As per tradition, I always try to run something when I visit the states, so my players can see me in running a game in person (plus it’s far easier to get this group of luddites together in person than online). This time around, I was inspired by twin revelations: Iron Man + L4D2. First, I have a friend named Walter whom I have gamed with for years (friend? I should probably call him my step-brother now ^_^ but one can be both, hmm?) and we often have a hard time gaming with one another. Specifically, I had been misreading his gaming style for years, and watching Iron Man finally let me grasp what he wanted. For example, he often wanted to play an inventor character, but hated the grunt work involved. After seeing Iron Man, I grasped that he wanted to be like Tony Stark (one of his favorite characters) or Doctor Who (another favorite): To be a clever super-hero who solves his problems with his mind, but is always central to the action.
Playing L4D2 got me thinking about zombies. Normally, I see zombie horror stories and post-apocalyptic scenarios as gritty and a struggle of survival. You play low powered characters and see if you can handle the situation or not, right? Walter loved these genres as well, but never really meshed with my vision of them. It wasn’t until I read this article (warning: Cracked.com is known to devour your time!!) that I saw another vision, another way to tackle those genres, and I was reminded of the appeal of Rifts.
With these ideas in mind, I set out to create a character Walter would love in a world that would appeal to my group. In a continuation of my experiment to stuff as much awesome into a single session as I could, I wanted to give the players this feel of an entire world with just a snippet of character and a single session. I also wanted to experiment with strong, highly cinematic characters with unique play styles, and to do that, I borrowed from the more cinematic options found in GURPS (and suggestions from the forum). Those systems tend to involve the expenditure of character points, which I don’t disagree with, but once you call them character points, players are less likely to use them. So I called them “Action Points” and gave them 5 at the start.
For the world, I drew a core inspiration from Rifts, creating a post-apocalyptic world that combined magic and technology, with dystopian dictatorships fighting monstrous madness with the players and survivors caught in between. I drew further inspiration from L4D2, tossing in crazy assortments of zombies and leaving whispers and hints that the dystopia was created from the corrupt remnants of the CDC, and then added a Supernatural vision of a post-apocalyptic world: Demons as possessing spirits rather than titanic beasts of fire and shadow, subtle rituals meant to fend off monsters, and with tough-but-ordinary men fending off the night. Finally, I layered a good dose of GURPS sensibilities, including a tech level disparity of 7 (the survivors) and 9 (the remnants of civilization that have moved on) and adding a grand conspiracy for the Illuminated, and then leapt with both feet into the session.
The first character was for Walter and sort of a core inspiration for the setting. I created Hunter to be a survivalist, a sniper, and a genius. I gave him Quick Gadgeteer and, to forgo any problems with spending too much time at a work bench when he needed to get into the action now, I gave him an “Instant Invention” cinematic ability: He could spend an action point to forgo creation time (provided I didn’t think it was too crazy). Often, Walter finds himself frustrated when the pacing notches up into action scenes that move faster than he can think, and then comes up with an idea that frustrates me. So, I granted his character the ability to “take a breather” and ask me to step aside, talk things out, figure out what both of us are trying to do. To make sense of the fact that his various abilities would give him a great deal of insight into my game, I just went ahead and gave him Illuminated (and why not? He loves conspiracies! Why not be a part of them?). The result was a wandering teacher, “the Man of Letters” who understood technology better than anyone else, carried advanced rounds of his own invention for his massive payload rifle, and had the capacity to bring back civilization, if he played his cards right and defeated the other “players of the game.”
Mailanka's Musing 