OOC-Game and Character Discussion

So we can use this thread as a starting point to discuss the idea for the game and character concepts. I'm going to be posting information about the game itself in a separate thread as soon as I can.

I have an idea for a grander meta plot, but my main goal is to give the game a test drive and see how it translates to PbP. So for now, we'll stick to the basic premise, you are Takers out in the Loss just trying to make your way taking jobs and trying to save up enough to retire comfortably.

I think I'd like to play the face.

The social skills really play into the negotiation parts of the game. Negotiation in particular has this cool, nonlinear time mechanic where between rounds of negotiation, the other players in the group can influence the negotiation by playing out vignettes where they research the client or the job or persuade people for tips. That kind of thing.

Yeah it was my favourite part of the oneshot episode so I figured I would build my character for that purpose...

I listened to the rest of them and enjoyed them. Really pushed me to want to start the game up.

How's this for a backbone of my character?

Simply known now as Run, before the outbreak Jimmy Larsson was widely known as Home Run.

Prior to his short career with the Boston Red Sox, he was considered an up and comer, with a small team and from his very first appearance hit Ball after Ball out of the park. He was soon snapped up by the Red Sox, acquiring fame and a huge contract overnight.

Before the money started rolling in, the world turned to hell. Now all Run has is his trusty bat and running shoes. Now he hits heads instead of balls and when the need arises, he runs.

Solid start. May want to consider the location. We'll be just outside of Memphis. If you want to stick with Boston that's cool, just consider how he got to Memphis. Alternatively, they have a minor league team the Memphis Redbirds that are affiliated with the St. Louis Cardinals or if you were a little younger you could have been at University of Memphis.

If you're going with a Melee fighter, you probably want to consider being Latent or Immune.

As I am from Toronto and a Jays fan, our characters can never be friends.... Lol. Just kidding.

I'm going to read through stuff and I'll post an idea later today!

OK, as a Brit, I'm don't know a great deal about Baseball so I'll bow to your superior knowledge :)

Ah...sorry . There I go assuming everyone is American again...

I guess it really doesn't matter. just trying to think about how your character would fit in the setting

Oh it's a great idea! I'm glad for the input. Should I set up a thread to go through the character generation on?

Reason Boston came to mind is that Run was about to get paid a huge amount of money (so from my limited perspective, a big team seems to fit) as a result of this being snatched away from him he is obsessed with money and wants to get his big Pay Day.

Well, baseball teams travel. He could just so happen to be in the area an still be on the Red Sox :)

Agreed, or maybe he was traveling to an away game and the plane crashed, but he managed to survive and make it to this area. It's all flavor. As long as he ends up on the wrong side of Memphis after the Crash, we're good.

So my plan was to start us off with one job and see how that goes and then decide how/if we want to continue from there. Is that cool with everyone?

Sounds good.

Yeah, sounds good.

Fine by me

I know it was unintentional, but we now have a baseball player, a bowler. Genisisect wants to be the face, maybe before the crash he was their agent. Great with contracts and negotiations...Jerry Maguire with a gun? Not sure what Valcos is thinking. Doesn't necessarily have to be a sports guy, could have joined them later.

Not trying to force characters on you just putting it out there to see if you like it.

Hey, I have some ideas floating around in my head. Just haven't had time to sit down at the computer. I'll try and get some stuff up tonight after work :)

No worries. I'm still getting up to speed on the rules and I'm going to have a fairly busy weekend, so we probably won't really get started before Tuesday or Wednesday evening at the earliest

I wouldn't be too opposed to the idea of being your managers, but I just don't know the first thing about anything to do with sports economics, it would be quite unsaturated for me to play that, I could probably make it work though...

I was originally thinking of playing a deal closer, you know the type of guy you get to help sell a pitch.

I haven't had a chance to go through the rules yet, but I'll try and build the character this Saturday (which I think is your Friday night...)

Like I said, just a thought, I'd rather you played something you're comfortable with and would have fun playing. Ultimately you could all just be people who ended up located near each other and found it mutually beneficial to work together.

If having the bowler proves troublesome for the group in terms of character selection or how the group gels I really don't mind swapping him out for someone else.

I don't see it causing problems, it was more me breaking the sports association theme we had going with your characters.

Just out of curiosity do you mean bowler as in bowling or bowler as in cricket?

Cool. I meant bowler as in bowling. I was being North American centric and forgot that bowler could also refer to cricket.

Np, I suspected as much. Just wanted to be sure

Sounds good to me

"Show me the zombies!"

OK character built, I think I did everything right...

Alright. Looks like everybody is done or close on character development. So a couple things I'd like to work out on this thread. how long has your crew been working together? You guys all have solid reasons for being in the area. The timeline is about 5 years after the crash and you guys have been takers for the majority of that time. Whatever you guys agree on is fine with me.

Depending on the other characters personalities, I'd say they have been together for an extended time. Claire doesn't trust people easy and her distance can be difficult to a new crew. I would say at least working together a few months. Have some minor jobs done together.

Alternatively, it can just be a fresh crew testing the water together.

Since Claire and Ham-Bone are both scavengers I can imagine them meeting accidentally and having a tense stand off in the seasonal aisle of an abandoned Wal Mart or something like. Once the tension diffused, perhaps they began to cooperate in order to compete against more ruthless gangs of looters.

Loan Shark could have worked with everyone before, but this either his first or few trips out with Takers

I'll flesh out the New Graceland post a bit more, but basically since it grew from the ashes of a car dealership there were lots of cars and a garage already. Plus he had several mechanics. The PB King has really been playing to his strengths and salvaging cars and parts for most of the time since the crash.

I like the idea of Claire being startled by Ham-Bone in the seasonal aisle. She'd feel awkward being caught deciding which lawn gnome would be best to take because she can't have them all. They could have a mutual trust, like they go out on runs together and sorts watch each other's back. Probably would talk too much, but share a few stories and loot.

I like that, especially the lawn gnome. I imagined Ham-Bone searching for camping gear but really being attracted by a bright orange and yellow slip and slide. Evoking memories of childhood, he wonders whether he should take it. I think those two would get along and make good partners.

Haha, I'm loving it. I can just picture the scene between the odd pair lol

Run could be new to the crew. He's been looking to join a new crew since his last got wiped out. Being handy up close he would be a benefit to any crew and Claire's normally distrustful nature might be cancelled out by his semi-famous status in the baseball world.

Claire would be familiar with any media attention he received. Being a recognizable face, she would trust him more easily. He's also a brute compared to her, it'd make sense for her to want to work with a big strong guy with a bat.

What kind of media attention did he receive? Like, how do you think the media portrayed him because that's what she would base it off of.

Ham-Bone, the second-rate bowler, would be both drawn to and jealous of a legit athlete. It could make for some interesting situations.

Before the Crash, Run was the new kid on the block at the Red Sox but already on his way to breaking records so he was loved by the media. His fame was incredibly short lived though.

As my only knowledge of baseball comes from the 80's movie Major League, Run reminds me of Charlie Sheen's Wild Thing (though with more hair and muscles) so I imagine he inspired a similar reaction. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Mi3KNEpbA4

Hell yes! Wild Thing! I'm loving all of this. Another thing to consider for Run... As an immune, it's an even more dangerous world oit there because your body is literally made of money. 350 bounty to be exact. To put that in perspective, you can retire on like 60 bounty. A fully loaded military grade vehicle is like 13 bounty

As to his fame, I would think based off your weak spot and back story that he had a ton of hype coming out of college and broke a ton of records there, but the crash happened shortly after getting signed to the Red Sox. So thats why he never really received the big pay day. But anybody who followed baseball at all at the time would know about him.

Yes, we're on the same page.

That's why he runs! Plus he wears his helmet and gloves much of the time, concealing how he looks.

Also would like to point out the difference between Latent and Immune. They both cannot be infected, but For Latents it's because they already have been infected, but for some reason did not turn into Vectors. You can spot a latent a mile away because they get the black veiny growths all over. Latents are contagious and if they die will turn into a Casualty. Immune people look like anyone else and cannot become infected and do not become Casualties or Vectors when they die.

Such secrets!

Mwahaha

:)

I was agonising for ages over the right character portrait, then I remember just the thing...

Thanks to those of you who have submitted characters. If it's not too much trouble, could you give the character sheet I posted a shot (LINK)

You don't need to include all of the skills, just the ones your character has.

Okay, and the last thing we need for the crew is a name. Also, just to make sure I'm clear on this:

Claire and Ham-Bone have been working together for a little while now and they met scavenging in the loss.
Run has recently joined (is completely new to?) the crew since his last crew....didn't work out.
....and I'm not clear on where Loan Shark comes into play.

He probably worked with hooking the crew up with gigs before but this is either his first, or one of his first times actually heading out. Not sure about a crew name though... Anyone else got an idea?

Also updated my charactersheet with your template. Just need to grab some more details from gear and then done!

I think Run has been with them a couple of months, enough time to earn trust we discussed.

So, Clair and Ham have been working together for a while. Run joined the crew to be some extra muscle, he has stayed around because he is trustworthy. And Loan Shark has proven himself useful for setting up jobs and stuff, but now wants to come out on some as well?

Sounds right to me.

Awesome. I've been working on the initial jobs that will be available, as soon as we get those characters in we can get started. I'm thinking probably Monday or Tuesday. Sound good?

Sounds good. I forgot to add Ham-Bone to the character sheet but will do it over the weekend.

You should have Ham-Bone's sheet. I spent 5 bounty to raise two skills and have banked the other 5. Can't wait to start.

Are you guys able to access my new subforum (Invisible Hand)?

I don't see it. It is truly transparent.

Sweet. Thanks.

Can't remember if I counted it this way. I just read that Backpacks and your first Rations are free at Character Gen. Make sure we didn't count those 2 Bounty out of your 10 (or 20 for Scavengers).

I want Claire to sabotage other crews, can't get a post up tonight it'll be another day or two. :)

Well to sabotage you need to know who they are. Once you do, you can try to sabotage them as a scam during the negotiations So for now think about how Claire would go about finding that info out.

Hey, so can I scout out PB's area to see what people are going to him for the contract? Claire has bigh awareness and binoculars and also decent stealth. She can collect Intel and bring it back to the group?

Using awareness is definitely an option in the rules so...

Absolutely. Awareness would be just like you described, kinda looking around your area for information. Despite having some very old school elements, like random encounters and what not. It's pretty big on collaboratively improvising the narrative. So for awareness, give me a sense of how you're going about applying that skill, you don't necessarily have to feed me NPCs (though I really like Greasy Pete and you'll definitely see that dude again, I don't feel like I fleshed out Deuce quite as much),

As long as you stay within the enclave, don't force the other players into actions that they haven't agreed to, and don't just start blatantly giving unwarranted benefits to your character that are unrelated to the roll you're probably ok. My plan is to do my best to incorporate whatever you give me and work it in to the story. If something just completely doesn't work for some reason, we may need to ret con it, but I'm going to avoid that as much as possible. These prep work checks are supposed to give us as a group an opportunity to a) move the narrative forward, and b) do some world-building together. The references and dependents provide another mechanic like that. They have a mechanical purpose (help overturn a failed result, and heal threats), but they are also there to provide opportunities to roleplay your characters.

Sorry this became a much longer answer than originally intended

Okay, can you give me a location that I would see PB King ? I don't want to place him somewhere, but can work some RP if I have a spot to use.

You can definitely incorporate others just don't dictate their actions, but for these small vignettes it wouldn't make sense most of the time. Ultimately we are just playing out one die roll.

I hope you guys don't mind me being a stickler for the rules. At least at first, once I feel more comfortable with the rules as written, then we can deviate from them here or there as we see fit.

Alright, Let's get the character's together before we jump into the negotiations. I'd like to see them interact a bit. Where do you guys typically meet?

Well loan shark keeps his personal life as far away from business as possible, so he'd probably meet up at a public place, unless you think we have some kind of club house.

Ham-Bone has his Astro-Van/Museum. That's an option or you could just have a meeting spot, the pub, or some other location

To be honest, I'm against s more public place. People can overhear us when we talk business. Pub is somethin after s job, not before. Claire is just a bit careful and not really a fan of being around randoms.

We've already seen that there's plenty of people around the enclave that are listening.

Lol, I still want the least amount of people listening. A pub is fine though, beer is always good!

The Astro Van is private. We can close the doors.

Run prefers privacy. His helmet is always on in public places but removes it in privacy with the crew. After they saved his life a month or so ago he trusts them enough to see his face and know he's Immune.

Seems like we're tapering off... I'll post the beginning of the negotiation scene tonight unless there are objections

Sounds good

Sorry, been busy with work. I'll try to catch up tomorrow!

I'll be away until Sunday and will not be checking in regularly. Feel free to play Ham as an NPC.

Thanks for the heads up.

I edited my character forum with a picture now, was a work in progress. Going to get my scam post up in a little.

If I perform a Partners in Crime scam (as I'm in the negotiation ) does my contribution act seperately from the main negotiator or add to it?

I'm pretty sure it just means that next round you make the skill check instead of me.

You could do negotiator support which if successful gives Shark an additional +2 bonus. Or you could still try to find a spot through intimidation or something.

Ham-Bone, I think, would feel an obligation to help out the guy in the tree. What do the rest of you think?

From a mechanics perspective, leaving this guy to die will be a self-control roll for detachment. The flip side is that it will cost valuable resources to fight all those zombies..and you gain...who knows?

Sorry I missed this. Run soft spot is defending the weak so this was a no brainier for him. If he makes financial gain from it, that's a bonus.

That's a point, my soft point is waste not, is probably see this as a needless expense of our precious resources...

Yeah, saving this guy isnt really in Claire's interest.

Just wanted to let you all know I'll be away for the holidays. we are leaving on the 22nd and should be back around New Years. I might be able to post but I am not counting on it.

That's fine. I'm going out of town on the 23rd through the 2nd so my posting will be down too

No worries! I'll be busy but keeping an eye on the forums anyway. Have a great time guys!

Sorry guys, was busier than I expected over the holidays. Didn't want to half-ass the start of the main event.

Happy Holidays, dudes :)

It's all good. Hope you all had a good break!

Check your link by the way, Wardomo

whoops! Fixed

Just noticed that Valcos posted in the absences thread said his posting is going to be inconsistent, but didn't give a time frame. I'll be rolling for Claire just to keep us moving.

Wanted to let you know I am out of town until Sunday. I might be able to post but I am not counting on it.

Cool thanks. I PMed Valcos but haven't heard back

I know Valcos has been busy with work. He's gone quiet in my Dredd game too

I'll be away until Tuesday. It is unlikely I will be able to post, so feel free to take over Ham-Bone until then.

Hey sorry everybody. I've had a string of nights where I'm either super busy or crash very early. I'll do my best to get us moving tonight

No worries. We all have periods like that.

Got a sick kid, might not be able to post the next couple days.

Back

I wanted to let you know that I'll be away for work between the 18th and 23rd. if things pick up in the game, feel free NPC Ham-Bone while I am gone.

I'm happy either way. I'm now running 5 games so wouldn't object if we called it a day, but I've liked what I've seen so far and happy to continue if that's the consensus.

WarDomo, you have to run the game, which is a lot of work, so if the payoff isn't there then you should ditch it. For my part, I've enjoyed the game and would be happy to continue if that is the consensus. The biggest problem was with char gen and not knowing what skills and equipment we needed to survive in the Loss. Now that Shark is armed, it might be more balanced. The RP/combat dichotomy seems to be built into the structure of RM, although not all legs or jobs need to involve combat. I've been looking forward to interludes and vignettes to inject more RPing into the game and to round out our characters more. At any rate, I can see how the game is not everyone's cup of tea, and I am happy to continue (or not) based on how others feel.

I've started running a RM PbP game elsewhere. Everyone has some combat capability, so that has not been a problem. Most people complain about the humanity mechanic. Players just don't like their characters suffering stress and trauma or the frequency with which they have to make the tests. So that game may come to an end too.

I am back. Any thoughts on whether or not to proceed with the game?

I'm still keen...

Just checking on the status of RM, as I am trying to decide whether or not to take on other games. I'd like to continue if others are into it.

Hey. Sorry. I haven't been responsive. Go ahead and join the other game. Life sped up a bit in the last few months and I haven't been able to devote as much time to PbP as I'd like. This game definitely took the brunt of that.

I appreciate you guys trying the game out and I'm happy to hear you were enjoying it. This was my first attempt at GMing pbp. I think it's best for me to set this one down though. I'm sorry.

No worries WarDomo. RL always comes first. You did a great job, and I couldn't tell that this was your first crack at GMing pbp. Thank you for giving me an opportunity to play RM. I like the game, although it is heavier on the structure than I am used to. If you decide to reboot it, I'll be happy to give it another try.

No problem. It was good gaming with you guys and I hope we meet again!

Don't worry about it! I enjoyed the tasting of a new system, and you did pretty well trying to adapt RM to play by post. See you around...