g33k

No, Chaosium doesn't DO updates when there is nothing new to say. They were working on it last time, they aren't changing that, so they're STILL working on it (they'd have announced a cancellation). Read the most recent from Rick, a dozen or so posts upthread from this post ... It discusses that "when will book <X> be out" is something they just cannot answer.

Unfortunately, it did not. This -- and other similarly nutjob-origin theories -- are out in the wild. 💩💩 As witness the sub-topic -- right here in this thread -- where multiple theories are being reported as currently-believed, by multiple people. 🤡

Gadzooks, sir, but you're right!! That quirky little gem /most/definitely/ should count!

It's one of the 3 most-advanced (furthest-along, closest to printing) RQ projects that Jeff has! Why would he abandon all that work???!?

Not to mention the thing where Prax/etc mostly experience Inora from when she's NOT Stasis-ing on her mountain-tops! Does she have some twin sister, or maybe a transformation myth? Or ... ?

That was, to put it bluntly, "fake news." Someone speculated, "hey maybe it could have been..." and the fearmongers picked it up and ran with it as if it were proven fact. I'll even go on to caution you that -- if your news feeds have fed you that "misinformation" and not corrected to the real info -- you may be relying on news that intentionally pursues fearmongering over facts; it's the profitable model of producing "news" these days. https://www.cancerhealth.com/article/tracking-coronavirus-epidemic-wuhan-world https://fullfact.org/health/new-coronavirus-not-genetically-engineered/ documents misreporting in the Daily Express: https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/theory-that-coronavirus-escaped-from-a-lab-lacks-evidence-67229

No, no, NO... you blinkin' Barbarian!!! The excuse is, "Jus' drawing a portrait": O-<--<| <sheesh, can't get the covert surveillance goin' nohow!>

uhhhh... you *DO* know there are wingnuts promoting the stupid idea that this is a genetically-engineered virus??? FWIW -- in case anyone doesn't know / hasn't heard -- that sort of gengineering can be spotted (and has pretty definitively been ruled out) by independent researchers all over the world.

Eagerly looking forward to the expanding Weaver setting! Also the new Elevation setting... I am... kind of amazed that the 3rd-party expansion to Mythras (that is Frostbyte's M-Space) is pursuing TWO separate campaign-settings! It speaks to the passionate interest many of us have in some good sci-fi gaming! It's pretty clear to me that Chaosium is missing SOME boat, here...

I'd expect a clever use of familiars would be the go-to method of collecting hair/etc for dire uses! More-than-cat-smart black cat in the middle of the night? Offhand, I'd think that's pretty hard to see/find/stop...

My wistful that-ship-has-passed wish is that the Posthuman guys would have come to Chaosium, and licensed BRP as the engine for Eclipse Phase. 😢 My new hope is for Chaosium to jump on their announced OGL-ish & SRD-ish BRP initiatives, plus something like the MiskatonicRepostory / JonstownCompendium (but for BRP); and then someone to do some cracking-good work in sci-fi !

There's two options, really, as I see it... 1) Take an existing IP with an existing fan-base, and develop the RPG of it. Many of these are already developed or in development (Star {Trek|Wars}, Dune, The Expanse, etc), but plenty of others exist. (I wonder which of the MANY properties that SJG did for GURPS (a) sold well & (b) would be available for re-licensing...?) 2) Get an author/developer (an individual or a team) who are passionate and devoted to a new creation of their own (one with the richness and depth and breadth that some of those pre-existing IP's have). Is there any other good/likely option than my (1) & (2) ? I note (with a bit of dismay) that they already had option (2) in hand, with Chris Spivey (proven successful! author/dev) and his own Kadimah setting. Evidently Chaosium feels (per the 5Mar announcement posted here by MOB) that their plates are full with existing projects, and they cannot adequately support this 2nd option: I am therefore uncertain whether they'd be (currently) able to pursue ANY sci-fi game (including option (1)). Per some other threads here, I'm likely to move ahead with my own hacked-together FrankenBRP for a sci-fi game (neither OQ's nor Mythras' existing offerings quite hit my mark).

Is there any reason it really has to be here on BRPC? Couldn't you get almost the same functionality from (e.g.) an online/cloud document or spreadsheet or whatever?

I too long for a BRP-engine sci-fi game. I don't believe "Future World" (as itself) is what Chaosium will use; bear with me on this, it'll take a couple of steps... 1) You see, Chaosium -- the new management -- has brought a bottom-line attitude that I don't think the company has had before. Yes, they're gamers who love gaming, with a deep and rich history of fannish activity. But it's no longer just a hobby for them: it's their bread and butter. And housing. And everything else. At the end of the daypayperiod... if all of them aren't taking home a reasonable paycheck , then the company isn't WORKING, its FAILING. And for "reasonable," read a "professional" paycheck, not some "side-hustle" bullshit: they're giving it their all, and it needs to support them. They left behind professional careers, not from feckless "I wanna do this, so screw reality & practicality" but in the genuine belief they could make it work as new professional careers. 2) They have all the history of Chaosium at their fingertips (or in musty boxes; depending). Sometimes that emerges in fabulous finds of ancient Greg'ory. Sometimes it's boring ledgers and accounting, sales figures, &c. And this "boring" stuff is fodder for their bottom-line geeks; yes, there really are multiclass Gamer/Accountants in Real Life... and at least one of them works at Chaosium. 2.a) Chaosium has stated that -- based on the sales numbers they can see -- the general rule is, "generic rulesets sell poorly / setting-rich rulesets sell better." This was the basis on which they elected not to further develop Magic World, for example: it wasn't selling in sufficient volume to justify the hours of labor. (I note FWIW that we're not seeing much from them about Superworld, either.) I don't think they have ruled those out in a "never again, under any circumstances" way; just that they don't realistically see such circumstances in the foreseeable future. 2.b) Notwithstanding however much some of us just luuurve us some generic rules that we can slap onto our own setting -- without having to excise some other stupid stuff (like Glorantha or Cthulhu) -- Chaosium has the sales numbers to demonstrate that we just don't buy BRP games in sufficient numbers to be a viable market for them to make that product. 3) It follows (almost inevitably) that Future World won't be something they see as a viable (in a business sense) candidate for further development. If they had some IP to hang it on -- something with an existing fan-base -- it would be different; I expect the FW engine could be used as the basis for any number of viable games... but that nice adaptable-and-spare feature turns out to be a downside (sales-wise) not an upside! * * * Mind you: A. I'd love to be wrong, and for Chaosium to just go, "fuck it, we'll make it work!" and do a full work-up of Future World. B. I do think a FW chassis could underlay a very successful SciFi RPG... I just think that Chaosium has proof in hand that it needs a rich deep setting to really drive the game in the market.

FYI - Here's a link to the campaign reports (n.b. it's the 2nd part of them; part-1 is over on TDM's forum (linked in the first post)) using M-Space to run the very highly-regarded Pirates of Drinax campaign (which is written for Mongoose-Traveller) : Looks really really good! I'll just tag @Pentallion in on this (as it's his stuff I link), in case he doesn't notice the thread...

This. The Crit/Special rules for Crushing weapons are meant, in part, to make Trolls particularly scary. If you don't have a LOT of Strength to give a big ol' damage bonus, the Crushing weapons are dramatically less scary.

I will argue that we almost-certainly need /SOME/ sort of tech rules. Maybe the Space Marine grunts seldom need starship rules, but they need rules for infantry-scale energy-weapons, high-mach kinetics, advanced armor, etc... the genre staples of "Space Grunt" warfare. If reasonably advanced or future-projected science/tech/etc (and the PCs' corresponding skills!), and high-tech threats (and responses, and counter-threats of your own) aren't part of the rules and rolls... then IMHO you aren't playing a sci-fi RPG, you're playing some other genre with sci-fi elements in the background. Or maybe you're playing a more Narrative-style ruleset, rolling the Conflict in an abstracted sense, rather than rolling your Skills in a universe-simulating pseudophysics of the game-engine.

Ducks... drakes... Po-TAY-to... po-TAH-to. Ain't so far from dragons, eh?

<looks at some of the 70's & early-80's art> No, no. I think you nailed it. ahemm... So to speak.

Just saw this again (as I was looking for other threads down below the main/1st page). Thought it might be worth bumping, since more and more folks are looking at isolation & distancing &c ... Bumpity-bumpbump!

SRA is indeed an official product. It gets mixed reviews. I have not played it. There have been some threads on RPGnet, Reddit, etc. I am given to understand they missed the bar of "Rules Light" but it's rather notably lighter than the new edition, or any prior edition, really. Or so I understand. You should also take a look at surprisethreat.com, if you decide to jump on SRA.

I think one of the classic worries, in facing witches, is the Coven. How do you ever really know you've found all the witches in a Coven? How do you even know you've found the most powerful one?

I think anything "storm" (the phenomenon) probably needs SOME sort of affiliation with Air or Storm (the rune). Ygg, Valind...I don't recall, what Runes does the White Princess have in Prax? She's the most explicitly-snowy deity I recall.

+1 for Loz' excellent line of Mythras supplements! You may also want to look in on a recent thread I started regarding "Expanse or Expanse-alike" BRP; lots of folks chimed in there with good suggestions! I'm likely to be hacking-together my own crunchy bits from multiple sources (both official publications and fannish ones), but such FrankenBRP's are a long tradition in the tribe!

They may not be "default," but they are a pretty well-known alternative setting, and known to work well.