Real RPGs, none of that new fangled computer bullshit

[Syt]

Thanks, I've come across it (and there's also Worlds without Number for Fantasy and Cities without Number for Cyberpunk) and will check the rules.

I want to start a Hostile Solo run this week; might AAR it if the fancy strikes me.

[Sophie Scholl]

Huge RPG .pdf bundle on Humble Bundle!
https://www.humblebundle.com/books/roll-big-or-go-home-rpg-megabundle-books

[Syt]

Already saw and picked it up.

Comes with a DrivethruRPG "voucher" which includes all these items, too, and adds them to your account/library if you have one there.

[The Brain]

My FLGS just got a copy of the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Ed. book I didn't have, so I picked it up. Nice. It's Tome of Salvation, on religions and such, which didn't feel necessary back in the day, but now I couldn't say no to completeness.

[Sophie Scholl]

I gave away almost all of my WHFRP books years and years ago. Now I'm probably going to sell off the two leftovers: the Bretonnia book and the Mousillon book.

[Habbaku]

I was gifted a new copy of WEG's 30th anniversary edition Star Wars RPG. 

Now I have to run the damn thing.

[Sophie Scholl]

WEG's Star Wars was my first ever ttrpg experience as a kid! My friend's older brother ran a one shot for us during an overnight birthday gathering. I played a merc that was a total copy of Mara Jade right down to her name. Because, when you can finally get to be any character concept you want to be, you totally pick to be a girl! Totally normal cis boy things. Right?   

[Sophie Scholl]

I'm sloooowly piecing together a group of folks to run The One Ring's starter adventure with. Now to decide if I want to do the first one they put out for 2e or wait a little longer and run the second one they're releasing this month.

[Syt]

WEG's Star Wars was my first ever ttrpg experience as a kid! My friend's older brother ran a one shot for us during an overnight birthday gathering. I played a merc that was a total copy of Mara Jade right down to her name. Because, when you can finally get to be any character concept you want to be, you totally pick to be a girl! Totally normal cis boy things. Right?   

(In computer RPGs I usually play female characters ... I mean, if I have to look at a butt near the center of my screen for dozens of hours .... )

[Darth Wagtaros]

Got to play some modules from the Temple of Elemental Evil that were re-made for 5e at Comicon.

I really like Dungeon Crawler Classics though.

[Sophie Scholl]

Session 0 for a Vampire: The Masquerade game set in NYC in 2000 just after the Camarilla took over. Looks like we're going to have a Gangrel, a Toreador, and a Hecata in the party as well as my Salubri. I'm thinking of going with a MSF/Doctor's Without Borders background who was turned while working in the collapsing former Yugoslavia. In the power vacuum and the chaos/uncertain power structure/potential for change that the setting represents, my character will be testing the waters. Our players/storyteller are from around the world, which should be pretty cool. One lives in Israel, one in Egypt, one in England, one in Ireland, and myself as the sole person from the States.

[Solmyr]

One lives in Israel, one in Egypt, one in England, one in Ireland, and myself as the sole person from the States.

Are you sure you don't want a Russian and a Ukrainian as well?

Sounds like a nice game! VtM is one of the games I'd like to potentially GM at some point.

[Syt]

I've been taking another stab at Star Trek Captain's Log.

I created a random Captain (Bolian Female, originally engineer who moved to Captain) in 2280 (post The Motion Picture, pre Khan), commanding a Miranda class that's on the Romulan Neutral zone to set up listening posts and maintain existing ones.

I created characters for the senior staff (at least back stories), so that there's a bit to work with.

I run the tables for generating a new mission - "Show the Flag - Set Up Schools." I thought it was a bit boring, but decided to stick with it. For theme and incident I get "Medicate" and "Spatial Rift." I guess there's a spatial rift we need to fix. As inciting encounter I roll "Deep Space - gravimetric anomaly." At least that fits the Spatial Rift theme.

I roll some tables for the colony - it's an agricultural colony of Tellarites who are not overly fond of the Federation. I assume they're largely veterans of the Klingon War 25 years prior (ST:Discovery) who just want to be left alone (the Captain grew up on a planet ravaged by war because her parents were scientists studying the long term effects of Klingon weapons). At least that's their governor. However, the council specifically asked for a Federation school to be set up (I'm bringing a Tellarite educator for that purpose).

Arriving in the system we come across the gravimetric anomaly and scan it, just in case. To see if something unexpected happens, I use Mythic GME's scene checks. Roll says I alter the scene - something hides/disappears, and I add a character (rolling for Ensign Rao, my comms officer).

I determine that my science officer scans the anomaly but it suddenly vanishes, as if someone flicked a switch. Meanwhile, Rao picked up static on the comms channel. We decide to leave a probe behind for analysis and continue to the planet. What little data we have semes to match gravimetric anomalies reported around structures of the Spherebuilders, but those were hundreds of lightyears away and didn't just switch on and off.

We have a chat with the Governor and one of the councilors. The governor accuses us of meddling, and that the probe is meant to spy on them. We manage to smooth things out a little bit before we are alerted that the anomaly is back.

We run the scans, but again - the anomaly disappears ... and so does the probe. There was again a burst of static, and our engines shut down. No system malfunctions, it's like someone flipped an off switch, though our engineer will keep checking.



Generally I like the narrative so far, but the lack of guidance by the game is at once great and annoying. There's plenty of oracle tables to roll on in the book, but quite a few are very specific that would be difficult to fit in. I can use other tables (god knows I've bought plenty books of tables and generators from drivethrurpg) and often do, like for fleshing out NPCs, but it's quite a hassle. Generally, ST:CL expects you to map out the story with support from the materials and tables. Which means you have a lot of freedom which is generally great.

At the same time, when I'm scanning an anomaly there's basically 10 million directions you could go with what happens, so something a bit more generic would be preferrable. The additional 2nd Edition books add more tables that help (esp. all the complications/technical tables in the Tech manual, or the planet biome tables in the Exploration manual), but for me it's a bit hit and miss. I'm actually thinking about creating supplementary tables to either expand the existing ones with more generic results, or bespoke D100 tables for scanning results, what effects weapons/anomalies/alien entities can have etc.