Guy Fawkes Day

I have taken notice of many people, friends, coworkers, etc honoring Guy Fawkes on this day, Nov 5.

This bothers me.

Guy Fawkes was a dissident, terrorist and traitor to his country.  The goal of the group Fawkes was a part of was to destroy Parliament, killing those inside, including King James, in order to put his daughter, Elizabeth, on the throne.

The reason?  Because King James had reacted to two previous Catholic plots to kill him in 1603...granted, the Kings reaction was a bit heavy-handed when, a year later and with much prodding from the Puritans, he showed hostility towards the Catholics, imposing fines and limiting their worship, in addition to removing Catholic priests from the country.

When Guy Fawkes Day was first declared, people would build a bonfire and burn an effigy of Fawkes, in remembrance of his capture and death, not to honor him but to disgrace him.

How has this man become a legend of good?  Especially for non-Catholics?

Fawkes belongs hand-in-hand with Che Guevara, Timothy McVeigh, and Osama bin Laden, the only real difference, Fawkes failed before he got started.

Please, before you honor a person, research the person.

So many people today walk around with a Che Guevara shirt, believing him to be some benevolent rebel, in reality, the man was a murderer of women and children, much closer to Saddam Hussein's son, Uday.

Think of the reaction people would have if you wore a mask of Hitler, Saddam or bin Laden with some 'great quote' on it.

Now think about why you honor a man such as Fawkes, unless you are Catholic, if you are Catholic, I can understand.

GM Notes: Omni Table to Difficulty Conversion

For decades, I have loved the simplicity of the Talislanta/Omni resolution system:  d20+skill+stat+/-modifiers check table.

After a couple decades of running SLA Industries and D6 almost exclusively it seems that while wonderfully simple, it underwhelms me as a GM.

With SLA Industries and WEG d6, and to an extent almost all the games produced after 1990, the common resolution method has been: roll dice, add/subtract stuff vs a difficulty number.

Difficulty numbers are a very fast and easy method of resolution, so easy in fact, that even with all the different task resolution systems in existence, they almost all follow the same basic setup.

5  Easy
10  Skilled
15  Moderate
20  Difficult
25  Very Difficult
30  Impossible

(for D20 difficulty, basically add 10, some numbers have been averaged/fudged for convenience of illustrating the point over exact definitions)

For Talislanta/Omni resolution, it would basically seem to follow the same difficulty as d20, but what about the Partial, Full and Critical Success, not to mention Mishap ratings of the Omni Table?  That is what really brings home variety in a game with static damage.

This is where things can get fun (and this would be easily portable to d20 also from what I have seen).

Raises, or Staging

One of the greatest things found in games like Shadowrun, World of Darkness, Deadlands, etc is the ability to do "extra" stuff depending on how well you roll, Talislanta/Omni reflect this with the Omni Table by having the above levels of success.

Sometimes this can be a bit tricky, or non-intuitive, to interpret.  I prefer things to be straight forward and fast, the less time I spend interpreting the rules, the more time we all get to enjoy the game.  But, I do love me some critical successes!

In keeping with the scaling above for difficulty, degrees of success would follow the same pattern.  For example, if the difficulty of the task is 15 (10+5 for 'easy') and you roll a total of 25, you can see easily that you have 2 'Raises' (25-15=10, 10/5=2).

After that, it is just a matter of telling the story:  "You pick the lock with blazing speed, not very many of the simple locks like that one around anymore."

For combat in the Omni system using this rule it still works.

Attacker Rating (skill+stat) = 6
Defender Rating (skill+stat) = 7
Attacker die roll = 15

Normal method:  15+(6-7)=14, a Success, normal damage is done
Difficulty method: 15+6 = 21 vs Defense of 17 (10+defenders rating), still a success, but more intuitively derived.

Okay, so what about higher levels?

Attacker Rating = 12
Defender Rating = 7
Attacker die roll = 20

Standard method, this would work out to a 25 (20+5), and be double damage.
Difficulty method:  20+12=32 vs Defense of 17, 15 higher than needed, so, 2 'Raises.'

Each 'Raise' could then be interpreted as:
a)  additional +1 damage per raise (eww...that kinda sucks comparatively)
b)  additional +DR of weapon (effectively double weapon damage before STR)
c)  -1 Defender Defense per raise
d)  a mixture of various effects

Let's look at d, because that sounds fun.  The defender would take 2x weapon damage for the first raise, then also be at -2 defense on the next turn as he recovers from the shock of the blow, or is trying to hold his guts in, possibly even from hesitation thinking "Do I really want to stay and fight this guy?"

The good thing is, rolling a total over 20 is now useful, the bad thing though is the inevitable 'Death Spiral' for the defender.

"But what about the ability to successfully Parry/Evade in Omni??" you ask?

Simply a matter of perception.

Normal method is the defender will focus his action on defense and roll d20+rating and if the result is a Full Success or better, the Attacker does not even roll, Partial Success indicates that IF the attacker hits he will only do half damage.

Standard parries (ie passive) are taken into account with Defense Rating (10+ applicable skill), an 'Active Parry/Evade' would work in the following manner:

d20+Defense = opponents difficulty to hit.

Using the above Ratings, if the defender decided to Parry as an action before hand and rolled a 15, the total would have been 32, still would have been a hit, but just barely.

This works great for melee, but what about Ranged attacks?

Remember the #1 rule of ranged combat: take cover!

As mentioned, melee Defense is 10+skill rating, this is fine for fighting face to face and you can (hopefully) semi-predict your attackers moves, but at a distance you cannot tell where your attacker is aiming.

So, my current thought is that Defense against ranged attacks would only be your Evade skill (passive) or d20+Evade Rating for an 'Active Defense.'

Yes, people with guns and bows are a bit more dangerous than people with knives with this setup, but you have nothing to defend yourself with at range, and the attacker still has range penalties.

Just some thoughts going through my head, until next time, enjoy your game!

GM Notes SPECIAL!: Russian Sleep Experiment Orange Soda

Read this and it really got my mind going.

To sum up, this piece of fiction tells about a Russian experiment in the 1940s regarding sleep deprivation that goes horribly awry.

Depending on the game, there are a few different ways this story can be handled at the gaming table.

SLA Industries: Operatives are sent to investigate a Soft Company and the lab is found a) intact while the experiment is in progress, b) after the experiment is over and they have to investigate what happened (hope someone turned off the gas...) or c) again, after the experiment is over, but the subjects are running loose...

Star Wars:  What have the Imperials done with some of the people on a remote frontier planet?  Well, lets check out the Imperial outpost and find out!

Rapture:  The PCs are sent to rescue people from a prison camp that has been set up, only to find that some of the people have been taken for experimentation.  What will the do when they discover the subjects have been possessed by demons?

D6 Adventure: duh...Russian (or Nazi) lab raid.

Asylum:  Either the characters stumble across the lab...or have volunteered to be test subjects!

Talislanta:  Rumors that the Rajan, or Kang, or Quan, or Farad, or Ur (after discovering some long-lost Alchemical texts on chemical warfare), or even possibly a Quaranian Necromancer-King, have reached more civilized lands and the PCs are hired to rescue the test subjects and destroy the lab if possible.

DnD:  A Necromancer has been using a new kind of undead to kidnap people in the middle of the night.  But the new undead is actually the people being experimented on and turned into nightmarish creatures to be controlled by the Necromancer.  These creatures are then used to kidnap more victims for the Necromancers deformed army.

Vampire:  Hunting out test subjects for Pentex to experiment on
Werewolf:  The tribal shaman or Ragabash has met one of the test subjects while traversing the Umbra and they pleaded with him for help, to save him from a Pentex lab.  The PCs are instructed to do so.  This would also explain what happens when the test subjects brainwaves flatline.
Hunter:  Vampires are out kidnapping people, Werewolves are creeping through the forest...time to get to work boys!
Mage:  The Progenitors and New World Order have teamed up with this new way to control the populace, at least that is the idea.  When word hits the Traditions, something must be done to stop it.

Cyberpunk/Shadowrun:  A contact, or friend, or family member, tells the PCs about this great job they found, it sounds a bit fishy so the PCs did some rooting, only to find out the lab hiring the guinea pigs manufactures toxins for warzones!  The PCs have to save their friend before it is too late!


Obviously, this story can be adapted to just about any RPG (Toon might be an issue...) and would make for a great creepy night of role-playing, or a fun night of killing baddies depending on play style of the group.

Me, I prefer to go with the creepy.

Conversion Machine: D20 SRD spells to Talislanta 4th/5th ed Part II

In my last Conversion Machine, we looked at the differences between Talislantan magic and D20 SRD (DnD) magic as it relates to the most widely used spell, Magic Missile.  We looked at converting the basics of the spell into the Talislanta framework and also a direct conversion that had to use Sorcery elements, making this magical staple into a very hard to cast bee sting.  This time, we continue with Magic Missile and way to get not only the same sort of effect, but make it even more powerful for our beginning Cymrillian Magician.

To recap, this is the spell we want to convert:

Magic Missile

Evocation [Force]

Level: Sor/Wiz 1

Components: V, S

Casting Time: 1 standard action

Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)

Targets: Up to five creatures, no two of which can be more than 15 ft. apart

Duration: Instantaneous

Saving Throw: None

Spell Resistance: Yes

A missile of magical energy darts forth from your fingertip and strikes its target, dealing 1d4+1 points of force damage.

The missile strikes unerringly, even if the target is in melee combat or has less than total cover or total concealment. Specific parts of a creature can’t be singled out. Inanimate objects are not damaged by the spell.

For every two caster levels beyond 1st, you gain an additional missile—two at 3rd level, three at 5th, four at 7th, and the maximum of five missiles at 9th level or higher. If you shoot multiple missiles, you can have them strike a single creature or several creatures. A single missile can strike only one creature. You must designate targets before you check for spell resistance or roll damage.

What we are working with here is obviously an offensive, or Attack, spell.  When we look at the Attack mode in Talislanta we actually have a couple of options:

ATTACK

Damage: 1 Hit Point of damage per Spell Level

Range: 50 feet (-1 to casting roll per 10 extra feet of range)

Duration: Instant / 1 round per level (no range)

Area: -1 to casting roll per foot of radius

In accordance with the rules in the book, we can make this a standard, single target spell, or an area effect spell.  Something more along the lines of the following:

Bolt

Base Spell Level: 1 (Dynamic)

Range: 50 feet

Area: 0

Duration: Instant

Base Difficulty: -1 per additional HP damage

Notes:

Example Spells: Arcane Bolt, Necromantic Assault

Or, for the AoE version:

Blast

Base Spell Level: 1 (Dynamic)

Range: 50 feet

Area: 5 feet radius (10 ft diameter)

Duration: Instant

Base Difficulty: -6 (-1 per additional HP damage)

Notes:

Example Spells: Geomantic Blast, Fireball

Depending on description, and house rules, your Bolt spell you use for the single target effect, and your Blast spell you use for multiple opponents, I would definitely allow my players to state that the spell will only effect a maximum of 5 targets, no problem.  Also, this removes the bee-sting effect and can make this simple spell a feared part of any magicians arsenal.  That 3pt damage just became 9 for our Cymrillian friend with a straight d20 roll.

"Wait...he mentioned the rules in the book, what about the house rules he was talking about!"

Never fear!

There are various house rules that I have heard of regarding spells and their usage.  The rules that I personally use have the Spell Level as the only thing that can be changed after learning the spell (as shown above, the Area and Range are static.)  Although I prefer a more static spell, my players do not always like that idea.

For the conversions, I will be using Dynamic and Static spell levels depending on the mode and the spell itself and I will do my best to keep the feel of the spell as written.  This means, of course, that there will likely be 3 or more versions of some of the spells, Magic Missile, for example.

To keep the overall feel of the spell, and not make it horribly difficult to cause minimal damage, let us attack this a different way.

We look at the qualities of the original spell:

1. It is simple
2. At base it is single target
3. It never misses
4. Just about everyone who casts spells knows it

Okay.

So, we can use the following for the base:

Magic Missle
Attack Mode
Base Spell Level:  1 (dynamic - meaning we can pump it for more damage)
Range: 50 feet (it halves the range, but we want to keep it as simple as possible)
Duration:  Instant
Special:  Qualitas, unerring, -15
Base Difficulty:  -16 (-1 per additional HP damage)

Hmm...still seems pretty difficulty, but with our +9 to cast it only comes out to a d20-7, still pretty hard for 1 HP damage.  Let us bend the rules a little.  So far I have been using the 'unerring' aspect of the spell as a 'Major Change' to the mode's capabilities, let me drop that to 'Moderate' which will save us -5 and make the Base Difficulty -11 instead.

That still puts our Magician at d20+9-11, or d20-2, but it also gives him the opportunity to boost the damage a little.  To do 5 damage it will put him at that d20-7, and as long as he does not mishap he will hit.

But there is another way...

You can dodge an Arcane Bolt, you cannot dodge a magic missile, so we meet in the middle a little.

Magic Missle
Attack Mode
Base Spell Level: 1 (dynamic)
Range: 50ft
Duration: Instant
Special:  Qualitas, Minor Change, hard to dodge, target dodges at -1/3 spell level, -5
Base Difficulty:  -6

Now we have it set up a bit differently, still having to use Sorcery, but at a much lower difficulty.  While still not the unfailing hit that the d20 version has, this does make it a bit harder to dodge and helps to keep the feel of the spell.  But what about the additional missiles and targets?

Well, a 3rd level Wizard in DnD is actually pretty accomplished when you think about it.  I believe in 3rd edition it breaks down to about 13 encounters per level, lets figure 6-7 encounters per session, so about 4 sessions.

I usually run a 'Heroic' campaign in Talislanta, so the PCs will be getting approximately 20 xp per session.  A decent amount of 80 experience can be given to our young hero and we can get him casting the unerring version without too much difficulty, or we can use Qualitas again...

Magic Missile
Attack Mode
Base Spell Level: 1 (dynamic)
Range: 50ft
Duration: Instant
Special:  Qualitas, Minor Change, hard to dodge -1/3 spell level, -5; Qualitas, additional target -1 per additional target, Minor Change, -5
Base Difficulty:  -11

Still not too shabby, keeps the basic feel of the spell.  Main caveat here though, is the damage would have to be split between the two targets, unless you up the additional target to a Major Change for an additional -5 difficulty.

Granted, that is starting to get very unwieldy, even for our experienced Magician.  Personally, I think the best bet is to leave it single target and use a blast style spell for multiple targets just to keep it simple.

Well, I hope this little venture gave you something to think about, even though it was aimed specifically at d20 and the Talislanta system the thought objects are going to be pretty close with any kind of conversion.

How much CAN we keep from the original?
Can we make it feel the same?
What are the different ways to accomplish the same goal, and which one works best for what we want to do?

Conversion Machine: D20 SRD spells to Talislanta 4th/5th ed Part I

So, for 'funsies' I decided to start converting the D20 SRD spells to the Talislanta 4th/5th edition mix that I use.  'Mix' because I prefer the modes from 4th edition but some of the changes that appeared in 5th edition.

Using the magic system from 4th edition has always been fun for me, I absolutely loved the players that would come to the table wanting to play a caster, but not wanting to take the time and energy to create their beginning spells.

This would allow me to not only have fun creating the spells, but also kind of show them what the magic in Talislanta was like.  From the minor skin and hair enhancements to pillars of flame that destroyed just about anything it touched, magic in Talislanta runs the full spectrum.

At times, using the Omni/Talislanta system for more 'standard' fantasy games, the thrill of watching a player look through their brand new, custom spellbook, carefully reading what I have handed them, to hear them say, "You, sir, are a sick and twisted man."  (This was stated by a player who had taken BattleMagic while looking through his healing spells.  New meaning to "A pox on you and your people!")

This always did seem to put the game on hold, for at least one session, while I crept back into my hole to do my dirty work, and some players just like to have a list of spells to choose from.

This brought me back to memories of searching through the AD&D 1st and 2nd edition spell lists, and, always being a sucker for punishment, I decided to grab the D20 SRD and do some converting.  Most of my players are familiar with DnD in some manner, so they would get a kick out of it.

So, a quick google search and download later, I had the spell descriptions from A-B and my Talislanta modes custom cheat sheet opened in my trusty word processor.

There are some caveats that you have to acknowledge when doing any conversions, especially when you want to stay true to the feel of one game, while using the system from another.

For example, modern magic in the Talislanta RPG system has the following rules:

1. Cannot return the dead to life
2. Cannot create life
3. Cannot affect time or causality
4. Cannot control two Powers at once (Fire and Earth, for example)
5. Cannot cast more than one spell at a time or blend two spells together (ie, use two modes at once)

Note that these rules do not apply to ancient magic.

Okay, so I already know there are going to be some issues with spells from DnD, no problem, all of the above can be accomplished using Sorcery from the Codex Magicus.

But then we get into the choices that MUST be made.  While Talislantan magic is very personal and a creative endeavor, magic from DnD is not.  This is because of the history from the two games, not the world history, exactly, the real world history of the games.

DnD sprung from miniature battles, massive scale battlefields and siege rules where wizards stood atop battlements and hammered the opposing army with magical artillery.

Talislanta came from table-top RPGs, where character development and a search for the unknown and history were active at the same time as a heavy interest in the post-apocalyptic genre.  Games such as Shadowrun, Cyberpunk, Earthdawn and Gamma World were all popular.  In a way, Talislanta helped to usher in 'Fantasy-Punk' if you wish to use that term.

One of the big differences that these two paths differ on, is range.

Standard range for an Attack mode spell in Talislanta is 50ft+10ft per additional boost, in DnD the range is much further.  The quintessential 'Magic Missle' spell, for example, is 100ft+10ft per level.

Additionally, targeting is different.  In Talislanta, that magic bolt effects only a single target while in DnD you gain an additional missile every two levels (max of 5) that can be split between up to 5 targets.  Also, the Talislanta bolt requires a roll to hit, the magic missile is unerring and always strikes its target.

As I said before, a lot of these differences can be ignored, or you can use the Sorcery rules from the Codex Magicus to get a more exact conversion.  But how does that effect the usefulness of the spells themselves?

Let us look at Magic Missile.

First, from the D20 SRD:

Magic Missile

Evocation [Force]

Level: Sor/Wiz 1

Components: V, S

Casting Time: 1 standard action

Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)

Targets: Up to five creatures, no two of which can be more than 15 ft. apart

Duration: Instantaneous

Saving Throw: None

Spell Resistance: Yes

A missile of magical energy darts forth from your fingertip and strikes its target, dealing 1d4+1 points of force damage.

The missile strikes unerringly, even if the target is in melee combat or has less than total cover or total concealment. Specific parts of a creature can’t be singled out. Inanimate objects are not damaged by the spell.

For every two caster levels beyond 1st, you gain an additional missile—two at 3rd level, three at 5th, four at 7th, and the maximum of five missiles at 9th level or higher. If you shoot multiple missiles, you can have them strike a single creature or several creatures. A single missile can strike only one creature. You must designate targets before you check for spell resistance or roll damage.

This is a 'Level 1' spell for Sorcerers and Wizards, an 'easy' incantation that almost every single player I have met has in their wizards repertoire.

Now let us look at the Talislanta version using the basic rules for magic:

Magic Missile

Attack Mode

Level: 1+

Components: V, S

Casting Time: 1 standard action

Range: Medium (50 ft. + 10 ft./additional -1 to casting roll)

Targets: 1

Duration: Instantaneous

Saving Throw: Evade (yes, in Talislanta, you can dodge offensive magic)

Spell Resistance: Yes (lets face it, resistance to magic is pretty universal)

Base Difficulty:  -1 per Spell Level

A missile of magical energy darts forth from your fingertip and strikes its target, dealing 1 point of force damage per Spell Level.

As you can see, the range is much lower, and you have a chance to miss.  Also missing is the ability to target multiple creatures.  Another realization is that while the DnD Magic Missile tops out at 5d4+5, there is no upper limit to Spell Levels in Talislanta, although I would not suggest casting a spell more than 1.5x your total bonus, that can get nasty.

Now let us look at the Talislanta version using a direct conversion:

Magic Missile

Attack Mode

Level:  3+

Components: V, S

Casting Time: 1 standard action

Range: Medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)

Targets: Up to five creatures, no two of which can be more than 15 ft. apart

Duration: Instantaneous

Saving Throw: None

Spell Resistance: Yes

Base Difficulty:  -33 (Qualitas, unerring -15; Qualitas, additional missile per additional 2 levels max 5, -10; minimum range -5, Spell Level 3 base)

A missile of magical energy darts forth from your fingertip and strikes its target, dealing 3 (avg 1d4+1) points of force damage.

The missile strikes unerringly, even if the target is in melee combat or has less than total cover or total concealment. Specific parts of a creature can’t be singled out. Inanimate objects are not damaged by the spell.

For every three spell levels beyond 3rd, you gain an additional missile—two at 6rd level, three at 9th, four at 12th, and the maximum of five missiles at 15th level or higher. If you shoot multiple missiles, you can have them strike a single creature or several creatures. A single missile can strike only one creature. You must designate targets before you check for spell resistance or roll damage.

YIKES!  This simple, basic spell just became a Master-Level...bee sting.

Now, to put this in perspective we will look at what a beginning Talislantan Wizard has for his skill.  I am choosing the Cymrillian Magician from the 4th Edition Talislanta book to use as an example.  The reason for this choice is simple, they are supposed to be the absolute best at spellslinging.

With Magic Rating of +6, and beginning mode at +3 for a total of +9, that shows great potential.  So, to cast even the most basic of the direct conversion, our awesome Magician, best you can get for a starting character, will roll d20-24 (d20+MR+Mode-Difficulty).  Ouch!  He just got fried, for a whopping 3-6 points of damage depending on house rules for Magical Mishaps (or, he just had the party teleported to some random dimension...).

Now, this does not mean that our Magic Missle cannot be done, it just shows how different the two schools of thought are, and pretty major genre differences.

Okay, so this leaves us with some serious thinking to do.  Not to worry, I will show another way to work this next time, and it will actually make the spell more powerful, and easier for our Cymrillian friend.

Until next time, enjoy your game.

GM Notes: Talislantan/Omni Magic

House Rules are always a GMs favorite tool.  Today I am going to talk about the house rules for the Talislanta setting and Omni system that are going through my head.

 Magic is such a large part of any fantasy genre game that special attention must be paid.
First, I use a combination of 4th and 5th edition Talislanta.  I use the modes from 4th edition, with the changes from 5th edition for the calculation of spell levels, range, etc.

Per my standard house rules, characters receive a number of spells in each mode equal to their Mode Rating, or Skill Level in that mode, plus an additional number of spells equal to their Magic Rating.  The bonus spells from Magic Rating do not have to be in any particular mode.

For example, Azadim, a Cymrillian Magician has the following modes: Attack +3, Influence +2, Defend +3, Alter +4, Heal +3 and a Magic Rating of +5.  This gives him a starting spell list consisting of 3 Attack, 2 Influence, 3 Defend, 4 Alter and 3 Heal spells.  The bonus starting spells he receives from his +5 Magic Rating he decides to put 2 into Alter (total 6 Alter), 2 into Attack (total 5 Attack), 1 into Heal (total 4) and the last into Influence (total 3).  Altogether, this gives our intrepid adventurer 18 spells in his repertoire.  Not too bad, really.

Now, I have to make a choice.  Flavor text describes Talislantans as always being on the lookout for new spells, especially Archean (ancient) spells that do not fit into the modern magic system.  Another section talks about how Talislantans have hundreds of spells.  Even another section describes players coming up with spells on the fly.

Yeah...not so much my cuppatea.

I have already limited the number of spells each character has, now its time to put them to work.  If we look at magicians in our standard way, and realize that this is a post-apocalyptic setting, then it would not be too far of a stretch to say that magicians do not spill all their secrets.

So...the choice is Dynamic vs Static spells, or Dynamic vs Semi-Static spells.

Common practice dictates that anything that is bound to Spell Level is scalable.  So for the Heal mode, you would only need 4 spells:  Heal, Harm, Cause Disease and Cure Disease.

And to make matters worse, with scaling involved, you would only need a few of each mode.

Attack: 3 spells; Bolt, Blast and Melee
Alter: 4 spells; Increase Attribute, Decrease Attribute, Increase Skill, Decrease Skill
Conjure: 2 spells; Conjure by Mass, Conjure by Area
Defend: 4 spells; Aura, Flat Barrier, Cone/Cylinder Barrier, Dome/Sphere Barrier
Heal: 4 spells; Heal, Harm, Cause Disease, Cure Disease
Illusion: 1 spell
Influence: 1 spell
Move: 1 spell
Reveal: 3 spells; Reveal, Scrying, Conceal
Summon: 2 spells; Summon, Banish
Transform: 5 spells; Trivial Change, Minor Change, Major Change, Radical Change, Complete Change
Ward: 2 spells; Ward, Hex

But, if all the spells are the same, and there are only 32 distinct spells...what about all that searching and secrecy that wizards are known for?

How about if only the Spell Level effects are scalable and everything else is static, like range or number of targets?  Okay, that helps a little, but still leaves us with basically 3 attack spells and 4 heal spells.  Still seems rather weenie in the grand scheme of things.

So let us take a look at the flip side, NOTHING is dynamic and the spell creation system is just that, a way to create static effect spells.  Now we have something to go on: a bunch of not-too-happy players.

Well, we never want unhappy players.

There is a middle ground.  Scalable effects, those that effect Spell Level only, can only be scaled up or down a number of levels equal to the Magic Rating of the caster from the base spell.

Hey!  Now that sounds like a good plan!  The GM is happy because he sees the wizard PCs scrambling for new spells and the PCs are happy because they get to do some cool scaling effects.

I have not playtested this yet, or mentioned it to my players, but you can expect me to test it before too long.

Enjoy the game!

GM Notes: That One Game...

We all have it...that "One Game."

The game that inspires us to creativity, the game that we grabs a hold of us and just will not let go.
That game that reshapes our imaginations, gets our creative juices flowing.

For some, that game is Dungeons and Dragons, for others it is Kult, or Star Wars, or Shadowrun, or Cyberpunk.  For me, that game is SLA Industries.

Throughout my game materials, notebooks, supplements, miniatures, props, etc, I have materials relating to my SLA Industries games.  Most of the content I have written for games, was written for SLA Industries.

Pages of NPCs, new weapons, new skill packages (classes), equipment lists, fashion styles, new races, pages upon pages, digital and physical, the ideas just keep flowing.

Just searching the internet, looking through the newspaper or merely even talking to people will get me thinking of a new idea, or how to work something into my game.

Back in 1993, I met a fellow gamer at the local shop in a town of around 3k people, in a rural area of Missouri.  I forget why we went out to his house, which was in an even more rural area, but while he was gathering his RPG stuff and tuning his paintball marker I found a book on his floor.

I sat there in his room, flipping through the book, entranced by the artwork.  Yes, just the ARTWORK.

It was all black, white and grey, some line art, some charcoal, some inked, but it captured me.

When we returned to the gaming store, I immediately put in an order for the book.  A week later it was in my hands.  I devoured it.  Within two weeks I started running the game.  Remember, this was 1993, almost 20 years ago.

To put this in perspective, I purchased my first SLA Industries book before Magic: the Gathering was sold at the local shop (granted, only a few weeks before), before the ill-fated Maztica for AD&D 2nd edition was released, before 2nd edition Vampire: The Masquerade came out.

And I am still running the game, still seeing elements of our world that can be used or exploited for my role-playing endeavor.

There have been moments during this time that I have taken a short break and ran AD&D, Talislanta, Star Wars and a couple one-shot games, but I always return to SLA Industries.

The game where a massive company owns almost all of the 'Known Universe,' were if you do not work for the company, you work for a Soft Company (small company with no backing or a direct competitor), a terrorist trying to bring down SLA Industries, or one of the unemployed masses.

The game where serial killers are so prolific they are not even acknowledged until their 13th kill, where violence and sex on the TV are the norm, not the exception.

Maybe the space in my heart for this game is because it is so far fetched, maybe it is the artwork, or maybe it is because of the ease with which I can setup and run a mission.

Maybe it is because, if you think about it, the game is so close to our own world...

Just some thoughts, enjoy your game.

SLA Industries: Out with a Bang meet Jack and Jill

With the squad being down to Grundy, Hunter, Cappin and Doc due to the missing Shaktar and Brain Waster the financier group 'Flaming Turkeys,' where they have been getting a few BPNs from, sends in a Sniper to help them out a bit.

After quickly burning through the newbies Blue BPN they decided to get back to business and call up Jonesy at Flaming Turkeys.

Offered a Grey BPN the squad happily accepts.  Simple work.  There is a Channel Resistance uplink cell in Industrial Sector 86 that has holed up in an abandoned building.

Arriving in the area, the squad parks the APC a couple blocks away and heads in on foot.  Upon getting to the building, Grundy attempts to weld the doors of the main entrance, briefly harassed by what appears to be a security guard who is waved off by Hunters SLA badge, and moves to the back door, leaving Hunter to watch the main entrance.

The Sniper, Terry, is placed on an adjacent rooftop to assist and Cappin heads around to the loading dock to find an entrance.

Doc and Grundy enter the building and as Grundy is welding the door shut they are interrupted by a man claiming to be a delivery boy for an Orientan restaurant.  Grundy slaps him out of the way, inadvertently killing him.

Doc decides to start working his way up the stairs to the second floor.  Terry radios the squad to let them know that all the lights above the 2nd floor just went out, as Cappin busts open the loading bay door.

Doc arrives at the 2nd floor door and opens it, he is met with gunfire.  As the bullets pelt him and the door, he manages to drop back and close it, and doses kickstart and UV.

Cappin, hearing his brother hit makes his way quickly to the stairwell, proceeded by Grundy.  With the Morgan brothers forming a plan for the 2nd floor assault, Grundy heads up to the 3rd floor.

Terry leaves his perch to get a better position with Hunter who is now working his way through the front of the building and checking the first floor.

Grundy makes it to the 3rd floor and opens the door, and quickly closes it as bullets ricochet off his helmet, almost killing him.  Good thing he is a Stormer.

Hearing their friend eat lead upstairs, Cappin decides to change up their plan, opens the door just a crack and tosses in a fragmentation grenade.

The dilapidated building shakes a little with the explosion, and all goes quiet inside.

Outside, Terry is making his way around the building and sees two figures zip line through some buildings.  He immediately radios the members of the squad inside and Hunter comes back out to help.

Looking over the damage inside, the grenade has blasted a hole in the 3rd and 2nd floors, the blast probably enhanced a little by the Vito and Buzzard model Tek Trex drones...that now lay scattered in pieces.

Grundy heads for the roof to try and assist with the 2 fleeing figures while Cappin and Doc head for the 4th and 5th floors.

Hunter takes off on his powerboard to follow a van that he spots leaving at a high rate of speed, Terry moves to another building to take up position in case someone else decides to run for it.

Grundy opens the door to the roof expecting to run to the edge and zipline down with his rifle, but the bullets pounding into him force him back through the door.  On the roof are 4 DN operatives packing SMGs and automatic rifles!

Doc leaves Cappin to clear the 4th floor and heads up to the roof to assist Grundy.

Cappin, after doing some quick drug-addled thinking, decides the best idea is to blow a hole in the 5th floor and runs upstairs while Grundy and Doc form a plan of attack.

Cappin tosses his last grenade through the door to the 5th floor at the same time Grundy and Doc open the door to the roof, Grundy going high and full auto, Doc kneeling and going low with two 603s with a single hotline round in each.

Grundy and Doc manage to take out all four of the DN operatives on the roof, while Cappin looks at the hole in the floor and wonders why the ceiling is still mostly intact.

Hunter is still following the van, calls Shiver scaf support to try and get a tracker in the sky, but there are none available at the moment while Terry is moving up the side of an adjacent building.

Doc and Grundy use the two DN operatives in body armor to slide down the zipline, to a now empty corner, as Cappin starts to sweep the 5th floor and catches movement at a door towards the end of the hallway.

Cappin, realizing he has no more grenades, kicks open the door and trigger locks his 706 Power Reaper, the four DN operatives inside open up with their DN74 SMGs and DN80 rifles...and everything goes silent.

With Cappin not answering his headset, Terry checks the room through his scope as Grundy grabs Doc and starts to climb back up the zipline.  Fifteen blocks away, Hunter is still following the escaping van on his hoverboard.

Terry sees no movement in the room.

As Grundy and Doc make it into the room they find Cappin with his chest torn apart and his left leg completely missing.  Doc immediately calls for medical help and him and Grundy attempt to revive him.

About 20 blocks away, the backdoor of the van opens up and a hail of bullets from the DN operative impact into Hunters chest knocking him off his hoverboard at around 50mph.  If the bullets had not killed him, the impact and asphalt would have.

Unable to revive Cappin, Grundy heads out to recover Hunters body.

The Channel Resistance cell was broken and the BPN successful overall, but it was a hard-won battle.  Doc and Grundy headed home with lowered heads and sunken hearts to drink a few sorrows and watch TV.

During the episode of GoreZone, Jack makes an appearance, showing film of Cappin and Hunter dying...

Til next time...enjoy your game!

GM Notes: Random Encounters

A friend recently asked about random encounter tables for Dungeons and Dragons, I posted some suggested places to look according to the best remembrance available to me, then it hit me, I have rarely used random encounters.

This struck me a bit funny, I mean, Dungeons and Dragons is based off of Random Encounters...right?

Absolutely not.

I mulled it over a bit and realized that I never really used random encounters because there was no reason to.

I know where I want my story to be about, why waste time with pointless encounters?  If the PCs are fighting against the Thieves Guild and have to go through a nearby forest to get something...why fight random orcs or goblins, when you can fight orcs or goblins that are in league with the guild?

This, of course, takes a little more preparation, but in the end it will fit the story and still seem like a 'random' encounter.

Random encounters are, I believe, meant to show that there is a world outside of the story, to "bring the world to life."  I fail to see how this can be accomplished when you roll some dice, check a chart, and put the game on hold while you get all the stats and encounter notes drawn up.

If I am going to pause a game for 5-15 minutes, I am going to take a break as well, not sit at the table gouging my eyes out while getting writers cramp.

Now, I realize that there are reasons for random encounter tables and I am not saying that they should not be used at all.  What I am saying is they should not be used during the game because it kills momentum, possibly sends the players on a wild goose chase and has a good chance of putting a player death in the hands of some nobody wolf or catablepas.

The best use of encounter tables I can think of is before the game, while you are still writing the notes for the adventure.

Three days of travel through woodlands?  No problem.  You know the PCs are going to have to do this, so you grab your d6, roll 4 times for each day (morning, afternoon, evening, overnight), consult your tables and voila!  The 'random' encounters have now become regular, planned encounters.

The helps in a couple of different ways:

Party Strength - low to mid level party, and you just rolled an early morning red dragon.  Following 'random encounter' usage, your party is now toast (literally).  But now, with the 'planned encounter,' you can tailor to the group.  Instead of said dragon pouncing out of the forest onto the party for an early morning snack, the party is awakened by a roar and leathery flapping of wings as the dragon flies over the forest.  This still provides the feel that there is a world out there unrelated to the story, but has the benefit of not killing the party without a fighting chance or breaking momentum.

Party Gear/Abilities - especially important in low-level or low-magic campaigns.  Using the random encounter method you may end up pitting the PC's against something they have no means to damage and then the monster just trounces them back to character generation.  Never fun, players prefer to die by adversaries, not random stuff.

Storyline - here is where it gets good.  So, lets say the random encounter is 5-10 orcs, you roll your trusty player-killers and get a total of 7.  Since this is before the game starts, you jot down that 1 of the orcs is bigger and stronger than the rest, the leader.  Another is his second-in-command, and the rest are just scabs breaking union lines because the rest of the orcs are on strike.

Taking it a step further, the main orc is written in as a hireling of the Thieves Guild and his small band of bandits bandies about preying on merchants and passerby's for the guild as well as scouting the area protecting the forest hideout.

Due to them actually being in the guild, they may even be better equipped than the standard orc.  Maybe a couple low level magic items, a few healing potions, a map to the hideout or a letter of reference including basic instructions from the Lord Mayor.

And that is how it works, the 'random encounter' of the orcs has now become a 'planned encounter' that actually moves the story forward instead of breaking momentum, and as a bonus even provides more threads in the story to follow.

Enjoy your game.

SLA Industries: Strawberry Princess Retrieval

Tonight, the squad had their first meeting with a Contract Killer: Strawberry Princess, via a Grey retrieval BPN.

It was a simple premise, locate and return Strawberry Princess, rep 6 CK who disappeared after ambushing Sour Blood after he made his way from destroying Deity in their latest match.  She was able to take him out because she uses a homemade non-lethal poison.

From Strawberry's agent they are informed of her last known address, and given a picture.  They are also informed that she is quite off in the head, and very deadly when she wants to be.

The squad comes up with a plan, they will dress up in costume as The Berry Knight (Grundy), Watermelon Soldier (Ian), Black Cherry (Hunter) and The Pie Pimp (Feelgood) and then deliver cupcakes laced with a sleeping agent to her apartment under the guise of Cupcake Scouts.

When they arrive at her apartment they find the place ransacked.  They check the surveillance video and see her leaving out the front door with her gear a few hours before.  Not knowing where she might run to they contact Dr McNamara, her psychologist.

After speaking with her psychologist, the squad learns that she is a paranoid schizophrenic fantasist who lives in a place called "Strawberry Land" and only feels safe in the "Berry Patch."

A wild goose chase is born!

The Medic and Death Squad Frothers head to her Clansmen to see if she went to them for help while the 313 Sector Ranger and the Wraithen KMS go downtown to check out a strip club called "Strawberry Land."

With no information in either place, the Frothers meet the rest of the squad at the club and start thinking about what to do next.

After looking into her past, the squad decides to contact a few of her ex-squadmates from "5-Star Carnage," the last squad she was in as an operative.

Doc Stevenson (Human Medic), Grease Monkey (Human Pilot/Navigation), Bullethead (313 Death Squad), Marco (Ebon I/I) and Norwood (Human Strike Squad) agree to show up to the club after finishing up their most recent BPN.  Stevenson, Grease Monkey and Bullethead are the only three that actually knew her.

They talk to the squad about Grainne, as they knew her before she joined the Circuit, and how she was such a nice girl that joined up with them after being in a few squads that bullied her.  Stroke, their deceased Brain Waster I/I treated her like a long lost little sister and after his death, she left the squad to join the Contract Circuit.

When the squad informs them that she is missing, Doc tells them of the time she was lost in Cannibal Sector 4.  Grundy (aka The Berry Knight), remembers the name "Berry Patch" from the back of his memory but cannot place the reference, being a Sector Ranger all he can remember is that it has something to do with Cannibal Sector 4.

The squad decides to go into CS4 to try and find this "Berry Patch."  Strawberry's old squadmates volunteer to help because she was "like a sister" to them.

Into the Cannibal Sector they go, and come across a downed Stingray, the jeep and SCAF bikes missing, communications, navigation and fire controls are all missing, along with basic equipment.  Investigation of the vehicle also shows them that it was taken down with precision weapons fire.

Leaving Norwood and Marco in the APC, the rest of the group go to scout around a bit, finding some children playing with a severed head.  As they watch and think about what to do, Grundy stands up and offers them cupcakes, the children scatter into the ruins.

Marco screams and runs towards the group, yelling about a man in Crackshot armor getting the drop on Norwood and dragging him off.

Everyone retreats into the APC and starts to move on.  Marco is given a cupcake to calm him down and quickly loses consciousness.  Worried that he may have picked up some sort of virus or infection in the area Stevenson and Feelgood start to examine Marco.

As the Wraith Raider starts to feel a bit uncomfortable, due to being the only other person there without a sealed suit, the two Medics find blood and what appears to be human tissue in the Ebons mouth.  Further examination uncovers blood on his fingers also.

Not sure of what to do, the group heads back to where Norwood was killed.

Norwoods body is found, not far from where the APC had been parked, his helmet gone, his face mauled by...something.  It turns out the squad was lucky to find anything, as there are a few cannibal children hiding in the rubble nearby.

Grundy asks the children if they would answer a few questions.  The children state that they want the body in return for information.  Stevenson agrees, he has only known Norwood for a couple weeks and is more interested in getting the reclamation bonus for the gear.

Grundy then asks if they have seen the Strawberry Princess, describing how she looks, the children mutter under their breath, "We have not seen the mother, can we have the body now?"  The body is left to the children.


Stevenson agrees to tie up Marco until he wakes up due to the wounds on Norwood not matching his story, then Feelgood can dose him with honesty to find out what happened.  Grundy loses his patience and uses a bit of Wall Wash as smelling salts to wake up the Ebon.

The Ebon states that he is working undercover on a BPN to ferret out Norwood who was suspected of being a DarkNight agent.  Marco states that Norwood asked him for his help so he popped Ebb Beast and took him out now that the truth was out.

Stevenson knocks him unconscious again, and ties up Marco, stating the truth will be found out when they return to Mort.

As night falls, Grundy goes hunting for something to eat.  He comes across a few cannibals that have taken down a couple of Ex-War Criminals.  He makes contact peacefully and explains that the squad is just looking for someone.  A couple of the cannibals break off from the group and return shortly with Violet, a 'Mother' in the cannibal clan.

More is found out about Grainne's time spent in CS4 and the group finds out that she is considered a member of the clan.  When asked about the "Berry Patch," Violet draws a map on a piece of skin taken from one of the Ex-War Criminals.

Grease Monkey takes a look at the map and lets everyone know that they will not be able to follow it during the night so the group takes shifts sleeping, Stevenson keeps Marco sedated to keep him from formulating.

Using the map, the Berry Patch is easy to find.  An ruined husk of a grocery store named, Berry Patch Grocery.

The squad, still believing that their costumes may work to get close to Strawberry Princess, enter the building first.  Making their way past the ruins of checkout stations, they are contacted over the loudspeakers by their target, who seems completely confused as to why they are dressed oddly.

Bullets scream through the front windows and the squad takes cover, Grainne's ex-squadmates have turned on the PC's.  Marco folds away as Grease Monkey and Stevenson take up position.

After a brief firefight, Carnage is dead and the squad have gained some trust with Grainne, who is happy to return to her Contract Killer lifestyle now that her old squad is dead.

The rest of the story:
Five-star Carnage was a successful squad, but Stevenson and Grease Monkey started to get into some subversive activities.  Stroke, being an Investigation Operative, was on to them and Stevenson killed him during a BPN.  Grainne, Stroke's confidant, left the squad to join the CK Circuit out of fear, she knew that Stroke was murdered, but had no proof.

Marco was brought into the squad directly by Stevenson, Norwood was brought in by Bullethead, under the guise of a new operative that needed a squad.  Norwood was on a BPN to infiltrate the squad and root out subversive elements.

Marco found out about Norwood and killed him, Stevenson played along with the group in order to throw the squad off because he did not know how much information Grainne had about his activities and wanted to make sure she was found so he could kill her.

Stevenson killed Bullethead after the squad entered the grocery, Marco was killed by Grainne.

The squad walked away with a couple of good contacts, a bit of extra cred and with some red tape acrobatics were able to re-assign Carnage's APC to their own squad.

Had a NPC cameo from my wife's Frother Don McGuiness, who is now convinced that the Cupcake Scouts are real and wants to be a 'Den Mother' for them.

SLA Industries Session Recap 3

Wanting to do a little more than combat BPNs, especially since the I/I was able to make it...failed, due to my botch of writing the White BPN before the game (ie, I did not).

Needless to say, almost everyone showed up, only missing one player out of 6.

So, wanting to continue the BPN route, the PC's get handed a Grey from Health and Safety.  Meeting with the corporate who issued the BPN, the players are instructed to remove a subversive from the Greenville Asylum Downtown.

Dr Griffin has been running unsanctioned experiments on his criminally insane patients and is to be exterminated (warrant provided).

The squad arrives at the Asylum to find a SHIVER APC outside, no SHIVERs to be found.  The SHIVERs were sent here to quell some disturbance inside the building.  A boot print on the door shows the entry was tactical as opposed to friendly.

The doors to the facility have since been chained shut from the inside, the Stormer unlocks the door easily, using the same method the SHIVERs used previously.

Nobody behind the counter but the PCs decide it would be in their best interest to sign-in and get visitor badges to follow protocol.  While obtaining the visitor badges behind they desk, the squad finds the body of a SHIVER, his Blocker Body Armor ripped open at the chest by what appears to be some kind of clawed hands, similar to a Stormer.

Most of the patients on this floor are locked in their rooms, and one of the rooms is filled with cocoon-like bags.  There are a few patients wandering around, but they are subdued by the squad using unorthodox tactics...the squad opened the staff break room and smashed open a vending machine.

Easily making their way to the end of the hall, the PCs come across a human male in a catatonic state wearing SLA Industries boxes instead of the normal blue pajamas of the patients.  Feelgood, the squad Medic, is able to bring him around a bit and the squad is provided the following information:  the men in the boxers are SHIVERs, they were attacked while answering a disturbance call by things that "came out of the walls."  Realizing the SHIVER is going to be useless in his current condition, the squad leaves him there.

The stairwell is empty aside from a large cocoon stuck in the corner.  The squad cuts the cocoon down carefully and opens it up to find a semi-concious human male inside, wearing blue coveralls, an orderly.


They take the orderly into the TV room and get him sitting next to the SHIVER.  And they take the orderlies keys.

Unlocking the stairwell gate blocking their ascent, the squad moves to the second floor.

The second floor hallway is covered in webbing, the lights flickering on and off, and more human-sized cocoons can be seen here and there along the floor.

The Wraith is attacked by 'something' in the webbing, the creature is quickly run off by a couple stabs from the Shaktar and Stormer, but somehow did not leave a path through the webbing.

Not feeling particularly comfortable with what is going on, the Brain Waster grabs a mob and pulls out her Klippo, seeing this happen, the Wraith grabs a fire extinguisher.

The webbing in the hallway goes up in flames, worried about the cocoons holding patients, the Stormer trips the fire suppression system, filling the hallway with foam...quick solidifying foam.

Two members of the squad are able to get out of the zone and avoid being caught in the foam.  They are then able to remove their squadmates.

Continuing very slowly down the hallway, because they are now having to cut their way through the foam, the Operatives make sure to check on the patients, cutting through the foam and checking the rooms.

Inside one room, there is a man in a doctors smock pounding on the door.  The operatives decide to leave him there for his safety...only to see his face hit the window and disappear.

The Stormer and Shaktar bust into the room, unable to see much with the flickering light, but the doctor is nowhere to be found.

Something sharp jabs into the stormers unarmored head and the Shaktar drops a tear gas grenade, but whatever attacked them is gone, the window to the outside broken and the bars bent outward.

The Stormer and Shaktar decide to follow whatever it was out the window and head towards the roof, the remaining three members will continue down the hall to reach the stairwell to the third floor.

Gaining access to the building from the roof and the stairwell, the squad gets back together before heading into the third floor, where the criminally insane, and their target await them...

to be continued...

SLA Industries: Session: le Duece

(yes, I mixed the languages in the title on purpose, to make you cringe...on to the recap)

Second session for the Squad "Out with a Bang."

Only three players were able to make it this time:

• Grundy, played by Bob
• Kr'snch, played by Ryan
• Hunter, played by Brandon

Our story takes place a few days after the last, with the Shaktar and Wraith Raider healed of the wounds they sustained from the DN Snipers.

Grundy invited the squad over for a few drinks, but they had other ideas and convinced him to grab a quick BPN.

They nabbed a Blue from a financier(ish) contact they had met at Slayer's Crib during the last session.  The Financier Group known as "Flaming Turkeys" is an up-and-coming operation, still low on the pole, so their BPNs are never the good ones.

The Blue was a simple seek-and-destroy in the sewers, something was killing civilians near a hatch that had been broken during the previous days GoreZone episode in Downtown.

It was simple enough, the squad went in, had some fun with a 20 foot crocodile and got paid.

The highlights included:

• Kr'snch being grabbed by the crocodile and unable to reach his melee weapons as it was trying to drag him into the sewage
• Grundy jumping on the back of the crocodile to help his squadmate
• Kr'snch was able to dodge a "deathroll" due to the Stormer holding onto the beast
• Once free from the crocodile's mouth, Kr'snch was able to watch the crocodile try and shake the Stormer loose by rolling
• The squad members being told by a Health and Safety agent not to speak of the crocodile

Was great fun!

We did call it a little early due to the rest of the squad not being able to make it, so it was pretty short.

The BPN was written a long time ago and can be found at http://trulyrural.com/sla/bpns.html, in the pdf titled "Several BPN's by Max Hattuer."  The title of the BPN was "The Basic Blue," due to the small squad size I reduced the number of crocodiles, also, having only the single crocodile seemed to fit the backstory better.

In retrospect, maybe I should have added in a second...next time, my pretty...next time...

It is Hard to Read an E-Zine on the Toilet

Getting back into the gaming "zone" after 10 years of "here and there" I am noticing a lot of changes.  One of those being the absence of all those great gaming magazines.

Dragon, Dungeon, White Wolf, White Dwarf, SHADIS (yeah...that died in the 90s but I still miss it).  Where did they all go?  What replaces the void?  Did printing costs really go up that much, or were the smaller print run magazines over-doing themselves with quality paper?

Books seem to be the same way, just about every game has multiple pdf's available, for the same price as the actual book in many cases.  Seems a bit of a ploy to me.

I want a REAL book, a REAL magazine to read.  Something I can take to the kitchen table or work to read when times are slow.  A physical something that I can read while sitting with the family in the living room hanging out.

That being said, I really do love the print quality of the books that are being released, but do they really need to be $30-$40 (US)?  If so, why does the pdf need to be about the same cost, surely those are a lot cheaper to 'print' for the company.

Wishful thinking, I know.  With the prevalence of tablets and smartphones the printed book is on its way out.  Soon, you won't be able to loan out the players guide to that new person in the group unless you hand them the entire tablet.

If you know of any good RPG e-zines out there, link to them in the comments please, I'll be sure to add them to my smartphone browser, its a small screen, but at least its portable.

SLA Industries: Out with a BANG!

First session of new SLA Industries campaign, fun had by all.

Squad Name:  Out With a BANG!
Squad Roster:

• Grundy - 313 Malice Sector Ranger (Bob)
• Cpt Morrigan - Frother Death Squad (Ian)
• Fairamay - Brain Waster I&I (Nikki)
• Hunter - Wraith Raider KMS (Brandon)
• Kr'nsh - Shaktar KMS (Ryan)
• Dr Feelgood - Frother Medic (Zach)

BPNs ran during this session:

• Blue - TrafficSLOps
• Red - Sniper Hunt
• Yellow - Let Them Eat Cake

Thrown together by bureaucratic process, the new Operatives were given a Blue BPN per standard procedure.

The mission was simple:  Head downtown to target location and assist SHIVER unit with traffic control until lights can be repaired.

Problem was, there were two rival street gangs shooting at each other with the SHIVERs caught in the crossfire.

While the squad was planning on what to do, Grundy stepped forward and was able to talk down the gangs.  The Manic Mongoose gang took off leaving the Kobra Khan gang to fend for themselves against the Operative squad.

Kobra Khan members were allowed to retrieve a couple of trapped gang members and leave.

Other than minor disturbances from civilians upset for being in traffic so long, nothing major happened until after the repair crew finished up and the traffic was flowing again.

While the squad was speaking with the SHIVER sergeant his head exploded in a red mist, and the squad was assigned a Red BPN to eliminate the DN Sniper team reported in the area.  These two events happened at almost the exact same time.

Realizing where the shot came from, the Wraith, Shaktar and both Frothers start heading for the fire escape on the side of the building to get to the sniper, the 'Waster and Stormer head for the front of the building.

The Wraith takes a shot in the back, obviously not from the sniper they are headed for, and the Shaktar turns towards the building on the other side of the street. Fairamay and Grundy happen to spot the other sniper after Kr'nsh reports what happened.

The two frothers and the Wraith continue up the fire escape while Grundy and Kr'nsh provide cover fire against the other sniper.  The second sniper goes down and Fairamay reports two more DN Operatives on the second roof.  Kr'nsh and Fairamay start heading for the fire escape on that building while Grundy moves to a position where he can see the front entrance.

Meanwhile, two-thirds of the way up the first building, a DN Operative drops a blast grenade down the fire escape, the Wraith jumps and rolls avoiding any serious injury, the Medic dives through a window and the Death Squad jumps to a ledge as the grenade goes off mangling the upper level of the fire escape.

The 3-man sniper team on the first building starts to run back through the interior stairwell, only to be met with fire from the Medics FEN AR, as the Death Squad makes it to the roof.

The second DN team seems to fair a bit better, after losing the sniper they immediately began retreating through the buildings stairwell, the 'Waster and Shaktar giving chase.  Upon reaching the ground floor, they come face to barrel with Grundy's assault rifle, and surrender.

The first team, at this point, has surrendered to the squad in the stairwell.  The Wraith grabs one by the throat for dropping the grenade and the Medic pulls out his claymore and starts hacking at one of the other two.

A concussive force leaves them all a bit woozy as the DN Operative held by the Wraith drops another concussion grenade, the Wraith drops him but manages to stay conscious, the two Frothers manage to stay on their feet easily with the combat drugs pumping through them.

The Medic takes one prisoner, the Death Squad kills another and the Wraith has an idea...

Back in with the second DN team, Grundy has them at gunpoint as Fairamay walks up behind them from the stairwell...BAM!  A single point-blank shot to the back of the DN Ops head takes him down, his team mate panics and runs, quickly taken down by the Shaktar and Grundy.

Feelgood comes in with the live DN Operative and shoots him up with Honesty so they can get information regarding any DN contacts they may have, Fairaway questions him and they get a name 'Billy,' a time and place where the team was supposed to report back before he dies from his wounds and the shock from the Shaktar torturing him.

Grundy calls in the information hoping to get a follow-up BPN, and the squad moves back to the street for SHIVER retrieval of the evidence.

Just in time to see the Death Squad and Wraith Raider throw the remaining DN Operative off the roof, who proceeds to explode in mid-air, raining a bit of blood and gore onto the street.

Feeling mighty good about their first BPN together, the squad heads to the Pit for a quick drink and decides to grab another BPN before calling it a day.

After working their way through the lines, filling out paperwork and waiting for an hour or two inside Slayers Crib, the Operatives are approached by a man in a suit, a low-ranking financier trying to get started.

He offers them up on a Yellow, retrieval of a Welfare Distribution Vehicle that went missing on its way to an orphanage, somewhat close to their earlier BPN location.

The squad accepts and heads quickly to the last known location of the truck.

They find two bodies, riddled with bullet holes and picked clean.  Luckily, they also find tracks in the refuse and grim showing the way the vehicle went.

Moving down the street towards a warehouse district the squad encounters some members of the Manic Mongoose gang, who uncooperatively tell them to bug off if they cannot pay for information.

So Grundy talks to one of the homeless in the area, trading his SLA Industries issues contraceptives and Klippo lighter for information.

After finding out the location of the truck, 3rd Eye is called in to observe the raid on the warehouse that the thieves are held up in.

Fairamay sneaks in through a sidedoor, Kr'nsh and Hunter head for the roof, Feelgood and Morrigan setup around the back with Grundy and the Media operative at the front.

Inside the warehouse, Fairamay reports the location of the vehicle, 4 DN Armoured people and 3 SHIVERs with a SHIVER APC.

Grundy pounds on the warehouse door and the thieves head for the APC and start closing the door, Fairamay tosses a grenade, too far to have any impact, Kr'nsh rappels in with his KK30 barking, Hunter moves to get in position, Feelgood and Morrigan come in through the back door rolling a grenade under the APC.

The grenade has no effect due to the APC's armour, Fairamay moves to secure  the truck, Grundy kicks open the door, the APC starts up, Kr'nsh lands on top of the APC, Feelgood and Morrigan start heading for the sides of the vehicle.

Grundy moves to jump onto the back of the welfare vehicle, with the plan to get a good shot at the APC, and misses the roof, landing in a pile of food in the back of the truck.  He quickly recovers and moves out the drivers side to assist with the APC.

Kr'nsh, realizing that he can not do much good on top of the APC with his Power Disc moves towards the drivers hatch, Feelgood and Morrigan manage to get on top of the APC and Grundy is just fast enough to grab onto the back.

Grundy manages to rip open the rear hatch as Morrigan tears open the top hatch and the thieves inside are met with a hail of rounds from Grundy's 603 and Feelgoods FEN AR.

As the driver exits the hail of ricocheting bullets inside the APC Kr'nsh removes his unarmoured head with one swipe from his powerdisc.

Fairamy moves through the open back hatch with her chainaxe as Kr'nsh moves in through the drivers hatch.  The two of them finish off the dying thieves.

BPN complete, they call in to have SHIVERs retrieve their missing APC and remove the bodies.  The squad returns the Welfare truck to its distribution center and a short 60 second spot of the squad rescuing the food and money that was meant for an orphanage from the evils of DarkNight subversives greats them as they get home.

Not bad for the first session.

Talislanta: Prologue

This will cover the first two sessions of the current campaign, mainly because it really did not get interesting until the game tonight.

First session:
Pretty simple start, Danuvian Virago and Zandir duelist have been hired by a Hadjin merchant to protect his carriage on the way north to Maruk to broker a deal for a large amount of Ogront dung.  While under attack from a Za raiding party, an Orgovian trader joins in the fight and is later hired on to fill one of the positions now left open from a dead guard.

Once in Maruk, the Hadjin merchant, proceeded by his Mandalan slaves (who are spritzing perfume on him) and his Hadjan attache', goes to broker a deal with a Marukan dung merchant.  Feeling slighted by the insults from the Marukan he leaves the Citystate, and our intrepid heroes, behind.

That ended the first session, mainly just to setup a little combat and get the PC's together in one place.

Second session:
Left in Maruk by the Hadjin, the Orgovian mentions that he has obtained a map to some treasure on the north side of the Marukan mountain range.  As the PC's discuss options, the Danuvian heads off to do...something (player was unable to make it due to illness) and they end up speaking with a Dhuna Warlock (player that was unable to make the first session) who is staying in the same inn.

The Zandir, completely uncomfortable with everything in Maruk because of the dung trade, wants to head off to Akmir to get supplies for the trip, the group agrees and heads south.

After resupplying in Akmir, the group again heads north, planning to bypass Maruk and get to some treasure-hunting!

On their way up the road they encounter a recently deceased Cymrillian, a quick exploration of the countryside via spyglass and they notice a cart being chased by Beastmen.  Again, they act heroically, running off the Beastmen and saving a Cymrillian woman.

As it turns out, the dead Cymrillian from before was her husband and they were on their way to Maruk to setup a home on land purchased in that area.

The PC's accompany the Cymrillian to the land her husband purchased.  To her dismay, the home is in ruins and the land looks fairly unusable for homesteading.  Realizing she has no way to homestead on her own, she agrees to trade the land for 2 Equs and supplies to the Orgovian.

Feeling pretty good about his trade, the Orgovian starts planning out what to do with the land and reads the deed...finding out that it is infested with Raknid!

After a brief discussion with the Zandir, mainly regarding how silly it was to trade two perfectly good equs and adventuring supplies for land in "poop-town," he concedes that it will provide them with a place to work from.

The Dhuna heads into town to find out what he can about the Marukan curse, with plans to remove it, and the Orgovian and Zandir start brain-storming about what to do with the Raknids.  They come to the conclusion that there has to be something beneficial to having Raknids around, and decide to turn the area into a ranch to raise Raknid for either material components...or food.

Stay tuned!

Adventures in ZBrush

So, picked up a copy of ZBrush (thanks to my wonderful wife), and have been spending every possible moment trying to learn this thing.

It...is...AWESOME!

At least in the right hands, and right now, my hands are not the 'right hands.' That is where the hard work will come in.

ZBrush is extremely powerful, and although it LOOKS very user-unfriendly, it seems to just be a matter of learning what does what.

I have gone through sooo many tutorials in the past few days, the more the merrier!  I do find it interesting to note, that sometimes it seems the most basic tutorials may have that nugget of information that makes you slam your head on the desk thinking, "that is so much easier, faster and intuitive than the last tutorial."  (example: I spent about 2 hours trying to get a cylinder to become a tube last night after watching a tutorial on dynamesh subtract...just to watch a tutorial today showing how you just change the inner diameter...)

The features to speed up the modeling and texturing process are great.  ZSpheres are excellent for setting up limbs, chains, ropes etc and with the skinning feature change the form made of them into a polymesh.

For example, the following image started as ZSpheres and then I used the above method to make the base form, changed brushes as needed in order to shape and sculpt a bit, then just colored things in.  All within the same program!

ZSpheres, radial symmetry, sculpting...all in one program!

Plus, I have the GoZ functionality from DAZ Studio which allows me to bring in models directly from Studio to sculpt on or model around, and then I can zip them back into Studio without having to worry about getting the scaling correct (because it already is!).

Still have a lot to learn, but this is the first thing I have done in ZBrush that I feel is remotely worth sharing.

Expect more in the coming weeks, I am seriously going to love this program once I get things all figured out, the possibilities are just driving me nuts!

Also, I have seen a tutorial posted for taking items out of Marvelous Designer (which is great for clothes) and using the retopology tools within ZBrush to clean them up for use in other programs - have not watched it yet, but you can bet I will!

Sheriffs

Considering my recent foray into the Old West, and those things that come with it, it stood to reason that at some point I would do a couple of badges.

The sheriffs badge was the first, due to prominence.  Easy enough to model, challenging to texture.  The filigree and text were done in GIMP after UV mapping the star, the points are merely small spheres that I stuck on the model.

About 30 minutes overall modeling time and an hour for textures, render was about an hour or so (hard to tell, I hit 'render' and went to bed after NUMEROUS text renders to get the lighting where I wanted it and bright enough for impact.

Took me a bit to get it right but this is what I ended up with:

Sheriffs badge, love the way it turned out!

Due to the lighting, it actually took a long time to render.

With the current political climate, and the amount of 'like' I had for the way the render turned out, I went online for a search of 'notable quotables' from sheriffs around the country.

I learned quite a bit, found some really good quotes (not included) from not only sheriffs, but other lawmen, outlaws, sideshow performers, statesmen, marshals, etc

I picked the most relevant for today's issues, and took the image back into GIMP to add text.

Final result:

Final image, feel free to share.

I do believe this is my best render yet, inclusively.

Looking for the next thing, still have a few more badges, but I think I can wait for those and focus more on the less 'popular' items like wagons and buildings, I have focused on the small things, time to get a little bigger.

All of these items are for a series of renders for a game I'm wanting to run, so I have a pretty good idea of what types of characters would be involved, just a matter of modeling the various props for them.

Playing cards, weapons, clothing, buildings, barrels (the wood kind), bows, knives, whiskey bottles, hats, lariats, spurs, etc.

Once I get to a point where I am about ready to run the game, I will shoot off some renders of the various character types.

It's not Deadlands, but it will be a type of 'Wierd West.'

3D Update: 1800s Inspiration

Not quite sure where it came from, but it started with this:

Got the inspiration from someone at work when they were talking about "Telegraph Day" (they have a list of strange 'holidays')

Interesting time and it really made me delve into the texturing in Blender, along with brushing up on basic modeling techniques and getting familiar with the Blender interface again.

My second foray into the 1800s was in response to a conversation I had with a friend regarding translating a fantasy RPG into a Wild West RPG.  Friend asked if he could have a 'buffalo rifle,' so I looked one up with a quick Google search and produced this:

Of course, if you do a Google images search for that particular rifle, you will get pics of OTHER rifles and firearms from that timer period.

Which brings me to my latest model, an "1892 Mare's Leg."  Which, from further reading and research, never really existed until 1958, where it was seen in the tv show 'Wanted: Dead or Alive' with Steve McQueen.

Not to be outdone, firearms manufacturers have since blessed us with many different versions of this lever action pistol.  It was also shown in Brisco County Jr and Firefly.

A bit expensive for the heavier calibres, but definitely ranks high on the "I want my character to have THIS!" chart.

Needs a bit of reworking (shells are expelled from the top, the side port shown is for loading); but that would just be a quick extrude.

Will probably be exporting as obj files for the express purpose of making them Poser props at some time.

We will see what comes next as I continue...maybe an old revolver, the 1800's just has such awesome toys!