Dice Robotech - Southern Cross Adventure - OOC

[Rykon]

I may as well ask while we're still counting stock, should I specify bringing along more mines? Forgot that after the MOS adjustment I ended up with Demolitions at 98%. Technically we weren't ordered to enter the complex and such, but even we never know what kind of crazy shenanigans we'll come up with this time.

 

[Purr]

Rykon I highly recommend doing so. In most roleplaying games like Robotech, either it's on your character sheet or it's generally agreed that you have said item (like your character's military ID), or you just plain don't have it. There is no "Oh, but everyone else grabbed mines back at the start! Of course, my character did too! Why wouldn't he?" (which you hear from the "Nothing Is Fair In This Game!" crowd...).

Another benefit to doing so now is it keeps you and your Game Master firmly on the same page.

 

[Rykon]

I don't necessarily mind from a character standpoint whether or not he's a demolition's expert. I just wonder whether we think we'll really need that many mines.

 

[Purr]

No idea. Gabi's bringing them along for multiple reasons and to follow the old saying, "It's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it." =)

 

[Rykon]

Yeah I went ahead and added them. It's probably an idle worry, but it does seem a little risky for all of us to carry around all those explosives in cargo with a mecha that doesn't have a secured pilot's compartment.

 

[Purr]

For what it's worth, one of the reasons I'm playing in this game is because (despite the wicked banter) I feel Psychie is a fair-minded person. She's not the type to take deathly advantage of that situation (unlike some player-killer GMs and DMs out there). Sure, the Zentraedi are born warriors who know how to use their rifles all too well, but I think it's the rare Game Master that would have them firing on Spartas or Myrmidon pilots in transport mode.

 

[Rykon]

I'll agree with that. I've only had one GM that really stood out to me as being in that category. Boy were they frustrated.

 

[Purr]

"Frustrated" or "frustrating"? Was it a "PKer" ("Player-killer"; a Game Master that had no qualms killing characters off whatsoever)?

 

[Rykon]

"Frustrated" or "frustrating"? Was it a "PKer" ("Player-killer"; a Game Master that had no qualms killing characters off whatsoever)?

The former. We were playing Exalted. The others here have a hint of what mischief I get up to in those games.

 

[Purr]

I've never played Exalted. Only Scion (via Sherwood here in RP Nation). I really like how those systems challenges and rewards writing. One of my players played Exalted for a time and he says it helped him with his. Whatever the case, I love his posts. He can express a great deal accurately and effectively and turn a good scene into a great one. =)

EDIT: Allow me to alter that for accuracy's sake. He often helps to turn good scenes into great ones just by his posts alone. He really gets into his character and includes everyone. He's one of those roleplayers that makes for great memories and experiences. Exalted helped him, but he's really just that good (Psychie and Sherwood very likely know who I'm talking about). =)

 

[Rykon]

Yeah, the stunt system is part of what really made me love Exalted. 3E's made stunts a lot easier to manage from a forum based perspective, but it does a lot of things with charms I really dislike.

 

[Purr]

May I ask how Stunts have become easier to manage? How has it changed and what do you like and dislike about the Stunt system?

 

[Rykon]

In second edition, stunts were one, two, or three dice.

In third edition, stunts are two dice, two dice + 1 success, or two dice with + 2 successes. The reason this is better for us forum goers is that players can assume a "one-point" stunt, take the two dice and the story teller can decide to add successes on their end when they resolve the roll. In the second edition case, you either stop and clarify or state your assumption as you roll.

My real dislike is with what they did with charms. Far more of them, far less impressive effects, still have high costs. So while you are in theory incentivised to come up with creative combos, the generic magic you start with is often times more beneficial, and the stuff you pay XP for can often times detract from the better (more simple one) that you didn't have to pay XP for. The thing that I don't think was recognized with the combo heavy mindset is: The human brain is the calculator for the game, not a computer. So obtuse high-brow probability tweak effects go under or over valued to large degrees and are supposed to be declared before rolling. This can feel very bad as a player when the high brow probability adjuster cost you 3 to 5 dice worth of magic and did literally nothing to help you at all.

I realize that was pretty rambly. Am I making any sense?

 

[D. Rex]

Marlon, the resident demoman, believes the only downside to carrying more explosives is you have to run farther faster when you set them all.

Also, iirc, the D-40s were declared by GM to be stable until armed.






As for exalted, I hope to learn from Rykon and ramp up the scale of my shenanigans. But dont tell Sherwood.

 

[Purr]

Rykon Enough sense that I think I follow your definition of Stunts and your frustration with Charms. It sounds like they made Charms far too complicated without providing reward for the time and effort investment. This goes against my way of thinking - a game, first and foremost, must be fun. The moment you make it less fun (or fun only for certain types of players), you remove some of the motivation to play it and improve the chances of players moving on to something more entertaining and worthwhile.

As an example, I once knew a gamer who was heavily, heavily versed in crime-related forensics (as it was part of his duty). He had spent his off-duty hours creating a realistic gaming system that had a combat system that went into extreme amounts of detail. Say, when firearms were involved, rolling a d20 plus the PCs skill and rolling damage was far from enough. He basically wanted, and rewarded, a ballistics report based on how many feet per second the bullet traveled, what trajectory it used, what effect it had when entering whatever it hit, and so on. While I liked the amount of time he had put into the combat system (I try to find the positives), I had to ask him, "Just who do you expect to play with? The only other people who can even understand it work in your field." He admitted that his system was for a niche few. I don't think it ever saw publication, but somewhere out there, for that select few, there is a ballistics-based combat system that is as nerdy as science and realism can make it. =)

D. Rex Tell Sherwood what? =)

 

[D. Rex]

In second edition, stunts were one, two, or three dice.

In third edition, stunts are two dice, two dice + 1 success, or two dice with + 2 successes. The reason this is better for us forum goers is that players can assume a "one-point" stunt, take the two dice and the story teller can decide to add successes on their end when they resolve the roll. In the second edition case, you either stop and clarify or state your assumption as you roll.

My real dislike is with what they did with charms. Far more of them, far less impressive effects, still have high costs. So while you are in theory incentivised to come up with creative combos, the generic magic you start with is often times more beneficial, and the stuff you pay XP for can often times detract from the better (more simple one) that you didn't have to pay XP for. The thing that I don't think was recognized with the combo heavy mindset is: The human brain is the calculator for the game, not a computer. So obtuse high-brow probability tweak effects go under or over valued to large degrees and are supposed to be declared before rolling. This can feel very bad as a player when the high brow probability adjuster cost you 3 to 5 dice worth of magic and did literally nothing to help you at all.

I realize that was pretty rambly. Am I making any sense?

Couldn't you just take the the 3e stunts and 2e charms and smoosh them together like mommy barbie and daddy barbie?

 

[D. Rex]

D. Rex Tell Sherwood what? =)

Perfect.



Also! Gabi and Marlon would probably have some pretty nerdy engineering chats. Or bicker over if the Ajax or Spartas is superior.

 

[Rykon]

Couldn't you just take the the 3e stunts and 2e charms and smoosh them together like mommy barbie and daddy barbie?

You can try and do some house rule erratas to 2E and make it play better than 3E in my opinion. But you'd also be throwing away alot of the basic rule system changes of 3E

I sort of intend to do that over time. I'm planning on building my "replacement" as a web application though. This will make digging through information easier and help me build my resume for future career opportunities. Next week I actually took off work to shrug off all the burnout from constant knee-jerk project changes. This'll give me time to catch up on some training courses for this project.

Edit: Long story short, I'd want Charm effects to look more like Tao effects from the Qin: the Warring States System/Setting. Though there are some fundamental system things I think need to be toned down a bit (crafting especially)

 

[Psychie]

Copy. Thanks, Psychie . I believe you also mentioned to Illya that the EW Pod in your game carries additional bundles of chaff and flares? If so, how many? What precisely does the EW pod do in your game and which skills does one require to operate it?

EDIT: My in-game post is updated. Thanks again. =)

EDIT: I found the post. It's 12 additional flares. I am guessing it also provides an equal amount of chaff packets given the context of the posts.

The skill to get the best use of the EW Pod is Advanced Electronic Combat from the Macros book. You can try a Electronic Countermeasures skill roll instead at a -15%, and a Sensory Equipment skill roll at a -40%.

A successful roll jams one system at a time for 2d6 minutes. One system jammed reduces all combat bonuses of your target by 25% and makes them lose 1 attack action as they struggle to clear their screens. Two systems jammed drops their bonuses by 50% and they lose two attacks. Three or more systems jammed wipes out all combat bonuses, drops the number of actions by half, and reduces the pilot to just visual targeting of what they can see.

 

[Purr]

And dang it if I completely forgot about most of the skill selections out of Macross Saga when I rolled Gabi... That gives Gabi a.... 36% chance to use the pod (she's got Sensory Equipment at 76%) and there are no Action Points to call upon. Oh well! C'est la vie. =)

Maybe I'd better go for missiles instead?

 

[Rykon]

I am assuming this scouting on my end is going to take multiple iterations of rolls, just let me know if I'm missing anything Psychie

 

[Purr]

Gundam Watcher 27 If you want to have a pair of posts, one in present-time, the other previous to our heading out, then Ryuko and Gabriela can have that discussion Ryuko wanted to have?

 

[Purr]

Psychie, does Alan alone spot the Zentraedi or did Gabi also spot them? As it's written, I'm not certain which it is.

 

[Psychie]

Sorry. You both see the mecha out there.

 

[Purr]

No worries!

Are any of them close together say 15 feet or less apart (for missiles) or 50 feet or less (for tank rounds)?

All of them are damaged, but are some worse off than others?