Nothing can stop the Army Space Corps!
As mentioned in my first GenCon post, I ran D20 Mars at GenCon last year, and was hoping to run something Planetary Romance like this year at GenCon. I was hoping to use an adaptation of Spirit of the Century to do this.
At its simplest level, it seems like this should be a fairly straightforward conversion. After all, Planetary Romance is part of the pulp era and typically features protagonists that are very much like their "Action Pulp" brethren. There were some issues to consider, however.
Not in Kansas anymore
The first thing that needs tending to is the setting differences that come with the planetary romance settings. Burroughs' Barsoom had some unusual features that became underlying narrative elements of the story.
Fortunately, SotC/FATE comes loaded for bear for this sort of thing. There was some discussion on RPGnet about the idea of campaign wide aspects. That could be applied here. So long as on the world, a few "concept" rules might apply, like "men don't kill women on Barsoom" or "mental powers".
Another thing to consider is that PCs (all characters, really) will fall into 2 distinct categories: Strangers and Natives. The fact that John Carter is an Earthman expresses itself in a variety of ways... he makes prodigious leaps (often unexpectedly, before he learns to take care), he annoys Dejah Thoris when he fails to say the right thing to woo her (which results in him having to gather a horde of Green Martians to win her back--tell me that's not a good reason to compel an aspect), evades having his thoughts examined, and so forth.
I thought I might automatically assume that one of the first aspects is either "Stranger" or "Native" (or some spin on that), but I might just grant a bonus aspect as befits the setting.
Many Tales to Tell
Another element of SotC that I am giving some specific thought to is how the phases work.
My plan for pregens is currently to create a large variety of pregens with stunts and skills all worked out, but only some of the phases and aspects. But with no Great War, what would go in its place? It seems to me "how you got to the planet" would go in place of "centurion sponsor".
Spontaneous translocation/astral projection is one method that characters use to get to their otherwordly funland in planetary romance tales. But having a body of unaffiliated earthmen spontaneously arrive on the adventure world and meet seems a bit uncomfortable to me. I prefer to link fates of adventurers like this.
Last year, I had the characters investigating the disappearance when stumbling upon an alien transport device. This time around, I thought about doing the "crashlanded spaceship crew" thing, but alas, some else stole that plot for their SotC game last year.
But all hope is not lost. The crew of a spaceship is still a good starting point for a crew with a common fate. Resorting to miracle science common in tales of the era (like Adam Strange's Zeta ray), I could just as easily have the PCs zapped off the ship by some convenient space phenomenon such as cosmic lightning from the great red spot. The PC Earthers might all be zapped off the ship, but have different fates before their paths cross again.
From there, it's easy to imagine the scattered crewmember's novels depicting their time after their unfortunate abduction from their ship.
And, of course, crossing paths after such a separation is totally in-genre for Planetary Romance.
Oh yeah, the title...
One thing about the idea of the crew of an spaceship that might be a nod to the era: prior to 1947, there was no US Air Force. The airborne force as it existed was a branch of the Army, the Army Air Corps. I thought if I actually set it in the era, I could make the ship a member of the Army Space Corps.
Though at this point, I'm not feeling that making the Earthmen be from the early 20th century is compulsory as it sort of loses its context on the alien world, it would give me the advantage of being able to tap into this RPGnet thread for pregen character ideas.
At its simplest level, it seems like this should be a fairly straightforward conversion. After all, Planetary Romance is part of the pulp era and typically features protagonists that are very much like their "Action Pulp" brethren. There were some issues to consider, however.
Not in Kansas anymore
The first thing that needs tending to is the setting differences that come with the planetary romance settings. Burroughs' Barsoom had some unusual features that became underlying narrative elements of the story.
Fortunately, SotC/FATE comes loaded for bear for this sort of thing. There was some discussion on RPGnet about the idea of campaign wide aspects. That could be applied here. So long as on the world, a few "concept" rules might apply, like "men don't kill women on Barsoom" or "mental powers".
Another thing to consider is that PCs (all characters, really) will fall into 2 distinct categories: Strangers and Natives. The fact that John Carter is an Earthman expresses itself in a variety of ways... he makes prodigious leaps (often unexpectedly, before he learns to take care), he annoys Dejah Thoris when he fails to say the right thing to woo her (which results in him having to gather a horde of Green Martians to win her back--tell me that's not a good reason to compel an aspect), evades having his thoughts examined, and so forth.
I thought I might automatically assume that one of the first aspects is either "Stranger" or "Native" (or some spin on that), but I might just grant a bonus aspect as befits the setting.
Many Tales to Tell
Another element of SotC that I am giving some specific thought to is how the phases work.
My plan for pregens is currently to create a large variety of pregens with stunts and skills all worked out, but only some of the phases and aspects. But with no Great War, what would go in its place? It seems to me "how you got to the planet" would go in place of "centurion sponsor".
Spontaneous translocation/astral projection is one method that characters use to get to their otherwordly funland in planetary romance tales. But having a body of unaffiliated earthmen spontaneously arrive on the adventure world and meet seems a bit uncomfortable to me. I prefer to link fates of adventurers like this.
Last year, I had the characters investigating the disappearance when stumbling upon an alien transport device. This time around, I thought about doing the "crashlanded spaceship crew" thing, but alas, some else stole that plot for their SotC game last year.
But all hope is not lost. The crew of a spaceship is still a good starting point for a crew with a common fate. Resorting to miracle science common in tales of the era (like Adam Strange's Zeta ray), I could just as easily have the PCs zapped off the ship by some convenient space phenomenon such as cosmic lightning from the great red spot. The PC Earthers might all be zapped off the ship, but have different fates before their paths cross again.
From there, it's easy to imagine the scattered crewmember's novels depicting their time after their unfortunate abduction from their ship.
And, of course, crossing paths after such a separation is totally in-genre for Planetary Romance.
Oh yeah, the title...
One thing about the idea of the crew of an spaceship that might be a nod to the era: prior to 1947, there was no US Air Force. The airborne force as it existed was a branch of the Army, the Army Air Corps. I thought if I actually set it in the era, I could make the ship a member of the Army Space Corps.
Though at this point, I'm not feeling that making the Earthmen be from the early 20th century is compulsory as it sort of loses its context on the alien world, it would give me the advantage of being able to tap into this RPGnet thread for pregen character ideas.