The Black Campbell

A quick perusal of this blog will quickly show that I’m a fan of the original Cortex system. While I liked the original Serentiy rules, I think the move from traits and complications from die shifts to actual dice ratings was a good idea. Since then, I’ve thought this one of the more elegant and flexible RPG mechanics I’ve seen. It has a few flaws for things like superheroes, but that’s not insurmountable.

The latest set of rules, “Cortex Plus”, was created for the Leverage and Smallville games and imported a lot of ideas from FATE to Cortex. Again, a perusal of the blog will show I’m not a fan of this move…however, I had thought that elements could be brought in to make the GMs job easier.

One place this shines is in the idea of “extras” — the bit players in the game from the gal running the grociery store you have a throw down in to the bad guys’ mooks. Mooks rules are particularly useful in settings like pulp games, Star Wars for stormtroopers, etc., or even for espionage games where you have to storm the volcano base and go through a $#!tsotrm of baddies to get to the real altercation with the privileged henchman and master villain.

Here’s an idea for how to create mooks/extras in your Cortex Classic (using cane sugar, not that corn syrup crap!) using some of the ideas from Cortex Plus (just 1 calorie…not Cortex enough):

Extras are given a general competence rating on how “bad ass” they are, from d4 to d12. It’s assumed there aren’t going to be extras with a d2, because beating up on an infant is uncool. d10 and higher should be reserved for big animals — lions, tigers, and bears or the like. The average bad guy should be d6. the slightly better than average bad guy, computer jockey you’ve hired, etc. d8. They then get a skill/descriptor die. This could be something like “Brick Shithouse” for that massive knuckle-dragger the bad guy has brought in to get you to sell your place to him — Say he has a d10 in Brick Shithouse. This is not overly competent on most things [d6], but when it comes to asskicking his descriptor counts it’s d6+d10. If he’s “Martial Arts Expert” — you can expect that his descriptor counts for Unarmed Combat and Melee Combat, and maybe covert (if he’s a ninja!)

Assume mooks have a 12 Life Points, but that when they take 6 points they’ve either unconscious or stunned enough they’re not a problem (unless the scene calls for it.) A mook like Brick Shithouse would have 16…because he’s built like a brick shithouse.

A few examples:

Fearsome Housecat: d4 for anything except being fearsome — then it’s 2d4 for intimidation and unarmed combat.

Fat Hacker Kid: d4 for anything but Hacking and Comic Book/Sci-fi Knowledge tests, then it’s d4+d10

Late-Night Security Guard: d6 and for perception tests 2d6.

Grizzly Bear: d12 plus d8 in killing your @$$.

Stormtrooper Nazi or the Star Wars kind: d6 and d6 in combat or chase related skills.

SPECTRE volcano base guards: d6 and d6 in combat and not much else.

So far, I’ve very little to complain about with the new OS X upgrade save one thing…Apple fix the f#$king issue where the wifi drops coming out of sleep. Check your damned support boards — it’s happening on MacBooks, Airs, and iMacs. When the computer goes to sleep, 4 thimes out of 5 it drops the wifi connection; it’s even more ornery if you’ve switched locations.

Fix the problem! It’s really damned annoying.

Tower of the Archmage is hosting this month’s RPG Blog Carnival with the topic “Animals in RPGs”…so let’s jump in!

Animals have been companions to humans since time immemorial — from work animals to pets, people surround themselves with these creatures. They care for them, name them, and sometimes view them as part of the family. Who hasn’t gotten at least a bit misty when a family dog or cat dies? Before cars, horses weren’t just your transport, they were your companion — selling a prized horse just didn’t happen unless you fell on hard times. Farm animals might be less “familial” for people, but they were no les important — they were your food or your money made incarnate in noise and crap.

Yet, outside of fable-based games like Mouse Guard how often do animals play an important role in role playing games. Yeah, you ride your horse to the dungeon…then what? A horse doesn’t do so well in a 10×10′ room with other people and some nasty…in fact, the horse can, at that point, become a seriously dangerous liability. I’ve seen people buy a falcon in a D&D campaign, only to forget it’s even on the sheet; they don’t know how to use it as an item, so it gets forgotten with those climbing stakes until last minute.

If animals are so important in most peoples’ real lives, why do they disappear in the game world?

One reason is obvious: Who’s playing the dog? Is the dog an NPC? Is he the GM’s responsibility? Tracking the creature’s stats, actions, and location can be distracting from the main character, thinks Runeslinger. (Good guy, by the way; check out his blog!)

The trick, if the character is managing his animal companion, is not to think of the creature as separate from him, necessarily, but an extension, a familiar… I have a cat named Vishnu that knows my moods well – he knows when to try and comfort, he warns me when my infant daughter is waking up with a meow and a nose on the eyelid, he eats bugs… So make the critter an extension of your character.

We had a Serenity campaign where one of the characters had a shepherd mutt named Asshole. He picked him up as a pup in the Unification War, and the dog grew up through the combat. It warned the characters of intruders, of things not right with the ship (he heard strange noises and prodded the engineer awake), he attacked villains, he crapped all over the ship providing comic relief…he was useful. The players originally hated Asshole, then grew to love him. When he got injured by a thug, they made that person their sole focus of ire for an adventure. The dog provided story.

I had a ferret in an old DD campaign that would hunt rabbits and other things for the character. That’s how he got his meals when they needed meat. I would forget about him periodically, until he was killed by an arrow. He stopped the arrow, actually, and saved the character. He was useful. and I made the OIQ (orc in question) pay for it dearly. It provided motivation and story.

“I find I prefer the understanding that the animal companion is a specialized form of NPC and as such is not merely a tool for the player, but a being with whom the character has a close and very personal relationship…” opines Runeslinger. If the GM is running the animal, it can get lost in the shuffle of NPCs…hell, major NPCs have gotten lost in the shuffle when running a game. “Say…wasn’t Trapp Sommers with us?” Oops! But if the GM infuses the animal with its own character (I played Asshole as a bit stupid, lovable, and codependent on his owner, and had a ball with him…so to speak.)

If they have a purpose, they’re less likely to forget them. In the current Battlestar Galactica campaign, the characters are serving in Aegis, a light battlestar that is new off the line. During construction of the ship, a cat somehow got onboard and has been with her ever since. The crew named it Kevin and we learned from the previous commander that Kevin is considered not just the mascot of the ship, but her good luck charm. They had put Kevin off and within days suffered major engine failure. When Kevin was brought aboard once more from Scorpia yards, things just seemed to work themselves out…or so the crew says. Kevin is, in many ways, the living expression of the ship for the characters to become attached to. He’s fat, cantankerous, and shows up in places he shouldn’t be…but the characters have taken to him already.

Not every campaign requires a pet companion. The sword & sorcery genre is a good one for having animals that hunt for you, or that you ride from place to place. So are Victorian-period/Western games: the English are crazy for their dogs and often would drag them on holidays (or adventures) — how the hell did Tintin get out of half his scrapes? Dogs are useful for cowboys in herding or warning of danger. And they are good companions. In space-based campaigns, a dog or cat might not be the best addition. For one, the dander and loose fur get in the air filtration systems…it’s a mess! they may not always be appropriate, but they can add to the fun.

Time to take on one of the more popular game systems out there: Savage Worlds. Like FATE, SW has a lot of adherents who talk the system up incessantly, and being adverse to hype, I’ve found myself trying to avoid both the systems (especially after FATE started creeping into other systems like Cortex. “You’ll like it, it’s just like the system…but with all the good bits of FATE added!”) I finally decided to do a review after reading this piece on Savage Worlds.

I finally got a chance to play in a Cortex game a few months back and posted the character I’d made on the site (search Trapp Sommers — I’m too lazy to link today.) Here’s my first impressions: it’s quick and stripped down, and I tend to like that. That said, I hate the single die and “wild die” mechanic; I hate the exploding die mechanic (that’s where, if you roll a 6 in this case, you get to keep rerolling that die. Every 6 allows you to keep doing it…) I also find the attribute or skill test makes no sense if you have  better trait than skill. Why roll a d6 for my firearms skill, if my Agility is a d8? (And that is my response to the criticism of Cortex in the above linked blog post — you’re rolling just as many dice and often different types. Your criticism seems based on a cursory read of the rules. Now that I’ve defended my current favorite system like some pathetic fanboy…which I guess I am…onward!)

I suspect most of my disdain for the single die is that most of the systems I’ve played either have you roll your attribute+skill in some combo — either a die rating for each, or a die test onto which the combination of attribute+skill add. So take that as you will; it makes for a swift test resolution…until you hit combat. Then Pinnacle adds a deck of cards for initiative. I love the James Bond system as anyone who reads this blog knows. The d6 for initiative but d100 for everything else always felt clumsy; this is more so.

However, outside of those two complaints, the SW experience was fairly solid. As a generic system, it’s pretty good — you can easily build the characters you want, if you take “experience” at the creation point. there’s enough examples of things to do almost any genre on the fly. and it is certainly less math and rule-intensive than GURPS, lacks the die step mechanic of Cortex that some find difficult, and it’s not d20. And for $10 for the Explorer’s Edition, it’s worth a look.

Most of us want to play big, strappin’, competent characters — the clever mage, the powerful fighter, the ultra-suave spy, the tough or  sexy femme fatale…but sometimes, stepping out of the usual can provide the player and group with a bit of fun. One thing I’ve rarely seen people rush to play is a child. Not a toddler, mind you, but the pre-teen/teenager.

Why would anyone want to play a kid? 1) In the case of prepubescents, and unless you’re a member of NAMBLA or B4U-ACT, it removes the sexual aspects from the character. This is especially nice for the younger player, or for that newbie that doesn’t want to get wrapped up in the weirdness of intercharacter relationships. 2) Children provide both particular challenges and benefits in many settings, that aren’t the case with most adult characters. 3) It makes the players have to think and work at the play…and that’s fun!

Point 1: My wife recently started playing. She’s new to gaming and she’s seems a bit uncomfortable with the idea of inter-character relationships (but I could be reading into things.) Her favorite character was a toss-off, a recovered character from a then-abortive campaign set in 1936 China (now resurrected and running well): “Shanghai Sally” — an 11 year old street urchin and thief that works for one of the other characters. There’s no sexual tension between her and the other characters, there’s no distraction with boys, etc…she’s all about the fun and the score.

Point 2: Sally provides some unexpected benefits to the player. As a child in a city full of homeless or itinerant children, she’s invisible for the most part. People don’t notice her doing surveillance while playing in the street. People don’t concern themselves much with an underage, dirty street girl poking around the bad guys’ hideout, save maybe that she might steal something. She doesn’t tend to attract violence, save a disdainful cuff to the head by the local toughs and cops. She’s small and fits into places the adult characters can’t. No one expects her to pull a Colt .380 Pony out of her pants. She’s been able to play the cute factor a few times to keep from getting pulped by bad guys.

The downsides are obvious: she’s not strong, big, or particularly talented in fighting. In fisticuffs, she usually comes away the worse for wear if someone lands a blow. She’s not as fast as adults, but she is quicker, able to dodge, weave, and use small spaces to escape. She has no real rights as a minor — the state can do what it likes with her. She only garners a certain level of respect, no matter how effective (she’s their “monkey”)…because she’s a kid. She doesn’t have money or a real job.

Point 3: Unlike what I expected, she’s turned Sally into a fantastic part of the campaign — our Short Round, if you will. Sally has just enough fighting skills to get herself into trouble if no dealing with a mook, and that leads to complications and more fun. She has to think her way out of trouble and uses her surroundings to her advantage (I think that’s the first time I’ve seen a hotel luggage cart used as a weapon!) She provides comic relief by making the other characters have to worry about the kid in their midst. She’s fun, and she makes the game fun.

So kids…an interesting role to take on for a game, if you’re thinking about something different.

About a month ago I’d finally had enough of dropped calls in my house and dumped Verizon Wireless after six years with the company. The service seemed to be getting shoddier and the phone I had was crap. After comparing services, i decided I was sick of being locked into a two-year contract simply to get a free — yet crappy — phone. I bought Virgin’s $25 300 minute/free email, text, and web plan.

The best deal, hands down, was Virgin Mobile. The service piggybacks on Sprint’s network when theirs is unavailable, so the coverage, so far, is pretty solid. I live in new Mexico and have a tendency to take my Triumph for rides to places that Big Red and the Death Star can’t reach, either, so losing my signal up in Jemez Springs isn’t much of a surprise. Coverage is just as good, so far, as Verizon in my region. Data reception and transfer rates are as good, if not a bit fast, than Verizon’s from what I’ve seen.

Call quality: solidly good, although I do have a few spots in my house that cause a bit of signal loss. No dropped calls yet. Sound quality is good.

The phone: I went with the $79 Samsung Restore — it’s a smart(ish)phone with a slide out keyboard for texting and email. I find it indispensable — I hate pecking through the letters and numbers on a standard number pad and the screen keyboards don’t have the haptic feedback to help me type quickly. Sound quality is good and call quality for those I’ve called is reported as good to great. Text transfer is quick, as is data files (in this case endless pictures of my three month old.) Web is good, but I hate the “mobile” experience — all text, for the most part. Still it’s nice to check maps, weather, and check email from the phone while I’m out and about.

Overall, I’d say my experience with Virgin is positive — the phone’s good, the service is good, and the customer service has been stellar (if based in Brahmapore or wherever…) I had to call in early on about having the wrong phone number and they fixed it quickly. I called when I topped-up but the minutes didn’t apply right away (they simply paid me up for next month) — fixed, no questions asked, no hassle.

The only thing I’ve noted is without the mobile-to-mobile minutes of Verizon, I use alot more time than I thought…I may need to raise my minutes to 450. If you use 150-200/month n Verizon, you’ll eat up 300 in 15-20 days on a slow month. I burned up 50 minutes just today… Their unlimited plan is, for now, $45 unlimited everything.

Eat that Verizon.

Perseus is now live on Amazon’s Kindle Store and soon to B&N’s Nook Store, priced for $1.99.

Destined to murder his grandfather and take his kingdom, Perseus — the son of the god, Zeus — is cast away to die as an infant. The gods, however, have other plans. Rescued by a fisherman and raised to be a good and strong young man, he is tasked by Athena with destroying the monster Medusa. But that is only the beginning of his journey from simple boy into a hero.

This new retelling of the Perseus myth returns to the original stories of the young hero and adds an important element often missing: the politics and machinations of the Olympians who use Perseus to settle family squabbles and punish those who have offended the gods.

Here’s a sample of the first two chapters to whet your appetite.

My novel Perseus should be going live on the Kindle Store and Nook in the next few days. It’s a retelling of the old Greek myth. I went through a bunch of the original versions of the story to get back to the basics, then added the important backstory of the internecine fighting between the Greek gods.