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Associated with Returner Games
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| Final Fantasy: Triumph of the Returners |
[Jan. 9th, 2009|10:28 pm] |
Final Fantasy: Triumph of the Returners Legends stretch back across the centuries - talking about the bold, the brave, the mighty that strove to make the world a better place. Men and women who fought for something more than themselves and who changed the world with their actions. While their deeds and their ways were as varied as the blades of grass, they were something more than the average - they were heroes. That is the very reason they are worshiped. Whether in a small roadside shrine where they performed their deeds or in the great Hall of Heroes, they are beyond mortal. Saints. Divine. And you? You’re no hero, but you’re no slouch either. It’s tempting, though, when you hear the call go out - from the Valhian Church itself, no less! WANTED: Those Who Would Be Saints The Day of Heroes approaches! To honor the Heroes of the past Her Holiness, Bishop Melisende Sarpedon, calls upon the bravest and the noblest in the land! Sponsored by Emperor Cyrus Argent himself, those who are able will be given chance to prove themselves and make their own legend! Be bold; for the great Heroes watch over us all. —– It is my utmost pleasure to present to you all: FINAL FANTASY: TRIUMPH OF THE RETURNERS This mega-campaign, following in the footsteps of RGi’s well known and well recieved Generica campaign, is about a simple thing: Celebration. With the long-awaited release of Third Edition, the RGi dev team has decided to celebrate the occasion by running the biggest, baddest FFRPG campaign we can. For the past two months, the dev team has been working hard to craft a world and a storyline worthy of our dedicated players, fans and contributors. Using the Guild-style campaign system pioneered by the Generica Playtest campaign, Triumph of the Returners is set in a rich Final Fantasy world. With an elaborate plot ahead stretching from level 1 to level 65, it promises to provide great times and allow the RGi dev team to give back to those who have supported us over the years. I invite you all to visit the wiki we have constructed and to use the new subforums dedicated to this campaign. Isn’t it time for some heroes? http://returnerstriumph.wikispaces.com/ And the subforum on the boards can be found here |
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| Sometimes the dice just go your way... |
[Oct. 30th, 2008|03:08 am] |
People always complain about the Archer sucking, and it might, but sometimes things just go better than they should, and Unlimited Shot goes and racks up 21 hits.
I'll probably never see dice do something *this* improbable again in my life.
Edit: 15608 damage before ARM. Truly an impressive figure. Wonder what other massive damage amounts people have dished out. |
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| High-speed character creation |
[Sep. 16th, 2008|06:05 pm] |
So, I am fairly sure that all of you have tried, at least once, whip up a character quicklike in a matter of minutes. Twice i've done it in under thirty minutes, one of those times it was under fifteen.
What can I say... Such high-speed creation leads to mistakes, sometimes very horrible ones. One of them had a so incredibly confusing and surreal background, coupled with such a horrible build... Oh my god.
Now the second? It was such a hilarious mistake. I had this character in mind for a while now, so I was like "WHAT? 15 minutes WHAT?" when the GM said it, so I used that idea. At it's very base, it's a goofy Dragoon whose lack of attention hides an unusual insight and awareness. So there I went choosing ads/disads. I went by and when I saw Combat Reflexes I thought 'Hey, nice, shows that he's very aware despite the looks' and then I skimmed over Flat-Footed 'Oh, nice, shows how he's kinda goofy and unattentive'. There I did, finished, submitted, got to playing. Amusingly the GM absolutely forgets Flat-Footed at the start of the combat, so did I.
It was only over twenty-four hours later that I went to update his sheet and was "What the HELL is CR and Flat-Footed doing in the same sheet?"
So, have any of you ever done any crazy mistakes like that? |
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| Explosives in the FFRPG |
[Mar. 11th, 2008|03:50 am] |
Until recently, there were (somewhat tested) beta rules for Explosives in the FFRPG. The skill still exists and (as of this writing) refers the reader to further rules in Appendix 1. Sadly, the rules for Explosives no longer exist in Appendix 1. I've pointed this out, so we're not going to go on about that. What we are going to look at, is seeing if there is something in Appendix 1 that we can use to proxy for explosives.
One of the new things added to the beta rules (without any playtesting that I'm aware of) were called "Draughts." Draughts do neat things. They can give temporary bonuses to Skills and Attribute Ratings. They can also have nebulous and only somewhat defined "Narrative Effects."
Draughts are made with Alchemy using the same system that produces Recovery Items. This makes sense, because Explosives are generally created through chemical means.
Let's look at what the rules for "Narrative Effects" are:
If the Draught's effect is narrative, the player must describe the desired effect. The GM will then determine whether it qualifies as a minor, modest, or major narrative effect for pricing purposes. As a rough guideline: Draughts with minor narrative effects tend to have a barely appreciable impact on the current story, while Draughts with major narrative effects
can change the entire course of the plot if used at the right time.
So then it's easy to see how explosives of various types (and sizes) could be modeled with this. Fire crackers would fit in as "minor" effects, I suppose "moderate" effects would be enough explosives to crack a safe or put a hole in a wall. "Major" effects could easily be enough explosives to level a building.
Looking at costs, it's apparent that this is probably too cheap. A Major Explosive would cost all of 300 gil. Granted simple explosives are fairly cheap to manufacture, but in a world where I can buy an expendable weapon called a "Flameburst Bomb" (which sounds suspiciously like the kind of bomb you'd rig up if you're an arsonist) for all of 375 gil, I'm not sure that the potential ability to level a building in one go is balanced at 300 gil.
Perhaps there needs to be some sort of guideline on how to combine Draughts together to get larger effects - on the other hand, 300 gil to change the entire course of the plot could be fun (for people that are not the GM).
Anyway, for all the would be arsonists in roleplaying games, this is my effort at giving you something you can use in the FFRPG. Lord knows you people leveled enough buildings and other assorted things in Silvertech 3. |
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| Returners FFRPG Beta Release is a Go! |
[Mar. 5th, 2008|01:45 pm] |
Just in case you've been living under a rock, I decided to post this for you. The Returners Final Fantasy RPG is currently reaching the beta phase for the third edition of the rules. You can see more details at Returnerblog.
Crossposted from my Livejournal. |
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| Silly Worldbook |
[Jan. 26th, 2008|09:05 am] |
So, I know a lot of you know about this because you saw me working on it, but I figure posting about it over here can't hurt. It's not like anyone but me ever uses this community to post things. :p
Over the past week or two I brainstormed and wrote up a simple and short fantasy setting for the FFRPG. It's pretty generic, and steals liberally from history and fiction, but I think it's kind of fun, and might be something someone would want to play with.
You can see it over at Ice's wiki: http://storagebin.wikispaces.com/FF+World+War
It's all there on that one page, except for the map.
Take a look if you want to.
Yes, okay, this was mostly just wanting to get a little activity going here... |
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| Eldamar Retrospective |
[Nov. 8th, 2007|06:10 am] |
As some of you might now, I've been running a series of posts over in Returnerblog about the Eldamar campaign that GenLeon ran. The posts feature commentary by various people involved with the game - basically everyone that I could round up.
Like I've said elsewhere, Eldamar is an important campaign for the FFRPG primarily because it tested things at virtually every level and actually finished. It was crucial to the development process as it exposed numerous kinks, bugs, and strange interactions. Plus it was pretty fun.
So, follow the links below to the posts directly, or browse through the archive at Returnerblog and enjoy.
Introduction by Demonic Gerbil
Part One featuring Shadowfang11's comments
Part Two featuring Morgan's comments
Part Three featuring Demonic Gerbil's comments
Part Four featuring NinjaWeazel's comments
Conclusion featuring GenLeon's comments
I hope if you haven't already heard about, or seen those posts, that you'll check them out. They're worth reading, even if it's just for the GMing advice buried in them. |
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| copy of Returner game: ver 2 |
[Sep. 23rd, 2007|10:55 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
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Does anyone has a copy of Returner game:ver 2 instead of Version 3 beta??? Pls comment here if you have a copy. So I can give you my email for you to send it to me. |
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| ORD Sporlight #6: Falcon Hunter |
[Jul. 21st, 2007|02:32 am] |
http://www.returnergames.com/ord/index.php/Falcon_Hunter
The Falcon Hunter comes to us from Ragnarok Online by way of writer Maegdae. When I see a job based on Ragnarok Online, without looking at the job, I already have certain expectations: Fairly limited equipment choices, 'customizable' abilities, and Brazilians. No, in the FFRPG we only have the one resident Brazilian and I doubt he's even looked at this job, so that leaves just the other two expectations to be fulfilled.
So let's see what this second ORD Job holds for us today.
I see that right away, the Falcon Hunter gets access to just about every ranged weapon, along with Knives. Armor-wise, well, I don't remember RO Hunters being able to equip shields, but that's probably nit-picking. Let's get on to the real fun, abilities.
The Falcon Hunter's abilities are split into two sets of powers. The first set deals with the Falcon that gives the job its name. The second set deals with the traps that an RO Hunter can lay.
So, the first two Falcon abilities are pretty boring. The first one is a reaction ability that uses a complicated formula to deal extra damage to the enemy. The second is a support ability that increases this damage to certain enemies and also adds a chance to inflict Disable on them. These are pretty much the defining abilities of the Job.
Blitz Break might be unbalanced. A high level Falcon Hunter (with 25 AGI and Death Penalty) can do 1200-3xARM damage to a single target for a CT of 6. Compare that to a Fighter (with the same stuff) doing 1100-2xARM damage for 10 CT (Double Cut). A 'typical' enemy at that level probably has between 120 and 200 ARM. So under that assumption the best case scenario for Blitz Break that's around 840 damage, worst case 600 damage. For the Fighter we get 860 and 700 damage. Well, upon investigation and actually looking at numbers (something many people are loath to do when investigating whether something is balanced or not), Blitz Break might be *slightly* unbalanced, but on the whole the 4 CT difference for comparable damage does not seem worrisome.
Steel Talons makes the Falcon's additional damage greater, pretty boring. Razor Wing is a two-hit T:Group move for 12 CT, so it sounds pretty powerful on the surface. However, the Falcon's damage isn't so great, so this probably is okay. Falcon Eyes makes the Falcon Hunter's crit range bigger. A lot of twinkish characters won't use it because they'll already have the advantage that makes the crit range 1-20, so this wouldn't be a big boost for them. For other characters? This would probably be the first thing used in a fight, especially if you have Haste or a Mediator to Entrust you.
Wind Walker is... at once pretty powerful and very underwhelming. Durations of (2) mean that it would have to be spammed constantly. On the other hand, it *is* Haste. And it's T:Party. That's pretty powerful.
At the level Falcon Assault is gained at, it's essentially "hit for 999 damage." It will do 6d6*3+16*25*3 = 1200-ish damage (assuming the same Falcon Hunter from above). After the damage cap, and since there's no ARM involved... 999.
Traps vary dramatically in usefulness and cost. Yes, cost. There's a Charge Time associated with laying out Traps, and there's also a Gil Cost because trap use consumes 'Trap items' which are worth 150 gil. At level 50 Traps stop acting like reactions, triggering against the first thing that attacks the party, and can be triggered with a second action by the Falcon Hunter to go off on the target of his choice.
Flasher is, despite the name, not about men in trench coats. It's T:Single Blind for the cost of 150 gil. Not really that bad of an ability even compared to an Ink which is T:Group Blind for 300 gil.
Blast Mine... is pretty useless. 750 gil to cast +1 Fire? Lame.
Sandman is pretty awesome, although the cost in gil is a bit ludicrous. Still, considering that Dream Powders are planned to be bumped way up in Availability and Cost, the gil cost is probably okay.
Concussion Mine gives the Falcon Hunter the ability to do MP damage. Unfortunately the amount of damage done is rather small and the cost in gil way, way too large.
Ankle Snare and Land Mine bring some useful status dealing to the mix. Snare nullifying the monster's 'melee' attacks and Land Mine doing Sword Slap's 'stun' effect. They're handy. Expensive, but handy.
Freezing Mine is awesome. Dealing Freeze (2)? Yes plz. It does cost 4500 gil, however, which is pretty darn expensive... Especially considering that a Freeze Stone only costs 2000 gil for basically the same effect.
Claymore is lame. Just... It's lame. Don't use it. 400 damage (at best) to one guy, and 100-150 to the rest of the group? So not worth it. It's just not.
In the end, the Falcon Hunter has some good ideas in it, but it doesn't 'feel' like it's based on RO. There's no putting some kind of esoteric 'point' quantity into the abilities to make them better. The action cost of laying down traps is probably too great. It would perhaps be better if the Falcon Hunter could start the fight with one or two traps already 'laid'. The Job's damage output is pretty good based on looking at the Falcon-abilities.
More or less this is decently balanced Job. It does damage, it has some statuses (for vast gil costs) accessible, and it has a few unique tricks up its sleeve that other Jobs don't. With some tweaking and testing, and a hefty rewrite of the traps, this would probably be something very playable. |
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| ORD Spotlight #5: Optional Blue Magic |
[Jul. 12th, 2007|02:34 am] |
http://www.returnergames.com/ord/index.php/Optional_Blue_Magic
Well, we've already looked at one of Morgan's creations (see ORD Spotlight #2), but he's such a prolific ORD guy that it's impossible not to run into him again.
Today I decided to dig into the ORD Spells section and see what was in there. As I've got a Blue Mage (of sorts) this one piqued my interest. Alas I see that there aren't a whole lot of spells sitting in there, but we'll work with what we have.
At this moment, Optional Blue Magic has a total of six spells in it: Aqua Rake, Trine, Sunshine, Ice Blast, Bow, and Rock.
Aqua Rake
Aqua Rake is one of Strago's Lores, and here it provides the Blue Mage with a source of Water-element damage and Wind-element damage. As it stands the FFRPG Blue Mage only has one spell capable of doing either element of damage, so adding this one to the mix makes for an expansion of the Blue Mage's ability to inflict either kind of damage. The MP cost also, just eyeballing it, looks okay. Not a bad description either. If we hadn't already decided that we were 'done' with spells, I'd say we should stick this one in the core rules.
Trine
This spell is from Final Fantasy 7. With a name like Trine, I'd have imagined it would do, well, three elements of damage instead of two. So that automatically puts it in the 'lose' column in my book. Still, it's a balanced looking spell that combines Lightning and Water damage, both are elements that the core Blue Mage are lacking a lot of.
Sunshine
In the same vein as Aqua Rake and Trine above, Sunshine combines two elements of damage: Fire and Holy this time. I don't recall what game this comes from, if any, but most of the same comments from above apply. The Blue Mage has more Fire spells that Water, Wind, or Lightning ones, so it doesn't bring a lot of diversity on that account. It does however bring Holy damage, which is a relative rarity
Ice Blast
This is just the Ice-element version of Eletrocute or Fire Breath. It's balanced and it fits in with other Blue spells. The only other Blue spell that does Ice damage is Magic Breath, which is a multi-element spell. Because it fills a gap in the Blue Mage's bag of tricks, I like Ice Blast, even if it is a blatant 'palette-swap' of other spells - which I guess all of the spells so far are. Also, this one was apparently written by GenLeon and not Morgan.
Bow
Ah. A low level spell. I fear that Bow is probably as unused and unloved as Laser Eyes is. I don't believe I've ever seen a Blue Mage use Laser Eyes. And I really doubt Bow would ever get used for the same reasons - it just does too little damage to justify spending any of that starting pool of MP on and if you get it later, it's useless.
Rock
I know this comes from some FF game, but I can't place it right now. When compared to spells like Blaster and Ultra Waves the MP cost seems reasonable - if not a little bit high as it's only a single target effect. The dice bug me for some reason. I can't help but think that should be 2d8 instead of 1d8...
My Thoughts
Well, none of these spells are outrageous. Indeed they build strongly off of existing Blue Spells. Aqua Rake, Trine, Sunshine, and Ice Blast fill useful niches in a Blue Mage's repertoire and could easily fit into the core rules. Bow is probably useless, but I wouldn't stop someone from taking it if they wanted - at level 1 or 2 it's better than a regular attack. Rock is nifty, I don't like the balance between it and the White Mage spell Confuse, but compared to other Blue Spells it should be fine. |
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| ORD Spotlight #4: Tunics |
[Jun. 26th, 2007|07:10 pm] |
http://www.returnergames.com/ord/index.php/Tunics
So far I've looked at a Job, a Race, and a rule set. I reckon that I may as well continue to dip into new sections of the ORD and expand my coverage of topics into new areas.
So, we have here Tunics, made by that paragon of never running his Whydah campaign Memona. At a glance Tunics seem like an interesting choice because they're an armor, which there aren't as many of as there are weapons available, and also they appear to take up two equipment slots instead of one like a normal piece of gear. So, let's dig in and see what we have.
At first glance I notice that there are two tunics per tier, and none of the tunics are 'basic.' They have all special effects. Because they occupy two equipment slots (head and body), the special effects are quite costly - and they're priced at roughly what two pieces of equipment might cost.
This issue of 'cost' requires a table, because I like tables. And it will let me do a side-by-side comparison. These prices are from the Head Slot and Body Slot pages as they currently exist at the moment. I understand some people may or may not have more up-to-date prices, but as they are not actually implemented, bite me.
| Tier | 'Bare' Hat+Robe Cost | Cheapest Tunic Cost |
| Tier 1 | 175 | 430 |
| Tier 2 | 1125 | 1375 |
| Tier 3 | 2550 | 2600 |
| Tier 4 | 4950 | 4140 |
| Tier 5 | 7800 | 7150 |
| Tier 6 | 11830 | 13300 |
| Tier 7 | 16100 | 11650 |
| Tier 8 | 21000 | 23470 |
(That table looks so 1996...)
One would expect that even the worst tunic of a tier should cost more than what a bare Hat and Robe should cost. Initially that assumption holds out, but the pattern is utterly destroyed by the time we get to Tier 5. Don't even get me started in the weirdness of Tier 7's Tunic being cheaper than the Tier 6 Tunic. That's wrong, it goes against every mechanic in the system, and more importantly it drives a semi-truck with a tanker trailer loaded full of nitroglycerin into the wall of common sense.
I'm not really sure if I need to go on, here. The first Tunic is too expensive for a starting character to purchase. The later Tunics oscillate wildly in 'relative' price compared to Hats and Robes. I'm not sure how Death Proof or Seal Proof on the Tier 6 Tunics drive the price up beyond what you can get on the Tier 7 Combat Caster's Cloak: Shadow Eater, Holy Eater, Shadow Enchancer, Holy Enhancer. Although it is a shame that there are very few Jobs (the Callers are all I can think of) in the system that can exploit both the Holy and Shadow enhancers at the same time.
The Tunics do break down the FFRPG's high end "Give 2 Artifacts and 1 Unique" paradigm. The Tunic's high end abilities are very powerful, and a single Unique Tunic can give bonuses comparable to two other pieces of gear. The Unique Crusader's Cloak gives the bonuses of Peytral (Unique Mail: +2 STR, Auto-Power Up), with the Golden Yarmulke (Artifact Hat: Auto-Magic Up), and leaves a +2 MAG left over. That's awfully darn powerful.
But even the Crusader's Cloak pales in comparison to one of the Artifact Tunics. Vermillion’s Cloak gives Refresh. For those who aren't familiar with it, Refresh comes from Final Fantasy 11. It's essentially "MP Regen." I don't believe there are rules for Refresh on the wiki at present, but it's safe to assume that it restores 10% Max MP every status phase, in a manner identical to how Regen works with HP. This is incredibly powerful. A 'decent' Black Mage is going to get back enough MP to cast Ultima every 3 rounds. I shudder to think of what a creative player could get away with when they have access to such an infinite and cost-free font of MP.
Finally, I do have a petty gripe. Real Tunics don't cover the head. They're essentially long shirts... Though I suppose "Hoodie" doesn't sound as "adventurous" as "Tunic."
So, in conclusion, I can reasonably opine that Tunics are crap. They're unbalanced in the system, poorly priced, and internally inconsistent. Don't use them. |
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| Phantom Dice script |
[Jun. 26th, 2007|02:49 pm] |
I know I'm boring everyone now, but I made a quick and dirty script for the Gambler's Phantom Dice. I patterned it off of my already-existing Bad Breath script, so it was a piece of cake. You can, as always, see the raw script over at the Silvertech wiki. See directions below for how to make Sugar roll you some Phantom Dice.
Phantom Dice Script 1.0
Type: FFRPG online roleplaying aid
This script will roll 2d6 and output the result of Phantom Dice for up to 9 targets.
Usage
!phantomdice or !phantomdice #
Where is a list of names for the targets of the Phantom Dice ability. Up to 9 names may be entered. Where # is the number of targets, between 1 and 9.
Changelog
1.0 - June 26, 2007
* Ripped off the Bad Breath script to produce a quick and dirty Phantom Dice script.
* Uses Sugar's dice roller to roll 2d6, and then [expr] to add them up.
* Has the same name/number functionality as the Bad Breath script does. |
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| ORD Spotlight #3: Map Combat |
[Jun. 26th, 2007|01:34 am] |
http://www.returnergames.com/ord/index.php/ORD:_Map_Combat
These Map Combat rules were penned by JonB and the Damn Elf, the latter of whom is busy renovating his newly purchased house these days and never shows his face on IRC. Slacker. :p Other people like NinjaWeazel and Newbie X have contributed to it as well.
The rules attempt to transcribe the FFRPG's abstract combat system into something resembling the map-based combat of Final Fantasy Tactics or Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. The older editions of the Final Fantasy Roleplaying Game were explicitly built with map combat support in mind, but the (perpetually in beta) Third Edition relies completely on a wonderfully fine-tuned abstract combat engine based on "the bad guys are here, and the good guys are here, and you hit each other" approach seen in classic Final Fantasy games, even neglecting the "Rows" of later entries in the series.
So, unlike a lot of ORD stuff, this particular set of rules has both canon and historical significance for the FFRPG.
The first thing that the Map Combat rules tackle is "how far can you move." Ranges are based on "hexes" which have an undefined size. The movement range depends on Speed, the character's Job, or the Monster's Type. Same this with the "Jump" which determines how tall a height change the character can move across from one square to the next. Pretty solid rules so far, there's nothing outrageous here.
After defining how to move around the map, we next come to new advantages that make sense in the Map Combat context. These advantages provide modifiers to a character's Move and Jump scores.
The rules for actually conducting an attack are laid out well, and easily understandable. I would dispute, depending on the range scale for a 'hex', whether Polearms and Flails should have such long ranges. Other than that, the text explains itself well, even providing an ASCII visual description of what a 'cone' effect looks like.
So how does attacking work? It's easy. Each attack has a Range (R:) and Area (A:) stat associate with it in Map Combat. The Range is how many hexes away the attack can hit, and the Area stat is how many hexes around the target are affected. Area is just, then, a more concrete way of saying something is T:Group in Abstract combat. There's some examples in the text to help clarify how these stats work.
Much of the rest of the ruleset is devoted to defining, for various abilities in the FFRPG, what the Range and Area and other details are, and how exactly they work in Map Combat. Much of the important rules relating to this are given in the errata, which occupies around one-third of the total size of the rules.
Of particular interest is the text that starts above Table A3-1 – Terrain Coloring and Difficulty and continues down to the extensive errata section. These rules describe how different terrains affect characters, and how they require differing amounts of Move to go into a hex of that terrain - or if the terrain is simply impassible because there's a huge tree in the way, or it's really deep water you wouldn't want to swim in while wearing armor. These rules could have some life on their own outside of Map Combat and get some use elsewhere in a campaign, so they're a nice addition.
The errata, I only have this to say: When your errata reaches a length comparable to the scale of the original rules, it's time to edit the rules and incorporate the errata into the main body of the text. The way it is organized now is confusing, spreads needed information through multiple locations, and is otherwise poorly done.
The Map Combat rules get a 8 for substance, and a 4 for organization. The Russian Judge gives it a 1 because it was written by Capitalists.
All in all, I like the Map Combat rules, and I think they'd work great on tabletop. I know some people have been using them online, and have had differing levels of success with them, with regards to speed issues and the fun factor.
Maybe some of the people that have played under these rules could give some comments about them from a Player or GM perspective? |
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| Reels Scripts |
[Jun. 25th, 2007|03:37 pm] |
I've finished up, today, basic support for all the kinds of Reels that the Gambler is able to use and implemented them on Sugarlips. It's actually up to version number 3.05 for the script, because I'd slated the version that supported all Reels for version 3.00. Anyway. You can find the script at the usual place. Basic instructions are below, if you just want to use what Sugarlips has implemented.
Reels Script 3.05
Type: FFRPG online roleplaying aid
This script contains function to allow you to roll the dice needed for various kinds of Reels abilities on the FFRPG Gambler.
Usage
!elementreels (skill) (gadget)
!mooglereels (skill) (gadget)
!chocoboreels (skill) (gadget)
!statusreels (exp)
!attackreels (exp) (blind)
!magicreels
Where (skill) is the character's rating in the Gambling skill and (gadget) is the rating of any Gambling Gadget to be used. (exp) is the character's Expertise/Gambling%, and (blind) is a 1 is the Gambler is blinded. |
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| ORD Spotlight #2: The Labayu |
[Jun. 11th, 2007|12:54 pm] |
http://www.returnergames.com/ord/index.php/Labayu
I know, it's been a bit longer than I promised since my previous entry. My apologies for that, but most of you know the basic cause of the delay and how un-fun it was.
For today's installment, I picked one of those races that Morgan put up on the Wiki more or less at random and came up with the Labayu. They're more or less Red XIII's people. Sadly for me, this puts horrible images of Hojo trying to breed Red XIII and Aeris together...
In any case, my personal derangements aside, let's take a look at the Nananki-knock off and see what we have.
The basic description of the race is simple and short, but it gets the point across. Although I have to wonder just how something without opposable thumbs decorates himself with feathers and beads, etc. That seems like it might be somewhat difficult...
The "core" of any race mechanically is its statline, and the Labayu seems to reflect the way Red XIII is portrayed in Final Fantasy VII. Having not played Ehrgeiz (all I know about it is that it's basically FF7: The Fighting Game), I can't comment on how well the Labayu matches up with the Django character from it. In any case, "fast" and "strong" seem to be what Red XIII does best in FF7, and its what his stats here show.
The Labayu's height and weight seem pretty spot-on, reflecting that of real-world lions rather well. The lifespan may in fact be too short, when we see Red XIII at the end of FF7 he doesn't look particularly close to being elderly despite the 500 years between the events of the game and the ending.
The first section of the society bit seems to reflect on most predatory pack animals, while the latter portion has me against wondering how they can decorate when they lack thumbs. It gives a pretty good indication of the kind of people these are. The roleplaying section carries on the theme of primitive but intelligent, and even addresses the lack of hands issue.
In conclusion, the Labayu (which means Lion in... uh... some language... >.>) could be a fun race to play. The writeup is fairly well done with no glaring errors, omissions, or inconsistencies, and the non-Humanoid aspect could make for some very interesting situations with a competent GM at the helm. |
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| !avail script |
[May. 17th, 2007|02:50 am] |
Tired of trying to figure out at what level a certain availability is reached? Well worry no longer! Sugarlips now has a new TCL script that does that for you:
!avail < number>
where < number> is the availability you want to look up.
This returns the level that availability first becomes... available. The script, for those running an eggdrop bot, is as always found on the Silvertech wiki. |
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| ORD Spotlight #1: The Surfer |
[May. 9th, 2007|10:03 pm] |
http://www.returnergames.com/ord/index.php/Surfer
I remember when Elemental Knight made this. It was one of a few jobs people did for a "Expert Competition" or something. It was a long time ago. Last year in fact. In any case, I don't recall what all submissions were finished, but EK made the Surfer.
The concept is kind of silly, but as it's only an exercise in "Hey, let's take an implausible skill and build a job around it" who cares, right? In the Surfer's case, it's built around the Swimming skill. I'm sure all of us will agree, Swimming isn't something usually associated with combat.
First, the abilities:
Catch the Wave
Sort of a... anti-Entrust? Instead of letting someone else use your init, you use their init. I'm not too sure how useful this would be, but it's certainly an interesting little ability to have.
Cutback
This is Third Eye, only weaker. Nothing more to say, really...
Floater
This is pretty neat. It's the anti-SOS ability. The Agility Up part of this is probably more useful, but I wonder about how often the Surfer is going to be at 75% HP or better.
Off the Lip
Not a bad ability. It does roughly 200% damage when it's first gained, and ends up doing artifact-level (for a d8) damage at high levels, and throws in Silence as a bonus.
Stall
Stop is a wonderful, wonderful status effect. Maybe it's a bit underpowered, but it's still nice.
Tow-In
Sort of a more friendly version of Misdirection Masque. I can see how it could be useful. When combined with Cutback and Floater, the Surfer can do a fair job of keeping someone squishier alive.
Tube-riding
I'm not sure I agree with the choice of statuses, but Protect and Reflect aren't bad ones to have. Plus, hey, you're ridin' the tube. >.>
Tubular
Similar to how Elan upgrades the Ninja's Justsu abilities, Tubular pumps up the Surfer's. And wow, it makes them pretty awesome. Cutback no longer sucks in most situations, Off the Lip is back to doing good damage, Stall gets to slap Condemned on people, and the Haste from Tube-riding makes it essential.
My thoughts:
While the Surfer isn't something I would want to play, it does present a somewhat compelling set of abilities that could plausibly derive from the Swimming skill. There are some pretty neat ideas there too. I'm not sure how much use Catch the Wave and Floater will be in practice, but they're interesting mechanically. For that matter, Tow-in is a pretty interesting little ability. I especially like the "Sharing Statuses" aspect of it, though I wonder if the characters share status immunities as well? Seems like there could be some interesting strategy that derives from that.
Well, I'll see you all again in a couple weeks, when I talk about some other randomly chosen ORD-thing. |
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| New Feature: ORD Spotlight |
[May. 8th, 2007|10:33 am] |
Well, in order to breathe some new life into this place, I'm going to try to do a bi-weekly feature where I'll grab something out of the ORD and present it here. Maybe I'll talk about how cool it is, maybe I'll shred it, or maybe I'll suggest improvements or give some ideas, or the like. I'm not sure what I'll do yet, but dangit, I'll do it. :p
Anyway, my goal is to produce a six 'issue' run of this feature over the summer. We'll see how it goes. :) |
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