a new game of Pulp, Stylized Villainy

[Jason Petrasko]

Hi,

I'm working up an RPG that will be based on:

PC's play pulp, stylized villains in an empire that spans the stars.

The basic idea so far is that the PC's have a little bit of nobility left in them, as does the empire in which they participate. In essence the PCs are the only one's free in the empire, being shen nobles. The idea of what the PCs do is:

Deal with rebel scum. Try and maintain their position and advance inside the facist empire.

I have a lot of it already layed out in this PDF:

http://inkarbon.com/tNFooE/Empire_Sample.pdf (360kb, 11 pages)

I'm interesting in knowing if there are some games out there I should be looking at that have done the same type of thing, and if anything strikes you as particularly interesting (or dull) in the basic ideas.

Thanks, Jason

[BrennaLaRosa]

Interesting. A bit depressing for my tastes, but the idea is refreshing to say the least.

[Selene Tan]

Ooh, neat. I've seen some "let's play the bad guys" adventures before, but they seemed less... mature. :)

Random note -- I keep pronouncing "Shen" like "shun" since it seems a lot like the Chinese word "shen," meaning spirit or god. Was this intentional?

The cliches make me think of the Tenets in Universalis. Is there a method for determining them before play starts?

I like the resolution mechanic so far, with the Push system. I definitely want to see more.

The text needs a bit of editing, but you probably knew that.

[Jason Petrasko]

Yes, I tried to incorporate some mature themes into the design. Though, I could easily see the play reflecting the maturity of the players themselves. In fact I saw that in the playtest session.

I actually pulled several terms I use in the game from japanese. Shen is from Shin as meaning: truth, reality, genuineness. The physical attributes are in a group call Tal from Tai meaning material. The mental attributes are in a group call Sel from Sei meaning spiritual.

I never thought of creating a system to establish them. I'm really think that would be cool, if your able to add them before play. I'm also thinking that getting to have a hand in creating the feel of the empire and emperor would be cool too, before play.

I had some doubts about the resolution mechanics, and some problems with the framework (a little d20/Action! knock off I worked up) melding with it. The core mechanics were a smashing success though, really ended up engaging. I'm looking forward to building a framework that is strong enough to embrace the rest of the mechanic. The current stat+skill BS isn't cutting it. :)

Yea, it's a very much unedited draft right now. I just want to get input on the game itself and don't have the patience to edit first.

Thanks for the input! You can check out the playtest thread here: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=15282

[Jason Petrasko]

Now, after the intial test and shakedown, the core D20-esque mechanic was pulled in favor of something more original and customized. Here I will attempt to describe it in an overview manner, pointing out the whys of it and how I envision play.

The new framework offers up ten aspects. These are: Academics, Aim, Dialog, Fight, Grace, Observe, Stunt, Shen, Sel, and Tal. These comprise the bulk of a character now, replacing both attributes and skills. They are assigned a rating from zero to nine. In the game you have a pool of bonus dice to draw from equal to this rating. The requirement o draw the dice is that you have to illustrate the connection of the aspect to the action. How is your academics helping your use of the computer on board a starship? Answer that with a visual and then you can pull dice from that pool.

Now I can get to the interesting part. These dice eventually run dry, just like all dicepools. What happens then? In this case your character needs a Windfall. Each Windfall refills a certain amount of the dice pool (shown on the character sheet, groups of 3 or 2). You get windfalls in the following manner: Winning Deep Conflicts, Losing a Conflict, and Quenching thirsts.

Winning deep conflicts occurs when a conflict with personal meaning to the character (depth) is resolved in the player’s favor. The depth of the conflict determines the amount of windfall earned.
Losing a conflict is simple enough, and earns the character a windfall.
Everytime the player plays out a thirst (a specific ignoble nature) they earn a windfall.

I think these ways to earn windfall encourage the kind of dynamic play I’m looking for. I picture powerful Nobles spending their dice for awesome action and then having to fail at a conflict to earn them back. I see Noble’s actively seeking out their personal dilemmas to create conlicts with depth to earn more dice back. Finally, just playing out their horrific thirsts is encouraged in this manner.

I'm wondering a handful of things: Is this too complex? Have I missed a manner to better use the windfall idea? Perhaps something is broken? Well I'll schedule another shakedown and see how it works out. The personal dilemmas of character will need some defining though...