Setup: Quixotic Restoration, Special Project by Invitation Only Options

[Blitz]

Mmm...salad...

You did a perfect job. At least to me it was clear as a bell (and kudos to referencing two of my favorites! Equilibrium and Firefly :D)

[HeySparky]

Yes. Okay... I'm refitting my GMing ideas into Winter's lingo. See if I've got you. In my take on this:

We take turns GMing the large scope and scale story bits for one another and then as individuals adopt/are adopted to handle the small scope and scale story bits.

Have I got it?

[WinterRat1]

Sparky - Exactly. You nailed it perfectly.

Note 1: I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with your ideas, but your ideas and my terminology now match up perfectly.

Note 2: My lack of agreement or disagreement is based on not having fully formulated my own ideas in this area yet, so it has nothing to do with my response to your thoughts as of yet.

[HeySparky]

Understood. I just wanted to make sure I got what you were saying and the best way to do that was to put it in my words around my ideas.

[WinterRat1]

Sparky - Question. With respects to your idea, when a GM is GMing the large scale/scope part of the story, is his/her PC essentially going to be relegated to NPC status then?

[Blitz]

Ok..in the interest of keeping this whole show moving forward Im going to make some executive decisions. It was suggested by Grendel to me last night that while committee's can be valuable, we need to have a decision head who can assess the information presented then make a final decision. For the most part, I will be that decision maker since I'm responsible for this whole idea in the first place :)

However, as there will be times when my opinion is too biased (with regards to my own character), so I would like to appoint Buddha as my backup. It makes sense since he's playing the other twin and I have absolute confidence in his fairness and leavel headed approach to stuffs.

That said, I LOVE the idea of the GM Adoption as far as the individual character development goes. I definately want to incorporate that idea. I think once we have a clearer idea of who is doing what and playing what, we'll be better adept at assigning GM's to characters.

As far as the over arching story goes, this is where I really want full collaboration. While every one of us is intelligent, knowledgable, and has a grasp of potential rammifications, the sum of our knowledge is far greater than our individual parts. This is the area where maturity is the most important as there may be some OOC knowledge that our characters cannot metagame with. The main component I am referring to is the fact that i truly want the opposition to read as a character. I don't want that side of the story being lost as "hidden movement". I want Grendel to feel comfortable about including sensitive information in his posts without worrying that the information will be abused. While I want there to be lots of ideas and suggestions thrown out about world effects, I also will be relying on everyone to police each other. If we see any actions that are questionably metagaming (I'm sure it will most likely be an accidental slip), let's bring it up and decide if an alteration needs to happen.

My final issue is with the opposition vs. the team. While I don't believe that anyone would consciously "cheat", it would be good to have some impartial party to coordinate the interaction since the current game mechanics are devised to have a hidden component.

My suggestion here is to have an uninvolved GM be a bridge between the two groups. For an example, let's assume we're going to hit one of Grendel's facilities. Grendel would supply his setup information (security systems, goon statistics, contingency plans, etc.) to the GM Bridge. The team would submit any planning or preparation information as well, such as gear aquisitions, legwork and prepwork, to the GM Bridge, who will be able to give legwork, surveillance and other info gathering answers based on the submitted plans. (likewise if the team is setting up a safehouse and Grendel's forces are planning an attack)

Each action event will have a GM handling the "GM" duties, such as organizing initiative, calling for rolls etc. That GM's characters will act as NPC's for the duration of the "game mechanics" driven parts. In the above example, it would be best to have Grendel GM it since we're hititng his facilities and his characters would transition to NPC easily.

When the GM takes on the "GM hat", the GM bridge will pass off the information aquired so that the GM can effectively run that portion of action. In 90% of the situations, I don't think this information will be absolutely necessary, but it will serve to keep things fair and balanced so people are not changing tactics midstream to compensate for unexpected creativity on one side. The GM Bridge will basically serve as a "yes, he really did do that before hand" sort of tool.

While I know none of us have any interest in metagaming, sometimes it cannot be avoided. If we all know that facility X has neurostun enabled security systems ooc, but not IC, it's hard to say if your characters would remember their chem gear or not. Whereas, if that information is not discovered IC, it can be told to that third party without jeopardizing the planning stages of the team. (that way, no one accuses you of metagaming when you show up with 5 sets of hazmat suits for the entire team:))

I really want those already involved in the project to be active participants as your writing ability and creativity is the number one reason I have invited each of you. What Im looking for is suggestions on someone who is trustworthy and reliable who could be the go between. They dont have to be an active GM, or even well versed in the rules of the game, just someone interested in participating in an ancillary role.

Another point I would like to make is that I see the thread as being much larger than Grendel's evil corp dudes against our enlightened children on a quest. While there will be confrontations (requiring the system I suggested above) I want those to be few and far between. Most of the action will be smaller missions or lots of flavor text that will need either an adopted GM or no actual GM at all (other than our ooc discussions). Think of most games here, the actual GM work is not NEARLY that of a table top game. Most of the time, these systems will be unnecessary or only used to a small extent.

[HeySparky]

I have to say... I'm TOTALLY stumped for what to play.

[Fenris]

Blitz,

I like your idea for the system, assuming we can find GM's to handle it. It sounds a little complicated in the writing, but I think the actual action will go a little smoother, since none of it has to happen with precision timing due to the nature of PbP. I agree with what you're setting up, so I'll wait for you to hand out the specifics of the mechanics (how to decide who's gm'ing when, etc.)

And to second Sparky, I'd like a more definitive list of the archtypical characters you want us playing so I can start thinking about my character concept too ;)

[WinterRat1]

Blitz, you're the boss. If you have formulated a set idea of how you want this to work by now, that's good enough for me. Just tell us how you want it done. I will add that while it seems the overall structure is starting to solidify, we still need to fill in various details that have been raised by people so far . Just something else I thought I'd toss onto your 'to do' list. ;)

And I'll third Sparky and Fenris. Archetypes please? :)

[Buddha72]

Agreed, I think at this point we need a list of the characters you wanted for this run so after everyone has grabbed their slot we can start making the magic happen as they say.

[Blitz]

Sounds good to me! Im really open as far as characters go as long as they're all very unique and memorable! Ideally, I'd like a good mix of metahumans, I think I want to make the twins elves..we have Roc as the troll and I'd rather not have more than one "big" guy :)

As far as archtypes, Im thinking a stealthy person, an authority figure, someone really lethal (adept would be rad)...but if any of you have a neat concept I didn't mention, throw it out there!

[WinterRat1]

Who is Roc the troll, and who is playing him/her?

So right now we have:

Buddha - (Elf?) Boy Mage - Tradition undefined
Blitz - (Elf?) Girl Technomancer
Grendel - All encompassing Forces of Darkness

McQuillan -
Fenris -
Sparky -
WinterRat -

(I'm assuming one of the above 4 is playing Roc the troll, but I didn't know who. Unless Roc is an NPC or being played by someone I wasn't aware had joined us)

I'll call one of the 'human' spots right off the bat. Personally, I prefer playing a combat character because we already have a decker and mage, I'm terrible with vehicles and their rules, and uh, I just like playing muscle characters. :) Completely undecided whether or not to go the adept or cyber route, as well as what type of combat character (tank, sniper, generalist, speedster, etc).

A very relevant question that will affect how I build my character is: Are we starting off as part of a pre-established team (and exploring our history through flashback/reminiscences) or do we have no prior history between us, or somewhere in between?

Personally, I think it'd be cool to say all the runner team (McQ, Fenris, Sparky, and I) has history with one another (romantic, professional, personal, maybe even rivals), but isn't necessarily already a full-fledged team. Then we get the best of both worlds in my opinion; namely, a rich shared history that can be explored, developed, and examined in past, present, and future POVs as we play, but also the opportunity to gradually come together and form more lasting ties that bind as we gel as a team throughout our quest. Thoughts on this?

Suggestion: Given what we're up to here, someone might want to be very good at gathering information, maybe through a combination of matrix and social interaction?

Also, has it been decided that are we going with the standard 400BP with a TBD karma bonus after creation? And can we get an approximation of that karma bonus and a karma-to-cash rate, assuming we'll be using that?

[Blitz]

ROFL...my poor tiny brain...Roc is in my other game :D ignore my stupidity

[Blitz]

Id actually like to start just a bit higher at character creation, like around 425-450, then adding like 15-20 karma on top of that. Objections?

[WinterRat1]

Two questions.

1. What is the purpose of starting with so little karma? How much can that really buy?

2. Does raising the BP limit affect any of the character generation caps? Specifically, the skill/skill group caps, resource BP allocation cap, attribute BP cap, etc.

Personally, I think it's easier to go with the RAW and then add karma and karma-for-cash to avoid the annoying implications of question 2, but that's just me.

On the other hand, it's entirely plausible to leave all the rules as is and just give us 25-50 more BP, which is fine by me. Certainly you'll get no complaints from me about that! :)

Your call Blitz, just let us know.

Don't forget to give some input on the shared character histories, or lack thereof everyone.

Oh, and I nominate McQuillan for the leader job no matter what archetype he is, since I seem to recall hijacking a boat quite easily (and equally important on a forum game, quickly) last time. Anyone who led the one run I've played in on DSF that actually FINISHED gets my vote for leader! :D

[Blitz]

Well, the reason I wanted to have higher build points and lower initial karma bonus was because I want to have the flexibility to make more flushed out characters WITH keeping the same max limitations. In other words, I still want attributes and skills at reasonable levels, but I would like the ability to add more qualities, contacts, additional skills, little more money, that sort of things.

Im still offering a small amount of karma for bonding foci, or increasing a skill or attribute above starting limits. Does that make sense?

I like the idea of having some initially implanted connections between the members but not being an actual "team" as of yet.

[WinterRat1]

Makes perfect sense. Understood Blitz, thanks for clarifying. Same character gen rules except with 425-450 BP. Do you have a final ruling on the amount yet?

I had a feeling you were offering a small bit of starting karma for the reasons you stated, but I wasn't sure.

[BishopMcQ]

The character concept I was tossing around for this escapade was a phys-ad who lost confidence in his magic and is on the path to burnout as he progressively gets more cyber. I had planned to build him around the ass-kicker model, but can go slightly more along an authority style if I'm going to be the group leader.

[Blitz]

As far as the final end amounts, Id like some feedback on what people want. I don't mind taking the lead here, but remember I want this to be more of an equal collaboration so give me YOUR opinions too :)

[Fenris]

If the range you're offering is between 425 and 450, I'd say go 450. The 25 points aren't going to make a huge difference, since they can't be sunk into attributes or qualities, and if you're going to increase it, might as well increase it significantly. Otherwise why bother? ;)

[BishopMcQ]

450 BP and 20 karma. I would say that we are treated as only having 400 BP for attribute expenditure (which is no more than half the total BPs) that way we are still limited by the normal rules, but can have additional skills or contacts beyond the norm.

Where would we like to be based out of? I know Seattle is the most common setting for most of us, but I've been doing a lot of work with Denver recently.

[Buddha72]

I agree with both suggestions above from McQuillan and Fenris. When we talked about this over IM you had mentioned wanting to make the characters special by giving them a maxed stat for free and possibly allowing them a "wiggy" thing like the old Lynk games. Are you still wanting to do that?

[HeySparky]

[WinterRat1]

The character concept I've been working on is a former corporate expediter (always did like that name). Kind of thinking of those investigator types who started off being responsible for policing the corporate employees (the corp internal affairs) but gradually gained more responsibility until he was increasingly entrusted with not only passing along information to his superiors, but expediting (like I said, always did like this word) the 'solutions' his superiors wanted as well.

I was planning on making him a physad just because my other main character is a cyberguy, and he would probably have a mix of assassin-type skills and social/investigative skills. Not exactly a wuss in a fight but not really designed for a straight-up slugfest either. I guess it'd be hard to characterize him as a particular archetype but that's the basic idea I have so far.

[Blitz]

Works for me! Lets go with 450 BP, Max 200 attributes, no availability restrictions (I trust you guys to get what works for the character and not buy suborbitals ;)) You can take any one attribute from 5 to 6 for free (you still have to buy it up to 5).