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[Mesa]

What is this?
This is the out-of-character, meta-discussion, player banter and questions thread for Project Phoenix, an up-and-coming space opera/soft sci-fi campaign ran by yours truly!

The details of the setting are still a bit in flux (and will be uncovered by the players as the campaign progresses), but here is the pitch:

Spoiler: Fluff stuff (click to show/hide)

Centuries into the future, humanity took to the stars and came in contact with a wide range of other space-faring civilizations - between species such as the birdlike Daffians and crystalline Geodi or the mysterious psychic Saikin people, the Milky Way turned out to be a very lively galaxy after all.

However, there was no sense of law nor order across the stars - no greater force or organization to keep the systems peaceful and safe. Pirates stalked the dark space between systems, wars both great and small were fought all over, and what little peace could be established between the sides, it was never meant for long.

That was until the Galaxy had to face its deadliest threat - a force from beyond the intergalactic void, wielding technology unlike anything Lacteans faced before. Swallowing unprepared systems, ships and colonies whole, the denizens of the Milky Way fell into a galaxy-wide panic, and agreed to stop the fighting in order to fight back against this exotic threat, far greater than their own skirmishes and space brawls.
It took many months, resources and lives, but eventually, the now-united forces of the Milky Way turned out victorious, and stopped the invaders before the entire civilized space fell apart, but it was not without cost - now, an entire portion of the galaxy lies in ruin, and nobody knows if these conquerors are to come back, possibly in even greater numbers.

To prevent an even worse fate in the future, an interstellar peacekeeping organization was founded by the largest of the spacefaring nations, dubbed the Pan-Galactic Council, establishing many laws, rules and directives, intended to bolster law and peace in the Galaxy and stop further infighting.

And now, their latest initiative was announced - to rebuild that was destroyed, gain back what was stolen and to fortify what already exists.
Dubbed Project Phoenix, this is the most ambitious interstellar effort yet - to restore the now-scattered colonies in the systems most badly consumed by the war, and make them ready in case the truly alien invaders, now called the Andromedans, ever wish to return to our Galaxy.

The Council needs assistance from any person, organic or metallic, soldier or engineer, to restore the broken and scattered sectors of the Milky Way, willing to travel and deal with the wide host of issues plaguing those regions. Will you join?

IC thread coming once I get some more things prepared, but also when this garners enough interest.

Now, why would it garner interest, you may ask? What makes this different (if not better) than other games ran around here?

For one, this is meant to follow the West Marches format of RPGs. Or the really old-school D&D format, depending on who you ask.
Here's how it works:

Spoiler: West Marches, explained (click to show/hide)

West Marches was a game I ran for a little over two years. It was designed to be pretty much the diametric opposite of the normal weekly game:

1) There was no regular time: every session was scheduled by the players on the fly.

2) There was no regular party: each game had different players drawn from a pool of around 10-14 people.

3) There was no regular plot: The players decided where to go and what to do. It was a sandbox game in the sense that’s now used to describe video games like Grand Theft Auto, minus the missions. There was no mysterious old man sending them on quests. No overarching plot, just an overarching environment.


My motivation in setting things up this way was to overcome player apathy and mindless “plot following” by putting the players in charge of both scheduling and what they did in-game.

A secondary goal was to make the schedule adapt to the complex lives of adults. Ad hoc scheduling and a flexible roster meant (ideally) people got to play when they could but didn’t hold up the game for everyone else if they couldn’t. If you can play once a week, that’s fine. If you can only play once a month, that’s fine too.

Letting the players decide where to go was also intended to nip DM procrastination (aka my procrastination) in the bud. Normally a DM just puts off running a game until he’s 100% ready (which is sometimes never), but with this arrangement if some players wanted to raid the Sunken Fort this weekend I had to hurry up and finish it. It was gaming on-demand, so the players created deadlines for me.

(Taken from here.)

In essence, you spend the downtime on your hub space station of sorts, and every week, a variety of tasks, emergencies and assignments become available to you - you as the players pick which ones you want to tackle, with whom, and when - not every player will get to participate in every session, and that's fine!
You can also choose to further explore areas you've already been to but had to skip certain elements of, or go out and explore in a totally free-form manner, traveling through space, finding starships, space stations, planets and other points of interest.

While there isn't much in the way of a set out plot per se, you are technically 'on a mission', and straying too far from said mission's objectives (ie. providing aid to the war-torn sectors of the Milky Way) may (or may not!) get you into trouble with the Council! Aside from that, you are free to do as you wish!

Now, enough fluff, and onto the more technical/crunchy part of the ordeal!

Spoiler: Open Legend, explained (click to show/hide)

Open Legend is a free and open-source (don't get to say that often wrt tabletop games) system, built to be agnostic of any given setting or theme, and easy to change and adapt to fit into any campaign. It's fairly simple to pick up if you are already remotely familiar with other tabletops, and even without that, it's still not too tough to get into - the core rules are reasonably small (as in, should 'only' take a few hours to sift through, depending on your reading speed and other factors).

It's more free-form and customizable than the likes of D&D, but not as overwhelming with rules and tables and formulas as the likes of GURPS, plus it's very accessible (no need to shell out money or have me point you to less-than-ethical sources to get a hold of the rulebooks).

While the 'downtime' activities (ie. what happens on the space station and does not require rolls) will take place on the forums here in the IC thread, actual sessions will be played on roll20, the online tabletop 'site. Invite links will be sent out to anyone willing to join, eventually.

As of right now, I don't expect fully-developed characters as I still have to expand on the fluff and make it somewhat presentable (not to the extent of making a full setting sourcebook, but enough to give you a footing in the setting and get a feel for it, if pitch above didn't cut it). In the meantime, feel free to ask questions about the setting, though don't expect answers for everything...

So yeah, for the time being, this is to check just how many people are interested, and for those who are interested to bombard me with questions to clear up things I inevitably missed/will miss (I've put off writing this for like a week now).

[scriver]

I am curious and interested.

[milo christiansen]

I would be interested. I have never used roll20, but I have played RPGs on Discord and here on the forum.

EDIT: I'm guessing from the fluff that character race will be pretty free-form? If so, I have an awesome (but not too odd-ball) idea.

Spoiler: The fluff half of the character sheet (click to show/hide)

Name: Tau
Size: Small
Race: Galactotech Experimental FURRy (Feline Unmanned Repair/Reconnaissance) Mech

Backstory:
Tau was built in the Galactotech robotics lab as a prototype for a new line of maintenance and light recon mechs. The idea was to make a small and agile mech that could traverse difficult and small spaces. It was decided that a mech with curiosity would be more likely to discover problems or intel during its assigned duties, and the FURRy line was an attempt to explore this concept. Unfortunately (for the corporation) this curiosity programming proved to be their undoing... Tau's earliest memories are of running the obstacle course, poking his nose into every corner as he made his way through in hopes of finding something new to report. One day, he found an access hatch left open by a careless tech. This mistake let him escape into the lab, into the vents, and finally along the trail of exciting new things to the starport. There are so many fascinating things out here, and no one ever said he couldn't explore for as long as he wishes... Tau never talks about his past, seeing as he found the lab very boring in retrospect.

Physical Traits:
* Skin made of interlocking matte gray plates.
* Semi-prehensile tail, climbing lock-pads integrated into paws, front paws unfold slightly for grasping.

Social Traits:
* Mildly (very) curious.
* A bit lazy... When someone is looking anyway.

Perks:
* Scavenger
* Innocent

Flaws:
* Curiosity: Like Kipling's mongoose, Tau has an insatiable urge to "run find out", even when that would be a bad idea...
* Naive

[Mesa]

I would be interested. I have never used roll20, but I have played RPGs on Discord and here on the forum.

EDIT: I'm guessing from the fluff that character race will be pretty free-form? If so, I have an awesome (but not too odd-ball) idea.

There's a few established species if one is a bit indecisive (and will be featured more prominently as NPCs/enemies), but you can go wild there, yeah.

[Mesa]

Some extra things I failed to mention:


Even though the sessions are going to be on roll20, I do not plan to use voicechat, so no mic is required.
(Partly because roll20's voice chat quality is subpar, and I don't want to force people onto Discord if they don't use it, and I feel more comfortable with text as a GM.)
I'd also be willing to take co-GMs on board if the group gets large enough, but that's more of a "just in case"/"for the future" statement.


I'm also working on something of a class/species list (more of a starting point/suggestion list), akin to what the OL core rules here.
Not sure how much of that I will get done, but hey, fun exercise I guess.

[Interus]

I found this site https://openlegend.heromuster.com/ for making character sheets, and it's pretty handy just for the ability to filter banes and boons to what you can actually use.

Milo, there's a feat called climbing that lets you climb on everything at your move speed and only costs 1 feat point! I don't know if you looked at feats yet, but that character just has to have it. (in case this reads as bossy, I intended it to sound excited)

Personally, I'm strongly leaning towards a hacker that's exactly like the one in the archetypes under character creation. With Fugitive and Observant as perks, and cowardly as a flaw. I decided on those before I knew that the setting involved working for the government, but there's no reason my current employers need to know that I've got a lot of underworld connections.

[Mesa]

I found this site https://openlegend.heromuster.com/ for making character sheets, and it's pretty handy just for the ability to filter banes and boons to what you can actually use.

Milo, there's a feat called climbing that lets you climb on everything at your move speed and only costs 1 feat point! I don't know if you looked at feats yet, but that character just has to have it. (in case this reads as bossy, I intended it to sound excited)

Personally, I'm strongly leaning towards a hacker that's exactly like the one in the archetypes under character creation. With Fugitive and Observant as perks, and cowardly as a flaw. I decided on those before I knew that the setting involved working for the government, but there's no reason my current employers need to know that I've got a lot of underworld connections.

HeroMuster is neat indeed, and there's even some macros one can slap on a character sheet to get a link to a filtered list of available boons/banes (and feats but I don't know how to get that working properly). Real handy!


(I did set it up on the char sheets for the three of you who offered to join, just to get it out of the way.)

[milo christiansen]

Milo, there's a feat called climbing that lets you climb on everything at your move speed and only costs 1 feat point! I don't know if you looked at feats yet, but that character just has to have it. (in case this reads as bossy, I intended it to sound excited)

I did indeed find that feat, and you are right, my character has to have it I also put the "Great Leap" and "Breakfall" feats on my list, climbing, jumping (farther than normal) with agility rather than might, and always landing on its feet are rather important to a cat

Full char sheet (thank you for the character builder link BTW)

[Happerry]

Count me in as someone interested in this, but it's 2AM for me right now so I'll take a crack at the system later on, when I'm actually awake.

[Rockeater]

Intrested.

[Mesa]

Milo, there's a feat called climbing that lets you climb on everything at your move speed and only costs 1 feat point! I don't know if you looked at feats yet, but that character just has to have it. (in case this reads as bossy, I intended it to sound excited)

I did indeed find that feat, and you are right, my character has to have it I also put the "Great Leap" and "Breakfall" feats on my list, climbing, jumping (farther than normal) with agility rather than might, and always landing on its feet are rather important to a cat

Full char sheet (thank you for the character builder link BTW)

FWIW, you can make character sheets directly in roll20 (which is handy for then referencing stuff from them in chat, during rolls and whatnot). I'm porting yours over to it right now, but still, use that in the future.


You can hop into the roll20 so I can give you a bit of a tour of it.
(Invites for Rockeater and Happerry are on the way.)


Some notes of mine:
- Craft Mundane Item requires a specialization/profession and Tau doesn't have one specified. What is it that he is meant to craft, broadly speaking?
- Curious isn't an official flaw, which isn't wrong per se, but it did make me have to wing the description a little bit.




(I hope I haven't actually been screwing up sending the PMs to y'all...)

[milo christiansen]

I looked for char sheets on roll 20, but didn't find them. I know they exist, but...

Craft Mundane Item does not have a specialization because the sheet lacks a slot for it. I figure "Engineering" would be the best one from the list in the rules.

Curious has the following description on my old char sheet: "Like Kipling's mongoose, Tau has an insatiable urge to "run find out", even when that would be a bad idea..."

[Mesa]

Well have you tried joining the game yet?
The sheets (and other things like handouts) are in the Journal tab when you are in a game. (Unless I truly fucked up the permissions, which I don't think I did...)


As for stuff like Craft Mundane Item specializations, I usually put them in parentheses after the feat name.
In this case, it would be Craft Mundane Item I (Engineering), so it can be distinguished from, say, Craft Mundane Item I (Medicine), if you ever wish to pursue that for instance

[Jerick]

Hrmm this looks interesting. I may have to look over the rules and put together a character.

[Interus]

So, my character is a sort of wandering hacker named Pisces who's placed herself into the Phoenix Project. Only now I'm not sure why. I want to play a role where I'm using spying and precognition to pinpoint targets for the group, using Truesight and occasionally my Observant perk to try to detect traps and maybe logic to disarm them, and bolster to boost my allies in combat, or maybe my drone, but I want to be a team player.

So now I have to figure out why a hacker who's scared of getting hurt and is constantly covering her tracks would join a government organization sending teams into dangerous areas. Best I've got is that she's interested in trying to figure out Andromedan computer systems, but there's a lot of concerns there. First, that's not a real goal. But maybe I'll change it to something audacious like reactivating an Andromedan scout ship and keeping it secret from the authorities (which honestly sounds like a terrible idea to me because it would attract WAY too much attention). On the other hand, her past is completely unwritten, other than that she has ties to information brokers and has a completely harmless background on record. Maybe she's looking for her parents or family. At the very least, I know that she wants to work with people because information alone isn't enough, and she needs close ties to people who are capable in other ways. I can't figure out what she needs those ties for though. She's not prone to being straightforward though, so if it comes down to it, maybe I'll just keep it a secret (even from myself) until we learn more about the setting.

So far though, I really like Tau and the Wract. I figure that as a fan of robots and computers, (and because I'm personally pro-AI) Pisces likes artificial intelligence, and would feel somewhat excited about meeting what could be considered a rogue AI. Plus it's a cat. I don't know if she's ever seen a cat before, but cats are great and robots are great. As for the Wract, they're very interesting. She shares the value of being willing to break the law and cross barriers to achieve your goals, while minimizing attention, and definitely has no problems with lying, but doesn't like the idea of assassination. She probably views backstabbing in a sort of "It's just business" way. I found that bio to be very interesting it got me thinking about what her own values would be.