Creating a new RP system [Part 3: The Story Overall]

[drawingfreak]

The theme: Monkey Robot Ninjas Versus Viking Dinosaur Pirates

Well, it is obvious that seriousness is not what we are going after here. Though, playing it serious would make it that much more hilarious.

What this thread is about is basically the Spine of the Story. It's that bare minimum of story that helps push the GM's imagination. In D&D, it's knowing the meat happens on the Material Plane, there is an Astral Plane and an Elemental Chaos, and all drow are Chaotic Good rebels yearning to throw off the reputation of their evil kin. In the Star Wars Roleplaying Game it's...well, Star Wars.

So what is our backbone? Our overall story?
----------------

If you want to build off of someone else's idea, post "Like [LINK TO POST] but..." and then continue.

I'm going to give this till Wednesday at 11:59pm EST. Then we shall have another vote. BEGIN!

[Dairun Cates]

I think Lyndworm came up with a pretty clever backstory. It really only lacks the robots and the monkeys (and Vikings if you don't consider them a specialty pirate). At the very least, if we can't come up with something better, it's a good starting point.

A massive ninja vs pirate war takes place on land and at sea. In this grim world survival is a very real concern for all but the wealthiest of individuals. All trade has slowed to a trickle as the trade routes are transformed into wartorn wastelands, roamed by highwaymen and the lost souls who once called this place home.

The enormous scaly beasts from the southern islands were domesticated decades ago, primarily used as beasts of burden and mounts on the battlefield. Since the war broke out, many animals have gone feral and now claim the countryside as their own.

As if fate is trying to rid the world of higher thought, a strange pox has been diiminishing the populations on both sides of the conflict. It seems to have no preference as to whom it strikes; old, young, weak, strong, all sexes of all races. To make matters worse, around 75% of those that die from the illness rise as undead within a few days. Some populations have managed to close themselves off to keep the roving hordes of undead from attacking.

[mikeejimbo]

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showp...96&postcount=2

I'm totally for that. A few things I'd like to add.

- The disease should be spread mostly through bites
- Robots: Should they be immune? On the one hand it would be a benefit to being a robot, on the other, zombie robot is a funny concept.
- The reason there is so much piracy should be because they're taking the chance to strike during the general chaos
- Ninjas then rose to take on the pirates?
- Vikings are a kind of pirate

[boomwolf]

I thought the pirates are robot zombies? when did they turn into viking dinosaurs?

(and how will that be balanced?)

[Dairun Cates]

I thought the pirates are robot zombies? when did they turn into viking dinosaurs?

(and how will that be balanced?)

That was actually a huge truncation of the original concept because I didn't name it. It's more of the robots and ninjas are on the same side and the pirates and zombies are on the same side. At least, that's the original concept. Might go somewhere else with it.

[drawingfreak]

I've been imagining a scenario so utterly bizarre that the Master's of the Universe may have competition.

The Forgotten Isle. It stands alone, thousands of miles from any other form of land. The center of the Isle contains Mt. Fujitsu, lair of the ninja. The waters are controlled by the Skull Armada, ruled by the Dread Pirate George. The land to the north is ruled by the legions of the Near-Dead. They're actually kind of nice when you get to know them, but their need to feed on the flesh of the living makes forming any kind of real relationship rather difficult. The land to the South is over run by herds of dinosaurs. The Manly Men of Manliness (not known for their originality...or good hygene) ride the beasts into battle. The land to the east is covered in thick jungle brush. The Monkey People of OOO, OOO, AAAH live in the trees. They like to throw poo. To the west is the Robopublic. The metallic armies of doom march methodically in circles until someone can come in and fix the bug in the software.

Races:
Human
Near-Dead
Manly Men of Maliness
Monkey
Robot
Cyborg (1/2 Robot, 1/2 Human)
Zomborg (1/2 Robot, 1/2 Zombie)
Ape-bot (1/2 Robot, 1/2 Monkey)
Franks (1/2 Robot, 1/2 MMoM)

Classes:
Pirate
Commoner
Ninja
Skeletal Crewman (Pirate Zombie)
Corpse (Neutral Zombie)
Re-Ninja(Ninja Zombie)
Viking (Pirate MMoM)
Dino Rider (Neutral MMoM)
Barbarian (Ninja MMoM)
Rope Swingers (Pirate Monkey)
Poo Slinger (Neutral Monkey)
Shadow Ape (Ninja Monkey)
Rust Bucket (Pirate Robot)
Clankers (Neutral Robot)
Hidden Cogs (Ninja Robot)

[mikeejimbo]

I think we should steer away from classes at this time. I mean, we never even said we were going to use a class-based system, right?

That said I like the list if we do go for one.

[drawingfreak]

I found it as a way to explain how we can have Zombie Pirates and the like.

Maybe we should refer to it as a job list?

[Lyndworm]

Thanks for the support guys. I really appreciate that you think my work is good enough to base a campaign around. That being said, howabout I stop making with the humble and maybe get to work here?

Some thoughts...

The world is rediculous, but the inhabitants don't know that. To them, this is just life as usual. I think it would maximize the awesome if everything was designed seriously, with equal thought given to realism, humor, and playability.

I like the world layout from DF just fine, but I personally feel that the zombies should be mostly unintelligent and not have their own nation/territory/island. They should be more of a plague upon the world, something to be feared, fought, and kept as far away from civilization as possible. Something like a Land of the Dead feel, but with dinosaurs and absurdity.

I think we should definitely avoid classes for the time being. I would prefer to have a classless system, but whichever way we go with it should be decided later.

I'm cool wiith the suggested races. My thoughts differed somewhat. I was thinking at least three races, monkeys (working title) with dexterity and wisdom bonuses, humans with no bonuses (maybe constitution and charisma for balance), and robots (working title) with strength and intelligence bonuses.

Robots should be able to contract zombiepox (working title). There are two reasons for this. One, if robots were immune they would have a pretty big advantage. Two, zombified robots are made of win.

Zombiepox should be contracted through fluid transfer, which would include bites.

There are several nations/groups of both ninjas and pirates. I've not quite got everything worked out yet, but vikings would definitely be a form of pirate.

Any thoughts?

Zack

[Dairun Cates]

I found it as a way to explain how we can have Zombie Pirates and the like.

Maybe we should refer to it as a job list?

Actually, this is for when we get to it, but I considered that we might actually consider a system based more around abilities than stats and consider the different races part of the prerequisites. Basically, you can pick two or just one. A zombie-pirate has most of the zombie and pirate abilities in his possible repertoire of abilities, but a pure pirate is the only one that can unlock the ultimate level of pirate skills. A bit abstract, but I also think this might be interesting as a d6 system so it's a bit more accessible to tabletop gamers. So, maybe I'm just crazy. I DID suggest pirate vs. ninjas afterall.

As for the fluff, I agree with the concept of the world being very serious to people in it while being absolutely ridiculous to us.

As for the concept of other ninja and pirate nations, maybe we could make cool names for what are essentially the cliches of ninja. Ie. Stealthily ninjas, Anime Ninjas, Wuxia Ninjas, Akira Kurasawa Ninjas (aka the one's that suck when there' 100 of them but are awesome when there's just 1), etc.

So, for naming, we could go something like...
Stealthy Ninjas = Shinobi
Anime = Shonenobi
Wuxia = Arcanobi
Akira = Lonenobi or Inversinobi

I guess on Pirates you could have something along the lines of Vikings, Fops, Drunkards, and Badasses.

[Lyndworm]

Good thoughts. Pure gold, actually.

Zack

[Dairun Cates]

Ah. The clever naming for the Pirate nations came to me.

Badass = Pirate King
Viking = Viking
Fop = Dashing King or just Dashking for short.
Drunkard = Drinking

[MrEdwardNigma]

I agree the world should be entirely serious, despite the ridiculous concept. Also, concerning the classes, I think simply Pirate and Ninja will do as classes (perhaps with Dinosaur Rider or Manly Men of Manliness as another class, as their race is actually human). The classes and races could combine into any of the other things, such as "Rust Bucket".

Zombifying robots seems interesting, but I'm wondering how it'll manifest. I mean, humans have rotting flesh, lowered intelligence and shambling, but what do robots have? Constant loud errors? Erratic behaviour? Killing sprees? Spontaneous explosions? All of the above?

[Zeta Kai]

I found it as a way to explain how we can have Zombie Pirates and the like.

Zombie Pirates = Cervantes de Leon

[Viruzzo]

We need to make a clear stand on the class/race definition right away, so that we define what we need to think about. I see two possible visions:
(a) class and races are separate, so we have a separate definition of what phisically someone is and what he can do (AD&D like)
(b) "races" are "classes", so there is only one list to choose from, and combinations of 2 (or more?) are possible

I like best option (b), and we could formulate the base "races/classes" as:
- ninjas
- pirates
- zombies
- robots
- dinosaurs (they have to playable!)
- monkeys

I think that races and classes should be unified because it gives you more feeling of what a character is. It does not matter the genetic descendance of a ninja, the important part is that he is a ninja!
For every race there would be hybrids (there are quite many that can be created with two races from a list of six) and some variants like those suggested above (like Vikings for Pirates).
We can also say they all the robots are a bit cyborgish, and as such can be zombified. It would manifest as decaying of the living parts they have, and maybe also some rusting or deformation of the robotic parts. Depending on what form the robot has (we can rule that they are more or less antropomorphic) they would try to bite or inject or something else to spread the disease.
I think that we need a better name for the zombie disease though, something more comical?

Zombiepox should be contracted through fluid transfer, which would include bites.

Very discomforting thought have crossed my mind...

Zombie Pirates = Cervantes de Leon

3 more days... Yoda!!!

[MrEdwardNigma]

I like Viruzzo's option A best, actually. I don't think being a pirate is the same kind of thing as being a robot at all. One's clearly a class (something they received training in) while the other is a race (something you simply are). This would allow characters to multiclass (but perhaps not as a pirate-ninja, as they are mortal enemies). Hybrid races should also be allowed, such as zombie robots, which could indeed essentially be some sort of zombified cyborgs.

[Viruzzo]

I like Viruzzo's option A best, actually. I don't think being a pirate is the same kind of thing as being a robot at all.

It's a bit of a "D&D vs AD&D" problem, but both options are viable.

For case (a), I suggest races:
- human (could be divided into an oriental themed subtype and a Viking-themed subtype?)
- monkey
- robot
- dinosaur (you're not taking them away from me!)
+ hybrids
+ a zombie "template" that can be applied to all of them

and classes:
- pirate
- ninja
+ race "paragon classes"

Here we have a problem: all the classes proposed until now are a subtype of these. The reason is that only two (pirates and ninjas) of the key concepts are "classes" in the classical (pun intended) sense. This way we would boil down to having X types of pirates, X types of ninjas and X types of race Y, which is kinda poor in my opinion, hence my (b) option that creates a single layer of "raclasses", ripe of variety. It is harder to design though, because if we allow all possible combinations of two of the six raclasses I proposed, we already have 36.

[KingGolem]

Personally, I like Dairun Cates' idea for classes the most:

Actually, this is for when we get to it, but I considered that we might actually consider a system based more around abilities than stats and consider the different races part of the prerequisites. Basically, you can pick two or just one. A zombie-pirate has most of the zombie and pirate abilities in his possible repertoire of abilities, but a pure pirate is the only one that can unlock the ultimate level of pirate skills.

We could use that for the class system and we could use Viruzzo's idea for races and the types of classes, particularly with the Racial Paragon classes. Another of Dairun Cates' ideas was the different varieties of classes, like the four types of pirates and ninjas.

Finally, I have my own idea of how the zombie disease should infect robots. Perhaps the disease grows colonies in the oil and coolant delivery systems of the robots, causing their movements to become even more ungainly from the wear and tear on their un-lubricated mechanical parts, and the infection in their coolant system causes their circuitry to overheat, thus impairing their processing power and causing them to behave erratically. The disease infecting the oil system causes the system to rupture in several places, and infected robot oil oozes out over their metal casing, so they spread the disease through their natural attacks, or through grappling or something.

[drawingfreak]

How about this...

You have these options with any combination of two:
Ninja
Pirate
Robot
Dinosaur
Monkey
Zombie

Each option has its own unique talents and modifiers and what not. Choosing the same option twice gives you even more unique talents and modifiers. For example, if you are a Monkey Ninja, you gain abilities common to both. BUT, if you choose Ninja twice, you get all the Ninja abilities PLUS the ability to disappear in a puff of smoke. Just an example.

However, there should be some forbidden combinations such as Ninja Pirate and Dinosaur Monkey. Unless we can find a way to make it work and anyone playing as that combination has no place in the world.

[drawingfreak]

Robot Dinosaur?

[MrEdwardNigma]

How about this...

You have these options with any combination of two:
Ninja
Pirate
Robot
Dinosaur
Monkey
Zombie

Each option has its own unique talents and modifiers and what not. Choosing the same option twice gives you even more unique talents and modifiers. For example, if you are a Monkey Ninja, you gain abilities common to both. BUT, if you choose Ninja twice, you get all the Ninja abilities PLUS the ability to disappear in a puff of smoke. Just an example.

However, there should be some forbidden combinations such as Ninja Pirate and Dinosaur Monkey. Unless we can find a way to make it work and anyone playing as that combination has no place in the world.

Someone already suggested that. Perhaps you.

Anyways, this actually comes down to pretty much what I said (with the forbidden combinations thing added) only my system is somewhat neater and allows for Pirate Zombie Robots.

Or, you know, Pirate Zombie Monkeys.

[drawingfreak]

Someone already suggested that. Perhaps you.

Anyways, this actually comes down to pretty much what I said (with the forbidden combinations thing added) only my system is somewhat neater and allows for Pirate Zombie Robots.

Or, you know, Pirate Zombie Monkeys.

No, my earlier suggestion was race and class based, ala D&D...kinda.

My more recent contribution was more akin to my already existing home-made RPG.

If Ninjas get +1 to Stealth and Monkeys get +1 to Climb, then a Ninja Monkey would get both. However, a Double Ninja would get +2 to Stealth and then something unique to Double Ninjas.

Also, for more flavor...we could have factions based on what option is your primary and which is your secondary. A Ninja Monkey could be a human born within the Ninja Clans but taught himself the way of the Monkey. A Monkey Ninja would be a Monkey trained in the art of Ninjitsu.

[Lyndworm]

Very discomforting thought have crossed my mind...

I assure you, that was not an accident.

Personally, I like Dairun Cates' idea for classes the most.

I have my own idea of how the zombie disease should infect robots.

I absolutely agree on both suggestions. I support both Dairun's system and your zombie-robot theory. Gold I tell you, gold!

Zack

[Dairun Cates]

Obviously, I'm all for races and classes being one thing, but I can see it being required to pick pirate or ninja as part of the system as your base "class". I do think that you can come up with an entire set of abilities for just being a monkey though. Maybe you're a human with monkey abilities or just a monkey, but you're definitely in the monkey class.

I do think the idea of Robot Monkey Ninjas is pretty fun though.

We could extend your options from 2 to 3 (ie. Robot Monkey Ninja, Robot Robot Ninja, or Ninja Ninja Ninja), but the question arises of whether we consider 216 different possible combinations to be a good thing. With a skill system, it's not hard to just create 3 tiers of skills for each race and let the combinations arise, but balancing might be a bit harder.

Then again, I'm going to guess balancing isn't our primary concern here.

By the way, on the issue of Zombie Robots. Apparently Alastair Reynolds had something similar called the melding plague. It's more like a merging cancer, but it is VERY close to robot zombies.

[KingGolem]

I absolutely agree on both suggestions. I support both Dairun's system and your zombie-robot theory. Gold I tell you, gold!

Heh, thanks. I don't know about anybody else here, but when I think of "robot," as a sort of race, I think of the (sometimes vaguely) humanoid robots that you might see in a black and white B-rated sci-fi movie from the '20s or '30s. I happen to find the concept of such robots becoming zombies to be hilarious, particularly the ensuing mental comparison between a normal human zombie and a robot zombie:

Human Zombie: We've all seen them. Another shambling, corpse-like human with their arms outstretched moaning "...braaaaaiiiiinnnssss...BRAAAAIIIINSSS...!"

Robot Zombie: The aforementioned '20s-'30s era B-movie with outstretched arms tipped with snapping metal claws, a head with a single rectangular glowing red eye with the head spinning around and shooting sparks, in the state of disrepair described in my theory of zombie-robots, and lurching forward shouting in a slightly metallic tenor male voice: "BRAINS! BRAINS! BRAINS! BRAINS! BRAINS!" Of course, the robot wouldn't need brains, but it would still be freakin' awesome.


Ok, and now that my nerdy ramble on why I find robot zombies hilarious is over, I feel I must more accurately illustrate my stand on races/classes, due to the recent discussion on races and classes. Indeed, I feel that races and classes should be separate, and we should have racial paragon classes that require one to be a member of their chosen race. The ideal race and class lists would look something like this:

Races:
Humans
Monkeys
Dinosaurs
Zombies (template)
Robots (maybe we could make this a template, you know, for monkey robot ninjas and such)

A few things concern me. First of all, the race list seems a bit lacking, I think we could do with another race. I'm open to ideas, but the first race that comes to mind are werewolves. Sort of like a race of humans who have in-bred natural lycanthropy for so many generation that now they are a race separate from standard humans. Second of all, "dinosaurs" is a vague term, for there are many types of dinosaurs. My idea for making the dinosaur race would be something like having them come from a land full of different types of dinosaurs, but there is one particular type which has evolved sapience. I think they ought to look like T-rexes (the quintessential dinosaur), but only about 7' tall and with longer, less-useless arms.

Classes:
Pirates
Vikings
Ninjas
Monkey Paragon (monkeys only)
Dinosaur Paragon (dino's only)
Zombie Paragon (zombies only)
Robot Paragon (robots only)

This class list also concerns me. Once again, I feel that the list is lacking somewhat, and could use another non-paragon class. Perhaps some sort of bad-ass type who uses guns, motorcycles, and explosives, like the kind who star in movies with rediculous amounts of action, like The Transporter (admittedly, I've never seen that movie, but from the comercials it struck me as a movie that focused almost entirely on exploding cars ). Ooh, then you could play a robot bad-ass guy and be like the Terminator. On another issue, it has been discussed...by someone here that vikings should be just a variant of pirates, but I don't think so. Though they are indeed similar in their mode of operation, I think of pirates and vikings more like rogues and barbarians, respectively.



Aaaand...while typing this extremely long post, another thought occurs to me. Perhaps we have an even looser class/ability system. Perhaps, instead of trying to come up with all these class features, we make a big list of special abilities and powers balanced against each other that have their own pre-requisites. I think it should follow a template like this:

[Power Name]
Race: Maybe specific to races? I mean, maybe you don't have to take the Robot Paragon class to get some kind of robot-specific ability.
Class: Maybe just one class (like Pirate and then anything else), specific combinations (Like Viking/Robot Paragon), or for pures (like Ninja/Ninjas).
Description: What the power does, obviously.

Maybe we could work out some kind of point-based system to determine how many such powers you could accumulate. And I'll try to work out a nice table to determine EXACTLY how many class/race combinations powers could exist for.

[Dairun Cates]

Personally, I'm fine with filling in the classes and races a bit more. Although, I think I still like the idea of being able to do class combinations. It adds for a little more depth and flexibility with not much more work. So, I still support the 2 class idea with the possibility of doubling up on a class.

I'm literally tossing random ideas here, but...
Races:
-Some kind of Dark Shadowy Race that's writes bad poetry and claims badness is in their blood despite the fact that every other member of their race dual-wields scimitars and rebels

-As a foil, a race of people so heroic, it's sickening

-Vampires (if we have werewolves, of course)

-Catgirls

-Ghosts

-Carebears (roomate's suggestion)

Classes:
-Magic Casters

-Bandits

-Action Heroes

Obviously, taking too many dilutes the theme, but it's a good way to get ideas flowing.

For the record, I think of the cheesy sci-fi robots as well. There's just no other way to go. Real robots don't fit the theme as well as the blocky funny ones.

On abilities, I think point-buy is the way to go. You can either buy better hp or more skills. It's simple, it's flexible, and it's fun.

Also, that's pretty much what I was thinking on abilities as well. Pretty much down to the exact same template.

By the way, just a side note, but since we're being cinematic, I was considering instead of "you get to use this skill so many times a day" we might have skills cost temporary hp to use (HP that's lost but regenerates faster) or something similar. Basically, the idea is that you exhaust yourself using your big skills constantly, but you won't die if from getting knocked out. You're just too exhausted to fight anymore. They actually implemented this for the Slayers d20 spell-casting system and I always found it to be a great way to handle the issue. It allows for more flexible usage for skills while still limiting usage of higher level ones without using a superficial mp system.

Although, that's more mechanics and we should probably continue to focus on theme and races and such.

[mikeejimbo]

Personally, I'm fine with filling in the classes and races a bit more. Although, I think I still like the idea of being able to do class combinations. It adds for a little more depth and flexibility with not much more work. So, I still support the 2 class idea with the possibility of doubling up on a class.

I'm literally tossing random ideas here, but...
Races:
-Some kind of Dark Shadowy Race that's writes bad poetry and claims badness is in their blood despite the fact that every other member of their race dual-wields scimitars and rebels

-As a foil, a race of people so heroic, it's sickening

This reminds me of the campaign setting I was creating. The Humans were the people who were sickeningly heroic and the tieflings were the Dark Shadowy Emo race. (Drow were evil Elves who underwent an ascension ritual.)

Actually, while they might not be extremely applicable here, my race descriptions were quite humorous.

[Dairun Cates]

This reminds me of the campaign setting I was creating. The Humans were the people who were sickeningly heroic and the tieflings were the Dark Shadowy Emo race. (Drow were evil Elves who underwent an ascension ritual.)

Actually, while they might not be extremely applicable here, my race descriptions were quite humorous.

I think the big thing is that we get cultural icons that represent a HUGE spread of culture. I think the Dark Shadowy Emo Race might actually fit in for that perspective. It also seems to me like Race is definitely a personality choice.

Dinosaurs = Savages and untamed
Humans = Balanced
Robots = Cold and Logical
Zombies = Persistent and somewhat Mindless
Monkeys = Silly and Care-free

So, we might want to identify the personalities missing and find things to fit in there.

[drawingfreak]

Our Alignments? (found it randomly on Google)

[mikeejimbo]

I think the big thing is that we get cultural icons that represent a HUGE spread of culture. I think the Dark Shadowy Emo Race might actually fit in for that perspective. It also seems to me like Race is definitely a personality choice.

Dinosaurs = Savages and untamed
Humans = Balanced
Robots = Cold and Logical
Zombies = Persistent and somewhat Mindless
Monkeys = Silly and Care-free

So, we might want to identify the personalities missing and find things to fit in there.

Hmm, that's a good point. By this logic, I would be a Monkey Pirate. (Or a Pirate Monkey?) Vikings are another class of pirate? Maybe I'd be a Monkey Viking.

Also, I love how that image is a pentagram.