Kind of on a dare, I am writing a pbta space hack about pirates! Avast, its a pirates life for me!
Solar Wind & Sale: an economic pbta hack for 3-4 players and an MC. At least until I divide up the fronts and make it GMful.
I have some novel things, maybe. This post is here to talk through how I expect those to work, and see if they make sense to you. Yes, you.
In decreasing order of novelty:
1. Only the ship has stats, which are Supplies, Guns, Trade, and Void.
2. These have sub-stats! For Supplies its Foodstuffs, Medical, and Repair. Sometimes you need to rely on access to fruit, sometimes its the self-sealing stembolts. What're some other sub-stats you might expect for Supplies, Guns, Trade, and Void?
3. Damage is done to stats! If the ship takes damage, you mark down one of the advances until it gets fixed.
4. There are ships officers: Captain, Quartermasters, Boatswain and sometimes Stargazer. These must be PCs. They have a move each, and are responsible for widely different things.
5. Only half of the playbooks can be in use at any time! These are things like Mechanic and Surgeon -- you can only have one. If you've got a Ship's Doctor, you don't have a decent mechanic.
6. (Less Novel) -- Each PC brings a new room onto the ship, which lets them change the game in a cool way. The Mechanic has a workshop, which lets her build or figure out just about anything. The Navigator has a balcony.
7. (less novel) -- the "Do something" move is "Rely on the crew", which always has a complication. Even on a 10+. You don't get out of drama by relying on the crew!
8. (less novel) We go around the table to build the ship. First, everyone marks off a ship's system that is lacking, "Our ship does not have medical equipment", "Our ship does not have cargo boxes", "Our ship's engines are untrustworthy, and possible missing entirely". Then, go around and build up systems, "Our food stuffs include cheese", "Our weapon systems include a real gang", "Our gigs include hauling cargo", "We have a lot of mechanics, 24".
9. I don't yet have an Hx system. That'll be after the first playtest. It'll probably be Hx with PCs and with the crew, though I'm not yet sure what that'll look like. Maybe a I'll steal from The Watch, and have a spendable resource.
10. The move for the Stagazer is almost exactly Let It Out, because why not steal from what I love the most?
What of this doesn't make sense? Does this sound good? Do you want to play this? Who am I unintentionally stealing from?
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Only comment I have is to make sure that the weapons available are largely non-lethal. Being a good space-swashbuckler means you can hit an enemy with an EMP pulse and then a magnetic 'poon.
ReplyDeleteNo idea if my comments are useful. I'm not really an RPG person, but I do spend a lot of time wishing I was a space pirate :)
*Points at League & Fathom as a place you might usefully steal for GMful-ness:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/172064/League-And-Fathom
John Hattan as of now, the type of weapon isn't in the rules and ships weapons are primarily used to scare other ships into giving you what you want, namely booty or prizes. If you have bigger weapons, that is easier and easier!
ReplyDeleteLevi Kornelsen huh. Of course you already did the work.
ReplyDeleteI'll read through this in the next few days. I was planning to steal gmfulness from dream askew and starship freeform.
Are you familiar with those? How does your approach differ?
I'm not familiar, though I've heard that Dream Askew did something in the same general vein.
ReplyDeleteOverall, my approach is to back up the shipboard roles so that the thing your character is expert at is not the thing that challenges you; instead, that's the sphere in which your character is a mouthpiece character for your GMing responsibilities.
Be wary of "damage affects stats until fixed." Threadbare 1.0 had that and it resulted in a death spiral that was not fun.
ReplyDeleteStephanie Bryant Agreed, it is risky.
ReplyDeleteOn the one hand, I love the image of the ship coming into port, barely still under power, with a lot of loot and maybe hauling a Prize or too. Docking just as the lights go out, and the air goes stale.
On the other, agreed death spirals can be super not fun! I'm hopeful to strike a balance, where most thigns are fixable but it still sucks just the right amount.
Levi Kornelsen This reminds me a lot of Starship Freeform by Jay Treat . I played a beta version of his at Nerdly; it had a similar GMful attitude, where everyone decides things related to what they do.
ReplyDeleteI may go a different route, with challenges presented by a player who is not involved. I'm not sure yet, and am getting slightly concerned about overloading the players.
Always a question: With what I have now, could I hit the bits of media that I want?
ReplyDeleteSerenity
Does not have: The PCs choose a bunch of the crew options, wanting to be a PC-only ship. This gets rid of the Crew, Gang, Traders, and Mechanics. The MC, a little annoyed, gets rid of their defensive weaponry; they'll have to deal without a single weapon system.
The PC's then upgrade lines: they have bread, a real med bay, modern weapons, cargo-hauling gigs, and the MC chooses their delta V is steady. The Captain (Mal) chooses to upgrade the hauling capacity, so there are a sealed nooks & crannies.The Quartermaster (Zoe) upgrades their gigs to include passengers, and the MC invents a Doctor, Shephard, and Companion who travel with them.
As default, we keep access to basic tools (hydrospanner), a pair of shuttles, some loose jingle, River's sight is blessed, and the hull is mostly air tight.
Hey yo, it works! There Serenity is (basically) a starting ship.
William Nichols It helps if you don't tie "ability to fix, run away, or fight" to the affected stats.....
ReplyDeleteStephanie Bryant Agreed.
ReplyDeleteAs I've got this now, fights are quick and dirty, as in standard apocalypse world. The Captain is in charge of combat, and can turn missed rolls into successes during the combat. Which means you could take a crapload of ship harm and still succeed, you'd just want to get back to port for repairs and crap.
I put together a quick Hx system, just saying who you love and loath the most -- and who feels the same way about you.
ReplyDeleteI also made character sheets. Maybe this thing'll work.