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Author Topic: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)  (Read 740736 times)

Tomcost

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6960 on: September 22, 2013, 07:16:50 pm »

After a very brief look at the list I have to ask: The "Cancer" effect, is for the user or for the person who is hit by the weapon?

Fniff

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6961 on: September 22, 2013, 07:22:48 pm »

Your choice.

Joben

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6962 on: September 22, 2013, 10:45:30 pm »

How to construct plots in a world with zero civilization and mostly non-sentient creatures? Almost all of the fiction tropes I can think of are not easily applicable, and there isn't the framework of human motivations and society to hang story elements on.

I always figured I might be in trouble if the players got tired of just clawing things to death and exploring.

Aliens. They truly go with everything.

Meteors. Mass extinction, yeah!

Alien meteors, perhaps. More fleshing-out might be needed.

You could also try volcanic activity, earthquakes, floods, maybe. Global cooling. Disaster movie plots, you know. They work equally well for people and dinosaurs.

Other than that, competitive species. Invasive species. Infectious diseases. Winters and/or rainy seasons.

They had competition, that was working fairly well. One species invasive and hostile, another competitive and intimidating but ambivalent.

I was toying with the idea of introducing sci-fi concepts back before the first game ended. I just wasn't sure I wanted to drop the 'realism' I had initially wanted. I have two basic concepts.

A: The players are not really free. They're in some sort of staggeringly vast artificial environment. Interacting with the zookeepers or attempting to escape could be long term sources of conflict. Maybe the PC's sentience is not natural, they may have been selectively bred or genetically modified for some purpose that might become clear later.

B: Fantasy/pulp elements, and it turns out they're in some sort of Edgar Rice Burroughs pastiche, like Pellucidar or The Land That Time Forgot, with various races at different levels of advancement running around. Then we could have fun things like Raptors vs Bronze Age ape warriors and cities of lizard men and whatnot.
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Broken Arrow - A small stats tweak to fix unrealistically overpowered arrows and bolts.

My RTD games: Roll To Raptor (On hold), Dino Arena

Digital Hellhound

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6963 on: September 22, 2013, 11:34:55 pm »

Trying that out, I got the Explosive/Clairvoyance Machine Gun. I'm imagining a magitech MG that fires exploding rounds while granting the user visions of the battlefield around him, a supernatural motion tracker. This is pretty cool stuff.

EDIT: Though Angelic Death Euphoria Explosives are even cooler. Nothing like dying of heavenly bliss.
« Last Edit: September 22, 2013, 11:38:15 pm by Digital Hellhound »
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mastahcheese

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6964 on: September 22, 2013, 11:54:31 pm »

Oh man, just tried that weapon generator.

Bastard Sword

Pain
River
Tribal

A tribal bastard sword that shoots rivers of pain?
Sounds awesome.


Axe

Sadistic
Bleed
Ill

I don't even need to go into detail about how messed up you are if you get hit by this.


Crossbow

Small
Dragon
Hallucination
Carvings

A crossbow that shoots small bolts that cause hallucinations of dragons on the walls?
An imaginary crossbow that fires tiny dragons with carved scales?
A crossbow that carves small pictures of dragons into whatever is hit?
Strange stuff, man.

But the best is what I got on the drug one.

Drunk
20 turn addiction

Effects:
Blind
Necromantic

Withdrawls:
Lizard
Bomb


You pour it down the throat of a dead guy, and it brings him back from the dead, but unable to see.
With them exploding into lizards if they don't get another drink.
Scary junk.
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Oh look, I have a steam account.
Might as well chalk it up to Pathos.
As this point we might as well invoke interpretive dance and call it a day.
The Derail Thread

Greenstarfanatic

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6965 on: September 23, 2013, 01:53:33 am »

For that crossbow one, I'd say it's a Crossbow made out of an unspecified material, BUT, it has carvings all over it. The rather small bolts it shoot cause hallucinations. However, it has a chance to TURN INTO a dragon at any time.

Now THAT'S a weapon.
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Hey, don't forget about research boy sitting right here!

Unholy_Pariah

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6966 on: September 23, 2013, 02:12:34 am »

Id say that it would be a small hand crossbow carved into a dragon shape that fired hallucinogenic bolts... but thats just me
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Clearly running multiple missions at the same time is a terrible idea.  The epic battle to see which team can cock it up worse has escalated again.

And Larry kinda gets blueballed in all this; just left with a raging bone spear and no where to put it.

Digital Hellhound

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6967 on: September 23, 2013, 02:55:08 am »

I think the best part is here that the same combinations can be imagined in so many ways. Could be expanded to vehicles, etc., too.
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sjm9876

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6968 on: September 23, 2013, 11:19:54 am »

A sharp, necromanctic, avian, witchcraft, machine gun.

A barbed machine gun that shoots zombie birds?
A winged machine gun firing razor blades that resurrect their victims?
I LOVE THIS GENERATOR.
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Fniff

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6969 on: September 23, 2013, 02:20:41 pm »

So, I came up with a few more things to use effects on. I have three more mechanics utilizing effects. Two are handy (Enemies and Spells) and one is mainly for filling out your world (Drama). Let me explain them.

First, enemies. You ever have trouble making enemies interesting for your players? They tend to end up as faceless copy-pasted mooks for me, since it's hard individualizing each enemy. However, I came up with a solution. You can have your regular faceless mooks, but there is also special enemies. They come in three classes:

Captains are enemies that are slightly tougher then your usual enemy. In a videogame, these would be special versions of normal enemies. You roll one effect for them. Usually, these are still faceless mooks in characterization, so you can have multiple versions of this to fill out the ranks.

Lieutenants are enemies that are difficult to fight against. In a videogame, these would be bosses. You roll two effects for them. These guys tend to have more personality, but they are still killable so keep them limited in number.

Generals are enemies that are extremely difficult to fight against. In a videogame,  these would be the final boss. You roll three effects for them. These guys have the most personality and are the toughest to kill, so keep them individual and interesting.

Here's a few I genned as examples.
Spoiler: Enemies (click to show/hide)
Second, spells. I personally have trouble coming up with interesting rituals and spells. I like them unique, but making unique spells is a chore and letting the players come up with their own spells can be kinda risky if it's not from a limited selection of elements. Here's a spell generator that I think covers most bases.

You have to roll a 1d3 for what it targets. It can be outward (Affects anything that is not you), inward (Affects yourself), or All Around (Affects everyone in the general area, including you). Then you roll a 1d3 for what school it is in. It can be Physical (Changes/Create objects permanently), Mental (Creates/Changes things mentally), or Temporary (Creates/Changes something that isn't entirely real for a temporary time before stopping). Then you roll a 1d4 for the amount of effects it has. Here's another few examples I have.
Spoiler: Spells (click to show/hide)

And finally, ever at a loss for another work of fiction that could appear in the RTD? What is the latest hot new TV show watching in your world? What's the latest book your writer NPC has put out? What play is on when your players need to assassinate the mayor at it? Well, here's my way of automating that process a tad.

First, you roll a d8 for what media it's based on. It can be book, a TV show, an animation, a film, a painting, a sculpture, a comic book, a theater play, or music. Then you roll a d5 for mood. It can be:
   1.   Dangerous To Diabetics. Everything and everyone is good! Yay! YAAAY.
   2.   Happy. Life's good, really. Optimism is the right path to take, and people are innately good.
   3.   Realistic. There's good people, and bad people. Some get rewarded, others don't. The world's worth fighting for, but it's not the best.
   4.   Sad. The good guys don't catch a break, and the bad people lap it all up.
   5.   Don't Watch This If You Are Feeling Depressed. Reality is a prison and it's a crappy one at that. Everyone is not only evil, but incompetent and insane. Going mad or committing suicide is the only way out.
Then, you roll a d7 for the ending.
   1.   Complete Happy Ending: Everyone goes away happy, even the villain is redeemed.
   2.   Happy Ending: Those who deserved their punishment got it, and the heroes get rewarded.
   3.   Bittersweet Ending: They completed their mission, but at what cost? Perhaps the villain got away. Maybe the person they wanted to save died. But at least the villains were stopped.
   4.   Grim Ending: Nothing's improved, but at least the good guys got away.
   5.   Sad Ending: the good guys are either dead or might as well be, but at least they did so while happy.
   6.   Downer Ending: the villains won. The good guys are screwed/dead. What a waste.
   7.   Kill Em All: everyone's dead. Everyone, villain and hero alike. Maybe one person walks away from all this if you're lucky.
Yes, you can have an extremely joyful fiction end up with everyone involved dead,or have the most depressing film ever end with a completely happy ending. This does happen IRL. REALISM.

Finally, you roll 1d4 for amount of effects, then roll effects. These are themes: stuff that happens in the fiction, are a running theme, or are related to the characters. So if you get an effect you don't think could be an overarching theme in the fiction, say it happens to a character or happens within the fiction as an event. Here's a few things I generated.

Spoiler: Fiction (click to show/hide)

Why is making mechanics so fun? And addictive? Also, I think I'm going to put the effects in a piratepad so people can edit in some more.

Digital Hellhound

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6970 on: September 23, 2013, 02:26:39 pm »

I have to say, Fniff, these are some damn excellent generators. Okay, I probably will never use the last, but the others are just wonderful and I want to run all the games with them.
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Fniff

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6971 on: September 23, 2013, 02:37:17 pm »

Yeah, the last one was a slightly useless one I did on a whim since I couldn't think of anything that would be good if it was a generator. The thing about generators is, you can't go too crazy with them. Too specific, it's useless. Fiction was the only general thing I could think of.
« Last Edit: September 23, 2013, 02:41:46 pm by Fniff »
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Xantalos

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6972 on: September 23, 2013, 02:43:05 pm »

Fniff. Those generators.
Are great.
You need to link the posts to one another or something though.
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sjm9876

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6973 on: September 23, 2013, 02:48:56 pm »

Those are great Fniff. If I get the time any time soon I'll probably write up a script for them.
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My dreams are not unlike yours - they long for the safety, and break like a glass chandelier.
But there's laughter and oh there is love, just past the edge of our fears.
And there's chaos when push comes to shove, but it's music to my ears.

Sigtext

Fniff

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Re: Roller's Block (RTD Brainstorming Thread) (HAPPY LATE BIRTHDAY) (Derm is 5k)
« Reply #6974 on: September 23, 2013, 02:51:40 pm »

Effects and Generators, all in one convenient place! When I add a generator, I'll post it here and on the piratepad. If I add an effect, I'll put it on my back-up list of effects and the piratepad.
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