RPGaDay Challenge 2015 - Day 10

I don't really have a favorite RPG Publisher right now, for reasons that should be apparent to anyone who has read my other post entries for the RPGaDay Challenge this month.

If no one is producing anything I really want, or have to have, and certainly not a line of such products, there is no one company that stands out as the best, or worst at not doing that.

Ah, I do so miss the heyday of RPGs in the 80's.

Not only did publishers put out great stuff at reasonable prices, but they kept putting it out. Product support wasn't limited to D&D, and it continually rocked in many cases. For some companies less was more, and although they made fewer books, those books were of high quality and usefulness. Others just kept cranking out great stuff month after month with no end in sight.

I guess I'd have to say my two favorite RPG Publishers of all time were West End Games and R. Talsorian Games.

West End Games, based right here in New York City, created and published some of my all time favorite games. Star Wars most notably, but also Ghostbusters, and Paranoia. As I mentioned above, they didn't just publish them, they supported them. The least backed of the games mentioned was Ghostbusters, and even that had two boxed set editions, and eight adventures and supplements in total.

I have a number of rather unusual connections to West End Games, and my name can be found in at least two of their Star Wars products. One of these days I'll have to tell that tale.

R. Talsorian Games, thanks to writer and game designer Mike Pondsmith, fueled my burning love for Japanese Anime, Manga, and culture when they produced Mekton, and Teenagers from Outer Space around the same time (or just after) I first discovered Japanese animation. I instantly grokked their games, and it was very clear to me that they grokked my friends and I, and what we wanted to see in the RPG industry.

Other favorites of those days were FASA (although I was mostly a fan of Star Trek, and Shadowrun only), Game Designers' Workshop and Digest Group Publications (for Traveller), and Fantasy Games Unlimited (for Villains & Vigilantes, Space Opera, and others).

Years later, I became quite fond of the people who made up Last Unicorn Games, and of course loved their products.

Nowadays, the closest thing to a favorite I have is probably Green Ronin. I like the people that run it, and many of their freelancers. Unfortunately, the only game I really like that they make is Mutants & Masterminds, and it doesn't receive quite as much love as it used to. *Sad Panda*

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Barking Alien

Supervillainy A-To-Z: Thwarted!

Curse you April! Get out of my sight you misbegotten month of malicious malcontent!

After a long and arduous battle, my life has succeeded where a powerful plethora of presumptuous paladins have paled with their paltry powers. April has defeated my attempt to unleash my victorious volley of vile villainy.

I am not going to make it. I have failed to best the A-to-Z Blog Challenge.

Real world concerns, both positive and pains in the posterior, have finally found the fatal flaw in my otherwise fiendish and foolproof plan.

But no matter. There will come...a reckoning. My twenty-six member army of evil will have its revenge!

From now until I complete my list, Sundays are Supervillain Sundays here at Barking Alien!

You have been warned...

***

There, I said it. I got that off my chest. I can release the breath I've been holding in for the last hour. It's the truth, it sucks but I can live with it.

Between two jobs, freelance, tax time, being sick and trying to get in some time to game with my friends, I simply couldn't also finish this challenge.

That  realization and admission super stinks but, as my boss and good friend would say, "It is what it is."

***

In other news..
.

The Marvel Heroic Role Playing Game from Margaret Weiss Productions is no more.

The official announcement on their website is here. To read the comments below the news, highlight them as someone thought it a good idea to have dark text appear on a dark background (at least that's how it appears on my smartphone and home computer).

As I wrote to my friend and fellow blogger WQRobb:

"From everything I've seen, I am saddened by this but by no means surprised. After nearly a year on the market, the only items in the stores (in New York City - the city of, roughly, a gazillion people) were the softcover core rulebook, the hardcover Civil War book and the hardcover Civil War book with the rulebook inside it.

Wow. How diverse.

Sure there were lots of things online and I know the gaming industry thinks 'Online is The New Tomorrow, Today!', but unless something announces these releases that I am always looking at or receiving, all I know if what I see when I walk into my local game store, comic shop, Barnes & Nobles/Waldenbooks, etc. I see nothing new on the shelves, I assume (consciously or unconsciously) like the game is unsupported."

Note: Yes, I am still old school enough to want a book I can touch. I like the smell, feel and easy of paper. I like to support my local stores so our tanking economy tanks less (or at least slower). I walk into stores to buy things but I often find no one is making things for me to buy. Then I find out they are online. After the thing is no longer produced / in vogue / of interest / as cool or better than what's out now / take your pick.

"It didn't help that they opened with Civil War either. Much like Identity Crisis for DC, what was a very popular and critically acclaimed series at the time of its release is much maligned or simply forgotten now. It has little to no bearing on the current state of Marvel Comics. Most of the dead characters from it and even its aftermath are now alive. No one remembers Peter Parker is Spiderman. It really isn't a very good or action packed series to start out with from a Superhero gamer stand point."

Oh well. It is an interesting system and I'm sure it will see a lot of use at conventions. No real campaign sustainability limits its use outside that venue anyway.

On a related note...

The fourth and final book in the DC Adventures RPG series from Green Ronin, DC Adventures Universe, is available on PDF and for pre-order. Although it is disappointing to realize that this is the last of the DC Comics RPG items with official Mutants & Masterminds 3E stats, I am happy it is ending on this particular note. If they had waited too, too long, DC's current 52iness might have crept in, rendering the product uninteresting and useless. This book is not only the last hurrah for DC Adventures but in some ways, the last hurrah of the pre-Nu52 DC milieu.

Now here's a thought...maybe, with MWP no long producing a Marvel Comics RPG, Green Ronin could swing a virtually identical four book deal with Marvel. Hmmm? Oh the possibilities...

***

May approaches. Take us out Mr. Sulu. Ahead, warp factor 6.

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Barking Alien

Losing and Gaining

This is my 470th post. I can't believe I am approaching 500 posts and at the same time, I can't believe it's taken me about 3 years or so to reach 500. I guess that means I don't post enough but sadly there is not much I can do about it. I post as often as I can.

I noticed I have 130 followers. That's two shy of my high, which was at one point, a week or two ago, 132. So I am losing my audience somehow. Possibly it's the lack of posts, possibly the subject matter I am covering (though I often get a good response with my Supers stuff) and maybe, just maybe, it's the fact that recent posts haven't had enough art. Pictures definitely help.

Be that as it may, I am gaining in real life and even in real life gaming. That is, my work schedule has really picked up and my gaming group is now consistently at 4 people showing up for a good 6-8 hours once a week with a 5th person joining on occasion.

Combine the aforementioned positives with my growing love for the new Marvel Heroic game, the next DC Adventures book from Green Ronin finally on the horizon and possibly an expanding of my Sunday activity/job working with the kids at the learning center and I'd say I have a lot of cool things to discuss, lost followers be damned!*

Anyway, I think the Marvel core book is due to drop on Tuesday. Expect a lot of ideas to flow once that happens.

Ever more,

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Barking Alien

*I don't actually mean 'damn my lost followers'. I get it. There could be any number of reasons they left. No hard feelings. You're all welcome back anytime. I'll leave a light on for you.

All I Want For Christmas

Or Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Festivus or whatever appropriate gift giving holiday comes around that you find worth celebrating.

Honestly the only thing I could possibly want is an easier and more enjoyable next year as compared to this year for my friends, family and myself.

Now, addressing the statement as it relates to gaming...

I find myself wanting two things very much...

First, to run some fantasy something. Obviously I've been talking about it quite a bit lately but I still can't seem to lock down my ideas for a new setting and campaign concept. That may well be because...

Secondly, I really, really want to get back to Sci-Fi. It stuns me that I call this blog Barking Alien and I haven't run a decent, long term Science-Fiction game in forever. I honestly can't remember exactly. It's been over six years since my top notch Traveller campaign 'Trojan Horses'. While I've had several failed attempts at Star Trek, I haven't run an ongoing Trek campaign since the early 2000's (probably a good 10 years almost). That is just straight up wrong people.

How to rectify this situation? No sure.

See, my Champions game is going so well that the guys involved want to play it whenever we get the chance. Since we don't get the chance to game as often as we did even 6 months ago, free time is Champions time. Truth be told it's hard to argue with that thinking.

Still, I would love to get the opportunity to run something else. I am eager to return to either Traveller or Star Trek or try something newer like Stars Without Number. I would love to get in a session of my personal D&D-But-Not game, even if it's in my old setting.

Seems today's post amounts to little more then weekend musings of a rather unconstructive nature. Oh well. Seems just to be the way of things these days.

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OK, wait...if I were really on the subject of things I want Santa to bring me how's this...a new edition of Mekton, Teenagers from Outer Space or a Star Trek RPG. How about the guys with the Star Wars license do a Star Wars game. Green Ronin, any chance the next DC Adventures book will come out before DC Comics reboots again?

Come on game industry! I am not buying games these days, not just because I'm broke but because you are not making anything I want. I don't play D&D. Can someone, ANYone make something interesting? Geez!

Like A Good Neighbor

A Faerie Kissed By Pixies by Brian Froud

"We call them faerie. We don't believe in them. Our loss." ~Charles de Lint

The fantasy stories that stir me most were not written by Tolkien, Howard, or Vance. No dear friends, while I respect those men they have never drawn me in as does the will o' the wisp, wondering with no purpose except to capture its brilliance in my eyes and hands. I look to Byron, Yeats, Barrie, Baum, Briggs, Froud and Lee, Black, and DiTerlizzi. These are my muses for things magical. These, and others, are my guides through the secret places under the hills.

One of my favorite RPGs ever has to be Faery's Tale Deluxe, published by Firefly Games and Green Ronin. Written by Patrick Sweeney, Sandy Antunes, Christina Stiles, Colin Chapman and Robin D. Laws (Robin Laws people!), the game is a perfect introduction into the world of Role Playing for your kids while at the same time being a fun and light change of pace for adults. Of course, being Adam 'Modify'em-If-You-Got'em' Dickstein, I made a few adjustments that turns the game, IMHO, into a workable long term campaign system.

 

First the basics...
 
Set in the fantastic woodland forest of Brightwood, the default fairy tale setting of the game, players choose one of four faerie types (referred to both as forms and patterns). Each has a predetermined number of dice to each of the games three attributes, Mind, Body and Spirit. The total number of dice always add up to 6. So for example the Brownie has 2 dice in each stat while the Pixie has 1 Body die, 2 Mind dice and 3 Spirit dice.

Each faerie form also has special abilities that come with their particular type. This is one area where I changed things up based on my knowledge and love of faerie folklore. I took away the Pixie's ability to fly and gave it to the Sprite, switching it for the Sprite's Animal Friend.

One figured stat is Essence, determined by doubling your Spirit stat for the start of every session. Essence goes up and down during play and you can be awarded Essence points in a manner similar to Force Points in Star Wars D6 or Hero Points in other games. Essence is used to power the more impressive feats of magic you can do with the aforementioned abilities. It is also your hit points. It is also one of the things I changed right away.

In order for the game to last longer and the magic to be more common, I determined that before a faerie takes damage to their Essence they take it to their Glamour, a new stat I added. Glamour is figured out by adding your Body to your Essence. In my games, damage, magic, and last minute saves are pulled from your Glamour, keeping Essence well protected and hidden. If you have no Glamour left than Essence is used. A Glamourless character is unconscious unless a Body save is made. A character with no Essence no longer exists.

Essence also comes in two 'flavors'. Bright Essence, possessed by good natured fae of the Seelie Court and Dark Essence, the life force of nasty and foul tempered denizens of the Unseelie Court. These are handled in a fashion similar to Force Points and Dark Side Points in the Star Wars D6 game. If a Bright Faerie has more Dark Essence than Bright Essence they may find themselves changing into a Goblin or slipping into madness. Once your Essence is all Dark you change into a Goblin for sure and you loose your original form's abilities which are replaced with Contortion and Black Magic. A Dark Faerie can attempt to redeem itself and gain Bright Essence. In my homebrew a Dark Faerie with Bright Essence is a Hob (i.e., Hobgoblin, Hobnob, Hobdobie).

The basic mechanics are ridiculously simple. Good or 'Bright' faeries score a success when they roll an even number on one of their dice. Bad or 'Dark' faeries and other enemies need to roll odd numbers to succeed. Magical items (called Charms) can give you a free or bonus success. The more successes the better. Some actions may require a minimum number of successes to really work. I sometimes determine more successes than you need gives you a critical success and less gives you a less than critical failure. No successes is bad news.

There are a number of other elements to the game such as the aforementioned Charms, Titles, Boons and my added houserules of Banes and Bunks (things dangerous or detrimental to the fae - the latter term borrowed from the 1st Edition of White Wolf's Changeling: The Dreaming).

I could go on and on about this game and I most likely will but first I'll let you absorb this bit. I leave you with Yeats...

"Faeries, come take me out of this dull world,
For I would ride with you upon the wind,
Run on the top of the dishevelled tide,
And dance upon the mountains like a flame."

~William Butler Yeats
The Land of Heart's Desire

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Barking Alien

UPDATE: I didn't like the original title of this entry as it didn't quite have that 'double meaning twist' I like to include whenever possible. I like this one better.

DC Adventures - Who's Who

In creating a campaign for Green Ronin's DC Adventure RPG, part of my initial design process was to determine which characters exist (or don't) on my personal infinite earth.

Going with my own belief that DC's strongest asset is its wealth of stories and characters that cover 75 years of publishing, I want as much of what they have developed to be available in my game as possible. I want the possibility of using virtually any location, setting, device, hero or villain ever.

Unfortunately, that does present some problems. DC currently has more than one Flash. Actually, they have three. That's not three characters with superspeed, that's three separate characters all called The Flash. Two of the three wear virtually the same costume. That's kind of silly. So how do I fix this odd situation? Simple (you hear that DC? I said simple...).

For the most part Earth Alpha D-1, as I have designated my campaign world, is identical to the universe any current DC reader is familiar with. Clark Kent is Superman, Bruce Wayne is Batman and Princess Diana of Themyscira is Wonder Woman. All appear to be in their mid-thirties. The Justice League is the world's primary superhero team, Lex Luthor owns LexCorp, the Rocket Reds protect Russia and Joker is nuttier than a PayDay candy bar.

But who is the Flash? Who is Green Lantern? Who's dead?

The answers are: Three people, seven thousand, two hundred people and very few people.

Let's start with the fastest man alive, shall we? Since Infinite Crisis and Flash: Rebirth returned the silver age Flash, aka Barry Allen, to the world of the living following his awesome death in Crisis on Infinite Earths, Barry has become the title character of the Flash comic book. Unfortunately, this has put the former Kid Flash, Wally West, who has worn the mantle of the Flash since the 80's, on the back burner. In the span of less than a year Wally West went from a major, A-List superhero who appeared on the animated Justice League Unlimited series to a barely discussed B-Lister. Boo DC. Bad form.

So, on Earth Alpha D-1, Wally West is the Flash and serves as a member of the Justice League of America. The reborn Barry Allen teaches Criminology and Forensics at the Justice League Academy facility which houses Operation: Young Justice, a training program for future superheroes and the focus of our campaign. The members of our version of Young Justice are too old to be 'teen' Titans and yet not quite ready for the JLA.

The third Flash is the golden age Flash of World War II, Jay Garrick, who thanks to a mystical time displacement incident currently operates as a mentor and trainer for members of the Justice Society of America.

On to my personal favorite superhero, Green Lantern!

There are thousands of Green Lanterns, two for every one of the 3,600 space sectors of our galaxy. So, Earth's emerald guardians are John Stewart who serves on the Justice League and mainly protects the Earth and Hal Jordan who is more mobile and tends to fly around our sector looking for trouble. Since its been established that Hal is a bit of a maverick and doesn't always get along well with authority in general (and JLA shot-caller Batman in particular), this just seemed logical.

Right now I'm not writing off anyone as definitely dead...except maybe Deadman. For the most part I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now, everyone and everything exists. How they exist and where is much more fun to think about than whether they do or don't.

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Barking Alien

Where Legends Live

I'm not entirely sure when DC Comics used the title of this post as their company slogan or for how long but it has always been one of my favorites.

As you can probably tell from my posts, I am a DC fan.

To put it more accurately, I am a superhero comic book fan who loves the DC characters the most. Unfortunately, this hasn't always been easy.

As a kid in the late 1970's and early 80's, liking DC wasn't especially cool compared to liking Marvel. I even remember saying to my friends that I liked Marvel better. At the same time, if you asked me who my favorite superhero was I would say Green Lantern. Ask me my favorite team book and I'd likely say The Legion of Superheroes or the Teen Titans.

"I thought you liked Marvel?", my buddies would say in an accusing tone.
"Oh yeah I do," I'd reply in defense, "Overall."

It was in high school that I figured out that since I wasn't trying to fit in with the majority in any other aspect of my life, why should my geeky choices be any different. So for Adam, who loved comic books and role playing games, it was 'DC For The Win' and 'Death Before D&D'.

I first heard rumors of a DC RPG using Mutants & Masterminds mechanics nearly 5 years ago I believe. As a matter of fact, while I was working in the comic book industry (in a manner of speaking) about 4 years ago, I had the rumor confirmed by some people working at DC Comics. For whatever reasons, the project was abandoned or placed on the back burner and I for one was really sad. I love DC and I believe M&M to be the best Supers RPG on the market. The combo would be nothing short of Reeses mixed chocolate and peanut butter. Awesome plus Spectacular.

Now, in but a few short months that could not feel longer, the rebirth of this comic book gaming geekgasm will be a reality. DC Adventures! Compatible with and showing off Green Ronin's Mutants & Masterminds 3rd Edition, this is the game I've been waiting for.

But what to do with it? I only have a quintillion ideas. I need to focus, bump the list down to the millions at least. There is my Legion Unlimited idea, my Earth-A.C. idea (what I think should have happened after Crisis on Infinite Earths), my Earth-2 alternative idea, my Earth-3 alternative idea, my alternate modern DC Comics concept...ooh, I just thought of ten more.

Of course, running a Supers campaign set in a popularly known setting is tough. It would be like running a...Star Trek game. Hmm. I can do this. I just have to solidify the background of my particular campaign's take on DC.

So the question is...Which Legends Live?

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Barking Alien

Score One for Truth and Justice

Look, up in the sky! It's a bird...it's a plane...it's...

Green Ronin getting the rights to produce an offical DC Comics RPG based on Mutants & Masterminds!

http://www.greenronin.com/2010/05/dc_adventures_press_release.php

Ooh, I can hardly wait...

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Barking Alien