Galactic - preview information

[Matt Wilson]

Since I've gotten at least a small amount of speculation about my next game in development, I thought I'd fill in some blanks.

Galactic is intended to be an epic space adventure game, but neither the definitive nor a generic one. There will be a setting, and there will be specific elements that won't carry over into any setting you ever dreamed of.

It's a mishmash of concepts, stolen shamelessly from D&D, Sorcerer, HeroQuest, various computer games, and more. I think Clinton made a great move in taking all the bits from games that he really liked and reworking them into a new game along with his own ideas. This is the game I want to play, with all the stuff I like in it.

So anyway, here's the scoop. It's the far future, and a post-apocalyptic human race has risen back up from near extinction on some remote world out in the galactic boondocks. Humankind is extremely factionalized, and nobody really likes anyone from any other faction. Circumstances have caused them to lose all knowledge of the past, so until they discover this big artifact jump ship in a far orbit, they've been under the assumption that this is their home.

Play begins some time after the discovery, and some of that technology has been reverse engineered, and characters are interstellar adventurers, starting out as ordinary (or mostly ordinary) people, and eventually fulfilling their destinies and leading the human race.

this is sort of a D&D influence, the start small and go on quests kind of thing, but without the tactics or the black and white nature of good and evil

The endgame has to do with a mythical threat to humankind, whatever it was that originally reduced trillions to thousands. It's still out there, and in order for humankind to face it successfully, it must stand united.

So your "guy" will need to do that somehow. You do that by gaining "influence" among factions, by doing things for them.

these factions I think are cousins of Sorcerer demons, with benefits for players as well as their own unpleasant wants and needs

The influence you gain affects both your capabilities and the scale at which you can effect change. So say you have small influence over a city state. That means maybe you can call upon a squad of people, and affect things at the group level. If you have a lot of influence, you could make an impact at a planetary level, with fleets and legions at your disposal.

and this would be Trollbabe's influence

So where's the moral/ethical dilemmas?

[list=1]
[*] since there's no real good guys, you'll face constant dilemmas based on who you want to ally yourself with.  X wants you to steal technology from Y, and you know Y are kind of despicable, but they're also pretty effective in a fight. If you do this, you weaken Y, and you might wish you hadn't later on.
[*] what happens when you fail at something but you really needed to succeed? What are you prepared to do? sacrifice something personal, or accept repercussions elsewhere?
[/list:o]

So that's sort of the game in a nutshell. I'm keeping the actual rules sequestered away until I work out a few more things, but I have a good portion of them sketched out.

[Jonas Larson]

Sounds interesting!

Do you have any idea of when you will be finished? At some points it sounds like you've just started, on others like you're nearly finished.

Keep us posted!

Good luck!
/Jonas

[Matt Wilson]

Do you have any idea of when you will be finished?

Jonas:

I choose not to answer, on the grounds that it may be used to incriminate me on some future date.

You're right about the game's current state, though. Some parts are pretty far along, others not so much at all.

[joshua neff]

It sounds a lot like HeroQuest, Matt, with factions (cultures) that have both good and bad qualities, and with the PCs growing in influence to determine the future of said factions--or maybe to create new factions?

That is incredibly cool.

[Jonas Larson]

Matt:

Okey, that's fine by me. I understand why you don't want to make promises you cannot keep. I would never incriminate you though, as I find it very important to respect authors (and other artists) integrity and to respect that their work takes time.

Well, sounds promising that I was right in my analysies though.

Galactic seems very cool, it's a game I would very much want to play at some point.

[Valamir]

Two random thoughts

1) your origins of humanity on this planet has alot in common with with the origins of humanity in Alyria...last remnants (presumeably) of humanity chased off world who've more or less forgotten their origins and who are still threatened by that which destroyed Earth.  I wonder if there's any possibility of a cross over history...

2) I think it would be fun if bits and pieces of Earth history are cultureally preserved as part of the worlds mythos and tradition.

[greedo1379]

It sounds like a really cool idea.  Have you thought about how the leader of thousands would defeat the big super evil that defeated trillions?  Would it be a psuedo magic thing like the Force?  If your hero is just collecting allies then I would assume that the super evil is something that would be defeated militarily or something but then why couldn't the other trillions of people do it?

[Matt Wilson]

Two random thoughts

your origins of humanity on this planet has alot in common with with the origins of humanity in Alyria...last remnants (presumeably) of humanity chased off world who've more or less forgotten their origins and who are still threatened by that which destroyed Earth.  I wonder if there's any possibility of a cross over history...

No kidding. Originally I was inspired by a computer game called Homeworld. Then I just started adding stuff. I'll have to give Alyria a look. That's the trouble, though, you know. Always new shiny things to look at that decide they're going to influence the game. If I'm not careful this game will end up being about people who paint boats.

Have you thought about how the leader of thousands would defeat the big super evil that defeated trillions?

Sure I've thought about it, but I'm not providing an answer in the book. What fun would that be?

If your hero is just collecting allies then I would assume that the super evil is something that would be defeated militarily or something but then why couldn't the other trillions of people do it?

The best answer I can give you at the moment is "because that game isn't about those other trillions of people." Your character does it because it's your character. That's the most important reason.

[JamesDJIII]

Wow.

Talk about a letdown.

I was really looking forward to a non-setting-specific Narrativist toolbox for science-fiction. Sigh.

I guess people like this sort of thing. Back to the caves...

[Matt Wilson]

James:

Sorry you're let down, but I'm not sure what got you thinking on that track in the first place. From my first post I talked about a specific setting, and that it was space adventure, not "science" fiction.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

If I'm seeing this correctly, then the whole point is that no one can actually defeat the big evil. Other people can't do it because no one can do it.

If the heroes do it, or rather, if their actions have such repercussions that the evil is made more vulnerable, then a very healthy dose of "consequential luck" is involved. By choosing to make up a character, the player is already committing to having that character be conceived of, by the other players and by "the system in action," as a nexus or particularly consequential jot or tittle of humanity.

Or to look at it a different way, if no one makes up any characters, then nothing any person in the imaginary universe could do would stop the evil.

Am I on the right track with this, Matt?

Best,
Ron

[Bankuei]

Hi Matt,

Sounds very cool.  Are the factions going to be treated as single entities for the purposes of play, or will you have personalities within each faction that need to be either won over, replaced, manipulated, etc.?  

It would be kind of neat for all the NPCs to each have an influence rating and by gaining their support, it would be considered the PC's rating.  Of course, such things would fluctuate according to events in play, but that's part of the fun and drama of politics, right?

Chris

[Matt Wilson]

If the heroes do it, or rather, if their actions have such repercussions that the evil is made more vulnerable, then a very healthy dose of "consequential luck" is involved.

Yeah, that's kind of it. You're the butterfly in China, so to speak.

However, as you go, your influence on events becomes more direct. Instead of your exploits following this long chain of consequences, you're basically at the front.

As a starting character, you might just be some schmoe trading goods or something, but the decisions you make regarding whom to sell to will have an impact. That, in turn, pulls you into the mix a little farther, and so on.

Sounds very cool. Are the factions going to be treated as single entities for the purposes of play, or will you have personalities within each faction that need to be either won over, replaced, manipulated, etc.?

Right now I have tiers of NPC support, with generic "redshirt" henchmen at the bottom and abstracted faction influence at the top. Any of those NPCs could be associated with a faction, but how you get them and what their benefits and drawbacks are differ. To support what you're imagining, you could use the support of your henchmen to get additional support from a more powerful "named" NPC, and then use that NPC's support to get faction-level influence. However, any use of NPC support on a roll puts that NPC at risk in some way. So maybe you try and get some alien to help you out, and you roll poorly, and it gets insulted and disintegrates a couple of your redshirts. Or maybe you get the support of a faction behind you, and then you screw up...

Make sense?