Post by Mutant Lord: William McAusland on Apr 17, 2013 19:07:54 GMT -8
A few character creation questions
by Welania » Thu Apr 26, 2012 1:37 am
Alright, let me see if I can phrase this properly. During character creation you roll a d100, then cross-reference it with the Trait Determination table on pg. 10, table TME-1-2 Trait Value Determination. That I understand perfectly, where it gets confusing is when it comes to Bioreplicas, Beastial Humans, Clones, and Transhumans.
For example, a Battle Bioreplicas' trait roll for Strength is 60+3d20. Now here is the question, do I cross reference that with the table TME-1-2 Trait Value Determination, or when I roll the 60+3d20, do I use that roll, and write it on my character sheet?
Another question, on table TME-1-14, Transhumans get a roll to their trait scores. For example, Endurance gets a d20. Is this added before using table TME-1-2 Trait Value Determination, or after, adding it to the "real" trait value score?
For bestial humans, some values get determined by a roll, such as Alligators getting a 10+d12 for Intelligence? Is this the 'final' score, or does the result of that 10-d12 need to be cross-referenced with table TME-1-2? I ask this because it is stated that "Almost without fail, bipedal, mutant animals are less intelligent, less attractive and more uncivilized than humans", but this description (Which I'm fine with), conflicts in some cases. The rat for example. His intelligence roll is 15+2d20, which would make him smarter than the average human if that is the final score determination, as it would average out to 35, which is smarter than a normal person. However, if ran through the table TME-1-2 Trait Determination, the average would make him out to be stupider than a human, at roughly 23, 2 points "dumber" than the assumed average norm (Which as stated on page 10 is 25.)
The human bonuses (10 to distribute among traits), is this added before table TME-1-2, or after? And any bonuses from the two d100 rolls, are they added before or after table TME-1-2?
Phew, so those are my questions. Great game, hope it is doing well, it deserves it!
My gaming group is having a blast with these rules, though we did tinker the system slightly (It's fine as is but we're detail whores), we use different damage types depending on the relic weapon, altering the SV or Damage according to weapon model, and ammunition used, with the base d20 (such as the auto-pistol) being 9mm. For example, a Colt M1911 (and its later revisions), does +15 SV (instead of +12) and d20+1. But that is just us and our weapon-detail loving ways, the system is actually amazing as is. Keep up the amazing work!
Re: A few character creation questions
by WillMcAusland » Thu Apr 26, 2012 3:28 am
Yes, for the battle Bioreplica the strength trait value is as rolled, whatever you get from 60+3d20. No need for table TME-1-2 in this case.
For Transhumans, as in the case of adding the d20 or d10, this is a bonus to the random result from table TME-1-2. Yes, this makes them potent, as their long dead creators intended.
With the Beastial humans, you've read it correctly. The 10+d12 is the final trait value, however a trait of +8 or -4, etc. is a modifier to whatever normal trait roll the character gets from table TME 1-2. Yes, the beastial human rat does turn out smarter than the average human. These bio engineered specimens were created from the smartest rats who worked out the maze the quickest. AS GM, you can reduce this amount or anything else of course on any table if it doesn't fit... but great question. Guess we are trying to give some advantage to playing a beastial human rat when another player could end up a s bestial human grizzly bear or scorpion.
Human bonus points are added after your character's randomly rolled traits. This way a player can use the 10 bonus points to top up a trait to possibly get an actual benefit form it, such as a damage bonus fro strength 35+ etc. Any trait bonus from table TME-1-11 Pure Stock Starting Bonus Roll, is also added after first roiling on TME-1-2. These bonuses are only for player character and important NPC pure stocks, highlighting that they are exceptional individuals among their kind and the sort that might undertake great deeds.
Thanks for the kind words about the game. I really like your variations on the auto pistol damage between 9mm and 45.
The Mutant Epoch is doing really well and now a full time gig for me. We are planning to release our first community setting book in the middle of May called Pitford: Gateway To The Ruins
Re: A few character creation questions
by Welania » Thu Apr 26, 2012 4:42 am
Thanks for the rapid response! That clarifies things, and the explanation for the Rat is sound. Thanks for the praise on the ammunition/weapon differences. We just do it that way so that finding, say, a .357 Magnum is different from digging up a 9mm, it puts some minor variety in the loot. I noticed the Outland System is simple enough to work fast, and complex enough to be moddable. I like that in a system, a lot. Though, currently, other than the weapon stuff I mentioned, we're running it as-is, and don't have any plans for further tweaks.
I do like how with a gas-mask you mention in the book that it makes you completely immune to most things, I don't like it when stuff like that is merely a modifier to a roll, because it can be difficult to come up with a reason why your gas-mask didn't 'work' randomly. Pitford look's good, and I saw the map you had posted on these forums of the Crossroads Region. It looks like there are going to be plenty of things to explore on that map, I'm curious about the Old War Zone, I can just imagine ancient combots and other war mecha roaming the warzone, stuck on a loop of their last command, "Kill anything it finds." I can picture rolling mists of still-active nerve gas, radiation-ridden bunkers and trenches full of skeletons and rats.
I'm going to sneak in another question for The Mutant Lord here... How common, or uncommon, are relic weapons? Is that GM decided, or does the setting itself (The Crossroads Region) have a general 'set' rarity? I can use the Mall of Doom a jumping point for rarity, though that is difficult due to the amazingly random nature of it (an aspect I love).
I have one or two more 'setting' questions. Steel... is steel available widely, or are swords made out of say, iron, or bronze? Or weaker metals? How common is steel, or even other alloys, like titanium? Would your average digger, or villager, know the difference between steel and iron?
Here is another... Fallout 3 inspired me to this question. Food, and drink. If I were to say, have the players find an unopened can of soda in a vending machine they find in the elevator shaft in Mall of Doom, after the right with the creature that is lurking inside the skeleton-ridden room at the south-end of the train tracks. With advances in preservatives, and such, is it a reasonable assumption that a soda or two could be salvaged and still carbonated, or at least, edible? What about a bag of chips?
Here is a third... pre-Fall society. How wanton was the commercial and corporate toward the idea of Capitalism? I have a player who wants to make a Bioreplica (Infilitration) that is the last of a line of "Living Toys", implanted with control chips to be the ultimate playmate for any buyer. Think something like an action figure except it isn't a machine, it's real. Their idea is the character was about to be implanted with the control chip and failsafe chip (To prevent it falling into rival corps hands, or in case of loss of control, there is a failsafe chip that explodes, blowing apart their head) but the company met its end suddenly. The reason the character had not withered or turned into a skeleton is they were in a healing vat, which on the 'assembly' line of this horrible 'toy', is where they're implanted, but due to the abrupt end of the company this character was never implanted, and instead just hung in the fluid until a digger team stumbled across this. Is this horrible view of irresponsibility and flippant morals a good example of life before the Fall? To elaborate a bit on this, I had planned to take this idea a bit further, these 'toys' where actually part of an plan to create boys (and girls) who could fight at a young age, as the 'toy' itself would begin to teach them firearm operation, and battle techniques... and of course it reported in constantly about the family it was 'living' with. You know, 'big brother' stuff.
In the Mall of Doom, its stated that Walsave is on top of a series of old buildings, and that these could very well be the tips of old skyscrapers and other buildings, at least that is how I read it. There was a great flood at one point, and when it receded, the old world buildings were buried under a lot of silt... So that brings me to my last question (for now, I'm a curious person). That question is this... is the rest of the Crossroads Region buried in silt? Is this common for entire old towns and cities to be buried under tons of silt and dirt? If so, the Great Ruins beyond Pitford, is it the same there? The ruins we 'see' are only the tips of the buildings?
And I lied, two more questions... the previous question lead me to these last two (I promise), these two questions are about diggers themselves. Are the Excavator so named because they descend into these silt and dirt covered buildings, literally sometimes digging their way down? And last but not least... are Excavators a Caste themselves? Like, are they a necessary part of society, as required as say, a blacksmith? Or are they more like mercenary adventurers, and people just think they're all crazy folk?
Sorry if these questions are annoying! I'm just a very curious person with a lot of questions.
by Welania » Thu Apr 26, 2012 1:37 am
Alright, let me see if I can phrase this properly. During character creation you roll a d100, then cross-reference it with the Trait Determination table on pg. 10, table TME-1-2 Trait Value Determination. That I understand perfectly, where it gets confusing is when it comes to Bioreplicas, Beastial Humans, Clones, and Transhumans.
For example, a Battle Bioreplicas' trait roll for Strength is 60+3d20. Now here is the question, do I cross reference that with the table TME-1-2 Trait Value Determination, or when I roll the 60+3d20, do I use that roll, and write it on my character sheet?
Another question, on table TME-1-14, Transhumans get a roll to their trait scores. For example, Endurance gets a d20. Is this added before using table TME-1-2 Trait Value Determination, or after, adding it to the "real" trait value score?
For bestial humans, some values get determined by a roll, such as Alligators getting a 10+d12 for Intelligence? Is this the 'final' score, or does the result of that 10-d12 need to be cross-referenced with table TME-1-2? I ask this because it is stated that "Almost without fail, bipedal, mutant animals are less intelligent, less attractive and more uncivilized than humans", but this description (Which I'm fine with), conflicts in some cases. The rat for example. His intelligence roll is 15+2d20, which would make him smarter than the average human if that is the final score determination, as it would average out to 35, which is smarter than a normal person. However, if ran through the table TME-1-2 Trait Determination, the average would make him out to be stupider than a human, at roughly 23, 2 points "dumber" than the assumed average norm (Which as stated on page 10 is 25.)
The human bonuses (10 to distribute among traits), is this added before table TME-1-2, or after? And any bonuses from the two d100 rolls, are they added before or after table TME-1-2?
Phew, so those are my questions. Great game, hope it is doing well, it deserves it!
My gaming group is having a blast with these rules, though we did tinker the system slightly (It's fine as is but we're detail whores), we use different damage types depending on the relic weapon, altering the SV or Damage according to weapon model, and ammunition used, with the base d20 (such as the auto-pistol) being 9mm. For example, a Colt M1911 (and its later revisions), does +15 SV (instead of +12) and d20+1. But that is just us and our weapon-detail loving ways, the system is actually amazing as is. Keep up the amazing work!
Re: A few character creation questions
by WillMcAusland » Thu Apr 26, 2012 3:28 am
Yes, for the battle Bioreplica the strength trait value is as rolled, whatever you get from 60+3d20. No need for table TME-1-2 in this case.
For Transhumans, as in the case of adding the d20 or d10, this is a bonus to the random result from table TME-1-2. Yes, this makes them potent, as their long dead creators intended.
With the Beastial humans, you've read it correctly. The 10+d12 is the final trait value, however a trait of +8 or -4, etc. is a modifier to whatever normal trait roll the character gets from table TME 1-2. Yes, the beastial human rat does turn out smarter than the average human. These bio engineered specimens were created from the smartest rats who worked out the maze the quickest. AS GM, you can reduce this amount or anything else of course on any table if it doesn't fit... but great question. Guess we are trying to give some advantage to playing a beastial human rat when another player could end up a s bestial human grizzly bear or scorpion.
Human bonus points are added after your character's randomly rolled traits. This way a player can use the 10 bonus points to top up a trait to possibly get an actual benefit form it, such as a damage bonus fro strength 35+ etc. Any trait bonus from table TME-1-11 Pure Stock Starting Bonus Roll, is also added after first roiling on TME-1-2. These bonuses are only for player character and important NPC pure stocks, highlighting that they are exceptional individuals among their kind and the sort that might undertake great deeds.
Thanks for the kind words about the game. I really like your variations on the auto pistol damage between 9mm and 45.
The Mutant Epoch is doing really well and now a full time gig for me. We are planning to release our first community setting book in the middle of May called Pitford: Gateway To The Ruins
Re: A few character creation questions
by Welania » Thu Apr 26, 2012 4:42 am
Thanks for the rapid response! That clarifies things, and the explanation for the Rat is sound. Thanks for the praise on the ammunition/weapon differences. We just do it that way so that finding, say, a .357 Magnum is different from digging up a 9mm, it puts some minor variety in the loot. I noticed the Outland System is simple enough to work fast, and complex enough to be moddable. I like that in a system, a lot. Though, currently, other than the weapon stuff I mentioned, we're running it as-is, and don't have any plans for further tweaks.
I do like how with a gas-mask you mention in the book that it makes you completely immune to most things, I don't like it when stuff like that is merely a modifier to a roll, because it can be difficult to come up with a reason why your gas-mask didn't 'work' randomly. Pitford look's good, and I saw the map you had posted on these forums of the Crossroads Region. It looks like there are going to be plenty of things to explore on that map, I'm curious about the Old War Zone, I can just imagine ancient combots and other war mecha roaming the warzone, stuck on a loop of their last command, "Kill anything it finds." I can picture rolling mists of still-active nerve gas, radiation-ridden bunkers and trenches full of skeletons and rats.
I'm going to sneak in another question for The Mutant Lord here... How common, or uncommon, are relic weapons? Is that GM decided, or does the setting itself (The Crossroads Region) have a general 'set' rarity? I can use the Mall of Doom a jumping point for rarity, though that is difficult due to the amazingly random nature of it (an aspect I love).
I have one or two more 'setting' questions. Steel... is steel available widely, or are swords made out of say, iron, or bronze? Or weaker metals? How common is steel, or even other alloys, like titanium? Would your average digger, or villager, know the difference between steel and iron?
Here is another... Fallout 3 inspired me to this question. Food, and drink. If I were to say, have the players find an unopened can of soda in a vending machine they find in the elevator shaft in Mall of Doom, after the right with the creature that is lurking inside the skeleton-ridden room at the south-end of the train tracks. With advances in preservatives, and such, is it a reasonable assumption that a soda or two could be salvaged and still carbonated, or at least, edible? What about a bag of chips?
Here is a third... pre-Fall society. How wanton was the commercial and corporate toward the idea of Capitalism? I have a player who wants to make a Bioreplica (Infilitration) that is the last of a line of "Living Toys", implanted with control chips to be the ultimate playmate for any buyer. Think something like an action figure except it isn't a machine, it's real. Their idea is the character was about to be implanted with the control chip and failsafe chip (To prevent it falling into rival corps hands, or in case of loss of control, there is a failsafe chip that explodes, blowing apart their head) but the company met its end suddenly. The reason the character had not withered or turned into a skeleton is they were in a healing vat, which on the 'assembly' line of this horrible 'toy', is where they're implanted, but due to the abrupt end of the company this character was never implanted, and instead just hung in the fluid until a digger team stumbled across this. Is this horrible view of irresponsibility and flippant morals a good example of life before the Fall? To elaborate a bit on this, I had planned to take this idea a bit further, these 'toys' where actually part of an plan to create boys (and girls) who could fight at a young age, as the 'toy' itself would begin to teach them firearm operation, and battle techniques... and of course it reported in constantly about the family it was 'living' with. You know, 'big brother' stuff.
In the Mall of Doom, its stated that Walsave is on top of a series of old buildings, and that these could very well be the tips of old skyscrapers and other buildings, at least that is how I read it. There was a great flood at one point, and when it receded, the old world buildings were buried under a lot of silt... So that brings me to my last question (for now, I'm a curious person). That question is this... is the rest of the Crossroads Region buried in silt? Is this common for entire old towns and cities to be buried under tons of silt and dirt? If so, the Great Ruins beyond Pitford, is it the same there? The ruins we 'see' are only the tips of the buildings?
And I lied, two more questions... the previous question lead me to these last two (I promise), these two questions are about diggers themselves. Are the Excavator so named because they descend into these silt and dirt covered buildings, literally sometimes digging their way down? And last but not least... are Excavators a Caste themselves? Like, are they a necessary part of society, as required as say, a blacksmith? Or are they more like mercenary adventurers, and people just think they're all crazy folk?
Sorry if these questions are annoying! I'm just a very curious person with a lot of questions.