbangs, he might love the Raid/Dredd thing about to go down and the street ambush, but dang. I am offering to do for him what he apparently likes but he won’t bite.
I can’t win.
I have a player like that now in my D&D campaign. He basically wants to play a character with access to fireball, and pretty much is only interested in casting fireball at things.
I've had *some* success with asking about his character outside of the game, and then bringing those elements to the forefront in the game. Oh, that drill instructor you had during your training that you hated? Cool, he's the next quest giver. Childhood crush? Deadly assassin going for a target you're paid to protect.
That kind of thing. I don't know. Some people are just in the game for very specific reasons. I try to just make sure everyone is having fun, and not judge how they go about getting that fun accomplished.
Is he the lady from Konosuba?
E: Also I’m not judging him for not getting into the narrative aspects anymore. I just want to help him.
Also, my players got me character bios and we've got a couple with superhero backgrounds and I feel like I should ask how hard I can go on it before inflicting definitely not vampirism on one of them.
Honestly, I'm super mad I never thought to roll his character that way. Make a custom class where he just gets uber fireball and passes out every time. Takes 3 rounds to cast, so people have to protect him, and then he just blows everything up. Might have been fun!
http://bloodofkittens.com/blog/2011/02/10/music-to-game-by-nurgle/
Maybe needs some doom metal.
Edit: gorram how is this chant not in a song?
“Buboes, phlegm, blood and guts! Boils, bogeys, rot and pus! Blisters, fevers, weeping sores! From your wounds the fester pours.”
Definitely going to use that for the intro. Give it a good 'ol hoarse screm.