Lloyd Dupont

I am going to conclude (in a while) my current fantasy scenario with player awakening in the respawn room, and "slowly remembering" it's all a simulation and awakening in Habitat 47... 😮 

Hopefully it will be a cool segway! 😄 

Well.. we are not there yet... 🙂

By the way the expansion of the universe will not go, as far as I understand it, from affecting intergalactic distance to suddenly breaking atoms, it's a progression I believe. Eventually it will separate galaxies, then star system then, later (I think), it will start dismantle matter, atoms, everything. Blackholes will be last, I reckon, but I dunno for sure.
Story is almost at the stage of separating star systems, good spot of a nice science plot. Additionally stars that are left ran out of energy and died, this is truly the end of times.

However.. Science was not my inspiration here to be honest 😮  my primary creative driver, so to speak, was to find a story where players start with everything imaginable at their finger tips, to fast forward to the end.... This is the end.

Speaking of which, reminder of a PCs fact, they are "ascended", i.e. they are not even normal life form anymore, i.e. they will have about 50 super hero points, and also unknown to them, they forgot, "1 extra life". Part of the thematic end story. The only "downside" is power does not regenerate in this story, another side of the end of times theme.

ok, you totally misread the first post. It is now confirmed!
I dont think I was that unclear... I just re-read what I wrote and I think it's understandable.. I think...

the transuniverse drive has nothing to do with the blackhole, obviously! 
the nihilist want to plunge into the blackhole to end with a bang!
(and the PC will try to stop them.. perhaps?)
but the totally unrelated transuniversal drive is an unfinished project they will learn on their way to the control center. which is here to give an alternate hopeful ending. however it will require some engineering and cant carry the whole habitat with whatever current resources are there.

So. Step 1, avoid blackhole. Step 2, build transuniversal drive. Step 3, be gods in a whole new universe!

Thinking to rename that story "The End of Eternity" by the way.

Also, but arguably it was less clear, you also misread the tone of the story. It's not SCI-fi, it's scifantasy. I mean come on, didn't the transuniversal drive gave that away? And what about "ascended lifeform with super power"? And what about downloading one's consciousness from a physical body into a virtual reality and back?
You totally missed the train on those! 😮 
The latest, since you are... apparently unfamiliar with it, is a common scifi trope nowadays, read the like of Peter F. Hamilton, John Scalzi (sometimes), Iain M. Banks for example.
 

Anyway a blackhole ship strike me as even be physically realistic provided one can do an actual FTL Alcubiere drive - i.e a drive that bend spacetime in such way that it goes faster than light, which that kind of end of time fictional super civilization would totally do as well.
Regardless there is no blackhole proof ship in this story, on the contrary. Hence the need to stop it from happening.
 

You game an idea though.. I might introduce space time wave which might cause.. some strange effect every now and then, have to think of it some more... 🙂

Thanks for asking. Yes I was thinking of a time when the expansion of the universe separated everything from everything else...

Since we are getting technical here.. there will be a time were (or when) every celestial body would be alone in an ever expanding empty universe, but still holding up together (according to our current understanding, dark energy is still a mystery after all). Celestial body and blackhole dissolve a little later, time might also lost its meaning without any matter left. Anyway this is the day... Blackhole still do exists then, for a little more, and what a way to go!

But you do need faster than light ship to go anywhere and the best of the best of the bestest navigation system to navigate to any specific point of interest, which the habitat has both btw.

Obviously there are more habitats, but they too are lost beyond the cosmic event horizon, going faster than light, trillion of light years away, much harder to reach...

No the civilization has not found a way to stop the universe expansion.. there is little energy left to do anything, were this a possibility... I guess that could be an alternate plot, but this is not my plot! 🙂

1 hour ago, svensson said:

So, scanning the answers given here, nobody can 'duck into the matrix' and wait out evolution. If Habitat 47 dies, the matrix dies. So nobody gets to wait out anything. They either fight against entropy on the chance they might die or they give up and die anyway, binary solution.

Confused here... if they go in to the alternate universe.. they can wait for it to cool down in the matrix.. in the end there is difficulty but hope.. perhaps they could be gods of a whole new universe..
The start is a bit dreadful.. but the end is rather hopeful, wouldn't you say? 😮 

48 minutes ago, Bill the barbarian said:

I know Doctor Who covers this idea a few times over a few doctors so this might be worth a lookup.

Wow. Nice... 🙂
Now... which one of the... 10,000 episodes?! 😮

55 minutes ago, svensson said:

What I'd like to know is this, 'the matrix' has to have a physical location somewhere. There has to be a power source, servers, something physical to preserve the personality 'engrams' with netherworld of electronic life. But if somebody drives the last habitat into a black hole, and that habitat contains the physical plant of the matrix, how would anyone stay alive?

I mean nobody dies inside the matrix, that's part of its programming. I was just talking PC can have fight in the matrix with other thing in the matrix. But they wouldn't die then!
But yes, its physical medium is on the ship.. and it will disappear, and all its life be snuffed...

55 minutes ago, svensson said:

Wow. THAT'S a happy one.... 😁

Haha.. yes, when I thought about it I think it might be pretty grim and PCs might even want to run into the blackhole as well.... hence I might have some hopeful supporting NPC and the second more hopeful discovery of a multiverse drive along the way! 😄

The initial idea is why always wait for the end of a long campaign to get the latests toys, lets run to the very end from the start!
And I came up with that... If they make it to the whole new universe and though of preparing for initial very adverse condition the end would be, you are alive in a whole new universe and you are its new gods now...

An idea of scenario hit me yesterday... and I thought to share it 🙂 

I call it the "End of Days" an extreme scifi mega dungeon.

So the players are on Habitat 47. A basic rotating cylinder of concrete and steel space habitat. There is no longer any star or planet or anything. Only empty unlimited cold darkness. The habitat is one of the first and one of the last, thanks to its simple energy efficient design. Where it comes from has long be forgotten though. Despite that even the space habitat itself is slowly undertaking decay. In some section the auto repair bot run dormant or out of energy. In some other they have grown hostile. But mostly inactive unless someone walks by.

Character would be end of time life form. Perhaps humanoid... But they have a huge internal source of energy (like... 200?) but only replenish if they find food. They can use it to use "power" or regenerate HP. They can cannibalize weapon or power supply to eat.. but then there is that much less resources... Player would be ascended obviously (i.e. they have access to psionic and super power), and they can find scifi weapon and armor, but all them will run out of energy.

Some people have given up physical body and live the matrix entirely. You cant die in the matrix, and its very lively. But it has little impact on the real world Though some part of spaceship (like critical locks) are controlled through it and guarded by powerful AI, the AI doesnt kill, of course, but when you die you either respawn very far, or perhaps get imprisoned, or perhaps got disconnected and access point disabled for you. And most access point to the Matrix are broken, of course.

The plot is that some nihilist group, despaired of the slow decay is committing suicide by diving the habitat towards a black hole (according to ancient map, hard to know whether its true in this empty darkness). And part 1 would be trying to reach control center and going away from the black hole. On the way they will learn of some research for a multiverse drive extension, that would enable the cylinder to go to a whole new universe, full of energy. Which would lead to a part 2 finding the design.. ultimately it is in the matrix. Modifying the drive would require resource and fight crazy auto repair bot. and cut the habitat in 2, and sacrificing many (the multiverse drive cant carry all) or maybe make an escape vessel....

The ending could be dying in a fiery ball of intense energy after crossing the veil between universe...... Or, if extra preparation has been taken, wait in the matrix, for a new universe to cool down enough for life... Or maybe die in a black hole if the nihilist won....

so.. critic is art with the book and lack of setting?

ha well, no wonder I didnt noticed, I dont care much about both of those! ^_^

What's wrong with Magic World?
It's pretty clean I thought ... 😮
(TBH I don't play Magic Word exactly, but I am inspired by it, even for my -still work in progress - scifi settings 😮 )

3 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Yeah, I know, based on some of your other threads. That's why I throwing out everything so that you have lots of options to pick and choose from.

In that case what is the benefit of the critical? How is it better than normal attack vs. normal defense?

yea... something didn't add up indeed.. 

I was too focused on Cyberpunk 2077 and not enough on BRP. In case of crit attack vs normal defense, you got normal success, reduced by armor AND the special effect 🙂 

5 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

Since criticals in BRP games  tend to be rather deadly  even to highly skilled characters

I am making my own combat system (I mean similar to all those D100 games around, with some personal touch), at any rate, about BRP specifically, crit attack vs normal defence: normal damage and armor applies. So not that bad really...

Interesting... 
I am already using the general idea of sacrificing 5SR for 10% bonus...

Mmmm... I might put that in my wanna be list of stunts.. which might or might not see the light of day if I got it long enough... 
(and yes I did look at the pirate supplement, but only a few stunt took my fancy, and I need some non combat one)

cool ideas... 🙂

this also allow for an unlimited amount of success (if your skill can go high?) .. and I am not sure I like it either... I might limit the number of success to 3 or 4 anyway. But it matters in case of contested roll.. I limit to, say 4, more success than the opposition...

2 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

One concern I'd have with that method is that it would require a certain skill score to achieve certain success levels. For instance, someone with Sword 20% can't make a skill roll by 30% let alone 60% or 90%. It will also make a 30% difference in skills much more decisive, as it will result in more success levels. For example someone with 120% skill will average 1 success level more than someone with 90%.

 

I'm not saying it's a bad method, just that it will really change things.

Yes, I mention that in that my original post... and divided about it...

24 minutes ago, Mugen said:

What do you mean ?

If I roll 30 and my skill is 75, did I succeed by 30 (I read the die) or 45 (I subtract 30 from 75) ?

Neither mechanism is really new. 

Warhammer 4th edition uses Margins of Success (the subtractive mechanism) and so did old french games Légendes and Premières Légendes in the 80s.

The other one is partly used in Pendragon (as a tie breaker), and in Fading Suns 3 first editions. Latest edition of Nephilim uses the 10s of the roll to determine the degree of success.

IMO, margins of succes are too much of a hassle to be fun. For instance, just to do one opposed roll, you need to do 3 subtractions :

-Subtract attacker's roll from his skill.

-Do the same for the defender.

-Subtract result 2 from result 1.

Simply reading the die is quicker, and is mathematically identical, but requires that you use a counter intuitive mindset, where lower is better in some cases but not always.

La critic here are either a fix range (like 01-05) or a divider of the skill percentage.

But I though to myself why divide for critic, why not use simple difficulty modifier.

Difficulty modifiers are not new. But I have not see them mention once for degree of success in this thread.

One idea I had this morning in bed...

Instead of dividing the base score.. we could succeed by a number, such as more than 30%, 60%, 90%, etc...
Of course this is very different since it allow any number of level of success instead of fixed 2 or 3 or 4 (depending)...

What's  'Manifest Destiny' ?

At any rate I wanted to avoid endemic horror enemy like in horror game like CoC. And a big bad like Mass Effect seems either too to be usex for only 1 (long) adventure or not really have its place in MoO...
(hey MoO has antarian, which are big interdimensional bugaboo... but they only comes now and then and destroy whole planet in just 1 interstellar raid.. and the game, just like MoO, has not that many planet that can afford to be destroyed for the sake of story...)

But my initial vision of the future was way too peaceful for an adventurers to exists...
But Cyberpunk nailed it! And I hate corporations too! 😄

And thouh it still rub me wonrg to see an hyper advanced future society with endemic urban violence (I tend to believe it would ruin all technological and infrastucture progress), hey, it;s just a game. And also, if one start with no public police force and health worker, only private one, urban violence doesnt  have much reason NOT to happen.. so not too hard to NOT disbelieve.. 😄

In my quest of finding repeating encounter / enemy in my scifi - Master of Orion - work in very long progress setting I am edging towards a Cyberpunk 2077 like society.
You know powerful soulless mega-corporations, and urban tribalism.

However, I'd like to put in some government setting from Master of Orion,. I.e. Human have "democracy", Bulrathi have "militaristic dictatorship", Psilon have "technocratic dictaorship", Elerian have mystic Monarchy Feodalism. 

Actually Elerian are fine. And as I formulate the question I start to have some idea... but the question was how would those government / society differ? How would it impact the gameplay experience?
Any tip?! 😄

As I am asking here is the idea I just came up with!

Those society would look relatively similar at ground level. But the top official agenda and propaganda would be different.
For instance:
- Human would be like America, i.e. let's invade this country (ahem rich in resource) to restore peace and order and bring democracy (and get money)!
- Bulrathi would be like, for the glory of Emperor, this planet must be subjugated (and the Emperor made glorious again)!
- Psilon would this planet is rich in resource we need and neglected by this primitive civilization, we need acquire it (this would improve our research by 7.3%!).

The Elerian would be leading by beloved leaders, really, they use psionic to infuse you with love and devotion!! And each leader will have its own agenda!....

this give me some inspiration for mor clarity / better wording on some part of my homebrew rule booklet for Master of Orion! 😄

I agree with you Nick...

However it could be argued, if the skill percentage range i between 1 to 100 (i.e. no skill value beyond 100%), using all tens (i.e, 10, 20, 30, ...) as critical avoid any Math and is almost equivalent to skill/10% critical threshold. Good for Math challenged players! 🙂 

And this flipping dice mechanic, as far as I understand, is when using luck point to change failure into success, I am sure you are fine with luck point! 🙂

I am confused by this sentence though "under certain conditions (such as a critical hit) you flip the digits", this does seem pointless...

28 minutes ago, g33k said:

No; or at least, not the one I was thinking of.  EP certainly goes above 100, for example.

But I remember finding a little b&w 100-ish page RPG ... somewhere ... that was  VERY  BRP-alike, but (I think) was "d99" instead of d100, and used doubles-are-extra as described.

maybe the Sabre RPG?

Sabre RPG is cool.. but it definitely have classes and sort of level... (which is a feature purposely avoided by BRP)

It well written, quite detailed though 🙂

21 minutes ago, Mugen said:

2000% was the required skill level to be a member of that "caste" in RQ3 Gods of Glorantha. 🙂

It was obviously not meant as a goal for PCs.

Also, I can't answer for @Kloster, but my understanding was that his answer wasn't only about when two characters are opposed, either in combat or other situations, but a general remark about the chances for a "master" to get superior success thanks to his very high skill. I also personally don't think there's anything inherently silly for two masters to reach a skill level so high they have 95% (remember the automatic failure on 96+ rule in RQ) chance to roll a crit. Surely not a very exciting situation in play, though.

I dont mind the mostali master having 100% crit chance in most cases.... I mean when 2 mostali master face each other in fencing, .. I guess it's a matter of personal fantasy at this stage... but I wouldn't give them 100% crit both on first missed parry... in effect I would apply the antiparry malus that reduce bot to 100% when facing each other... 🙂

also.. pardon me.. but this is the BRP subsection.. and I will confess my ignorance of most things Glorantha and mostali master.. 😮 

though, to be fair, around 1992 I believe, I bought the RQ3 God and Glorantha book!! But I left it in France long time ago, and forgot it all! ^^