Game setting and rules discussion

Welcome all.

Some of the things that we need to sort out:

What kind of game are we expecting and wanting to play?
Free trader/Merchants - Firefly style - start with a ship, probably older and with "character", travel around trying to make ends meet
Troubleshooters - A-Team style - a team of ex-military and agent experts going around solving problems and helping people out
Some kind of mix of the two?
Something else?

Let me know!

Personally, I'm not a big combat hack and slash person. I won't avoid it all together but I don't expect the party to be getting into combat situations all the time.

Which rules system to be used?
Some of you are familiar with the Cepheus rules, others aren't. I'll try my best to answer any questions about the rules.

Note that neither one has classes like D&D. You have career that was what you did before the start of the game. Your career determines what skills and other benefits you've gained.

Also note that there are no (known) aliens in the setting. There are "alterants" (genetically engineered humans) and "uplifts" (genetically enhanced intelligent animals). The

Here are the main options:

Hostile/Cepheus Universal
The Hostile rules are specific to that game and setting while Cepheus Universal is a more generic version of the Hostile rules.
Character generation is a bit simpler, with fewer options and the skills list is fairly short. There are options for non random character generation by design and choice or random character generation with the dice deciding skills and such. There is also options for life path style generation and semi-random as well.

Clement Sector
Clement Sector character generation is a lot more detailed. The skills list is a lot longer and there are many, many more career options and choices. It is significantly more random.

Personally, I like both. What I am inclined towards right now is using the character generation for Clement Sector and then running the game with the Cepheus Universal rules.

These are summaries of the basic game play rules....

I’m happy with both rules options, although not having Clement Sector I’m happy to have a character assigned to me for the game. In terms of style I’m flexible but also don’t need it to be a constant string of combats.

Note that all the chargen options for Clement Sector are spread out over several books. I wouldn't expect anyone to get them, but I can certainy walk people through the process easily enough.through the process. Same for the other books.

Hey y'all! I'm okay with either rule option but I also don't have Clement Sector. As for the gameplay style, I'm cool with either the Firefly, Troubleshooting, or a mixture of both.

I swear I posted a response but i guess I forgot to send it lol

I have a copy of Cepheus as a pdf but not clement sector but I’m fine with either.

Are there to be private forums?

So, looks like Li has decided to drop out.

Sean is currently a maybe. I talked to him the other day in person and he expressed that a simpler system would be his preference.

So, from the preferences expressed and the I don't cares, here's what I'm thinking.

Clement Sector as the setting and Cepheus Universal as the rules.

Seth and Hedgewizard, you both have those IORC, yes?

Maux and Hardin, I'll sort you out if you need.

Nobody needs to get anything for Clement Sector.

As for what sort of game, only a couple of you expressed a preference for the style, and I think colony building would work well.

There's an open frontier area and a settlement agency - the Cascadia Colonization Authority (CCA) .

I'm thinking to take a good target world and have the party basically establish the colony as part of the CCAs expansion program. Players would take roles as management and other key members of the colony.

Would be heavily borrowing from Colony Builder, as well as from Hostile Solo and possibly a bit from 2300 AD.

And yes, I'll be setting up several subforums including individual private ones for each player/character.

Sounds good to me, I do have Cepheus Universal

Admin wrote: 

Seth and Hedgewizard, you both have those IORC, yes?

What's IORC?

Sethmokami wrote:

Admin wrote: 

Seth and Hedgewizard, you both have those IORC, yes?

What's IORC?

A fat fingering of IIRC - If I Recall Correctly.

Admin wrote:

Sethmokami wrote:

Admin wrote: 

Seth and Hedgewizard, you both have those IORC, yes?

What's IORC?

A fat fingering of IIRC - If I Recall Correctly.

Ah yes, I've got Cepheus Universal!

Alrighty, here's the plan:

For character generation, a la Colony Builder, use the Design Based rules starting on pg. 34 of the Hostile Rules book. If you'd like, add on the Lifepath events from Cepheus Universal. This should give us nice full characters with good skill bases.

Seth and Hedgewizard should be familiar enough. Maux and Hardin, I'll walk you guys through this if you want.

For general play, we'll be using primarily Cepheus Universal, supplemented as needed by Colony Builder. If you don't have the books don't worry, I've already posted the important "cheat sheets". Pretty much everything else will be on my side of the screen.

To give everyone an idea of the general concept, I'll quote:

The players can take on the roles of the ‘movers and shakers’ within the colony, they are responsible for solving issues and dealing with the inevitable crises that will occur. To broaden the players’ scope, the referee may even allow players to take on a couple of roles. If the referee is using these rules to play solo, he will have access to all of the key characters. Which characters are the ‘key’ characters will vary from colony to colony, or from game to game. Think of this somewhat like an episode of Space: 1999 or Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the key characters featuring in each episode are not just those at the top of the hierarchy, they include lesser characters, too, that have talent and charisma and who get involved regularly with the events and emergencies. They are friends, allies and work-mates – seniority isn’t worth a damn when the tsunami is heading your way, or that three-headed exomorph is hunting colonists through the corridor.

Create ten key characters that fit the roles listed below, or swap out some of the roles for other characters of your own devising that you think might work well. One of the players should definitely play the role of the colony’s leader, the operations manager.
 Operations Manager
 Assistant Operations Manager
 Physician
 Chief Engineer (Engineering Department Chief)
 Veteran or Senior Roughneck (or Rancher, Farmer, Logger, etc.)
 Computer Technician
 Chief Ranger
 Scientist
 Marshal or Chief Deputy
 Colonist (Department Chief)

I'm not planning on running ten PCs, but you get the idea. Start thinking of what you'd like to play.

For Maux and Hardin, here's a list the career choices:

Career Descriptions
The following fi fteen career paths will be fully
detailed later in this chapter:
• Corporate Agent: A corporate ‘fixer’,
a spy, a diplomat and deal-maker, who carries
out the will of the corporation on the Off -World
colonies.
• Corporate Executive: A powerful and
wealthy senior offi cer of a corporation. Requires
Soc A+ in order to qualify. Your Soc determines
your starting rank.
• Colonist: Person relocated to a new
world or settler on a new planetary colony.
• Commercial Spacer: Crewman or
offi cer aboard a merchant transport starship.
• Marine: Member of the United States
Marine Corps (USMC), trained to respond to
threats in the American Sector. Also any modern
soldier of 2225.
• Marshal: Either a US Federal Colonial
Marshal or Deputy assigned to keep the
peace on one of the American Sector’s many
installations, or a colonial Protection and
Security (PAS) law enforcement offi cer.
• Military Spacer: A crewman or offi cer
aboard a United States Space Command (USSC)
warship.
• Physician: A medical doctor.
• Ranger: A civilian guide and survival
expert on a habitable world; or a paid member
of the Action For Peace Foundation (a volunteer
paramilitary NGO)
• Rogue: A criminal, making money from
extortion, theft, assassination, burglary and so
on.
• Roughneck: A resource extraction
specialist, such as a miner or oil driller, working
in the hazardous environments of the Outer Rim
and Frontier.
• Scientist: Individual with expert
knowledge of a science, especially a biological
or physical science.
• Survey Scout: Member of a corporate
resource exploration team, surveying unfamiliar
territory in space.
• Technician: A skilled mechanic,
electrician, computer expert or engineer.

Note that the exact names of the careers aren't going to correspond exactly to the setting, but will be close enough. A "corporate agent" in Hostile might be a government agent in Clement Sector, for example.

I'll be working up the details of the world to be colonized and posting info in the next week or so.

Right now, what I have in mind is basically a cooler Earthlike world, with a shallowish equitorial ocean, and the land ranging from an oceanic/marine west coast climate type through taiga, tundra, and then massive ice caps. Not quite an iceball world, but similar to Earth in some of the deeper ice ages.

Here’s the Roles I’d be 100% fine with playing!

1. Veteran or Senior Roughneck
2. Chief Ranger
3. Marshal or Chief Deputy
4. Colonist (Department Head)

Not sure what I’d like to play but I am kind of thinking about playing a rogue-ish type, someone using the colony to enrich himself, by supplying hard to get items, and smuggling contraband on and off planet.

That or drone operator, and if we’re using cyberpunk-esque cybernetics, more like rigger type

Hardin wrote:Not sure what I’d like to play but I am kind of thinking about playing a rogue-ish type, someone using the colony to enrich himself, by supplying hard to get items, and smuggling contraband on and off planet.

That or drone operator, and if we’re using cyberpunk-esque cybernetics, more like rigger type

Given those, the Careers that’d fit in my opinion are Rogue and Technician. You’d have to come up with a Colony Work Role that makes sense for your character as the Rogue, but the Technician should fit right in as Chief Engineer with minimal party conflict. Also, the Comms skill is used for Drones, so make sure to take that if you go that route!

And just to note...

Do feel free to take the swap 2 stat rolls option as well as splitting careers.

Two careers split the points, ask about promotion....

I think the following roles would be good for me:

- Physician
- Ranger
- Scientist

Admin wrote:And just to note...

Do feel free to take the swap 2 stat rolls option as well as splitting careers.

Two careers split the points,  ask about promotion....

Where do you want us to post our character sheets once they're done?

Sethmokami wrote:

Admin wrote:And just to note...

Do feel free to take the swap 2 stat rolls option as well as splitting careers.

Two careers split the points,  ask about promotion....

Where do you want us to post our character sheets once they're done?

Will be setting up private fora for everyone once I get it fugured out.