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).