A Fantasy I Have

Yesterday morning I awoke to a jolt of inspiration! Part epiphany, part dream, and part memory, thoughts began running through my mind and I rushed to my computer in order to weite them down.

In about three hours I created 'Adventurers of The Enchanted Lands', a Fantasy hack of R. Talsorian Games' Anime Comedy RPG classic, Teenagers from Outer Space, created by Mike Pondsmith. 

This isn't exactly my first time creating this game.

I've used TFOS to run many different genres and settings over the years, including Medieval Fantasy. It is one of my all time favorite RPGs. I once used it to run my D&D-But-Not milieu of Aerth for a short Winghorn Guard campaign as a matter of fact. 

For this outing I'm doing things a little differently rules-wise; the mechanics being even simpler this time around. In addition, I'm adding in a few features inspired by recent Japanese Indie TRPGs for a little extra flavor. 

Where to begin? OK, the Core Mechanic: 

Roll 2d6 + Relevant Attribute/Stat + Relevant Knack (if any) and try to meet or beat a Target Number (TN) set by the GM.

• • Easy task: TN 7–9 
• • Moderate: TN 10–12 
• • Hard: TN 13–15 
• • Epic: TN 16+

Critical Success: Boxcars! A Natural 12. Amazing Effect + ‘Anime Flare’ (A flashy description, an extra benefit, or a temporary power-up. This could include making your next Check Roll with Advantage. Roll 3D6 and take the highest two. 

Comedic/Flawed Success: Beat TN by 10+. You succeed with a funny or dramatic side effect (e.g., Your Fireball cooks the monster as well as the Party’s food supply or burns up the dungeon map. Perhaps your elaborate sword technique leaves you dramatically posing for another round or two).

Success: Simply beat the TN. You succeed! 

Failure: If Check Roll is below the TN it is a Miss or Failed Action. You can change it to a Partial Success, succeeding with a Complication, -1 Fatigue, or Disadvantage on next roll. A Disadvantage means rolling 3D6 and taking the two lowest numbers.

Critical Failure or ‘Botch’: Roll Snake Eyes! A natural 2. If the Check Roll total is a Failure, some additional dramatic complication occurs in addition to the Miss. If the Check Roll total Succeeds, you do indeed do what you intended but something still goes seriously wrong. 

As you can see, different factors can introduce a Bonus or Penalty Die Advantage or Disadvantage to a Check Roll but generally speaking that's all there is to it. The objective is to keep things both simple and narrative. 

Character Creation is likewise pretty simple and straightforward, largely the same as TFOS with a few tweaks for a Fantasy setting: Players pick an Archtype - Elf, Dwarf, Human, etc. , determine their Party Role(s) which are 1-3 Traits which can lower the Target Number of tasks related to them, and then work out their Attributes - Stats and Knacks - Basically Skills but also things like Spellcasting or Turning Undead. 

The Character Sheet looks like this...

Magic System 

Anime-Flavored Magic is flashy and costly. Roll Spirit + Magic Knack + 2D6.

• •Low-Cost Spells: Utility, Buffs, Attacks with no Damage (They Confuse, Distract, etc.). Only costs Spell Fatigue on a Botched Check Roll.
• •Big Spells (Dragon Slave! style): Powerful but they drain Spirit (an effect called Spell Fatigue) or cause side effects (hair turns odd color, scent attracts monsters, etc.). -1 Spirit to cast, -2 on a Critical Failure.
• •PCs can take on extra Spell Fatigue to make Spells more effective. 
• •Learning Magic: New Spells are obtained by learning and practice. Must be taught or found in Spellbooks or on Scrolls. Progression feels like Frieren - slow, meaningful mastery that occurs over time.

Combat & Exploration

• •Theater of the Mind with quick rounds. No grid needed.
• •Initiative: Roll Agility + Luck or just go in dramatic order.
• •Damage is narrative. You take Hits; after taking half your total you are stunned and hurt. Target Numbers go up to the next difficulty level. At zero Hits, the character is unconscious and their overall situation may worsen. Player Characters can only die in unavoidable situations or by player choice. Starting Hits = Body + ½ Luck.
• •Dungeons are living, breathing places: Traps, rival adventurer parties, sentient doors, patrols of haunted armors, and wandering entities that want to chat.
• •Food & Rest: Cooking monster meat gives mechanical buffs and restores morale. Skipping meals causes penalties (hungry party = comedic failures).

These are the basic or core rules I have so far and they should be enough to start my Solo campaign. In the next post I'll give you my main character's completed Character Sheet, some idea of why I made the choices I went with, and perhaps a little of the world/setting. Still haven't decided whether or not to go with Aerth. 

Thoughts, opinions, and ideas on this project are much appreciated! 

See you soon,

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Barking Alien

31 Days / 31 Characters - HINATA 'HELLCAT' NEKOMOTO

As mentioned, there is no way I am going to be able to complete this year's 31 Day Character Challenge by Wednesday. Nonetheless I am going to keep going until I hit the full 31, however long that takes me. I am motivated, enjoying myself, and I at least beat the number of posts I made last January so I'm calling it a win.

Yatta! 

 

Character: Hinata Nekomoto

AKA: Hellcat, Nekomoto-9, N9

Player: Victoria (Can't remember her last name but it was Japanese). 

System: Cyberpunk 2020 / Mekton II - Interlock System with Houserules

Additional campaign ideas and mechanics were borrowed from the magazine Mecha Press. 

Nature: Short Campaign: Neo-Tokyo Boomrunners: INTERSPEC

Gamemaster: Adam Dickstein

Circa: 1992-93

Origins: Sometime in 1988 I had the idea to run a campaign titled, 'Neo-Tokyo Crimebusters: Freelance Police'. This was a Cyberpunk Action/Comedy inspired by Japanese Anime and Manga such as Appleseed, Akira, Bubblegum Crisis, Dominion Tank Police, and Mobile Police Patlabor. It went over really well, though we only got about a dozen sessions out of it before various schedule changes caused it to dissolve before its time.

You can expect to see a 31 Days /31 Characters entry from this campaign down the line. 

Roughly four or five years later I was talking Anime with some friends and we came up with what we thought would be a cool premise for a series. Then it dawned on me that it would also make for a great RPG campaign. The group agreed and we met that weekend to create the characters. To speed up the campaign prep time I resurrected my source materials from Freelance Police. Boomrunners was to be set in the same Neo-Tokyo as Crimebusters.

Backstory: POSSIBLE TRIGGER WARNING.

This game dealt with some darker and more mature subject matter than my usual campaigns. I used to dip into this type of thing more often but less so as I got older. I was extra cynical in the 90s. 

Viewer Discretion Advised.

Hinata is a Nekomoto-9 Pleasure Bioroid, found discarded in a pile of organic refuse with a gunshot wound to the chest. Discovered and called in by Agents of Interspec's Division 3, they were instructed to bring her back to HQ by Chief Medical and Biosciences Expert Dr. Shun Sasaki.

Dr. Sasaki treated the Nekomoto-9, nursing her back to health (which involved quite a bit of bio-engineering repair) until she was awake and able to move about on her own. Healing increasingly quickly after Sasaki's initial treatment, 'N9' proved surprisingly intelligent and knowledgeable. Digging into the doctor's file, N9 discovered he'd had a daughter, Hinata Sasaki, who died a few years earlier in a Boomer rampage. Dr. Sasaki joined Interspec right after. When he found out about her 'investigation', Sasaki wasn't upset at all and was happy to answer any questions she had. This led to a close 'father-daughter' relationship between the two of them, with N9 trusting Sasaki over anyone else in the world. Sasaki in turned asked N9 to honor him by having her take the name 'Hinata'. 

Not long after taking on her new identity, Hinata Nekomoto decided to make some cosmetic alterations to look the way she wanted to, instead of having the appearance someone else paid for. Additionally, there was still the mystery of who shot her, why, and what her life was before being found by Interspec (she had no memory of anything before that). Best not to look like someone who was supposed to be dead. 

Left: Pleasure Bioroid Nekomoto-9 or N9 / Right: Agent Hinata 'Hellcat' Nekomoto

 

Hinata applied to join Interspec herself, training for three years before going into the field. Two years after that she was recruited into the 'Boomrunners', a group of Special Agents operating out of Division 3. 

Overview: Set in the year 2092, the campaign followed the Boomrunners, a team of crimefighting operatives working for Division 3 of Interspec. Interspec is an Interpol-like organization that battles high powered android, bioroid, robot, and cyborg focused crimes. They are almost always brought in to deal with renegade Boomers (See previous post). 

Each member of the five person team had their own special skills and abilities, as well as a unique (custom) powered battlesuit. When in their suits, the team members are usually referred to by a codename or callsign. Hinata Nekomoto, who's callsign is Hellcat, is an extremely talented acrobatic, contortionist, and climber. She is remarkably adept at hand-to-hand combat. Hinata turns out to be a competent detective and has skills in stealth, infiltration, disguise, and seduction. 

Adding to her martial arts training, her armored powersuit is equipped with razor sharp claws capable of tearing through most materials easily. They also give her enhanced climbing ability (there are similar retractable ones in the feet). Additional features of the suit include increased leaping ability and a power cord 'tail' that can connect to energy outlets and temporarily super-charge the armor. Like all battlesuit users, Hellcat has increased strength, speed, and a sensor heads-up display. 

Hellcat had some additional abilities related to her bio-engineered origins. She had a heightened sense of hearing, excellent night vision, and a regenerative healing factor that only kicked in if she was reduced to 3 Hits or less (which is what helped save her from the gunshot mentioned in her Backstory). 

The rest of the Boomrunners team consisted of:

Killjoy: Incredible at reading people. Armed with a Samurai Sword similar to Hellcat's claws. 

Lighthouse: Team leader. Excellent detective. Tracker/Ranger type. Laser weapons.

Nightlight: Extreme stealth. Communications, Hacker. Special short-range laser weapon.

Pepperjack: Landmate style Mecha 'suit'. Gattling gun, Missiles, Buckler Shield. Jump Jets.

Lighthouse and Nighlight were brother and sister I believe (the characters, not the players).

Killjoy was a Cyborg. 

Highlights:

I really loved how the player, Victoria, gave the character a 'Noir Detective Story' feel while simultaneously completely fitting in to the over-the-top Anime action scenes. She, as well as most of the other characters, also totally bought in to various romantic subplots, even if they didn't all end positively. Their hardsuits could stop high caliber weapons but nothing deflects a broken heart. 

Many of Hinata's subplots were about questions of identity as much as trying to unravel her origins. We explored some deep ideas. How did N9 end up where she was and who she was really? What was her life like before someone tried to kill her? Why do I keep saying 'her' life? Isn't she me? Aren't Hinata and N9 actually the same person; why does it feel like that's not true anymore? Was N9 ever really a person; was she her own entity or was she just a doll who someone bought then grew tired of playing with?

One great fight I recall had Killjoy, Lighthouse, and Hellcat fighting a Boomer who had disabled Pepperjack (Nightlight was in a nearby basement tracking a signal that had hacked the Boomer). The teamwork was top notch, with Nightlight hacking the hack and throwing off the Boomer's sensors as Hellcat flipped and spun around the big brute occasionally rending a cable or other component. At some point she squatted down, balanced on the Boomer's arm as it began to shift the limb into a machine gun. Hellcat does a backward somersault/leap off the arm, damaging it with her feet claws, and creating an opening for Killjoy to charge in a slice off the arm with his sword. Super Cyberpunk Anime Badassery! 

Game Info:

It's been so long that, as with many of these entries sadly, I just don't have those character sheets anymore. It was primarily a Cyberpunk game, with Mekton II used for many of the Mecha elements and some tweaking to make it all fit together. In addition, I used articles in Mecha Press Magazine that covered Bubblegum Crisis and other Anime to get things to feel just right. Interestingly, the second issue (and one or two later ones I think) had an original mini-RPG called Techno Police 2100 AD, which was surprisingly close in concept to the game that preceded Boomrunners and set the stage for the world. 

This was also one of the games, maybe the first one, that used my alternative 'Humanity' mechanic as mentioned in this ol' post on Blade Runner. The basic idea being that while Humans who replace their organics parts with cybernetics are in danger of losing their Humanity and Empathy, Androids and Bioroids (similar to Replicants) start with with very little Empathy/Humanity and are trying to gain point in it through life experiences. While the goal is to be 'truly Human', it can also result in moments of desperate, passionate or panicked outbursts. A true Human can feel anger, fear, and sorrow but paramount above all else, they don't want to die. 

Roy Batty would approve. 

Notes:

Hinata is a gender neutral Japanese name that means Sunflower or 'Facing the Sun'. As for Nekomoto, Neko means Cat, while moto refers to a Book or 'true words'.

Dr. Shun Sasaki. His name means 'Talented and Wise'. 

The battlesuits of the Boomrunners, the term Boomers, and many other aspects of this setting were lifted (then customized) from Bubblegum Crisis and its many spin-offs. I would say that IP was the single biggest influence on the game. 

In the Bubblegum Crisis universe, 'Boomer' is a derogatory term for what is more property called a Voomer, an artificially created bio-mechanical life form. Voomers may be designed to be maids, waiters, soldiers, or any other vocation.

If one malfunctions and goes on a murderous rampage it is dubbed a Boomer. Some people call all Voomers Boomers, implying they believe every single one is destined or at least likely to go crazy. 

In this campaign only the term Boomer was used and these beings were almost exclusively created for combat related jobs. Other vocational roles were filled by androids, bioroids, and cyborgs.

The bright yellow hair Hellcat has while suited-up (See image below) is a hologram. It can be altered or deactivated on command.

Legacy:

Its been a very long time since I've thought about this character or her campaign, partly because its been a long while since I've felt particularly inspired by a Cyberpunk Anime or Manga. Certainly not enough to dig out my almost 30 year old notes on the subject. 

Now, with recent Anime titles like Metallic Rouge and Pluto, it may be something to consider revisiting in the not too distant future.

If you have some free time after school, how about joining our club and ya'know, saving the world from evil? Great! You can learn all about it from club Vice-President ICHIKO YORUHIME. 

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Barking Alien

31 Days / 31 Characters - GATES

Teenagers from Outer Space is one of my all time favorite RPGs for so many reasons.

First and foremost, its super simple, straightforward, and easy to modify. Second, the game is written in a fun, humorous manner with enough personality to get you into the feel of things right away. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, it is a game about Japanese Animated Comedy by Mike Pondsmith, a man who understands Japanese Animated Comedies. 

When this game came out I was already a huge Anime fan at a time in which not everyone in the USA knew what Anime was. This game and its author 'got it' though and I used that to introduce this particular brand of awesome-ness to all my buddies. 

My first and possibly best TFOS campaign was 'Blast City Blues' and my own character in that setting is Gates.

Character: His real name is a series of high-pitched squeeks, chirps, and clicks that end in what sounds a bit like 'GEEL'. 

AKA: Gil Gates

Player: Non-Player Character, turned PC. Played by Adam Dickstein.

System: Teenagers from Outer Space - 1st and 2nd Edition. 'Advanced TFOS' Houserules.

 

Campaign: Blast City Blues and Blast City Blues: Summer Break.

Gamemaster: Adam Dickstein and Others

Circa: 1987-1989

Origins: The original version of Gates came about from a practice drawing.

I was teaching myself to illustrate in an Anime/Manga style, with my major influence being Rumiko Takahashi, the renowned female Manga artist famous for some of the most popular series of the 80s and 90s (including Urusei Yatsura, Ranma 1/2, and Inu Yasha to name a few). I drew a basic male character who bore some resemblance to Ryunosuke from Urusei Yatsura (a female character often mistaken for a boy) and Ryoga from Ranma 1/2. 

A few days later, after buying the first Teenagers from Outer Space book and reading it through several times, I found myself opening up a notebook to jot down some campaign ideas and I saw my drawing right there in front of me, having been put into the book for safe keeping. I think I stared at it for a few moments before I added glasses to the fellow. Then antenna. That's when the character and the idea for Blast City Blues rushed into my head. 

Backstory: Unpronounceable-GEEL and his twin sister Unpronounceable-GEEGEE were orphaned when their parents stayed behind during the mass exodus from the United Galaxy Alliance region of space to the Earth. It was implied they had invented the Star Drive technology that got everyone else away before the voracious Dreggetti arrived. 

The two infant Googlimooglians (Gates' species) were not in the main ship but one of several vessels forming a convoy behind it. Their vessel finally reached Earth some years after the capital ship that became Blast City and were released from stasis about 15 years before the first campaign's 'present'. The twins were adopted by First Contact Specialist Gertrude Gates and her Exobiologist husband Godfrey Gates. This is how the Googlimooglians got their Earth names, Gil and Gigi Gates.

As they grew up they couldn't be more opposite. Like all Googlimooglians the twins were remarkably intelligent and good at engineering and science but Gil was an introvert, nerdy, emotionally detached (on the outside), and socially awkward. His sister, who was considered very attractive by Humans and other aliens, was outgoing, cool, in-your-face, and wore her feelings on her sleeve. 

The rebellious Gigi was a trouble-maker and too much for the aging Gates couple to handle, so she was sent to live with relatives on Mars. 

Gil on the other hand was a genius, a model student, excepted into all kinds of advanced programs, and felt very, very alone. With his sister gone he had no friends, was teased for his odd appearance (there weren't any other Googlimooglians around), thick glasses (our Sun generates more light during the day hours than their home star), and his egg-headed pursuits. 

He begins Blast City High School a sad and lonely super-scientist.

Overview: When we meet Gil for the first time in the game he is attending Blast City High and getting picked on/bullied by a bunch of Humans and aliens. He is saved by Miguel 'Mecha' Herrera and the two end up becoming best friends. The cast builds and builds with all sorts of offbeat and even downright bizarre Humans, aliens, robots, and other manner of people getting involved in their crazy adventures. All but one...Gigi Gates.

For nearly a year of play, no one knew Gates (everyone called him by his last name) even had a sister. She is never seen or referred to. Then there were a couple of more serious episodes and in one Gates mentions that there are very few Googlimooglians left in the universe. To his knowledge, "We may be the last." The other Players/PCs thought he meant 'we' as in the ones living in Blast City but what he really meant was he and his sister. 

In one of the last story arcs in the original campaign, Earth is invaded by a fleet of Galactic Pirates who are there to obtain some Time Travel device they think is hidden in the bowls of Blast City. Leading the charge is...GIGI?!? Yep, Gigi Gates, who had been attending Blast City's rival school Mars High, quit school to become a space pirate. 'Mech''s player begins a running joke were he is trying to defeat the Googlimooglian Space Biker Chick with Gates' help while also trying to get Gates to fix him up with his sister. "But...It's...THEY'RE THE SAME PERSON!"

"I know", says Mech, "You're a genius Gates. Multi-tasking like this should be easy for you."

The Highlights:

Gates was often the catalyst of the trouble in many adventures. 

Gates once invented a teleporter that ended up being a duplicator, generating an exact copy of the person who used it...only evil. 

There was the time he determined the mathematical calculation for Cool and made himself the coolest kid in school, as well as a complete mega-jerk. He attracted a legion of other mega-jerks resulting in a horde of smooth, well dressed, zombie a-holes. 

There was the time he borrowed a library book while on a school trip to Alpha Centauri and relativistic time from lightspeed travel made it over 4 years overdue. The Library Network sent a Librarian to retrieve it; a Terminator-like combat android whose exterior looked like a thin, grey haired old lady but she could smash through steel walls and fire stun blasts out of her eyes. This story was illustrated into a comic book for our RPG Clubs entry into the Art & Design High School Art Festival. 

During the Boogie Ball Championship between Blast City High and Luna Prep, Gates and Speed (my friend David Concepcion's character) realized the Luna team was cheating. While Mech played against them despite this, Gates and Speed investigated and had to deal with some tough opponents and a kid who was essentially as smart as Gates! That was fun and really challenging.

Legacy: Gates hasn't been seen in a game in many years, which makes me a little bummed just thinking about it. The image I used above is the first picture of him I've done in forever and it made me smile to depict him once again. 

Hopefully he'll get the chance to mad-science again in the near future.

Game Info: As I've mentioned before, one of the first changes I made to TFOS was to change its die type from a D6 to a D10 to get a greater range and make it more compatible with the other 'Interlock' games from R. Talsorian. Therefore Gates' stats read like this:

'Gil' Gates - Near Human, Male.

SMARTS: 10                    DRIVING: 4

BOD: 4                              LOOKS: 6

R.W.P.: 7                           COOL: 3

LUCK: 3                            BONK: 5

KNACKS: Super Science: 4, Latest Invention: 4. Investigate: 2

POWERS: Mad Genius: 10

Next up, we warp into the Final Frontier - FINALLY! Let's go where no one has gone before with Lt. HEREK of the USS Gryphon!

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Barking Alien

Thorough Thursdays : CYBERPUNK

This Thorough Thursdays entry was supposed to have gone out yesterday, but I came down with a terrible cold, and forgot to publish it. Gomen nasai!

Prior to this post, I have only tagged three posts with the label Cyberpunk.

Those posts refer to the Cyberpunk 2013/2020 Role Playing Game by R. Talsorian Games and the genre as a whole respectively.

Three posts labeled Cyberpunk by a Science Fiction fan who loves the concepts of artificial intelligence, robots, and Anime/Manga.

That's just wrong.

I first discovered the term Cyberpunk through my uncle, a brilliant fellow and an avid reader of Science Fiction. He was especially interested in SF works that address changes in Human nature, culture, and thought brought upon us by advancements in technology.

After reading a number of novels in the genre he recommended them to me, namely Hardwired and Voice of the Whirlwind by Walter Jon Williams, Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive by William Gibson, and Blood Music by Greg Bear.

I became quite a fan myself, and since I am influenced as much by cinema as literary works, I became further inspired by the film Blade Runner, and the often underrated TV series Max Headroom.

This all lead me to the R. Talsorian Games RPG Cyberpunk 2013, and its follow up, Cyberpunk 2020. I ran a lot of 2020, often altering it a bit to reflect more of a Blade Runner setting and feel. I also tried my hand at Shadowrun, 2300 AD, and other games with significant Cyberpunk elements.

Around 1990 I discovered the Japanese RPG Metal Head, a Cyberpunk RPG that also included space travel, mecha, and other elements that really appealed to me. I ran a few games of that as well.

Many of my Traveller campaigns contain heavy Cyberpunk influences in the way technology and corporate culture interact with the people of Charted Space and the Third Galactic Imperium. . 

Cyberpunk is a strange genre. It really should be jarring, thought provoking social commentary and sometimes it is, but it is just as easily an excuse for technology-porn, and non-stop action.

How many Cyberpunk stories have cybernetics? Most, if not virtually (pun intended) all.

How many Cyberpunk stories feature 'punk'? Not many.

Punk is traditionally a social movement born out of the frustration and angst of the working class. It bucks tradition, corporate culture, and celebrates freedom, non-conformity, and the establishment through acts of counter-culture rebellion.

Does Cyberpunk actually do that?

As noted, sometimes it does, but other times the main characters of Cyberpunk stories end up working with, or at the very least within, the confines of the established authories to take down other interests who aren't all that different in the grander scheme of things. For example, Major Motoko Kusanagi of Ghost in the Shell isn't some punk rebel trying to stick it to the man, but rather a kind of police officer - She is the man! Well...you know what I mean.

Wouldn't a true Cyberpunk hero, or heroine have no cybernetics, avoid the 'net', and try to dismantle the oppressive culture of megacorporate government control? Are Shadowrunners really Cyberpunk if they go on runs for one megacorporate patron against another? That's just facilitating the situation, not rebelling against it, which is the real definition of punk. 

For a time it seemed that Cyberpunk in the classic sense had fallen out of favor. Real world scientific advancements had shown that biological, not mechanical, improvements were the logical next step. Also, things stated to look less dystopian, and an oppressive corporate culture less likely to prevail. 

Now, things have swung back the other way. Between the current world political and social climates darkening yet again, and improvements in the fields of prosthetics and virtual reality, the outlook for our future seems more Cyberpunk then ever. Is it just a coincidence that Blade Runner is getting a sequel now, and they finally put together a live action Ghost in the Shell film (crappy and poorly handled as it was)?

Recently Age of Ravens started a Cyberpunk retrospective of sorts as part of his History of RPGs series. One of the podcasts he's involved with, Play on Target, released a recent episode covering Cyberpunk gaming as well. Check them out won't you?

In the end, I am going to say I am a fan of Cyberpunk, especially its presentation in games, Anime/Manga, movies, and television. At the same time, I see it in a fashion similar to how I see Fantasy. It's a guilty pleasure for me this genre, since I don't feel like most of the Cyberpunk we see is truly what Cyberpunk is, or what it could be. The Cyberpunk we get is over-the-top, sensationalized Cyberpunk, and that's the opposite of what Cyberpunk should be.

What are your thoughts on the subject?

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Barking Alien

Quicker Than Quick, Stronger Than Strong

The past 48+ hours have been most unusual.

My Mom was admitted to the hospital ER yesterday after experiencing some stomach pains on Sunday. As it turned out she needed to have her appendix removed.

Between being admitted, having an examination, having tests run, determining she needed an operation, having the operation, going into recovery, being released and going home took a total of 8-9 hours. No, I am not joking, nor exaggerating. My Mom first contacted me at 3 pm to let me know what was going on, and she got home, and was asleep in her own bed by 11:30 or thereabouts.

I got home to find a postal worker buzzing my apartment with a package for me. Yes, that late at night. The package was from a very dear friend I haven't seen in person in some time, though we speak occasionally on Facebook.

My buddy has been cleaning out his home of various items including his collection of games, toys, and other paraphernalia, and decided to send some of it to me. Among the item were a number of RPG books.

In his own words he said, "Treat them gently; there may be a forgotten dream hiding among these pages."

Some are items I own already.
Some are cool items that are neat to have.
Some are previously missing pieces of my youth that define who I am now..

Fitting into this last, and most precious of categories is none other than this...

That's a copy of the first edition of the Anime/Manga Giant Robot Role-Playing Game Mekton. I have been trying to get a hold of one for ages.

As I have made clear many times in the past, Mekton was, and is, one of my all time favorite games, largely as a result of the creators' deep understanding of the subject matter the game covers.

Mekton is quite literally a Japanese Giant Robot RPG, by a Japanese Giant Robot fan, for Japanese Giant Robot fans.

It is also a game that came out at the perfect time for me. I had recently made new friends who had exposed me to Japanese Animation and Manga (Comic Books) direct from source, and it made a huge impression on me. It changed the way I thought about games, about staging them, and how character and story intertwine with action. 

Between 1984, and 1994 I ran a lot of Mekton, mostly with Mekton II in 1987 to be completely honest. While I did run a few campaigns using the original rules, there weren't as many gamers familiar with Mecha Anime in those early years, so finding players was tough. 

With each new edition and add on that expanded the game, the system become very much improved in many ways, but I still feel that my favorite version is the first one. It was simpler, more straightforward, easier to modify, and later editions added so much fiddly crunch that I feel they slowed down combat even as they made it more tactically flexible. 

I like simplicity over complexity. I like things to seem complex, but really be rather easy to comprehend, and utilize. Like origami, or a karesansui (Japanese Rock Garden). 

This book has really got me jazzed to run a Mecha game again. It isn't just this book of course, as I noted in a recent, previous post I am in an Anime/Manga RPG mood. 

I also recently got a hold of a partial translation of the Japanese tabletop RPG Metallic Guardian, one of the SRS System games by noted Japanese RPG design house Far East Amusement Research (F.E.A.R. - how's that for a game company name acronym?).

I am currently working on figuring out how to play it, while simultaneously seeing if any of my favorite bits can be imported over to Mekton. 

What can I say, I love to kitbash. 

Robots are on the horizon my friends.

Watch for them.

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Barking Alien

Direct Hits

Yes folks, I know this one is late. OK, really late. My plans for the close of my September theme had to take a backseat to my Real LifeTM, which just got a lot more interesting. I am soon to be the owner of my own business. Details coming soon.

The next few posts are not all I have to say on the subject of comedic RPGs by a long shot, but they are all you're going to see of the theme month gimmick for September. As we are now into October already, I want to switch to my next theme, Horror, and Fantasy.

Just like September, I am going to play fast, and loose with the overarching motif, so some remaining material from September may yet find its way into the new month of posts.

***

My next guests first hit the scene in 1987, where they found a niche with fans looking for a different kind of sound. Not truly indie, they were also not emulating the bands that were topping the pop charts at the time. In many ways, they were very much a part of the new wave movement of the late 80s.

Here promoting their self-titled album, sentients and sophonts across the cosmos, please give it up for our musical guest...

Teenagers From Outer Space!

 

'Ride On Shooting Star'
From the Anime FLCL, or Furi Kuri
By The Pillows

I've said it before and I have no problem repeating it here:

Star Trek is my favorite setting to game in.

Star Wars D6 by West End Games is my favorite system.

Superheroes is probably the genre I've run the most at this point.

 

Teenagers From Outer Space however, that's the game that has my heart; green, eleven-valved, and methane producing as it might be.

Over the last twenty-eight years that the game has been in existence, I have easily run Teenagers From Outer Space, or TFOS, dozens upon dozens of times. Sometimes, I've even used it to run Teenagers From Outer Space!

Yeah, I'll explain...

I've told this story before, but about a day after reading the rules for TFOS, I modified them by changing the D6 standard to a D10 standard.

In addition to giving the game a bit more range, it made the system more compatible with R. Talsorian Games' other 'Interlock System' games, such as Cyberpunk 2013/2020 and Mekton. Other advantages to this alteration included facilitating some additional house rules, and homebrewed sub-systems, as well as making TFOS adaptable to outside systems, most notably Ars Magica (more about that below).

At a Japanese Pop Culture convention in 1995 or 96, I met with the editor of R. Talsorian's V-Max Magazine, a house periodical dedicated to Anime, Manga, and gaming with a lean toward their Anime related titles. I described to him my modified Teenagers From Outer Space game, which I had come to call 'Advanced TFOS'. He loved the idea, and had me work it up as a full article for V-Max. Unfortunately, RTG folded up the magazine before the article could see print.

While I'm not a huge fan of universal systems (believing a game's mechanics should be tailored to the game it's supporting), I do have a scant few games that I believe can be used for a wide variety of genres, subgenres, and settings. My Advanced TFOS, and even standard TFOS, are among the most versatile, and effective in my opinion.

The main reason is their simplicity. TFOS is a Stat + Ability/Skill + Roll system, with very little else going on to get in the way. Perhaps my favorite idea in the game though, is that if you roll too low, you fail, if you roll the difficulty number or higher you succeed, but if you roll too well...it can end up backfiring on you royally. Exceed the required difficulty number by more than double, and things can get out of control. It is recommended that the GM embellish the success to the point of extreme, over-the-top, you'll-wish-you-failed-the-roll, comedic annoyance.

 

As I mentioned, I've used the 'Advanced TFOS' rules to run a plethora of games, including several set in my homebrewed campaign setting of Blast City Blues. The Blast City Blues universe is similar to the default idea for TFOS but my variant allows for more character and story options. Magical Girls in stylized sailor suits, Giant Robot Pilots, adolescent Cyborgs, and Psychic School Kids can all be found somewhere in the milieu of Blast City.

 

However, the default premise of the game isn't what I want to address with this post so much as what else can be done with the system. As the focus of September's entries are comedy games, I would like to tell you all about some other humorous trips I've taken using this very versatile map as a guide.

 

Some of my most successful alternate uses of TFOS include:
  

Galaxy Quest

 

My first Galaxy Quest game, a one shot that turned into a campaign (that became a phenomena! Um...yeah), was originally based on my Advanced TFOS rules. I added the Jobs, and Character Types, and the rest is history. It was a hell of a thing.

Near Miss

A Science Fiction Comedy campaign very much in the vein of Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy meets This Is Spinal Tap.

The PCs were members of a musical group of misfit aliens travelling around the universe getting into one crazy mess after another. The name of the band, Near Miss, was also the name of a garage band I was in with some buddies from high school (who were incidentally the players in the group plus one, or two others).

Neo-Tokyo Crimebuster - Furiransu Keikan

Using a hybrid of the Advanced TFOS rules, and the rules of Mekton II (foolishly trying to make the R. Talsorian 'Interlock' systems actually interlock), Furiransu Keikan (roughly, Freelance Police) was an Action/Comedy set in a cyberpunk future where various corporations police various regions. Citizens are welcome to chose, and pay for whichever 'Law Enforcement Provider' they wish.

The PCs represented a small-ish, independent police precinct trying to make a name for themselves in the crime ridden, high tech city of Neo-Tokyo. Inspirations for the game included (but were not limited to) Dominion Tank Police, Blade Runner, Mobile Police Patlabor, Barney Miller, and Starsky and Hutch.
 

Once Upon The End of Time

A Science Fiction Time Travel/Action-Adventure/Murder Mystery campaign inspired by my friend Avram Grumer in which the entire plot is revealed in reverse order, starting from the end of the story in the first session.

 
Each session afterwards was set a few days to several months before the previous one. The last adventure had the players joining the Time Patrol, and being confronted on their first mission by their older more experienced selves who were out to stop the campaign villain's creation.

Wizard of Oz - End of the Rainbow

 

I ran a campaign set in L. Frank Baum's Oz and its surrounding magical lands using my Advanced TFOS system crossed with (get this) Ars Magica. A significantly simplified Ars Magica to be sure, the combination of the two worked incredibly well. I was very happy with the outcome and would love to try running it again.

 

***

 

I haven't played, or used the game in quite some time, and that is a shame. Not just because I love it so much, but because I feel it's the kind of game my Barking Alien Gaming Group could really get behind. So why haven't I brought it to bear with my regular gang? Well, it goes with something I am hoping to bring up in a future post, but in all honesty, I may just say to hell with it, and do it. We've been experimenting with the occasional one-shot comedy game here, and there recently, so there is no reason we couldn't give it a go.

We're going to pause one last time for a commercial break, but we'll be right back after this...

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Belated Happy Birthdays to Groucho Marx (Oct. 2), Jim Henson, and Steve Whitmire (Both born on September 24th!). 

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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TFOS The Forever

Aside from Star Trek, this may well be my all time favorite game. Maybe.

TEENAGERS FROM OUTER SPACE!

Created by the maverick game inventor extraordinaire Mike Pondsmith and first published in 1987 by R. Talsorian Games, Teenagers from Outer Space was the first commerically popular non-mecha game based on Japanese anime. Of course, the mecha game actually based on giant robot anime was Mekton, also by Pondsmith.

As I mentioned before in the post on Mekton, I was a fan of Anime and Manga long before it was well known in the U.S.. This meant that I was adding Anime bits to my other RPG campaigns (such as D&D, Traveller, Villains & Vigilantes, Star Trek, etc.) in the form of more cinematic combat, background pathos, crazy visual descriptions of characters, creatures, machines and the like when Mekton and TFOS rolled in and said, "Hi! Were you looking for us?" The answer was a resounding yes.

It helped a lot that the rules are super simple, the premise super flexible and the rulebook written in a humorous, "Don't take this too seriously" style that is not only perfect for the genre but also a hoot to read.

Now speaking of 'the genre', what exactly is the genre of Teenagers from Outer Space?

Well, Anime and Manga are not genres in and of themselves but rather mediums with a particular style that can be used to tell stories in a variety of genres. The basic premise of TFOS in a nutshell is aliens make contact with Earth and after a while their children enroll in our schools, hang out in our malls and discover dating, pizza and rock n' roll. The universe is forever changed. The genre is a mix of Science Fiction/Space Opera, Slapstick Action Adventure and Romantic Comedy. Its a mix that is encountered fairly often in Japan (Tenchi Muyo, Birdy the Mighty, Dirty Pair) but much less so in the U.S. (though European comics seem to get it pretty well).

I've used the game for Western Superheroes, Medieval Fantasy, straight up Space Opera and a host of other things, though usually also adding a dose of comedy.

The system is your basic Stat + Skill Rank + Die Roll familiar to most D20 fans. The 'Interlock System' was extremely influential to game design of the era and the following years, obviously all the way to the design of 3rd Edition D&D. Unfortunately, Mekton and Cyberpunk used a D10 but Teenagers used a D6 for some reason. I switched TFOS to D10 right away, making the three games much more compatible.

Another adjustment I made was to give the Special Powers and Abilites ranks similar to skills. The idea was simply to not have everyone with Superspeed be the same speed for example. Player Characters in my house rules all start with 10 points and can either roll randomly or assign points to the powers they want. For example, my friend Dave's character 'Blitz' had Superspeed 10, while Pete's teenage cyborg had Superstrength 3, Invulnerability 3 and Micro Missiles (Zap) 4. We also added a lot of new powers and abilities.




I've run at least two or three long term campaigns using the game's default premise, modified by settings of my own creation. The most successful was a game I ran in high school entitled 'Blast City Blues' in which alien refugees escaping a deadly enemy come to Earth with a warning and an offer. The warning is that the menace of three galaxies is hot on their heels and the offer is to give the Earthlings super powers and advanced technology to fight off the coming invaders. The offer is excepted but the menace never arrives. Now, 20 years later, the refugee ship is an island city that houses a school for the superpowered offspring of Earth's original volunteer protectors.

Going to leave it there for now but I'm sure I'll be coming back to this subject again in the future. The products of R. Talsorian Games had a pretty profound effect on me and my gaming style. I can easily see analyzing and discussing them further.

Until then,

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