Dice Press Start! OOC [Fabula Ultima]

[Zufaix]

Hey all! Welcome to the campaign. As I said in the interest check, you can call me Zufaix, Zuzu, or Sky. While I'm new to PbP campaigns I'm not new to TTRPGs. I've DMd for about 6 years on and off now (mostly within 5E but also a bit of PF2E), and I'm incredibly excited to try out a new system. I've ran the Press Start! Module before to great success with my home table and am currently in the makings of starting up a full campaign. This system is much more rules-lite than others I've seen but still has a great deal of customizablity for both players and GMs. So, with that said, I hope we can all have fun and tell a great story!

First, I'm going to dm you all a link to a Google drive with both the Press Start and Core Rulebook pdfs that I personally own (so please don't just share them around). If you dont feel comfortable with Google drive, please let me know and I can find another way to give you them. From here I'd like everyone to take a look over the Press Start! adventure module and see if it's something you guys would be interested in. Otherwise if everyone is fine with it, we can jump straight to the world building and character creation sections of the Core Rulebook (pg 146) for our own original campaign. Of course feel free to read the rest of it at your own convenience.

Once everyone has an idea of what they'd like to do or contribute, we can move forward from there.

Feel free to ask me any questions you may have!

Nellancholy Lost Martian ERode W War123

 

[ERode]

Are you good with using classes and hijinks from the High Fantasy expansion?

 

[Zufaix]

Are you good with using classes and hijinks from the High Fantasy expansion?

High Fantasy is fine with me. I'd like to avoid using the Techno Fantasy Atlas for now as some of its mechanics and classes can be hard to integrate into a normal fantasy campaign.

 

[Nellancholy]

Alright,having looked over the module I think it might be interesting to run it first,and then maybe conceptualize a different,original campaign.

Would help to get W War123 up to speed with the system.

HOWEVER,because of our less compressed timespan of PBP (we're not sitting at a table or in a Discord call),I also agree with the idea of jumping into an original campaign immediately if the majority goes that way,since creation is a big part of the fun for most TTRPGs anyway.

It's less urgent to make sure everyone learns everything "right now".

 

[ERode]

Off the top of my head, Im provably gonna do Fury + Dancer.

 

[Nellancholy]

We start with 5 levels,right?

I was thinking I might kick things off with something like Sharpshooter 3/Entropist 1/Orator 1.

 

[Zufaix]

We start with 5 levels,right?

I was thinking I might kick things off with something like Sharpshooter 3/Entropist 1/Orator 1.

Yup 5 levels to distrubute between 2-3 classes of your choice.

 

[Nellancholy]

Anyway,once we get Lost Martian on board,we can decide whether we're going to run the module,and what kind of story we're gonna tell if we go straight to an original campaign.

The class combos are pretty agnostic,but knowing what the campaign actually is will inform our character concepts better.

 

[ERode]

Roll20 also has a Fabula Ultima sheet, but since we're doing it PbP, found this one which seems useful enough.

 

[ERode]

Also, if you end up really wanting to support the designers for whatever reason, right now, the entire Fabula Ultima package is going for around $15 USD.

 

[Zufaix]

Roll20 also has a Fabula Ultima sheet, but since we're doing it PbP, found this one which seems useful enough.

This is really nice. Alternatively there is Fultimator, but I think this might be preferred as you don't have to download an app for anything.

 

[ERode]

Agenda secured. Rogue + Dancer + Weaponmaster.

Gonna go debuff chaining with Rogue and Dancer, then follow up with Breach hijinks from Weaponmaster. Gradually move forward with the Counterattack + Dodge scheme from there.

 

[Zufaix]

Damn, not even into the first post and I'm already afraid for the villains lmao

 

[Nellancholy]

I didn't have a strict plan going for my character,but I was gonna start with Aceelerate with my first Entropist level,then Stop as a straightforward way to tip things in our favor.

Condemn from Orator.

And then just focus more on Sharpshooter for straightforward damage output before learning Entropist ritualism and more spells.

 

[ERode]

“Nice villain. Would be a shame if their stats all dropped by one tier at turn one.”

Vs

Multigrain Skin Gloves

 

[ERode]

Yeah, Fury and Guardian is funny. When I played it, I snagged Weaponmaster as well so every time someone failed to hit me, I had a chance of shieldbashing them for free.

 

[Nellancholy]

Nice,we have a Spiritist on board. If this campaign goes long enough for me to get more levels in Orator I could be a backup healer too.

Just gotta see what our final party member will be.

 

[Nellancholy]

Lost Martian once you're read the books,feel free to discuss your character choices/ask any questions here

 

[Nellancholy]

Idk how much damage can be sustained even with me being able to half physical damage. So unless Fury's 5 point heal is enough to sustain throughout the game irdk? Sell me on Weaponmaster's Counter? ERode

If you look at the GM section of the core book,a typical party is expected to endure three easy fights,two equal fights,or one hard one before resting and resupplying. Each individual battle is a noticeable tax on resources.

Also note that independent of a character's abilities,every character can spend 3 IP to produce a potion that heals 50 HP or MP in an emergency,which is a good chunk of healing even at higher levels.

 

[ERode]

You are a Guardian. Specifically, a dual-shield Guardian. That already gives you hella high Defenses. You're very rarely going to be taking damage, and even if you do, your HP is going to be pretty high anyways. As well, you can pick the Guard action to further increase your stats and defenses, while Fury's Provoke will ensure that you're still doing your job as a tank even when you selfishly Guard.

The Weaponmaster's Counterattack just allows you to occasionally do damage every time you properly defend against an attack (which, as explained, you'd be doing fairly often). It isn't that complicated in the end.

 

[Nellancholy]

Remember that when you guard you can also choose to extend the defensive benefits to one other party member,which means you can keep us alive even before healing is needed

 

[Nellancholy]

So Zufaix and everyone else,I would say that things are probably trending towards original characters and an original campaign.

Got any prospective ideas of what kind of setting and story premise we'll build? Since that's kind of the first step.

 

[Zufaix]

I would say that's a safe assessment to make. With that said, there's a few things we can work on to help with the world building. On pgs 149-151 there's a flowchart as well as some tables to look at if anyone is struggling with ideas.

First, in the google drive, I'll layout one of the two world sheets we can choose from. Then I want to hone in on what sort of technology level we could be looking at. Something mideval in typical JRPG fashion? It could also take place during an industrial revolution of sorts. We're already using the High-fantasy Atlas for classes, we can certainly do something adjacent to that. Maybe magic and technology have begun to intertwine, leading to a boom in magitech usage?

On the topic of Magic: Maybe magic is something the gods gifted to mortals? Or it's something inherited through bloodline? Magic could be outlawed in favor of technology which is seen as more stable.

Obviously there's more to world building than just this, but this feels like a good jumping off point. Feel free to give any ideas you might have, or something specific you want to get out of this campaign.

 

[Nellancholy]

Yeah,it's best to have input as a group,but at the same time we gotta start off somewhere.

We're not locked in fully on character concepts yet,but it might be a good idea to establish the main conflict and that'll help us nail down our characterization.

Maybe a wartime story with the typical empire aiming to swallow up the world,or something more morally grey.

Maybe a fairly standard quest to gather sacred treasures and save the world.

Or the party being a band of bandits/mercenaries/pirates/treasure hunters who get swept up into a bigger conflict.

 

[ERode]

All JRPGs need to have a violent and crazy inciting incident, after all.

I'd say something like...

There's Natural Magic out there (relies on individual talent and effort), but recently, there were discoveries that uncovered special crystals that can be used to power Magitech (ending with magical tools that can be used by anyone). Around the world, such crystals are rare. But in a particular small nation, it was discovered that there was a large ore vein of that special crystal, which immediately made the nation itself of great interest to all the greater powers nearby. You've got a merchant republic wanting to mine and sell that shit, you've got the knightly kingdom that wants to 'safeguard' it to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands, you've got the religious peeps who say that it's sacred and thus should fall under the purview of the church, etc.

Then the King of that nation is assassinated, leading to a messing war of succession between royal siblings, who are all sponsored by different foreign forces, and our characters end up getting caught in the middle of this, as a mercenary force or just civilians found in the wrong place at the wrong time.