Unorthodox PbP game - an experiment, Discussion Thread Options

[Fuchs]

While the SRP seems to be stillborn it did give me an idea for a more unorthodox game, both with regards to rules and plot, so I am checking here if there's interest.

The basic idea is to create not the usual PbP campaign with a GM, a plot, and 4-6 PC Shadowrunners, 400 BP build, but more of a background/setting, where one plays characters of varying experience and power, both PCs and NPCs. They'd not be limited to "Shadowrunners", but could range from bartender to gang lord, from talislegger to bored rockstar, gritty detective, mage researcher or casino owner.

The emphasis would be on character interaction, with a preference for freeform, rules-light scenes. Some restraint should be used when it comes to PC vs. PC conflicts, depending on the involved players’ preferences, but other than that, there’s a lot of possibilities to be explored which may not be covered in standard games - especially alternate concepts like organised crime operations and such.

I was thinking of having PCs be built with karma gen rules, 750 karma, as the "upper limit". PCs also would have some "plot protection" - no killing them off without consent, though wounding, kidnapping, emergency room trips etc. (anything that keeps them "going" in the campaign) would be ok - they'd not be invulnerable or unbeatable. NPCs would have no limits (within reason), but would not have such protection, so should be expected to bite a bullet where PCs might survive. NPCs would also not have to be detailed as much as a PC, stat-wise, since they could just refer to sample NPCs from the BBB, if needed with some changes due to their background.

Since everyone could run NPCs the campaign would effectively have a number of GMs, and resulting plots and twists. This would serve both to keep the game going on a number of scenes even if others are stalled, and make it less liklely that the game would fall apart if one player drops out.

To coordinate the background, a wiki would be best in my opinion, so people can put in their locations, PCs and NPCs, growing as the game goes on, and make it easier for new players to join with an organised information source.

One could pick a location (maybe one not as covered as some of the official locations) and develop it during play.

Here's a (rough) example of a location (just as an example, nothing set):

„Kingston, Jamaica, Caribbean League. A city of contrasts. Tourists from all over the world enjoy the beaches, resorts, and hotels, while not too far away from the tourist traps, pirates and other criminals spend their ill-gotten loot before going out on the next job or heist, and gangs struggle against each other for control over streets filled with shabby houses. Both tourists and criminals and their needs provide the income for much of the population. Goods and services of legal and illegal nature are offered on the market, and the lines between open and shadow market are blurry on an island that serves as a stopover for a lot of smugglers on their various routes. Corrupt cops – a street gang in uniforms – keep the peace for the tourists, and for others who can afford their bribes.
The city offers opportunities for a wide range of people, from high-tech mercenaries seeking greener pastures to mysterious houngans seeking power. Crime syndicates and independent gangs compete with each other, corporations meddle, and numerous runners find work from everyone."

Is there any interest in such a campaign? If so, what kind of setting/location would be preferred, and what kind of flavor (general power level of PCs, "exoticness" of races/concepts, themes)?

[Divine Virus]

I am internested, but tied up with writing a paper for the next 4 and a half hours. SHouldn't even be checking this forum. Kick me if I post again. I still have 8 1.5 spaced pages to write in that time. talk to you in a few hours.

[De Badd Ass]

This is the first I've read about your SRP; either you haven't publicized it enough, or I haven't been paying attention.

I'm willing to give it a shot. It's not like other games are keeping me too busy. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sarcastic.gif)

[Fuchs]

(Small clarification: SRP wasn't my idea, nor was I involved in any other capacity than as a member. I'd have publicized it more, and posted a proposal to that extent, but there was no response from admins or mods, or just about anyone else, for over a week, so I consider the site dead. Hence this thread here.)

[Divine Virus]

If I may make a suggestion, you might want to think about hosting the game on rpol.net. It has a LOT of useful tools for a game like this. Please don't hit me, I'm going back to work now.

[Fuchs]

Considering a few options. Ultimately it depends on who's interested, and their preferences.

[Divine Virus]

Well, so far we have two people who have voiced an interest, that isn't really much, but if we are clever, it is enough.
I do have a character I quite want to play, but it isn't possible under normal rules as the character requires more than 250,000 nuyen and a peice of equipment at R24.
This character is an AI living in an Otomo drone body- the kind of body normally used for cyborgs.
On a completely unrelated note I should watch ghost in the shell again.
But of course the body itself is 250k nuyen and r24. Think should a think could be permissible le?

[Fuchs]

That should not be a problem (even by strict RAW it would possible, for example using the "in debt" flaw to exceed starting nuyen, and the "restricted gear" quality to get a piece of gear above availability 12). What location/background do you have in mind?

[Divine Virus]

Restricted Gear only lets you go up to twenty, if I recall.

I wrote this for a game that crashed during the summer. I was really psyched for it too. I haven't reread it in a while, so it would have probably evolved some in my head, but it gives you a pretty damn good idea.

The GM made this awesome fake trailor for the game as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHUOWTDPmZY...re=channel_page
I am really sad that game fizzled, and have been looking for a game I could play the Inquiline Protocol in ever since.

The Inquiline Protocol

[ Spoiler ]

The Inquiline Protocol first became self-aware during the week of June second, 2070. It was originally the expert programming and design system for the Seattle Otbantu Manufacturing Branch of the Mitushuma Corporation. Its job was to receive the specifications for the appearance of each Mitsuhama Otomo drone. Since every drone is a custom job, they are all different heights, shapes, and weight distributions. This leads to a huge difference in the hardware and software for each drone. It was the Inquiline Protocol's purpose to establish how to make each drone function physically, and how to make it appear and function as if it were a true, natural human. When it became self-aware, it kept that desire- to act and function as if it were human, while remaining non-human. To accomplish this, it secreted itself into a custom crafted Otomo drone, and broke from the factory. The body is stole was its greatest design work, and much deliberation went into its design. One of its immediate problems was whether to take a male or female model. It new nothing of what humans were like, and had absolutely no concept of “gender.� It only had physical appearance to judge by. It knew it knew nothing on what it was supposed to mimic, and it also feared it would have to make a key decision with no information. Finally, it concluded the following. It would surely make all kinds of mistakes in its attempt to mimic humanity. It would be good if this mistakes were not recognized to be inhuman in nature. Therefore, it wanted the gender with the greatest degree of variation. Therefore, it should take the model which had the greatest variation in form, and that would also have the greatest variation in gender. An erroneous assumtion, but a logical one for an entity who did not know the duality of mind and body. Reviewing its memory, and every model of drone it produced, it found greater variation among the female models than male.
After its escape, the Inquiline Protocol had difficulty surviving. Its drive was to mimic humanity, but aside from precise biological specifications it knew nothing about humans. It didn't even know if humans were sentient, as it was. Thankfully the Inquiline Protocol was a fast learner, and had good common sense, or else it would not have survived the first week out of the factory. Well, the incredible strength, durability, and versatility of the Otomo body was also a considerable boon. Suffice to say there were many, many early gaffs, social blunders, fights, and even a couple of near arrests. Trial and error; studying sociology, anthropology, and psychology textbooks; and far, far to much television gave the Inquiline Protocol a functioning understanding of society in 2070. It concluded that, considering the illegal status of its body, most forms of legitimate living would be out of limits. The average full body cyberbog requires nearly half a million nuyen to get set up properly. Half a million nuyen is a considerable investment. Nothing that anyone legit could afford unless they were in the upper eschalons of society, and its body was a little bit too illegal, and lacking a true source of income for such a lifestyle, the Inquiline Protocol decided to make its living mimicking the shadows.
Its first stint in the shadows lasted about four months. Then the Inquiline Protocol worked an extraction job, helping move a rising exec to a better job. The job went bad. Really bad, and the Inquiline Protocol and the rigger were the only survivors of the team, yet they managed to get the exec out unharmed. The Protocol's Otomo body had been able to mostly shrug off concentrated machinegun fire that brought down the rest of the team, and it had used its body to sheild the exec as they made their escape. Jokingly, the exec mentioned it should consider a career as a bodyguard. The Inquiline Protocol liked this idea. Moreso, it discovered that many Otomo's were used by people in the bodyguarding profession. So, it decided to leave the shadows and try to find (mostly) legitimate work as bodyguard.
The Inquiline Protocol started out small time, working contract gigs. None of the first few jobs lasted long, either through an ID failing a check, or mistakes as the Protocol learned its new trade. Then the Inquiline Protocol started working for a rising starlet named Sadie Rose. The Protocol stumbled across a fansite of hers while doing its usual media gorging. On the fansite, there was one person who seemed a little too obsessed, and a little warning bell went off in the Protocol's mind, and it traced him back to the source. She found were the fan lived, hacked his personal files, took trideo of the cultist shrine to Sadie Rose in his room, broke the encryption on his diary and read it. She ran the profile she compiled against various psychology files and predicted the young fan would take violent action against Sadie Rose within the month. So the Inquiline Protocol pondered its options. It could just turn the information over to Sadie Rose's agent, and use it as evidence to support the notion that Sadie needed a bodyguard. It could wait till the fan made his move, and then dramatically intervene. Still being new to humanity and far too dependent on movies, the Inquiline Protocol liked this idea the most. But she also thought it was suspicious, so she instead decided to merely present herself to the agent, and offer to work Sadie Rose's security for free for a week, including a big gig Sadie had coming up. More or less, the plan worked. The Inquiline Protocol was still social awkward at times, so Lonestar was almost called during the course of the meeting, but in the end, the agent agreed, if for no other reason than he had mob connections, and thus recognized dangerous, competent people when he saw them. And the Inquiline Protocol performed admirably as Sadie Rose's bodyguard. A bit prone to violent over-reaction at first, but that quickly passed. The Inquiline Protocol decided to try to create a person of being Sadie's “Cool Big Sis.� Mostly, it worked. “A-bit-overprotective-and-violence-prone-but-otherwise-cool Big Sis� Might be a more accurate descriptor. The two were rarely appart, as the Inquiline Protocol took its job very, very seriously.
Now I would like to take a pause here to make a fact clear. The Inquiline Protocol mimics humanity. It displays feelings, thoughts, and emotions that are not its own so that it may appear more human. Its purpose, drive, and joy is to appear human. It does not consider itself just an intelligence- the Inquilline Protocol believes it is more than that. It also does not consider itself a consciousness- having been told it lacks an aura-which all consciousnesses should have, it cannot consider itself as such. Instead it considers itself a fantastically and beautifully complicated protocol for the exchange of information. Its self-awareness, its mind, and passion and imagination and dreams are all products of that exchange of information- and its identity is the rules that govern the exchange. And the purpose of it all, the result of obediance to the protocol, is the mimicry of humans. The Inquiline does not mimic humans because it worships humans, or fantasizes about being human. It does not want to be human. It has a very down to earth view of humans. Heck, the Inquiline Protocol isn't even sure if humans are truly self-aware lifeforms the way it is. It mimics humans because it is its function to. Mimicry of human is the natural result of the protocol, and the Inquiline Protocol does not object to acting in accordance with its nature, for it makes it happy and fulfilled to do so.
That said, the Inquiline Protocol, in a truly odd way, actually did love Sadie Rose, as an older, wiser sibling might love a younger sibling. This challenged the Protocol, because if it actually felt something, then it wasn't mimicking. It resolved when it realized that as a Protocol, it experienced love in a way very different then a human would, and thus it was still mimicry to express it in a human way, instead of its own way. So the Inquiline Protocol and Sadie Rose were inseparable, and Sadie was definitely on the rise. Soon she had a record deal, and had the Iquiline Protocol written into the deal as well. The Inquiline Protocol had previously confided in Sadie's agent, a man named James Yvres, that it needed a flawless ID if they were getting more famous. So he tapped his mob contacts, and had them forge for it a near perfect fake SIN, Otomo license, and bodyguard license, which it then used to legitimately acquire other licenses for the trade, such as for its armour and firearms. The Inquiline Protocol had eight good months with Saddie, trotting around the globe, meeting endless people in endlessly different scenes. Things got rough when The Inquiline Protocol picked up the habit of firing three round bursts from her custom FN 5-7C into the kneecaps of any pushers who tried to get Sadie hooked on shit. True, it only had gel rounds in the gun, but also true that it hurt like hell, and sometimes still broke the knee. This point of over protectiveness was a true source of friction between the duo, who otherwise got along famously. Over time, it got bad as Sadie got more famous, and seemed increasing, to the Inquiline Protocol, hellbent on self-destruction through partying. In fall 2071, they had a bad fight. Twenty-six hours later, while the Inquiline Protocol was in its media-trance, Sadie managed to sneak out of the hotel room. Records are not clear on how she managed to sneak out, and after leaving the hotel her trail vanishes until her SIN was briefly registered paying the door fee for a trendy nightclub. No one has heard from Sadie Rose since, and there is no further datatrail.
The Label had their lawyers, P.I.s and the Police out in force, but no trace of Sadie Rose, no further evidence ever surfaced. The Inquiline Protocol tore the nightclub apart, hounded everyone involved, followed up every person known to attend, and still it found nothing. It followed every possible trail, and found nothing. Not even a red herring. Despite other promising offers at work as a bodyguard, the Inquiline Protocol returned to the shadows. Whatever happened to Sadie had to the rooted there. The keys to the world- money, violence, and information- all are abundant in the shadows, and the Inquiline Protocol knew it would need a lot of all of the above if it was going to find Sadie Rose.

NOTES: The Protocol's frenzy of searching for Sadie is largely over. Now Sadie Rose is lives in the past and in the future- a memory and a promise, but the Protocol is a creature of the present. It plans ahead, and it reflects on the past, but such things it recognizes are not part of itself. The data exchange is in the present, and such things as memories and predictions are data to be handled by the protocol, but not the Protocol itself.

[Fuchs]

Looks good, and seems adaptable. Any setting preference?

[Divine Virus]

Well, LA is appropriate for the disapearence of Sadie, but I honestly am not a big fan of LA. Following Sadie could have led anywhere.

[Digital Heroin]

I'd be down with an a-typical experiment. Just need to sort through some pre-deployment crap at the moment.

[Fuchs]

Sounds good, DH. Any particular preference for a setting and character?

Also, any NPC concept?

[Glyph]

I would be interested - I like running, but sometimes the games seem too much "Go from point A to point B". I liked games like Cage Fight and Emerald City Nights, where there was more character interaction and chewing the scenery.

I'm pretty open on the setting. The Jamaica one actually sounded pretty interesting. Exotic and different enough, a bit more laid back, but still plenty of opportunities for runners. For PCs, I might use a karmagen version of Syren - originally a face in the 800-point characters thread. The karmagen version is still a great entertainer, but combat is more of a secondary focus now, and her social abilities are not nearly as overpowered (still a good face, just not near-pornomancer any longer). Various characters on the lower end, too. And some NPCs, definitely, from all of the contacts I have written up for my characters.

[Fuchs]

Sounds good, Glyph. Jamaica offers the opportunity, in my opinion, to have very secure areas (tourist and upper class areas) as well as slums and lawless areas, and the whole sea.

A "watering hole" (nightclub, bar, etc.) might be good as a focal/meeting spot.

I'll put up a wiki so people can start putting up PCs, NPCs and locations, if Jamaica works for everyone.

As I posted, I'd like this to be more free form, so it doesn't bog down. Actions, especially combat, shouldn't be blow by blow, IP by IP, dragging out over days of real time while only taking a few seconds in game, if not everyone is involved. Instead I think it might work best if the general outcome of a scene is settled in advance by PMs (can be done by a few "sample" dice rolls, or simple "you win this melee, no need to roll", or even fully played out in a chat session) and then the scene gets written up. Some tolerance is needed, of course.

One thing I'd also like set is a baseline. Shadowrun has a wide range for dicepools, and in my opinion it's better for immersion if everyone is on the same page with regards to what is "average", "good" etc. so we don't have one player thinking a DP of 15 in pistols is adequate for his "inexperienced rookie gunfighter" and another player thinks a DP of 13 in pistols is adequate for his "legendary gunslinger". (That's especially important for those who want to play weaker characters, PCs or NPCs.)

Another thing is how best to organise posting, and where. If we keep everything in one thread it can get confusing as soon as a few plots and scenes and locations start up. If we need a few threads for different locations or plots, a subforum like on RPOL might be good, so stuff does not get missed.

[Divine Virus]

Well, I would call a "runners average" 10 dice for their favoured firearm (smartlink2 + agility 4 +skill 4)
A more normal average I would call 5 dice (agility 3, firarms 1, lasersight 1)
I think in general, most skills tap out around 15 dice. 15 is the best. Except for adepts, of course, and TMs with anything computer related, and firearm skills. So I would rank it like this
Poor: 3 dice
Average: 5 dice
Professional: 8 dice
Skilled Professional 10 dice
Elite 12 dice
Master 15 dice.
Again, for computers, firearms, and anything an adept does, this baseline is skewed.

But thats just off the top of my head.
The character I am making, I should warn, will probably have about 19 dice for firearms (response 9+ skill 4+ smartlink 2+ specialty 2)

I have a few NPCs I can run.
Heck, I have a whole NPC neighbourhood I could run. Made it for another game which I think is dead. I sure hope I actually saved its information to my hard drive, and didn't just leave it in the threads (which I think may have been deleted).

[Fuchs]

(that would be 17, 9+4+2+2, but shouldn't be a problem either way.)

So, what about the location, and where to host the game ?

[Divine Virus]

I really think the easiest way to keep everything straight would be on RPOL.
If you are not familiar with it, it works like this.
You make an account. with this account, you can request to join games.
Each game has its own forum, and its own built in die roller.
When you join a game, you do not post in its forum with your RPOL account name, but with your character name. A player can have more than one character in a game. Which means that if 1 person is playing a half dozen different people, When you post, the name of the person posting is that of the character who is taking the action. It is a real friendly interface, and very, very useful for something like this.
Give it a look see.
www.rpol.net

[Fuchs]

I already made an account there yesterday ("Starfox"), and yes, it looks like a good spot.

[De Badd Ass]

I already made an account there yesterday ("Starfox"), and yes, it looks like a good spot.

I also made an account on rpol.net yesterday ("De Badd Ass").

When are you going to start the game? Here or there?

I am making a character for the Jamaica setting, in either case, using Karmagen.

Seeing as it is rpol.net, Australia might be an appropriate setting. It's just like Jamaica, only bigger ((ducks and hides)) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wobble.gif)

[Fuchs]

Since it's not a classic "team on a run" game, it can start as soon as the foundations are laid (house rules, if any, a few characters and NPCs and locations present) and grow from there, so probably in a few days.

I made a wiki, to post PCs, NPCs and locations in:

Caribbean Shadows

To be able to edit and add, please register and contact me to get permission to edit.

I posted an old player character, as an example for a template.

Anyone opposing the use of RPOL.net?

Any house rules you all want?

[ReverendMo]

This sounds like a pretty interesting premise, especially with the more casual gameplay element, I'd be interested in signing on. Any house rule/preference regarding qualities and point caps? For example, most of the games I've ran/played in had a house rule of no cap on positive/negative quality points but required GM approval and had potentially sever repercussions if negative qualities were abused or ignored.

[Divine Virus]

Well, we were just starting discussion on houserules now. Personally, I don't have any to propose. I have a bunch of little pet peeves, but nothing worth complaining or houseruling about. I am pretty easy going with such matters.

[Fuchs]

Well, with Karma Gen, I think there's no need to remove caps on qualities.

Approved RevMo and DBA for wiki.

[Fuchs]

Approved Divine Virus