I've been thinking of a XCOM-like suggestion game where the players control the leader of a squad, commanding it from his HQ.
The squad will be sent on missions given by mission givers the players communicates with during the metagame (missions can be acquired via a mission list updated after every mission, during a mission, and via RP in the metagame.) to various locations, with various objectives. Before each mission, the soldiers would be equipped with gear in the HQ's inventory, which is obtained as rewards, during a mission, and in the metagame.
After being sent on a mission, the game turns into a bit of a roll to dodge. Each soldier has stats, hidden to the players, affecting various things along with their equipment+(also hidden)traits, D20 style.
The squad can converse with peaceful contacts, explore, fight hostiles, etc., and eventually be extracted on the dropship. Post-mission, you ONLY get what is in the returning squadmates' inventories.
If someone died and you didn't pick up their gear, you lose their gear. If you didn't pick up something, you don't get said something.
Soldiers can be hired when a player asks for hiring options. A random amount of soldiers will be made with varying pays and bios, hinting at their stats+traits.
When injured in the mission, soldiers will remain injured and be put in the HQ's medbay, and take varying amount of missions to recover. They can be prematurely ejected, or put in better hospitals
for faster recovery times at a fee.
Soldiers can also level up in skills, and acquire traits at certain occasions.
GM: Soldier 1 grabs his flashlight, and flicks it on.
Nothing.
They continue through the hallway when [listening roll. No modifiers] Soldier 3 hears something, and spins around.
"HOSTILES!"
The squad attempts to scramble for cover, but [roll] S2 trips, losing grip of his assault rifle.
Shots come flying out of the darkness, and a scream originates from S2's mouth after his back was pelted with numerous
OAR-712 bullets. Distracted by the demise of his squadmate, S1 gets [roll: agility - armor pen., - distraction, etc. against enemy's
accuracy] hit by a seemingly stray bullet, falling down, not responding to the radio.
Staring into the darkness, S3 readies her rifle, hands shaking. [next turn, S3 will have fear penalties
because she has a fearful trait.]
P1: "Have S3 lob her grenade into the darkness, and drag S1 further into the hallway."
P2: "No! S3's grenade was faulty, and it may backfire. S3 should make a run for it, instead."
P3: "+1 to P2, but S3 should try to get in a burst at the hostiles as she runs."
etc. P3 wins in support.
GM: S3, rifle still in hand, starts to back away while in cover. Before they can get another chance at
firing, she bolts for it, with her rifle faced behind her. [Future hit+catchup rolls against S3 will
have a penalty due to S3's fear trait]
The rifle lights up the entire area, and S3 catches a glimpse of what appears to be a marine [roll
accuracy - fear penalty - running penalty against enemy] clutching his chest.
[roll for catchup/GM chooses]
A minute later, S3, panting, flicks on her rifle's light, and two doors appear. The vague map given by
the mission giver seems to indicate that one of them leads to the exit.
The metagame would be pretty hands off. The players can unlock new items to purchase via mission rewards, and during missions as well as RP segments.
The players then purchase items at any time in the metagame, and equip soldiers with those items. This would provide a progression from a lowly group to a renowned high-tech one.
Players can take missions, converse with contacts, and manage their soldiers.
-Healing times. Soldiers injured in missions require time off-mission to heal in the medbay, They can be forced out prematurely, or you can pay a fee to move them to a better hospital and speed up their recovery process.
-Contacts. Obtained via many means, they represent progression, basically. RP-wise, they're contacts to new NPCs. These NPCs can sell you new items, unlock gameplay aspects, some progress the storyline, and some may offer deals, etc.
-Storyline. There will probably be an overarching storyline of some sort, if possible.
And other things, TBD
However, I'd like some input. What could I add to the metagame to add more stuff for the players to do (making it a large part of the game), while keeping it simple? I'm also undecided on when/how to level up soldiers. Should I make them earn exp by killing things+etc, and the players can choose what general avenue to "train"/etc. in? A natural 20/whatever would level them up in that attribute? I honestly don't know. ANOTHER problem is the setting. I was thinking sci-fi, but it could be anywhere. 1970s, 2030s, 2521, etc. And what would the player's group be? A special ops team? Mercenaries?
The type of game is also a concern. I want it to be a suggestion game, but I'm not too sure if it's the right path for it.
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Topic: Gaming Block (Game Discussion Thread) (Totally Not Roller's Block) (Read 418963 times)