Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - neko128

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 ... 8
16
DFRPG / Re: How would you do this concept:
« on: July 22, 2010, 03:01:08 PM »
There is absolutely no canonical reference to creating other planets, New Krypton style, much less entire universes.

I agree with that, but...

Quote
Well, the Nevernever is enormous, and contains everything from Mount Olympus and Asgard to the courts of the Celestial Bureaucracy and the ruling seats of Faerie. But it doesn't contain things without mystical significance.

I'm not sure I agree with that.  I seem to remember someone commenting that you can find anything in faerie if you're willing to go far enough looking.

Either way, I'd actually be tempted to make this person a "pocket Outsider".  They went tween-dimensions anyway, and then came to ours...  I've always rather pictured "the Outside" as a hostile multiverse, not a single Hell, anyway.  It'd make her hunted and unpopular to anyone who realized, but they wouldn't necessarily have to realize.  >.>

17
DFRPG / Re: [Aspects] Compels for Gun-Fu?
« on: July 21, 2010, 01:06:42 PM »
The compel that comes to my mind is something along the lines of a distinctive style - people recognizing you, emulating you, specifically studying ways to defeat you, stalking you...

18
Ahhh, my apologies - I mis-read.  You're right, of course.

Okay.

1) Compel protection.  You see a homeless guy who you give your coffee change to every day getting mugged, or the convenience store you buy coffee at every day being robbed.  Or your favorite faerie informant being magically controlled.  Compel them to do something about it.

2) Compel curiosity.  X changes; why?  The homeless guy disappears.  The convenience store suddenly changes owners.  The faerie informant is just gone.

3) Compel absence.  When they're *not* in area X, give them discomfort, or even a penalty on a skill check.  "Well, if this were *your* neighborhood, you'd know *just* where to go to buy obscure object X, but since it isn't I'm compelling a penalty on your resources..."

4) Compel anticipation.  Going back to my previous example, you know flag-stone X is loose, so you anticipate someone standing on it and stumbling; *compel* the anticipation so that when they stand on it and *don't* stumble (they're unusually agile, they were aware of it too and feinted, it got fixed by the janitor), they get a bonus on their melee for your defenses being out of line to stop it.

19
DFRPG / Re: New GM - help needed
« on: July 16, 2010, 01:20:38 PM »
My $0.02:

1) Come up with a story arc.  Know where you're planning on it going.  Know how the characters are getting involved.  Base it on the focus of your game; are your characters average joes?  Are they movers and shakers?  Is what they're doing going to leave even the broken vase standing, or will it shake the city to its very foundations?  Figure out the beginning, the intended end, and the scope.

2) Make some notes about plot points.  Don't write a novel, just get a vague idea of where the action's happening.  So the end result is that the mad Dr. Magik is going to complete his ritual, become a god, and take over the world; and the players get involved because he kidnapped their dog.  Are there certain scenes you *know* you want them involved in?  Certain reveals you need to have happen?  Make index cards.  Not an outline - that implies order in most peoples' minds.  Just unordered plot points.

3) Index cards really are your friend.  Make one for an NPC, with a couple of notes that'll remind you who they are and what's already happened with them (Joe the Dog-Catcher.  Hates his job.  Met at the pound looking for the character's dog.).  Make one for a location, with high points ("background count", "quick police response", "fault electrics", "fire trap").  Make one for important plot points (The new deputy mayor, who wants to appoint his brother-in-law the new dog-catcher, is in cahoots with Mad Dr. Magik.)

4) Be flexible, and be prepared for everything to fall apart - and this is why you should *not* get a story locked in your head.  High points?  Yes.  Characters?  Yes.  Locations?  Yes.  Storyline?  No, because your players will (accidentally, without knowing, and with the best of intentions) rip it to shreds.  A perfect example is a D&D module I was reading through recently; it happened to be designed with easier encounters at the front gate and the assumption the party would go in there and work their way up to harder stuff.  A GM noted that his party declared the front gate an "obvious trap" and instead climbed a cliff to go in the roof, triggering about four of the really hard encounters accidentally - one while the paladin and cleric were halfway up a rope and without armor.

5) Try to work your characters' aspects into the game.  Not *all* of them *every* time, but Fate and DFRPG are intended to be role-play-heavy, not roll-play-heavy, IMHO.  The players put work into they characters; thread it through your story.  Make it personal, get them involved. 

6) Don't be afraid to embarass yourself.  Use the little girl's voice and the old man's voice.  Flirt with the suave face and cower in your chair from the terrible ogre or fearsome wizard.  Get them involved.

7) Try - at opportune moments - to be dramatic.  You know that major plot point?  The enchanted dagger still crusted with blood as Mad Dr. Magik runs away to his secret hide-out?  $10 at an army surplus store, 10 minutes with an engraver, and a packet of dried ketchup = awesome prop with runes on the blade and dried blood.  "The doctor runs out through the door, screaming spells that collapse the passageway behind him, and on the altar you see -" *pull out dagger* *thump on gaming table* "- that he left his ritual dagger behind!"

8) Remember that everyone's there to have fun - you *and* them.  You have expectations, they have expectations.  Be as aware of them as you can be.  If someone's unhappy, find out why.  If it's you, figure out why.

20
One good compel of this, if it's an appropriately small area, is some level of combat advantage.  For example, you know just which stair on the pavement has a loose flagstone, so you know they're about to stumble a moment before they do; or you know that the wiring's loose in the basement and the lights flicker whenever a subway train goes by, so hearing it start to approach, you can count on a moment of strobing distraction to pull off something tricky.

21
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 14, 2010, 01:16:31 PM »
Mine are now listed as "out for delivery" on UPS's tracker; and my roommate's home today.  Hopefully, that'll mean they're waiting for me when I get home!  O.O

22
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 13, 2010, 07:46:02 PM »
As it seems to have been going Neko, I'm right there with you. No updates. Who did you call to find out what you did? I tried calling UPS and all I got was automated service.

Ignore the options it gives you and repeat "representative" until it gives you a live person.

23
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 12, 2010, 06:24:44 PM »
Well, I checked this morning and UPS's tracking screen still had nothing after the package left NV on the 7th, expect a predicted delivery date of the 14th.  Having trouble believing that it took over 100 hours to leave NV and get to another warehouse, I eventually called today, and was told "Oh, we don't show every scan on the tracking tool.  The package was scanned leaving a warehouse in Illinois yesterday, and is probably in New York now.  I expect it'll get scanned again this evening."

Which left me wondering...  If they arbitrarily leave updates out on the tracking tool, what's the point of having it?  If I'd known it was in Illinois yesterday, I'd never have called - I'd at least have some idea what's going on and not simply a 5-day gap in the information.

*sigh*  At least they're scheduled for Wednesday.  My wait should soon be over.

24
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 09, 2010, 08:01:13 PM »
Right there with you Neko.


...Do you mysteriously live next to me or something...?

If you live in Upstate NY, I suppose it's possible.  :-P

25
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 09, 2010, 08:00:42 PM »
Well my wife just called me and told me that she is reading my books....


Here I am working and she's reading my books!!!!


Grrrr....

That's grounds for divorce in some states!

26
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 09, 2010, 02:03:35 PM »
So the last entry is still the departure scan from Sparks, NV a day and a half ago...  But the status changed from "in transit" to "in transit - rescheduled" without another check-in or an original delivery date.  Not sure what that's supposed to mean.  :)

EDIT: It now has a "rescheduled delivery date" of 7/14.  Wow.  It's going to take 7 days to get from NV to my place in NY?  Geez, UPS...

27
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 09, 2010, 01:02:57 PM »
Ooooooooooo....they're pretty.  And they come with that "new book smell" at no extra charge! 

Fred and the Evil Hat team have produced a thing of beauty.

That's what *you* think.  That new book smell?  $10 surcharge on each book!

28
DFRPG / Re: So... a change in the shipping date for the DFRPG books.
« on: July 08, 2010, 02:13:56 PM »
No worries. Folks have a right to be disappointed (and we're some of those folks). I just want to make sure we do right by people, y'know?

As previous people said, I hope I wasn't sounding ungracious also.  I bitch and whine as much as anybody, but it's an expression of my strong desire to get my mitts on these books (and jealousy over people who already have them!) and not meant as a complaint over you and yours.

There's a lot of stuff that goes into a process as complex as this, and I have an idea how much of it's outside your direct control.  You've been up-front and open and helpful and gone out of your way to help the community and your customers.  No further apology needed from my point of view.  :)

29
DFRPG / Re: Dresden Themed Fate "Tokens"
« on: July 07, 2010, 07:15:46 PM »
If you're feeling cruel, make your Fate points M&Ms or jelly beans.  And enforce the "If you eat your fate point, it's gone forever!" rule.

30
DFRPG / Re: Conflict with Campaign Style
« on: July 07, 2010, 07:03:29 PM »
For violations of the laws of magic, wouldn't it depend heavily on the type of telepathy?  I would have thought that broadcast telepathy, for example, was fine - reading someone's mind is not necessarily the same as hearing their thoughts.

Also, there's a fine line between empathy and telepathy and mind-reading.  I'd have said there's definitely room for grey in there.

Pages: 1 [2] 3 4 ... 8