So guess what I get to run in a week or so?
Funny story...
Every Wednesday night I'm in a Superhero game on Google Hangouts. The system is the lightly crunchy, but pretty narrative Kapow!
We've been doing it for a while now (I've mentioned it before in passing), with an average assemblage of 4-5 players, plus the GM. The current campaign was essentially a spin-off of our original one, as the GM duties were passed from one fellow to another due to the former's hectic schedule.
In addition, the current GM does a neat thing where he switches from the PCs doing battle with some villain in say, Seattle, to trying to stop a rampaging monster in Montana. Separate characters are used to cover the two locations, and the events always relate to each other. It is the same world, but we change up our characters periodically to tackle new scenarios taking place in separate locales, while our main PCs are back handling another situation.
Anyway...
Last Wednesday, for whatever reason, only two players showed up in addition to the GM (myself included). We were all pretty wiped out, and decided to forego and regular adventure, and just shoot the breeze. It was a blast, and I got to know the guys a little better, and vice versa.
We also discussed our gaming preferences, and which games we'd played, what we liked, what we didn't, etc. To make a long story as short as I can, my buddy Lloyd (of London - no really) is a big fan of the Cortex System by Margaret Weis Productions. He is especially fond of the newest edition of their Firefly RPG, which uses that system. Lloyd as made a point of noting that one of his worst RPG experiences was when he played the West End Games D6 Star Wars game. He ended up berating the game quite a bit.
Yeah, not on my watch.
I not only defended by beloved Star Wars D6, but explained that pretty much everything his previous GM did for the game sounded wrong. I do mean bad-wrong. Seriously. Just from his description I wasn't sure if the guy who ran it was familiar with the rules. Or with Star Wars for that matter.
I then issued a bit of a challenge. You see, I really don't like Firefly. I like Cortex just fine. It's not the game mechanics I'm talking about. It's the Firefly/Serenity universe. I find it really, really boring.
So I made him a deal - He runs one session of Firefly for the group on some off day, and I'll run Star Wars D6 on a different day. He has to convince me that the setting rocks, and I have to convince him that my favorite rules system rocks.
I feel that the Force is with me on this one. I'll keep you all posted.
AD
Barking Alien
May the Force be with you on this one. You know I love the WEG Star Wars game, and frankly think it would be a better system to do a "merchant marine" sci-fi game (which is what I think Firefly, Traveller, and a lot of sci-fi RPG's tend to be) than most.
ReplyDeleteAn interesting thought.
DeleteI hadn't ever considered that really, as I tend to save it (D6) or more cinematic games (although I suppose Firefly is a cinematic 'merchant marine' setting, right?).
As much as I love Star Wars d6 (my first roleplaying game, no less), when I have tried to run it the last couple of times, it has shown its age. In my view, it needs a few major tweaks:
ReplyDelete- Some static values to substitute rolls in combat such as defense and resistance.
- A revised, more coherent skill list, specially for the 2nd edition (the original one is shorter and better).
The beauty of it is that they are very easy to implement. In fact, once you start modifiying bits, you find it works great as a generic sci-fi (or, more precisely, "space sci-fi") reglament. I used it to run a light rules Star Trek game and it was nice.
I've run Firefly many times and it is always a big hit. I think a big part of it is the system I use. The magic system stripped out of Deadlands Classic. I don't sweat the tech and that's how Joss intended it.
ReplyDeleteI have the new Cortex version of Firefly but am a little nervous about switching over. I've used Marvel Heroic to run Star Trek and that worked great. But Firefly...Still nervous.
Interesting. I am trying to imagine how that would work (modifying the Deadlands magic system for...skills?).
DeleteMarvel Heroic for Star Trek is something I've heard of before. Have to try that one of these days.
Clarification: Remove Magic, leave everything else intact for Deadlands: Firefly. (-:
ReplyDelete