SF and Gaming Blog

OK, so which Illuminati just played the Ketchup is a Vegetable card?

Don’t know what I’m on about? All I can say is “Fnord!”

David Edelstein (Amadán to his friends) has posted some wonderful Online GMing Tips on the DreamLyrics Message Board.

Population: One: Monday Mashup #2

We have a new gaming meme, the Monday Mashup. And this week it asks:

Pick a roleplaying world and talk about how you’d use the specified book/movie/TV show/whatever as an inspiration for a campaign or one-shot set in that world. You can post on your own blog or LiveJournal or in the comments here, as you see fit.

This week, your mashup subject is Invasion of the Body Snatchers. (The 1978 remake is also valid fodder.)

I tend not to GM much using published settings, preferring to develop my own. So let’s set Invasion of the Bodysnatchers in Kalyr. I ran a five year campaign using the setting a few years back, and currently run two on-line games set there. As well as the odd convention scenario.

For those of you not familiar with the setting, Kalyr could be described as a science-fiction setting dressed in fantasy clothes. Psionics is quite common, and technology has become more arcane, the principles by which devices work lost or obscured. And the whole world is ruled by secretive and sometimes hidden elites.

Kalyr already had a race of psionic shape-changing aliens, the Drarth. As a race they’re not particularly malevolent, although a small percentage of them are insane, at least by human standards. So far, the ‘bad’ Drarth tend to be loners, so an organised Drarth conspiracy would not be expected. They’re too few to attempt a takeover of any of the larger cities (and my games set in this world have so far been largely city-based), especially since any significant population of psis are likely to sniff them out pretty quick. A small outpost might be a different matter, if the Drarth can eliminate or subvert any psis present. Or perhaps one very powerful Drarth could do it on it’s own, replacing one individual and using it’s psionic powers to control everyone else? And just what might their agenda be?

Alternatively, we could go for the technological route. One secretive group in Kalyr possesses the technology to produce clones. Taking the Cold War metaphor into Kalyr’s own Cold War, we’ll have them in league with the “Evil Empire” of Kalyr, Karmork. Their agenda is much more straightforward, to expand their brutal and chauvinistic empire. (They’re really closer to Nazis than to Communists) They’ll be substituting their clones for important members of the societies they plan to subvert and soften up. Such a plan would be very long term, would need large numbers of agents to gather the required DNA samples of their chosen victims, and significant effort to remove them (by kidnapping or assassination) so as to replace them with the clones. They won’t go to the trouble of trying to replace a large fraction of the population, just a small number of influential people; city administrators, military commanders or influential religious leaders. Can the heroes thwart their plans before the clones betray the city to the invading army marching out of Karmork?

Game Wish 56 asks about Friends and Associates

Do your characters have friends and associates who play a regular role in the game? What about henchmen and hirelings in the old D&D sense or Champions-style DNPCs? How does your group handle playing them? What sorts of things are they used for in the game? Is their influence good, bad, or indifferent?

In on-line games I like to give my characters friends and relations, as much to give the GM a few plot hooks to play with as much as anything else. Of course, when I’m playing in a game where 99.8% of the population dies from a plague, the same GM will kill them all of slowly and painfully while watching how my character reacts emotionally. Similarly, the first incarnation of goth-metal guitarist Karl Tolhurst came complete with the rest of the band (one of whom was dead and another undead), as well as several members of his family.

The long-running AD&D game I played years ago had a large cast of henchbeings of assorted, considerably outnumbering the actual player characters, and a major reason why combats tended to go on all night.

As a rule, I dislike henchpeople when I’m GMing, because I have a tendency to forget them and let them fade into the background. Character’s friends and family are another matter entirely; they’re a valuable source of plot hooks. I always try to make them individuals in their own right that have lives of their own.

One character that gave me real problems was when the player character was the bodyguard to a powerful mage. The mage a character of a much higher power level than the mostly “street level” PCs, and whenever she was around she tended to dominate things. I eventually had her kidnapped by bad guys (using a teleportation machine) just to take her out of the picture for a while, and force her bodyguard PC to take the initiative.

With the UPC Bar Code Character Generation, you can turn a household object, publication or any other product with a barcode into a D&D character! (Thanks to John Crimmins for the link)

Some examples:

The new album “Permission to Land” by The Darkness is an untrustworthy religious dwarf

Gender: Male
Race: Dwarf (Height: 3’11″, Weight: 154 lbs.)
STR: 16 [+3]
DEX: 12 [+1]
CON: 13 [+1] [+2 CON racial bonus]
INT: 17 [+3]
WIS: 7 [-2]
CHA: 7 [-2] [-2 CHA racial penalty]

Total ability modifier: +4

Where you were raised: (see Hero Builder’s Guide for details)
Temperature Zone: Cold (arctic or subarctic)
Terrain: Plains
Community Size: Delve
Family notes:
Economic Status: Military Support
Social Standing: Lower Class
Family Defense Readiness: Medium
Private Ethics: Untrustworthy
Public Ethics: Undeserved
Religious Commitment: Strong
Reputation: Outstanding
Political Views: Loyal Opposition
Power Structure: Matriarchy
Ancestors of Note: Prophecy, Spell Creator

Education:
Early Childhood Instruction: Multicultural
Formal Education: Natural History
Learning a Trade: Special Military Training

Life Events (thus far):
Early Childhood events: Undertook a Long Journey
Youth Events: Battle
Pivotal Events: No Pivotal Events

Relationships:
Parents: Two Living Parents
Siblings: Only Child
Grandparents: Three Grandparents Alive
Extended Family: Many Living Relatives
Friends: Few
Enemies: No Enemies
Instructors: No Instructors of Note

Meanwhile a Minitrix N Gauge Swiss Re460 Locomotive comes up as human heretic. Not sure what class he’d be

Gender: Male
Race: Human (Height: 5’10″, Weight: 204 lbs.)
STR: 14 [+2]
DEX: 13 [+1]
CON: 12 [+1]
INT: 14 [+2]
WIS: 14 [+2]
CHA: 15 [+2]

Total ability modifier: +10

Where you were raised: (see Hero Builder’s Guide for details)

Temperature Zone: Warm (tropical and subtropical)
Terrain: Hills
Community Size: Village
Family notes:
Economic Status: Poor
Social Standing: Newcomer
Family Defense Readiness: Mixed
Private Ethics: Fair
Public Ethics: Normal
Religious Commitment: Open Heretics
Reputation: Unknown
Political Views: Dissatisfied
Power Structure: Matriarchy
Ancestors of Note: None

Education:
Early Childhood Instruction: Religious
Formal Education: Politics
Learning a Trade: Healing

Life Events (thus far):
Early Childhood events: Undertook a Long Journey
Youth Events: Great Romance
Pivotal Events: No Pivotal Events

Relationships:
Parents: Two Living Parents
Siblings: Fraternal Twin
Grandparents: Grandparents Unknown
Extended Family: Few Living Relatives
Friends: Some
Enemies: Arcane Rival
Instructors: Exotic

The Ordnance Survey 1:25000 scale map of Manchester and Salford comes up as this evil Half Elven Fighter/Mage

Gender: Male
Race: Half Elf (Height: 5’6″, Weight: 177 lbs.)
STR: 18 [+4] ()
DEX: 10 [+0] ()
CON: 13 [+1] ()
INT: 18 [+4] ()
WIS: 10 [+0] ()
CHA: 11 [+0] ()

Total ability modifier: +9

Where you were raised: (see Hero Builder’s Guide for details)
Temperature Zone: Temperate
Terrain: Desert
Community Size: Elven Dominated Area (Elven City)
Family notes:
Economic Status: Military Support
Social Standing: Lower Class
Family Defense Readiness: High
Private Ethics: Evil
Public Ethics: Undeserved
Religious Commitment: Strong
Reputation: Mostly Bad
Political Views: Dissatisfied
Power Structure: Elders
Ancestors of Note: None

Education:
Early Childhood Instruction: Magic
Formal Education: Finishing School
Learning a Trade: Healing

Life Events (thus far):
Early Childhood events: Survived Childhood Danger
Youth Events: Crime
Pivotal Events: Community Crisis

Relationships:
Parents: Parents Lost or Unknown
Siblings: 2 older brothers
Grandparents: Father’s Parents Alive
Extended Family: Many Living Relatives
Friends: Some
Enemies: Diabolic Enemy
Instructors: Exotic

So it wasn’t a Shoggoth after all. The beached “blob” was a whale carcass. Well, that’s what they want you to believe. (Link from Adam Lipscombe)

In this week’s Game Wish, Ginger asks about character naming:

How do you choose character names? What makes a good or bad name for a character? What are three examples of really good (or really bad) character names, and why are they so good or bad?

My favourite line in any RPG rulebook comes from The Dying Earth RPG, and reads as follows:

If you give your character a mundane or anachronisic name, like Nigel or Sue, your GM should allow you proceed though the entire creation process, only to have your character horribly slain in the opening scene of the first adventure. Do not say we failed to warn you.

You can spoil the atmosphere of a fantasy game by inappropriate names. (Same goes for books, having characters called “Kevin” and “Nigel” clunked badly for me in Katherine Kurtz’s Dernyi Rising)

I believe fantasy characters need to evoke the feel of the setting; whether it’s taking names from historical source for a game based on fantasy versions of historical cultures, or using made-up linguistics for a complely original world. I’ve tried to come up with some consistant languages for my own setting, Kalyr, which is worth doing if you’re GMing the setting, since you need dozens of NPCs. Read what Dorothea has to say on the subject. It’s why J.R.R.Tolkein is a better fantasy writer than Katherine Kurtz, and what goes for novels also goes for games.

However, most of my recent characters have been in modern-day settings, where naming a little bit easier. For example, Ivor Tregonning, my character in David Edelstein’s The Stand is a Cornish railwayman, named by taking the first name of real-life railwayman mentioned in a book, and the distinctive Cornish surname of one of the posters in a railway mailing list. I didn’t realised he’s also one of the characters in The Who’s mini-opera “A Quick One While He’s Away” until later.

Then there was the Sword-Worlder in a Traveller game (which never really got off the ground) called Þorkell Svensson, partially named after an Icelandic poster on the boards of Pyramid Online. There are problems, though, in using a name including characters that don’t appear on standard English keyboards on an on-line game. (Ümläüt had the same problem!)

I’ve gone for slightly humorous names in some games. Leaving aside my AD&D Viking called “Mudgard”, I’ve played an Ofanite of Jean in In Nomine called “Ed Craigentinny”, on the basis that Ofanites took humorous surnames like “Jett” or “Wheeler”. This was in a setting where an earlier character had used pseudonyms of “Neville Hill”, “Philip Marsh” and “Adam Longsight”. Anyone reading this who comes here for the train posts might understand those.