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Post by grinnenbaeritt on Nov 16, 2019 8:23:21 GMT
A couple of playtest things, though. The character sheet: * The pregen sheets in the quickstart have separate tracks for mental and physical strain. The blank character sheets I picked up from somewhere have only a single bubble for starting strain. Something to keep an eye on in the final release. * We started using Tracks a bit in this session. Again, it would be really good if they were on the front of the sheet. I'd move the biographical information to the back. And again, the blank character sheets have Tracks giving +2 or +4 bonus, while the quickstart has them giving +1 / +2. That's something to keep an eye on. Personally, I prefer the larger swings for Tracks, but that's my taste. * At the start of the session, we talked about Tags and using them to in things like combat scenes, but when it came to the firefight it was a standard "shoot to kill" affair. That's something I need to be more aware of next time we play. I noticed the difference in track modifier as well... it's a divergence from the "rule of 2". Perhaps it's meant to be a more minor affair (like the minor Injury Penalties) because the combined effect would be too crippling? My "re-do" of the character sheet placed the tracks and injury penalties in the same column at the front, that way any combined cumulative penalties are easier to assess.
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Post by neil on Dec 1, 2019 20:47:23 GMT
A couple of sessions have happened since the last update. There hasn't been anything particularly interesting to report on the playtest front, beyond what I've already mentioned.
As for what happened in the game..
The PCs caught up with Pomona (the renegade(?) NGC member) as she was just about to escape in a hopper with her surviving henchman and Taj the prisoner. Some very desperate actions by the PCs meant they managed to capture the people and the flyer itself! They flew the now-stolen flyer to a rendezvous point picked by Bijou (the warden). Bijou took Marion and Taj to Bright Savannah for safety. Triton (PC) contacted the NGC and handed over Pomona to them. The main NGC were grateful for the PCs keeping things mostly-quiet, took Pomona, and gifted them the flyer.
The PCs took a look at the location history of the flyer and found a much-visited location about 80km to the east of Harmony. They decided to investigate, even though that meant ignoring another call from Huxley that he'd picked up more radio signals, like the ones he orginally picked up from Afton.
The PCs took the flyer and landed near the site of interest. They saw another hopper land at the site and many people unload it. There were also some unknown animals moving around the people. They had a wide and flattened body dominated by two thick and muscular wing-like fins, and several tentacles. The largest of the tentacles served as multiple legs and the creatures tended to stay low to the ground and lay flat when not moving. And the crypto-zoology-obsessed investigator did nothing!
One of the other PCs sneaked into a hut in the camp and opened one of the unloaded crates. Inside were several dozen colourless transparent jelly spheres, much like frog spawn without a nucleus. Aurora grabbed one of them and had a flash of Lesear effect just from touching it. As she investigating, Hilario (a Native from Heather Point) came in, lifted some floorboards, and pulled out some guns. Aurora returned to the PCs just as gunfire started in the camp. The hopper lifted off then crashed and a group of aquaforms could be seen swimming rapidly away from the camp, while being chase. The aquaforms eventually managed to get into the jungle, while the PCs returned to their hopper.
And now the second session.
The PCs were approched by a journalist wanting to get some background on Afton, Corrector and their Whalesong cult. The PCs gave no comment. But they were then approached by Yesenia, a Long John prospector who was warned off a promising site (near Heather Point) by Corrector. Eventually, the PCs were hired by the prospector and off they went.
They returned to Afton's crash site, to find it abandoned. While in the jungle, another hopper appeared and dropped some people onto the _Last Chance_, who then tried to break in. There was a bit of a confrontation as Moritz, their leader, warned the PCs to stay away from his claim. The PCs left the island, hacked and captured one of Moritz's drones that was following them, and searched for Long John. Their boat has hampered by a very, _very_ fast-growing infestation of pump weed in the MHD tubes and the PCs noticed the large swarms of jump-jump around the boat, and how they didn't flee as they normally do. Later, one of Yesenia's people was in the water, recovering a survey drone when he was attacked by jump-jumps. None of the bites was individually serious. but the hundreds of bites he suffered meant that a lot of his skin was removed. The PCs' first aid supplies weren't up to this sort of injury (equivalent to about 60% third degree burns) so they called medevac from New Fremantle.
Moritz turned up after the medevac plane left, warned off the PCs again, and a firefight ensued. A lucky shot hit Moritz in the hopper's cockpit and the hopper left. We finished with the PCs finally finding a Long John desposit! They speared some jump-jumps for a celebratory dinner, but when it came to cooking them, a few of the very dead jump-jumps had disappeared. Where had they gone..?
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Post by Pawel on Dec 2, 2019 18:26:49 GMT
Well done crypto-zoology-obsessed investigator for staying alive and sane by not obsessively investigating those particular specimens! Then again, jump-jump multi-bite surely must be the worst way to go ever in the 100some years of the colony. A bit of corrective body sculpting required for the affected PC, I guess? Cheers, mate. I always enjoy your session reports. I think your campaign is going awesome and I'm sure your group is having lots of fun. Looking forward to the next chapter of the jump-jump mystery.
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Post by neil on Dec 20, 2019 23:01:24 GMT
After a couple of weeks of pause, caused by player illness, we concluded the campaign on Tuesday. It was a rather changed tone from the previous sessions, with plenty of body horror as the nereids came out of the background.
The PCs found the missing jump-jump fish when their boat's intruder alarm went off. They found the fish splatted over the boat's computer core. When they took the cover off, they found it full of fish entrails and something mucus-like that was moving around. It had also opened the casing for the computer's DNA storage. They tried removing the mucus through various tactics (leading to comments that the PCs were engaged in "snot-shepherding") but eventually Aurora gave up and burnt it all, including the computer. That left the PCs reliant on the boat's backup computer.
As they were dealing with that, Yesenia (the prospector) on the beach started screaming. She was covered in similar mucus, collapsed in a convulsing pile, then started crawling towards the sea. Her prospector friend had mucus on his hand; Triton eventually persuaded him that chopping it off was the best course of action. Thomas's drone eventually immobilised Yesenia. She started mouthing off about "despoilers", "restoring the balance", and "I am Poseidon", and wanting to go into the sea. Eventually Triton and Aurora accompanied Yesenia to where they discovered the Long John, and then into a nereid machine farm.
There was a strange conversation, half in cetacean with Yesenia, half though visions in Aurora's and Triton's minds. (Aurora blissed out about half-way through, watching as fluid-filled sacks drifted from the walls of the farm to stick to her skin.) During the conversation, Yesenia dissolved into the water. The nereids wanted Triton's help in "restoring balance" to Posiedon by sterilising Harmony (as a first step); Triton tried to argue that at least some humans were the good guys and wanted to stop the pollution.
Eventually, the PCs decided to take some of the sacks back to Harmony; the nereids wanted them delivered to Afton and Corrector at the Whalesong Church site there, where they would "restore balance" to Harmony. The PCs weren't sure what they'd do when they got there. Just before they left, Yesenia appeared, staying underwater (she wasn't an aquaform). She clung to one of the Last Chance's hydrofoil struts. She was still there when they arrived in Harmony.
At the church site, they met Afton who came aboard the boat. He had a cut arm and asked for better treatment. When they first aid kit appeared, Afton lunged for a syringe of broad-spectrum antivirals and injected himself. His cut started bleeding profusely, then blood started coming out of his nose and mouth. During this, Afton was saying he'd been possessed by nereids and this was his only chance of freedom. As Afton dissolved on the floor of the Last Chance's cockpit, Corrector appeared, transformed into a pseudoeel, and made a bid to get the sacks brought from the nereid machine farm. They fought it off for a while, defeating it with another dose of antivirals.
And that was the end of that.
Some playtest comments. The players really like the system, and thought highly of the background. They could appreciate the depth of the background and how all the parts seemed to hang together; that gave a good impression of verisimilitude.
The players liked the Skill Sets and the Tracks. The Skill Sets allowed for customised characters and the Tracks brought out their personalities. The players liked that the Tracks were individual to each PC. We didn't reach for any rules for moving positions up and down the tracks, so didn't miss them. Players moved their characters Track positions based on the fiction.
(This reinforces my view that the Tracks should be on the front of the character sheet, next to the Skill Sets.)
I didn't use Tags as much as I should, and I didn't use roll modifiers as much as I should either.
The players would have liked more guidance and examples on how to put together collections of Skill Sets. In particular, it's easy to have no Skill Sets seemingly relevant to tasks such as perception and brawling. In those situations I was loath to revert to straight characteristic rolls, as that's equivalent to a Core skill at level 5.
People didn't seem to miss extensive lists of hardware and biomods. The ones in the quickstart were more than enough.
In a related point, no-one worried about money. It might be the style of game, but I think I'd use some kind of "standard-of-living" and "excess cash/treasure" system, rather than worrying about counting scrip.
More comments when I think of them!
Conclusion A solid game, good game engine, enjoyed by all. Well done Biohazard!
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Post by Pawel on Dec 22, 2019 11:17:57 GMT
Nice conclusion, mate. Hope all players had lots of fun, and you too, running the game.
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Post by Admin on Jan 27, 2020 16:32:23 GMT
No update from the week before, as there wasn't much to report that was interesting for others. The PCs were hired by Taj, husband of Margot (the bush pilot from the original crash). He was terrified as a bunch of NGC heavies had burst into their flat and killed her. Taj wanted quiet passage to New Fremantle. The PCs established that the attack was by a renegade few members of the NGC, led by someone called Pomona. They'd just dropped Taj on in Fremantle when they got a message that Margot was alive and under the protection of Bijou, the Warden. Aurora (the NGC sympathiser PC, and wannabe ecoterrorist) contacted Pomona and told her that Taj was in Fremantle. The PCs went back to the island with the weird niƱos and Lesear-inducing lagoon, only to find it guarded by Natives from Heather Point. A few of the Natives swarmed the PCs' boat, spouting off about Despoilers, but the PCs managed to get a water sample. Last week saw the PCs return to New Fremantle to get the sample analysed. It took a few hours, but eventually they found it contained some Long John, but not enough to indicate a major LJ seam nearby. It also had some unstable organic molecules, which had been described in the scientific literature; they were purported to have psychoactive properties, and were connected to rumours of nereid activity. The unstable nature of the molecules suggested they were being made somewhere nearby. Meanwhile, Aurora spotted Pomona near the bar in Fremantle, slipped away from the other PCs and caught up with her. Pomona talked Aurora into helping kidnap Taj and then return with the group back to Harmony. That involved a few good scenes with Aurora wrestling with her conscience. The other PCs eventually noticed Aurora was missing, contacted her, and were told she was safe and going to Harmony in the hopper. The PCs rushed back in their boat and eventually caught up with Aurora as she was persuading Margot (and Bijou) to go from the Blue Mountain saloon to a back alley where Pomona & co could ambush her. That turned into a firefight on a boardwalk, and we ended the session with the PCs about to attack Pomona's hopper, containing (they think) Pomona, Taj, and another NGC goon. A couple of playtest things, though. The character sheet: * The pregen sheets in the quickstart have separate tracks for mental and physical strain. The blank character sheets I picked up from somewhere have only a single bubble for starting strain. Something to keep an eye on in the final release. * We started using Tracks a bit in this session. Again, it would be really good if they were on the front of the sheet. I'd move the biographical information to the back. And again, the blank character sheets have Tracks giving +2 or +4 bonus, while the quickstart has them giving +1 / +2. That's something to keep an eye on. Personally, I prefer the larger swings for Tracks, but that's my taste. * At the start of the session, we talked about Tags and using them to in things like combat scenes, but when it came to the firefight it was a standard "shoot to kill" affair. That's something I need to be more aware of next time we play. Love reading about other's BP games. And thank you for the playtest feed back. Super useful! Regarding the single strain track and the tracks bonuses - sounds like you have an earlier version of the playtest character sheet. Mechanics always evolve during development...
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Post by neil on Feb 11, 2020 11:50:35 GMT
Love reading about other's BP games. And thank you for the playtest feed back. Super useful! Regarding the single strain track and the tracks bonuses - sounds like you have an earlier version of the playtest character sheet. Mechanics always evolve during development... Thanks! We had a fun game, so I thought I'd share some of the love. I mentioned the strain and tracks because I know, to my cost, that it's the sort of thing that can easily get overlooked when assembling a final version.
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