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Wednesday, December 9, 2009

[RPG] Updates Notification: 9th, December-

I am busy describing life in all of the Imperial Castes based upon the ancestral traditions of former starship crew positions (Astrogator, Medical, Survival Instructor, etc.), and their applicability to contemporary Urutskan life.
--Mechanically, this works with both the Spectral Index, and traditional d100 rolls equally well, so both camps are accommodated without diluting the system.

Likewise, the micromanagement of Skill % has been eliminated through the introduction of the Spectral Index, which itself, eliminates the use of d100 while still maintaining as great a range through the addition of PC bonuses for Ethnicity, etc.

I have also updated the Dynamic Pool rules to align more precisely with Gamma World's (nd6) HP, where n is equal to the figure's Constitution score. Although, Urutskans are generally of a lighter build overall than inhabitants of a full G world, rather than .95 G or so of that smaller, watery world.
--Now, commoners and non-Fight-die gaining persons are still as durable as an average GW character, and any gained DP from Fight Dice are simply added to the total.
---The effect this has upon the Combat System is that Critical Strikes will conform more closely to the established 'Double Damage' sort of operation than my, 'straight into the negatives' method. Concurrent with that, however is a 'Wound Level' mechanism which emulates similar effects I find desirable in my games; namely that folks really ought to go unconscious before kicking the bucket more often than not.

Also Combat-related, Critical Strikes now occur only on iterative '5+ what was needed' results, and taken off of the raw die (dice) results of a '20', etc.

With all of the talk of Mass Combat and the Deendee End Game in the blogs, I brushed-off my work from earlier in the year and combined it with the Spectral Index to provide a standard wargamey matrix with the added granularity of a subjective, colour-logic system.
--I'm letting all of that simmer, but have taken efforts to support a seamless integration with the PCs so that 'on-the-fly' change of focus 'zoom' can be used to affect both the Strategic and PC scales of action.
---The results of 'heroes' are then stepped-down one level for the aligned warriors around them, but also, poor troop rolls can drag-down the heroes' efforts. It is the most synergistic and compact mechanism that I have seen in a system tailored to such high degree of integration with an RPG, so I hope I succeed in my lofty goal.

My entirely random character, Eresenkh Elik, using the CharGen tables, and before expending any 'PC' currency, is pretty interesting and serves to illustrate the sorts of folks who surround and support/undermine the PCs in their efforts/exploits, and from whence PCs are derived.
--This makes UWoM PCs somewhere on the order of magnitude between D&D and GW starting characters, which is where I intended.
---This ought to further facilitate the use of GW and UWoM materials back and forth between the two games, and a few of the tables are based on concepts put forth by James M. Ward in early Dragon articles for Metamorphosis Alpha.

I'm certain other bits are escaping me at present, but that's the gist of the changes.

5 comments:

  1. Ooo. . . with regard to social castes based on ancestral traditions of former starship crew positions, if you haven't already read The Blue World by Jack Vance, you should absolutely do so!

    I don't want to ruin it for you, but in The Blue World there is a society based upon a similar premise. It is, naturally, executed in a manner that is all Vance, but I figure that it might be a good, inspirational, read.

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  2. James, thank you for the recommendation.
    --I'll put it in the queue.

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  3. Keep at it, I am eager to see Urutsk finished. I have the betas and will be running a couple of marathon games within the next three weeks, in addition to my every other Saturday game, one set in the Ancient Vaults world and on in the Urutsk setting and I am chomping at the bit to run them both.

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  4. I've been thinking about the Diced Spell Point post - it's clever, but it didn't immediately click for me, took a couple of reads.

    What do other people think - Is it too elaborate ?

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  5. bat,
    --I am delighted and honoured.
    ---I'll see if I can get you the revised rules before then.

    Sean,
    --Thanks for saying so, Sean. I really appreciate the time you took to consider it.
    ---Let's see what others think, and how my player likes it. (ought to, as it is a potential freebie, but, who knows?)

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