MU* Wishlists

[Aria]

@Jennkryst said in MU* Wishlists:

Since it’s advertised on the other page, I’ll link to there, but 2e Mage Game definitely did exist at one point, and I think it is still up, and is Mage only (I think).

Edit to add: while it is up and I could connect to it, it looks like the game fizzled out. WOE.

Oof. That looks like something I would’ve loved, but somehow missed.

As for Ares, the big draw for me is the web portal allowing distracted or async scenes. That’s been a big help for managing the fact that I sometimes have to wander off to deal with a string of panicked messages for my capstone group or some crazy change to an assignment that my professor made, as I’ve been managing a full-time courseload more semsters than not while also working full-time at a more demanding job than I had when I started the program.

Other than that feature, I’m honestly pretty neutral re: systems and FS3.

[Jennkryst]

The more I think about it, since Exalted Essence is just ‘when you start your next scene after finishing combat, restore half your remaining motes… if you sleep all night, you wake up fully replenished’… no detailed tracking like Vitae or Mana or other WoD-y stuff…

… the more I think, the more I realize that yeah, it just might work on Ares. So when I slip into the next semi-manic MUST NEW GAME state, I’m probably going to barrel into trying to figure that out, instead of getting back to the FFG Star Wars attempt.

Or maybe I’ll see a squirrel and run off to wherever it leads me, instead.

[Aria]

@Jennkryst said in MU* Wishlists:

The more I think about it, since Exalted Essence is just ‘when you start your next scene after finishing combat, restore half your remaining motes… if you sleep all night, you wake up fully replenished’… no detailed tracking like Vitae or Mana or other WoD-y stuff…

… the more I think, the more I realize that yeah, it just might work on Ares. So when I slip into the next semi-manic MUST NEW GAME state, I’m probably going to barrel into trying to figure that out, instead of getting back to the FFG Star Wars attempt.

Or maybe I’ll see a squirrel and run off to wherever it leads me, instead.

I’ve played FFG Star Wars in table top when it first dropped.

From what I remember, while I think the idea behind the system is cool, their weird special dice just annoyed me. Y’all couldn’t have done that with the regular pips and assigned number values? Seriously? Why?

For WoD/CoD games, I’m always into any variation of Mage or Changeling. I never got the chance to play Geist/Sineaters but would’ve loved to. Promethean was also a favorite, but the only place I had the opportunity to play it was on White Wolf’s moderated games way back in 2007 or so.

[GF]

@Jennkryst I’m so disappointed in Exalted Essence, if I’m honest. I’ve tried showing it to friends who were too intimidated by vanilla Exalted’s amount of crunch, and they remain too intimidated to even try it because of the amount of bookkeeping, the number of resources you have to track, and decision paralysis looking at all those Charms.

So coming from that perspective, I’d be very curious to see how an Exalted Essence MU* does. I hope it’s just my experience.

[Rucket]

Honestly, I think at this point tracking shit like Willpower, Mana/Blood/blahwhateverblah is probably more easily handled on a scene to scene basis rather than worrying about day to day bookkeeping.

Like if someone waltzes into a scene, just assume they have max pool, and then the ST can “track” how much someone’s used on their own if they so choose. Or if no one cares and you want to act out a power fantasy, go wild.

If it’s a “PvE”/Cooperative storytelling experience (and tbh that’s the sort of experience I’d be looking for anyway), then it doesn’t really matter.

[Jennkryst]

@GF Yeah, it’s definitely one of those ‘have the ST at the table to answer questions/make suggestions on building the character’ systems more than ‘stat it up on your own and just show up’ types. Or even a ‘tell me what sort of character you want to play, and I will wrote it up for you’ sorts.

I’m still on my Roster trip, so gonna just throw a bunch of builds into the mixer and see what’s what. Still give people the option of making their own, just roster gets built in ties to other characters.

[Roadspike]

@Jennkryst said in MU* Wishlists:
no need for game-side pool tracking (… of motes. Willpower or Limit, maybe. HMM.)

There’s a plugin in the final stages of development that will track at least one resource pool, allowing you to raise it, lower it, and set it. It’s currently tied to FS3, but could no doubt be tweaked to suit another system.

[Livia]

@Rucket

I agree that it doesn’t need much.

I know it’s been said before that WoD/CofD and Ares probably don’t fit, but when I think about the recent CofD games I’ve played, there really haven’t been a lot of coded systems. All you need is stat tracking, a dice roller, and that’s about it – though a system to spend and regain a resource pool (Willpower & Vitae/Mana/Essence/whatever) wouldn’t be too bad.

About the most codey thing I see CofD games do these days is have faedesc stuff setup for changelings.

And I guess shapeshifting code for the werewolves has been nice to automatically have the right stats for rolling.

[Faraday]

@Livia said in MU* Wishlists:

I know it’s been said before that WoD/CofD and Ares probably don’t fit, but when I think about the recent CofD games I’ve played, there really haven’t been a lot of coded systems.

The reason they don’t fit is not really about the sheet/roller, it’s about a) the atmosphere of OOC secrecy and b) all the ancillary system code like blood tracking, obfuscation, etc. that tend to be more common in those games.

For more info, see the discussion: What would it take to implement CofD in Ares

There have been several WoD games that used the RPG plugin to basically work like an online tabletop with text/PDF sheets and a simple roller. Everything else is left up to the GM. It worked fine. Just comes down to the type of game you want to run.

[Livia]

@Faraday said in MU* Wishlists:

@Livia said in MU* Wishlists:

I know it’s been said before that WoD/CofD and Ares probably don’t fit, but when I think about the recent CofD games I’ve played, there really haven’t been a lot of coded systems.

The reason they don’t fit is not really about the sheet/roller, it’s about a) the atmosphere of OOC secrecy and b) all the ancillary system code like blood tracking, obfuscation, etc. that tend to be more common in those games.

For more info, see the discussion: What would it take to implement CofD in Ares

There have been several WoD games that used the RPG plugin to basically work like an online tabletop with text/PDF sheets and a simple roller. Everything else is left up to the GM. It worked fine. Just comes down to the type of game you want to run.

Right right, that’s what I meant. What I’m saying is that OOC secrecy and code like obfuscation etc has not been something I’ve experienced in Chronicles of Darkness games for several years now.

[Faraday]

@Livia said in MU* Wishlists:

What I’m saying is that OOC secrecy and code like obfuscation etc has not been something I’ve experienced in Chronicles of Darkness games for several years now.

Cool. I’m not really involved in that community so all I know is second-hand. Like in your own post you mentioned shapeshift code, a pool tracker, and desc changer - all of which would be tricky to do. Not necessarily impossible, but certainly not straightforward. Those are the sorts of obstacles I am referring to.

If you don’t need any of that and just want a cooperative, OOC-transparent, non-immersive CoFD game with some stats and die rolls, you can absolutely do that in Ares. Indeed, people have.

[Livia]

@Faraday said in MU* Wishlists:

Like in your own post you mentioned shapeshift code, a pool tracker, and desc changer - all of which would be tricky to do.

Yeah, there’s some tricky bits there. The desc changer I don’t think is really needed at all, just some old holdovers, a lot of people put both their mortal desc and fae desc up on their wikis anyway.

FS3 has luck pools right? I feel like something like that could be used for things like Willpower. But I haven’t looked at how it’s handled.

I’m mostly just thinking out loud now anyway.

[mietze]

The main “issue” I have seen with a few attempts/thought exercises that never quite got to the nitty gritty attempt was people having a hard time adjusting to the very idea of “cooperative”/non-PVP if they’re playing CoD/WoD. EVEN IF they were essentially playing it anyway, there seemed to be just this huge cultural gulf of people for whatever reason /needing/ to feel like it was an option or that people could play that way sorta if they wanted to even if the games where that actually happens have been very few for years and years. Also some players really like the crunch and will be very noisy and mopey without it. And given all the epic freakouts about CoD in general I think as a whole the playerbase of that genre can be a little slow to adjust to new things sometimes. Open sheets. Not being able to win by OOCly being able to build the best mechanics. Ect.

Do I personally think people could get over it, yes, I would argue many have. Sometimes I wonder if one of the things holding back an open invite offering is just people not wanting to have to deal with the rush of people that would come and then like complain forever about all the ways they hate the game they’re desperately trying to be a part of. And I mean it would be different than the “good old days,” for sure. It would probably lean more into asynch. Story wise I could see it being more superfriends against a bigger baddie/less competition within the sphere and between spheres, ect to really take advantage of the awesomeness of FS3 (and I know you CAN do pvp and stuff with it, but I don’t know. It seems like that’s ignoring the beauty of how it works) system. I happen to think all of those things are positive to neutral. Aside from using the actual CoD mechanics I think people are already halfway there with how they tend to actually RP, it’s just that maybe they don’t want to admit it!

[Livia]

@mietze said in MU* Wishlists:

The main “issue” I have seen with a few attempts/thought exercises that never quite got to the nitty gritty attempt was people having a hard time adjusting to the very idea of “cooperative”/non-PVP if they’re playing CoD/WoD. EVEN IF they were essentially playing it anyway, there seemed to be just this huge cultural gulf of people for whatever reason /needing/ to feel like it was an option or that people could play that way sorta if they wanted to even if the games where that actually happens have been very few for years and years. Also some players really like the crunch and will be very noisy and mopey without it.

This is what I mean, how much crunch has there really been? Since F&L in 2016, Reno, CoS and a couple of others that didn’t quite make it off the ground, I really don’t feel like there’s been that much, in the CofD space anyway. Some of the oWoD games lean into that old style.

And even when you have PvP (I still hate the term, this stuff should be called Character vs Character), I had some moments over the years that were full cooperation between myself and the IC person I was fueding with, OOCly we were communicative, sharing information about our characters, no need for OOC secrecy. I think the culture has shifted a lot, personally.

[Faraday]

@Livia said in MU* Wishlists:

FS3 has luck pools right? I feel like something like that could be used for things like Willpower. But I haven’t looked at how it’s handled.

FS3 doesn’t have scene-based or time-based luck pools. It’s just a permanent thing you spend, like XP. So it meshes a bit better with asynchronous/simultaneous scenes. Once you spend it, it’s gone, and it doesn’t really matter what order you do it in.

[Roz]

@Faraday said in MU* Wishlists:

@Livia said in MU* Wishlists:

FS3 has luck pools right? I feel like something like that could be used for things like Willpower. But I haven’t looked at how it’s handled.

FS3 doesn’t have scene-based or time-based luck pools. It’s just a permanent thing you spend, like XP. So it meshes a bit better with asynchronous/simultaneous scenes. Once you spend it, it’s gone, and it doesn’t really matter what order you do it in.

My experience of CoD is that the pools were all manual anyways. They’re time-based in the system, but the code people are using is still just people running a command to refill a pool based on IC time passing, rather than anything automated.

[Livia]

@Roz said in MU* Wishlists:

@Faraday said in MU* Wishlists:

@Livia said in MU* Wishlists:

FS3 has luck pools right? I feel like something like that could be used for things like Willpower. But I haven’t looked at how it’s handled.

FS3 doesn’t have scene-based or time-based luck pools. It’s just a permanent thing you spend, like XP. So it meshes a bit better with asynchronous/simultaneous scenes. Once you spend it, it’s gone, and it doesn’t really matter what order you do it in.

My experience of CoD is that the pools were all manual anyways. They’re time-based in the system, but the code people are using is still just people running a command to refill a pool based on IC time passing, rather than anything automated.

I believe Theno’s code has something in it that would auto refill 1 willpower per day but that’s not even necessarily.

Most scenes people ran often came with a ‘don’t forget to fill up your willpower and essence!’ reminder at the start anyway.

[Jennkryst]

I think one of the main reasons X of Darkness games have that secrecy mindset is because the setting has secrecy baked into it, thematically. MORTALS DO NOT KNOW, WE MUST NOT REVEAL OURSELVES, THERE ARE EMEMY ORGS TRYING TO SNEAK IN AND DESTROY US FROM WITHIN

…

And yeah, wanting to keep sheets secret from people you are at war with for whatever reason is like. Appropriate.

But if people can be mature adul-NO WAIT COME BACK!

I didn’t have anything to actually finish that thought, just the joke.

LUCKY FOR THE EXALTED COMMUNITY, they already have open sheets. And lucky for the Ares code, the only thing Essence rules needs to track are motes.

Will isn’t Willpower, it’s built up SORCERY power, and can be done in downtime so you can assume you start at 10 unless plot intervenes.

Power is INERTIA built up towards dealing damage to someone, and I believe it always starts at 0, so ot can be tracked in-scene.

Anima builds during combat and fades after, so can be tracked in-scene.

Limit does not exist in Essence… the curse can go off at any moment!

And Health is health. Already trackable but healing can be sped up with charms. Need to look at the code for that.

So Motes are the only real thing to track (even then, you can assume full unless you’re doing ‘this takes place before you have time to fully recover from the last thing’ scenes)

[Livia]

@Jennkryst said in MU* Wishlists:

And yeah, wanting to keep sheets secret from people you are at war with for whatever reason is like. Appropriate.

Meh. Do it anyway, show people everything. Any IC conflict I’ve had with other PCs has always been way better when there’s OOC comradery and communication backing it up. I have no interest in OOC antagonism with the actual player.

[Roz]

In whole, my CoD MU* experience isn’t extensive – probably like a yearish total between a couple games? But after experiencing how the code was set up and used, I did come out of it thinking, “Someone could probably do this in Ares if they wanted to.” I didn’t encounter any custom code that was time-based other than XP accumulation stuff; it was all just manual commands for spending and regaining various pools. The OOC obfuscation wasn’t a huge thing the places I’ve played, but I’m sure that’s a YMMV. The biggest point there was just that sheets weren’t public, which I’m sure someone with the know-how to make a real plugin could manage.

(I’ve actually mulled over this and had a lot of Thoughts at one point, can you tell.)