sladethesniper

That is a great list...I like the ideas. As I am not a connoisseur of pulp/Victorian stories, I can offer no additional personalities, but I do like this... -STS

This is the in-game justification I use for why cybernetics cause mental issues...please note that these are for augmentation (abilities far above human norm) as opposed to simple replacement (abilities equivalent to human norm). "Augmentation is another stimulus that causes beings that gain excessive amounts of cybernetic/ biomagical enhancements to gain a mental axis. Although some of these are beneficial, most of them are not. The reason that they are so harmful is that it reduces a characters ability to empathize with fellow biological beings. The root of these problems is that as a being transcends their original limits, they begin to feel less and less like they used to. This is especially true for those who gain sensory, neurological or musculature enhancements. The issue is that they can no longer interact with the world in the same way. For example, when a being gains thermal vision, they lose the ability to see colors as others of their race can. Within a few years they will forget what colors really are. They typically have horrible fashion sense, since a shirt is a shirt, and whether it is day glow pink or black will have no impact on whether they wear it or not. Thus, their manner of dress is comical or they have someone pick their clothes for them or they have lots of clothes in the same color. Auditory boosts typically have a tendency to make beings much more cynical since they can hear people whisper under their breath, or what they whisper to each other behind their backs. Those with sensitive auditory systems usually have very few friends. The same can be said for those beings with naturally good hearing such as the Sheng'po or Lupines. Auditory boosts also turn beings into insomniacs, since every small sound interrupts their sleep. Tactile boosted beings have a tendency to be fastidious about their cleanliness and their apparel. Rough fabrics drive them crazy, irritants such as poison ivy, sunburn, bug bites, extreme heat or extreme cold are debilitating to them. In addition they cannot sleep unless under very fine fabrics such as silk. Other fabrics are too scratchy and too heavy to sleep under. Beings who have boosted smell have a tendency to sniff the air. There is a huge amount of information carried by scents and those who can gather that information need to collect it, and sadly, sniffing does that. This is a disconcerting behavior when done by those races that it is not common practice to do so. Those with boosted smell also typically have a hatred of spicy food. They seem to prefer extremely bland meals. Gustatory boosted individuals have many of the same proclivities, although they have to lick surfaces to gain information. This is a drawback for social as well as safety reasons. Nothing quite like licking some nerve agent droplets. Neurological systems make people move fast, faster than they want to sometimes. For instance, the time it takes to stop an impulse, such as punch your boss when he is pissing you off is far too slow when you have boosted reflexes. The nature of the enhancement makes those who possess it seem to be twitchy. They constantly have to force themselves to not do things. A stimulus causes a reaction, and there is rarely enough time to "stop" yourself from doing something stupid. Those with neurological upgrades also have a tendency to have a very short attention span. Constantly needing stimulus, they are commonly insomniacs, and are extremely fidgety. Always tapping fingers, gnawing on pencils, tapping their feet and bouncing around, they are not the people you need on an ambush line or conducting surveillance. They lack the ability to just be still. Adrenaline boosters are even worse. Everything makes you overreact, then you are tired. Constantly switching between adrenaline fueled mania and exhaustion; a boosted individual is not good company. They have a tendency to be moody and emotional wrecks. Musculature boosts come in two types...permanent and temporary. Temporary boosts are caused by chemical infusion throughout the body, typically testosterone, endorphins and adrenaline, all of which cause an individuals' mental state to become unbalanced. Becoming freakishly strong, rage filled and immune to pain is a good thing when engaged in covert operations gone bad and you are alone, outnumbered and behind enemy lines. It is not a good thing when you are meeting your soon to be in laws for the first time and their dog annoys you by biting you heels! A permanent muscle boost causes its own set of problems. With more muscle tissue, a being has to eat a lot of protein. For a human who gains a small boost, it is not that much of an issue, just eat another meal. For a troll who gains a large boost...they eat constantly. Not snacks, but full meals. Expect to triple or quadruple the cost of food every month as they eat, and eat, and eat. If a being lives with other beings in a sort of "safe house", then there will likely be arguments about who drank all the milk, ate all the dog food, and made a huge mess in the kitchen. Permanently strength boosted beings are also notorious for breaking things. Glasses, dishes, sensitive electronic or mechanical or magical items are not built to be handled by overly strong beings, and they break easily." I also have justifications for addiction to magic, why adventurers are usually crazy (murder-hobos with PTSD) and how high level skills can make you less fun at parties. tl;dr...cyber augmentation makes you crazy (so does magic and being a murder-hobo). -STS

Several questions: 1) What form of magic is most common in your games? Sorcery, magic or Elric style summoning? 2) How do you adjudicate magic resistance for PCs or NPCs? Do you allow it at all? I am looking through the BGB, Elric, CoC and RQ looking for how to do it, and not really finding any ruling on it. 3) For your games, do the balance issues between non-magic users and magic users arise? I ask because in BRP games that I have been in do not seem to have the imbalance in between fighters & mages that other games have (specifically the D&D "linear fighters, quadratic wizards" trope) Thanks. -STS

This would be an interesting tidbit of strange for a modern CoC campaign: Strange monument mysteriously shows up in front of Paseo area restaurant | KFOR.com -STS

Sounds very very interesting. I will post more this weekend when I have a chance to read through it. Thank you! -STS

Personally, the best aspect of BRP is the simple mechanics of the system. While there are some things that come up in gaming that are not well covered by BRP, it is extremely easy to extrapolate from the basic rules which leads to a fast paced, exciting game session, which is kind of the point. As a combat heavy simulation, BRP is not the game to go to...nor does it do magic/psionics/powers especially well...BUT, BRP is also so easy to import things from other systems into it, that it is like the universal recipient of gaming systems. So, simplicity and "import-ability" of other game systems are the strengths of BRP in my opinion. Something else, a bit niche perhaps but... In BRP you can take something you see on TV, a novel, a computer game and make it in BRP and use it in your game. With other games you have to wonder about this power, that skill, random ability X and Y and how many HP it has or whether a particular class or build or ability meets with the requirements laid down in some book... BRP does NOT have this problem. You can easily translate from any source material into BRP and that is just one more strength for the system. -STS

c/p from my homebrew rules that may be of use here: Because BRP Vhraeden has no level system, it is somewhat challenging for a novice GM to set the appropriate amount of challenge for a group of characters. This is easily remedied by use of Ability Levels. There are 10 Ability Levels, and they are appropriate for characters as well as NPC's. A beginning character is usually considered Average or Above Average. The Ability Level is determined by adding together all of the percentages of a beings skills, abilities, and statistic checks. That number is the Ability Level for that being. Ability Level Descriptor 0% to 1000% Novice, max skill 30% 1000% to 1200% Rookie, max skill 40% 1201% to 1400% Green , max skill 45% 1401% to 1600% Trained, max skill 50% 1601% to 2000% Average, max skill 55% 2001% to 2500% Above Average, max skill 60% 2501% to 3000% Experienced, max skill 70% 3001% to 3500% Elite, max skill 80% 3501% to 4000% Expert, max skill 90% 4501% to 5000% Awesome, max skill 95% 5001%+ World Class, max skill 98% or above depending on setting By using this you can see how a world class character is at least 5 times as powerful as a novice or a rookie, but remember that this is only as an individual...a world class character will almost never be alone, they will usually have at least one Awesome cohort and several Experts or at the very least Elites in tow. They also have huge amounts of resources which allow them access to all sorts of ability boosting goodies. This is important to remember, since many RPG's have the idea that a “major character” must have freakish ability scores and ridiculous amounts of "power" in order to be important. That theory is utterly ridiculous. If an enemy warlord has a high leadership skill and actually delivers on his promises to his subordinates, there is no reason why a very “low level” NPC can not command the undying loyalty of some very high level cohorts. This is essential to understand when creating NPC’s for you characters to interact with. A major foil does not need to be an insanely old, ridiculously powerful warlord or wizard, but it could simply be their neighbor who knows somebody that owes them a favor or two. (Basically it turns it into a point buy system) -STS

Congratulations! -STS

Agreed. -STS

Trying to make a system of difficulty for BRP has been somewhat difficult in the 20 years I have been playing the game. What I usually end up doing is basing my enemies off the stats of the PC's. For weaker combats -20% off the highest combat score of the PC's is what I have found to be a simple rule of thumb. For a good threat combat -10% off the highest combat skill is good. For an epic combat, combat skills = to those of the PCs will make for high adventure. More important is the number of enemies compared to the number of PCs. less that the PCs will be a low threat encounter, equal numbers is a good fight (even with slightly lower combat stats), and more enemies than PCs is a good way to get them killed, especially in a modern setting where they can be engaged by multiple threats simultaneously (two or three guys opening up with shotguns or on burst/full auto will pretty much ensure that 1 PC per round is going down). This is how people are trained...pick the biggest threat and engage it till it dies...spreading out damage evenly is poor tactics. Additionally with bigger numbers of NPCs vs smaller PC groups is that they can use fire and maneuver to lay on the hurt and unless the PCs gain and maintain the initiative...they will be reacting to the NPCs and with the fast pace of combat in BRP, they may have little to no time to reverse that trend. -STS

How I do it... Weapons have a straight damage causing capability (the dice rolled). Armor has a straight armoring capability which reduces or eliminates damage from the incoming attack. Damage that is stopped may still cause blunt trauma to the target. Ammunition can make weapons penetrate armor better (such as AP rounds) or worse (such as glaser safety slugs, reverse wadcutter, etc.) The rationale is that weapons start off with a set amount of energy, and the more stuff it penetrates, it has to expend energy to get through it, thus leaving less energy to damage the target. Granted, this is gross oversimplification of wounding mechanisms, but for games it is good enough. Not having a copy of the game you refer to in the OP, my benchmarks for damage are: 1" of penetration in flesh = 1 point of damage 1 mm of Iron = 1 point of damage 0.5mm of RHA = 1 point of damage I have a pretty long list of weapon damages and armor types that I can PM you if wish. -STS

I have CthulhuTech and I love the setting...sort of a ROBOTECH meets Cthulhu vibe...but the non BRP rules left me cold...so I had to rework all the rules, which was not really worth it really...but the background material was nice...but trying to work the dhohanids and tagers was a royal pain...the rules had more in common with Storyteller and Palladium than they did BRP... -STS

Pulp CoC?? Where is this fabled book? A question on the BRP Pulp book, does it have any rules for Mad Science or Steampunk? If so, I will buy this... -STS

Well, I bought HEX and although the flavor text was pretty good, I think that I am still going to go with a psuedo-planar type thing: There are several permanent gates to different locations (similar to how the Plateau of Leng is coterminous with both Earth and the Cold Wastes)... The gates I have set up so far: Plateau of Leng = Cold Wastes North Polar Gate = Atvatabar (is inside a dyson sphere, thus why it is a "hollow earth", just not inside our Earth) Gharne = The Underdark (is a rogue planet...has no atmosphere, thus the only way to survive is by being deep underground)...sort of permanent hellish prison for entire races... Congo = Arcadia (filled with elves, a joyous place...that is constantly at war) Valley of Borovia = Ravenloft Need a place for this gate = Commoraugh Still going to need an adventure, but I think that I am going to use Dr. Leviticus Blue's "Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine" as the McGuffin... Plus, the group is already familiar with planar horror, seeing as how they are stuck in Ravenloft double dealing Strahd and Azalin... Ideas welcome for plots. -STS

OK, going to be taking the CoC/Ravenloft game back to Earth and will wanting to do a "Hollow Earth" style adventure.... Does anyone know of any good Hollow Earth type stuff? I am torn between doing a classic hole in the ground Hollow Earth or turning into a psudeo-planar game where The Underdark is basically a planar location that connects to Arcadia/Commorragh/etc. and the Illithids are the underground dwelling larval form of Star Spawn... Ideas? -STS

Stuck in Barovia, ran afoul of Dr. Mordenheim who pretty much trashed our PC's... Monk got turned into a were-lynx The steampunk engineer had his mini-robot grafted onto his left side so now he is a "1/2 golem" Van Richten now has a limp and some other wierdness (but as the GMPC, we don't really know what is going on with him) Catherine had a soul transfer with Mordenheim's wife After the good doctor had his fun, we were thrown away as failures into a boat with other "failures" like some psuedo zombies and other fun things. Got off the boat, met a nice lady, got attacked by were wolves, and finally made it to Barovia. Made nice with the townsfolk and bought up two kids that were going to have their hands chopped off since they were thieves. Met the local anti-vampire secret society, then went to meet Strahd. The PC's tried to BS him, but shocker, he saw threw it. Zephraim, the steampunk inventor started groveling and we didn't get killed and Morgan the monk was able to get Strahd to merely give us amulets that allow him to watch what we do instead of ghoul us. Off we go to find Azalin and determine the truth of this "Grand Conjunction", whatever that is... -STS

Hi all, Currently playing CoC after a loooong hiatus. The set up is as follows: I run one story arc, then the wife runs the next story arc, then me, repeat.. The characters are: A protege of Abraham van Hellsing named Rudolf van Richten (the GMPC) An acolyte of the London Arcanum Chantryhouse named Morgan (no last name, he is an orphan) Catherine, a detective from Scotland Yard Zephraim, a steampunk inventor We have gone through 2 PC's already (one is in a coma, the other is taking care of her father who got attacked) as well as 2 main NPC's that were helping us out. Wandered around London for 3 seesion, fought vampires, burned a chantryhouse down, got beat down, stole an airship, blew up a castle, crashed an airship, fought vampires, messed up a spell and "killed" 5 of our allies. The group was supposed to try and stop the resurrection of Count Dracula in Transylvania, but jacked it up and ended up in Barovia (yes, Ravenloft) When we get back from Barovia in about 8-10 sessions, we will have two main issues... 1) Set up the Hellsing Society 2) depending on the events in Barovia we will either fight the Cult of the Skinless One in Egypt or have to team up with Dracula to keep Strahd down Anyway, keep on losing sanity! -STS

For realism, it is a good deal, but with combat already the slowest part of gameplay it just slows it down more. -STS

Savage Sword of Conan for "savage worlds" + Elric or Stormbringer would get you what you want. The first file is about 90% fluff and some rules for making stuff more Hyborean...the Elric/Stormbringer would be the meat of the game. That is what I am using. -STS

Yeah, I have the original version too. Lots of good material to work with, but converting that system was PAINFUL...I went with LUG Trek/FASA Trek instead and using PD as background. -STS

I use BRP for my super's game. I stat the NPC's out and let the casualties fall where they may...STR of 70? No problem... DEX of 38, you got it. If you can kill with a punch, so be it. What this means is that I have a super's game, but it does not follow the super genre... To make a super genre BRP is difficult, but to have (for lack of a better term) realistic supers, it works fine. It works for me. -STS

THAT was NOT Funny!!!! The wife and I were quite upset at that thought...get your damn dirty d20's off my BRP! -STS

I have been doing this for years. Started with Palladium and Call of Cthulhu (BRP), which was actually pretty easy. Eventually, I threw in the World of Darkness, then everything else. Right now, my three bookshelves of RPG's are all able to fully combined into BRP with the help of several files on my computer covering weapons damage, skill transfers, combat, and character creation. Converting game systems has been a hobby of mine for a while. It can be rewarding and frustrating at times. What I can say is that one of the best parts to convert is character creation. That is actually the "meat of the game" which will allow you to explore a setting. Converting combat systems is a pain and not really worth it Converting equipment is nice, but only do the stuff that can't be found in your "base system". Setting conversion is nice as well, such as smashing RIFTS: Vampire Kingdoms and WOD: V:tM together, but you might end up with some very odd results. Good luck! -STS

I have been doing this for years. Started with Palladium and Call of Cthulhu (BRP), which was actually pretty easy. Eventually, I threw in the World of Darkness, then everything else. Right now, my three bookshelves of RPG's are all able to fully combined into BRP with the help of several files on my computer covering weapons damage, skill transfers, combat, and character creation. Converting game systems has been a hobby of mine for a while. It can be rewarding and frustrating at times. What I can say is that one of the best parts to convert is character creation. That is actually the "meat of the game" which will allow you to explore a setting. Converting combat systems is a pain and not really worth it Converting equipment is nice, but only do the stuff that can't be found in your "base system". Setting conversion is nice as well, such as smashing RIFTS: Vampire Kingdoms and WOD: V:tM together, but you might end up with some very odd results. Good luck! -STS

I run open ended skill lists. Almost anything can be a skill, along with my favorite skills ever seen "Flail about wildly 40%" and "Kick your ass 98%". For my own campaigns I have characters with about 15 skills and others with about 40... I have found that character type really seems to affect skill # as well as genre. Experts have less skills but are very good at them, whereas a normal person has a huge variety of skills at minimal proficiency. SciFi has more things thus more skills and cave men don't really have need of a lot of skills, but the ones they do have, they need to be pretty good at. For my homebrew game, I had about 100+ skills available for use. -STS