game idea(Demontes)

[twiztidsoul0512]

Hello all,

I am working on a game idea and I wanted to throw it out there and get some feedback on it. The premise of the game is that the human race has been enslaved by demons. The PCs are people that are "god-born" and they have special powers that puts them on the front lines of the war against the demon oppressors. The game is set in a dark sci-fi setting, guns and grenades and such are there for the players to use but you are more likely to see them with swords and knives.  I think I am going to use the standard class/level system for the characters ( I know throw stuff at me) but I want to allow players to duel class and choose which class they wish to level as they increase in Xp. Also I am trying to give each class something distinct over all the other classes. A good example of this would be the magic-users who have access to every spell in the game at the start of a session. The catch is that spells use life force which every living being has to keep them alive. If a magic-user meditates they are able to drain life force into their life pool and store it for later use. Since this life force regenrates over time there are no adverse effects to meditating to aqquire life force to your life pool, however if the player's life pool is empty they may still cast spells, however the life force is drawn from living being around them and may harm said being. I want to keep a skill system, however since I want the game to have a video game console feel to it there will be tons of skills and loot for the players. I have awhile to go yet but I just wanted to get some feed back.

[Andy Kitkowski]

Hey, welcome!

What are you looking on feedback for?  Do you have any of the system, setting etc laid out to look at/criticise?

-Andy

[twiztidsoul0512]

Andy,

I really don't have much of a system down other than the magic system that I discribed in my first post. I guess right now I am looking mostly at the background of the game, so allow me to elaborate more on that. As I said the world is ruled by demons who have enslaved the human race. There are five different clans of demons that live in the world, these clans have divided the world into five different lands for them to rule over. Being demons they are constantly at war with each other to take a larger chunk of the land for their own. Outside of the five clans are independant demons that run amuck and cause general chaos. With all the enslaving and interdemon war occuring this puts the human race in quite the mess. The PCs as I said play god-born people, what a god-born is is a person who was born of direct disendant of the six gods. All god-borns are born with increased abilities beyond that of a normal run of the mill person. The Gods that the players are born from are related to the main class that they choose when they create a character. Thanks to their abilities the god-born are the selected ( or forced) leaders of the human race and fight on the front lines against the demons.  I have the basics of the magic systems as I already stated ( I guess twice now) I have one class pretty fleshed out which is the spirit warrior. The spirit warrior class is your standard "tank" class with a twist. Spirit warriors can soul bind their weapons, by doing this the weapon increases in strength as the warrior increases in levels, thus making a soul bound dagger a very potent weapon at higher levels, however, the player can only have one soul bound weapon and if that weapon is lost then s/he will take negs in combat with any other weapon untill the soul bound weapon is recovered. I also have an unnamed class that acts like a magic-user but uses demon blood to power their spells instead of life essences, members of this class are born of a demon god as opposed to the other five classes, that means that they have no trouble siding with the demons if the personal gain is high enough. What I have so far for the system is based on a d10 percential system, that may change before the end of the game, but as of now pretty much everything is rated from 1-100. I like this system because it is a very common rating system and easy for non-role players to understand. I am still working on the other classes and most of the demons and mechanics behind the game, I have the background set pretty well, in fact I am working on a novel based on the game world ( which is where I got the idea for the game world actually) that I want to post on lulu when I finish it. I will give more detail on the game system as I figure out more of it. This was going to be a OGL game but fell apart so I am trying it with my own system.

[Eero Tuovinen]

Why not OGL? What you've told us sounds OGL, feels OGL and smells OGL. Just plug in your character class ideas to the D&D chassis and you're ready to go, effectively. Write the setting out in an engaging manner, and that's it.

Do you have design goals that are not met by D&D? You mentioned imitating videogames, but doesn't D&D do that pretty well? Actually, I'm at loss when trying to think of a system that would suit better among the mainstream games.

It's not easy to make a whole game out of nothing. If you're more interested in the setting than mechanics, there's much good in using D&D. Especially if you're already committed to a class-based design centered around leveling up and gaining kewl powers.

[twiztidsoul0512]

I agree and that is why it started with OGL, I ran into a couple of problems. The main two being the magic system I would have to completely revamp and I feel that the combat in D&D is rather slow, I am going for a fast past cinamatic feel, also the skill system,  I want quicker leveling and a bigger selection of skills. I could take the basic OGL set-up and add all of the above but at that point, hell I have 75%-80% of the system I am working on now. I have written and helped write other games but this is the first one that I want to publish, the others are used among local gamers.  Which is why I am posting here, to get an idea of what other people outside of the local area think of my game.