Onward - To New Frontiers! (Torchship Playtest Quest)

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CHARACTER SHEETS
RULES
LORE BIBLE (WIP)

Seriously y'all, this is an open_sketch/DragonCobolt quest. It's gonna get spicy.
We'll put all the NSFW stuff behind spoilers but like, for real.
Also also: There will be drug use in this quest, it's the space 60s. Many, but not all drugs will be fictional.​
 
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So, we're probably looking at spacetime fuckery, a computer glitch, or somebody lied.

I don't think a computer glitch would lead to very interesting stories,so it's probably not that. I guess you might lie to the humans so they resist less when you steal their ship and/or weapons, but it seems unlikely they would keep the lie going or the humans alive this long. So... Probably time fuckery?

[X] Contact the Runners, don't mention it, see what they do.

Let's see what they volunteer. Do they even remember that they acquired a human ship however many years back?

DragonCobolt said:
Sommer and Schwarzenberg both had their second child today
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Huh, this phrasing is interesting. It implies they both gave birth, but later it's implied there's only one baby. So, this might be a typo, but maybe the humans have started fusing together babies... For reasons?
 
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ancusohm said:
So, we're probably looking at spacetime fuckery, a computer glitch, or somebody lied.

I don't think a computer glitch would lead to very interesting stories,so it's probably not that. I guess you might lie to the humans so they resist less when you steal their ship and/or weapons, but it seems unlikely they would keep the lie going or the humans alive this long. So... Probably time fuckery?

[X] Contact the Runners, don't mention it, see what they do.

Let's see what they volunteer. Do they even remember that they acquired a human ship however many years back?



Huh, this phrasing is interesting. It implies they both gave birth, but later it's implied there's only one baby. So, this might be a typo, but maybe the humans have started fusing together babies... For reasons?
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Or two different people were pregnant simultaneously.
 
[X] Contact the Runners, express interest in the Siloship.

I'd like to take this opportunity to once again complement the writing and worldbuilding for Onward. This chapter was an excellent read. This has been a lot of fun, and is in my opinion what Star Trek only wishes it could be. It's like a love letter to the platonic idea of Star Trek, minus all the bits that makes it kind of suck in practice sometimes.
 
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[X] Contact the Runners, express interest in the Siloship.


If we don't mention it, they're going to get suspicious of why we aren't mentioning it when they recognize the design similarities. Be open about it, and just be clear that we're not out to repossess the ship.
 
@open_sketch

Looking at the rule change, I'm a little worried that lowering the floor on 'number of dice' to one will cause problems. Because that interacts with the crit-fail mechanics to make critical failure as likely as any success of any kind.

If you want players to be extremely wary of even attempting to use whatever combination of abilities would leave them with a dice pool of one, then that's "working as intended." But it does create some very punishing scenarios that are relevant in game design.

Especially if, for instance, the party deciding to collectively try something means everyone, including the person with a dice pool of one, has to roll. Or if there are situations that can force the party to roll such dice to see if they withstand some effect or something.

I apologize if I'm not having a nuanced enough understanding of your ruleset to see why this won't be a problem.
 
Simon_Jester said:
@open_sketch

Looking at the rule change, I'm a little worried that lowering the floor on 'number of dice' to one will cause problems. Because that interacts with the crit-fail mechanics to make critical failure as likely as any success of any kind.

If you want players to be extremely wary of even attempting to use whatever combination of abilities would leave them with a dice pool of one, then that's "working as intended." But it does create some very punishing scenarios that are relevant in game design.

Especially if, for instance, the party deciding to collectively try something means everyone, including the person with a dice pool of one, has to roll. Or if there are situations that can force the party to roll such dice to see if they withstand some effect or something.

I apologize if I'm not having a nuanced enough understanding of your ruleset to see why this won't be a problem.
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Well if everyone is rolling then those dice pools only help, since in collective action your treat all the dice as one pool and take the highest result.
 
Siloship
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    • If you have somebody who would only contribute one dice to something, it's often a better idea to think of something they'd be good at specifically instead of just adding them to the pile. It makes group checks a bit more nuanced.

    Also...



    Solar Patrol Siloship "Scorpion-4"
     
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    • open_sketch said:
    If you have somebody who would only contribute one dice to something, it's often a better idea to think of something they'd be good at specifically instead of just adding them to the pile. It makes group checks a bit more nuanced.
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    OK yeah, as long as the game engine isn't routinely forcing them to make those rolls because the alternative is mechanically bad in some other way. It's workable in the right context, but it'd really stink if you had to do it in a situation like rolling saving throws in D&D, or where the only way the party can deal with a situation is for everyone to independently roll checks in the same thing and you have to argue about which thing, with a zero-sum game because some characters are hilariously weak in one area and others in another.
     
    [X] Contact the Runners, express interest in the Siloship.

    Sorry to be that guy, in case it was explained and I didn't catch it, but what are "Runners"?
     
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    CallmeIshma3l said:
    [X] Contact the Runners, express interest in the Siloship.

    Sorry to be that guy, in case it was explained and I didn't catch it, but what are "Runners"?
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    It's in the lore document.

    Essentially, roaming fleets thst are running from some cataclysm.

    Runners
    Runners are the remains of a civilization which now lives entirely aboard spacecraft, with no meaningful planetary element. In common parlance, runners are distinct from regular refugee flotillas in that they aren't going anywhere specific: they have no intent to settle another world and build surface infrastructure again, perhaps indefinitely.


    Runners are, like hiders, usually a result of catastrophic destruction within their society, or the threat thereof. Where hiders become convinced the solution is to avoid detection, runners believe that they must always be ready, as a people, to flee danger. Some runners are actively being chased, while others are on the move as a precaution.


    Runner fleets are frequently enormous and often grow larger with time, with the largest consisting of tens or even hundreds of thousands of ships sourced from across the galaxy. This makes fighting them an unappetizing proposition, but simultaneously the lack of a safe haven for the civilization population and the individual vulnerability of obsolete or damaged ships disincentivizes aggression from the migrants. They'll win any fight, but at staggering cost.


    Runner fleets typically make long, meandering journeys through space, crossing through the beacon networks of dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of interstellar states. Most civilizations are willing to let runners pass, as they make excellent trade partners and sources of intelligence, often bringing information about unknown civilizations on the far side of a rival's borders. Runner life is usually very difficult, and they tend to shed defectors or found small colonies along their path as dissidents jump ship.


    When runner fleets finally fragment, they are frequently the origin of pirate enclaves.
     
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    CallmeIshma3l said:
    [X] Contact the Runners, express interest in the Siloship.

    Sorry to be that guy, in case it was explained and I didn't catch it, but what are "Runners"?
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    "Runners" and "Hiders" are recurring dead end states for spacefaring civilizations. Hiders are ones who hunker down in a few hidden locations and cut themselves off from the rest of the universe. Runners are ones who become perpetual space nomads.
     
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    Leila Hann said:
    "Runners" and "Hiders" are recurring dead end states for spacefaring civilizations. Hiders are ones who hunker down in a few hidden locations and cut themselves off from the rest of the universe. Runners are ones who become perpetual space nomads.
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    Are they a dead end though?

    The description notes that they tend to sprout small colonies along their path, indicating that Runner fleets are more of a civilizational reproduction strategy than a dead end.
     
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