Doctor Who Game what system to run it in?

[Hopeless]

Watched the anniversary special yesterday (and today and of course this morning courtesy of iplayer and bbc 3... have already ordered both this and the adventures in time and space special commemorating the series when it first started thanks to Amazon) sorry but I got thinking...:smallredface:

You are all playing Gallifreyans and the game starts off at the Fall of Arcadia as seen in the anniversary special... would you be interested?

I'm thinking Savage Worlds, but that doesn't mean you can't try Fate Core or suggest another system in addition to the Doctor Who rpg...

So what do you think?

My idea involves them finding their way into the Black Archives on Earth thanks to the doctor using that Timelord portrait of the Fall of Arcadia however it also means Daleks also reach Earth and that escaping from the Black Archives means they have no idea how they reached Earth nor how they escaped the Fall of Arcadia but as they say everyone has to start somewhere?!:smallcool:

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'd say FATE-- it's the best system I've played for talky, non-violent action, which is I think what you'd want here.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Fate Accelerated (http://fate-srd.com/fate-accelerated/get-started) is perfect for this, because it focuses more on what type of approach you take in a situation, and less on what skills you use. Very Doctor Who.

For instance, you might try to confront a Dalek in a Forceful manner (pushing a bookshelf onto it), a Flashy manner ("Hey, look at me!" *run*), a Sneaky manner (setting up a Dalek trap), or a Careful manner (keeping calm while the Dalek rolls past). Depending on what approach to solving the problem you take, the difficulty might be different, and the consequences definitely will be.

[hamlet]

Why not use the existing Doctor Who RPG? I think it runs on FATE anyway.

[holywhippet]

You mean the Cubicle 7 one? That isn't FATE based and isn't overly similar. You can see a review of it here: http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/14/14631.phtml

I was in a campaign using that system briefly before we ran into a lack of players problem. It will depend on your players, but we were having a lot of fun playing.

[Jlerpy]

I think the coolest thing about Adventures in Time and Space is the initiative system.

[Mutazoia]

There are several existing versions of the Dr. Who RPG that have been released over the years (FASA was the first). GURPS also has a time travel splat, and with all the source material for everything from Early Rome to super sci-fi, finding material for any kind of time/space location should be pretty easy.

[Joe the Rat]

Ooo, the FASA system. Handy that. You can run a Dr. Who / Star Trek crossover without having to convert anything!

Yeah, FATE looks ideal for the typical Dr Who story - less fighty, more talky-flighty-timey-wimey.

[holywhippet]

It isn't that FATE is less fighty, it's more that it lets you fight however you want. I'm in a Dresden Files FATE game and you have three stress tracks - physical, mental and social. You can take someone out by damaging them enough on any of them.

In some ways it might not be the ideal system for Dr Who though. If you are in an alien jail cell you might want to pick the lock. So you'd use your burglary skill normally. But it's an alien lock and if you are a regular human it might not be feasible to do so as you wouldn't understand how it designed.

[Jlerpy]

It isn't that FATE is less fighty, it's more that it lets you fight however you want. I'm in a Dresden Files FATE game and you have three stress tracks - physical, mental and social. You can take someone out by damaging them enough on any of them.

In some ways it might not be the ideal system for Dr Who though. If you are in an alien jail cell you might want to pick the lock. So you'd use your burglary skill normally. But it's an alien lock and if you are a regular human it might not be feasible to do so as you wouldn't understand how it designed.

I'm not clear what you mean. Are you suggesting that the ideal system should let you, or not let you? Because either way, Fate would work. If you want to say a block's a lock and you can handle it, just make it a regular roll. If not, they get a fate point for their trouble and can give a little line about how these aliens use a device you're not used to. Sorted.

[holywhippet]

Yeah, but FATE is in many ways designed to let the players direct the narrative along with the DM. So the players might want to pick an alien lock or use alien technology but by rights they should have little chance of doing so. Simply handing them a FATE point for not being able to do so isn't a good solution IMO because that means every player could take a swing at it and get a FATE point because it's impossible. If the players want to pick the lock on an alien jail cell they should be able to, even if it means spending FATE points or taking consequences like setting an alarm off.

[Grod_The_Giant]

That seems like a misunderstanding of how the system is supposed to work-- among other things, aren't you supposed to be able to refuse a compel by paying fate points? And you would certainly be justified in not giving more fate points for other people who try a task you just said was impossible.

But more generally, perhaps you're just not comfortable handing that much narrative power to the players? That's not a condemnation; not every system works for every DM, and I can't run FATE to save my life.

(Also, weird example-- "alien stuff is weird and different and impossible" is kind of the opposite of the show's theme)

[CarpeGuitarrem]

That's just scenario design that doesn't reflect the show. "It's an alien lock, therefore you as a human cannot try to open it" essentially openly contradicts how they're always messing about with alien technology. :smallwink: (That being said, it's also totally feasible to say "you have to work out a doohickey to allow you to interface with the alien lock, how will you do that?" Because that is something in line with Who.)