Right Where Am I?

Ok. So where am I now in the fusion process? Well, quite some way on from when I last dev blogged. I am now rewriting the fused rule-set. I have yet to finalise magic, but need more of the world developed to tailor the magic rules, so I’ve had to put that on hold for a bit to get the world sorted. This is new territory to me, so I’m learning it by writing out the original source material, and getting the root sources as well. I’m drawing up maps and stitching in resource material from other generic sources.

I’m concurrently writing up the RPG framework to submit to the PC’s that outlines the principles of the system without talking about what lies beneath. I will also publish here the second set of player preferences and how I’ve integrated these into my writing process – I’ve mentioned them already but I’ll just underline them for you and do a bit of a walkthrough.

What else? Oh yeah the main rules – now in their second rewrite as I craft the game-maual further and in the process having some mutations, name changes to protect the innocent but with all the original sources referenced. In case you’ve been wondering I’m hoping to approach the original authors and copyright holders for the main copyrighted systems (Chaosium) and see if an authorial credit/copyright share is an option from the mashed system. The world is copyright another company – so I may well write it for another world too, later on, before approaching Chaosium and the lead authors. I’d have to scrap the HM stuff completely before doing that, as that’s a different couple of companies and I’m not having a negotiation with Columbia Games/Kelestial Productions bunch as well as Chaosium! Might as well just bring about world peace and all that! The FUDGE stuff is open-sourced I think, but I’ll check that out before doing anything else.

I’m about 3-6 months away from being able to do the above, but my thinking is there for you all to see and we can see from this devblog in 3-6months time whether or not I got it right, or very wrong. Also, this whole thing may remain out of the public domain and just end up being our pet system. Or I might adapt key elements not dependant on the source systems for something publishable. Who knows? We’ll see eh.

So yeah – some mutations in the rules going on which is pushing it away from the original source material (all sources acknowledged explicitly within the text to trackback all decisions so they can be undone so to speak).

That’s my update – next time the second player’s prefs, and my walkthrough for how I met them, and also the framework for the fusion system. Which, by the way, now has a project title. I’ll let you in on that in my next devblog post.

Near Miss in Rules Synthesis

So yesterday evening I sat back down to continue with the system build, and also to explore again the world I was going to run games in and had a narrow squeak in terms of the fusion build.

Up until now I have been stitching together Harnmaster 3rd Edition for the character profile development and the Skills set (not the character description in terms of attributes/characteristics itself). The character description in terms of characteristics was coming from Call of Cthulhu 5th Edition (was 3rd Edition but 5th Edition is a bit more refined and still not too clunky). So the rules-set is mainly CoC 5th Edition because the combat mechanics are relatively lean, quick, 100% based so relatively compatable with the other bits, and its deadly. Problem is – lack of data for the fantasy setting which was troubling me. Harnmaster has that in spades but it is a slow system and I don’t want to take too much from it.

So, last night I’d turned to my old systems – I was meant to be doing some game world development and I sifted through my various systems and ended up looking at RuneQuest 2nd Edition. Never played. I played Third Edition before I ever saw the previous 2nd Edition. It is of course out of the same stable as CoC, is %-ile based and so I started to think it was my solution to the lack of weapon data without having to go to HM and getting overly bogged down. I didn’t want to go there – because a strong preference expressed by player one is not having the hell of armour profile management.

And then I got carried away and on reading through RQII, and loving some of the ideas and how everything was in one book, and also that the monsters were well described – I nearly threw away the baby and the bath water, by junking what I had done so far in terms of the character sheet and switching it all out for RQII pure and simple. Thought I would cut out a lot of work – even liked the magic system. Nobody had used it before or played it so the ‘air of wonder and mystery’ would be preserved.

Problem is – I don’t know it and as I read through it more carefully I found it hard to grasp as it was similar but significantly different to the IIIrd edition I’d played, and different from the CoC I know and love.

Urgh. Fortunately I’d saved what I’d already done on the ‘cloud’ and grabbed it back again. I’ve aborted switching the main system from CoC to RQII, but now I have an alternative magic source (still not certain), a compatible monster base, a weapons base, and also a possible source of world system that no one else has played in – including me. So that is all great.

Today I have recovered and started to stitch in elements of RQII into the Character Description (just add in the CHA characteristic into CoC – which used to be there in Third Edition so not so difficult). This makes RQ monsters for the Fantasy setting almost immediately accessible. Great. RQ weapon data is also almost immediately compatible.

Now, because I have a layer of FUDGE (Freeform User Defined Game Engine) acting as an effective translation matrix for d6 and d% to put categorical descriptions of the numbers underneath, and have synthesized from frequency tables of d6 and d% the means to do so into a 7 category system, I’m really cooking with gas.

I can see how this would work, and how to fix little incompatabilities. Plus, it’s offering a new-ish way to describe characters to players, and rolling up characters is my major mission objective at the moment.

Magic is a biggie, as is equipment etc – which is more world dependant. I’m enjoying the challenges of synthesizing character development and so forth from the RQII & CoC systems which is turning into an interesting and satisfying project. Still not certain about the world – although a shopping trip yesterday to ‘The Works’ in Brighton, and seeing Clash of the Titans at the cinema is making me think of the Mythic Europe setting I have lying around somewhere in Ars Magica and RQ Vikings. Thing is I can’t find those old systems in my flat – so having to reconsider with what’s available. I did buy a big illustrated book of monsters in the shop which has some wonderful inspiring illustrations. Looking forward to getting to the world stuff, but first feel I need to ground out most of the rules set.

Further to this – there is the second players wish-list on my mind, which I will come to next, because it adds a few twists to the current rule-set mash development.

Post ‘Kick off’ Round One – Developing Fusion Ideas

So, we’ve had our usual ‘wouldn’t it be good if we had a game running again?’ conversation, instigated if I recall correctly by me as usual, and now we’re committed to getting something off the ground.

I suggested we all write down our three top love and hates of RPG’s and use that as a springboard for discussion via an e-mail group. I’ve collected the preferences and have begun constructing a system, well, melange of systems, based on the preferences so far – including my own as GM.

I’m using the game-systems I already know to form a mash-up for our fusion rpg. We’ve done similar things before in adapting our previous favourite game system – Harnmaster. (Many Harnmaster websites exist – and I can heartily recommend http://www.warflail.com/ as a good ‘un for resources, expansions, articles and what-not).

So it looks like from what I’ve got from the players so far, we want a fusion of systems that affords us:

• a quick/not overly complex or laboursome combat system – it’s not going to all grind to a halt as soon as somebody waves a sword or knocks an arrow. (sp. armour profiles)
• hidden mechanics/story + roleplaying paramount
• flow – fast-moving story
• risk – mortality and potentially terminal costs
• PC’s/Players know what you know about the world and no more

There are still more preferences filtering in through the e-mail group, it’s all a bit sporadic and sluggish (as per). Did have a chat with another member of the group – and got an idea of his thoughts/wishes, which I’ll plug in to this blog in the next post. I’m dedicating a post to each of the ‘kick off’ ideas circulated by the players.

Initial thoughts in terms of game-systems I have and know well are:

Not Harnmaster for combat then – it’s a pig slow system even at the best of times. However I know this player still enjoys the character creation and involvement and enjoyed that process. So somehow, hidden mechanics but still involved in character creation. PC’s to know what they know about the world and what they can do in it no more. Hmm.

So my thoughts turn to CoC (Call of Cthulhu) – another %-ile based system, of the RuneQuest type (I also know and have run RQIII), with a significantly faster combat system then CoC. Ok so maybe a combination of: Harnmaster character profile development, CoC game engine for combat and skill use, with the descriptions being a combination of a merger of the HM skill set and CoC.

Then – ping! how about a FUDGE-like coating over the top. So, the players have character sheets that describe their characters in a qualitative categorical way, with the actual figures hidden underneath and revealed only to the GM? The players can guess the skills/percentages and what is a success/failure based on their rolls – if they really want to. The GM abritrates all the rules and the PC’s can pick them up if they want to from the descriptions that overlay them.

Sounds groovy and more than meets the initial requirements. But how to generate such a character and keep the figures hidden. And character professions/classes – what of those? Well I’ve come up with some solutions for those issues and I’m building the amalgamated game engine in a spreadsheet on my netbook. So far the game systems being mashed are: HarnMaster 3rd Edition, Call of Cthulhu 5th Edition and FUDGE.

I’ll plot out how this looks in the next post, wherein we’ll discover the next players preferences and how accomodating to those needs swerves the fusion design somewhat, and introduces that age-old problemette for FRPG’s – magic. Oh and world. Oh and races. Some ways to go – but at least there’s some reactions in these fusion chambers! (Groan).